He went spiraling down and down the stairs impossibly. Finally, he stumbled out onto a cellar floor of packed dirt. Dazed and ill, he looked around, trying to get his bearings. A door slammed, startling him. He looked up. The stairs were just wooden stairs now. And the door at the top of the flight was shut. As Bishop stood there looking at it, he smelled gasoline. Gasoline was spilling down through the door, running down the stairs, dripping onto the cellar floor. The specialist had outsmarted him again, had caught him again. Bishop understood what was going to happen next a second before it did.
The gas caught fire. Of course. Flames spread over the cellar ceiling and down the stairs, blocking the way out.
Bishop stood squinting up at the flames. He knew this was real. He was trapped down here. And Weiss—where the hell was Weiss?
He turned to scan the cellar. There he was. He saw Weiss's body in the hectic light from the flames. Weiss was lying on the dirt cellar floor. He was lying on his side, one hand stretched up over his head, one resting in front of him. Bishop might have thought he was sleeping there, but for the blood that had run out of the center of him. It was pooled in the packed dirt, black in the firelight.
"Weiss." Bishop tried to shout the word but it was barely a rasp. He staggered across the cellar to him. He caught hold of a support beam, wrapped his arm around it. He slid down the beam to the floor, kneeling by his old boss.
He glanced over his shoulder. The fire was spreading up the walls and down the stairs toward him. He could feel the heat of it now. It dried the tears on his cheeks. The first tendrils of hot, black smoke drifted into his nostrils.
He wanted to die. He had failed at everything, even this. He wanted to kneel here and let the fire come and die with Weiss and have their bodies burn together. Crying dry, he looked down at the fallen man.
In the dancing flame glow, he saw Weiss's big body rise and fall with a breath.
"Jesus," Bishop murmured.
Weiss was still alive.
With a new feeling flooding into him, Bishop crawled across the floor to Weiss. He grabbed Weiss's heavy shoulder. He shook it, shouting, "Weiss! Weiss!" Behind him, the wood of the stairs began to crackle as it burned. The sound of the fire was growing louder. It was like a rushing wind. His voice was almost hidden beneath the noise of it. He shouted again. "Weiss!"
It was no good. Weiss just lay there. Bishop looked down at the sad, hangdog face, all slack and fleshy and flickering with fire. The sight of the old man made his heart ache. He wanted to tell him how sorry he was, sorry for everything. Sorry he had failed even at this.
But there was no point. Weiss couldn't hear him. Somehow Bishop would have to get him out of here and tell him then.
Bishop took a searing breath. He lifted his face. A black haze of smoke was hanging over him. Coughing, he looked down at Weiss. He had to lift him. That was the only way.
He worked as the smoke sank down toward him, as the fire leapt, crackling, around the stairs. He shoved and dragged Weiss's limp body onto its front. Grunting and hacking, he pushed himself off Weiss's back and stood and straddled him. He wrapped his arms around Weiss's enormous chest.
Holding on to Weiss, Bishop began moving backward. The effort ripped him open inside. He felt his innards tear ing like a paper bag. He screamed with the pain. He kept moving backward. Weiss was six foot four at least. Two hundred and fifty pounds at least. It didn't seem possible his body would keep rising, but it did. As Bishop moved backward, he drew Weiss to his knees. He went on screaming. He went on lifting Weiss. It was impossible, but it was real, like the fire and the tears were real.
Screaming again, he hauled Weiss to his feet. Holding him upright, he got around in front of him and raised one of his slack arms. Bishop bent his knees and pulled the arm over his shoulder. He brought the whole enormous body across his back, holding the arm with one hand and the dangling legs with the other.
Then, screaming wildly, he straightened, holding Weiss across his shoulders. His insides tore again. He felt hot fluid spilling inside him, spreading through him. He faced the fire on the stairs. The top steps were snapping and crumbling. Sparks were flying upward. The banister had become a line of bubbling flame.
Bishop charged up the stairs, up into the heart of the fire, carrying Weiss on his back. The flames surrounded him. The heat engulfed him. The smoke was everywhere, crawling over his hands, over his face. He lifted one leg and then another, climbing. His legs grew rubbery, weak. They wouldn't hold him. He fell to his knees. He rose again, screaming, lifting Weiss. The fire felt as if it would strip the flesh from his cheeks. He climbed. His guts bled inside him. He thought he must be dead already. He thought he must be a corpse animated by pure will.
He stepped on the top stair. It cracked. It caved in under his foot. Only the very bottom of the riser held. His foot came down onto it. He felt it bending with his weight. He had only another second before he broke clean through.
He drove himself forward into the door.
The door flew open. Bishop pushed through it, carrying Weiss. He was out—out in the upstairs room again. The room was ablaze. The whole house was burning. The night was blindingly bright with fire.
He turned, this way and that. The smoke was thick as mud. It smothered him like mud. He was lost in it. He couldn't see the door. He couldn't tell one direction from another. Black smoke was folding over him. Black unconsciousness was rising inside him.
It occurred to him that none of this was possible. It couldn't be real. It had to be a dream. But even then, in the impossible moment, with the black coming down over him and rising up inside him, he was struck with wonder by the fantastic appearance of a child.
He caught a glimpse of the child through the flames. He saw him standing in the chaos of smoke and fire, wonderfully calm, wonderfully still. It was a boy with red-gold hair and a beautiful face, all serene. Bishop remembered him from somewhere. He had seen him before as he had seen the demon truck driver before. It came to him then. The child was a character in a movie, some crap movie or other he had seen on TV. He had stayed up late one night, getting drunk on beer and staring at it. It was full of clichéd images like this one, like this golden boy. He had watched the entire film. It was a complete piece of shit. He wished he had never wasted his time with it. Now he was stuck with this clichéd kid, standing in the midst of the fire.
Well, maybe he wasn't real, Bishop thought, but there he was, all the same. He must've come in through the door. The door must be right behind him: the way out. Bishop went toward him, slogging across the blackness.
The fire clawed at his flesh. The smoke bore down on top of him. He staggered under the weight of the smoke and under the weight of Weiss. He went on, step by step, his knees starting to buckle. He carried Weiss to the child.
The child lifted his hackneyed and beautiful face. He lifted his white, white hand. Bishop held Weiss steady on his back with his right hand and held out his left toward the child. The child took hold of it. He drew Bishop forward, through the black smoke and the blackness inside him, through the flame and the flaming pain. Bishop gazed at the child, amazed and glad that he had come to him out of the crap movie. Then he looked up over the child's head. He saw the door. The door was a standing rectangle of white light. The child tugged him by the hand and drew him toward it.
The fire fell away behind him. The smoke and noise fell away. The door grew closer. The white light grew brighter, bigger. The white light surrounded him. The white light became everything.
Bishop opened his eyes. He didn't know where he was at first. He had come as if from light into light. He had been surrounded by that fantastic brightness, and now he was in the hospital room and the lights were on and Sissy was sitting over him. She smiled at him. She had a sweet smile. Tears were streaming down her cheeks.
Bishop tried to speak to her. It was hard. He hurt. He hurt a lot.
"Ssh, take it easy, Jim," Sissy whispered. Bishop remembered her voice and how tender it always was. "You'
re gonna be okay. You made it. You made it back to us."
Bishop tried to speak again. His mouth moved but he hadn't the strength to push the words out.
"It was close there, let me tell you," Sissy went on, her voice breaking. "We weren't sure you were going to pull through. You're a pretty tough guy."
Bishop tried to lift his hand to her. He couldn't. He must've moved it, though. Sissy looked down at it and put her own hand into it. Bishop was glad to feel her. The soft woman skin. The cool woman skin.
His eyes traveled from her face, up and around the room. Chairs, the bed rail, a silver tray, tubes, machines. It was the same hospital room as before. He had never left it. The house in the middle of nowhere wasn't real. The demon wasn't real and the child wasn't and neither were the fire and the whole business about carrying Weiss. Only the darkness had been real. The darkness and the light. And the tears—he could feel the tears rolling down his face onto the pillow. They were real too.
He was alive. That was the point. He was still alive. Maybe he had failed at everything, but whatever needed to be done, there was still time to do it.
He licked his dry lips. He squeezed Sissy's hand. He wanted to tell her how sorry he was, how terribly sorry. He had not gotten to Weiss. He had not told him about the Shadowman's plan.
"It's all right," she whispered down at him. "It's all right."
Bishop closed his eyes, exhausted. He would live. There was time. But it was not all right. It was not all right at all. He had not reached Weiss. He had not told him the plan.
Weiss was still out there—still out there, in the middle of nowhere—alone.
50.
For him, in the end, it was a matter of seconds.
Weiss heard Julie's footstep on the path. That was the first he knew she was there. She was almost at the house, almost at the front door.
He sat stock-still in the armchair in the darkened room. The .38 was in his hand, his palm sweaty against the grip. He held his breath, straining to hear. The footsteps drew closer. He knew the killer would have to make his move in the next moment.
Weiss sat still, sat still. There was no room for error. If the killer was still watching him, if he saw him leave the chair, it would be over. He had to go at exactly the right moment.
Julie's hard heels sounded on the paved path. Ten yards away. Then five. Then three.
Then a break in the rhythm of her step. And Weiss thought: now.
51.
The killer moved.
The girl was only two strides from the door. She was lifting her hand to the knob. He had waited for this. People who are nervous or afraid of something look over their shoulders as they approach a door, but there is a moment when they have to open it, when they have to focus forward and they can't look around. That's the moment you can take them. He knew this. He had done it half a hundred times.
He was out of the car in a second, the 9mm SIG held lightly in his hand. He went up the walk behind her without making a sound. In his excitement, the silicone bodysuit seemed to weigh nothing; the fake flesh seemed to have become his own. He moved easily. He glided through the rain.
Now he was right behind her. She was unaware. It was a fine electric moment. He was alive to everything: the rain on his face, the feel of the gun, the way his movements seemed to flow, inevitable. Then something else: he caught the scent of her. The musky, flowery scent of her on the cool, wet desert air. It was a joy.
She opened the door quickly. With a fearful, jerky motion, she slipped her hand inside and flicked up the light switch. She was about to take one last look behind her.
Before she could, the killer grabbed her.
He slipped his left arm around her throat. He yanked her close against the left side of his chest. That kept his body protected and his gun hand clear.
He was through the door, in the house, in the living room. It was a moment like music. The smell of her hair filled him. His cheek was close to her cheek. Her soft throat was trapped in the crook of his arm. He held her fast and leveled his gun at the armchair, at Weiss.
But Weiss was gone. The chair was empty.
The killer kept moving. He was ready for this. He stepped to the side, carrying Julie with him. He had her almost off the floor. She was choking, clutching at his arm, but too weak to struggle. With a sweep of his gun hand, he covered the kitchen, the bedroom, and the front door—the only places Weiss could've gone.
It all happened in a second, one single second with the girl gasping and the rain pattering and the killer sweeping the room with his gun, waiting for Weiss to come at him.
Then, for the first time, as he turned from one side of the house to the other, he saw the braid rug out of place. He saw the trapdoor in the floor.
A bolt of fear went through him. He hadn't known about the trapdoor. He had missed it when he checked the house earlier. The rug out of place. The trap. Weiss could be down there.
Surprised, he swung to face it, lowered the gun at it.
The moment he did that, he knew Weiss was behind him. Weiss had gone out the kitchen door and come around the house, come back in through the front. Of course he had. He had only needed the man who called himself John Foy to see the trap, to face it for that single instant. He was Weiss—and he had known that's what the killer would do.
The thought went through the killer's mind: swing back around, swing Julie around for a shield, shoot Weiss down as he comes through the door.
But he only had time for the thought. Then Weiss stepped up behind him and drove the butt of a .38 into the base of his skull.
The man who called himself John Foy crumpled to the floor, unconscious.
52.
The killer let go of Julie Wyant as he fell. She staggered away from him, deeper into the room. Rubbing her throat, she looked up at Weiss where he stood hulking and breathless just within the doorway. The killer lay on the floor between them.
Weiss looked at her. The sight of her made something catch and hesitate inside him. He knew that sweet, rose, white, and wistful face, the dreamy eyes—he knew them so well from the pictures he had of her; now here she was before him in the flesh.
She seemed about to speak. He stopped her with a gesture—a movement of his head toward the open door.
Julie Wyant swallowed, rubbing her throat. She looked down at the man on the floor. She nodded. She moved to the door, passing close to Weiss, so close he smelled her and felt the heat of her. Without pausing, she reached for him, gently pressed his arm through his trench coat. He ached.
Then she was gone.
With a grunt, Weiss dropped down on one knee beside the fallen gunman. He retrieved the 9mm SIG from where it had dropped from the gunman's hand onto the braid rug. As he slipped the weapon into his raincoat pocket, he heard a metal door shut in the night outside. Julie had gotten back into her car. He heard the engine turn over.
The killer was already stirring. Weiss held the .38 on him and searched him quickly with his left hand. He reached inside his raincoat, feeling his sides, under his arms, the small of his back, the waistband beneath his paunch. He ran his hands down one leg, then the other. He found the compact .45 in an ankle holster on his right leg. He waggled it free.
Weiss stood up. He had his .38 in one hand and the killer's .45 in the other. As he stood, he caught a glimpse of headlights from the corner of his eye. That was Julie Wyant driving away.
He would probably never see her again, he thought.
He moved heavily across the room, back to the armchair. He sank down into it. He laid the .45 on the phone table beside it. He trained the .38 on the man on the floor, the man who called himself John Foy.
It was the first good look he'd had at him. The first good look he'd had, knowing who he was. He couldn't remember how he'd looked the other time he saw him, in the driveway back in Hannock. He had the sense he looked totally different now. Bigger somehow—or fatter maybe. He wasn't sure. He had the sense if he ever saw the guy again, he'd look different then to
o.
The killer groaned. He shifted on the floor. He moved his hand to his head and rubbed the spot where Weiss had hit him. His eyes fluttered open.
"Oh God," he said.
As Weiss watched, he slowly pushed himself up into a sitting position. He shook his head as if to clear it. He breathed in deep. He looked around until he saw Weiss sitting over him in the armchair.
Then he smiled.
Weiss held the gun steady on him.
Good, the killer thought.
This was what he had planned for. He'd hoped to get Weiss on the ground fast, but he'd known what Weiss was, he'd known what Weiss could do. So now the detective had the SIG Sauer and the .45. But the Saracen was still nestled in the pocket of the killer's body vest. In a minute or so, the man who called himself John Foy was going to pull it out and blow Weiss away.
Good, he thought.
But the rage—the rage burned in him. He didn't care about the thudding ache in his head. He could ignore that. But not the rage. Sure, he had known Weiss might outguess him, might trick him somehow, but now that it had happened, he didn't like it one bit. And the trapdoor—that was almost as if Julie had been in on it with him, as if they had planned the thing together, laughing at him the whole time. And then—why had Weiss let Julie go? He was aware of it, aware of her driving away, even as he came back to consciousness. That was the one thing he hadn't planned for. He wanted her to be here. He wanted her to see what was going to happen next. He had assumed Weiss would want her to see that too. He thought that was the point of the whole thing, that she was the point. It had never even occurred to him that Weiss might let her run away.
Now she was gone. He would have to find her all over again. It wouldn't be hard this time. There was only one road out of here. He would track her down before she ever reached the interstate. He just had to get this over quickly and get on her trail. But he had wanted her to see this, and the rage burned in him.
Damnation Street Page 25
