“Uh-huh,” Chief Forrest said. “I think I got the picture. You call the State boys?”
“Alert going out right now.”
“Uh-huh. Kinda out of your territory, isn’t it, Captain?” Shrewd bastard, Delaney thought desperately.
“Yes, it is,” he confessed.
“But you’re bringing up ten men?”
“Well…yes. If we can be of any help…”
“Uh-huh. And you just want a watch on the Park gate. Out of sight naturally. Just to see where this crazy goes and what he does. Have I got it right?”
“Exactly right,” Delaney said thankfully. “If you could just send one of your men out…”
There was a silence that extended so long that finally Captain Delaney said, “Hello? Hello? Are you there?”
“Oh, I’m here, I’m here. But when you talk about sending out one of my men, I got to tell you, Captain: there ain’t no men. I’m it. Chief Forrest. The Chilton Police Department. I suppose you think that’s funny, a one-man po-leece department calling hisself ‘Chief. ’ I know what a big-city ‘Chief’ means.”
“I don’t think it’s funny,” Delaney said. “Different places have different titles and different customs. That doesn’t mean one is any better or any worse than another.”
“Sonny,” Chief Forrest rumbled, “I’m looking forward to meeting you. You sound like a real bright boy. Now you get up here with your ten men. Meanwhile, I’ll mosey out to the Park and see what I can see. It’s been a slow day.”
“Thank you, Chief,” Delaney said gratefully. “But it may take some time.”
“Time?” the deep voice laughed. “Captain, we got plenty of that around here.”
Delaney made one more call, to Thomas Handry. But the reporter wasn’t in, so he left a message. “Break it. Blank running. After him. Call Thorsen. Delaney.” Having paid his debt, he hitched up his gun belt, hooked his choker collar. He went into the radio room, pointed at three men; they all headed out to the heavy, armed cars waiting at the curb.
Still high, the air in his lungs as sharp and dry as good gin, Daniel Blank came dashing down the inside staircase of Celia Montfort’s home, leaped over the fallen Valenter, went sailing out into the thin winter sunlight, those distant screams pursuing him.
There was a man kneeling on the sidewalk between Blank and his car. This man saw Blank coming; his face twisted into an expression of wicked menace. He began to rise from his knee, one hand snaked beneath his jacket; Blank understood this man hated him and meant to kill him.
He performed his ax-transferring act as he rushed. He struck the man who was very quick and jerked aside so that the ax point did not enter his skull but crunched in behind his shoulder. But he went down. Daniel wrenched the ice ax free, ran to his car, conscious of shouts from across the avenue. Another man came dodging through, traffic, pointing his finger at Blank.
Then there were light, sharp explosions-snaps, really-and something smacked into and through the car body. Then there was a hole in the left window, another in the windshield, and he felt a stroke of air across his cheek, light as an angel’s kiss.
The man was front left and seemed determined to yank open the door or point his finger again. Blank caught a confused impression of black features contorted in fear and fury. There was nothing to do but accelerate, knock the man aside. So he did that, heard the thud as the body went flying, but he didn’t look back.
He turned west onto 86th Street, saw a double-parked car with three men scrambling to get out. More shouts, more explosions, but then he was moving fast down 86th Street, hearing the rising and dwindling blare of horns, the squeal of brakes as he breezed through red lights, cut to the wrong side of the street to avoid a pile-up, cut back in, increasing speed, hearing a far-off siren, enjoying all this, loving it, because he had cut that telephone line that held him to the world, and now he was alone, all alone, no one could touch him. Ever again.
He took Traverse No. 3 across Central Park, turned right on Broadway, went north to 96th Street, made a left to get onto the Henry Hudson Parkway, which everyone called the West Side Drive. He went humming north on the Drive, keeping up with the traffic, no faster, no slower, and laughed because it had all been such a piece of cake. No one could touch him; not even the two police squads screaming by him, sirens open, could bring him down or spoil the zest of this bright, lively, new day.
But there was some kind of hassle at the Bridge-maybe an accident-and traffic was backing up. So he just stayed on the Parkway, went winging north as traffic thinned out and he could sing a little song-what was it? That same folksong he had been crooning earlier-and tap his hands in time on the steering wheel.
North of Yonkers he pulled onto the verge, stopped, unfolded his map. He could take the Parkway to the Thruway, cross the Tappan Zee Bridge to South Nyack. Around Palisades Interstate Park to 32, take that to Mountainville. Then south to Chilton. Simple…and beautiful. Everything was like that today.
He was folding up his map when a police car pulled alongside on the Parkway. The officer in the passenger’s seat jerked his thumb north. Blank nodded, pulled off the verge, fell in behind the squad car, but kept his speed down until the cops were far ahead, out of sight. They hadn’t even noticed the holes in window, windshield, car body.
He had no trouble, no trouble at all. Not even any toll to pay going west on the Tappan Zee. If he returned eastward, of course, he’d have to pay a toll. But he didn’t think he’d be returning. He drove steadily, a mile or two above the limit, and almost before he knew it, he was in and out of Chilton, heading for the park. Now his was the only car on the gravel road. No one else anywhere. Wonderful.
He turned into the dirt road leading to the Chilton State Park, saw the locked gate ahead of him. It seemed silly to stop and hack off the padlock with his ice ax, so he simply accelerated, going at almost 50 miles an hour at the moment of impact. He threw his forearm across his eyes when he hit, but the car slammed through the fence easily, the two wings of the gate flinging back. Daniel Blank braked suddenly and stopped. He was inside. He got out of the car and stretched, looking about. Not a soul. Just a winter landscape: naked black trees against a light blue sky. Clean and austere. The breeze was wine, the sun a tarnished coin that glowed softly.
Taking his time, he changed to climbing boots and lined canvas jacket. He threw his black moccasins and topcoat inside the car; he wouldn’t need those anymore. At the last minute he also peeled off his formal “Ivy League” wig and left that in the car, too. He pulled the knitted watch cap over his shaved scalp.
He carried his gear to Devil’s Needle, a walking climb of less than ten minutes, over a forest trail and rock outcrops. It was good to feel stone beneath his feet again. It was different from city cement. The pavement was a layer, insulating from the real world. But here you were on bare rock, the spine of the earth; you could feel the planet turning beneath your feet. You were close.
At the entrance to the chimney, he put on his webbed belt, attached one end of the nylon line, shook out the coils of rope carefully, attached the other end to all his gear; rucksack, crampons, extra sweater, his ice ax. He put on his rough gloves.
He began to climb slowly, wondering if his muscles had gone slack. But the climb went smoothly; he gained confidence as he hunched and wiggled upward. Then he reached to grasp the embedded pitons, pulled himself onto the flat. He rested a moment, breathing deeply, then rose and hauled up his gear. He unbuckled his belt, dumped everything in a heap. He straightened, put hands on his waist, inhaled deeply, forcing his shoulders back. He looked around.
It was a different scene, a winter scene, one he had never witnessed before from this elevation. It was a steel etching down there: black trees spidery, occasional patches of unmelted snow, shadows and glints, all blacks, greys, browns, the flash of white. He could see the roofs of Chilton and, beyond, the mirror river, seemingly a pond, but moving, he knew, slowly to the sea, to the wide world, to everywhere.