by Stuart Woods
The three of them passed St. Patrick’s Cathedral, paused in front of Saks Fifth Avenue and gazed at the giant Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center. Then they crossed the street and walked into the arcade that led to the skating rink.
Teddy dallied in front of Saks for a minute or two, since he didn’t have to worry about losing the three while they looked at the skaters and the tree. He used the pause to try and identify Holly’s tailing team.
There would be four of them, he knew, and they would dress against type, as he had. He had his doubts about a woman pushing a baby carriage, who was ignoring the Saks windows and looking at the crowd instead. Chances were, a doll occupied the carriage. He liked a man, too, wearing a fat down jacket and a lumberjack’s cap with earflaps. The man should have been smart enough not to wear suit trousers and wingtips with that outfit. The other two team members, he reckoned, would be working closer to Holly.
He crossed the street when the pedestrian stoplight changed, and he had just reached the other side and was entering the arcade when he heard three gunshots. A .45, he thought immediately, and the sound came from near the skating rink.
Suddenly, the thick crowd in the arcade became a tidal wave of people, all running away from the gunfire. Teddy flattened himself against a shop front and his hand closed on the little Keltec .380 in his coat pocket. He looked back toward Saks and saw that the mother with the baby carriage had abandoned her young and was crossing Fifth Avenue as best she could through the traffic and against the running crowd. So much for the safety of her “child.”
As the crowd quickly drained from the arcade, Teddy looked toward the skating rink and saw a man carrying a semiautomatic pistol in each hand, spinning like a dervish and firing random shots at people and through shop windows. Two shoppers were down, and there was broken glass everywhere. Then Teddy saw the man with Holly, one hand behind his back, walking quickly toward the shooter. Teddy began edging up the arcade toward Fifth Avenue, keeping his back to the buildings and his hand on the gun.
Then, for no apparent reason, the shooter stopped spinning and started walking backward, directly toward Teddy. His attention seemed occupied with something farther down the arcade, and Teddy saw that it must be Ham Barker, who was walking calmly toward the man. He knew that Barker held a gun behind him, and that, as soon as he was a little closer to the shooter, he was going to start firing himself. Teddy was behind the shooter, in a direct line. If a slug from Barker missed or overpenetrated the shooter, Teddy was in line to catch it, and he didn’t want that.
He backed into a doorway, took the Keltec from his pocket and held it at waist level, keeping it close to his body. The shooter was maybe eight feet away now, and that was close enough. Teddy fired two rounds at the man’s spine; almost simultaneously, he heard two other shots, probably from a 9mm. He left the doorway and walked quickly toward Fifth.
Teddy didn’t look back to see what was happening. He put his gun hand back into his pocket, turned left and headed for the corner of 50th Street. A sea of people were rushing across Fifth Avenue through the stalled traffic, and he joined them and headed down 50th toward Madison. As he reached the other side of Fifth he checked the reflection in Saks window and saw in the crowd the man in the down coat and lumberjack’s cap coming toward him. He seemed to be speaking into his left fist.
Teddy continued down 50th Street, then, as he approached the side entrance to Saks, he ducked down in the crowd and pushed his way toward the revolving door. He was inside the store in a second, and he didn’t wait to see if his pursuer was behind him. He turned left and walked as quickly as he could toward the long bank of elevators. The white dial over one turned red, and Teddy ran for it, pushing his way inside just as the doors began closing. Looking back the way he had come, he saw the man in the lumberjack cap come in through the revolving doors. The elevator doors closed, and the crowded car started up. Teddy thought the man saw him at the last possible moment.
BACK IN THE ROCKEFELLER CENTER arcade Holly was running toward Ham, her 9mm in one hand and her ID wallet in the other. She held the ID in the air, with the wallet open, and the gun out in front of her, the safety off and her finger alongside the trigger guard. She heard four shots, spaced very close together and saw the shooter go down. It was unlike Ham to fire more than twice, since he always hit what he was shooting at.
The shooter was on the ground, but he was moving, and there was still a gun in each hand. Ham was approaching him, his gun in both hands, and Holly ran up beside him. “I’ll get one hand,” she said.
“Right,” Ham said, but his eyes never left the shooter.
Holly saw a woman from the Barn approaching from Fifth Avenue, holding a gun. There seemed to be guns everywhere. Holly walked up to the shooter and put her foot on his right wrist, while Ham did the same to his left. She put her weight on his wrist, and his hand opened. She bent and picked up his gun, while Ham took the other one, but she did not let her attention stray from the shooter.
“Ham,” she said, “do you still have that Orchid Beach P.D. badge I gave you?”
“Yep,” Ham said.
“Get it out and wave it when the cops come. We don’t want them shooting at us.”
“Right.” Ham was digging in his pocket.
Then cops came from everywhere.
TEDDY GOT OFF the elevator on the sixth-floor men’s department, turned right and walked into the men’s room. He went into a stall, reversed his coat so that the raincoat side was now out, folded his felt hat and put it into the coat pocket, took a tweed cap from the other pocket and put that on, then pulled off the Vandyke and nose and put those in his pockets.
He left his shopping bag on the toilet seat, went to a sink and turned on the water, then checked his reflection. There were bits of spirit gum clinging to his face and he wiped it clean with a damp towel. He left a dollar for the attendant, then walked out of the men’s room, past the elevators to the escalator, donning a pair of heavy, black-rimmed glasses as he walked. As he started down he saw two men walking very quickly away from him through the men’s department, gun hands in their pockets, talking into their fists. He began walking down the escalator to make his descent faster.
HOLLY FRISKED THE DOWNED SHOOTER for more weapons and found none, just the two .45s, but he had half a dozen full magazines in his overcoat pockets. He had stopped moving, now, and she thought he must be dead. “Ham, how many rounds did you fire?”
“Two,” Ham replied.
Two holes in the man’s chest were oozing blood.
“I heard two more,” Holly said.
“So did I, but it wasn’t me. The gun noise was a little light, maybe a .380.”
Holly looked at the woman from the team. “Did you fire your weapon?”
“No,” the woman said.
“Who did?” Holly asked.
“I think it was Teddy Fay,” she replied.
Then the police were in charge. Holly identified herself and Ham, and they talked to a detective for half an hour as he covered the scene.
“He’s got two holes in his chest and two in his back,” the detective said. “Who was the other shooter?”
“I’ve no idea,” Holly replied.
FIFTY-ONE
LANCE WAS SITTING AT HIS DESK, disconsolately working his way through some administrative paperwork, when his cell phone vibrated on his belt.
“Yes?”
A man’s excited voice riveted his attention. “He’s in Saks!” he panted.
“Who?”
“Teddy Fay. There was some sort of commotion and gunfire over at Rockefeller Plaza, and I spotted a man who fits the description crossing the street and ducking into the store. Request maximum backup!”
“Easy now,” Lance said. “Did anybody else make him?”
“Martin did; she radioed me, and I was on my way when I saw the guy. He matched the description.”
“Give me the description?”
“Six feet, slim, wearing a tweed overcoat and a reg
ular felt men’s hat, broken nose, mustache and chin whiskers, brown. He was carrying a shopping bag, a red one, filled with wrapped presents.”
“I’ll have people there shortly,” Lance said. “In the meantime, have your team cover the main floor exits; don’t let him leave the store.”
“Got it.”
Lance closed his cell phone, picked up his desk phone and entered a twelve-digit number that would ring the cell phones of every man and woman in his unit. “Listen up, everybody; Teddy Fay has been spotted at Saks Fifth Avenue, that’s between Forty-ninth and Fiftieth. Everybody converge on Saks right now, no delay. When last seen Fay was wearing a tweed topcoat, a felt hat, a broken nose and a brown Vandyke beard. He’s carrying a red shopping bag with wrapped gifts inside.” He repeated the instructions, then dialed the front desk. “This is Cabot; I want a car out front now.” He ran for the elevator.
HOLLY WAS TALKING to a police detective when her cell phone rang and she got Lance’s message. “I have to go,” she said. “I’ll talk to you, Lieutenant, later.”
“You can’t go,” the detective said. “This is a police investigation.”
“No,” she said, “it’s a national security matter. Mr. Barker will continue to talk to you.” She sprinted toward Fifth Avenue, grateful that she had not worn high heels. Traffic was at a standstill, and she threaded her way through it and ran into Saks through the center revolving doors. She immediately spotted a team member guarding the entrance and ran up to him. “What’s the word?”
“He’s upstairs somewhere,” the man replied. “Lance is scrambling everybody. In the meantime, we’re to watch the exits; we can use your help.”
“How did he get upstairs?”
“Elevator. An agent saw him.”
Holly ran for the rear of the store. She was about to go for the elevators when she saw the escalator. That would give her at least a quick look at each floor. She got on and headed up. On the second floor she got off, looked slowly around for as far as she could see. No tweed topcoat, not that he would still be wearing that. She got back on the escalator and began ascending, looking for a man with no coat at all.
AS TEDDY REACHED the fifth floor he caught sight of someone coming up the escalator whose clothes he coveted. The man got off on five, and so did Teddy. He followed the man, who turned immediately through a door marked “Employees Only.”
Teddy followed him to a men’s room, and as the man stood at a urinal, Teddy fetched him a hard chop across the back of his neck. The man collapsed as if he had no legs.
Teddy stripped off the man’s outer clothing and got into his outfit. He put his tweed cap in a pocket, then pulled off the man’s beard and put it on. A quick check of the mirror, and he was out of there, headed for the escalator.
He had no sooner stepped onto it than he saw, coming up, a red tam. Holly looked up and directly at him, then looked away. Had she spotted him? Maybe, but she wouldn’t recognize him. He kept his eyes fixed straight ahead as she passed him going up.
Teddy continued to the ground floor and got off the escalator. He walked, but not too quickly, toward the 49th Street exit, and as he did, people passing him waved and said, “Merry Christmas!” to him. “Merry Christmas!” he said back, and occasionally, “Ho, ho, ho.”
He saw the woman with the baby carriage standing between him and the door. She no longer had the carriage, and she was looking desperately around the ground floor. “Merry Christmas,” he said as he passed her.
“Yeah, same to you,” she said, not looking at him.
Out on the sidewalk Teddy started walking toward Madison Avenue, looking for a cab. The air was filled with sirens, and people were still running away from Rockefeller Center. He made it to Madison and got lucky with the bus. A moment later, he was riding up Madison, and at 50th Street, he got a glimpse of the continuing chaos. He sat down next to a little boy.
“Hi, Santa,” the boy said.
“Hi, there. Merry Christmas,” Teddy said.
“Can I have a micro-motorcycle for Christmas this year?”
Teddy had no idea what a micro-motorcycle was, but the boy’s mother was shaking her head violently and mouthing “No!”
“You bet!” Teddy said, and the woman looked shocked. “If you’re really good, I’ll bring you two.”
He couldn’t very well take off the Santa suit on the bus; the kid would go nuts. He waited until he got off at 63rd Street before he stepped into a doorway, stripped off the costume and dumped it into the nearest trash basket, then he continued east, toward Lexington and his shop.
LANCE STOOD ON THE STAGE of the little theater on the twelfth floor of the Barn and stared at his agents. Kerry Smith sat beside him, looking depressed.
“Holly, what’s the story on Rockefeller Center?”
“Some cab driver went nuts,” she said. “He abandoned his taxi in the middle of Forty-eighth Street and walked into the Plaza with a gun in each hand. He shot a skater and two people in the arcade before Ham shot him. Oh, Teddy Fay shot him, too. Twice.”
“What happened with Teddy?” Lance asked. “I thought we had him trapped in Saks.”
A man stood up. “We sealed the place immediately, like you said, and when backup arrived, we scoured every floor. We found nothing.”
“Then he couldn’t have been in the store. Maybe he went up one flight, then came back down and left the building.”
“We had it sealed very quickly,” he said. “I can’t explain what happened.”
“Any theories?” Lance asked the group.
Holly tentatively raised her hand.
“Yes, Holly?”
“Maybe a Santa Claus suit,” she said.
“You think he was wearing a Santa Claus suit?” Lance asked incredulously.
“Maybe. There was a Santa Claus going down as I was going up. On the fifth floor there was a commotion; apparently, somebody had found an unconscious man in the men’s room. I’m just connecting the dots.”
Another woman stood up. “A Santa Claus walked right past me at the Forty-ninth Street exit and wished me a Merry Christmas,” she said.
Holly raised her hand again. “We found a red shopping bag in the sixth floor men’s room,” she said. “It was full of gift-wrapped, empty boxes. It’s being checked for prints right now, but I’m not holding my breath.”
Another agent stood up. “Listen,” he said, “how are we ever going to take this guy without a description? I mean, we had a good description this time, but nobody was looking for a guy in a Santa Claus suit.”
Lance wished to God he had an answer to that one.
FIFTY-TWO
IRENE FOSTER WAS BACK from New York in time for work on Monday morning, but she was a little late getting to her office at Langley. As she passed Hugh English’s office, she saw him looking through a stack of papers on his desk. “Morning, Hugh,” she said, sticking her head through the doorway. “Sorry I’m late; I just got back from New York.” She didn’t like it when Hugh got in before she did. Every time that happened, something invariably went wrong.
“Irene,” English said, “do you know somebody in operations called Charles Lockwood?”
She did not, and she immediately had an awful thought. “Sounds familiar,” she said, trying to breathe normally. “Why?”
“I got a memo from payroll this morning, saying Lockwood is three weeks behind on his time sheets, and they won’t pay him, until he’s up-to-date. That’s what troubles me.”
“What’s that, Hugh?”
“If he’s turning in time sheets, that means he’s executive level, not just a clerical worker, and I swear, I know every mother’s son at the executive level who works for me.”
Irene walked forward and held out her hand. “Give me the memo,” she said. “I’ll sort it out.”
“Thank you,” he said, handing it over. English hated dealing with any administrative matter.
Irene took a deep breath; she might as well get it over with, she thought. “Hugh, have
you got a second?”
“Sure. Take a pew.” He waved her to a chair.
She took off her coat and dumped it on the other chair, then sat down. “I’ve been thinking about this for a while,” she said, “and I’ve decided to put in for retirement.”
English blinked in surprise. “How long have you got in?” he asked.
“Twenty-seven years.”
“Then you’re fully vested in your pension, I guess.”
“I guess I am.”
English sat back in his chair. “Irene, I just can’t imagine the place without you. I mean, you’ve been in this office with me for as long as I’ve occupied this chair, and we knew each other a long time before that, didn’t we?”
“Yes, we did, Hugh. Better than twenty years, anyway.”
“I’ll probably have to assign two people to do your job.”
“Thank you, Hugh, but my shoes won’t be all that hard to fill.”
“I’m not going to count on that. What are you going to do with yourself?”
“Funny you should mention that; I was on the Internet last night, looking at houses in the Caribbean.”
“Where in the Caribbean?”
“I’ve heard good things about St. Thomas and St. Barts.”
“St. Thomas was looking overgrown, last time I was there,” English said, “but St. Barts is very nice.”
“It seems a bit more expensive than the other islands, but I’ll take a harder look at it.”
“Twenty-seven years,” English said, shaking his head. “I’m coming up on thirty, myself. It’s probably time I got out of here, too.”
“I can’t see you in retirement, Hugh.”
“Well, it’s become clear that I’m never going to get the top job, unless Kate Rule Lee drops dead, and I’m not going to count on that. When do you want to go?”
“I guess as soon as I can break somebody in,” she said.
