Mike Shayne Mystery Magazine, Vol. 44, No. 4, April 1980

“I’ve locked the others in and I’ll be coming out with the kid,” the boy held Sandra in one arm. “Come here to me, Foley, it’s, that sick I am of shoutin’.” Superintendent Foley walked over to the window.

“You see that kit tied to the kid’s back?” Foley nodded. “Inside is a bottle of nitroglycerin, one strange move, I shoot anti the whole lot, you, me, everything will be blown to hell. Understand?” Again Foley nodded. “Now get out there and I warn you not to let anyone move so much as an eyelash if you want anything left of the Clinic.”

There was a rustle of movement behind Maura as the out-patients pushed their way in wheelchairs and on crutches into position by the gates. The blind men brought up the rear.

“Everyone stay where you are,” Superintendent Foley’s voice boomed over the loud hailer, “Condon will come out in a minute and when he does I don’t want anyone to breathe until he is in the car and it has left the area. There is a bomb on the child’s back which he will explode—” His voice stopped as Sandra, leaning on her walking frame inched out on to the tarmac. A small determined figure dressed all in red, her hair bunched into a handle above each ear and fastened with long-eared plastic rabbits, she looked neither to the right nor to the left. Her parents watched from the entrance of the shelter not daring to breathe. Then Arne Condon appeared in the doorway, gun in hand.

Kelly’s wife was by the gate eyes riveted on the roof of the right hand wing! Nothing. No one. Oh God, she said under her breath, where is he? Though Condon moved at a snail’s pace behind the child, every passing moment, found him that much closer to his goal. If she didn’t see Shay soon, it would be too late for the planned diversion to serve its purpose. Everyone was in place awaiting the signal that she couldn’t give until he was in place. A seagull swooped drawing her eyes left — and she saw him — on the roof to her left — his right not hers. She glanced around to see if the slight bulge in the flat line of the roof had been noticed, but all attention clung to the drama being enacted on the tarmac as to a life support unit.

Maura lifted her hand slightly and the two nearest her rolled forward. The others followed close behind, their initial movement through the gate cloaked by the black Mercedes and the surrounding motorcycle escort.

Condon was almost halfway to the car, gun trained on the mount lumped on the child’s back. “Can’t you push that thing faster?” he hissed through his teeth.

“I’m going best I can,” she answered, swiveling to look back at him. As she turned, one of the wheels hit a stone causing the left handle to come adrift. She swung sideways off balance, body stiff in calipers locked at the hip. The frame teetered. Mouths gaped in silent prayer as the child-bomb poised precariously mid-fall. Paralyzed by fear of imminent mortality no one dared offer help.

Then Arne Condon reached down awkwardly to catch the child with his left hand, words jerking, “Not a move — out of — anyone! — I warn you!” Sandra leaned her shoulder against his leg for support until both hands regained their purchase on the walking frame.

“Thanks, Arne,” Sandra said before continuing to push, twist, push, twist across the remaining distance separating her from the car. When certain the child was steady on her feet again, Condon looked up to find the courtyard ringed with spastics on crutches advancing in eccentric cadence. They were intersperced with children propelling themselves in wheelchairs and the three blind men led by dogs.

“Bleedin’ hell! What are you tryin’ to pull, Foley?” Condon shouted. Swinging around, the Superintendent blanched on seeing the small army of disabled toiling across the tarmac just the way Shay Kelly had suggested. A vision of the young Guard drawn and quartered momentarily flickered in his mind.

“Believe me, Condon, I had nothing to do with this. I swear.” Foley spoke softly, hoping to control the situation by being calm in the face of the terrorist’s rising hysteria. “Ignore them. Just keep following the little girl, nobody will try to stop you.”

“Don’t give me that bleedin’ crap. I want them stopped! I’m warnin’ you!” Condon shrieked head turning, trying to face everywhere at once. Suddenly, a shot cracked. Condon jerked sideways, the revolver dropped to the ground. In falling his foot toppled Sandra onto her face crying. Medical aid and an Army bomb disposal unit converged, one bundling Arne onto a stretcher, the other gingerly relieving Sandra of her lethal hump. Then she was in her father’s arms, her mother, laughing and crying, kissing her little hands. Men from the media were everywhere flashing cameras, asking questions, demanding statements.