The bottle crashed at his feet. Flames sprang up from the sidewalk. He threw both hands up to protect his face, and then immediately stepped back and brought his right hand down again, pistol level, firing into the wall of fire, through the wall of fire, two quick shots in succession.
Somebody screamed.
And suddenly they were on him. They jumped through the names like circus performers, three of them hitting him almost simultaneously, knocking him to the pavement. He rolled away from the fire, tried to roll away from their kicks. He brought the gun hand up again, fired again, three shots gone now, heard someone grunt. Don't waste any, he thought, and one of them kicked him in the head. He went blank for an instant. His finger tightened reflexively on the trigger. The gun exploded wild, close to his own ear. He blinked his eyes. He was going. He fought unconsciousness. Someone kicked him in the shoulder, and the sharp pain rocketed into his brain and brought him back. Four shots gone, he thought. Make the next ones count. He rolled away again. He blinked them into focus. Only two of them on their feet now. The third one flat on his back near the entrance to the building. Fourth one lying on the sidewalk dangerously close to the fire. He'd hammered two of them, but there were still two to go, and only two shots left in the gun.
His heart was pounding.
But he took his time.
Waited till the lead kicker was almost on him, and then shot for his chest.
Second one right behind him, almost knocked off his feet when his buddy blew back into him. Genero fired again. Took the second one in the left shoulder, sent him spinning around and staggering back toward the wall of the building.
Genero could hardly breathe.
He got to his feet, fanned the empty gun at them.
Nobody seemed to be going anywhere.
He backed off a pace, pulled cartridges from his belt, loaded them into the cylinder, counting hellip; four, five, six and ready again.
"Move and you're dead," he whispered, and yanked the walkie-talkie from his belt.
Detective/Third Grade Richard Genero had come of age on the eve of All Hallows' Day.
The school custodian who answered the night bell was the same one who'd locked Sebastian the Great's tricks in a storeroom earlier this afternoon. Peering through the grilled upper glass panel of the door at the back of the building, he recognized Hawes at once, unlocked the door, and let him in.
" 'Evening, Mr. Buono," Hawes said.
"Hey, how you doing?" Buono said.
He was a man in his late sixties, thinning gray hair, thin gray mustache over his upper lip. Pale blue eyes, somewhat bulbous nose. He was wearing coveralls. A flashlight was in one of the pockets. He clipped his ring of keys to a loop on the pocket.
"This is my partner, Detective Brown," Hawes said.
"Nice to meetcha," Buono said. "You come back for the stuff?"
"Well, no," Hawes said. "Few questions we'd like to ask you."
Buono immediately figured they knew he was stealing supplies from the classroom closets.
"Hey, sure," he said, and tried to look innocent. He locked the door behind them, and said, "Come on over the office, we can talk there. My friend and me were playing checkers."
They walked down a yellow-tiled, locker-lined corridor. They passed a wall clock that read twenty minutes past ten. They made a left turn. More students' lockers on either wall. A bulletin board. A poster reading:
COME CHEER THE TIGERS!
Saturday, Nov. 1, 2:00 p.m.
RAUCHER FIELD
To the right of that, another poster announcing:
SEBASTIAN THE GREAT!
HALLOWEEN MAGIC!
Auditorium. 4:00 p.m.
Beneath the lettering was a black-and-white photograph of a good-looking young man wearing a top hat and bow tie, grinning into the camera.
"Okay to take that poster?" Brown asked.
"Which one?" Buono said.
"The magician."
"Sure," Buono said, and shrugged.
Brown began pulling out the tacks.
"Come in handy, we find the head," he said to Hawes, and then folded the poster and put it in his inside jacket pocket.
Buono led them further down the hall, opened a door at the end of it. A sparsely furnished room. An upright locker, green in contrast to the reds, yellows, and oranges of the lockers in the halls. Long oak table, probably requisitioned from one of the administration offices. Four straight-backed chairs around it, checker board on one end of it. Coffee pot on a hot plate on one wall of the room, clock over it. Framed picture of Ronald Reagan on the wall opposite.
"This here's my friend, Sal Pasquali," Buono said.
Pasquali was in his late sixties, early seventies, wearing brown trousers, brown shoes and socks, a pale yellow sports shirt, and a brown sweater buttoned up the front. He looked like a candy-store owner.
"These people here are detectives," Buono said, and looked at Pasquali, hoping he would understand what the look meant: Watch your onions about the chalk, and the paste, and the pencils, and the erasers, and the reams of paper.
Pasquali nodded sagely, like a Mafia don.
"Pleased to meetcha," he said.