“Hartlepool in ’75?” I asked.

“Yes,” replied Tamworth slowly. “You heard about it?”

I had. Most people had. Hades had been cornered in the basement of a multistory car park after a botched robbery. One of his associates lay dead in a bank nearby; Acheron had killed the wounded man to stop him talking. In the basement, he persuaded an officer into giving him his gun, killing six others as he walked out. The only officer who survived was the one whose gun he had used. That was Acheron’s idea of a joke. The officer in question never gave a satisfactory explanation as to why he had given up his firearm. He had taken early retirement and gassed himself in his car six years later after a short history of alcoholism and petty theft. He came to be known as the seventh victim.

“I interviewed the Hartlepool survivor before he took his own life,” Tamworth went on, “after I was instructed to find . . . him at any cost. My findings led us to formulate Rule Number Two: If you ever have the misfortune to face him in person, believe nothing that he says or does. He can lie in thought, deed, action and appearance. He has amazing persuasive powers over those of weak mind. Did I tell you that we have been authorized to use maximum force?”

“No, but I guessed.”

“SO-5 has a shoot-to-kill policy concerning our friend—”

“Whoa, whoa, wait a sec. You have the power to eliminate without trial?”

“Welcome to SpecOps-5, Thursday—what did you think containment meant?”

He laughed a laugh that was slightly disturbing.

“As the saying goes: If you want to get into SpecOps, act kinda weird. We don’t tend to pussyfoot around.”

“Is it legal?”

“Not in the least. It’s Blind Eye Grand Central below SpecOps-8. We have a saying: Below the eight, above the law. Ever hear it?”

“No.”

“You’ll hear it a lot. In any event we make it our Rule Number Three: Apprehension is of minimal importance. What gun do you carry?”

I told him and he scribbled a note.

“I’ll get some fluted expansion slugs for you.”

“There’ll be hell to pay if we get caught with those.”

“Self-defense only,” explained Tamworth quickly. “You won’t be dealing with this man; I just want you to ID him if he shows. But listen: If the shit hits the fan I don’t want any of my people left with bows and arrows against the lightning. And anything less than an expanding slug is about as much good as using wet cardboard as a flak jacket. We know almost nothing about him. No birth certificate, not even a reliable age or even who his parents were. He just appeared on the scene in ’54 as a petty criminal with a literary edge and has worked his way steadily upward to being number three on the planet’s most-wanted list.”

“Who’re number one and two?”

“I don’t know and I have been reliably informed that it’s far better not to know.”