Flashpoint Read Free

power to slow us down.
        Shouts, yells, and curses filled our section of the plane as the unprepared gamblers were stacked in heaps in the aisle. I forced myself back into my seat so I could look out the window again. There was a sharp, explosive noise beneath the plane. A circular metal object flew off to one side from under the edge of the wing and spun away. Trailing it was a black tubular ring. I had to look again before I realized that it was the blown-out tire that had been blasted loose from the dual-wheel landing gear when the retaining rim tore loose from the shock of the hard landing.
        I could feel the brakes being applied in quick jabs as the deep-throated engines tried in vain to check us. "What the hell happened?" Duke yelled beside me. The brakes went on again as the jets kept working at full pitch. We yawed back and forth as brakes and reverse thrust took effect. Then the plane veered hard to the right. It left the macadam and bounced violently over softer, sandy ground. We bobbed across the uneven earth, and I was rammed forward into the seat ahead of me again.
        My shoulder banged into Duke Conboy sitting ashen-faced beside me. The plane sounded as though it was breaking to pieces. It swerved and hit the macadam again, spun around, and finally came to a stop with a long shudder. It was cocked sideways across the last few feet of runway. Forced against the window again, I found myself staring up the airstrip in the direction of the private plane whose glinting propellers were taxiing it rapidly toward us. The plane's pointed nose and defiantly upright tail glittered as the setting sun turned its dune-yellow paint to glistening gold. Even before it came to a full stop near us, a man in khakis climbed out of the passenger side onto the low wing, then jumped down to the ground.
        Slung across his shoulder was a machine-gun.
        The man sprinted toward the rear of our plane and disappeared from my view.
        There was dead silence around me for a long moment. Then there was a babel of profane complaints as the gamblers dragged themselves to their feet, clutching at various parts of bruised anatomies. "Jesus!" Duke exclaimed hoarsely. "What d'you suppose-"
        "Each person is to remain in seat!" a heavily accented voice rasped over the cabin loudspeaker system. "We mean business! Man in rear of plane has Sten gun to use!"
        A brrr-rrr-rrrttt of machine-gun fire punctuated the words. Someone had opened the exit in the rear of the plane, and the man with the machine-gun had climbed the lowered stairway and placed himself in charge.
        The sound of machine-gun bullets ripping into the ceiling of the plane had sent the gamblers diving into their seats. Down the aisle, at a run from the rear of the plane, came the white-coated bartender with the pin point eyes. That's the little bastard who opened the rear boarding door, I decided. This goddamn situation is a hijack.
        "We advance now through the plane!" the loudspeaker blared. I couldn't see into the front compartment around the bulge of the galley. Duke leaned out into the aisle, peering toward the front where the hophead bartender had disappeared. "Your money and your weapons you will put into this canvas sack!" the metallic voice continued. "We watch you closely, and the machine-gun is at the front here to protect our men coming through the plane!"
        I thought of Hazel's money. I unfastened my chamois-lined shoulder holster containing my Smith & Wesson.38 and dropped it into the pocket on the back of the seat ahead of me. It sank out of sight with the airline literature and the barf bag. With the gun out of the way, I unbuttoned my shirt and pulled out the bulky envelope containing Tippy Larkin's seventy-five thousand dollars.
        I tried to jam the thick manila envelope into the seat pocket, but the space was too small. The mouth of the pocket gaped open, sure to attract unwelcome attention.