Free The Informant by James Grippando Page B

hundred volts running through the tracks.
    She wondered if he’d follow her back up, but she was almost afraid to check. She reached into her purse and clutched her can of Mace. With half-steps, she tentatively made her way back to the top of the escalator. Peering down to ground level, she could see him only from the knees down, standing by a Pepsi billboard at the base of the escalator. He hadn’t made his move yet. But he hadn’t left the station.
    She hated to take her eye off him, but she stepped quickly to the edge of the platform to check on another train. No sign of one. She scurried back to the escalator, then froze. He’s coming up!
    On impulse, she yanked the red emergency lever, shutting down the escalator. He looked up, and for the first time they made direct eye contact. Her heart stopped.
    She prayed he’d turn and run. He ran toward her, gobbling up two steps at a time.
    She screamed, but he kept coming. Across the platform was an elevator. She ran for it. With a push of the 76
    James Grippando
    call button the doors slowly opened. The rapid echo of footsteps warned he was still giving chase. As she jumped in the elevator she could see him closing in. She screamed again, hitting the button over and over to make the doors shut faster. He was just ten feet away when she gave up on the button, put the weight of her whole body behind the door, and pushed it shut.
    She fell against the wall, gasping for breath. After a split second of relief, terror struck. The elevator was a dinosaur. He’d hit ground level before she would. She flung open the control panel and pulled the emergency stop, jerking the elevator to a halt and sounding the alarm.
    She grabbed the phone.
    “Help me!” she shouted.
    “Security,” a man answered.
    “A man—he’s chasing me! Pinstripe suit, on the platform. Stop him, please! Stop him before he gets away!”
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    Chapter 11
    b y 4:00 P.M. Pacific time a thick, bone-chilling fog had rolled in from San Francisco Bay, reducing visibility at Union Square to about two city blocks. The square was a restful and impeccably manicured park in the busy hub of the shopping district, planted with palms, yews, boxwood, and flowers, all centered on a towering memorial to Admiral Dewey’s victory at Manila Bay.
    Rush-hour traffic inched along the wide streets bordering all four sides. At one end, the palatial St. Francis Hotel sat with the permanence of the Pantheon. Macy’s Department Store flanked the south side. Streams of pedestrians hurried along the sidewalks, wrapped in warm winter trench coats to keep off the chill.
    Curt Rollins had never been to San Francisco before, so the heavy fog fascinated him. It made him think of London. Jack the Ripper.
    “Cheerio, ol’ chap,” he said to a teenage girl in the crosswalk. She made a gross-out face and scurried away.
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    James Grippando
    He headed east on Post Street, toward the teeming rectangle that was the banking center between Kearny and Sansome Streets, the West Coast version of New York’s Wall Street area. Along the way, he planted himself on the sidewalk to admire his reflection in the big plate-glass window outside F.A.O. Schwarz. He wore faded Levis, an Atlanta Braves baseball cap, and a thick navy-blue parka that made him look much bulkier than he was.
    Traces of dried brown feces besprinkled his leather gloves, but his secondhand clothes were otherwise clean, recent acquisitions from the Salvation Army. A pair of deep-tread hiking boots came in handy trudging up and down the steep city sidewalks. Walking made him winded, for at age thirty-two he had the body of a much older man. In the six years since prison he’d yet to find a job or a decent place to live. A thin face and jaundiced pallor bespoke vile habits and a lifetime of addictions. He was in perpetu-al need of a shave, a bath, a fix and a drink.
    “Hey, fuck you, buddy!” he snapped at the window.
    “No, fuck you !” his image shouted back. He grabbed his crotch