“That’s good news,” Hawke said, “Do you think our Chinese friends are aware of it?”
“I very much doubt it. It’s only a bit of chance that you yourself saw it. It is only visible from the sea at a certain precise angle. And even then, the chances of ever seeing it are minute.”
“Why?”
“The entrance is completely below sea level most of the time. Only at dead low tide, like we have right now, for a short time, is it visible and accessible.”
“Feel like a swim?” Hawke asked Brock, a wide grin on his face.
“A swim?” Brock hadn’t told Hawke this, but he was something of a landlubber. Unlike his lordship, who seemed in his element at sea, Harry Brock longed for the feel of good old shifting sand beneath his feet. Compared to Hawke, he was Ahab the A-rab, the Sheik of the Burning Sands.
“We’ll wait until dark. Then swim over there and check out this very serendipitous chink in the armor.”
“Yeah,” Brock said, his expression grim. “Thank God for serendipitous chinks.”
“Ever hear of an outfit called ‘Thunder and Lightning’?” Hawke asked.
“Hell yes. Everybody in the community has. Legendary. Fitz McCoy and Charlie Rainwater. Seriously bad boys. Bunch of kick-ass mercs based out of Martinique, right? Some old fort with a fancy French name.”
“Right. They call it Fort Whupass now.”
Brock laughed. “You know those guys?”
“We shared some special moments in Cuba a few years ago. When Fidel went on vacation and his generals took over. It got noisy. We all got along pretty well.”
“Still have their number?” Brock said, a big smile on his face.
“No, but my buddy Stokely Jones does. Maybe I’ll give old Stoke a call.”
“Yeah. Considering what we’ve got here, I think that’s a real good idea.”
Chapter Forty-two
Coney Island
“WHAT’S HE GOING TO DO?” MARIUCCI SAID, “A FUCKING swan dive?”
Congreve thought perhaps that was exactly what the Chinaman had in mind. His position was precarious. The second swipe of the ladder had crumpled the entire top section of the tower. The aircraft warning light formerly at the tower’s pinnacle was now dangling by tangled wires, sparking and snapping just above the killer’s head. The rotted black crossbeam he was standing on was sagging dangerously in the middle. It looked as if it could give way at any moment. The crowds below were swooning in anticipation. It was all faintly ghoulish, Ambrose thought, but he couldn’t turn away.
“I’ll be right back,” the captain said, “I think they’re about to get the Ferris wheel moving.”
Mariucci had no need of seeing another jumper. Congreve imagined he’d seen enough falling bodies for a lifetime on that cruel day in September.
The captain squeezed the top of Ambrose’s arm gently and disappeared into the maze of police, fire personnel, television news crews, and their respective vehicles, all parked willy-nilly wherever they had come to a stop. The midway was now jammed with useless emergency equipment and mobbed with people who had no business being there. All massed between the two opposing attractions and all looking up into the sky.
They stood with their eyes riveted on the drama unfolding a hundred feet up. Light rain was still falling. The beams from spotlights on the ground and mounted on the hovering helicopters looked like solid columns of light.
All were trained on the little man in white coveralls. He had his back to the crowd. His arms were stretched above his head, hands clinging to the beam above. He hadn’t moved in ten minutes. His audience was rapt, transfixed.
For those fortunate enough to have binoculars, the only thing missing was the expression on the man’s face as he unslung the haversack from his right shoulder and let it fall. It hit a beam or two going down, bounced once or twice, and dropped out of sight.
“Jump!” some civilian screamed. It seemed not everyone in the crowd was rooting for the Chinaman. Some of them even laughed out loud. “Turn around so we can see you!” a woman cried out.
As if in response to the crowd’s demands, the man could be seen to loosen his two-handed death grip on the skewed beam just above his head. He pried the fingers of one hand loose and slowly released the beam with that hand. He deftly turned ninety degrees, so that he was facing parallel to the beam. His grace and economy of movement, Congreve had to say, were those of a champion gymnast. An Olympian performance.
He paused and took a deep breath, or so it seemed, and then released the other hand. He gently lowered both arms to his side and stood unassisted on the narrow beam. It was a feat of balance to be admired, and some in the crowd showed their appreciation with applause as if he were a circus artist. This was Coney Island, after all.
The man then moved his feet slowly, tiny steps, turning carefully around so that he was now facing the midway.
“I can’t look!” a woman cried out, but she did.
The Chinaman raised his arms straight out from his side holding them poised like a high diver at shoulder height. After a long moment, he folded both arms across his chest and lowered his head. The crowd was stone silent now. Waiting. Many of them rubbing their eyes with the strain and the rainwater in them as they stared without blinking at a man surely about to plunge to his death.
Behind them, the colored lights of the Ferris wheel had illuminated once more and the big wheel started revolving slowly. No one even noticed, not even Ambrose Congreve, but Joey Bones was coming back to earth.
The Chinaman didn’t jump. He put his arms to his sides and lowered his head. He seemed to hang there for a second. Then he simply leaned out into space and pitched forward off the beam. He fell head-first, arms tightly held against his side, legs held firmly together, toes pointed. By diving in this way, Congreve estimated, he was able to increase his velocity from the normal speed of a falling object to approximately two hundred miles per hour. Terminal velocity.
Terminal being the operative word.
Ambrose watched him fall, feeling a wave of nausea wash over him.
You could almost see him accelerate.
At the last fraction of a second, he tucked up into a tight ball.
The crowd screamed. It was terrifying and riveting to watch a human being fall to his death. It took all of two seconds for him to hit the ground.
The Chinaman was dead. But he had gone out with a certain style, nonetheless, and Congreve found that interesting. Ambrose turned away and saw that the Ferris wheel was indeed turning. Joey Bones’s car was now at the bottom. You could tell because that’s where all the lights and news cameras were trained now.
Because of the tall fence, few people, mostly policemen and ATAC team members gathered inside the fence surrounding the tower, actually saw the man hit the ground. But the sound of a falling body hitting concrete from great height was not one anyone there that night would ever forget.
Nor was the sight of him sitting bolt upright on the cracked stone, his shattered legs sticking straight out from his erect, shattered body. From the back, he looked almost normal. Except that his shoulders were far, far too narrow. And his head rested right atop them, no neck to support it. From the front, those who dared to look at the corpse saw a face from a nightmare, its features rearranged in a surreal fashion, one eye below his nose, the mouth a vertical slit.