Dirty Harry: Duel For Cannons by Dane Hartman

Author:Dane Hartman [Hartman, Dane]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
ISBN: 0446907936
Publisher: Warner Books
Published: 1981-09-05T22:53:41+00:00

C H A P T E R

S i x

The locale was cheery. It was time for the annual Alamo Stadium Rodeo. The crowd was cheery. Among the roaring masses that were delighting in the assembled cowboys’ antics were Peter Nash and his family. The weather was cheery. The sun shone bright on the Stadium and its sparkling surroundings, Brackenridge Park, the San Antonio River, and the Hemis-Fair Plaza.

The only thing that wasn’t cheery was Harry Callahan. He felt the heavy weight of a cross-hair sight across his face all the time. He didn’t like the crowd, he didn’t like the noise, and he didn’t like the stake-out.

“Don’t worry,” Nash had said. “Everything is tightly planned.”

“As tight as the Four Ponies Bar?” Harry had asked.

“Tighter. Come on, don’t worry, Harry, we’re using only experienced officers this time. The whole thing will go down smooth as silk. You’ll see.”

But Harry had made his living worrying. It kept him on his toes and above ground. “I don’t like Carol and the kids being here.”

“Come on,” Nash said again. “I take them to the Rodeo every year. We’ll be three people amid tens of thousands!”

Even so, Harry didn’t like it. The whole situation had come together too easily. Word had gotten around that another Striker payoff was going down at the Rodeo. That made sense. It was one of the biggest civic events that occurred all year. It would be natural that Striker would skim off some extra cream. But the way the rest of the plan fell into place bothered Callahan.

He was to backstop Officer Henry Lieber, a by-the-book veteran who was set to catch Jack Foster, another Striker employee, in the act of payoff. That, too, was fine. What really worried Harry was that a huge stadium with thousands of screaming fans was a perfect place to payoff an out-of-town inspector. Harry kept about a tenth of his attention on Lieber and Foster, and ninety percent of his instincts were scanning the area for a Sweetboy.

To lower the risk of a back attack, Harry positioned himself against a solid concrete wall near the stables. He was watching the main stadium office from across an open area lined with animal enclosures. In the middle of the oblong space were heaps of straw and a wagon or two. Beyond that was a driveway leading to the stadium grounds flanked by paths into both sides of the stands.

Harry had been busying himself at that end of the open space for about fifteen minutes as off-duty officer Lieber worked his nonchalant way toward the office. The plan was to wait until Foster went inside the office, then they’d both move in to catch him in the act of receiving a kickback.

According to Nash’s information, Foster was late. That didn’t bother Harry a bit. If he had his druthers, Foster wouldn’t show at all, so Harry could wait until the rodeo ended and everyone went home before leaving himself.

Lieber signaled that he would check up the road a bit to see if Foster was coming.

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