Read Dirty Harry 03 - The Long Death for Free Online Page B

slowly after him just as the elevator doors opened and Fatso stepped out.
    “You sure work up a sweat, don’t you?” he said, seeing Harry’s dripping wet face and soiled suit.
    “There’s one back there who won’t give you any trouble,” Harry told him, motioning toward the locker room. “Cunningham’s on the loose with a sidearm and half a wet suit.”
    “Which half?” asked Devlin.
    “The bottom half,” replied Harry. “So you’ll have no difficulty recognizing him.”
    Devlin nodded and pulled out his walkytalky to report to the forces outside. Harry moved on to the roof door.
    Thinking better of opening it and walking out, he stepped over to the window to take a look first. As far as he could see was a flat, white-graveled roof flanked on two sides by different sections of the building. Beyond that was Golden Gate Park, the Music Concourse, and the De Young Museum. Cunningham was nowhere to be seen. Harry cursed under his breath. If a half-naked man wearing rubber pants and waving a gun could be lost, the rest of the SFPD could probably do it. Taking a deep breath, Harry pushed open the roof door and stepped out.
    Nothing happened until he was midway to the roof edge. Then several little fountains of rock dust gouted up, stinging his legs with gravel shards. Harry ran, rolled, and came up against the side of the building. No more bullets were forthcoming. The attack had told him three things. First, the guns had to be automatics since there were no loud reports following the richochets. That meant they were silenced weapons, and only automatics could be silenced effectively.
    Second, the shooting had to be from some distance away. Otherwise he would have been hit by at least one of the shots. Even taking into consideration the lack of accuracy a silenced automatic causes, the attackers would have to be almost out of range not to hit a target as big as him. And lastly, more than one shooter had him sighted. The bullets had come from two directions. That meant that Earle Snelson was somewhere nearby.
    Harry edged along the side of the building until he reached the edge. Looking down, he saw the large cylindrical pool that housed the sharks. The management thought it was best not to keep them inside. Rather, they had built an outdoor pool that flanked the building so an observation window could be utilized. That way, the patrons inside could feel safe looking at the sharks outside.
    Callahan felt anything but safe. It was a twenty-foot drop to the ground and only a few feet of pavement separated the building side and the sunken shark pool. As dangerous as the man-eating fish were, it was hardly more risky than remaining on the roof. Whatever the case, Harry figured, he wasn’t getting anything accomplished. So deciding, he left the security of the wall and stepped out into the sunlight.
    The bullets began again. First one from his left, then another almost in front of him. But to fire on him, the others had to show themselves as well. Harry saw Cunningham let off a shot from an outcropping on the left corner and the slug went behind his neck. Snelson was behind some boxes in an indentation to the right of the roof door, and his lead dug into the roof between Harry’s feet.
    Harry answered both shots with shots of his own. The first whined off the wall Cunningham was behind and the other dug into one of Snelson’s protecting boxes, followed by an insidious clank. Harry was fucking stunned. Snelson had hidden behind some scuba supplies.
    Cunningham leaned out and peppered the roof with shots. Harry felt the heat of one across his cheek as he ran to the edge of the roof, jumped as high as he could straight up in the air, spun around and squeezed off three shots from his .44 at Earle’s protective boxes.
    As Harry fell, a shattering explosion ripped across the roof. Harry landed on his feet, fell sideways and rolled as hunks of wood and shards of metal flew out and down. As Harry threw himself against the