Dirty Harry 05 - Family Skeletons (19 page)

“You followed me after that first night,” he seethed.

“No!”

“You told Christine where to find me.”

“No. Harry, I swear . . .”

“What else did you do, Collins? How far would you go to get ahead? Kidnap and drug a girl after killing her boyfriend?”

Collins’ dark eyes widened. He could see the noose Harry was tightening around his neck.

“Would you kill another innocent girl just to frame the suspect?”

“Jesus Christ, Harry. Stop it. Stop it now.”

“Would you pump your captive so full of drugs she didn’t know who was holding her hostage? Would you get your hands on Browne and do the same to him?”

“Harry, you don’t know what you’re saying!” Collins cried, crawling up the wall. “No, man, you got it all wrong!”

Harry yelled over his denials. “Would you set up a whole sacrificial scene just so I could kill the suspect? And when I didn’t, you were there to play the cavalry?”

“This has gone far enough . . . !” Shanna declared, suddenly walking between Collins and the gun.

But Collins knew Callahan’s reputation better than the girl did. He knew Harry had the clout to make any arrest stick. And he knew that Harry was right in that this new chain of events had more logic than the cult story. Police corruption was so commonplace that the courts would buy almost anything. Just as the girl drew near, Collins grabbed her by the hair and around the waist. He used her as a shield as he ran out the door.

Harry gave chase, but Shanna just stood in the doorway after Collins had released her. Harry nearly punched her out of the way. Shanna saw his muscles tense and flinched. Harry stopped himself for the second time that day and just pulled Shanna back into the apartment by the shoulder.

“Get her out of here,” he told Linda. “And call the police!”

Harry tore after the black man in the white boxer trunks. Things had changed from the sixties. If a negro had run around any major city in his underwear ten years ago, he would have been tackled by twenty concerned citizens before he had gotten ten yards. Everyone would have assumed that he was running from the police. In the eighties, a man in trunks running as fast as he could was not unusual. Everyone would think that he was just another jogger. For one of the few times, Harry wished it was the sixties again.

Collins turned onto Beacon Street and ran up to the first corner. The light was only with him one way, so he took a left. Attached to the building across the street was a fire escape. Collins leaped up onto the first rung and started climbing.

Harry might have been able to hit him from the angle and the distance. But again something was keeping him from pulling the trigger. He had never shot a man unless it was in self-defense or he was absolutely sure about the guilt. As he crossed Beacon Street toward the fire escape, he had to admit he wasn’t sure. His theory made more sense than the Orenda plot, but then anything would.

Harry jumped onto the third fire escape rung, still clenching the .44 in his right hand but not aiming it. By then, Collins had reached the roof. He kept running without looking back. Harry pumped his legs harder. He had to get to the end of it. He couldn’t let Collins get away. He had to find out the truth.

Callahan dragged himself to the roof as fast as he could. He pulled himself over the roof lip just as Collins was leaping from one building to the next. The athletic black soared across a ten-foot span onto the tar of the brownstone next door. This time Harry did aim the weapon.

“Halt,” he said. Collins ducked behind a chimney. Harry purposefully pulled the trigger. The Magnum bucked in his hand, and the bullet slashed across the bricks of the fireplace tube. Collins started zigzagging across the other roof. Harry ran to the edge of the first building and jumped. He landed on the upraised lip of the second roof’s edge and fell forward. He rolled and came up running again.

Collins leaped to the next roof. They were playing leap frog across the tops of the Beacon Street townhouses. Harry stopped in the middle of the second roof and aimed at Collins’ churning legs. He could see that the black’s bare feet were already torn and bleeding.

With an eight and three-eighths-inch Magnum barrel, there’d be a good chance he’d be able to wing the detective. But with the slightly less velocity ability of the six and a half, it was chancy. Harry decided to chance it anyway. He pulled the trigger, the gun jumped, and the bullet tore a hunk out of the black man’s thigh.

With a pained shout, Collins skipped, stumbled, and fell right on the opposite edge of the third building. At that moment, Harry heard the sounds of police sirens screaming up the street. There was one thing nice about a battle between a Boston detective and a San Francisco inspector; it brought the rest of the force out damn quick.

Harry slowed as he neared the edge of his roof. He kept the .44 centered on Collins back as the man crawled to the front edge of the third building.

“Hey,” he screamed down at the squad cars, waving madly. “Hey, up here! Up here!”

The same feeling Harry had when he nearly shot the couple in the car instead of Browne returned to him with almost full intensity. Collins was calling the cops. He wanted their help. He hadn’t run because he thought Harry was going to turn him in. He ran because he thought Harry was going to kill him!

Callahan didn’t have a chance to think any more about it after that. Because the Boston policemen got out of their cars and started shooting at him.

C H A P T E R
T e n

T
he whole area around Harry’s feet seemed to erupt. His arms went up to protect his face as the tar of the roof, bricks on surrounding chimneys, and the metal on all the TV antennae started whinning, splitting, breaking, and flying off in all directions. The chips and shards dug into Harry’s skin as he spun down to his face.

Well, of course, these guys would be shooting at him, Harry told himself angrily. All they got in their patrol cars was an “officer needs assistance” code. And as far as the majority of the Boston PD was concerned, Collins was the officer—in or out of uniform. After all, it was Collins’ face that was plastered on every TV and newspaper in the city after the press conference, not Callahan’s.

Harry looked wildly around for a way out as the police bullets continued to slam into the surface around him. He figured he had nothing to fear immediately. The cops wouldn’t risk the lives of the tenants by shooting too low. But in a matter of minutes, if they were any good at all, a cop would appear on the fire escape of the first building, a cop would appear from the fire escape in the last building, a cop would crawl up the fire escape on this building, and a few more would be working their way up the stairs right below Harry. He couldn’t trust Collins to call them off. It might fit the detective’s plan to have Harry killed. He had to work fast if he wasn’t going to be perforated.

Callahan hastily crawled to the edge of the roof opposite the fire escape and looked down. There was a window on the third floor directly across from a third floor window in the next building. He looked around the roof for a door to a stairwell and saw it on the northwest edge of the building.

He risked rising to a crouch to run for it. He had just gotten his hand on the latch when an officer armed with an M-16 jumped onto the last building’s roof from the fire escape.

Oh God, Harry thought. The cop thinks he’s a SWAT member. Harry shot in his general direction just to keep him down. Then he hauled back the metal door and dove through. He slid face first down the first staircase as thirteen M-16 slugs made a circular design in the metal work of the roof door. As his face touched the third-floor carpet, Harry heard more cops pounding up to the second-floor landing.

Callahan got his bearings quickly. He found the door he was looking for, then leaned over the banister in front of it and started firing at the policemen below. He kept shooting until he heard them retreat to the first floor and the Magnum’s hammer clicked on a spent shell.

The cops below heard it, too. They doubled their speed up the steps. Their noise covered the sound of Harry kicking the door in. He jumped into the apartment and swung the door shut behind him, hoping the place was empty. No such luck. A petrified college student stood in the doorway to his bathroom, his pants down.

Harry lowered his gun, reached into his pocket, and took out a wad of bills. “You can have all this money if you don’t shout,” he told the embarrassed kid. Without waiting for an answer, he ran into the apartment’s bedroom, threw back the shades, and opened the window on the side wall. It wasn’t big enough. He closed it again and moved back to the bedroom door.

The kid was still staring in wide-eyed wonder at the cop. As Harry seemed to decide against whatever he was planning to do, the kid opened his mouth to ask a question. But then Harry ran as fast as he could in the other direction. He took three long strides and propelled himself through the window as hard as he could.

As the glass smashed around his head and folded arms, Harry sure hoped his trajectory was right. If he caught any part of the opposite wall, there’d be a long fall to Beacon Street.

He felt something smash into his side. After a split second, it gave way. Harry had done it. He had jumped across the alley through two closed windows.

He felt something sliding across his knees as he landed. He couldn’t push his legs straight. He looked down to see himself sliding across a table, taking most of some very surprised people’s lunches with him. He finally fell off the edge of the long surface, rolled, and came up at the door of the apartment.

“Sorry,” he said hastily to the four people half-out of their seats. Then he slammed the door behind him and went in search of a back way.

Timing was still important. With luck, the kid had kept his peace. If the cops didn’t know he’d changed buildings the hard way, they wouldn’t have enough men to cover all the block’s exits yet. But it was only a matter of minutes before they cordoned off the entire area.

Callahan found the back stairway. He went down until he found the basement door. It let out onto an alleyway between blocks. He saw no cops either way, so he crossed to a basement door on the opposite side and kicked it open. He walked through the building’s lobby and came out on Newbury Street.

He kept walking quickly without looking back. He still wasn’t in the clear, not by a long shot. He didn’t want the police to find him, and he didn’t want to give up so they could compare theories. He needed time to think. Someplace other than a police station.

He couldn’t return to Linda’s or Shanna’s apartment. That would be the first and second place they would look. He couldn’t go to Christine’s place. That would be the third place they’d look. Harry turned right up Newbury Street. There was only one other place he knew about for sure in Boston. And that was Shanna’s college counselor’s office—Dr. Gerrold.

Callahan moved quickly to the door in between the record store and cheese shop. He checked his watch. It was perfect timing. Just after five and closing time. He hoped the doctor would be out. Callahan trotted up the steps. On the first landing was a door to a chiropractor’s office. On the second was the sign for a professional medium. On the third and last was a legend which read: “Dr. Richard Gerrold. Students:
M-W-F
3 to 8
P.M.
All others by appointment.”

Behind the opaque glass the office was dark. Harry brought out his trusty credit card again. It didn’t work. Someone had installed a metal trim bar to prevent just such an occurrence. Callahan was undaunted. From the same wallet he had taken the card, he pulled out a thin metal rod. A few minutes at the top of the stairs and the lock clicked open and the door swung back.

The office was decked out very nicely. It had a comfortable, welcome, and private feeling. Three things Harry appreciated at this stage of the game. He relocked the door, leaned his back against it, and rubbed his face. Dropping his hands and sighing, Callahan tried to make his mind work again. It told him he was hungry. He began to prowl around the office for something to eat. He found a small refrigerator with a carton of orange juice and a red raspberry yogurt cup. He took both and moved toward the oak door opposite the receptionist’s desk marked “Private.”

He put down the yogurt and drank the OJ. while trying the knob. It was locked. The credit card worked on this one. Inside was an even classier room than the reception area. There was a big, walnut desk in the middle and a luxuriously appointed couch off to the side. All around those were bookcases filled with psychology volumes, spotlights, file cabinets, the latest in recording equipment, and a small locked cabinet that looked like it served as a bar.

Harry sat behind the desk, shook the yogurt canister vigorously, took the lid off, and drank it. He didn’t feel much better afterward, but at least it took an edge off his hunger. It let him think.

If Callahan was right about Collins, then the police would have one of the more insidious mass murderers in the city’s history under arrest. If he was wrong, then Harry was guilty of what he had accused Morrisson of: assault with a deadly weapon, resisting arrest, and disturbing the peace. Not to mention several other charges.

And just as before, Harry wasn’t positive he was right. The danger might be over, but the crime had not been completely solved. God, he groaned to himself, what a mess. Stuck in an Eastern city two thousand miles away from any possible character witnesses, with the police force after him. He had nearly killed his cousin’s husband. He had shot two of his beloved relative’s lovers and seen four other people die. And still he was no closer to any kind of peace of mind.

He needed a drink. Badly. He swung up to the cabinet, pulling out his metal pick as he rose. The lock was small and simple. Harry broke it in a matter of seconds. The small wooden side folded down into a little shelf. Inside was a junkie’s paradise.

There were vials of liquid in neat little rows. There were three separate syringes in their own individual velour cases. There was a brass cup full of needles, each individually wrapped and sanitized.