F Paul Wilson - Novel 10 (62 page)

 
          
Carole's
tone took on a definite chill. "You're saying that Joseph would jeopardize
our lives and what we know just to get revenge on Franco?"

 
          
"You're
not answering the question."

 
          
Carole
looked away.

 
          
Was
it simple revenge? That had to be part of it, Lacey knew, and she had her own
score to settle with this monster for what he had done to her Uncle Joe. But
she sensed something more than revenge driving Joe to this showdown, something
she was missing.

 
          
That
worried her.

 
          
"Look,
Carole, you've got to admit that Joe isn't exactly the same guy he was a week
ago. He was dead, and now he's not. What brought him back to life? It wasn't
your God, so what was it?"

 
          
"God
intervened. Joseph was supposed to become one of the undead, but he did not.
God has turned the Devil's own work back on him, making Joseph an instrument of
His divine vengeance."

 
          
"Buy
into that if you want, Carole. I don't. I can't. And I'm a little worried about
that weird dream he's been having. We know Joe's been to hell and back. I just
hope he didn't bring a little of that hell back with him."

 
          
CAROLE
. . .

 
          
By
Sunday evening they were ready to make their move.

 
          
Fifty-three
minutes before sundown, as soon as Joe was up and fed—Lacey's turn tonight—he
got behind the wheel of the Navigator and drove down Broadway. Lacey sat up
front next to her uncle; Carole had the rear to herself.

 
          
"Are
we ready for this?" he said as they approached
Thirty-fourth Street
.

 
          
Carole
wasn't sure. She hoped so.

 
          
They'd
learned through three days and three nights of steady surveillance that the
Vichy—the more time she spent with Joseph and Lacey, the more Carole found
herself using that designation—stuck to a fairly rigid schedule of two shifts:
a large contingent of perhaps twenty-five or thirty worked the days, while only
a half dozen or so manned the entrance at night.

 
          
They'd
taken over Houlihan's and turned the bar-restaurant into a cafeteria of sorts.
It served two meals a day—breakfast and dinner—at change of shift. Using
binoculars, Carole and Lacey had watched from their perch across the street as
the Vichy attacked heaps of scrambled eggs every morning—the cook had to be
using the powdered kind—and pots of some sort of stew every evening.

 
          
All
three agreed that the meal break at shift change was the time to strike. All
the Vichy were concentrated in Houlihan's then. They'd settled on dawn, Monday,
for their assault.

 
          
But
assault how?

 
          
Joseph
and Lacey had wanted to find a way to use the napalm, rig it somehow to explode
and turn the restaurant into an inferno while the
Vichy
were eating their breakfast. But the
"somehow" eluded them. And even if they did manage to come up with a
way to explode it, the napalm presented too many chances for something to go
wrong. If they were only partially successful—if they killed some but not all
of the Vichy—they'd have to abandon all hope of success. They couldn't win a
fire fight with them, and from then on the Vichy would be warned and on full
alert.

 
          
Carole
had had a better idea. This was why she'd brought along the canister of sodium
fluorosilicate. She'd had a feeling they might need a more silent form of death
than bullets and napalm. She'd found canisters of the chemical at one of the
local municipal utility authorities where it was used to purify the water
supply. At a few parts per million, sodium fluorosilicate was harmless. But
ingestion of half a gram of the odorless and tasteless powder interfered with
cellular metabolism, making you deathly ill. A gram caused convulsions and
death. Not a pretty way to go, but probably better than being burned alive by
napalm.

 
          
Carole
wished there were another way, one that could be delivered by someone else and
not multiply the number of lives she'd already taken. But there was nothing and
no one. It was her idea, her responsibility. She couldn't shirk it off on
someone else.

 
          
The
question was, how to get it into the
Vichy
? Obviously via their food. This evening's
sortie would accomplish that—they hoped.

 
          
Joseph
turned the big SUV onto Thirty-fourth and said, "Let's pray that those
technicians I've been watching don't eat with the rest of them tomorrow. We
need them. And besides, they appear to be innocent. The three of them seem
older than the typical
Vichy
, they're unarmed, and dress like middle managers. They arrive in a
group every morning, flanked by two
Vichy
.

 
          
They're
not tied or manacled, but I get the impression they're prisoners of some
sort."

 
          
"But
they could wind up sick or dead," Lacey said. "Then what do we
do?"

 
          
"Please,
God, don't let them," Carole said. She had blood on her hands, she was
crimson to her elbows, but so far none of it was innocent.

 
          
"But
what if they do?" Lacey persisted.

 
          
Joseph
shook his head. "I've been watching three dawns in a row and not once have
they eaten with the others. In fact, by the time they're brought in, breakfast
is just about done, and they're taken directly inside. Let's hope tomorrow is
no exception."

 
          
Halfway
between Sixth and Fifth Avenues, Joseph slowed the car to a crawl. Carole
leaned forward, peering ahead between Joseph and Lacey toward the lighted
windows of Houlihan's, glowing like a beacon in the fading light. She searched
for signs of stray
Vichy
who'd wandered away from the
Fifth Avenue
entrance around the corner where they
usually hung out. But nothing was moving on the street except their car.

 
          
"Damn!"
Joseph said. "The earring. Would somebody do the honor?"

 
          
Lacey
fished the
Vichy
earring off the dashboard and punched it
through his earlobe.

 
          
"Didn't
feel a thing," he said. "Are you ladies ready?"

 
          
"Ready
as I'll ever be," Lacey said. "How about you, Carole?"

 
          
Carole
could only nod. Her mouth was too dry for speech. They were entering the belly
of the beast.

 
          
Joseph
swung the car into the curb and stopped. Houlihan's lit-up interior was empty.
Dinner wasn't ready yet. The cook was back in the kitchen.

 
          
"I'll
turn the car around and wait here. Hurry. And be careful."

 
          
Carole
watched Lacey shove a pair of steel bars she called "nunchucks" up
the left sleeve of her sweatshirt. She turned to Carole and took a deep,
quavering breath.

 
          
"Let's
roll."

 
          
Carole
alighted with her backpack in her hand. She'd removed the stakes and crosses
and hammer and replaced them with a football-size sack of sodium
fluorosilicate. A pound of the stuff. Enough to kill the
Empire
State
Building
's
Vichy
contingent a dozen times over.

 
          
They
hurried across the sidewalk, pushed through the revolving glass doors, and
headed straight for the rear of the restaurant area. The air smelled sour. The
bar, tables, and floor were littered with paper plates, food scraps, and empty
beer cans. Waves of glistening brown beetles scurried out of their way as they
approached.

 
          
"Cockroaches,"
Carole whispered. "I've never seen so many."

 
          
"Maybe
they feel some kinship with the clientele," Lacey replied.

 
          
They
paused outside the swinging doors to the kitchen. Light filtered through the
two round, grease-smeared windows.

 
          
"Okay,"
Lacey said. "I go first."

 
          
She
pushed through the doors; Carole followed. A fat, balding, cigar-chewing man in
a bulging tank top stood before a stove, stirring a big pot. He looked up as
they entered.

 
          
"Who
the fuck are you?" he said.

 
          
"A
couple of hungry ladies," Lacey said. "Got any dinner you can
spare?"

 
          
"Yo."
He grinned and grabbed his crotch. "I got dinner right here."

 
          
"That's
not exactly what we had in mind."

 
          
"You
eat some of this, you get to eat some of what's cookin in the pot.
Capisce?"

 
          
While
Lacey talked, Carole looked around the filthy mess of a kitchen. She didn't see
a gun. The cook probably couldn't imagine he'd need one. Immediately to her
right she spotted the other thing she was looking for: half a dozen ten-pound
canisters of powdered eggs. One was open, its lid slightly askew.

 
          
"I'm
kind of cranky right now," Lacey was saying. "I'm hungry, I've got
low blood sugar, and I'm feeling premenstrual. You'll like me better when I'm
not hypoglycemic."

 
          
"Ay,
this ain't no Let's Make A Deal." He jabbed a finger at Lacey. "You
do me before you eat"—then at Carole—"and she does me after.
Otherwise you can get the fuck outta here."

 
          
Lacey
sighed and took a step toward him. "Oh, all right."

 
          
He
grinned and started loosening his belt. "That's more like it!"

 
          
Lacey's
hand darted to her sleeve and came up with her nunchucks. She whipped her hand
around in a small circle, snapping her wrist and slamming one of the steel bars
against the side of the cook's head. He grunted and staggered back, clutching
his head. Lacey followed, swinging her nunchucks left, right, left, right, then
vertically, connecting each time with either the man's head or his raised
elbows. With blood spurting from his face and scalp, the cook turned away,
dropped to his knees, then fell forward, covering his head with his hands and
groaning.

 
          
"Stop,
stop! Take what you want!"

 
          
"Warned
you I was cranky. Now get flat on your belly and stay there." He complied,
leaving the patterned soles of his sneakers facing Carole. Lacey turned and
gave her a nod.

 
          
Carole
knelt beside the open canister of powdered eggs and removed the lid. It was
three-quarters full. A heavy metal scoop lay inside. She pulled the bag of
sodium fluorosilicate out of her backpack and began scooping the egg powder
into its place.

 
          
"You
could have been nice, you know," she heard Lacey saying. "All we
wanted was something to eat. Didn't your mother ever teach you to share?"

 
          
"I'm
sorry," the cook moaned. "I'm sorry!"

 
          
"Now
we'll have to take it."

 
          
When
Carole figured she'd scooped out about two pounds of egg, she zipped up the
backpack, then emptied the pound of sodium fluorosilicate into the canister.
The chemical was white and the powdered egg was a pale yellow. She used the
scoop to mix them into a consistent color, then replaced the lid.

 
          
God
forgive her. She'd just sealed the fates and numbered the hours of dozens of
men. Vicious, evil men, but men nonetheless.

 
          
"All
right," she told Lacey. "I've got the eggs."

 
          
Lacey
had the big chrome refrigerator door open and was peering inside.

 
          
"What
have we here?" she said. She reached in and removed what looked like a
pepperoni and half a wheel of white cheese. "Looks like cookie's got his
own private stash!" She turned to the cook and squatted beside him.
"All right. We're leaving. Don't even think about moving or making a sound
until we're gone or I'll bust your head wide open and fry your brains on the
grill. Capisce? "

 
          
The
cook moaned and nodded.