every nerve and muscle. They were not watching me. I filled the syringe with the alcohol.
Hauser was juggling his snub-nosed detective special, a Colt and looking around the room. He could smell danger like an animal. With his left hand he pushed the closet door open and glanced inside. My stomach contracteed. I thought, “If he looks in the suitcase now, I’m done.”
Hauser turned to me abruptly. “You through yet?” he snarled. “You’d better not try to shit us on Marty.”
The words came out so ugly he surprised and shocked himself.
I picked up the syringe full of alcohol, twisting the needle to make sure it was tight.
“Just two seconds,” I said.
I squirted a thin jet of alcohol, whipping it across his eyes with a sideways shake of the syringe. He let out a bellow of pain. I could see him pawing at his eyes with the left hand like he was tearing off an invisible bandage as I dropped to the floor on one knee reaching for my suitcase. I pushed the suitcase open, and my left hand closed over the gun butt- I am righthanded but I shoot with my left hand. I felt the concussion of Hauser’s shot before I heard it. His slug slammed into the wall behind me. Shooting from the floor, I snapped two quick shots into Hauser’s belly where his vest had pulled up showing an inch of white shirt. He grunted in a way I could feel and doubled forward. Stiff with panic, O’Brien’s hand was tearing at the gun in his shoulder holster. I clamped my other hand around my gun wrist to steady it for the long pull-this gun has the hammer filed off round so you can only use it double