by Jon Land
That left only Stephen Shay between her and escape. She limped down to the next level. Just one more staircase to go and she was free. Suddenly she stopped.
The staircase leading to the lobby was totally rotted out. She swung as quickly as she dared and limped down the hallway, past doors splintered or missing. Her eyes and ears were alert for Shay’s approach. She fought to imagine the layout of the building based on what she had seen of it. Part of the fire escape was still intact, accessible from rooms just a little farther on.
The floor gave way on her next step. She felt herself plunging downward and reached out with her hands, grabbing hold of what remained of the flooring. Her feet dangled in the black air beneath her. She looked down.
There was a wide, jagged hole below that went all the way to the cellar, a drop of almost thirty feet, with a pile of sharp, pointed wood and cement chunks waiting for her. Sandy felt panic seize her at the same time her grip on the rotting wood above began to slip. Somehow she had to find the strength to pull herself up with her throbbing fingers.
Sandy began to hoist herself upward, raising her upper body to take as much strain from her fingers as possible. It did little good. The pain was phenomenal and she had little power left in her arms and hands.
A shadow loomed above her. Sandy gazed up and saw Stephen Shay move emotionlessly to a position directly over her hands.
“Help me, Steve,” she said softly, not pleading. “Help me.
His initial expression had given her hope, but it evaporated before her words were finished. Saying nothing, he brought the soles of his scuffed and dusty European loafers in line with her fingers and raised the tips. He would crush the fingers and she would plunge to her death, or to a crippled agony in which she would linger for hours before death claimed her. Resistance was futile. The end had come.
The tips of Shay’s loafers had just reached her fingers when a muffled spit found Sandy’s ears. Above her, Shay’s face seemed to disintegrate into nothing as he rocked backward, freeing her fingers. One of her hands nonetheless lost its perch, and the second was sliding off, when a set of powerful hands locked onto her wrists and in one swift motion yanked her up through the cavern that had threatened to swallow her.
Breathless with relief, tears streaming down her cheeks to mix with the blood, Sandy found herself gazing at a man who looked somehow familiar. No, not the man, just his suit.
A cream-colored suit. It was the man who had followed her from the hotel!
He retrieved his silenced, still smoking pistol from the floor as he spoke.
“We’ve got to get out of here. More of them will be coming.”
His words emerged with measured concern, not panic. His cream-colored suit showed barely a stain or tatter from the rotted building. His eyes swept the corridor like a light-house beam guiding ships through the night.
He holstered his gun. “You’re hurt,” he said, moving toward Sandy. “Here, lean on my shoulder. There’s a fire escape that’ll get us out of here just up ahead.”
“Who are you?” she asked, finally finding her voice.
“Later,” the man said, and he led her off.
Chapter 24
MCCRACKEN HEADED THE cleaning van through the Atlanta darkness toward the headquarters of the People’s Voice of Revolution. Sahhan’s nonprofit institution owned a modern ten-story office building located on the outskirts of the Fairlie-Poplar District in the shadow of the famed Peachtree Center. An hour before, the heavy security outside and in the building’s lobby had convinced Blaine that Sahhan was inside. His problem then became how to gain access to the building.
The cleaning van had provided his answer. The real janitor was now unconscious in the back. His baggy overalls made a good enough fit on Blaine’s frame.
He had been met at the airport by a man contacted by Sal Belamo. There was nothing official about the arrangement. Just an agreement between friends. The man would not provide backup, his job being only to deliver a gun to McCracken and then take him to Sahhan’s headquarters.
Blaine swung the van around in a wide U-turn and brought it to a halt directly before the main entrance to the building.
“I’m new,” he shouted to one of the guards. “Can you tell me where the service entrance is?”
“Around to the side that way,” the guard shouted back, pointing.
“Thanks,” Blaine said, and drove off again.
The service entrance was located just past a ramp that led into a private parking garage. Two guards stood on either side of the door. Blaine climbed out of the van and without acknowledging them moved to the rear doors and hoisted a floor polisher out. The real janitor’s body lay under furniture covers.
“You got a pass, man?” one of the men asked.
Blaine fished in his pockets for the picture ID belonging to the real janitor. He had been hoping displaying it wouldn’t be necessary to gain access into the building. He bore only a slim resemblance to the man he was impersonating.
The guard checked his face against the ID. “This don’t look much like you, man.”
“It’s the beard. Didn’t have it six months ago.”
The guard was still looking.
“Hey, look,” Blaine said suddenly, coolly, “you want me to leave, I get right in the van and head for home. Don’t mean shit to me, boss. I got two guys out sick and I just as soon watch the Hawks game on TV. Up to you.”
The guards exchanged glances, then shrugged.
“Keep the badge pinned on you anyway,” the first one told him. “And wear this under it.”
He handed Blaine a visitor’s badge and Blaine immediately clipped it onto his pocket and started to back the floor polisher toward the door. One of the guards held it open. Then he was inside, the pounding in his chest starting to slow down. He wondered what might have happened if they had checked the machine before letting him enter. Would they have found the pistol he had wrapped inside the coils of the cord? No matter now. Blaine pulled it free and jammed it into one of his spacious pockets.
He dragged the floor polisher across the tile, his mind searching for a means to locate Sahhan and get in to see him. It seemed crazy, but back in New York Blaine had concluded that his best strategy now lay in convincing the black radical that he was being used, that he was merely a tool for a white billionaire. McCracken would offer his own knowledge of the plan as proof and hope Sahhan believed him. If he found Sahhan, he would have to find a way to convince him. It was as simple as that. Tomorrow was Christmas Eve.
Without realizing, Blaine had pushed the floor polisher straight into the lobby, which was congested with guards. Too late to turn around; that would draw even more attention to him. So he crossed the floor en route to the elevators.
A pair of Sahhan’s guards appeared on both sides of him. Blaine looked up briefly, then back at his polisher. His heart was thudding against his chest again. He followed them into the elevator.
One of the men hit the button marked 10 for the top floor. McCracken feigned pulling his hand back as if that were his choice as well.
“Sorry, that floor will have to wait for tomorrow,” an icy voice informed him.
“I don’t work Christmas Eve, boss,” Blaine said.
The speaker just shook his head. “Not tonight.”
Without protest, Blaine hit the 9. The tenth floor was closed to him. He had found Sahhan. But which office? Where on the tenth floor would he be? Each floor contained yards and yards of corridors. There was no way he could check the room arrangements on the tenth.
The elevator stopped on nine. Blaine backed out and dragged his floor polisher after him. This level seemed deserted. All the doors along the corridor were closed, and only the standard night lighting was in use. His quarry was above him. Somewhere. Well guarded, too well guarded to reach easily. There had to be a way.
McCracken started to unwind the polisher’s cord, pretending to search for an outlet in case his actions were being viewed on the building’s closed
circuit television monitors. His mind kept working, though. He could take the stairwell up but it, too, would be guarded and even if he overcame the guards, there would still be too many obstacles to surmount before he reached Sahhan. He needed a direct route into the fanatic’s office, but how?
His first thought was to make an approach from the outside by scaling the building. Its design, though, was quite modern, the side little more than a sheet of glass.
Blaine looked up at the ceiling and felt a thin smile cross his lips. If this was of the standard office building design, there would be an insulated crawlspace between each floor. The top floor, the tenth in this case, would have an attic over it containing duct work, wire conduits, and plenty of room to maneuver if he could get up there. Blaine logged the options through his mind. The stairwell was out, as was the elevator. …
Wait! The elevator! Certainly he couldn’t use it in the traditional sense, but what if he improvised? With the polishing machine behind him, he moved to the elevator bank and pushed the down button.
The doors chimed open thirty seconds later and Blaine breathed easier at the sight of an empty compartment. He entered routinely, machine in tow. Once inside, he flipped the switch that would lock the doors open and, more important, hold the elevator in place.
McCracken’s eyes focused on the trapdoor above him. There was no sense worrying about the possible discovery of the inoperative elevator on the ninth floor and the subsequent investigation. He would have to hope that with everything else on their minds, the security guards wouldn’t notice until it was too late.
The trapdoor was well out of his reach, and Blaine did not want to venture into an office for a chair or something to provide a boost. Then he realized he already had just that in his faithful floor polisher. It was certainly heavy and sturdy enough to support his weight. With the base propped against the wall, it would do fine as a makeshift ladder.
Blaine had to get a yard off the floor and the polisher enabled him to do it. His hands pushed the trapdoor open and shoved it aside. Hanging tightly on to the edge of the opening, he pulled himself up into the shaft above the compartment, eyes widening to grow accustomed to the suddenly dim light. The smell of grease and oil flooded his nostrils as he climbed atop the elevator’s roof and reached out to test the cables. They were slippery but strong. His eyes probed around him.
What he sought lay fifteen feet up, an opening in the shaft half the size of a door. The opening would permit him access to the attic that lay directly above the tenth floor, thereby providing him with a direct route to Sahhan’s office from above. Blaine tested the cables one last time and started to climb.
The going was extremely slow. The grease on the cables coated his hands and made it hard to get a grip. Every time he removed a hand from the cable, he had to lower it to his white uniform and wipe it clean. Then he would pull himself up a bit more and lower the other. He found a twisted rhythm to the process and finally reached the doorway. It was latched but not locked. Blaine held tight with his hands on to the cable as he thrust his legs out and forced the door open.
He maneuvered his body through and crawled inside. In the near darkness he made out miles and miles of wire conduits and overlapping duct work, all in neat and orderly patterns. The heat was stifling, adding sweat to the grease coating his flesh, and Blaine started pulling himself along on his stomach, skirting some obstacles and passing under others. The tenth floor would be deserted except for Sahhan and his guards. He needed to find a reasonable cluster of activity, at least voices, to tell him he had found his mark.
He wanted to do his best to avoid the corridor. Guards would be poised there, and they might be alerted by scraping noises coming from above. Stiff and cramped, the heat cooking his flesh, McCracken crawled cautiously forward. He stopped when he heard a voice beneath him, muffled by the insulation, precise words indistinct. The words came in spurts lined with pauses. Sometimes the spurts were long, sometimes not. A phone conversation, Blaine realized. It had to be Sahhan, which meant he was directly over the militant’s office.
A few yards later, over what he judged to be the room next to Sahhan’s office, Blaine found a trapdoor which, when opened, revealed the layers of fiber glass insulation below. He stripped them away until the white drop ceiling panels were revealed and reached down to slide one back.
Beneath him was an empty room lit by a single lamp. He slid the panel back farther and lowered his head through to gain a better view.
It was a meeting room, dominated by a large conference table surrounded by chairs. McCracken’s eyes, though, went straight to an inner door connecting this room with the one next to it: Sahhan’s office. Blaine praised his luck.
He slid the ceiling panel all the way out and lowered himself softly onto the conference table below. He stepped down from it just as lightly. The carpet swallowed what little sound his stride made as he moved to the connecting door.
The knob gave enough to tell him it was open. He could hear Sahhan’s voice clearly now coming from the other side.
Blaine fit the silencer onto the barrel of the automatic Belamo’s contact had provided. He moved his shoulder against the door and grasped the knob tightly.
Then he burst into Sahhan’s office.
Chapter 25
“PUT IT DOWN. Slowly.”
McCracken’s rapid inspection of the dimly lit office showed no guards, only Sahhan seated behind his desk holding the telephone receiver tightly to his ear and wearing sunglasses as usual. Blaine stepped closer and made sure the fanatic saw his gun.
“Tell whoever you’re talking to that something demands your immediate attention. Not a word different. Say one and I’ll kill you now.”
Sahhan obeyed the instructions exactly. Blaine could sense the fear in his eyes behind the dark lenses. The receiver clicked into its cradle.
“But you haven’t come here to kill me, have you?” Sahhan asked.
“Not unless I have to.”
The radical shook his head and turned his chair to better face McCracken. “No, if you had meant to kill me, you would have done so already. You’re a professional. Professionals do not need to arouse their anger to motivate their kills.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment.”
“I meant it as one.” Sahhan leaned forward, his face screwed up into a tight ball. “Wait, I know you. You were at the reception a few days ago at George Washington. Mr. Goldberg, wasn’t it?”
“It was Goldstein.”
“And so, Mr., er, Goldstein, if you have not come here to kill me, what can I do for you? Surely you know that there are guards everywhere in this building, so you cannot possibly hope to get away with whatever it is you expect to.” Sahhan moved his sunglasses lower on his nose, as if to get a better look at the man holding the gun on him. “But then, that wouldn’t bother a man of your resources, would it? After all, you discovered a way in here. I’m sure you’ve devised a way out as well.”
“You’re going to escort me out yourself, Sahhan.”
“Kidnapping?”
Blaine shook his head. “A decision you’ll arrive at yourself after you’ve heard what I’ve come to say.”
“If you plan to ask more challenging questions, I assure you that the answers will—”
“No questions this time. Just statements. I know about Christmas Eve.”
Sahhan’s expression didn’t waver. “I suspected as much when you mentioned it at the reception. The proper people were alerted. Apparently they failed to eliminate you.”
“You called Randall Krayman or one of his representatives, am I right?”
Sahhan’s mouth dropped. Any words that might have been about to emerge were lost.
“Don’t bother answering, Sahhan, I already know the truth. Krayman’s financing your private army. He’s bankrolled this entire Christmas Eve rampage of yours and even set you up with Luther Krell to make sure your men were outfitted with the proper weapons.”
Sahhan looked away. “Know
ledge can be a dangerous weapon itself, sometimes a mortal one.”
“So can guns. And in this case you know about only half of them.” Blaine moved behind the desk until he was barely a yard from Sahhan. He could see the fanatic stiffen. “Listen closely, Sahhan, because here’s where the fun begins. Krayman’s been using you all along. You’re part of a much greater plan. I’ve just come back from an island in the Caribbean called San Melas. Krayman owns it. He’s been training mercenaries there for God knows how many months, training them to destroy your troops once they’ve accomplished their purpose. I’m not talking about just your troops either. You personally will pose too much of a threat for him to leave around. Krayman’s after some kind of ultimate control. The PVR was important to him only because it would give him an excuse to mobilize his private army into the nation’s streets.”
Sahhan looked at him calmly. “You have your facts wrong, Mr. Goldstein. It is I who am using Krayman. This entire affair was my idea.”
“No,” Blaine insisted. “Think back to your dealings with Krayman and his people. Weren’t they too neat, too clean? How many ideas did they put into your mind, how many words into your mouth? Where did you come up with the logistics for this strike? This is a large-scale operation, professional all the way. Krayman arranged consultations for you. Advice was given, so subtly perhaps that later you might have thought the ideas originated with you. There are men who specialize in such areas. Believe me, I know.”
“You know nothing!” Sahhan flared, his voice rising slightly. “You think I haven’t considered everything you’ve said? Krayman and I are working together to achieve mutual goals, but when all this is over, only mine will be achieved. There are fifteen thousand of my followers out there waiting for Christmas Eve to come. But once they begin to spread the justly deserved chaos throughout this nation, hundreds of thousands more will join them. The poor, the oppressed, the downtrodden, the frustrated—they will rally together against their oppressors. Then whatever else Krayman has planned won’t matter because he won’t be able to accomplish it without me. The paralysis will be total and only I will be in a position to lift it.”
