Brimstone

In the rearview mirror, D'Agosta could make out a long black Mercedes, absurdly out of place, cruising slowly up the park drive behind them. It pulled onto the grass across the te

"What dreadful lack of subtlety," said Pendergast. "It appears these gentlemen have been watching too much television."

D'Agosta eased the car forward, coming to a stop near the exit back onto Broadway. The hill fell away here and the trees were more numerous, blocking their car from view.

"Too bad I'm in uniform," he said.

"On the contrary: being in uniform, you will be the last one they suspect. I'm going to get as close as I can, see if I can learn more particulars about the meeting. You buy a donut and coffee over there"-he nodded to a dingy coffee shop across Broadway-"then wander into the park. Take a seat on one of the benches by the baseball diamond, where you'll have a clear line of fire should anything untoward occur. Let us hope, with these children around, that nothing of the sort occurs-but be ready for action regardless."

D'Agosta nodded.

Pendergast gave his eyes a vigorous rubbing. When his grubby hands fell away again, his eyes had lost their clear, silvery hue. Now they belonged to a tippler: uncertain, watery, red-rimmed.

D'Agosta watched Pendergast get out of the car and amble back up the rise. The agent was wearing a brown sport coat of dubious material, a faded stain between the shoulders; double-knit slacks a size too large; a pair of shabby Hush Puppies. His hair was several shades darker than usual-just how the hell had he managed that?-and his face was in need of a wash. He looked exactly like a man who was down but not quite out, clinging to a few shreds of respectability. And it wasn't just the clothes: his very gait had changed to a vague shuffle, his body language tentative, his eyes darting this way and that, as if prepared to ward off an unexpected blow.

D'Agosta stared another moment, marveling. Then he exited the car, bought a coffee and a glazed donut in the coffee shop across the street, and headed back into the park. As he crested the little rise and approached the diamond, he could see the shorter Chinese man getting into the back of the television van. His large companions were hanging back about forty paces, arms crossed.

There was a whooosh as a model rocket went off to scattered cheers and clapping. All eyes turned skyward; there was a pop and the rocket came drifting back, floating beneath a red-and-white-striped miniature parachute.

D'Agosta eased himself onto a bench across the diamond from the van. He slipped the lid off his coffee, pretending to watch the rockets go off. This was strange: the would-be cameraman was now calling the kids together, apparently to film them. D'Agosta wondered if the cameraman was Chait, Bullard's main man in New York. He decided otherwise: Chait was no doubt inside the van with the Chinese honcho.

He turned his attention back to Pendergast. The agent was strolling along the walkway near the van. He paused, fished a racing form out of the trash, shook it clear of debris, then stopped to chat with the cameraman. It looked like he might be asking him for money. The man scowled and shook his head, motioning Pendergast to move on. Then the man turned back toward the children, gesturing for them to line up with their rockets.

D'Agosta felt a knot tighten in his stomach. Why the hell was the man organizing the kids like that, anyway? Something did not feel right at all.

Meanwhile, Pendergast had seated himself on the bench next to the van, so close he could almost touch it, and was going through the racing form with a pencil stub, circling various horses and making notes.

Then-inexplicably-Pendergast stood up, went to the back door of the van, and knocked.

The cameraman came striding over immediately, gesticulating furiously, shoving Pendergast aside. D'Agosta resisted the impulse to reach for his gun. The back doors of the van opened; there was some loud talk; the doors slammed shut. The cameraman gestured angrily for Pendergast to move off, but instead, the agent shrugged and seated himself back down on the bench, returning to his study of the racing form, perusing it with languid ease, just as if he had all the money in the world to blow on the horses.

D'Agosta looked around. The two plainclothes FBI agents were strolling along the far side of the baseball diamond, talking. The Chinese goons didn't seem to have noticed them. Their attention was riveted on the van and what was going on inside. They seemed ready for something. Too ready. And there was the cameraman, still lining up the kids, as if he, too, was expecting something to happen at any moment.

D'Agosta felt an almost unbearable sense of apprehension. He asked himself why Bullard's men had gone to such trouble to place themselves in the midst of these kids. They had no inkling they were under surveillance. The tension was between them and their customers, the Chinese. He'd gathered as much from the wiretap, and now it was playing out here.

He started to calculate what would happen if the Chinese thugs pulled out weapons and opened fire on the van. The kids would be caught in cross fire. That's what it was all about: the kids were protection. Bullard's men were expecting a firefight: the cameraman was lining up the kids as a human shield.

D'Agosta dropped his coffee and donut and rose from the bench, hand on his piece. At the same moment, the back doors of the van flew open, and the little Chinese man got out as quickly and lightly as a bird. He began striding across the baseball diamond. He flicked his hand toward the two thugs-just the barest gesture-and broke into a run.

D'Agosta saw the two reach for their weapons.

Immediately, he dropped to one knee, steadied his grip on his handgun, and aimed. As soon as a weapon appeared-an Uzi, by the look of it-he squeezed off a round, and just missed.

Abruptly, all hell broke loose. There was the pop! pop! pop! pop! of semiautomatic-weapons fire. Kids scattering, grown-ups yelling, grabbing their kids and ru

D'Agosta fired a second time at the goon he'd missed, stopping him with a well-placed round to the knee. The other turned toward the unexpected fire, swinging his Uzi and spraying automatic fire across the outfield; Pendergast, shielding two children with his own body, coolly dropped the man with a shot to the head. As the man went down, his Uzi swung wildly, still firing; small clouds of dirt erupted in the grass before Pendergast; then the agent fell sharply back, pushing the children out of harm's way as a spray of blood suddenly darkened his arm.

"Pendergast!" D'Agosta screamed.

The goon D'Agosta hit refused to stay down. Now the man had rolled over and was firing on the van, the rounds whanging its side and sending chips of paint flying. A burst of fire came from its front seat; the Chinese goon went down again; and the van pulled away with a squeal of tires.

"Stop them!" D'Agosta yelled at the two agents. They were already up and ru

Now the head Chinese had reached the black Mercedes. As it roared to life, the two agents turned their fire toward it, blowing out the back tires as the car swerved into the lane. A round hit the gas tank, and the vehicle went up with a muffled thump, a ball of fire roiling skyward as the car left the lane and rolled gently into a grove of trees. The door flew open and a burning man got out, took a few halting steps, paused, and slowly toppled forward. In the distance, the television van was careening out of the park, vanishing into the warren of streets to the west.