Free Dirty Harry 07 - Massacre at Russian River by Dane Hartman Page B

left, hoping to take him by surprise.
    These men are goddamn desperate was Harry’s only thought.
    Police sirens howled in the distance, but Harry took no comfort in them. It was more likely that the San Francisco police—his presumed colleagues—would only assist the DEA agents in placing him under arrest, not the other way around. It would do him no good to say that he had not been responsible for initiating this battle.
    Out of the corner of his eye he glimpsed the man in the London Fog coming his way. It was no surprise. Harry fired his Magnum, careful not to hit him. Just keep him on his toes, force him back. Harry succeeded.
    But by doing this he’d had to withdraw his attention from the agent in cashmere, who was nearly upon him. Harry had no opportunity to aim, only to fire in his general direction.
    He’d not meant to hit him. The man had just been unlucky enough to get in the way. All at once the upper right shoulder of the cashmere glimmered bright red, and the man was reeling back. Then he fell and lay on the street, thrashing in pain.
    The man in the London Fog seemed momentarily at a loss. From the shelter of a doorway he fired twice more, but the only thing he hit was the car Harry had concealed himself behind.
    This section of Beach Street now resembled a battlefield on which large numbers lay dead. In fact, only one man had been wounded. The others—members of the tour group and hapless pedestrians caught in the crossfire—were prostrate and motionless only because they were afraid of drawing attention to themselves.
    It was not until the police arrived that they dared to stand erect. The shooting was over. And Harry was gone.

C H A P T E R

S e v e n
    “S id?”
    “Who is this? Harry? How are you?”
    “Getting along. Look, have you got a car you could lend me?”
    Sid Kleinman was accustomed to getting requests from Harry, but usually they were calls for wire taps, antibugging equipment, warning systems, and ingenious two-wave radios. Those made sense; Sid was in the electronics business, after all. But a car? This was Harry’s most pedestrian request but also the most surprising.
    “I don’t think that should be any problem. Any particular model?”
    “Just something that runs and is liable to continue doing so in the near future.”
    “All right.” Sid sounded a bit dubious. “Can I ask you what’s wrong with the department that you can’t get a car?”
    “No, Sid, you can’t ask. And I’d rather you wouldn’t mention this to anybody.”
    “I understand. Well, stop by my store in an hour, and I’ll have something ready for you.”
    A two-door 78 Olds, a Super 98, was waiting for Harry in front of Sid’s store. It was painted bright blue, came with air conditioning and all sorts of nice optionals and ate up enough gasoline to keep Kuwait’s oil industry going for another year.
    Harry had been of two minds about returning to Russian River. Now, ironically, Russian River loomed as more of a sanctuary than his home base. The wounding of an officer of the Drug Enforcement Agency, an event that was announced every hour on the news Harry had tuned in on the car radio, was a crime serious enough to make him subject to arrest wherever he went in San Francisco. The only positive development that he could see was the omission of his name from those reports. The commentator said only “that the gunman is still being sought.” Evidently, Harry’s enemies preferred to find him on their own rather than instituting a general alarm.
    Not that he was likely to be safe in Russian River. Safety wasn’t what he was driving back up Highway 101 at eight in the evening for. No, what he intended to find were some answers—answers that would vindicate him.
    By the light trickling from under the door, Harry could tell that Turk’s office was occupied. He hesitated before knocking. It was conceivable that Turk and Davenport had been alerted that he was to be apprehended should he show himself. He