The cams multiplied the power of the thrust from the string once it was wound tight by the small cranking device she carried in her bag. It could launch a projectile at three hundred and fifty feet per second.
The weapon could shoot both longer arrows and shorter bolts. Depending on the weight of each it could deliver more than a hundred pounds of kinetic energy to the victim at fifty yards. In a word, at close range it was deadly.
Tonight Ana was hoping she wouldn’t have to use it, that the medieval appearance of the device might be enough to hold the man in place and frighten him senseless so that he would tell her what she wanted to know. There was no need to kill him if she didn’t have to.
A second later she heard what sounded like shuffling footfalls mixed with the rushing water of the river. Ana snapped a quick peek around the corner and stepped out away from the building, moving quickly to the center of the walkway. She pulled the curved rear shoulder stock tight into her body to steady her aim and sighted down the barrel over the bolt until it was pointed at the center mass of the man’s chest.
At first he didn’t even see her. For someone who had just killed another man he seemed unfazed, his attention gripped by the splendor of the river. The unremitting sound of the cascading water seemed to have drowned his senses. His attention was focused on the other side. Maybe he was meeting his companion over there.
He was maybe twenty-five feet away and closing on her. Any second he would turn and see her. She stood stone-still.
He was young, maybe early twenties, slender, well-muscled, and wiry. She guessed he was probably quick and dangerous because of it. He had a dark complexion and short dark hair. If she had to guess she would say North African, perhaps Egyptian or Lebanese. But he could have been from anywhere.
When he finally turned his head to the front, the startled expression that washed over him seemed to drain the blood from his face. It froze him in place, fifteen feet directly in front of her with nowhere to go, the river on one side and the solid wall of the building on the other. A look of panic filled his eyes. Instantly his knees flexed, his arms extended out from his sides ready to fight as he turned his head first one way, then the other, looking for any avenue of escape.
The last thing she wanted was a rabbit. Ana knew if it turned to a footrace she would never be able to catch him. He was young, lean, built like a runner. She was winded, still recovering from her sprint around the building.
She tried talking to him in French. When that didn’t work, she tried English, then Spanish.
Whether he didn’t understand her or chose not to, she couldn’t be sure. But it seemed to relax him. Slowly he came out of his crouch, relaxed his arms as he studied her from a distance. He put his hands on his hips, struck a bold pose, murderous male model strutting the latest in soiled T-shirts and shredded jeans.
She motioned for him to put his hands up.
He didn’t do it. Instead he just stood there looking at her. The message? She had only one arrow. Did she really want to burn it over something like this?
Ana kept the crossbow trained on him as she backed off a couple of steps. It was a mistake.
The kid suddenly smiled. He mistook her movement for fear. It told him all he thought he needed to know. If she wanted to kill him she would have already done it. She was probably just some pain-in-the-ass citizen trying to be a hero. He had already made enough miscalculations to fill a book.
She motioned with the crossbow for him to get down on the ground.
This time he shook his head and the smile broadened. He motioned with his hands toward one thigh, challenging her to shoot him in the leg. He’d be on her with the knife in an instant, cutting her throat. Besides, she’d probably flinch at the last second and miss. This time he winked at her and said something in a language she didn’t understand, at least not the words.
Ana got the message. The eruption of manliness, the seeping arrogance. Not only was there a single arrow, but the person behind the trigger was a woman. She could read it in his eyes. Ana had known that look since she was a young girl. If he wasn’t careful this machismo was going to get him killed.
When his feet suddenly started to move and he backed up just a short step she said, “No!” He was getting ready for something. She could tell.
He stopped momentarily as his right hand slowly went toward the back pocket of his jeans. The smile never left his face.
Ana knew he was reaching for the knife.
“Stop!” She shook her head, looked at him with a stern expression, tightened her grip on the crossbow, and leaned into it as if she was about to pull the trigger.
His hand slowed but only for an instant before it disappeared behind his hip. The sound of the water covered the snap of the blade as it opened.
He may have concealed the knife, but his faltering smile and the fixed concentration in his eyes told Ana all she needed to know.
The spring in his legs launched him toward her. Two strides like a long jumper and he closed the distance. She pulled the trigger.
The needlelike point of the knife lashed out toward her throat as the momentum of his body quickly carried him forward.
The bolt met him in midair. It entered his chest and disappeared for a fleeting instant before Ana glimpsed it again in the distance as it skipped like a stone across the surface of the river.
His outstretched arm holding the blade reached her just as she turned her body and stepped to one side. His lifeless form flew past and collapsed in a heap on the cement a few feet beyond where she stood.
A fraction of a second sooner and even as deadweight his body would have planted the knife in her chest.
FORTY-THREE
Harry and I hoof it toward the traffic bridge where the lake pours into the river. On the other side of the bridge is the main Lucerne train station, a modern glass and steel structure.
In front of it in the distance I can see the freestanding remnant, the high arching stone façade of the entrance to the nineteenth-century station. That building was lost to a fire in the early 1970s.
In the dead of night there is almost no traffic at all on the bridge. It is nearing two in the morning. Harry and I walk briskly without saying a word, dragging our luggage over the rough cobblestones as we go. The two bags bounce all over the place. Off to the right I see banks of flashing lights just across the river near the entrance to the old wooden footbridge a few hundred yards away, downriver.
“They must be doing some work,” says Harry.
Four minutes later as we approach the other side of the bridge we see that a small crowd has formed near the stone walkway leading along the river. There are a dozen people or more, all looking down the river toward the flashing lights.
By the time we get there, the contagion of curiosity has infected us. We stop for a moment and look down the river along the quay on this side. It is not construction. I can see police vehicles, several of them, and a larger crowd near the end of the wooden bridge. “I wonder what happened,” says Harry.
A fellow standing in front of us hears him. He turns, looks at us, and says, “Someone murdered an old man coming off the bridge.”
As shocking as it is, ordinarily we might not have thought anything more about it, except that Harry and I were instantly troubled by the same question. We look at each other.
“No,” says Harry. “Couldn’t be. He left almost an hour ago. You heard him. He was gonna take a taxi back to his son’s apartment. We gave him the money.” Still, the rash of accidents leaves us both wondering.
We are going to miss the 2 A.M. train. By the time we drag the rolling cases the hundred and eighty yards or so down along the river, Harry and I convince ourselves that it can’t be Korff. It isn’t possible. Some other poor soul.