The Ninth Orphan (12 page)

As he drove, Nine calculated his options.
Downtown or out of town?
With a speedy Porsche at his disposal, he favored his chances in the open countryside rather than in confined city streets. The fugitive agent glanced at the fuel gauge and was pleased to see the tank was near full.
The countryside it is then
.

In the Fiat, Seventeen leaned out her open window and aimed her pistol at the Porsche. She was forced to quickly pull back inside as the Fiat slammed into the side of a stationary vehicle. “Don't lose him!” Seventeen warned the junior officer.

The young officer gripped the wheel and accelerated after the now battered Porsche as it turned into a busy arterial road. He was conscious of the dirty looks his zealous passenger sent his way every time the Fiat lost ground on the Porsche. She seemed obsessed. He wrongly assumed her obsession was sparked by the need to save the Alleget woman from her abductor. Keen to do his bit, he
applied full throttle
.

In truth, the ultra-competitive Seventeen couldn’t give a damn about Isabelle. She saw this as her chance to bury Nine for good. Memories of her fellow orphan constantly beating her into second place throughout their formative years at the Pedemont Orphanage still ate away at her.

High above the arterial road, a police helicopter tracked the Porsche’s progress. Its searchlight illuminated the action unfolding a hundred meters below as the speeding Porsche and Fiat were captured in
the searchlight's
beam.

From the chopper, the Porsche’s progress was easy to follow. It was marked by a series of crashes at intersections along the way as Nine ran red lights and ignored give-way signs in his efforts to shake his pursuers. Collisions involving several police cars resulted in spectacular fireballs that lit up the night sky, briefly turning night to day.

17

O
n a rural road outside of Paris, smoke belched from its exhaust as the stolen Porsche sped south. An hour had elapsed since the vehicle’s madcap journey began and still it was being pursued by the Fiat and a dozen other Police cars. And the chopper still tracked it overhead. Inside the Porsche, Nine ignored his hostage’s pleas to slow down.

Ashen-faced, Isabelle gripped the dashboard with both hands as the Porsche rounded a tight bend on two wheels. “Please!” she cried. Her cries fell on deaf ears.

Nine had a plan and it didn’t involve slowing down. Still in his Russian guise minus his beard, he knew he must shake his pursuers if he was to have any chance of securing the freedom he so desperately yearned.

The fugitive agent tensed when he saw flashing lights ahead and road signs instructing motorists to slow. A road tar sealing gang worked through the night. Steam rose from the hot tar being laid behind a truck.

A pointsman waved out to slow down. Instead, Nine accelerated, spraying hot tar everywhere and forcing the pointsman to dive into a ditch. The Porsche ploughed on through the newly-laid tar seal, spraying it over the workers and the pursuing cars. Irate workers shook their fists and swore at the Porsche which was now also covered in tar.

Behind the Porsche, tar covered the Fiat’s windscreen, limiting visibility. The junior officer wisely slowed the car. In the seat next to him, Seventeen urged him to speed up.

The young man reluctantly accelerated. Sweating profusely, he peered through the dirty windscreen as the Fiat's windscreen wipers operated in slow motion. At the same time, Seventeen leaned out the passenger window and fired shots at the Porsche. She had the satisfaction of seeing the Porsche’s rear window shatter as one of the bullets hit home.

“
Don’t shoot!” the junior officer warned her. “You’ll hit the hostage.”

Seventeen ignored him and loosed off another shot. She
had
to stop Nine. If that meant risking the life of his hostage, so be it.

In the Porsche, Isabelle screamed and ducked down as a bullet whistled past her ear. Nine ducked too. Seeing the Fiat closing in on them, he stepped on the accelerator and drove even faster along the newly-sealed road.

Knowing that Seventeen’s next shot could be lethal, Nine’s mind went into hyper-drive as he searched for a way to shake his fellow orphan. He hit the electric cigarette lighter on the dashboard as an idea came to him. Frantically looking around the Porsche's interior, he spied a blanket on the back seat. He reached over, grabbed it then removed the electric lighter from the dashboard and set the blanket alight. Isabelle looked on, aghast.

Nine threw the now burning blanket out the window. Looking in the rear vision mirror, he was relieved to see the burning blanket caused the newly-laid tar-seal to ignite.

In the Fiat, the junior officer gasped as the road ahead erupted into flames. Next to him, Seventeen grabbed the wheel and steered the Fiat into a ditch to escape the inferno. Flames engulfed the following police cars, forcing their drivers to steer off the road or, in two cases, evacuate their cars. Seconds later, the two unmanned cars went up in fireballs.

Seventeen and the junior officer scrambled out of the ditch they’d ended up in. All they could do was watch the Porsche's disappearing tail lights.

In the Porsche, Nine glanced in the rear vision mirror and was pleased to see the police cars were no longer following. The helicopter was another story. Its unwavering searchlight told Nine the chopper was still tracking him relentlessly. He leaned out the window and looked up at it, as if to reconfirm it really was there.

Heavy breathing alerted Nine that all was not well with Isabelle. She was experiencing a panic attack.

“
I think...I'm...dying,” Isabelle gasped in French.

“
You're just hyperventilating.” Nine rummaged around in the glove box, searching for a paper bag. There was none, but he did find a large, folded envelope. It contained car ownership papers. Nine emptied the envelope and handed it to Isabelle. “Breathe into it.”

Isabelle placed the open end of the envelope over her nose and mouth, and began breathing into it. She now realized she probably was hyperventilating and was aware that inhaling carbon dioxide was the standard method of combating that condition.

“
Slow your breathing,” Nine warned her.

The Porsche leaned alarmingly as Nine turned hard right at an intersection. Another glance in the rear vision mirror confirmed he had shaken the police cars, but the ever-present chopper’s searchlight reminded him he was not free yet.

He peered at the fuel gauge on the dashboard. It indicated the tank was near-empty. “Damn!” he cursed. There was also a strong smell of petrol fumes. He guessed, correctly, the fuel tank had been ruptured – probably by a bullet.
We need to ditch the Porsche
.

Nine scanned road signs as they flashed past. One referred to a tunnel two kilometers ahead. A new plan occurred to him as the tunnel drew closer. His plan depended on at least one other vehicle being in the tunnel. Unfortunately, at this time of night, he knew there was a good chance they’d find they’d have the tunnel to themselves.

The chopper’s spotlight remained on the Porsche. Its pilot watched as the car entered the tunnel, leaving a trail of smoke behind it.

Behind the wheel of the Porsche, Nine was relieved to see three vehicles coming toward them in the tunnel. He glanced at Isabelle who still breathed into the envelope.

She reflexively looked over her shoulder. In the tunnel's confines, smoke obscured any rear view. Removing the envelope from her face, she looked accusingly at Nine. “What now?” she asked.

He ignored her and studied the first oncoming vehicle which was now less than a hundred yards away. Isabelle resumed breathing into the envelope.

As the distance between the two vehicles rapidly narrowed, Nine reached for his handbrake. “Hold on.” He braked and jerked the handbrake violently.

The Porsche spun one eighty
degrees before stopping in front of the other car, a Volvo, forcing it to stop hurriedly. The two vehicles following the Volvo braked to avoid a pile-up. The Porsche was now facing back the way it had come.

Nine got out and ran to the Volvo. As he ran, he called back to Isabelle. “C'mon!”

Still in shock, and not thinking clearly, Isabelle obeyed without question. Nine reached the Volvo, pulled open the driver's door and pointed his pistol at the driver, a middle-aged businessman. He grabbed the trembling businessman by his tie, pulled him out of the car and led him back to the Porsche whose engine was still running. “Get in!” he commanded in French. The shaken businessman jumped in behind the Porsche's steering wheel. Nine held his pistol to the businessman's head. “Drive for all you're worth.”

Nine fired his Glock pistol at the tunnel’s roof. The shot reverberated in the confined space and the businessman accelerated away in the still-smoking Porsche as fast as he could. Nine jumped in behind the Volvo's steering wheel and flung open the passenger door for Isabelle. She considered running from him, but his steely look indicated he was in no mood to be messed with. She reluctantly climbed in. “Stay down,” Nine ordered.

Isabelle ducked out of sight. Nine executed a U-turn and drove toward the tunnel's northern exit. As the exit neared, he turned off the Volvo's headlights. Behind them, the drivers of the two stationery vehicles sat frozen in their seats, trying to make sense of what they’d just witnessed.

In the chopper above the hillside, the pilot spotted the now smoking Porsche re-emerge at speed from the tunnel's southern entrance. The distance between the helicopter and Porsche shrank rapidly as the craft dropped close to ground level. The Porsche continued speeding south, its driver unaware he was now safe.

#

Dawn was breaking as a nondescript van reached the outskirts of Paris. It traveled well within the speed limit. Behind the wheel, looking haggard and unshaven, was Nine. An exhausted Isabelle slept next to him.

After hijacking the Volvo, the fugitive agent had realized the authorities would discover the vehicle switch as soon as they apprehended the driver of the stolen Porsche; within minutes of emerging from the tunnel, Nine had ditched the Volvo, hiding it in a disused, roadside barn, and stolen the van.

Now, as he drove toward a suburban train station, he spotted the top of the Eiffel Tower in the distance. He nudged Isabelle as he turned into the station's car park.

“
I've got to get rid of this van,” Nine muttered. Isabelle blinked in the daylight as she awoke and studied her new surroundings. Nine squeezed the van into a parking space between two cars and nosed hard up against a concrete wall. Climbing out, he looked back at Isabelle and fixed her with a stare. “Stay there.”

Checking no-one else was around, he produced a Swiss Army knife and unscrewed the van's rear number plate. Isabelle looked back at him, trying to determine what he was up to. Nine walked along a row of cars and quickly removed the front plate of a Citroen. He returned to the van and replaced its missing plate with the Citroen's plate.
That should throw the bloodhounds off the scent for a while
, he thought.

Nine suddenly remembered his Russian guise had passed its used-by date. And he was conscious he looked unshaven and disheveled. He was also very aware that, as the daughter of a recently retired, high profile politician, Isabelle could easily be recognized. Resisting the urge to take their chances looking as they did, he jumped back into the van.

Not even glancing at Isabelle, he unbuttoned his shirt to reveal the small black kit still strapped to his chest. Unzipping it, he withdrew a false moustache which he promptly glued to his upper lip. Then, using hair gel, he combed his hair back in the style of an Italian playboy, albeit a slightly unkempt one. He glanced at himself in the rear view mirror. Nine knew he needed to do something about his clothing, but that could wait.

Isabelle stared at him in disbelief. The transformation was startling and had taken less than two minutes. Nine turned his attention to her. He grabbed a discarded scarf he’d spotted earlier on the van’s rear seat and proceeded to tie it around Isabelle’s head, gypsy-style. It concealed most of her hair. As a final touch, he made her don a pair of sunglasses. She remained too shell-shocked to offer more than token resistance.

Satisfied their new guises would do the trick for the moment at least, Nine pulled Isabelle from the van and marched her toward the train station entrance.

18

I
nside the already busy station, Nine kept a tight grip on Isabelle as he led her through crowds of early morning commuters. Glancing left and right, he scanned the commuters and their luggage.

Within seconds, he spied a man’s trench coat that had been thrown carelessly over a suitcase. The coat’s owner was engrossed reading the morning paper and had his back to the case. Without breaking stride, Nine scooped up the coat as he and Isabelle walked past. Only Isabelle noticed.

Once out of sight of the coat’s owner, Nine quickly donned the stolen coat. He prayed no-one would recognize Isabelle. So far, her make-do disguise seemed to be holding up. He also hoped she wouldn’t be difficult. If she chose this moment to draw attention to herself, he knew he could do little about it. Nine was gambling on the fact she was still in shock and wouldn’t be thinking clearly. He was right. Isabelle was just going through the motions. She was too tired and scared to even contemplate escape.