A Maidens Grave

cradled her groin as Brutus’s fist drove into her chest just below the breastbone. Melanie doubled over, breathless.
    He rose easily and she saw that, aside from the scratches on his cheek, he wasn’t hurt at all. He’d been playing with her. Roughhousing.
    Then he had her by the hair and was dragging her into the front room.
    She dug her nails into his hand and he slapped her face hard. Her vision exploded with light and her arms went limp. The next thing she knew she was in the window of the slaughterhouse, staring out at the windy field and the brilliant lights trained on the building.
    Her face was against the glass and she thought it might break and slice through her eyes. No, no, not that kind of darkness. Permanent darkness. No, please . . . .
    Stoat stepped forward but Brutus waved him off. He pulled his pistol out. He spun her around so she could see him speak. “If you could talk like a normal person, maybe you could say something to save yourself. But you can’t. No, no. You’re a freak of nature and if they don’t come through with that chopper you’re going to be even more of a freak. Shep, how much time . . . ?”
    Stoat seemed to hesitate and said something she didn’t understand.
    “How much fucking time ?” Brutus’s bloody face was distorted with rage.
    He received the answer and lifted the gun to her cheek.Then slowly his hand entwined in her hair and turned her around so that she was facing into the blinding white lights once again.
     
    Melanie. Potter saw her face through his thick field glasses. Melanie was the next victim.
    Budd, LeBow, and Frances stared out the window. Stillwell came on the radio and said, “One of my snipers reports that Handy’s bleeding. Doesn’t seem serious but his face is cut.”
    “Twelve minutes to deadline,” Tobe said. “Downlink coming in.”
    The phone rang and Potter answered at once. “Lou, what—?”
    “I’ve got a new one, Art,” Handy’s voice raged. “She’s got some spirit. I was gonna forgive her after she gave you that little troublemaker. But the slut got it into her mind she wanted to have a little fun. Go for a roll in the hay with me.”
    Stay calm, Potter told himself. He’s playing you again. He tamped down his own rage, which mimicked Handy’s.
    “She’s into some sick stuff, Art. One of them S&M pups, looks like. She’ll learn, she’ll learn. You’ve got ’bout ten minutes, Art. I don’t hear that chopper overhead we’re gonna do some nine-millimeter plastic surgery on this here girl. Now I want that fucking helicopter. You got it?”
    “We have to bring one in from Topeka. There—”
    “There’s a goddamn airport three miles west of here. Why the fuck don’t you bring one in from there?”
    “You said you—”
    “Ten minutes.”
    Click.
    Potter closed his eyes and sighed.
    “Angie?”
    “I think we have a problem,” the psychologist answered. “He wants to hurt her.”
    This was a real setback. Potter could probably have gotten an extension of the deadline from a Lou Handy who was in a good frame of mind and in control. Vindictive Lou Handy, embarrassed and angry Lou Handy, wasn’tinclined to give them anything and was now in the mood for bloodshed.
    Oh, Melanie, why couldn’t you have just left well enough alone? (Yet what else did he feel? Pride that she had the guts to resist Hardy when he tried to beat her for saving Kielle? Admiration? And what else?)
    Angie’s beautiful, exotic face was frowning.
    “What is it?” Budd asked her.
    “What Handy was saying about plastic surgery. What does he mean?”
    “He doesn’t want to kill anyone else just yet, I think,” Potter said slowly. “He’s worried that he’s losing too many hostages and we haven’t given him anything substantive. So he’s going to wound her. Maybe blind her in one eye.”
    “Lord,” Budd whispered.
    Tobe called, “Arthur, I’m picking up scrambled signals from nearby.”
    “What frequency?”
    “What megahertz, you mean?”
    “I don’t care about the numbers. Whose would they be?”
    “It’s an unassigned frequency.”
    “Two-way?”
    “Yep. And they’re retrosignals.”
    Some operations are so secret that the law enforcers’ radios use special coordinated scramblers that change the code every few seconds. Derek confirmed that the state police radios didn’t have this feature.
    “How nearby?”
    “Within a mile radius.”
    “Press?”
    “They don’t usually use scramblers but it could