Then they said nothing further until Jim stopped, peering around the corner of a long, single-story warehouse. The town seemed quiet. The sun was halfway down, and the water was calm, with small wavelets lapping at the crusted wood of the piers.
There were three men on watch.
Two stood together, smoking on the main quayside. The third was walking slowly up and down on one of the maze of narrow jetties, closer to the open Pacific.
All had rifles slung over shoulders.
“Follow close,” Jim said, his arms around Sly and Heather, feeling his daughter trembling with either fear or excitement. “We walk straight to that man on his own. Like we have a right. Hoods up and don’t look at him. Closer we get before he spots us as strangers, the better chance we got. Soon as he goes down, you two hop into the boat and Carrie’ll untie it.”
“What about those other two, Dad? Won’t they be able to see what’s happening?”
“While you all get into one of the rowing boats, I’ll… deal with them.”
“Me see the sea,” whispered Sly as if he were chanting a mantra for good luck.
NANCI SIMMS held up a hand, stopping the others from chattering over a small campfire close to a low headland that overlooked the sea. Day was almost done, and they’d decided to wait before venturing down into Eureka.
“What is it?” asked Jeanne McGill. “You heard something, Nanci?”
“Yeah. Three shots, from a big handgun. Spaced out. One and then two more.”
THINGS DIDN’T QUITE GO how Captain James Hilton had hoped they would.
They got onto the jetty, feeling the slow surge and swell of the water against the old, creaking timbers. The two men standing together hadn’t even looked around. Jim had peered into the first boats they passed, seeing to his relief that all of them seemed to have a couple of sets of oars in them.
To cut the risks, he wanted to get away from the farthest end of the pier, giving less time for any attack from the land.
“Hey there, neighbor.” A friendly call came from the single man, with no hint of suspicion. “Fine evening, it is.”
Jim nodded then, pitched his voice low to try to disguise it. “Cold, though.”
“Who’s that, Jerry?” that voice came from behind them and to their right, where one of the men had suddenly taken an interest in the foursome.
“Why, it’s…” the first speaker said, then hesitated, clearly becoming uncertain. “Why…who the fuck are you, neighbor?”
He began to unsling the rifle.
Jim had his hand on the walnut grips of the Ruger, inside his jacket, precisely ready for this moment.
The range was twenty feet, farther than he’d wanted to open the shooting, but the guard was silhouetted against the fiery light of the sun. The .44 full-metal-jacket round hit him high in the center of the chest. A perfect killing shot, through heart and lungs and spine, knocking him backward, where he tripped over the edge of the pier and plopped into the water.
“Hey!”
“In the boat, now,” snapped Jim. He’d already dropped to one knee, right arm straight, steadied with his left hand. He sighted on the pair of sentries, around thirty paces away from him.
They stood with their backs to the whitewashed wall of a warehouse, both reaching for their hunting rifles, fumbling in a panic at the shocking sight of their colleague butchered in front of them.
Shots two and three were perfect. It was just like being on the shooting range, aiming for inners with a round of drinks depending on it.
“Yes,” breathed Jim, seeing the men fall, the wall behind them sprayed with two vivid splashes of arterial blood, double red in the sunlight
.
NANCI WAS RUNNING FAST, arms pumping, Mac behind her holding a pair of binoculars he’d snatched up. Paul McGill was third, then Jeanne and Pamela. Jeff was jogging, and the two little girls brought up the rear.
All of them wanted to see what was happening in Eureka, below them.
“BASTARD SHITTY… Got it!” Carrie Princip struggled with the knot in the thick, damp rope and finally freed it from the smooth bollard.