The Coffin Dancer

run into any movers or tenants, so he stepped outside again and slipped around the corner, away from the safe house. He eased behind a potted pine tree, which hid him from the sidewalk. With his elbow he broke the narrow window leading into a darkened office—of a psychiatrist, it turned out—and climbed in. He stood completely still for five minutes, pistol in hand. Nothing. He then eased silently out the door and into the first-floor corridor of the building.
    He paused outside the office he believed was the one with the window opening onto the alley—the one with the blowing curtain. Stephen reached for the doorknob.
    But instinct told him to change his plans. He decided to try the basement. He found the stairs and descended into the musty warren of basement rooms.
    Stephen worked his way silently toward the side of the building closest to the safe house and pushed open a steel door. He walked into a dimly lit twenty-by-twenty room filled with boxes and old appliances. He found a head-high window that opened onto the alley.
    It’d be a tight fit. He’d have to remove the glass and the frame. But once he was out he could slip directly behind a pile of trash bags and in a sniper’s low crawl make his way to the fire door of the safe house. Much safer than the window upstairs.
    Stephen thought: I’ve done it.
    He’d fooled them all.
    Fooled Lincoln the Worm! This gave him as much pleasure as killing the two victims would.
    He took a screwdriver from his book bag and began to work the glazier’s putty out of the window. The gray wads came away slowly and he was so absorbed in his task that by the time he dropped the screwdriver and got his hand on the butt of his Beretta, the man was on top of him, shoving a pistol into Stephen’s neck and telling him in a whisper, “You move an inch and you’re dead.”

III
Craft smanship
    [The falcon] began to fly. To fly: the horrible aerial toad, the silent-feathered owl, the humpbacked aviating Richard III, he made toward me close to the ground. His wings beat with a measured purpose, the two eyes of his low-held head fixed me with a ghoulish concentration.
    The Goshawk ,
T. H. White    

 . . . Chapter Nineteen
    Hour 23 of 45
    S hort-barrel, probably Colt or Smittie or Dago knockoff, not fired recently. Or oiled.
    I smell rust.
    And what does a rusty gun tell us, Soldier?
    Plenty, sir.
    Stephen Kall lifted his hands.
    The high, unsteady voice said, “Drop your gun over there. And your walkie-talkie.”
    Walkie-talkie?
    “Come on, do it. I’ll blow your brains out.” The voice crackled with desperation. He sniffled wetly.
    Soldier, do professionals threaten?
    Sir, they do not. This man is an amateur. Should we immobilize him?
    Not yet. He still represents a threat.
    Sir, yessir.
    Stephen dropped his gun on a cardboard box.
    “Where . . . ? Come on, where’s your radio?”
    “I don’t have a radio,” Stephen said.
    “Turn around. And don’t try anything.”
    Stephen eased around and found himself looking at a skinny man with darting eyes. He was filthy and looked sick. His nose ran and his eyes were an alarming red. His thick brown hair was matted. And he stank. Homeless, probably. A wino, his stepfather would have called him. Or a hophead.
    The old battered snub-nose Colt was thrust forward at Stephen’s belly and the hammer was back. It wouldn’t take much for the cams to slip, especially if it was old. Stephen smiled a benign smile. He didn’t move a muscle. “Look,” he said, “I don’t want any trouble.”
    “Where’s your radio?” the man blurted.
    “I don’t have a radio.”
    The man nervously patted his captive’s chest. Stephen could have killed him easily—the man’s attention kept wandering. He felt the skittering fingers glide over his body, probing. Finally the man stepped back. “Where’s your partner?”
    “Who?”
    “Don’t give me any shit. You know.”
    Suddenly cringey again. Wormy . . . Something was wrong. “I really don’t know what you mean.”
    “The cop who was just here.”
    “Cop?” Stephen whispered. “In this building?”
    The man’s rheumy eyes flickered with uncertainty. “Yeah. Aren’t you his partner?”
    Stephen walked to the window and looked out.
    “Hold it. I’ll shoot.”
    “Point that someplace else,” Stephen commanded, glancing over his shoulder. No longer worried about slipping cams. He was beginning to see the extent of his mistake. He felt sick to his stomach.
    The