Godzilla followed its quarry from Summer onto High Street by way of a short cut across Bay Bank Plaza which sent pedestrians scurrying. To keep close on High Street, Blaine mashed parked cars where space demanded. Whatever time was lost in the effort was made up by the constant weaves the squad car was forced to make to avoid cars. They came at last to Bedford Street and crashed through a sawhorse without seeing the telltale sign:
CLOSED FOR CONSTRUCTION
Construction on a water main had shut down Bedford Street from end to end, but the squad car had already committed. The street was totally torn up; it was an obstacle course of deep holes, sawhorses, and open ditches.
The women’s car took an awful beating, but Godzilla negotiated the conditions easily. McCracken felt himself being jolted upward in his seat time and time again, but he was gaining, damn it, he was gaining!
Just a car-length away, he saw the huge blonde lean out the passenger window and fire pistols with both hands. Godzilla’s windshield exploded and Blaine ducked low to avoid the spray of glass. The next series of shots clanged off the crusher’s grill and Blaine knew the blonde was now aiming for the tires or the radiator. But the tires were solid all the way through and the radiator reenforced with extra layers of steel.
Feeling confident, Blaine rose just enough to see over the dashboard and jammed Godzilla’s accelerator all the way to the floor. The crusher’s engine roared as it shot forward with a burst of speed that brought its monstrous tires within a yard of the police car. Then an unmarked ditch off to the right caught one of Godzilla’s tires. Blaine felt the sudden drop with a jolt. He gunned the engine but the monster truck was caught at a difficult angle even for the 640-cubic-inch engine to power out of. As the squad car struggled down the rest of Bedford Street, Blaine rocked Godzilla between forward and reverse. At last the monster truck jumped free. Blaine gunned the engine and roared the final stretch down Bedford Street to where it ended directly before Lafayette Place. He had either a left or right to take now, and he was certain the women had turned right.
Soon after swinging onto Chauncy Street, he saw the tail of their squad car screech into another right. McCracken sped past traffic, which pulled over in front of him, and followed the women down Summer Street. The traffic was heavy, but by blowing his horn to alert drivers to his presence he succeeded in having enough cars pull over to keep his path cleared.
When he passed between South Station and the Federal Reserve Building, traffic suddenly thinned. He had the squad car dead in his sights. Only a hundred yards separated them, but the women were speeding away from the field, seizing the open stretch down Summer Street for their final escape.
McCracken was fighting with Godzilla for more speed when ahead he saw an eighteen-wheel tractor trailer backing slowly across the width of Summer Street. It was obviously having trouble negotiating a delivery slot in a building on his side of the road. The squad car came to a halt behind the eighteen wheeler, trapped once and for all.
Seeing his chance, Blaine darted into the empty lanes of opposing traffic and sped forward. He sideswiped one car and then squeezed between two others. Suddenly the police car was directly before him. He gave Godzilla all the gas it would take and felt it shoot forward as though eager for the task ahead.
The monster truck mounted the squad car, and trunk, roof, then hood gave way like plastic. A series of pops followed as jagged metal pressed into the tires and flattened them. The police car sunk even lower. Godzilla continued to roll forward.
At last the crusher touched pavement again and Blaine threw Godzilla into neutral and jumped down. He reached the driver’s door, ready and eager to deal with the women inside.
A frightened Boston police officer with his face bleeding from a host of cuts gazed up at him in abject terror. And all McCracken could do was melt innocently away, wondering where exactly it had been that he’d lost the women.
Chapter 19
“You don’t mind me saying, Mr. M., you look, ayah, like fucking hell.”
McCracken almost asked the harbormaster, with his sun-wrinkled flesh, sunken eyes, and liver-spotted hands, who was he to judge? But instead he just shrugged and settled farther back on the bench to wait for the ferry to take him across the bay to Great Diamond Island.
“Been a slow night, has it, Abner?”
“Was till near about two hours ago. Someone at the Estates must be having a party I’d say, ayah.”
Blaine forced his shoulders upright at that. “Lots of people make the trip over?”
“Near ’bout a dozen, ten anyway,” the harbormaster replied. His faced angled in its typical quizzical expression. “Funny thing now that I think about it, they were all men. Three cars, three or four to a car.”
“Shit,” McCracken said, standing up.
“Huh?”
“How long ago, Abner?”
“Couple hours, like I said.”
“How long exactly?”
The harbormaster scratched at a wrinkled, sunken eye with a finger blackened with dirt. “Five runs back. Say two-and-a-half hours.” His eyes bulged suddenly. “Hold on. You’re gettin’ that look you had when you made that man drive his car into the bay. Took me a half day to dredge it out. Don’t make me do that with three cars, not three cars, please!”
“Don’t worry, Abner, I’m not in the mood.”
Blaine’s mind was working fast. After abandoning Godzilla, he had stolen a car from the Boston Aquarium parking lot and driven straight through to Maine. He arrived at the harbor two hours past sunset, which would have given the women plenty of time to have arranged for a team to be waiting at his island condominium. They would have expected him to head back home under the circumstances. The only anomaly was that they hadn’t left any of their number here at the harbor. Then again, if they tried for him here and missed, he was gone. If they went for him on the island, their chances would be better and his opportunity for escape far worse. Should have been more careful with Abner, though, maybe sent the cars over one or two at a time to avoid suspicion. They’d learn their lesson when he didn’t show up.
“Still got that double-barrel twelve gauge, Abner?” he asked the harbormaster.
“Mr. M., you promised you wouldn’t—”
“I’m not gonna use it on them, Abner. I just need a little insurance. Like to borrow it, if I could.”
The old man eased himself behind the counter and drew the iron relic out. “Take care of it now. It belonged to my daddy.”
“Which makes it older than you.”
“Ayah. Considerably.”
“Terrific.”
Abner handed it over. “Tip you gave me last Christmas more ’an entitles you to the favor, but if you’re in trouble, Mr. M., seems a mite better to sit here awhile and think it out, I’d say.”
“No can do, Abner,” Blaine said, already making his way for the door.
“Got someplace you gotta be?”
“Just going to visit a friend.”