had to raise his voice to be heard. 'Over there!' he said to Holcroft. 'That car!'
The Englishman nodded in agreement.
They dashed across the street. McAuliff by now had his wallet out of his pocket, removing bills. He approached the driver - a middle-aged black Jamaican - and spoke rapidly.
'We need a ride. I'll pay you whatever you want!'
But the Jamaican just stared at Alexander, his eyes betraying his sudden fear. And then McAuliff saw: the tablecloth was under his arm - how did it get under his arm? - and the huge stain of dark red blood was everywhere.
The driver reached for the gearshift. Alex thrust his right hand through the window and grabbed the man's shoulder, pulling his arm away from the dashboard. He threw his wallet to Holcroft, unlatched the door, and yanked the man out of the seat. The Jamaican yelled and screamed for help. McAuliff took the bills in his hand and dropped them on the kerb as he pummelled the black across the sidewalk.
A dozen pedestrians looked on, and most ran, preferring noninvolvement; others watched, fascinated by what they saw. Two white teenagers ran towards the money and bent down to pick it up.
McAuliff did not know why, but that bothered him. He took the necessary three steps and lashed his foot out, smashing one of the young men in the side of the head.
'Get the hell out of here!' he roared as the teenager fell back, blood matted instantly along his blond hairline.
'McAuliff!' yelled Holcroft, racing around the car towards the opposite front door. 'Get in and drive, for God's sake!'
As Alex climbed into the seat, he saw what he knew instantly was the worst sight he could see at that moment. A block away, from out of the milling crowds on the street, a tan Mercedes Benz had suddenly accelerated, its powerful, deep-throated engine signifying its anticipated burst of speed.
McAuliff pulled the gearshift into drive and pressed the pedal to the floor. The car responded, and Alex was grateful for the surge of the racing wheels. He steered into the middle of Queen's Drive, on what had to be Miranda Hill, and immediately passed two cars... dangerously close, nearly colliding.
'The Mercedes was coming down the street,' he said to Holcroft. 'I don't know if they spotted us.'
The Britisher whipped around in the seat, simultaneously withdrawing the Rycee automatic and the transistorized radio from both pockets. He snapped on the radio; the static was interspersed with agitated voices issuing commands and answering excitedly phrased questions.
The language, however, was not English.
Holcroft supplied the reason. 'Dunstone has half the Unio Corso in Jamaica.'
'Can you understand?'
'Sufficiently... They're at the corner of Queen's Drive and Essex. In the Miranda Hill district. They've ascertained that the secondary commotion was us.'
'Translated: They've spotted us.'
'Can this car get a full throttle?'
'It's not bad; no match for a Mercedes, though.'
Holcroft kept the radio at full volume, his eyes still on the rear window. There was a burst of chatter from the tiny speaker, and at the same instant McAuliff saw a speeding black Pontiac come over the incline in front of him, on the right, its brakes screeching, the driver spinning the wheel. 'Jesus!' he yelled.
'It's theirs!' cried Holcroft. 'Their west patrol just reported seeing us. Turn! The first chance you get.'
Alex sped to the top of the hill. 'What's he doing?' He yelled again, his concentration on the road in front, on whatever automobiles might lie over the crest.
'He's turning... side-slipped halfway down. He's righting it now.'
At the top of the incline, McAuliff spun the wheel to the right, pressed the accelerator to the floor, and raced past three automobiles on the steep descent, forcing a single approaching car to crowd the kerb. 'There's some kind of park about a half a mile down.' He couldn't be sure of the distance; the blinding sun was careening off a thousand metal objects... or so it seemed. But he couldn't think of that; he could only squint. His mind was furiously abstracting flashes of recent memory. Flashes of another park... in Kingston: St George's. And another driver... a versatile Jamaican named Rodney.
'So?' Holcroft was bracing himself now, his right hand, pistol firmly gripped, against the dashboard, the radio, at full volume, against the seat.
'There's not much traffic. Not too many people either...' Alex swerved the car once again to pass another automobile. He looked in the rear-view mirror. The black Pontiac was at the top of the hill behind them; there were now