Eureka

by William Diehl

  “Watch out, he’s a southpaw,” I mumbled to Culhane.

  While Culhane kept the uncouth Irish thug talking, Bobby Aaron pulled up behind the two mobster cars, blocking them in.

  Guilfoyle looked back at Aaron’s car, then at Culhane. Worry furrowed his brow.

  “What the hell’s going on?” he demanded.

  Culhane reached in his back pocket and took out the warrant on Guilfoyle for harboring.

  “I got a warrant here for your arrest, signed by State Supreme Court Judge Gray,” Culhane lied. “I’d show it to you but you can’t read.”

  “For what?”

  “Aiding and abetting in first-degree murder, harboring known felons, attempted murder of two Los Angeles police officers. Want me to go on?”

  “On what authority?” Guilfoyle sneered.

  “You’re in my county,” Culhane said. He looked over his shoulder and said, “Show him, Max.”

  The one-eyed deputy flicked on the spotlight on the side of the Packard, and swept its beam to the side of the road about forty feet behind Guilfoyle’s car. A sign read county line.

  Guilfoyle’s jaw began to twitch.

  “Hey, Rusty,” Culhane said without taking his eyes off Guilfoyle, “show this muttonhead our guest of honor.”

  Rusty opened the office door in Lefton’s lodge and pulled Earl out. He stared across the road at Guilfoyle.

  “Earl here’s all the witness we need,” Culhane said. “We been playing twenty questions. You know how to play twenty questions, Guilfoyle? It’s like I ask him, what’s bigger than a grain of sand and smaller than a pea, and he says, Guilfoyle’s brain.”

  Culhane took a pair of handcuffs out off his pocket and held them up, letting them dangle like a noose in the lights of the cars. “Reach around with your right hand, take out that peashooter of yours, and drop it on the ground,” he ordered.

  To my right, I heard two shotguns click as shells were charged into chambers.

  There was movement inside Guilfoyle’s car.

  “Fuck you,” Guilfoyle snarled, turning full face toward Culhane.

  “Either you throw down your gun or I’ll take it away from you,” Culhane said calmly.

  Guilfoyle stood fast. The fingers of his left hand began to twitch.

  “You, boys!” Culhane yelled to Guilfoyle’s crew. “Don’t be stupid. You’re in a cross fire. Give up your hardware and nobody gets hurt.”

  He took a step toward Guilfoyle, and the big mobster’s left hand flashed toward his automatic.

  Culhane bent his knees in a crouch as he swept the .44 from its holster. He fanned the hammer back as he brought his gun hand up and fired.

  It sounded like a cannon.

  The big man grunted as if he had been punched in the stomach. Culhane’s bullet tore into Guilfoyle’s abdomen, knocking him backward onto the grille of the Caddy. He looked shocked but the bullet didn’t stop him. Growling like a wounded animal, he pushed himself off the grille and blindly fired a shot. It chipped the road under the Packard and whined off in the dark.

  Culhane fanned off two more shots.

  Both into Guilfoyle’s chest.

  He screamed as he was knocked backward again. His elbow smashed out a headlight. His breath wheezed out of him like air wheezing out of a balloon. The derby flew off his head and bounced at his feet. Deep red blood oozed from the wounds in his chest and stomach.

  He swung his gun up as his chin fell against his chest and fired another shot. It nicked Culhane’s shoulder, kicking a tuft of his silk shirt into the air.

  Culhane said nothing. He held his arm at full length and fired again. The last shot knocked Guilfoyle’s head straight back. His eyes rolled up. He slumped and his right arm draped over the headlight support as his legs turned to rubber. He fell straight down and dangled from the support.

  The passenger door flew open and a gunman jumped out, swinging a tommy gun. Culhane whirled, fell to one knee, and fanned off his last two shots. One smacked into the gunman’s cheek. His head snapped back, its side bursting into a plume of blood and bone. His hat floated off and rolled into the darkness. The shot spun him around. His finger tightened on the trigger and the stutter gun ripped a trench in the ground at his feet, blew out the front tire, and sent the hubcap spinning away. He fell facedown, his feet crossed at the ankles.

  Inside Guilfoyle’s car a shape moved, a shotgun swung up.

  “Look out!” Max yelled, shoving Culhane out of the way as he leveled a sawed-off shotgun at the windshield and fired both barrels. The left side of the windshield splattered and crumbled in on itself. Behind it, the mobster took the full blast in his face. Blood and bone showered the backseat as he was smacked backward.

  The last gunman started screaming.

  “Don’t shoot, don’t shoot, I’m finished,” he cried, and threw his .45 out the car window. It was followed by his wiggling empty hands. Max pulled the door open, grabbed a fistful of shirt and tie, dragged him from the car, and threw him on the ground. He lay there whimpering, his face and suit splattered with the blood of his dead partner.

  In the rear car, pistols and shotguns came flying out of windows. Hands were wiggling to show they were empty. One by one, four more of Guilfoyle’s shooters tumbled out with their hands straight up over their heads.

  The smell of cordite was whisked away by the wind.

  Culhane stood up and brushed himself off. He looked at his shoulder. “Ruined my best shirt,” he said.

  “You okay?” Max asked.

  “Thanks to you,” Culhane said, and smacked him on the shoulder.

  I did a dead head count as Culhane walked over to Guilfoyle, still dangling from the headlight support. He wrenched the .45 from Guilfoyle’s taut fist, held it behind him, and Max took it. Blood showered down the side of Guilfoyle’s face and spurted from the holes in his suit.

  “Nice shooting,” I said.

  “Buck Tallman used to say shooting’s just like swimming,” Culhane replied, holstering the Peacemaker. “You never forget how.”

  He watched as the four hooligans from the rear car were herded up to us by Bobby Aaron.

  “You know the setup at Shuler’s?” Culhane asked me.

  I nodded.

  “How much security?”

  “Lightweights. Ski and I got in without any problem—until Guilfoyle showed up.”

  “They know you?”

  “They wouldn’t remember me, it was dark.”

  “Bring Earl up here,” Culhane said. “You know where Riker’s holed up?” he asked the gunman.

  “I wasn’t there when he came in, but I’m guessin’ he’s on the third floor of the rage ward. That’s where the VIPs usually stay. There’s a swimming pool on the first floor, and the second floor is for the loonies, the ones they chain to the floor.”

  “How do we get in?”

  “Only one staircase up to three. Got a steel door, so it’s hard to break in. The elevator’s the only other entrance to three. It’s at the end of a short hall from a private door. It could be a death trap.”

  Culhane walked back and forth in front of him for a minute or so.

  “Okay,” he said to his crew, “here’s the plan. We go in with two cars. Morningdale’s gonna drive one car, with Rusty beside him and Redd and Max in the backseat. Aaron drives the other car, with me and two backups. Morningdale will get us through the gate. You do anything fancy, Morningdale, Redd’ll cut your throat. You understand that?”

  “I understand,” he nodded. A tear of sweat wriggled down the side of his face.

  “What we want is surprise.”

  I heard myself say, “No,” again.

  Culhane looked at me with surprise.

  “No?” he said.

  “You’re trying to count me out again,” I said. “Riker’s mine. I started this case and I’m going to finish it. You sit this one out, you’ve done more than enough. And you might still have a political career to worry about. I’ll ride shotgun with Morningdale.
Redd and Lenny in the backseat. Aaron drives with Rusty, and Max in the other car. We’ll assume he’s holed up in one of those apartments at the sanitarium.”

  “That’s where he’s at, the sanitarium,” one of Guilfoyle’s men, Bloom, offered suddenly. “I drove him and Guilfoyle up to building B from the boat. There’s four apartments on the third floor.”

  “How many entrances in and out?” I asked.

  “It’s a fire trap,” he said. “There’s only three doors in on the first floor and one of them goes straight to an elevator—express to the third floor so the big shots can go in and out without entering the main building. There’s staircases on each end of the building, but only one of them goes to the third floor.”

  “That’s the one with the steel door to three?”

  “Right.”

  I drew a little sketch with my finger in the dirt beside the road and studied it.

  “There’s also a staircase to the roof right next to the elevator,” he said. “It’s the only access to the roof.”

  “So if we cover the elevator and the third-floor door to the staircase, we’ve got him boxed,” I said.

  “If you can get onto the third floor,” they both agreed.

  “That is, of course, if he’s there,” said Culhane.

  “Let’s go find out,” I said.

  CHAPTER 40

  It was a little past midnight when we drove through the gate in the eight-foot stone wall and kept going as quietly as we could, past the pond down to the Victorian main building of the Shuler Institute. The guard at the gate saw Earl and waved us through. There was a light over the door and a dim night-light in the main office, but the place was deserted.

  We cut off our car lights and followed the gravel drive around the main building, guided by the moon. We stopped under a group of trees and turned the car off. The second car followed. I got out, walked to the edge of the trees, and listened.

  It was deathly quiet. A cricket chirped way down at the end of the property and an occasional breeze whisked the leaves. Otherwise there was not a sound.

  The rage ward loomed behind the main office building like a haunted Victorian mansion etched by moonlight. Like the main building, the third floor had four large gables, one facing in each direction, their spires reaching up like daggers toward the full moon. The second floor had several high windows on each side. That would be the ward for “the loonies” as Morningdale had called them. The first floor, apparently the gym and swimming pool, was windowless.

  There was a single light on. It cast an eerie yellow glow from the gabled window facing west, toward the Pacific. Otherwise, the building could have been deserted.

  “Is that where Riker’s holed up?” I whispered to Morningdale.

  “Probably,” Earl said. “I know Dahlmus had the south room, and me and that nut from Baltimore each had a room.”

  In the darkness of the south room, Riker had watched the two cars drift under the trees and stop. Was it Guilfoyle and his bunch coming back? They had left in a hurry, he assumed to pick up Earl and that loopy one in the gaudy shirt. Riker sat on the window seat, saw two of the men come to the edge of the grove of trees and stare up at the building. He began to get nervous. He took out a cigarette, cupped his hand when he lit the match.

  Big Redd squatted in the safety of the trees and stared hard at the one darkened window he could see. Then he thought he saw a flare. He squinted his eyes. Not sure. He focused on the dark window. Then he saw a red pinpoint brighten for a second. He picked up a pebble and tossed it at Bannon.

  I felt a stone hit my leg, turned around, and saw Redd, hunched down. He made a motion for me to move back and with the other hand pantomimed someone taking a drag on a cigarette. Then he pointed to the dark window on the south side of the third floor. I moved back and focused on it, saw a momentary glow. Someone was in there. Smoking. Watching us. Now we had a problem. If it was Riker, we couldn’t move from the cover of the trees without being spotted.

  The gravel road wound down past several utility buildings and swept around the rage ward, almost to the end of the large compound, before circling back to the main entrance. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky and the moon was so bright there was no possibility of making a dash across fifty yards of lawn to the entrance of the secured building without being spotted. Riker could be sitting there with a high-powered rifle, ready to take down anyone who entered the building.

  There was one possibility. At a certain point, the driveway came within ten yards of the southwestern corner of the building. From the third floor of the building, it would be impossible to tell how many people were in the car. Also, from any one of the gabled rooms, it was only possible to see any three sides of the building.

  I decided to send our two fastest runners, Redd and Aaron, to zigzag fifty yards across the lawn to the cover of two bays of trees under the south window. At the same time, one-eyed Max would drive straight to the northeast corner of the building, and one-armed Lenny, Rusty, and I would pile out of the car and blow the lock on the door Riker could not see. Once inside, our objective would be to cross the swimming pool room, to the stairwell on the southern side of the building. I would go up the stairs followed by Rusty, and hopefully trap Riker on the top floor, while Lenny and Max would cover the entrance to the elevator. Redd and Aaron would make a dash for the building and back me up. Riker’s only option then would be the roof.

  There was still that if. What if Riker was someplace else? Maybe making a run for it on a boat. Maybe some pilot was flying in to pick him up and fly him down to Mexico. Riker was a devious, psychopathic, cold-blooded killer. No time to worry about what-ifs. I had to move.

  Riker watched the copse of trees, wondering what their next move would be. He had to assume that Culhane and Bannon were down below with plenty of backup. And if that was the case, he also had to assume that Guilfoyle had been trapped or arrested at Lefton’s place. Maybe even killed. Riker had to get off the third floor. To stay there was suicidal.

  Below him, two dark figures darted from the trees, dodging like rabbits in the moonlight, and behind them, one of the cars roared from the shelter of the small orchard.

  The car was heading for the north side of the building. His blind side.

  He had only one option. Get off the third floor and go through the second-floor ward to the north side of the building.

  And create a diversion.

  As he ran from his apartment and down the hall, he was smiling. Culhane and Bannon commanded the top of his hate list.

  What a diversion he had planned for them.

  Rusty handcuffed Earl to the branch of a eucalyptus tree.

  “One sound outta you and you’re morgue meat,” I said, then jumped in the car.

  We screeched down the gravel drive, slued around the corner, the car’s rear wheels spewing stretches of lawn behind them, and slammed to a stop. The four of us piled out. The door’s interior lock was a bar lock, a long steel slat running the width of the door. It could only be unlocked from the inside by a key.

  “Lose the door,” I said to Rusty, who swung his pump shotgun up and blew the hinges off. We charged through and ran around the pool to the exit on the south side. That door was unlocked.

  As Lenny and Max headed for the elevator, I followed Rusty up the stairs, two at a time, to the third floor. There was a short flight of steps, a landing, then another flight up to the second-floor landing and the door to the ward for the insane.

  Riker was waiting for us when we reached the first landing. As we rounded the corner, his shotgun roared, echoing up and down the narrow stairs. It deafened me for a moment but the blast hit Rusty in the legs, just below the knee.

  I squeezed off three shots as fast as I could but Riker had spun back around the corner.

  Rusty rolled down the stairs to the landing, his legs shredded by buckshot. I jumped down and pulled him around the corner just as Riker got off another shot. It ripped a three-foot hole in the wall. And once again, Riker w
as gone.

  Eerie screams came from the rage ward. At first one or two, then a chorus of terrified cries and shrieks. I peeked around the corner just as Riker fired a third load of buckshot into the lock of the mental ward. Riker dove through the doorway, my shot missing him by inches.

  Rusty was groaning in pain. I got on the walkie-talkie. “This is Bannon. Rusty’s down with leg wounds. I think it hit an artery. Riker’s in the mental ward, going north. Get a doctor and get some backup to the north door. I’m in pursuit.”

  “On the way,” Max answered.

  I took off my jacket, wrapped a sleeve around Rusty’s thigh, and used the shotgun barrel as a tourniquet to stop the arterial blood pumping from one leg.

  He pointed up the stairs. “Go, go,” his lips told me.

  Like the hounds of hell, screaming, moaning, babbling howls led me up the stairs into bedlam.

  The mental patients were raving mad, chained to beds, clutching at Riker, tearing at his clothes. They were scratching his face, some looking for a savior, some striking out in fear. He was slashing at them with his shotgun and punching them, dragging them and their beds as he raced toward the far door. Another group rushed me as I charged in. Under the dim rays of the overhead night-lights, they were faceless hands and arms clutching at me, restrained only by the chains that bound them either to the floor or their beds. I spun around, trying to break loose, when I heard Riker’s shotgun roar again. On the other end of the ward I saw two or three inmates spin away from him, screaming in pain. He turned and fired a second blast into another group. Bodies lurched as the buckshot ripped into them.

  Then Riker saw me. He shook loose the last of his attackers, dodged through the door, and raced down the stairs leading to the pool room.

  I holstered my Luger and tried to break free of the terrified people surrounding me so I could follow him.