JUNK

Chapter Seven

Steve's friend in Bude had connections at a private helipad. Leaving the Audi for his family, the furious Texan was in Plymouth, then London, within hours. He hadn't so much as packed a bag. He strode into the Gatwick police office and demanded satisfaction. He used his big fist to pound someone's desk. The cops there had no idea what he was talking about until he shouted "CI5" at them. Then they sat him down quite gently and put in a call to that establishment.

"Lemme at 'im," hissed Bodie, at Gatwick. "I'll kill the son of a bitch."

"Oh, well, that should be helpful." Doyle put a hand on his friend's chest to stop him. He was weary but still not about to let Bodie have his way in this matter.

He and Murphy had driven their silent captive to Plymouth and flown back to London from there, Murphy shaking his head periodically. "He doesn't look the part," he kept saying. "No, sir. Not this bit of fluff."

"This bit of fluff," warned Doyle, "could take your head off with the flick of a toe." He was, of course, trying to make the little junkie laugh, and succeeding most of the time. Somehow every time he laughed Doyle was certain he was not a serial child-killer. Although this meant the killer was still on the loose, and that wasn't anything to cheer about, it also meant that Doyle wasn't losing his grip. If he lost his ability to judge character, how would he ever believe he had the right to mete out the justice he was so often asked to effect, or indeed to do his job at all? No, if he could be won over even once by that silly laugh, then it was better for all concerned if the boy were innocent. Now Bodie wanted to destroy that, and how could he explain it all to Bodie? "Listen to me, you great instrument of righteous vengeance." They were in the Capri now, Bodie at the wheel, Sam sleeping, cuffed, in the back. (Spalding, home from Surrey, picked up Murphy in order to drive him straight to Pimlico for another stakeout.) "He led us a merry chase, all right, I grant you that, but wouldn't you do the same?"

"Yeah, sure, if I were a child-murderer."

"Do you have it in you?"

Ray's question startled the taller man. "Do I... what do you mean by that?"

"Bodie..." Ray's voice was soft. "You and I have killed. Can we even count how many people we've killed? I'd have to stop and think hard, wouldn't you?"

"Not children. Never children."

"Parents, though, maybe."

"Not the same."

"Okay we've never killed children. Could we? Would it be possible? Could we ever come to that?"

"No. Never. And..." Bodie was distraught. This wasn't what Ray had planned. "... he didn't just kill them." Bodie pulled over to the shoulder of the roadway and stopped. He was shaking.

"Bodie..." Doyle was ready to detain his friend but Bodie made no move to open his door. He sat clutching the steering wheel, blinking back tears and blinking back anger at his tears. "What is it, Bodie?"

"It happened to me, too," said Bodie, finally. His voice was almost raspy. "It happened to me too." Ray waited. "You know how when you are a child you believe even the most hateful acts are acts of love?" Ray didn't, but he nodded anyway. "When you are three years old, you don't know that grownups can be so fucked up. You figure they always know what they're doing, and if they hurt you, you deserved it." Ray nodded again. This he knew. "Well, when I was three, my mother got sick. She was in hospital. Pa was out working all the time so he sent me to my mother's sister. Aunt Sally. I was with her for, oh, I don't know, maybe six months. Did I ever mention Aunt Sally to you?" Ray shook his head. He knew that Bodie knew he'd never mentioned Aunt Sally. "Aunt Sally took me into her little flat where she lived alone with her dog and her parakeet. I slept on the sofa. The dog liked me. Big dog, twice my size, some kind of mutt. Slept on the sofa with me, took up the whole thing. I used to end up on the floor, but I didn't mind. Patrick, that dog's name was. Used to jump down then and curl himself around me. Parakeet's name was Emerald. Funny the things you remember." Bodie, white-knuckled on the steering wheel, remembered for a minute or two. Ray waited. "Funny the things you forget, too.

"Aunt Sally. Jesus. Everything I did was wrong. If I was hungry I was a pain in the arse. If I didn't eat I wasn't cooperating, or I was criticizing her cooking. If I was quiet I was plotting something. If I was laughing, I was making too much noise. If I was crying I was making too much noise. If I was breathing I was making too much noise. If I played I was messing with her things, or I was being bad, or... Three years old and I was screwed no matter what I did. Wasn't allowed to touch anything. Wasn't allowed to exist, really. Just the sight of me made her mad. Yet, and this is the strange part, she was always hugging me, always kissing me, always holding me on her lap, always telling me how much she loved me.

"And hitting me."

"Bodie," ventured Ray.

"No, that's not it. Not the hitting. No, I don't mean that." Bodie was barely audible now. "Every kid gets hit. You got hit, right?"

"Yeah."

"Sure you did. Bet you deserved it, too, you little imp. And so did I. But... Sally used to cut herself."

"Cut?"

"With a razor blade. Little crosshatches in her legs. Just enough to raise welts. The blood came up but didn't flow. She made little designs. She had this crazy boyfriend who came over sometimes, and she used to call him all the time, and when she hung up, whether he was coming over or not, she would get out this razor blade and cut little patterns into her leg."

"Jesus."

"Yeah. And one day they had a big fight on the phone, and she was cutting herself, and a little blood showed on her leg, and I was scared, and I pissed myself." He looked at Ray. "I was three!" Ray held up his hands: no contest. "She got really mad. She made me clean up all by myself, and I didn't do a very good job, and she was giving me these looks the while, like she wanted to kill me. When I was finished she said I wasn't clean enough and she wouldn't let me put new clothes on. She tied me to the sofa..."

"Oh Bodie." Ray was aghast.

"No, she always did that. I mean after she found me on the floor with Patrick one morning. She said it was to keep me from falling out again but some nights when she was mad she said it was to keep me from touching myself." Bodie attempted a smile at this. It was a piss-poor smile indeed. "No, but this time, she tied me to the sofa and I was naked, which was a little different, and it wasn't night, and this time she took her razor and she cut little designs into the bottoms of my feet.

"I couldn't walk for a while after that. While my feet were healing she cut my buttocks, but then she must've got afraid because she never did it again. Anyway, I healed up and then my mother came out of hospital and I went home." Bodie let go of the steering wheel and covered his face with his hands. Ray said nothing. What was there to say? Could he tell his friend how his throat and gut ached with anger on his behalf, how he would like nothing better than to go back in time, if only that were possible, and change it all for him? The child Bodie could not be comforted, and the man Bodie would not be comforted. It was even too late for revenge. Ray waited. Bodie took his hands down from his face and put them back on the steering wheel. He turned to Ray, dry-eyed and full of rage. "You ask me if we could kill children. Killing is nothing. Killing is nothing."

"All right, Bodie," said Ray, softly. "All right."

"Killing would be too good for someone like that shit back there. He ought to have done to him what he did to those children."

"But Bodie. What if he's not the one?"

"He's the one all right."

Ray squinted his eyes mostly shut, making everything, even Bodie, look as rain-speckled as the windshield. "You want him to be the one. You want him to be the one and I can't figure out why."

Bodie looked at him again. "You want him not to be the one, and I can't figure out why." He sighed. "Of course I know why. You want everyone not to be the one. You want everyone to be good because you're good."

"I'm not good."

"Yah you're not good. Right." Bodie snorted: as close to a laugh as he could produce just now. "Anyway I've been the bad cop and I guess that makes you the good cop. I suppose insofar as you keep me off his back he trusts you. You can have a go at him first." Truth be told, Bodie was tired now and wanted to sleep. He could barely drive the Capri to Doyle's street so Doyle could pick up his car and drive a groggy Sam halfway across London, back to HQ. He sat in the Capri for a half an hour after they'd gone, collecting what he thought might be left of his wits.

Cowley at first had no idea who Larry Presley was, but when he heard it was Stephen Whatley demanding to see the lad he could figure it out well enough. He had Susan, who was delighted to get out of HQ, take him all the way out to Gatwick, to meet the gentleman and in less than two hours had pieced together the entire odyssey, Susan taking copious notes. Alas, CI5 now no longer needed Steve Whatley, or any of the Whatleys, and Cowley amiably declined to reintroduce the Texan to the object of his concern.

"I can make a pretty big stink about this," said Steve. "Your London Times might be interested to know you torture people in the middle of London."

"Might they now?" said Cowley. "Then I suppose we had best detain you. Susan?" The agent nodded. "Make sure this gentleman receives comfortable accommodations in London, will you? And Susan... don't let him out of your sight."

Sam was anything but happy to be back in Room 11, but he thought he had the measure of the man who was gazing at him so curiously, and at least Bodie wasn't here knocking him about. Besides, he had come to a decision - one Al would hate, but Al wasn't here either.

"Ray," he said, looking up from his chair. Doyle, standing behind his own chair, was amused at the lad's use of his first name. From another perp he might have found it annoyingly manipulative, but he didn't feel that from Luther. "I want to tell you something. It's not exactly what you're hoping or expecting me to tell you, but I think I have to tell you anyway."

Without a word Doyle drew up his chair to level Luther's sightline and sat waiting for whatever was coming next.

What came next was not less strange to Doyle than learning that Bodie had been born from Cowley's nose and had eight legs.

"I shouldn't tell you this," began Sam, carefully.

"Yes, you should," interrupted Doyle.

"I'm not who you think I am. I'm not Luther Allbright."

Doyle digested this, then decided, "So you've decided to go with an insanity plea. Well, Luther, that may be the best thing for you. Put us in a bit of a hole, it does, I don't mind telling you, and I may not be able to prevent Bodie's taking it out of your hide this time..."

"Please listen." Doyle made a show of shutting his mouth and listening intently. "I'm not Luther Allbright. I know I look like him and sound like him... I'm even beginning to feel a little bit like him, but I'm not him. My name is Doctor Sam Beckett..."

"Oh, doctor, now, is it?"

"Yes. I'm a physicist. Please listen. Do you think a kid like Luther even knows what a physicist is?" Doyle had no answer for that one. "Do you think Luther knows the string theory of time travel?"

"Could've heard it on the telly," said Doyle, doubtfully.

"Not a chance."

"Or from Doctor Mbake!"

"Doctor Who?"

"No, not Doctor Who..."

Sam shook his head much as Doyle had. "Look, did you know Luther before... before our little incident with the car and the train?"

"Met you for the first time at the train yard, mate, as you well know."

Sam thought for a moment. "All right, all right. Luther never finished school, right? I finished more schools than most people had time to enroll in. I was a school junkie! I've got six or seven degrees, I forget which; Al knows..."

"Al? You said Al before."

"Yeah, Al's my friend. Only," Sam drew in a breath. "You're not going to believe this part either."

"Probably not," admitted Doyle.

"He isn't here. I mean he isn't in London in 1985. He's in New Mexico, in, oh, it must be 1998 or 1999 by now. He appears to me in the form of a neurological hologram..."

"I was wrong," said Doyle, abruptly. "You're not strung out. You're tripping!" He stood up and turned away, shaking his head.

"No! Please..." In spite of himself Doyle turned back. What he saw confused him: a man's confidence backed the boy's absolute sincerity. "I'm trying to tell you I'm a time traveler. I've changed places with your Luther. I know it sounds crazy but why would I make up such an outrageous story, knowing you would never believe it?"

Doyle sat back down. He shook his head again, this time to clear it of the growing conviction that there was some truth in what he was hearing. "Go on," he finally said.

"Well, there's not much more to tell. The real Luther is in a waiting room at Project Quantum Leap in New Mexico in... in your future. I'm taking almost as big a risk telling you this as you would be believing me." He looked at Ray. "Are you... believing me?"

"I don't know," said Ray. "I don't know, I don't know, I don't know."

Sam closed his eyes and tipped his head back, trying to straighten out a kink in his neck. He needed a second opinion of how he was doing here. He needed Al. He opened his eyes again and saw that Doyle hadn't moved and was watching him in equal hope of being persuaded or being disillusioned. "What would you do," said Sam, "if you knew I was telling you the truth?"

Ray considered that. "I'd tell Bodie," he said finally, "and he'd tell Cowley, and they'd tell Doctor Ross, and she'd give me lots of tests, and Bodie would have a new partner, maybe one who'd be a little more eager to beat you up than I am."

"Are you eager to beat me up?"

"No," said Ray, honestly, "I'm not eager to beat anyone up. And I know you think Bodie is, but he's not."

"Only me."

"Yeah," agreed Ray, absently. "I mean no. I mean that's not your concern right now."

"So you'd just run this by everyone and go with their verdict that you and I are both crazy. You wouldn't... try to make use of this unusual situation."

"What unusual situation?"

"That I'm a time traveler. That to an extent I know the future, because for me it's already the past. That I could help you find Billy, or whoever hurt those children."

"I thought you said you didn't know where Billy is."

"I don't. Al is working on it."

"Al." Ray shook his head. "Tell me about this Al."

"Well, he's... he's a little older than I, and not as tall. Well, taller right now, but usually not as tall. This..." (Sam nodded up and down, indicating Luther's body) "... isn't me."

"Uh-huh," said Ray, not understanding. "I'm sorry about the cuffs."

"Look, there aren't any weapons and I promise not to hit you..."

"Tough guy. I promise not to turn my back on you!" Ray thought. "All right. What the hell. I'm crazy to be listening to you in the first place. If Bodie were here..." He fished a small key from his pocket and, helping Sam to stand, unlocked the cuffs and freed his arms. He stepped back as Sam slowly brought his hands down to his sides, then up to his face; Sam scratched his nose prodigiously and Ray had to laugh. "Sit." Sam sat. "Go on, then."

"Where was I?" Sam rested his hands on the little table and rested his cheek on his hands, but he kept his eyes open.

"Al is usually shorter than you but not now. I can't believe I'm listening to this."

"Right. He's my best friend. As far as I can remember he's my only friend. He's a retired Navy admiral - that's the U.S. Navy... Oh!" He sat up straight again. "Did I tell you I'm an American?"

"No," smiled Ray, "you didn't mention that." He continued to stand, his fingers resting lightly on the back of his chair. He didn't think the strange young man could come up with anything else that would surprise him now. American indeed!

"Ah, well, I am. And so is Al. Only he was a bit of a city boy and, well, I was a farm boy. Anyway, he goes into this imaging chamber and a hologram of him is projected to wherever I am, and we can see and hear each other, but we can't touch."

"He's like a radio."

"Well, yes," admitted Sam, "that's a good analogy. And to take it a bit further, your receiver doesn't get his channel but mine does. Only he's not really here at all, as I was telling you. It's just his hologram."

"His hologram is here now?"

"No," said Sam, rather sadly. "I wish it, I mean he, was."

"No doubt, no doubt." Ray had to sit down to digest all this. "Okay, you said you know the future. Can you tell me something in the future? Something short term, so it can be proven out?"

Sam shook his head. "Not without Al - and even with Al, well, if it's not in tomorrow's paper, Ziggy can't read it..." He stopped himself from explaining to Doyle what a hard time the egotistical hybrid computer was having penetrating CI5. He thought the agent might not be pleased to hear that anyone was trying, even more than a decade in the future.

"When's Al coming back?" demanded Ray, suddenly.

"I... I don't know. Soon, I hope!"

"When he comes back, you ask him to tell you something from tomorrow's Times. You ask him the headline! He should be able to tell you that, right?"

"Sure," said Sam, "only he'd ask me why I wanted to know and he'd kill me if he knew I was telling you all this."

"I thought you said you couldn't touch."

"Well he'd never speak to me again, anyway. Okay, I'll try to think of a way." He looked up at Ray suddenly. "You're not going to make me stay awake with no food answering questions for days and days again, are you?"

"Uh, no," said Ray. "I don't think I could take that either." He stood up. "Let's find a place for you to sleep." He reached for his R.T. but suddenly didn't open it after all. "Luther?"

"Sam, actually."

"Sam, how did you... I saw the tape. You never said how you knew that train was going to crash."

Sam brightened. "Al told me. How else could I have known? Al told me!"

Four hours later Bodie pounded his way into the cell where Sam lay almost awake and worried about, well, mostly the likelihood of Bodie's pounding his way into the cell. The agent grabbed him by the undershirt in which he slept and dragged him up and off his cot. "Look," started Sam, more annoyed than anything.

"You look," cried Bodie. "Where is he?"

"Who? Ray?"

Bodie shook the scientist. "No, you moron, not Ray! The little boy! Sammy Clark!"

"No, no!" Sam was horrified. "Not another! Please God not another. When?"

Bodie, disgusted, let go of him. "You know damned well when. His parents just called it in. Twenty-four hours he's been gone. You had time to do it. You were out there."

"So he hasn't been found. That means he could still be alive." Bodie was silent. "What kind of parent lets a small child be gone twenty-four hours before calling the police?" Then Sam stood up and went straight to Bodie, who was rather shocked at this, and who suddenly realized too that this was the first time since his initial capture that the little junkie was in Bodie's presence uncuffed. Before he could decide what, if anything, he wanted to do about this, Sam said, "Why aren't you out looking for him?"

"Good question, Sam! Maybe he doesn't know where to look." If Sam jumped it was the tiniest start possible; his eyes never left Bodie's. "But we do."

To this Sam did react. In response Bodie decided not to cuff the youth but to subdue him nonetheless, although Sam hardly needed subduing; Bodie reached out to take Sam by the shoulders, turn him and slam him against the bars of the cell, but somehow he found his move blocked. He darted his foot out to trip the junkie but instead found himself on the cold stone floor, with his arms twisted behind him. "Al? Where?"

"Luther says he saw Billy write down an address on a yellow stickum pad and then hide the pad in a drawer in the kitchen. It might still be there. Tell Bo Didley Squat here to look for that."

"Billy knows an address," said Sam, still restraining the furious Bodie. "I can find it for you. I know what it looks like. I know where he wrote it. Take me to his apartment."

"You mean your apartment." Bodie stopped struggling.

"Whatever. And I want Ray to come too."

"And a jet and a million pounds, is that it?"

"No," said Sam. "Just Ray." He let go of Bodie and stood up, backing away from the agent, who sprang to his feet and came after Sam as if there had been no pause in the physical struggle. Sam held his arms up in defense but Bodie was on to him now and jabbed a knee into his stomach, then, as Sam bent double, caught him and threw him down onto the cot. Leaving him there without doing any further harm, and totally unaware of the vile names Al was calling after him, Bodie walked out of the cell, locking it behind him, and out of the building, some minutes later. The rain was merciless. He sloshed through London to Ray's street but could not park in front of Ray's building; he had to go around the corner and walk back. He was soaked by the time he got in, and Ray didn't answer his buzzer until the fourth try. When he did answer it was with a croaky "Yah," not even a question; who else would buzz at this hour but Bodie, and a distraught Bodie at that? - just what one needed in the middle of the night.

"He wants you," said Bodie, breathless and dripping at the door.

"Yah," repeated Doyle, turning away and rubbing his eyes, "everyone wants me. I'm adorable is all."

"No." Bodie grabbed his partner's arm. "He wants you to come with us to his flat. There's an address. He can get it."

Now Doyle managed to look slightly alert. He didn't pull his arm away, so Bodie let go of him. Doyle frowned. "It's bleedin' midnight, isn't it."

"One twenty-three," said Bodie, without looking at his watch. He was staring right into Doyle's eyes and still managed to miss the fact that his partner was suppressing a fair amount of mirth. (It wasn't only Bodie's ridiculous certainly of the exact time that was amusing Doyle; it was his partner's attire: over a rather fancy, and, alas, quite wet, black silk shirt, Bodie was wearing, of all things, Doyle's plaid jacket, likewise drenched. This would've been a perfect time for Doyle to retrieve this much-borrowed item but he wouldn't have dreamt of it.) Bodie could never put anything by Doyle but the same did not hold in reverse. When Bodie was in a snit, it was always a single-minded snit, and his vision was besnitted too. "Come on."

"Yah all right." Doyle trod in no particular hurry into the bedroom to shed his robe and put on some street clothes. Bodie rudely followed, only to have the door slammed in his face. (This was so Doyle could get the giggles out of his system.)

He fretted for all the three minutes it took for Doyle to emerge clad in the same ripped jeans and white sweater-jacket (no longer soiled) he'd been wearing when they'd first apprehended young Luther. Bodie had never resurrected his ruined garment.

In the Capri, on the way back to HQ, Doyle casually said, "you'll never believe what Luther told me this evening..."

Al was gone by the time the agents arrived back at Sam's cell. Sam was waiting for them, dressed in his wrinkled and less-than-fresh work shirt and jeans. There had been no way for him to clean up. He wasn't worried about any of that; Al was off researching the fate of little Sammy Clark but big Sammy Beckett wasn't about to wait around for the results. Bodie unlocked the cell. Sam backed away but held out his hands to be cuffed. Doyle did the honors, for which Sam was grateful; Bodie would have cuffed his arms behind him instead. He stayed as close to Ray as he could and even through his snit Bodie noticed this and laughed darkly. "It doesn't matter what kind of crap you laid on my partner tonight. He didn't believe you and nor did I." Sam's heart sank. "But even if we did it doesn't matter at all. You screw this up, Luther, and I won't have to lay a finger on you. My partner will hand your head to me." To this Ray nodded solemnly, but Sam wasn't worried about that either. He had no intention of screwing up. He was, however, anxious to know whether it was true that Ray had not believed him. He was even more anxious to find the boy.

"We might need more manpower," said Sam. Bodie and Doyle looked at one another. If Luther were planning a break the last thing he'd request would be more manpower.

First they R.T.'d Murphy, waking that gentleman from a sound sleep and eliciting from him some less than gentlemanly language. They picked him up outside Finnegan's Pimlico residence, where he'd been dozing in Spalding's car as Spalding crept around the building after an unexpected shadow. The shadow had turned out to be a cat. "I'm going to relieve Susan," complained Spalding. "Bloody babysitting. I'm through here." Murphy bade his nervous and muddy companion adieu and got into the front passenger seat; Doyle joined Sam in the back.

When they R.T.'d Jax they found that not only was he awake but he was staking out Angela's flat, AKA Billy's abode, AKA Luther's digs. There they finally headed.

"Fifty-four Churchmouse Street," Sam whispered to Ray, under the hum of the windshield wipers.

"What's that?" Ray was annoyed. If Luther knew the address already, why were they on their way to his flat to look it up?

"Al says I'm supposed to die today at fifty-four Churchmouse Street," said Sam. "I don't know whether that's the address we're going to find in Bil... in my flat. I don't think so. But just in case anything happens, please remember fifty-four Churchmouse Street."

Ray sighed. "All right, mate. Fifty-four Churchmouse Street."

"What's that?" Bodie called back.

"Nothing, sunshine. Just more nonsense. Something about mice."

"While the cat's away?"

"Something like that."

The silver Capri pulled up behind Jax's discreet blue company-issue Escort. He got out to greet them and was surprised at the gang that piled out to meet him. "What's this," he asked, "a party?"

"Block party," said Bodie. "Doyle and Kojak here go up and look for the paper. I'll keep the halls secure. You two keep lookout down here."

Everyone agreed to that, though they also agreed that keeping watch in such a downpour was pretty futile. "The entire Granadian army could've swum past us," declared Murphy, "and we wouldn't have seen it. Spalding only saw the cat's shadow because it yelled." Having made his declaration, Murphy got into Jax's car as fast as he could, to keep dry, but Jax stood outside in the downpour a moment, watching the other three disappear into the building, before getting back into the driver's seat and wiping his hair and face with a huge towel he had there - once he managed to pry it away from Murphy.

The hallway of the third floor was dark; the bulbs at both ends had gone out or been put out. Bodie waited at the top of the stairs nearest the Allbright flat while Doyle and Luther went in. He was relieved to see the light under the door a moment later. He went back down to the middle of the stairwell. He could see the fire door at each landing and he could also see (and hear) the rain making a racket out the hexagonal stairwell window. He'd be damned if he could make out even the vaguest hint of Jax's car and this worried him; who else might be out there? He also fretted that he couldn't see the stairwell at the other end of the hall. The sound of the rain was tremendous; he hoped he would be able to hear, at least, if anyone approached.

Inside the flat Sam went straight to the kitchen and began pulling open drawers. Doyle just stood and watched as the scientist grew more and more frustrated. There was no yellow stickum anywhere. Sam held his wrists up. "Get these off me," he demanded. Ray sighed. "Come on. I can't search properly like this." Ray silently unlocked the cuffs. "Thank you." Sam pushed past the agent into the living room, then the master bedroom. He stopped when he saw the red grease on the closet door.

"Rust," said Doyle. "Oil and rust." Sam searched the bureau drawers and found nothing but an ugly-looking knife hidden among some boxers. He used a pair of shorts to pick up the thing and hand it to Ray, who shook his head. "Sam, right?"

"Right."

"Not Luther."

"No. Not Luther."

"God help me it makes sense of a sort."

Sam was sitting on a short stool, flinging things out of the drawers of a small desk in the second bedroom - Luther's he assumed. He found a children's book by Edward Eager and he found a small bible. He set them aside. He found Luther's works and dashed them to the floor. He looked up at Ray, who was looking down at him in the utter dismay that could only mean he was beginning to believe Sam's story.

Sam stood up and made his way into the bathroom. There was only one drawer in there. He opened it. It was full of papers, many stuck together from the moisture of the room. He stared at the papers, then raced back to the kitchen so suddenly that Ray yelled, "Hey!" and ran after him. Sam reopened the first drawer he'd gone to. He picked up every paper in that drawer and turned it over. There, on the back of the eleventh sheet he turned, was a yellow stickum paper with an address written on it. He glanced at it, then handed it to Ray. A sudden noise startled both of them. Ray slipped the paper into his jeans pocket and ran lightly to flatten himself against the wall behind the door, drawing his Walther and waving Sam, who'd followed, back into the kitchen.

The door creaked open and Sam, peeking out of the kitchen, saw a larger, slightly older but much more muscular version of what he'd seen in the mirror. This could only be Billy Allbright. Sam stepped out of the kitchen and smiled. "Hey, Billy!"

"Hey Sweet Lucy!" Billy's smile wasn't friendly. He came toward Sam and punched him hard on the left shoulder. "You let me down, you did, little brother!" Doyle came up behind Billy and stuck his gun into the small of his back but before he could say a word someone had come up behind him and, not bothering with such niceties as "hands up" or "drop it," clubbed him behind one ear with the butt of a revolver. Doyle went down like a sack of sludge. The newcomer grinned. Billy didn't even turn to look. He was watching Sam's face. "Friend of yours, boy?" Sam couldn't answer. He tried to smile, tried to look as if he'd just been rescued. "What'choo been tellin' the laws, then?"

"Nothing!" whispered Sam. The man who'd knocked Ray down was pointing the revolver at the scientist's face. "Where've you been?"

"Never you mind that, little brother. Hey Vic, this is sweet Lucy, my kid brother I was tellin' you about. He's a pain in the arse and a junkie to boot. Now on top of everything he's been grassin'."

"Not very brotherly," said Vic, coming closer and touching the muzzle of the gun to Sam's temple. Sam tried to keep his eyes on Billy. He tried to imagine whether he wanted Bodie to come and rescue him or whether Bodie's immediate interference might result in some deaths, not least his own. He wished Al were here to advise him whether to raise his voice to alert Bodie or to keep everyone quiet to avoid disaster. "What're we gonna do with Sweet Lucy then?"

"Bring him along," said Billy. "Candy's got some stuff right?"

"Always." Vic grinned. "Candy's always got candy. Too smart to touch it herself, of course."

"Come along then, Sweet Lucy. Sweets for the sweet, I always say."

Billy pushed Sam toward the door and through it. That's when Sam decided: he let out a yell that was muffled when Billy grabbed him by the head, holding both hands over his mouth and pushing him forward toward the near stairway. They ran straight into Bodie, who was opening the fire door when Billy pushed Sam into him. Bodie and Sam toppled down the stairs together like Holmes and Moriarty off their Alp, Sam landing on Bodie, whose head was dangling down from the landing onto the next step. Vic pried Sam off the dazed agent, dragging him back up to the third floor hallway, which he cleared of sleepy, disgruntled neighbors by flashing the revolver. Billy pushed Bodie down the next flight of stairs, then ran up and across to follow Vic and the hapless Sam.

Doyle crawled out of the flat just in time to see the far fire door slam closed. He tried to stand up so he could run toward that door, but for some reason his legs would cooperate only as far as standing, not running. Then he heard Bodie groan and forced himself in that direction. He practically threw himself down the stairs himself to get to Bodie. "I'm all right," growled Bodie. "After them!"

"Right," said Doyle, standing up and passing out.

"Jax! Murphy!" Bodie flipped the R.T. shut and shook Doyle awake. "Ray, they're getting away!"

Doyle scrambled to his feet and flew past Bodie (who was actually quite sore from his tumble) down to the street, where Jax and Murphy were not even yet in the building. Bodie followed him down. Doyle waved him away, then cried "Wait." He fished the little yellow stickum out of his pocket and shoved it at Bodie. "Go!"

"Go with him," Bodie ordered the other two. "I think we're having an honest-to-God flood here. Get him home and then call me!.

This was not, however, within the agents' power, especially as Jax had left the keys in the Escort. Doyle was in the driver's seat before Bodie and the Capri were quite out of sight, and he'd pulled away from the kerb before either stranded agent could join him.

"Call yerselves a cab, ye useless gits!" Doyle was off to 54 Churchmouse Street.

Bodie soon found himself at the address scrawled on the yellow sticky paper. He glanced at it again in the darkness. Could this be right? As far as he could tell through the downpour this was a proper neighborhood and the address belonged to a real house, with a gate and a garage. Then he saw the 1/2 running off the edge of the paper and looked again at the house. The garage had its own number, with the 1/2. The water was filling the road so well that he chugged up onto the sidewalk in front of the main house and parked there. He doubted anyone could hear him, and he kept his lights off. He thought to take a torch from the glove box, but shoved it back when he realized that its batteries were dead. There was a folded-up umbrella in there and he took that instead. He was walking back to the garage in the dark, struggling to keep the brolly right-side out, when he saw a figure fleeing the garage, a bundle its arms. He was almost certain this was Angela, though he couldn't say why. He began to run toward her, then turned back to the Capri, cursing. Surely she had a car. He couldn't get the umbrella folded back up and threw it out into the street. He dove into the Capri and got it started just in time to see tail lights go on right in front of him.

He turned on his brights, figuring he'd been seen anyway by now; he wanted to see what he was chasing. It was a little blue Citroën Safari. "Billy's car," he murmured.

Driving took up all his energy. Trying to see where Angela was taking the Citroën was futile. Still once in a while he thought he saw a splash apart from the natural splashes, perhaps another glint of tail light, or even a reflection off dirty chrome or blotched window. He followed these splashes and those glints until he could do so no longer. Cursing, he pulled the Capri to the kerb, hoping it was a kerb, praying he hadn't lost her.

He couldn't even rightly tell, until he was inside, that she'd led him to a warehouse.

She was, of course, nowhere to be found, but she'd left a trail of raindrip. He could see it clearly once his eyes adjusted to the dimness. He followed it up some aluminum stairs, across a kind of catwalk and to an open door. How could she have got so far so fast? He should at least have heard her on the stairs. The pit of his stomach told him that the trail had not been Angela's. For all he knew she had never even entered the building. Someone else was here.

He backed away from the door, up to the wall, the drill he and Doyle knew so well, drawing his weapon, pointing it at the ceiling. No matter how many times he had done this, with or without his partner, there was always that extra little thrum of the heart, the little excitement about the possibility that this was the moment before the moment of his death. He listened hard but heard nothing, hardly even the rain. Cautiously he leaned in, peered around the door, then straightened. The room was empty. He snorted in mocking relief and went on in.

It was just a remnant of an office. Bodie didn't think anyone actually worked here. There was a desk but no chair, a phone but no cord connecting it to anything, a filing cabinet with its empty lower drawer gaping.

Small debris littered the floor. From somewhere far off came a foul odor.

Bodie could see no reason to scrutinize the office. He went back out to the aluminum stairs and tried to pick up the trail, but there was none. He swore silently. Had his epithets been less silent he might have missed the tiny creaking sound above him. He froze. Nothing. Then he heard it again. That, then, was his trail.