The Disappearance (The Lt. Hastings Mysteries)

by Collin Wilcox

  As he was talking, I raised my head for a look, and for the first time noticed that most of the glass was gone from the front windows—two full stories and two smaller windows on top. Dirty lace curtains stirred in the warm breeze. Nothing else.

  “So,” Harris was saying, “Byrnes and I ran around to the front and covered Smith, while he hauled Blackman back to—”

  “Just a minute,” I interrupted. And to the ambulance stewards: “Hold it, you men. Wait till I give you the word before you get out from behind this car. You could draw fire.” I looked around the crouched semicircle of a dozen officers, half of them with shotguns, all of them clustered behind the two cars, waiting for instructions. I found four familiar faces, two with shotguns. I ordered them to break in pairs for the houses on either side of the Victorian tenement, where they could get a good angle of fire, protecting the ambulance men without exposing themselves. Another half dozen men I assigned to crowd control; someone was already on the loudspeaker, haranguing the sluggish rubberneckers, forcing them beyond the suspect’s line of fire. Now I saw a cruiser pulling up and was surprised to see the bulky figure of Pete Friedman behind the wheel.

  As the four men broke for the two adjoining houses, dodging and running low, we all drew our guns to cover them. But, carefully watching the gently blowing curtains, I could see nothing stir. Was he still in there? Could he have—?

  A shot cracked out. Glass splintered from one of the small third-floor windows. The savage whine of the ricochet sounded behind me. I dropped to the street and whirled. No one was hit, and now the crowd, black and white mixed, was pulsating with the particular low, primitive mumble of a mob, restless and frightened.

  “Hold it,” I called as several officers raised their weapons, aimed at the small window. Then pointing to the single man with an automatic rifle, I said, “When these ambulance men move, you put a timed volley into those two windows. Empty the whole clip. Got it?”

  “Yessir.” He rested the big rifle on a squad car’s roof, carefully sighting. The man looked good, calm and competent, deliberately nestling his cheek snugly against the rifle’s stock.

  I turned to the crouching ambulance stewards. The older of the two was licking his lips, looking walleyed back over his shoulder.

  “All right, you men,” I said softly. “Are you ready?”

  The older man seemed about to shake his head, but finally gave me a sick, sheepish grin. He looked as pale as the victim, who still lay with eyes closed, lips twitching. I wondered whether the patrolman was dying.

  “All right,” I said sharply, gesturing to the stewards. “Go.” And to the rifleman I called, “Shoot.”

  The rifle cracked as the patrolman began squeezing off his shots. The savage, mind-searing crack of the high-powered weapon took me fleetingly back to a foxhole—face in the mud, hands clasped over my helmet, trembling, desperately wondering whether I’d soiled myself. Frantically praying, wildly, incoherently.

  A patrolman opened the ambulance doors; another patrolman waited at the wheel. The two stewards pushed the gurney inside; the doors slammed shut. The ambulance was moving, gathering speed. I exhaled, called for the rifleman to stop shooting, then returned my gaze to the house. A hand lightly clapped my shoulder. Friedman’s broad, sweaty face was close to my own, just below the level of the squad car’s window. Lieutenant Friedman, at two hundred and fifty pounds, was always very particular about his cover.

  “What’re you doing here?” he asked.

  “I was on my way downtown when I heard the two-oh-two.”

  He snorted. “I was on my way to the dentist. Next time I’ll leave the radio off. I think I’ve got an abscess.” He eased himself down to sit flat on the pavement.

  I realized that I was smiling. “Well, you’ve probably missed your appointment by now. You may as well stick around. We can co-manage this operation.”

  Again he snorted, settling his bulk more comfortably, then sighing. “I’m senior. I’ll plan the strategy. You can execute it. What’s going on?”

  Harris and I gave him the details. Friedman listened sourly, constantly exploring the inside of his mouth with his tongue, occasionally touching his cheek tenderly. Finally he rose laboriously to his knees, took off his hat and studied the house. “Anybody got any vests?” he asked.

  “We have,” Harris said. “Byrnes and I.”

  “Get them, then,” Friedman ordered. “Then get on the horn and find out whether there’s anybody in the crowd from that house who knows the layout.”

  Harris nodded, then moved away.

  “What’d you think?” Friedman asked.

  “I think we’d better call in and let the captain know what’s happening. Then I think we may as well send four men into the house, to make the suspect stay put. Then we can fire a gas grenade through that upper window and see what happens.”

  Friedman promptly nodded. “Excellent. Right out of the book. You want to go in?”

  “Not really.”

  “You take this one, I’ll take the next. Honest to God, Frank, I don’t want to jiggle this tooth. You’ve just got no idea how—”

  “All right.” I looked around. “I’ll take Harris, Smith and that guy with the rifle. Do you know him?”

  “Yeah. His last name is Lloyd. He’s a good man. Doesn’t get rattled, and he got a departmental citation not so long ago. He’s one of those killer types, though. You’ve got to—”

  Harris was running across the street to us, keeping low. I watched the blowing curtains, but could see no sign of movement. Harris dropped to the ground, his notebook in his hand.

  “Here’s the house layout,” he said breathlessly. “If the guy’s still up in that front window on the top floor, according to this colored girl I found, he’s got himself bottled up. There’s only one stairway leading up to that apartment. See?” He pointed, explaining the rough sketch.

  “Does this girl live there?” I asked.

  Harris nodded, gulping for breath.

  “Does she know the suspect?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Did you describe him to her?”

  “Well—” He hesitated.

  “Never mind,” Friedman said. “Why don’t you and Harris get the vests on, Frank, while I call in to Captain Kreiger? If there’s a chance the suspect’s got himself bottled up, we’d better move.”

  I nodded, assembled the three officers and explained the plan. Harris and I, with the vests, would go first, carrying our service revolvers. Smith and Lloyd would back us up, carrying shotguns. We buckled on the vests, checked our weapons and waited behind the cars, crouched low. We all had gas masks, slung over our shoulders. In my left hand I carried a walkie-talkie; in my right hand, my service revolver. Friedman and I checked our walkie-talkies. Then, at Friedman’s nod, we ran for the building—spreading out, running low, zigzagging.

  I got to the porch first. We were still exposed to fire from a downstairs window. I hit the door with my right shoulder, popping it open, splintering the panels. We were inside the dingy entryway, littered with papers and candy wrappers. The stairway was to our right, just as Harris had drawn it. Four ground-floor doors opened off the entryway, all of them closed. I looked at the door that apparently led into the front apartment.

  In a low voice, struggling for breath, I said into the walkie-talkie, “We’re by-passing the front apartment downstairs, Pete. Nobody’s stirring. But you could station a couple of men in the entry hall down here. We’re proceeding upstairs. I’ll tell you when to fire the gas.”

  “Roger. I’ll send in the two men immediately. Watch yourself. Kreiger told me, before I left, that he’s got some kind of a new, cushy assignment for you. So stay well.”

  “Roger. Here we go.” I slipped the walkie-talkie into my side pocket, telescoping the aerial. I instructed Lloyd to keep an eye behind us. Then, slowly, Harris and I began climbing the stairs. Smith came next, then Lloyd, coolly glancing back over his shoulder.

  We reached the sec
ond-story landing. There were two doors, one for the front apartment, one for the rear. I pointed to the front apartment and placed the men: Harris to the right of the door, myself to the left; the other two stood back to either side. It was the operation repeatedly drilled into every policeman: how to enter a dangerous room. I nodded to the three men and got answering nods in return. I shifted my gun to my left hand and slowly tried the door. The knob turned, the door moved inward a fraction of an inch, unlocked. I took a deep breath, nodded again and crouched low. Harris, on the other side, was doing the same. I would go in first, breaking to the left. Harris, coming right behind me, would break to the right. If trouble developed, we would fall flat, the two men behind us firing over our heads.

  At the last second, I remembered the walkie-talkie. I took it out of my pocket, placing it carefully on the floor beside the door. Then, nodding a last time, I slammed open the door, throwing myself into a narrow, dark hallway. Ahead was a living room, opening on the street. I was standing in the center of the room, still crouching, my feet crunching bits of shattered glass littering the floor.

  The place seemed empty—silent, harmless. I instructed Lloyd and Smith to keep the outside hallway under surveillance while Harris and I checked the closets, beds and bulky furniture. We finished in the kitchen. Seeing a dirty glass on the drainboard, I opened the cold-water tap and filled the glass, thirstily gulping. The two faucets both dripped, and beneath each faucet the porcelain of the sink was worn through to black iron. I filled the glass again and offered it to Harris. He shook his head. I drained the second drink, hearing myself noisily swallowing. Something in the sound momentarily evoked the sensations of football on a fall afternoon: drinking from the water bucket, watching the plays, listening to hurried instructions; breathing deeply, absently feeling for bruises; wincing unconsciously when a player got badly crunched.

  “Okay,” I heard myself saying. “Let’s try the top floor. I’ll call for the gas.” I went out into the hallway, switching on the walkie-talkie. “We’re going up to the top floor, Pete. Can you get a gas cannister in there?”

  “Sure. I’ll confirm it. I’ve got Bertha now. No problem.”

  “Roger. Let me know.”

  Bertha was an armored car, similar to a Brinks van.

  I slipped the walkie-talkie into my pocket, leaving the switch open. Then, nodding to the others, I started up the last flight of stairs.

  As I cautiously poked my head above the floor level of the third landing, I saw only one door. If he was up there, we had him. I motioned for the others to look, then to keep their heads down.

  “I’ve never figured out,” Harris was whispering, “why they always head for the top floor. If he’s there, he’s cooked.”

  “Sometimes they’re looking for the roof.”

  Harris shrugged, shaking his head. Lloyd was between us now, slipping his shotgun into the bannister spokes, training the gun on the single door. He settled himself comfortably—naturally—behind the gun. He was young, still in his twenties. He was tall and well muscled, and he moved with a slow, deliberate grace. His face was good-looking, clean-cut—an all-American face. But his dark eyes, staring down the gun barrel, were somehow too calm. Deadly calm, they suddenly seemed. Dead and calm.

  I watched Lloyd raise a deliberate hand to remove his uniform hat. His eyes never left the door. He dropped the hat to the stairs. I watched the hat tumble slowly down to the landing.

  “Don’t shoot too quick,” I warned. “If he gets any of that gas, he won’t be able to—”

  I heard a small thud, then a low hissing. At the same moment, the walkie-talkie crackled.

  “There it is, Frank,” I heard Friedman say. “Have you got good cover?”

  “Roger. We’re all set.”

  “All right. Don’t take any chances. Remember that cushy assignment Kreiger’s got for you.”

  “Roger.” I clicked off the radio, slipping it back in my pocket. “Keep your heads down,” I cautioned. “Don’t—”

  From the paint-peeling door came the stifled sound of a cough. For the first time, I saw that the door was splintered around the lock. He’d kicked it in.

  “All right,” I yelled. “Come on out. Open the door and throw out the gun. Then, when we tell you, come out with your hands clasped behind your neck. We’ll give you exactly ten seconds. And remember, first the gun. Then, when we give the word, you come out. Not before. You have ten seconds.”

  Now the coughing was louder. I listened for the sound of movement, my eyes fixed on the door. Nothing stirred. I reached for the walkie-talkie.

  “Give us another cannister, Pete.”

  “Roger. Half a minute.”

  But almost immediately I again heard the thump, and the hiss. Two perfect shots, in succession. Lloyd still stared fixedly down the barrel of his shotgun. Now his lips were drawn back. His teeth were clenched, his jaw muscles corded.

  The door opened. From inside came the sound of choking, gasping. The yellowish-white gas eddied out into the hallway.

  “Throw the gun out,” I called. And to my three men: “Keep your heads down. He might—”

  He was staggering out into the hallway. He tripped on the torn carpeting, falling to his knees. He looked young, barely twenty. His eyes were tightly shut, his cheeks wet. With his left hand he reached out, clutching the bannister. He was retching; vomit stained his shirt and trousers. I could smell the odor plainly. The small revolver was in his right hand, raised to point at the opposite wall, twelve feet from our heads. He was still on his knees, shaking his head like a groggy fighter. Beside me, Harris was shifting his pistol to his left hand, drawing his night stick. He began crawling up the stairs, silently, keeping low. If Harris could get close enough with the stick, he could—

  The suspect suddenly lurched blindly to his feet, then fell against the bannister. The revolver was pointed down at the floor.

  “Drop it, goddamnit,” I was yelling. “Drop it, or—”

  Lloyd’s shotgun blasted, a foot from my head. The suspect smashed back against the far hallway wall, hung spread-eagled, then slipped to the floor. His shirt was bloody; the wall above him was blotched with bits of bloody flesh and shreds of bloody clothing. His legs jerked spasmodically, his fingers twitched. He was huddled in the fetal position. The head lay at a strange, awkward angle, as if the neck were snapped. The eyes, still streaming tears, stared at the blank wall, a few feet above my head. The mouth gaped. The legs no longer jerked; the fingers were still.

  I stood up, reaching for the walkie-talkie. I cleared my throat, biting my tongue against a rising sensation of nausea. “Okay, Pete. Tell them to bring the stretcher up.”

  “Roger.” There was a pause. Then: “Everyone all right?”

  “Everyone’s all right. No problem.”

  “Here we come.”

  I returned the walkie-talkie to my pocket, then holstered my gun. Harris was climbing the stairs, his gun held on the dead boy while he took his revolver, emptying the cylinder. Smith, behind him, was covering. I watched Lloyd take his shotgun from between the bannister spokes. He ejected all the shells, according to regulations, then reloaded the magazine, leaving the chamber empty. He pointed the gun toward the ceiling, clicked the hammer, then set the safety. Now he lowered the gun, and without glancing at the body, walked the few steps down to the landing, picking up his uniform hat. He carefully brushed the hat, adjusted it on his head, then turned to stare silently up at me. He held the shotgun easily, as if the weapon were a part of his arm. His dark eyes were expressionless.

  Friedman’s battered brown felt hat appeared on the stairway. Looking down, I saw a small, graying, bald-headed man plodding behind Friedman’s heaving bulk. He wore a tattered gray sweater, with a dirty undershirt beneath. His chino trousers were wrinkled and badly stained; his blue-veined feet were thrust into run-over carpet slippers.

  As Friedman gained the last landing, he stepped aside, puffing, to let the small man go ahead.

  “This is
Mr. Kirsch,” Friedman said, glancing briefly at the corpse. “He lives—lived—in the same building with the suspect, just a couple of blocks away.” He pointed to the body, still bleeding heavily. “Is that your neighbor, Mr. Kirsch? Leo Powell?”

  The bald man glanced once at the body, then closed his eyes. He turned, suddenly sitting on the stairs. I saw a single tear slowly streaking Mr. Kirsch’s pale, gray-stubbled face.

  “Well?” Friedman prodded.

  “That’s him, all right. That’s Leo.” He shook his head. “Honest to God, I don’t understand it. Some of the punks in this neighborhood, black and white, you can tell from the time they’re little tiny kids, they’re going to end up bad. But Leo, I known him for five, six years. He’s like a little kid, even though he’s eighteen, nineteen. He never hurt nobody—nobody at all. Never gave nobody any trouble.”