Killer in the Street (22 page)

He stepped out into the bright sunlight of a street that was at the moment completely empty of all traffic—auto or pedestrian. The nearest signal light was half a block away, and at this hour the traffic was all moving downtown. It was a beautiful day. That was an odd thought to take with him as he hurried to the alleyway where he had left the station wagon, but it was an odd thing he was about to do. Kyle Walker was a civilized man who was going to commit a murder in broad daylight because it was the only way he knew to save his own life and that of his family.

He was surprised at his coolness. Perhaps killing was an art that never left a man if learned early enough and thoroughly enough. He had no fear of eyewitnesses—what people saw was almost entirely subjective. Besides, the alleyway offered a shelter and, since the building was new and only partially rented, there weren’t many people who might be eyewitnesses. Finally, volunteering anything—especially criminal evidence—had gone out of fashion a generation ago. He removed the gun from his pocket and waited.

When Donaldson stepped out of the optometrist’s shop, he no longer wore dark glasses. He wore the same type steel-rimmed glasses he had worn on the night he strangled Bernie Chapman, and he still carried the sample case. He walked briskly to the pickup and reached for the handle of the door. At that moment Kyle came out of the alleyway and raised his gun. It was his intention to give Donaldson as much warning as Donaldson would have given him, but there were two exterior rear-view mirrors on the pickup, and Donaldson had one of them directly in front of his face as he opened the door. He whirled about holding the sample case before him. Kyle’s first bullet shattered the glass in the half-open door. His second smashed into the cab above Donaldson’s head as he made a successful dive for the front seat. An instant later, before Kyle could locate the target for his third shot, the pickup roared into motion and veered crazily into the street.

And then there were human sounds. A woman screamed. Kyle spun about in time to see Madsen’s chalk-white face staring at him from the doorway of the shop. He had missed his one chance and there was no way to pursue Donaldson now. He ducked back into the alleyway and raced for the station wagon.

The white pickup ran the first signal light, narrowly missing a laundry truck and two pedestrians. Before reaching the next intersection, it swung off onto a side street and slackened speed. Rick Drasco took stock of the situation. The left window was shattered and the mirror that had saved his life was demolished. Otherwise the truck was undamaged. He continued to drive more slowly and merged with the downtown traffic at the next signal. His palms were wet with sweat, and he could taste salt on his lips. His glands were reacting to the excitement of the hunt and to the anger—the wild, racing anger that was welling up inside like a volcano. Somebody was going to get hurt when it erupted. Rick Drasco always moved in his own way and at his own time. It wasn’t so much that Walker was fighting back that infuriated him; it was that he had the audacity to strike first.

Drasco reached the highway and drove slowly through the center of the city. At the outskirts, he parked beside a roadside telephone booth. The notebook in his coat pocket contained all of the telephone numbers pertinent to the contract. He found the one he wanted and put in a long-distance call—to Sam’s cabin in the mountains.

A soft, cautious male voice answered.

“I want to speak to Mrs. Kyle Walker,” Drasco said.

“Mrs. Walker isn’t here,” Ramon replied. “She has gone back to the city—last night.”

In the background Drasco could hear a childish voice pleading at Ramon’s side. “Is that my daddy, Ramon? Is my daddy coming today?”

“Who is that with you?” Drasco demanded.

“That is Mike,” Ramon answered. “Mike is the Walkers’ son. If you want to leave your name—”

“That won’t be necessary,” Drasco said. “You just tell Mike that I’m a friend of his Uncle Sam, and Uncle Sam asked me to drive up there to the cabin and take Mike to his daddy right away.”

Kyle needed help and knew only one place to turn. He couldn’t go back to Charley. She had done her noble bit and was very likely under police surveillance because of it. He couldn’t turn to Van. Van was brilliant but penniless. That left Sam. Kyle remembered that he could have told Sam the truth at the Booster Club luncheon—but that was a world ago when he held an advantage and gambled to win. Now, a loser, he drove scared and listened for the sound of sirens. Sam was the money man with worldwide contacts. He might at least be able to protect Dee and Mike.

And Sam wouldn’t be watched. Good Citizen Sam could be relied on to do the right thing if Kyle Walker came to call. Once the station wagon had turned in at the Stevens driveway, Kyle felt comparatively safe for the first time in almost twenty-four hours.

Sam’s Cadillac was still in the drive. Kyle parked directly behind it and walked quickly to the front door. He rang the bell several times. There was no answer. Sam was an early riser who usually breakfasted in the kitchen with a radio newscast blaring at full volume. Kyle walked around to the rear and found that door unlocked. He rang again and then walked inside. He was now on the service porch where another door opened into the garage. Passing it by, he stepped into the kitchen. Sam wasn’t there and the radio was silent, but there was evidence of a hasty breakfast having been consumed: half a cup of stale coffee, a plate that had held eggs and bacon and an unwashed skillet still on the stove. A second cup of coffee—black (the way Sam drank it)—was untouched, and placed beside the cup was a long white envelope with the name “Julia” scrawled across the front in Sam’s familiar bold hand. The envelope was unsealed. Kyle opened the flap and found that it contained two one-hundred-dollar bills. He replaced the money inside the envelope and left it on the table.

He walked into the hall and listened for some sound of life.

“Sam—?”

There was no answer. He walked to the study door and looked inside. At first glance the room seemed empty, and then Kyle noticed a second long white envelope propped up against a brandy decanter that was standing on a small table beside the leather chair. He walked to the table and picked up the envelope. This one was addressed, also in Sam’s hand, to Captain Jimmy Jameson. And then, because he was becoming prepared for what he would find, Kyle looked for Sam and found him seated deep in the leather chair facing the fireplace. He was dressed in his fanciest boots and the cowhide vest he had worn in the portrait, and the gun that was still clasped tightly in his right hand was a bone-handled range pistol taken from a rare-gun collection kept in a display case across the room. It had been fired once at close range and the shot was true. Sam Stevens had committed suicide.

Kyle was stunned. It was so senseless. Ignoring the name on the envelope, Kyle ripped out the contents and began to read:

The words on the paper in Kyle’s hand mocked his reason. There were several pages—some with dates and amounts of the transfer of money. It was the pathetic story of a man caught in a web from which he couldn’t get free short of the means he had finally used. The last few lines told that story:

Kyle stopped reading and touched Sam’s body. It was still warm. He had waited until Drasco left to fire the shot. That was the only way he could be sure Drasco wouldn’t find the letter and destroy it.

And now it was Kyle’s, and there was nobody left to protect Dee and Mike. He folded the letter carefully and put it back in the envelope, and then he put the envelope into his inside coat pocket. It just might be enough to buy his freedom.

Jimmy Jameson stood with his back to the wall map in his office and tried to follow Detective Geary’s story. Clifford was there to back him up. Baird had gone to the airport to check out the Mexico City flight.

“We know the man in the white pickup was Donaldson,” Geary said. “The optometrist, Madsen, gave us the story. Donaldson came in yesterday morning and left a pair of glasses with a broken lens. He wanted a rush order on the repair job—said he was in town to represent an air-conditioning firm and couldn’t do his work without glasses.”

“Madsen,” Jameson reflected. “He wasn’t the first listing, was he?”

“No, a Joseph Abrams was the first, but it didn’t matter. As soon as we got to Abrams and briefed him on the situation, he gave us the telephone number of the concern that would have to do the lens grinding on such a job. They traced the order back to Madsen and we got there about three minutes after the shooting.”

“Three minutes too late. What about the pickup? Did any of the witness get the license-plate number?”

“No. It was probably stolen anyway.”

“And what about the man who fired at Donaldson? Any identification?”

“Two positives,” Geary said. “Madsen and a waitress in the coffee shop across the street gave almost identical descriptions. I sent a man over to Walker’s house to pick up his photograph, and both witnesses agreed he was the attacker.”

“The attacker?” Dee echoed. “Oh, no!”

Jameson silenced her with a glance. “Aren’t you the person who reported to me that Kyle was missing and had taken his gun? Go ahead, Geary.”

“That’s about it,” Geary said. “Madsen got a look at Mr. Baird’s photo collection on the way back here and gave us another positive identification. Mr. Madsen, would you like to do your own talking?”

Ollie Madsen sat on a straight-backed chair flanked by Geary and Clifford. Somebody had given him a cup of hot coffee which he seemed to be using as a hand warmer. He smiled wanly.

“The man who told me he was R. R. Donaldson—I have his business card in one of my pockets. Oh, well. You know about that anyway. Donaldson is the same man Mr. Baird is looking for—Rick Drasco.”

“You will swear to that, Mr. Madsen?”

“On the Bible!”

“Thank you,” Jameson said. “Did Mr. Baird tell you that Drasco is a known gangland assassin who has been identified by his accomplice as the killer of a New York City garage attendant five years ago?”

Madsen looked pale.

“You may go now,” Jameson added.

“Now?” Madsen echoed.

“Don’t worry. Your shop is the last place Drasco will come to now. He got his glasses, didn’t he?”

“Yes, sir.”

“And now,” Jameson added, looking at Geary, “he’s no longer immobilized.”

Geary got the message. “I think we had better locate Walker and worry about Drasco later,” he said.

Jameson backed away from the map and leaned against his desk. He stared at a collection of wriggling, bisecting lines, and reflected on Kyle’s situation. He knew all of those streets—he had developed many of them. It wasn’t going to be easy to find him if he was determined to go on with this loner act.

“All right, let’s start with where we know he isn’t,” Jameson said. “He isn’t at his own house, and he isn’t at his secretary’s apartment.”

“When I talked to her last night—or was it early this morning?” Geary mused—”She said that R. R. Donaldson of Baemer Air Conditioning had called at Kyle’s office yesterday morning, but Kyle told her he was accepting no calls. That proves Drasco was trying to make contact.”

“Then it isn’t likely that Kyle will go back to his office today,” Jameson declared, “or that Baird will find him at the airport. Even if he was booked on that flight, he won’t expose himself so soon after the shooting.”