Downstairs they checked the bedrooms again, this time for any sign of the Crows. It was all there: a stack of un-mailed press releases, letters, two different sets of men's clothing.
"I'm gonna talk to this woman," Lucas told Del. "You shut the front door and call Anderson, tell him what we've got. Get a warrant down here, maybe we can finesse things later. And tell him we may want an ERU team for when the Crows come back."
While Del went to call, Lucas walked back to Barbara Gow, who was lying on her side with her knees up to her face, weeping. Lucas uncuffed her and prodded her back with his foot.
"Sit up," he said.
"Don't hurt me," she wailed.
"Sit the fuck up," Lucas said. "You're under arrest. Seven counts of first-degree murder. You have the right to remain silent…"
"I didn't do anything."
"You're an accomplice…" Lucas said, squatting next to her, his face two inches from hers. He was not quite shouting, and he deliberately let spittle rain on her face.
"I didn't do anything."
"Where are the Crows…?"
"I don't know any Crows…"
"Bullshit. All their stuff is in back." He gtabbed her by the blouse and shook her.
"I don't know," she said. "I don't know where they went. They took my car."
"She's lying," Del said. Lucas looked up and found Del standing over them. His eyes were dilated and he hadn't shaved for several days. "Stay with her for just a second. I wanna run down to the bathroom."
Lucas waited, watching the woman's face. A few seconds later, they heard the bath water running.
"What're you going to do?" Lucas asked when Del returned. He tried to sound interested-curious-but not worried.
"She's got nice hot water," Del said. "So I thought maybe I'd give the bitch a bath."
"Shit, I wish I'd thought of that," Lucas said happily.
Gow tried to roll away from him but Del caught the old woman by the hair. "You know how many old women drown in the bathtub? Suck in that scalding hot water and can't get out?"
"It's a tragedy," Lucas said.
"Let me go," Gow screamed, struggling now. Del dragged her toward the hallway by the hair. She flailed at him, but he ignored it.
"There's some coffee in the kitchen," Del called. "Why don't you go heat up some water, we can have a cup. This'll only take a minute. She don't look too strong."
"They went to kill Clay," Gow blurted.
"Jesus Christ." Del let her go and the two men crouched over her.
"They can't get to him. He's got round-the-clock bodyguards," Lucas argued.
"He sneaks out," Gow said. "He has sex with little girls, so he sneaks out."
Lucas looked at Declass="underline" "Motherfucker. They don't crack the security. They get Clay to come out. Call Anderson and have him get onto the feebs. Find out where Clay is. And get Daniel."
Del dashed down the hall toward the telephone and Lucas gripped the old woman's hair.
"Tell me the rest. I'll testify in court for you. I'll tell them you helped; it might get you off. Where'd they go?"
Tears ran down her face and she sobbed, unable to talk.
"Talk to me," Lucas screamed, shaking the old woman's head.
"There's a man named Christopher Drake. Corky Drake. He lives up in Kenwood somewhere," Barbara Gow sobbed. "Clay goes to his house for the girls."
Lucas let her go and ran into the kitchen, where Del was on the phone. "I gotta go," he shouted. "Stay with her. Tell Anderson I'll call in ten seconds, tell him I'll need those squads." • Lucas sprinted to the Porsche, cranked it, picked up the handset and called Dispatch.
"A Christopher Drake," he told the dispatcher. "In Ken-wood. I need the address now."
Twenty seconds later, as he turned onto Franklin Avenue, he had it.
"I need everything you've got. No sirens, but make it fast," he told Dispatch.
Anderson came on: "I'm talking to Del, we're going out to the FBI now. How long before you make this Drake's place?"
Lucas ran a red light and calculated. "If I don't hit anything, about two minutes," he said. He crossed the center line into the left lane and blew past two cars, the speedometer nudging sixty.
The squad car came out of the loop road, turned away from them and kept going. Aaron grunted, checked his watch again and said, "Let's go."
Drake's house was a quarter-mile down the lane. They did a U-turn in front of the house, so the car would be pointed out, and left it on the street. The yards were wooded, and the brush would screen them as they approached the house.
"Let's get the tie," Sam said as they climbed out of the car.
Aaron looked up at the sky as Sam popped the tailgate. "Good moon for a killing," Aaron said.
In the soundproofed privacy of the bedroom, the girl dropped the kimono around her feet and slipped onto the bed. Lawrence Duberville Clay peeled off his underwear and slipped in beside her, and she put her arm over her chest. "Smell so good," she said. He looked over her shoulder at the video camera and the monitor screen. The light was just right. It would be an evening to remember.
Leo held the cut-down shotgun by his side as they pulled the railroad tie out of the car and held it by the handles. A battering ram. Nearly a hundred pounds, swung hard, focused on a point no bigger than a hammerhead. Better than any sledgehammer made.
Swinging the tie, they moved swiftly through the dark into Drake's yard.
"Go through it one more time," Leo said.
Sam recited in a monotone. "Aaron and I swing it. When the door goes down, we drop it and you run right over it, freeze anyone inside. Aaron takes the ground floor, blocking anyone out, and you and I go up the stairs. There are four bedrooms up the stairs, and they'll be in one of them."
"Drop the tie, go in, freeze anyone, then Aaron takes over and we go up the stairs."
"Clay carries a gun; you've seen the pictures," Aaron said. He looked up at the moon. "So be careful."
They stayed in a screen of trees as they came up the drive, then broke across an open space to a lilac bush, paused to adjust their holds on the railroad tie.
"You got it?" Aaron asked.
"Let's go," said Sam.
Running awkwardly, they rushed at the door, then stopped at the last second and swung the tie as hard as they could. It hit the door two inches from the knob and blew it open as effectively as a stick of dynamite. They let go as the door flew open; the tie fell half inside, and Leo was in the living room. Drake was there, coming off the couch, a pearl-gray suit and pink open-necked shirt, his mouth open. Leo, his face twisted into a mask of hate, shoved the shotgun at him and said in a coarse whisper:
"Where is he?"
Integrity had never been one of Drake's burdens. "Up the stairs," he blurted. "First door on the left."
"If he's not there, motherfucker, you gonna be sucking on this shotgun," Leo snarled.
"He's there…"
Aaron held Drake as Leo and Sam took the stairs, struggling with the railroad tie as they went, their footfalls muffled by the thick carpet. At the top, they looked at each other, and Leo held the shotgun over his head. They went at the bedroom door with the tie. The bedroom door was no more match for the ram than the front door had been. It blew open and Leo went through.
Music was playing from a stereo; the lights were low enough for comfort, bright enough for spectating. A video camera was mounted on a steel tripod, with a television flickering beside it. Clay was there, his flesh obscenely white, sluglike, on the red satin sheet. The girl was beside him, nearly as pale as he was, except for a streak of scarlet lipstick.
"Get away," Leo said to the girl, gesturing with the shotgun.
"Wait," said Clay. The girl rolled away from him and off the bed.
"Wait, for Christ's sakes," Clay said.
"On your feet," Leo said. "This is a citizen's arrest."
"What?"
"On your feet and turn around, Mr. Clay," Leo said. "If you don't, I swear to God I'll blow you to pieces."
Clay, frightened, crawled off the bed and turned. Sam slipped his pistol into his pocket, took out his obsidian knife and stepped behind him.