Walk a Black Wind Read Online Free PDF

like a mirage fading down a tunnel. His head became as small as a pin, and his thick body stretched up and up to touch the ceiling.
    â€œFortune?” he said. “It’s John Andera. You okay?”
    He slipped into focus, became normal size, and I saw that he was standing over me where I lay on the floor of the corridor. John Andera, not the man who had hit me—unless?
    â€œA man tailed me,” I said, my jaw stiff and heavy. “A little shorter than you, not as broad. Brown eyes, camel’s hair topcoat. Know him?”
    â€œNo,” John Andera said. “What did he want with you?”
    â€œI was going to find that out by ambushing him.”
    Some ambush. I wondered if I was ever going to learn that even with two arms I’d never have been a fighter. My “victim” had been a fighter, maybe a real one, the way he had moved.
    â€œDid Francesca know any ex-professional fighters?”
    â€œI don’t know,” Andera said. “I came for a report.”
    I sat up. My left eye was puffed, my face hurt, and my belly ached. But it was all bruises—too fast to have done much damage. I had gone down, stunned, but not really out. I stood up. It could only have been minutes or less.
    â€œYou didn’t see anyone coming out of here?” I said.
    â€œNo, no one,” Andera said.
    â€œCome on.”
    I went down the stairs as fast as I could on stiff legs with John Andera behind me. In the gray noon only a few people walked along my street. Andera stood beside me, and I saw the green Cadillac. It was double-parked across the street with its motor running.
    â€œThere!” I said to Andera.
    I heard the three heavy shots as something slammed into my head and the street went black.
    A pale green ceiling, and a chemical smell. The ceiling was supposed to be a dirty ivory, my corridor. Why did my corridor smell of chemicals? I was on the floor of my corridor, I’d been knocked there. I … but why was the corridor so soft, my hand sinking in when I pressed?
    I was on the floor outside my office. I had to be, of course. The man in the green Cadillac had …
    What slammed into my head?
    Shots. I’d been shot!
    The shadow bent over me, close. A face.
    â€œDid you see anything, Dan? Who shot you?”
    Captain Gazzo not John Andera looked down at me, very close, and he was standing up, so I was high off the floor. How could a man float off the floor on a soft cloud if he was still alive and …
    â€œDan? Did you get a look at who shot you?”
    â€œNo,” my own voice said from somewhere.
    â€œA guess?” Gazzo said.
    â€œNo.”
    The pale green ceiling was a hospital room. The antiseptic smell. A soft, high bed. Now I knew that, so some time must have passed. A lot of time, or a little?
    â€œHow bad am I?” I said to the ceiling.
    A face appeared over me. Captain Gazzo—again or still?
    â€œThat was this morning,” Gazzo said.
    I must have asked him out loud. I hadn’t thought I had.
    â€œYou’re okay,” Gazzo said. “One shot creased your skull good. Probably a forty-five. We found you out cold on the sidewalk. You’ve got a nice groove on your head, and a fair concussion. No real harm, you’re full of dope. You were alone, Dan? You didn’t see who shot?”
    I hadn’t seen who shot. The Cadillac, yes, but there were other green Cadillacs, and I hadn’t seen where the shots had come from. Had I been alone? No, but yes. For now.
    â€œI didn’t see,” I said. “I was alone.”
    â€œYou’re bruised up from something else, too.”
    â€œI was hit,” I said. “Earlier. Small man, didn’t know him. He hit good. I’m tired, Captain.”
    It was dark outside when I sat up. They told me it was still Saturday. Still? Then I’d lost Friday already. I managed to eat. John Andera came to see me after dinner. He was nervous and different. His