Dark Side of the Street - Jack Higgins [3]
The commando waved and the helicopter swung ahead of them, lifted over a rise and disappeared.
Hagen turned to face Hoffa. "You seem to know your stuff."
"There was an article in Globe magazine last month," Hoffa said. "It's in the library."
Hagen shook his head and sighed. "You're a funny bloke, Ben. I never could figure you out and that's a fact."
Unexpectedly Hoffa smiled, immediately looking about ten years younger. "That's what my old man used to say. Too late now though. Too late for all of us."
"I suppose you're right."
Hagen reached for his cigarettes and as he got them out, the Land-Rover went over the rise and started down a heavily wooded valley. He gave a sudden exclamation and leaned forward. The helicopter had landed in a clearing at the edge of the trees and half a dozen commandos were strung out across the road.
The cab window was pushed back and Parker called, "What in the hell's all this then?"
"God knows," Hagen said. "Maybe they think we're on the other side."
Parker started to slow as a young officer walked forward, waving him down. Like his men, he wore a combat jacket and his face was darkened with camouflage cream. As the Land-Rover rolled to a halt, the rest of the party moved in on the run, tough, determined looking men, each carrying a machine pistol.
Parker opened the door of the cab and leaned out. "Look, what is this?"
Hagen couldn't see what happened, but Parker cried out in alarm, there was the sound of a scuffle, a blow and then silence.
Boots crunched the dirt surface of the road as someone walked round the side of the vehicle. A moment later, the glass window at the top of the rear door was shattered and the young officer peered inside.
"All out," he said pleasantly. "This is the end of the line."
Hagen glanced across at Hoffa, taking in the smile on his face, realising that the whole affair had been rigged from the start and the Alsatian leapt for the broken window, a growl rising in its throat. For a moment it stayed there, rearing up on its hind legs trying to force its way through, and then the top of its skull disintegrated in a spray of blood and bone as someone shot it through the head.
The dog flopped back on the floor and the young officer smiled through the window at them, gently tapping his right cheek with the barrel of a .38 automatic.
"Now don't let's have any more fuss, old man," he said to Hagen pleasantly. "We're pushed for time as it is."
Hagen looked across at Hoffa, despair on his face.
"You'll never get away with this, Ben. All you'll collect is another ten years."
"I wouldn't count on that," Hoffa said. "Now make it easy on yourself, Jack. These blokes mean business."
Hagen hesitated for only a moment longer and then he sighed. "All right--it's your funeral."
He took the keys from his pocket, moved to the door and unlocked it. He was immediately pulled outside and Hoffa followed him. Parker was lying on his face unconscious, wrists handcuffed behind his back.
From then on the whole affair rushed to its climax with the same military precision that had been a characteristic of the entire operation. Someone unlocked Hoffa's handcuffs and transferred them to Hagen while someone else gagged him with a strip of surgical tape. Parker's unconscious body had already been lifted into the rear of the Land-Rover and Hagen was pushed in after him. The door closed, the key turned in the lock with a grim finality.
There was blood on his face from the dead Alsatian and as he rolled away from it in disgust, swallowing the bile that rose in his throat, the Land-Rover started to move, lurching over the rough ground away from the road. Through the side window above his head he was aware of the trees as they moved into the wood, crashing through heavy undergrowth and then the vehicle braked suddenly so that he was thrown forward, striking his head against the wall.
He lay there fighting the darkness that threatened to drown him, a strange roaring in his ears. It was a minute or so before he realised it was the helicopter taking off again and by the time he had