Kill Zone by Loren D. Estleman Page A

their charges, and when Don felt the need he radioed Larry to come up and keep an eye on the bridge while he used the captain’s toilet. The choreography worked. But eight hundred frightened people with bladders and sphincters ranging from healthy to minimal were a lot, and there had been a number of accidents that had done little to improve either the atmosphere or the dispositions of captive and keeper alike.
    â€œWhere are we going?” Holliday wanted to know.
    â€œEast.”
    It wasn’t the first time the question had been asked or the answer given. This time the captain involved himself.
    â€œFor how long?” he asked. “We’ve only got fuel for twelve more hours. Erie’s a big lake. We could drift for days before anyone rescues us.”
    â€œNice try, Popeye. You could steam for four days and still have enough oil to burn Toronto.”
    Cap’n Eddie looked at him with the first faint blue glow of the dawn of admiration. “You did your homework.”
    Don said nothing.
    A stuttering noise sounded below, as of an outboard motor revving up and then stalling abruptly. A scream, then silence.
    Don snatched up his portable radio. “Who fired that burst?”
    A pause, then Larry’s voice crackled out of the speaker. “I think it came from the bottom deck.”
    â€œFay?” Don released the speaker button, waited, pressed it again. “Fay, you there?”
    â€œYeah.” She sounded breathless.
    â€œWhat went down?”
    â€œNothing. Benny Goodman just tried something sweet.”
    â€œWho the hell is Benny Goodman?”
    â€œMr. Big Band. Crane. Nobody’s bleeding, don’t fret yourself.”
    â€œEasy on that ammo.” He set the radio back down on the chart table just as the security guard came bounding up from the captain’s quarters, tucking his uniform shirt into his pants. The guard’s face was as white as the shirt. “Who got shot?”
    â€œSorry. You’ll have to stay and see it again.”
    The guard gave Don a puzzled look.
    Three tiers below, Fay was standing with her radio hanging from its strap on her shoulder and the smoldering muzzle of her M-16 almost touching Chester Crane’s long thin nose. The bandleader sat spraddle-legged on the deck at her feet, his bald pate glistening through wisps of gray hair. His toupee had slid off finally and skidded ten feet along the highly polished boards. A ragged line of closely spaced holes stitched the back of the bandstand where Fay had fired when Crane had tried to jump her. Coming down hard from her last cocaine toot, she had been yawning bitterly and he had thought to catch her off guard.
    â€œWhite boy,” she said, “I don’t know how you got this old.”
    He tried out his best Trocadero grin on her. It lost some of its glitter under the few lights allowed to burn on the dance deck. “Can’t blame a guy for trying.”
    â€œOh yes I can, Mr. Music. I got no sense of humor.”
    â€œEverything square, Fay?” Sol’s voice rang out calmly from the stern.
    She called back that everything was sweet. Her smile as she went on looking at Crane was brilliant against the old gold of her face. He watched her through squinted eyes. The smoke from the automatic rifle was making them water. Still grinning, she raised the barrel, holding the weapon horizontal, stepped back a pace, and sank to her heels, laying the rifle on the deck. Then she straightened and moved back another step.
    â€œYou call it, Baton Man,” she said. “All you got to do is pick it up ahead of little Fay and fill her full of holes. You can move fast when you want to. For an old man with no hair.”
    Crane looked down at the weapon just beyond his feet for a long moment before raising his eyes back to hers. “You’re nuts,” he told her. “Doped up.”
    â€œI’m stone cold. Pick it up, Señor Swing. ’Cause if you