He tried to think rationally. What could this man want with him? He could just be doing what the other thousands of people here were doing, enjoying the St. Patrick’s Day festivities.
He looked back at the man again and his instincts told him—run. This man is trouble.
He ran across the brick driveway toward City Hall. A drunken college student wearing a huge green foam cowboy hat was taunting a pretty girl with his beads. His buddies were chanting words of encouragement egging her on. Looking up, Jake could see the clock just below the gold dome of City Hall.
The clock showed 11:55.
The music was louder as the bands in the parade marched down Bay Street. Another roar from the college boys behind him. He turned around to see the young woman pull the front of her shirt up to her neck and shake her breasts. Her nipples were covered with green shamrock pasties.
The throngs of revelers packed the park in front of the Hyatt entrance, obscuring most of the parade from view. Only the floats were visible above the crowd.
He stopped at the corner of City Hall and looked back across the front of the Hyatt. He had a relatively clear view of everyone coming across the entrance as the swelling crowds jammed up next to Bay Street to watch the parade.
Then he spotted the man with the blaze in his hair. The man stopped and looked around. Jake tried to round the corner of the building but wasn’t fast enough. He peered back around the corner and saw the man coming toward him fast.
He pushed his way through the massive crowd packed in front of City Hall, where the distance from the building to the street was much smaller. He bumped into a man wearing a camouflage baseball cap and a green wife-beater shirt.
“Hey! What’s your problem, man?”
“Sorry, man,” Jake said, and moved as quickly as he could past City Hall.
He walked east in front of the old Savannah Cotton Exchange, now Solomon’s Lodge Freemason Hall. A red-winged lion guarded the front of the old Exchange.
He stopped for the parade at the corner of Bay and Abercorn streets. Looking up at the old majestic live oaks, still bearing their leaves, he saw Spanish moss hanging from the limbs and gently swaying back and forth in the breeze.
He looked around at faces, searching for his pursuer. A vendor selling beads, hats and trinkets stood next to the light pole on the corner. Three teenage girls walked by giggling, each with a headband supporting two shamrock antennas.
He heard one of the girls say, “Did you see his hair? And his eyes … they were creepy looking.”
A flood of panic swept over him.
He scanned the area.
He saw nothing.
He feverishly looked around, jumping up to see over the sea of green headwear.
Then he saw the man.
Twenty feet away, coming right at him.
Without hesitation, Jake ran into Bay Street, cutting through the middle of a high school marching band. He almost made it across the street without running into anyone, until a band member raised his trombone to play. He collided with the shining brass horn, knocking it free from the musician’s hands. The horn bounced twice on the red brick crosswalk.
Jake jumped over the horn and kept running. The band member shouted at him in anger.
He turned south down Abercorn. Looking back over his shoulder as he ran. He made it forty feet before he lost his footing when the sidewalk suddenly dipped at an entrance to a parking garage. He tumbled onto the concrete entrance landing hard on his left shoulder. A sharp pain shot through his shoulder and into his neck. He rolled over and looked at his shoulder, his leather jacket was scuffed and stitching had pulled loose. He was glad he was wearing the jacket now.
He jumped to his feet. His left shoulder throbbed from the impact on the pavement. Farther down the sidewalk, a vendor selling green beer in two-foot-tall plastic glasses looked at him, then shook his head in disgust at what appeared to be just another drunk.
Glancing back the other way, he saw the huge man crossing Bay Street. Jake had increased his lead to a hundred feet.
Almost all of the streets in the Historic District were closed to vehicular traffic during the parade. Jake stepped into Abercorn and ran down the middle of the street until he reached Reynolds Square.
The square was full of revelers. A vendor selling strands of green beads to two teenage boys had set up his station next to a park bench, not far from the statue of John Wesley that stood in the center of the square.
Panting, he slowed to a brisk walk, weaved through the mass of people, looked around and saw the man gaining on him again.
He broke into a full sprint out of Reynolds Square, south on Abercorn past the Lucas Theatre. As he approached Broughton Street, he saw the parade coming north on Abercorn. The parade turned east at Broughton, so he turned west.
The corner and surrounding streets were lined with people, some having camped out for hours ahead of time in order to get a good view of the parade. Many had set up chairs with their coolers close by. A few even set up umbrellas for shade, but Savannah’s Finest made them take the umbrellas down for safety reasons as the crowds grew.
He ran diagonally across Broughton Street at the Broughton Municipal Building toward the Marshall House. Two blocks farther, he reached Bull Street, where the sidewalks were again jammed with parade-watchers.
The parade was moving south on Bull toward the end of its route. The route had started on the southern end of the historic district, looped through downtown, then ended back just a few blocks from where it began.
Jake weaved through the crowd, stopping underneath the awning at Starbucks. He looked back and hoped he had lost his follower. The aroma of the coffee shop made him realize he hadn’t eaten all day. His stomach growled at him in protest. He paused, looking around for a few moments to get his bearings, until his angst pushed him onward. He followed alongside the parade down Bull Street.
He crossed through a break in the parade and into Wright Square. In the southeast corner of the square, Jake stopped by a granite boulder big enough to hide him from view. He drew several deep breaths and rested a moment. A plaque indicated the boulder was from Stone Mountain and commemorated the burial in 1739 of Tomo-Chi-Chi, Chief of the Yamacraw tribe. He didn’t read it — he was looking for the man.
On the other side of the square, he merged back into the parade and celebrators, trying to get lost in the multitude of green. The thought struck Jake, if the man was a threat to him, he was certainly a threat to Beth. He pulled out his phone and redialed her number. Still no answer.
At Oglethorpe and Bull he saw a big green landmark sign marking the birthplace of Juliette Gordon Low, Girl Scouts founder. He moved much faster than the parade itself, traversing the two blocks to Chippewa Square in surprisingly good time given the holiday crowds.
He stopped at the corner of Hull Street and Bull Street beside the square. Surely he had lost the man by now. Tired and out of breath, he rested his hands on his knees while he gulped in air and stared back at the crowd. He thought he saw a fleeting glimpse of the white-blazed hair but couldn’t be sure. Then it was gone.
After he caught his breath, he started running again. Heading diagonally across Chippewa Square, he crashed into a young couple getting up from a park bench. The man yelled, “Hey, asshole. Watch where you’re going.”
Jake looked back into the square and saw the big man moving towards him again.
Jake hurdled some bushes, crossed through the parade again, then darted through an open wrought iron gate into the backyard of a home on the corner of Perry and Bull.