Free Dirty Harry 03 - The Long Death by Dane Hartman

get anything more here, Harry,” the doctor stated. “I’ll have to go over her on the slab back at headquarters.”
    “All right,” said Harry, waving the orderlies over, “untie her.”
    Just then Fatso Devlin came bustling in from the basement door that opened up on the tiny back yard, waving a sheet of paper.
    “Got a positive I.D., Harry,” he announced. “Her prints and picture matched up with someone at an anti-nuke demonstration arrest at Berkeley last year.”
    “Student?” Harry guessed.
    “Student. Barbara Steinbrunner. Dropped out of classes two weeks ago. Teachers hadn’t seen her since.”
    “Got a list of friends and known associates?”
    “Teachers are working on that now.”
    “All right, let’s get over to the campus,” decided Callahan. “I’ll give Bressler’s fondest regards to Mohamid and meet you at the car.”
    Harry stepped around the hospital workers who were wrapping Barbara up for the one-way trip to the medical examiner’s office and walked back to the milk case. Before he sat down he glanced up at the pretty black girl in the western shirt. High forehead, upturned top lip, terrific nose, and a no-nonsense body. Eighteen at the most, but definitely a woman to watch out for.
    “Watch your ass,” Harry told his ex-ally as way of introduction. “Take it easy and don’t let any of your people overreact. This thing smells worse than a gay bar’s bathroom, but it’s not going to take much to set off a backlash in the community. Just don’t plan any sudden trips to Rhodesia or burn down any municipal buildings, and I think it’ll be OK.”
    Big Ed Mohamid looked up, his face expressionless. “Is that an order, sir?” he asked flatly.
    Callahan lost all his humor. His eyes narrowed and he frowned. “Just some advise. Friend to friend.”
    “We were never friends,” Mohamid stated.
    Harry’s reply was cut short by a commotion at the basement door. He turned to see Fatso struggling with a wiry young white man with curly hair waving a sheet of paper and shouting. Before Callahan could move, the thin guy slipped out of Devlin’s grip and charged across the room at Mohamid.
    Three black men swung down off the steps to land in front of Big Ed, effectively creating a human partition. The uniformed men started forward just as it seemed the curly-haired man would lay into Mohamid’s guards. Harry stepped in front of the black trio, slapping one hand over the white guy’s waving wrist and the other hand on the man’s neck.
    “Hold it!” the curly-haired white guy choked out. “Hold it!”
    “It’s a reporter,” Devlin explained, trudging up to the tableau. “I couldn’t stop him.”
    The reporter wrenched himself out of Harry’s grip and pulled himself back together. “I just wanted to ask Mr. Mohamid about this letter he sent the newspapers,” he said, pointing at the paper in his other hand.
    “Letter?” Harry queried, looking at Big Ed from between two of his Uhuru members. Mohamid stared at the floor and didn’t say anything. “What letter?”
    “The one about how the revolution is still on and how whitey still had to pay,” the reporter paraphrased quickly. “Do you have any comment, Mr. Mohamid?” he shouted under Harry’s arm.
    The three black men started forward as Harry grabbed the reporter under both arms and threw him into the clutches of two uniformed men. “Get him out of here,” he ordered.
    Fatso brought up the rear as the cops followed instructions. As soon as the cellar door closed behind them, Harry turned to Mohamid, who was standing among his reassuring Uhuru crowd.
    “It’s starting again,” Mohamid intoned. “Get out, Callahan. Get out now.”
    Harry examined the group silently for a moment. All the men were standing tall, their faces expressionless but strong. The pretty girl was standing with them in the front, defiant, proud. They found dignity and pride in their unflinching dedication to each other. Their self-respect was