At eleven-thirty the police were no closer to pinpointing the bird-dog beeper on the Ringers’ Chrysler, but a call came in over the radio that chilled every officer on the streets.
“Double homicide, Hermann Park. All units respond. Repeat…”
Sam was headed down Fondren in the direction of the park. Amid the curses of his companions, and despite the frenzied commands coming from Garbo on the squawk box, Sam was calm.
“He hasn’t gotten away yet,” he repeated for the fourth time in five minutes.
“He killed two of them this time!” Jack was exploding like a house full of dynamite. He kept tensing muscles in his jaws as he stared through the windshield. Sam feared what action he might have to take to restrain Jack if they ever caught up with the killer. He knew the younger man was reliving the night they had found Willie in the deserted lot, and he was dangerously close to having a nervous breakdown.
“We can’t jump to conclusions,” Sam advised. “The park homicides might be something else.”
Sam pulled up next to two patrol cars already on the scene, their bubble lights whirling. One of the uniformed officers had the door of an old Renault open and was looking for the registration papers. Sam did not really expect to see the navy-blue Chrysler, but he was disappointed all the same not to spot it.
“What have you got?” Jack asked the nearest patrolman.
“It was the Wireman,” came the answer. “Two kids, teenagers, by the looks of it. Boy and girl, both missing their heads.”
Jack swore and turned back to the car.
“Where are you going?” Sam inquired.
“We gotta move. He’s long gone by now. I’m going to check with the chopper.”
Sam stayed behind to question the officers. A park security guard had found the bodies on a routine drive-by. He did not see a suspect or any car except the victims’ Renault in the parking lot.
Sam went to the girl’s covered body and lifted her wrist. Her flesh was still warm. The smell of her blood permeated the air.
“He took the heads?” Sam asked the patrolman standing next to him. “You didn’t find them?”
“No, they’re gone. Think we’re going to catch him, Sam?”
“There’s no doubt in my mind.” Sam moved away from the girl’s poor dead body.
“Sam, they’ve picked up the beeper!” Jack called.
Sam hurried to the car, motioned for Jack to take the wheel, and took the passenger seat. “Where is he?”
“On the freeway heading out of Houston. He’s about twenty miles ahead of us,” Jack replied, starting the car.
“Then we’d better hurry.” Sam sighed, relieved at the second chance they had been given.
“He’s going to get away again,” Patty Trumbine grumbled from the backseat. “He’s leaving town.”
Jack set the blinking bubble light on the dashboard and drove the Fury ninety miles an hour down the center lane of I-10. A couple of times he had to make swift lane changes in order to get around slower vehicles, but the miles ticked off, and soon they were the closest police car to the fleeing Chrysler.
The helicopter kept pace overhead, frequently interrupting on the receiver to assure them they had the bird dog tracked in the right direction. All the Fury had to do was point its nose straight ahead. They were gaining.
The tracking device in the car began to show the signal weakly, but it was an adrenaline shot to Jack DeShane. He forced the Fury to a hundred, and the speedometer needle hovered there. They overtook and passed dozens of cars. Headlights dimmed behind them like winking fireflies.
Patty buckled his seat belt. Sam merely clasped his hands together in his lap. Jack held the steering wheel loosely and concentrated on the road that was taking them ever closer to Nick Ringer.
Screaming sirens followed Jack until the freeway seemed full of patrol ears. Garbo led the pack, issuing orders to his units and the helicopter in pursuit. Every one of the policeman involved realized the seriousness of the situation. It was imperative that they find the killer. If he shook them again, he would have time to rid himself of the severed heads.
As they reached the city limits of Houston, the helicopter pilot reported his fuel was low, and Garbo ordered him back.
“We have him on the tracker,” Garbo said. “We won’t lose him this time.”
The killer could not drive forever.
CHAPTER 31
DALEY DROVE FAST, too fast. The world spun past the windows.
For a while Nick battled demons: light, airy, horned beings that clutched him and sucked the breath from his mouth. But they went away, and he felt empty. He was no longer tormented by the people of either world. He was in a corner by himself where winged creatures, hoping to get to him, beat out their lives against the invisible barrier.
Nick reached up to touch the safety glass of the windshield and dreamed his fingers sliced through into the night. He could grasp the stars if he wanted and bring them down to earth to warm him. He could hang the moon on the Milky Way and walk in its silvery light. He could create universes and, with a puff of his breath, set them whirling forever. If he wanted to leave the earth and enter another galaxy, he had the power.
His fingers came away from the glass, retreated to the silent space where his temporal body lounged.
Daley drove too fast. He was taking them both into the past where escape would be impossible. Surely he realized his mistake? He had battered down the walls holding everything in its place, and what lay ahead were years torn from a calendar they should never witness again.
Too fast, slipping backward, snatching for telephone poles, for clouds, for the starry sky to halt the awful, sickening plunge into the hideous past.
His blond hair fell over his forehead like a veil. The blood on his hands was dried and flaky. He breathed specks into his nose.
Daley was not listening. Daley was alone. Daley had forgotten his only brother.
Nick felt a split starting at his groin and zigzagging up his abdomen, between his nipples. A line going straight up his neck, over his face, into his falling hair, and down again, like a snake swallowing its tail, back to where it began. Everything was going to fall out from inside him and lie in a wriggling heap between his legs.
He should have pocketed the stars when he had a chance. He should have chinned himself into heaven on the hook of the platinum moon. He should have taken God’s place and toppled the planets with a sigh.
Was it too late?
Tentatively, Nick reached out with one hand to the glass that held him in place, earthbound. His fingers met resistance. He could not discover the secret passage into the heavens again.
It was too late.
He turned to stare out the window into midnight. The seam inside him widened, and an eagle swooped within the confines of the car and carried away chunks of his soul while Nick watched—helpless.
A man crouched over a shallow grave patting red damp clay into place. Another man held the shovel and hung his head.
Birds, wakened by the coming of the men, flew in startled bands through the pine boughs, looking for quiet. The sky withdrew its starlight and the moon scuttled into a gray cloud. There was rain on the air, the promise of sudden showers.
The man holding the shovel loosened his fingers and let the mud-encrusted handle fall to the ground where it bounced on the new grave. The man with his hand on the dirt darted backward, sat down in a puddle, and struggled to his feet.
“What do we do now?” he asked.
“Nothing,” the other man answered simply.
“It’s all my fault.”