fly to the side of the highrise.
Keeping his eyes on the piton that thrust up between his spread feet, he
jerked on the rappelling line several times. Hard. The piton didn't
move. He shifted his weight to the longer line but kept his right-hand
grip on the safety tether. Even with a hundred and fifty pounds of
downward drag, the piton did not shift in the crack.
Convinced that the peg was well placed, he released the safety tether.
Now he was balanced on three points: left hand on the long line, both
feet on the wall, still at a forty-five.
degree angle to the building.
Although he would not be touching it again before he reached the ledge,
the safety rope would nevertheless bring him up short of death if the
longer line broke while he was rappelling down to Connie.
He told himself to remember that. Remember and stave off panic.
Panic was the real enemy. It could kill him faster than Bollinger
could. The tether was there. Linking his harness to the window post.
He must remember ...
With his free hand, he groped under his thigh, felt behind himself for
the long rope that he already held in his other hand. After a maddening
few seconds, he found it. Now, the line on which he would rappel came
from the piton to his left hand in front of him, passed between his legs
at crotch level to his right hand behind him. With that hand he brought
the rope forward, over his right hip, across his chest, over his head,
and finally over his left shoulder. It hung down his back, passed
through his right hand, and ran on into empty space.
He was perfectly positioned.
The left hand was his guiding hand.
The right hand was his braking hand.
He was ready to rappel.
For the first time since he had come through the window, he took a good
look around him. Dark monoliths, gigantic skyscrapers rose eerily out
of the winter storm. Hundreds of thousands of points of light, made
hazy and even more distant by the falling snow, marked the night on
every side of him. Manhattan to his left.
Manhattan to his right. Manhattan behind him. Most important-Manhattan
below him. Six hundred feet of empty night waiting to swallow him.
Strangely, for an instant he felt as if this were a miniature replica of
the city, a tiny reproduction that was forever frozen in plastic; he
felt as if he were also tiny, as if he were suspended in a paperweight,
one of those clear hemispheres that filled with artificial snow when it
was shaken. As unexpectedly as it came, the illusion passed; the city
became huge again; the concrete canyon below appeared to be bottomless;
however, while all else returned to normal, he remained tiny,
insignificant.
When he first came out of the window, he had focused his attention on
pitons, ropes and technical maneuvers. Thus occupied, he had been able
to ignore his surroundings, to blunt his awareness of them.
That was no longer possible. Suddenly, he was too aware of the city and
of how far it was to the street.
Inevitable, such awareness brought unwanted memories: his foot slipping,
harness jerking tight, rope snapping, floating, floating, floating,
floating, striking, darkness, splinters of pain in his legs, darkness
again, a hot iron in his guts, pain breaking like glass in his back,
blood, darkness, hospital rooms....
Although the bitterly cold wind pummeled his face, sweat popped out on
his brow and along his temples.
He was trembling.
He knew he couldn't make the climb.
Floating, floating ...
He couldn't move at all.
Not an inch.
In the elevator, Bollinger hesitated. He was about to press the button
for the twenty-third floor, when he realized that, after he lost track
of them, Harris and the woman apparently had not continued down toward
the lobby. They had vanished on the twenty-seventh level. He had
searched that floor and all those below it; and he was as certain as he
could be, short of shooting open every locked door, that they were not
in the lower three-fourths of the building. They'd gone up.
Back to Harris's office? As soon as that occurred to him, he knew it
was true, and he knew why they had done it. They'd gone up because that
was the last thing he would expect them to do. If they had continued
down the stairs or elevator shaft, he would have nailed them in minutes.
Sure as hell. But, in going up, they had confused him and gained time.
Forty-five minutes of time, he thought angrily. That bastard has made a
fool out of me. Forty-five minutes. But not one goddamned minute more.
He pushed the button for the fortieth floor.
Six hundred feet.
Twice as far as he had fallen on Everest.
And this time there would be no miracle to save him, no deep snowdrift
to cushion the impact. He would be a bloody mess when the police found
him. Broken. Ruined. Lifeless.
Although he could see nothing of it, he stared in tently at the street.
The darkness and snow obscured the pavement.
Yet he could not look away. He was mesmerized not by what he saw, but
by what he didn't need to see, transfixed by what he knew lay below the
night and below the shifting white curtains of the storm.
He closed his eyes. Thought about courage. Thought about how far he
had come. Toes pressed into the shallow mortar-filled groove between
two blocks of granite. Left hand in front. Right hand behind.
Ready, get set ... but he couldn't go.
When he opened his eyes, he saw Connie on the ledge.
She motioned for him to hurry.
If he didn't move, she would die. He would fail her utterly. She
didn't deserve that after the eighteen months she'd given him, eighteen
months of tender care and saint-like understanding. She hadn't once
criticized him for whining, for his paranoia or his self-pity or his
selfishness. She had put herself in emotional jeopardy that was no less
terrifying than the physical risk demanded of him. He knew that mental
anguish was every bit as painful as a broken leg. In return for those
eighteen months, he had to make this climb for her. He owed her that
much; hell, he owed her everything.
The perspiration had dissolved some of the coating of Chap Stick on his
forehead and cheeks. As the wind dried the sweat, it chilled his face.
He realized again how little time they could spend out here before the
winter night sapped their strength.
He looked up at the piton that anchored him.
Connie will die if you don't do this.
He was squeezing the line too tightly with his left hand, which ought to
be used only to guide him. He should hold the line loosely, using his
right hand to pass rope and to brake.
Connie will die....
He relaxed his left-hand grip.
He told himself not to look down. Took a deep breath. Let it out.
Started to count to ten. Told himself he was stalling. Pushed off the
wall.
Don't panic!
As he swung backward into the night, he slid down the rope. When he
glided back to the wall, both feet in front of him and firmly planted
against the granite, pain zigzagged through his game leg. He winced,
but he knew he could bear it. When he looked down, he saw that he had
descended no more than two feet: but the fact that he had gotten
anywhere at all made the pain seem unimportant.
He had intended to thrust away from the stone with all his strength and
to cover two yards on each long arc. But he could not do it. Not yet.
He was too scared to rappel as enthusiastically as he had done in the
past; furthermore, a more vigorous descent would make the pain in his
leg unbearable.