Dirty Harry 01 - Duel For Cannons (13 page)

“Oh, my, my, my, y’all really shoulda stayed home,” the sheriff laughed. “Everythin’ was goin’ just fine until you showed up.”

Strughold smiled, chuckled, and all but hopped up and down in the seat as the car wound its way out of the stadium. Harry could understand where some of Mitch’s mirth was coming from, but he couldn’t fathom why the sheriff was acting like it was Christmas. He didn’t have to wait long to find out.

“Had to play the hero, din’t ya?” the sheriff cackled. “Had to face Thurston yerself, huh?”

“What are you babbling about?” Harry asked tiredly.

“Babblin’? Babblin’? Why, that’s a hell of a thing to say! And you bein’ the man who blew Tucker’s system to shit!”

Callahan had a funny way of reacting to trouble. Rather than becoming upset, morose, or despondent, he got crafty. As soon as Sheriff Strughold delivered that last bombshell, Harry was already trying to figure a way out. In the meantime, he had to keep the idiot talking.

“What do you mean?” he asked, allowing some doubt to creep into his voice.

“I mean jes that!” the sheriff chortled, holding his sides. “I mean you couldn’ta known that Thurston was going to be there the other night, so somebody had ta tell ya. So all of a sudden, we knew there was somebody tellin’ Tucker too. Then all we hadda do was find out who and git you outta the way!”

Strughold took a moment to slap his two deputies on the back. They joined in with his laughter as the car turned on to the road outside the stadium.

“Well, you haven’t got me yet,” Harry said, bringing the Sheriff’s attention back to him. “This thing will never hold up in court.”

“The hell it won’t!” Strughold announced. “The only witnesses you got is those kids an’ they’ll say anythin’ we tell ’em to.”

“How about Officer Lieber?” Harry asked, already knowing the answer, but desperate to keep Strughold confessing.

“Hell, his pension is more important to him than the likes a’ you! Once we found out he was goin’ ta be the arresting officer, the rest was easy.”

“How did you find out?” Harry asked, playing on the sheriff’s ego. “Our plan was perfect.”

“Well, ya see, that’s the problem with hospitals,” Strughold said cryptically. “Once you get a wounded officer into a bed, its kinda hard to keep track of all the drugs that’s pumped inta ’im. Sometimes they kin be a kinda mistake, y’know? And then the officer gets a bad case of diarrhea of the mouth, if ya know what I mean.”

Harry blessed the sheriff’s own infection for revealing the truth. Somehow, probably very easily, Striker had gotten to the off-duty officer with the crushed toes. Pumping the guy with truth serum, or perhaps just threatening him and his family, Striker had gotten the full story as to how the Four Ponies arrest went down.

And if Striker knew how that worked, he knew that Nash was behind it.

The situation had gotten far worse than Harry expected. Given the situation, Harry wouldn’t have been surprised if Striker had reserved a nasty, uncozy jail cell for him and thrown away not only the key, but the lock as well. And once he got out, he wouldn’t be surprised if Nash had joined Tucker in that great courtroom in the sky and his badge was in serious jeopardy.

The latter problem didn’t faze Harry in the least. His badge had been in jeopardy before. But contrary to the James Bond book and movie title of the past, you only live once. Peter Nash, not to mention his family, were in incredible danger. And if Harry was rotting behind bars, there was nothing he could do about it.

Harry looked at the three cops as the car turned onto New Graunfels Avenue, heading toward Route 81. Once the car hit the highway and picked up speed, Harry knew any escape would be that much harder. He looked around the seat for the .44 Magnum. Thankfully, Strughold was so sure of himself that he left the big gun lying next to his left thigh. In order to get it, Harry would have to reach across the sheriff’s bulk.

Harry looked at the door next to him. It was locked, naturally, and there was no door tab to let the alleged perpetrator unlock it. But Harry knew where the lock mechanism was inside the door. One high-powered bullet and the door should open. Yeah, and one punch and the sheriff should lose consciousness. And if he went fast enough the deputies should be too stunned to react. And the car should be going slow enough so when he jumped out he didn’t break both arms, both legs, and most of his ribs. And if he was really good this year, he wouldn’t get coal in his Christmas stocking.

Looking at it objectively, Harry knew that the only thing he had going for him was surprise. No one in his right mind would consider battling three armed cops while he had handcuffs on. And no inspector in his right mind would jeopardize his life and career to assault another officer and avoid capture. That was what Strughold was probably counting on. Both the sheriff and Striker thought that Harry would roll over and play dead rather than play with his future.

It was time to prove them wrong, Harry figured. As he twisted his wrists to see what kind of give the handcuffs had, he thought, of all things, about how the cartoon character Tweety Pie would have put it. “He don’t know me very well, do he?” rocketed through Harry’s mind, then he moved.

Lucky for Callahan, the sheriff decided to say something to his deputies at that very moment. So Strughold’s face met Harry’s clenched hands halfway up. The back of the car reverberated with a loud smacking sound, then Strughold reared back, his eyes closed. As soon as Harry felt his fists meet flesh, he pulled his arms down and grabbed the Magnum’s butt.

Swinging back, he pushed the gun barrel against the door, just under the armrest and pulled the trigger. The smacking sound mingled with an earsplitting boom. The deputy in the passenger’s seat saw a flash and the driver accidentally jerked the steering wheel in surprise. The car swerved, but the back door remained closed.

Callahan stared in shock just long enough to notice that the deputy in the passenger seat was turning around. Then he reared back himself, brought his feet up, and kicked at the door with all his might.

Then it burst open. Harry’s legs swung outside the swerving car. The door swung out, then bounced back. Harry met it with his shoulder as he threw the rest of his body forward. Thankfully, the surprised driver hit the brakes right after the gun went off, so the speed Harry was falling out at wasn’t really a problem. What was a problem was that the cop car was well on its way toward stopping, so that the deputies could get out and decorate his body with bullet holes.

That thought did much to keep Harry moving fast. He hit the ground and rolled as the car arced away from him. The actual landing wasn’t as awful as it could have been, so Harry spent his spinning time praying that another car didn’t run him over. Happily for him, the street was empty because almost everyone in the area was inside Alamo Stadium.

Harry pulled himself to an abrupt stop, resting on his elbows and knees. To his delight, the Magnum was still clenched in both hands, the cop car was fifty feet down the street and still rolling, and there was an embankment nearby. He got up quickly but painfully. His left leg announced to his brain that it was wounded as his eyes focused on the police car. As he watched, the vehicle screeched to a halt and the passenger door opened. Trotting toward the side of the road, Harry pointed the Magnum at the opening door and fired. A hole ripped through the door’s window, splattering glass across the road. The door closed.

Harry dived over the embankment and rolled down a grassy hill into a wooded area. Taking no time to look back, he got up and ran. He ran through the mass of cypress and oak trees, smelling the cool, comforting scent of nearby water. If his knowledge of San Antonio geography was right, he was near the river, just before it wound its way through Brackenridge Park.

Harry spied the boat basin even before he got out of the woods. His timing was terrific because just then he heard the sounds of pursuit behind him. The dock was a small one, mostly lined with sightseeing vehicles. Some were the two-person floaters where a pair made it go by cycling a riverboat-like paddle. Others were bigger flatbed barges outfitted with rows of seats for a leisurely tour down the Paseo. But there were also one or two sleek outboard crafts built for faster speeds. Harry ran out of the tree cover toward the ships.

No one noticed the handcuffed, gun-wielding inspector until the pursuing cops started yelling. Then the innocent bystanders looked toward the racing uniformed deputies, then in the direction they were pointing. All of a sudden Harry’s desperate plight became shared knowledge. Immediately thereafter everyone started getting out of the way.

A man tackled his wife and kids to get down to ground level. Groups of teenagers dived off the paddle-boats. Workers started deserting the dock
en masse
as a scuffed, bloodied, sweating man in handcuffs holding a huge revolver came running right at them. The only person who didn’t move was one lone boatman holding the anchor rope from one of the motorboats. He kneeled by the craft, staring at Harry in shock.

Callahan pointed the Magnum at him. “The key!” Harry demanded. He lucked out. The guy immediately stuck his hand into his pocket and tossed him the key. Harry had to pull the gun away from the guy’s head to catch it, and the guy took the opportunity to try jumping him.

Harry marveled at the guy’s bravery and stupidity. Then he clubbed him on the head with the Magnum and jumped into the boat. It was an unpretentious craft with two seats, a regular wheel, and standard clutch. Harry threw his gun onto the driver’s seat and rammed the key into the corresponding keyhole.

A bullet slashed through the boat’s windshield. Harry pivoted, grabbed his gun, and blasted back at the two cops. They had just reached the rear of the basin. Harry’s shot went in between them, but it was enough to split them up and make them dive under cover.

Callahan turned back to the boat’s dash and tried to turn the key with the gun still in his hand. The barrel was too long. He turned back toward the cops and fired again to keep them down, then dropped the gun on the dash and turned the key.

The boat roared into life, but without pushing forward the clutch, it would only roar in one place. Harry realized that at about the same time the deputies did. Harry’s cuffed hands were reaching for the device when another bullet splattered into the driver’s seat. Another came hot on its heels, making a hole in the dash next to Harry’s legs.

“Shit!” Callahan cursed, scrambling for the Magnum and slamming his back against the dashboard. He wasn’t so much worried about one of the bullets hitting him as he was about one of them hitting the gas tank. He pointed the revolver with both hands and repeatedly pulled the trigger as he arched his back. His lower vertebra did the trick. It connected with the clutch and the boat jerked forward.

Just as the craft started to move, Harry’s gun ran out of ammunition. The click of the hammer hitting an empty chamber was drowned out by the growl of the motor, but the deputies saw that nothing was coming out of the Magnum barrel. Harry knew he didn’t have time to reload so he turned all his concentration on driving.

The deputy who had been driving saw it as a chance to peg the escaping inspector dead to rights. He raced forward along the dock, firing as he went. The bullets smacked all around Harry. He turned to see that the anchor line was still attached to both the boat’s rear clasp and the pier’s pylon. Harry wondered which would give out first as he pushed the clutch all the way over.

They both did. As soon as the rope grew taut, Harry poured on the speed. There was a loud twang, a tearing sound, and then the pylon cracked, the clasp flew off and the last board making up the dock dropped into the river just as the deputy stepped on it.

Both the cop’s legs flew into the air, his gun went spinning into the water, and he landed heavily on his back. To add insult to injury, the metal clasp boomeranged and slapped him in the side. He howled in surprised pain as Harry sped down the river.

The other deputy jumped right over his partner and into the other motorboat. He screamed for the key as well as yelling at his dazed associate to radio for more help. The boat’s key was thrown to him as the wounded cop hobbled back toward their car.

The second chase was on. Harry had traded a running race with a speedboat sprint. And he knew it wouldn’t be a very long one. The Paseo del Rio was not only a very shallow river section, it was an often-interrupted one. Even casual canoeists had to cross dozens of portages to get anywhere in the city.

Harry broke open his revolver chambers, threw his gun on the dash, and dug into his pocket for one of the four auto-loaders he always carried with him. He used to carry only three, but after the homicidal Lieutenant Briggs caught him with his bullets down during the “Magnum Force” case, he had decided an extra wouldn’t hurt. No one would ever completely disarm him again.

As he dug one out, he noticed his leg wound. Almost the entire left pant leg was ripped open, exposing a nasty looking cut that stretched from his lower thigh to his lower calf. It couldn’t be that bad, Harry reasoned, since he could still stand on if. So deciding, he ignored it and got back to reloading his gun while steering the careening boat.

Lining up the auto-loader with the gun’s chamber was child’s play. Locking the cartridges in was a little harder. Every time he pushed on the auto-loader the gun would also be pushed forward. He quickly jammed the barrel against the side of the dash, then pushed the auto-loader. The bullets slid in, the auto-loader clicked and let go. Then being done, Harry wished there was some way he could shoot the handcuff chain in two.

He wished for a way all the more when he heard another bullet zing over his head. Harry turned to see a deputy in a speedboat hot on his tail. He didn’t bother to shoot back. Hitting anything from a careening boat while trying to steer with handcuffs on was unlikely. Shooting a duly authorized Texas deputy was the same as committing suicide anyway. At this point in the game, Harry would settle for survival.

He ducked down in the driver’s seat and concentrated all his effort on avoiding a crack-up. Coming up fast on the port side was a tourist barge lazily drifting past the sights. The deputy saw it, too, and lowered his gun. It would not do for a visitor to get croaked by a cop on the river. That gave Harry a little extra time to think.