THE MATLOCK PAPM W
worth it, he thought. If Kressel hadn’t left for Sealfonfs, he would pick
him up and they could talk on the way over. Matlock had to talk, had to
begin, He couldift stand the isolation any longer.
He swung the car to the left at the comer of High Street Kressers house was
a laxge gray colonial set back from the street by a wide front lawn
bordered by rhododendrons. There were lights on downstaim With luck,
Kressel was still home. There were two cars, one in the driveway; Matlock
slowed down.
His eyes were drawn to a dull reflection at the rear of the driveway.
Kressel’s kitchen light was on; the spill from the window illuminated the
hood of a third car, and the Kressels were a two-car family-
He looked again at the car in front of the house. It was a Carlyle patrol
car. The Carlyle police were in Kressers housel
Nimro&s private army was with KresseV
Or was Nimrods private army with NinrodP
He swerved to the left, narrowly missing the patrol car, and sped down the
street to the next comer. He turned right and pressed the accelerator to
the floor. He was confused, frightened, bewildered. If Sealfont had called
Kressel-which he had obviously doneand Kressel worked with Nimrod, or was
Nimrod, there’d be other patrol cars, other soldiers of the private army
waiting for him.
His mind went back to the Carlyle Police Station –a century ago, capsuled
in little over a week-the night of Loring’s murder. Kressel had disturbed
him then. And even before that-with Loring and Greenberg-Kressers hostility
to the federal agents had been outside the bounds of reason.
Oh, Christi It was so clear nowl His instincts had been right. The
instincts which had served him as the
,n6
Robert Ludluin
hunted as well as the hunter had been truel Hd’d been watched too
thoroughly, his every action antLcipated. Kressel, the liaison, was, in
fact, Kressel the tracker, the seeker, the supreme killer.
Nothing was ever as it appeared to be-only what one sensed behind the
appearance. Trust the senses.
Somehow he had to get to Sealfont Warn Sealfont that the Judas was Kressel.
Now they both had to protect themselves, establish some base from which
they could strike back.
Otherwise the girl he loved was lost
There couldnI be a second wasted. Sealfont had certainly told Kressel that
he, Matlock, had Lucas Herron~s dianes, and that was all Kressel would need
to know. All Nimrod needed to know.
Nimrod had to get possession of both the Corsican paper and the diaries;
now he knew where they were. His private army would be told that tins was
its moment of triumph or disaster. They would be waiting for him at
Sealfont!s; Sealfoufs mansion was the trap they expected him to enter.
Matlock swung west at the next comer. In his trouser pocket were his keys,
and among them was the key to Pat’s apartment To the best of his knowledge,
no one knew he had such a key, certainly no one would expect him to go
there. He had to chance it; he coulddt risk going to a public telephone,
risk being seen under a street lamp. The patrol cars would be searching
everywhere.
He heard the roar of an engine behind him and felt the sharp pain in his
stomach. A car was following him-closing in on him. And the ’62 Chevrolet
was no match for it
His right leg tbrobbed from the pressure he exerted on the pedal. His hands
gripped the steering wheel as
TEE MATLOCK PAPM 337
he turned wildly into a side street, the muscles in his arms tensed and
aching. Another turn. He spun the wheel to the left, careerung off the edge
of the curb back into the middle of the road. The car behind him maintamed
a steady pace, never more than ten feet away, the headlights blinding in the
rear-view mirror.
His pursuer was not going to close the gap between theml Not then. Not at
that moment. He could have done so a hundred, two hundred yards ago. He was
waiting. Waiting for something. But what?
There was so much he couldn7t understandl So much he!d miscalculated,
misread. Hed been outmaneuvered at every important juncture. He was what
they said-an amateurl Hed been beyond his depth from the beginning. And
now, at the last, his final assault was ending in ambush. They would kill
hfm~ take the Corsican paper, the dianes of indictment. They would kill the
girl he loved, the innocent child whose life hed thrown away so brutally.
Sealfont would be finished-he knew too much nowl God knew how many others
would be destroyed.
So be It.
if it had to be this way, if hope really had been taken from him, he!d end
it all with a gesture, at least. He reached into his belt for the
automatic.
The streets they now traveled-the pursuer and the pursued-ran through the
outskirts of the campus6 consisting mainly of the science buildings and a
number of large parking lots. There were no houses to speak of.
He swerved the Chevrolet as far to the right as possible, thrusting his
right arm across his chest, the barrel of the pistol outside the car
window, pointed at the pursuing automobile.
He fired twice. The car behind him accelerated, he
338 Robert Ludlum
felt the repeated jarring of contact, the metal against metal as the car
behind hammered into the Chevrolet’s left rear chassis. He pulled again at
the trigger of the automatic. Instead of a loud report, he heard and felt
only the single click of the firing pin against an unloaded chamber.
Even his last gesture was futile.
His pursuer crashed into him once more. He lost control; the wheel spun,
tearing his arm, and the Chevrolet reeled off the road. Frantic, he reached
for the door handle, desperately hying to steady the car, prepared to jump
if need be.
He stopped all thought; all instincts of survival were arrested. Within
those split seconds, time ceased. For the car behind him had drawn parallel
and he saw the face of his pursuer.
There were bandages and gauze around the eyes, beneath the glasses, but
they could not hide the face of the black revolutionary. Julian Dunois.
It was the last thing be remembered before the Chevrolet swerved to the
right and skidded violently off the road’s incline.
Blackness.
32
Pain roused him. It seemed to be all through his left side. He rolled his
head, feeling the pillow beneath him.
The room was dimly lit; what light there was came from a table lamp on the
other side. He shifted his head and tried to raise himself on his right
shoulder. He pushed his elbow into the mattress, his immobile left arm
following the turn of his body like a dead weight-
He-stopped abruptly.
Across the room, directly in line with the foot of the bed, sat a man in a
chair. At first Matlock couldi* distinguish the features. The light was
poor and his eyes were blurred with pain and exhaustion.
Then the man came into focus. He was black and his dark eyes stared at
Matlock beneath the perfectly cut semicircle of an Afro haircut. It was
Adam Wilhams, Carlyle Universitys firebrand of the Black Left.
When Williams spoke, he spoke softly and, unless Matlock nusunderstood-once
again-there was coulpassion in the black’s voice.
“I’ll tell Brother Julian you~re awake. Hell come in to see you.” Williams
got out of the chair and went to the door. ‘Yoifve banged up your left
shoulder. Dodt try to get out of bed. There axe no windows in
,W Robert Ludlum
here. The hallway is guarded. Relax. You need rest”
“I doet have thne to rest, you goddamn fooll” Matlock tried to raise
himself further but the pain was too great. He hadet adjusted to it
You don’t have a choice.” Williams opened the door and walked rapidly out,
closing it firmly behind him.
Matlock fell back on the pillow. . . . Brother Julian.
. He remembered now. The sight of Julian Dunoi!?s bandaged face watching
him through the speeding car window, seemingly inches away from him. And
his ears had picked up Dunois’s words, his commands to his driver. They had
been shouted in his Caribbean dialect.
“Hit bim, monI Hit him again] Drive him ofl, mon]”
And then everything had become dark and the darkness had been filled with
violent noise, crashing metal, and he had felt his body twisting, turrung,
spiraling into the black void.
Oh, Godl How long ago was it? He tried to lift up his left hand to look at
his watch, but the arm barely moved; the pain was sharp and lingering. He
reached over with his right hand to pull the stretch band off his wrist,
but it wasn’t there. His watch was gone.
He struggled to get up and finally managed to perch on the edge of the bed,