Dirty Harry 10 - The Blood of Strangers (9 page)

The bullet smashed into his throat, severed the jugular, releasing as a result, a Niagara of blood. He was dead as he dropped to the ground. His camera fell on top of him, the tape still running.

His colleague, preferring to save his ass rather than win a posthumous Pulitzer for news photography, threw himself down without the slightest regard for the fate of his equipment.

Ellie remained standing, incredulous that one of her cameramen should have died before her eyes. She knew that she should duck or get out of the way or do something but she was rooted to the spot, paralyzed by fear, and there was the assailant looking right at her, his eyes gazing into hers with a strange intensity. He had come to a halt, only yards away, and for a moment it was as if he had all the time in the world. She had the feeling that she knew this man from somewhere, that they had met long before, and that he now intended merely to renew their acquaintance. This was not his intention at all. She did not actually see the .38 until he had it raised in his hand and the sun was on it, making it sparkle as brightly as a fabulous jewel.

C H A P T E R
S i x

“D
rop it!” Harry yelled, loud enough to be heard over the tumult.

The assailant swung about immediately, but the .38 was still grasped in his hand. He possessed fine reflexes, firing as he turned, instinctively gauging Harry’s location.

Harry had anticipated this, and shifted his position just sufficiently so he was no longer in the line of fire. Just as he discharged his .44, several police officers and plainclothesmen had the suspect in range and began to open up on him.

The .44 took him first, causing him to collapse with a gaping hole in his thigh. Still, with the .38 in his grip, he struggled to rise but by that time several men were shooting at him and he had no chance to get off another round. His body twitched in midair as he was struck again and again; his white sports coat, torn and shredded, flapped in the breeze like a flag of surrender. Then there seemed to be nothing left of him at all. He seemed to have folded up when he died, his knees close to his brow, like a fetus.

Harry would have liked to have known who this man was, but there were too many detectives congregating over the body. No telling who had the authority here, but one thing was sure, it wasn’t Harry. His obligation was to watch out for Kayyim, unless, of course, he was forced to track him instead.

It was at that moment that he looked up and saw Ellie Winston.

She had, more or less, recovered from the shock of nearly being killed. Her cameraman, relieved that he’d been spared the fate of his friend, had gotten himself erect and was once more filming the aftermath of a botched assassination attempt.

She was very pale and for a few seconds, she seemed not to recognize Harry. But Harry knew her all right. And this time he was unable to elude her.

She stepped up to him.

He shrugged and resigned himself to enduring questions from her that he would do his best to deflect.

“We can’t go on meeting like this, Miss Winston,” he said first.

She managed a faint smile. “I want to thank you.”

“For what?” He honestly wasn’t certain what she was referring to.

“For saving my life.”

It was only now that Harry realized that this was what he had in fact done. He’d been so obsessed with stopping the assailant, whoever he might be, that he hadn’t perceived the threat he’d posed to Ellie.

“In the future, Miss Winston, maybe you’d be better advised to stay in your office. It’s not exactly hospitable once you get outside.”

“If I had wanted to I could have been a housewife and then no one would have to worry,” she replied. “But that was not the choice I made.”

“Suit yourself.” He turned away.

“Are you staying in L.A.?” she asked, accelerating her pace to keep abreast of him.

“That’s none of your concern.” Actually, he didn’t know what he’d be doing now that Kayyim had had his public ceremony and given away his country’s petrol-dollars.

“On the contrary. You’re part of my story. I followed you here, I’ll follow you wherever you go. So you’d better get used to me.”

This astonished him. He’d assumed she’d come to L.A. to cover the Kayyim visit and that his meeting with her was pure coincidence. He groaned.

“Why? You don’t want to have anything to do with me. I told you that before, I’m bad luck. Go home and cover fires or the March of Dimes, whatever it is you people do. Leave me alone.”

She was undeterred. “Look,” she said, “I’ll make a bargain with you.”

He froze in his tracks. He stared at her quizzically. “What kind of a bargain, Miss Winston?”

“You’re undercover now, aren’t you?”

“Until you came along I was,” he conceded.

She gestured towards her cameraman. “I’ve got you on tape. I’m the only one who does, too. I can go back to San Francisco this afternoon and have that tape broadcast tonight with you shooting that man or else I can edit you out.”

“You will identify me by name and say I’m with the San Francisco Police Department?”

She might have been bluffing, but Harry couldn’t afford the risk.

“That’s right.”

“You’d blow my cover?”

“Like you, I have a job to do. If you make it impossible for me why should I help you out?”

“Maybe because I am trying to prevent people from blowing each other away and all you’re trying to do is get some damn prize.”

She wasn’t convinced. “I don’t expect you’ll see it my way. I just want you to know the situation, that’s all.”

“What do I have to do for you to edit me the hell out of the tape?”

“Cooperate with me. Tell me where you’re going and what you’ll be doing. I want to record it, but I promise you I won’t release anything until your investigation’s over. I’m not greedy, I just want a little give-and-take.”

He sighed. He didn’t like this. It was one thing dealing with murderers. Dealing with attractive female T.V. reporters was something else again. He began to suspect that all things being equal he preferred the murderers. They weren’t so devious.

“All right, Miss Winston . . .”

“Ellie.”

“Ellie, you’ve got yourself a deal. But the truth of the matter is I don’t know what happens next, where I’ll be assigned.”

She nodded dubiously. “Let me know this afternoon or whenever they let you know. I’ll wait for your call. I’m staying at the Wilshire.”

“Isn’t everybody?” he said.

By the time he returned to the Beverly Wilshire, Kayyim had already been spirited away in a limousine which could resist handfired rockets if need be. But there were no more assaults on the minister. He acted with great aplomb and throughout the lunch the university gave in his honor at the faculty club, he was as gracious and expansive as ever. Maybe he was accustomed to attempts on his life; in any case he refused to discuss the incident except to express his regrets that two people had died as a consequence of the unprovoked attack.

Connelly was waiting for Harry in the suite. He looked hot and weary and the iced tea he was consuming didn’t seem to be doing him much good.

“You did good out there today,” he said. “If Kayyim had been hit, there would have been hell to pay. Very embarrassing for us even if he is a son of a bitch.”

“Did you find out who the joker was who tried to blow him away?”

“Name’s Mark Morgan. Mean anything to you? Means nothing to us. We checked it out. Washington ran the name through the computers. Nothing. Could be an alias. But when I say nothing, I mean that even the fingerprints don’t match up to any prints we have in our files or the armed services have in theirs.”

“And how did he get onto the campus with all the security checks?”

“Again, it’s a mystery. Did somebody get careless? Was somebody paid off? Your guess is as good as mine. We’re trying to find out right now, but you can bet your ass nothing much is going to come of it. But we did come up with some information about the explosion in San Francisco Airport that you might be interested in.”

So much had occurred since then that Harry had forgotten about it., “I’m listening.”

“Apart from the TNT a very volatile
plastique
was used called RDX, otherwise known as cyclotrimethylene trinitramine. Class A explosive, that is to say it can’t be shipped on any passenger or cargo aircraft. Nor can it be exported without a Federal license. It’s considered a defense article.”

“How . . . ?”

Connelly anticipated his question. “How did our friends in the Alpha Group get hold of it? That’s a very interesting question and since there’s no record of any RDX being heisted from the plants authorized to make the substance, there are only two conclusions I can draw. One is that the terrorists concocted the stuff themselves, which is pretty unlikely and would require sophisticated technology they probably don’t have access to . . .”

“Or?”

“Or they have some very good connections.”

It was at that moment that the phone rang. Connelly picked up. He listened for a few moments, mumbled something in response, hung up, and turned back to Harry.

“Kayyim’s just gotten back. He’s coming upstairs to change and pack. He’s on his way out of here.”

“High time we were free of the joker.”

“Oh, we’ll be free of him all right. You won’t.”

He enjoyed the look of puzzlement that came over Harry’s face. “I don’t understand.”

“I didn’t tell you before, but Kayyim is especially grateful to you for saving his life this morning.”

“All in the line of duty.”

“That may well be, but you see, he is short one bodyguard . . .”

“The bodyguard with the slight indisposition?” Harry attempted, with little success, to keep the sarcasm out of his voice.

Connelly’s sardonic smile indicated he knew much more about the bodyguard’s indisposition than he was letting on. “That’s right. He won’t be able to make the return trip and Kayyim needs a replacement, just so long as he’s in the air. Maybe fifteen, twenty hours more or less. When he gets where he’s going, he’ll have plenty of his own men to protect his ass.”

“And you’re saying I’m to be it.”

“Hey, you proved yourself, didn’t you? He requested you and considering how advantageous it would be to us, why, we were happy to agree. That’s twenty additional hours you’ll be close to him. Who knows what you can pick up?”

“A disease,” muttered Harry, who had been looking forward to going home.

“Look, you’re going in style. Kayyim doesn’t stint.” He paused, shrugging, “Except in the alcohol department. But maybe you can slip yourself a few on a stopover somewhere.”

“One thing you didn’t mention. Where am I going, Libya?”

“No, not Libya. Beirut, Lebanon. That’s Kayyim’s next stop.”

“But they’re in the middle of a war over there.”

Connelly nodded. “So I understand,” he said.

It was only after Connelly had left the suite that Harry recalled his promise to Ellie Winston. He had the operator ring her room. Sure enough, she was eagerly awaiting his call. She picked up on the first ring.

“You said you wanted to know where I’m going, Miss Winston?”

“That’s right.” She did not remind him to call her Ellie.

Harry could hear the anticipation in her voice. “I don’t think you’re going to like this. Beirut.”

“Beirut, Lebanon?”

“You got it.”

“But there’s a war on over there!”

“Exactly what I said.”

“Whatever for?”

“Hey, you know what I know. I kept my promise, now you keep yours and make sure my face isn’t on the six o’clock news tonight.”

She ignored this. “You’re going over with Kayyim, aren’t you? That has to be it. You’re on the 7:45 Pan Am flight to Paris.”

She knew more than he did. Obviously, she had somehow gotten Kayyim’s itinerary. But that was not his concern at this point.

“Miss Winston, once again, do I have your assurance that you will do the necessary editing on that film? I haven’t much time.”

“Yes, Inspector Callahan, your anonymity is guaranteed. Have a pleasant flight.”

When Harry put down the phone, he had the feeling that something wasn’t quite right. Ellie Winston had been too acquiescent; it wasn’t like her. She has to be up to something, he decided, but he wasn’t certain he cared to discover precisely what it was.

They had fifteen minutes alone together. As soon as Ellie had alerted him that she was on her way to Beirut, David Whittier dropped everything and grabbed the first shuttle flight available to L.A. They agreed that L.A. Airport was the most convenient place to meet.

Whittier was a handsome man who looked more like one who constructed buildings rather than designed them. Two years divorced, with three teenaged children, he never thought he’d become so involved with Ellie Winston. Their personalities were so different. She was so resolutely independent that it was an ordeal trying to keep up with her; she was always running off somewhere.

But never to Beirut, never to some part of the world where she was so clearly in danger. Whittier had come to L.A. not for the purpose of saying goodbye but to discourage her from making the journey at all.