Paul skidded on the frozen surface, abrading his right side; he drew his legs up foetally to get them out of the line of fire; he heard Pyne’s feet moving and he jabbed his hand desperately into his. coat pocket. He lay on his right side; it was his left hand and that was the little automatic, the .25, and it felt absurdly toylike in his hand.

The Luger exploded again and the bullet screamed off the pavement; he heard it slam the bricks across the road.

Paul dropped flat. Beneath the car he saw the shadows of the tall man’s overshoes, moving hesitantly. Paul fired.

Left-handed; it was a miss; the bullet whined off the curb.

The overshoes began to run toward the car.

Terror pumped adrenaline through him; his hand shook. He rolled back into the street and that was what took Pyne by surprise because Pyne expected him to cling to the shelter of the car. Paul came in sight before Pyne expected it and when Pyne fired it was too hasty; the shot went wide somewhere and Paul was shooting as fast as he could pull trigger, the sounds reverberating madly in the narrow canyon like something careening around inside a metal can.

The .25’s stopped Pyne in his tracks and hurled him backward, exploding against his body; the Luger fired once more, high into the air; then the tall man toppled. It was clear by the way he fell that he was dead: one of the wild bullets had struck his throat.

“Dear God.”

40

PEOPLE WOULD HAVE HEARD the noise but they wouldn’t have a fix on it and it wasn’t the kind of place where things were reported immediately to the Man. He glanced at the upper windows; the moving light had been extinguished. Certainly that one wasn’t going to report anything.

It came to him then in a moment’s crazy inspiration as he crawled to his feet and stood swaying. He felt an insistent hammering behind his eyes. It would work; he saw it full-blown in his mind and he was incredulous.

He took the Centennial from his pocket. He still wore the rubber gloves. He knelt by the dead man. The Luger was clutched in the outflung right hand. Paul slipped the Centennial, into Pyne’s left-hand coat pocket. Then he went back to his own car. He had a bad moment of shakes before he was able to turn the key but he knew he had to get clear before he could afford to let the reaction hit him and he forced himself, tightening up the muscles of his stomach and squeezing the steering wheel with all his strength until the dizziness subsided. He gunned the car away and didn’t put the headlights on until he was several blocks distant. He heard the approaching sirens but he never saw them; he stayed to the side streets until he was well away.

Then he parked and let himself slump with the back of his head on top of the seat-back, choking down the nausea and letting the shock wash over him, not fighting it, waiting it out.

There was still one thing to do. When he felt strong enough he started the car again and drove north into the Loop. It was nearly two in the morning; the city was dark and silent. He went north onto the Dearborn Avenue bridge and stopped the car in the middle of the bridge. Put the .25 automatic into the paper bag along with the gun-cleaning kit and stepped out of the car. He stopped briefly, his nerves prey to imagined dangers, but nothing stirred in the night and he took two quick strides to the railing and dropped the heavy bag into the Chicago River.

Then he drove home.

41

CHICAGO, JAN. 7TH—The Chicago vigilante is dead. He died as he lived, by the gun.

The body of Orson B. Pyne, 47, of 2806 Reba Place, Evanston, was found last night riddled with bullets in a side street off Lafayette Avenue in South Chicago after police received two telephone reports that shots had been heard in the area.

(For story on Pyne’s background, see page 14.)

Found in the dead man’s possession were a .45 caliber Luger automatic pistol and a .38 S&W Centennial revolver. The Luger had been fired four times, according to the police. The Centennial had not been fired.

Pyne was killed by several shots from a small-caliber weapon, according to Captain Victor Mastro of the Chicago Police Department’s special Vigilante Squad.

Mastro said, “He finally ran into a criminal who was faster than he was.”

Police are searching for the man who killed Pyne but if there are clues to his identity, the police are not revealing them. Captain Mastro said, “He was found on a very dark side street. Probably he went in there to entice a mugger to follow him. The mugger was armed—preliminary ballistics reports indicate it was probably a .25 caliber automatic with dum-dum bullets—and evidently there was a gun-fight. The entry angle of the death bullets indicates that the assailant was flat on the street when he fired, which may mean he’d ducked for cover or may mean he was wounded himself, although we doubt that’s the case, since any injury from that .45 Luger would have torn him up pretty badly and he wouldn’t have gotten away. We found no blood on the scene that couldn’t be traced to the dead man.”

Both guns found in Pyne’s possession were rushed immediately to the police laboratory. Captain Mastro said, “There’s absolutely no doubt that these are the two weapons that were used in all the vigilante cases.”

42

AWEEK LATER he left the office at six o’clock and put the Pontiac up Lake Shore Drive through a gentle snowfall; he was at Harry Chisum’s house by half past the hour.

He’d stopped by two days ago but Irene’s car had been parked at the curb and he’d gone by without stopping; he’d had a very bad time of it that night but he knew he had to face the old man and it was better to get it done.

There was no sign of Irene’s car. He rang the doorbell and took a vague satisfaction in the surprise with which Harry Chisum greeted him.

“I’d like to talk to you.”

“By all means, Paul. Come in.”

“Are you alone? I don’t want to disturb—”

“We’re quite alone.” Harry led him into the parlor and Paul glanced at the ancient television set. Not long ago he’d have hated it for betraying him.

“Would you like a drink? Sherry perhaps?”

“Scotch if you’ve got it.”

“How are things at Childress Associates?”

“They keep me jumping.”

“It’s probably good for you to have a lot of work to do.”

“Yes, it’s a life saver.”

Harry made the drinks and they returned to the parlor. “Well then.”

Paul said, “There’s something I want you to know.”

“I’ve pretty much figured it out for myself.”

“I tried to talk to him. He wouldn’t let me finish. He pulled out that goddamned Luger and started shooting at me. It was blind luck as much as anything else. It might just as easily have been me. I had no intention of shooting the man, Harry.”

“Yes.”

“I’ve got to know you believe that.”

“Is there any reason why I shouldn’t?”

“When I planted the thirty-eight on his body it was an afterthought. I hadn’t planned that.”

“All right, Paul.”

“If he’d only listened to me I could have talked him out of it. It would have worked.”

“He was an impatient man, I suppose. His son a heroin addict. …”

“He panicked, that’s all.”

“Yes.”

“Harry, I get a feeling you don’t believe me.”

“Why shouldn’t I?”

Paul looked down at his drink. “I don’t deserve much consideration. I can’t ask you to keep my secret. But I want you to believe this—it’s important.”

“Paul, I believe it. I’m utterly convinced you had no intention of killing that man. What more can I say to you?”