It was Sherrill. He lay flat on his back, his teeth bared in a mirthless grin. His clothes were smouldering, and his hands, lying on the burning carpet, had a burned-up, scorched look. He had been shot through the head at close range. One side of his skull had been smashed in.
Even as I leaned forward to stare at him, there was a sudden whoosing sound, and two long tongues of flame spurted out from the floor and licked across his dead face.
II
The little Wop stood in the doorway, grinning at us. The blunt-nosed automatic in his small, brown fist centred on my chest. The dark, ugly little face was shiny with sweat, and the dark little eyes were shiny with hate. He had come silently from nowhere.
“Give me that,” he said, and held out his hand. “What you put in your pocket—quick!”
I was holding my gun down by my side. I knew I couldn’t get it up and shoot at him before he got me. I pulled the dossier out of my hip pocket with my left hand. As I did so I saw the sudden change of expression in his eyes: hatred to viciousness. The trigger-finger turned white as he took up the slack. I saw all this in a split second, knowing he was going to shoot.
Paula threw a chair forward to crash on the floor between the Wop and me. His eyes shifted and so did his aim. The gun went off; the slug missed me by about two feet. I was firing at him before he had time to get his eyes off the chair and on to me again. The three bullets cut across his chest like sledge hammers. He was hurled back against the wall; the automatic falling from his hand; his face twisting hideously.
“Out!” I said to Paula.
She bent and snatched up the Wop’s automatic, and jumped for the door. As I ran across the floor I felt it give under me. There was a sudden loud cracking of breaking timber. Heat came up at me as if I were running across red-hot boiler plates. The floor sagged and gave. For one horrible moment I thought I was going down with the floor, but the fitted carpet held just long enough for me to reach the door and the deck.
There was a terrific crash inside Sherrill’s office. I caught one brief glimpse of the furniture sliding into a red, roaring furnace, then Paula caught hold of my arm, and together we raced down the deck.