The Devil's Footprint (6 page)

There was
nothing except an embossed coffee mug.

Anything can be a weapon!

He seized the
mug by its base, leaped over the temporarily sprawled figures of Cochrane and
Warner, and punched the Japanese full force in the face with the open rim as
the terrorist was turning back to Cochrane's office after throwing the grenade.

Fitzduane put
everything he had behind the blow.
 
The
shock of the vicious impact ran up his arm and jarred his shoulder, and he
grunted with the pain and effort.

The mug
shattered, virtually exploding.

Shards
penetrated the assassin's face.
 
The
impact broke Wakami's nose and cheekbone, temporarily stunning him.

Edged metal
slammed into the door frame beside Fitzduane as he ducked in reflex.
 
He realized he would have been stabbed if the
first killer's dazed body had not impeded his attacker.

He pivoted,
smashed his elbow into his assailant's stomach, and jabbed with the broken
remains of the coffee mug at the back of the hand holding the weapon.

The hand was
caught between the blow and the door frame, and Fitzduane was fighting with the
force of true desperation.

The man gave a
shriek of agony as the bones in his hand were shattered and he lost his grip on
the punch dagger.

Fitzduane
grabbed the man's arm, the bloody hand dangling uselessly from it, dropped to
one knee, and threw the terrorist over his shoulder into Cochrane's office.

Fitzduane then
wrenched the strange-looking weapon from the wood.
 
If felt like a woodworker's
tool in his hand; the general shape was like a gimlet, but the blade was like a
short, thin stiletto.

His movements
flowing one into the other, he raised the slumped head of his original attacker
with a hard palm blow under the chin.

As his head
came up, Fitzduane hooked his right arm around and stabbed the needlelike blade
into the man's ear.

The terrorist
jerked upright in a horrified spasm as the punch dagger cut into him and his
mouth opened as if to scream, but the point had entered his brain before the
pain message could be implemented.

He collapsed
lifeless like an abandoned puppet.

Fitzduane
looked back into Cochrane's office.

The terrorist
he had thrown there had fallen on the edge of the table that had been lying on
its side since Cochrane had tripped over it.
 
The impact had driven the air out of his lungs, and while he lay there
gasping, Cochrane had taken his own belt off, made a sliding noose with the
belt buckle, and looped it around the fallen man's neck.

The terrorist
kicked desperately as the noose tightened, and his one good hand flailed as he
tried to loosen the unrelenting grip.

Warner tried
to pinion his legs.
 
The terrorist
writhed, his strength formidable in his desperation.
 
His legs kicked clear.
 
Cochrane suddenly jerked the noose at an
angle with all his strength.

Fitzduane
could hear the sound of the man's neck snapping.

Cochrane, his
tie askew and his hair rumpled but ever the chief of staff, looked up at
Fitzduane.
 
"We're okay, Hugo.
 
Check outside.
 
There may be others."

It was a point
that Fitzduane had considered.
 
Reacting
to immediate threat had been a matter of instinct.
 
Now he left the shelter of the door frame
with some caution.

There were
going to be a bunch of trigger-happy Capitol police here any moment, and that
thought did not fill him with a sense of well-being.
 
Also, there could be other terrorists.
 
There had been only two waiting in the
reception area, but that did not mean that there were not more waiting nearby.

Space was so
limited in the offices that his short journey from the door frame of Cochrane's
office was through a corridor of filing cabinets.
 
The distance was only about six feet until
the space widened, but it represented temporary safety and Fitzduane was not
enthusiastic about stepping into the unknown.

But some
things just
had
to be done.
 
He had to leave his steel-drawer haven and
hope nobody was waiting around the corner with unfriendly thoughts.
 
The image of Patricio Nicanor being
decapitated was still emblazoned on his mind, and the unfortunate man's body
and severed head lay just behind him.

He moved
forward.

There was a
cacophony of shouts and cries and moaning noise coming from the general office
on the left, but the reception area seemed unnaturally quiet.

He tried to
remember the layout.

There had been
receptionists working either side behind built-in desks as he came in.
 
One was Tanya.
 
He did not know the others' names.
 
There was a petite brunette in her late
twenties.
 
And there had been someone
else filing, he seemed to recall.
 
All he
had seen was a man's white shirt and the kind of thick hair you have only when
you are very young.
 
An
intern.

He heard a
noise behind him.
 
He had forgotten about
Maury during the action.
 
The
uncharitable thought came to him that it would have been nice if Maurice had
intervened earlier, but then he realized that there really had been neither
time nor opportunity.

Only seconds
had passed, and the leader had initially been cut off from the action by the
sprawled bodies of Cochrane and Warner.
 
So he had kept his head and moved when it was appropriate.
 
Of course, Maury, though he was the
antithesis of the man of action in appearance, had actually seen more combat
than most.
 
He knew about all this stuff,
and in this situation that was reassuring.

Maury raised
his fingers to his lips, indicated right and then at himself.
 
He then indicated Fitzduane and left, and
there was a question on his face.

Fitzduane
nodded in agreement but felt a chill run through him.

He was getting
sloppy.
 
Congress was not in
session.
 
He had forgotten all about the
empty congressman's office.
 
Because
maybe it was not empty, and if he had turned left as he had planned his back
would have been to the office.
 
He could
almost feel the blade being hammered into his kidneys.

Both men were
about to move when they were momentarily brought to a halt by a rivulet of
crimson that flowed slowly around the last file cabinet.

Fitzduane was
sick inside.
 
He looked at Maury and held
up three fingers and brought them down one by one.
 
"Three, two, one, GO!" they mouthed
silently in
unison,
and both moved away from the cover
of the cabinets into the reception area and to left and right, respectively.

Tanya lay
sprawled on the ground, her arms up in front of her face as if to ward off her
attacker.
 
The upper half of her dress
was saturated with blood and the material was ripped and torn as if she had
been struck a series of blows.

The other
receptionist had died at her desk.

She was
slumped forward over the computer keyboard, and a bloody hole at the base of
her neck showed how she had died.

There was a
third body in the main doorway, slain while attempting to flee.
 
The white shirt was now crimson but
unperforated.

Fitzduane
followed the blood line and saw that in this case the punch dagger had been
slammed into the back of the skull.

He felt
nothing but sadness.
 
The young should
not die, and certainly not slain casually like animals in an abattoir.

Fitzduane
moved to the general office.

Several forms
were sprawled over their desks and nearly every surface was pitted as if a
grenade had gone off.

Unhurt figures
rose from behind desks as he looked.
 
Several were bleeding from cuts but seemed otherwise unharmed.
 
Certainly, there were enough fit people to
take care of the injured.
 
One was
already speaking into a phone.

"Stay
here for the moment," he said, "while we check a little further.
 
We've got two, but there may be others."

Maury came out
of the congressman's office.
 
"It's
clear," he said.

Cochrane
emerged from his office, his shocked gaze only loosely focused on Fitzduane and
Maury.
 
"He's — I think we killed
him," he
said,
his voice shaky.
 
He looked around, and anger hardened his
voice.
 
"Hell, where the fuck is
Security?"

He stiffened
suddenly as he noticed Tanya and the other two dead staffers.
 
He brought up his hands to his face as if to
hide the horror of what he was seeing.
 
"Oh, God!" he said.
 
"Oh, God!
 
Oh God!"

He slumped to
his knees beside Tanya and took her in his arms, though it was clear it was
hopeless.

It came to
Fitzduane that these were people the chief of staff worked closely with and
felt responsible for, and now he had gotten them killed.
 
These were office staffers and interns.
 
This was not what they had signed up for.

Cochrane was
sobbing, guilt etched into his face.

Fitzduane
hunkered down beside him.
 
"Lee," he said.

Lee looked at
him in agony.
 
"Lee," repeated
Fitzduane sharply.
 
"How many were
there in the Japanese party?"

Cochrane shook
his head, trying to focus.
 
"I—I
don't know," he said dully.
 
"Two, I think.
 
Does it
matter?"

Fitzduane rose
to his feet and looked at Maury.
 
"Maury," he said, "can you get me patched through to
Security?
 
Tell them the situation here,
identify me, and tell them to bring along spare radios, body armor, and weapons.
 
Do you know the right person to speak
to?
 
We need some juice here."

"There is
almost certainly one other terrorist loose.
 
There is
always
a watcher, and
sometimes more than one.
 
You know
that.
 
You've been there.
 
I think we should lend a hand.
 
These cops won't have the experience."

Maury nodded
as he was picking up the phone.
 
There
were several brief verbal encounters in English, and then he broke into rapid
colloquial French.
 
"
D'accord
," he said finally, and put
down the phone.

"Quebecois
are like the Irish," he said.
 
"We get around."

"Who is
he?" said Fitzduane.

"Number
two on the Emergency Response team," said Maury.
 
"But how do we know what we're looking
for?
 
There are Japanese tourists all
over the place — and the others may not even be Japanese.
 
We could be looking for any race or
creed."

Capitol police
with drawn guns entered the doorway and looked around uncertainly.
 
Maury's contact had not connected yet.

Fitzduane held
up a hand just as one of the policemen was moving forward.

The policeman
stopped, though he was far from being sure why he was paying any attention to a
bloodstained civilian.
 
Yet the man had a
definite command presence.

Fitzduane bent
down and picked up two pairs of black horn-rimmed glasses that had been placed
neatly on the reception table beside two empty cups.

Maury pursed
his lips, went into Cochrane's office, and then came back.
 
"Identical haircuts, suits, shirts,
ties, and shoes," he said.
 
"A
neat and simple trick if you want to avoid being recognized afterwards."

"But
which may work in our favor now," said Fitzduane.
 
"Well, it had better.
 
We don't have much else."

A short,
stocky, fit-looking man appeared through the doorway dressed in SWAT
fatigues.
 
He and Maury had a quick
conversation in French before he turned to Fitzduane.

"This is
Henri," said Maury, reverting to English.

"Let's go
to it," said Fitzduane.

Henri shook
his head.
 
"Colonel Fitzduane, I
know how you must feel, but it's more than my job is worth
.
  
This thing is going to be
investigated every which way by more agencies than there are letters in the
alphabet, not to mention hearings on security by both houses.
 
IF it came out that I had armed a couple of
civilians and allowed them to go terrorist hunting on the Hill...
 
Well, it does not bear thinking about.
 
I'd be the salami and the system the slicer,
and believe
me,
these people do know how to cut."

Cochrane had
now recovered somewhat, though he still looked pale and shocked.
 
He had covered Tanya's upper body with his
suit jacket and now stood slumped against a filing cabinet, his clothing soaked
in drying blood.
 
He ran one hand wearily
through his hair in a gesture of both exhaustion and sadness.