“Police late last night announced they have located several witnesses who recognized the kidnap car. Identity of one man, believed a gardener on a Connecticut estate, is being kept secret. It is understood that this man observed the actual kidnaping, at the time that the Wilton station wagon was forced to the side of the road. License numbers that he is said to have supplied police have been traced to a limousine stolen in Queens six days ago. This is thought to be the car used by the kidnapers....”
Static suddenly crackled over the set and the announcer’s voice faded out. Dent quickly crossed the room and twisted the dial and then once more the voice came to those in the room, clear and distinct.
"... at four o’clock this afternoon, when Mrs. Wilton will make a personal plea to the kidnapers over a nationwide hookup... “
Dent snapped off the set.
“Goddamn it,” he said. “Goddamnit, I had a feeling that car might be spotted.” He swung-toward Red.
“Didn’t I tell you not to pick up a car on Long Island?” he said, spitting the words out in a bitter, low voice. “Why the hell won’t you guys ever listen to me?”
Red reached into the icebox for a bottle of beer. He jerked the cap off, using the head of a nail sticking out of the wall.
“Aw, hell, Cal,” he said. “What’s a difference? So they know the heap was jacked on Long Island. That don’t make ‘em know where we are.”
“That isn’t the idea,” Dent said. “I don’t want them localizing any part of the job on Long Island. I just hope to God nobody spotted that pile out this way and reported it. It’s a good thing we’re going to wind this thing up tomorrow night.” He turned toward Pearl and suddenly became aware of her dead-white face. The girl sat on the edge of a chair, nervously twirling her fingers.
“What’s wrong with you?” he snapped.
Pearl looked at him blankly for a second. Then she told him about the windshield wiper and the cop.
“He was too nosy,” she said. “Wanted to know what my husband’s business was. Asked about his friends. Dent, I don’t like it. Something’s eating on him. He even said he might stop out here and see if everything
is going all right.”
I “He stops out here,” Red said, “an’ I’ll stop him. Lousy snooper.”
Gino sneered and turned to the couch. He had taken the bandages off his face and he looked as if he had gone through a meat chopper. He still limped badly and his shirt was open to the waist, exposing wide swatches of white bandaging. He sat down painfully.
“The cop is suspicious, all right,” Dent said. “But I don’t think he has made any connection—at least, not yet.”
Gino looked up. “Let’s take the kid and make a run for it,” he suggested. “Pearl and Red can go back to the apartment in town and take the kid in with them after dark. You and I can make the meet with Fats, pick up another car out this way, and go ahead with the plan tomorrow night.”
“And what about the nurse?” Red asked.
“What about her? I’ll take care of her all right.” Gino smiled evilly as he said it. “As far as that goes, I can take care of both her and the kid. We don’t need them for the payoff.”
“You ain’t gonna hurt that kid,” Red said suddenly, his oddly broken face crinkling and his eyes going small and mean. “I ain’t gonna see nothing happen to that kid. You done—”
Dent jumped to his feet. “Shut up, all of you,” he ordered. “We aren’t going to move. You’re letting yourselves get jittery for no reason. We only got another day here. Nothing has happened yet and nothing will. As long as we got the kid, and as long as she’s alive, we got an insurance policy. Start killing people and we’ll all be dead. That’s when the law will really begin to close in. Right now, so long as we got the kid, they aren’t going to do nothing to make it hard for us. We got to stay here and sit tight.”
“Maybe,” Pearl said, “Gino is right, though. Maybe Red and I should go back to town.”
Red swung to her, his eyes dangerous. “You sticking up for Gino against me?” he asked.
“Pm sticking up for myself,” Pearl said. “Pm frightened. First that damned cop. And this radio, going all the time. I just begin to feel jittery.”
“Look,” Dent said. “Don’t be a bunch of damned fools. Everything is going just as we planned it. There’s nothing to worry about. Wilton will have the dough and Fats will make the contact. I told you, we’ll clean it up tomorrow. Now for God’s sake sit tight and take it easy. You all knew it was going to be tough when we started out on this job. So take it easy.”
“Well, if this damned rain would only stop...” Pearl said.
“Never mind the rain. How about making some grub?” Dent gestured toward the icebox.
“I’m going up and get on some dry clothes first,” Pearl answered.
Red followed her wordlessly out of the room and up the staircase.
He stood next to the door of the bedroom, after he had closed it behind them. His eyes watched Pearl as she stripped off her dripping clothes. Red moved to reach for her, but Pearl quickly pushed him away.
“Not now,” she said. “For God’s sake, not now. Can’t you see I’m scared and I don’t feel right.”
Red shrugged. “Nothing to be scared of,” he said.
Pearl quickly swung back toward him. Her arms went out and she reached around his neck, pulling his face down to her own.
“Red,” she whispered. “Listen, Red. Let’s you and I duck. Let’s get out of here now. We should never have got mixed up in this in the first place. There’s going to be trouble. I can feel it in my bones.”
Red pulled his head back.
“We’re gonna stay and see it through,” he said, his voice surly. “How about the money, huh? You want we should walk off on the money?”
Pearl pressed close to the big man and her eyes were wide and her mouth a seductive invitation as she looked up at him.
“You got me, Red,” she said. “You got me, and the money won’t be no good to us if they catch us.” Pearl tried all of the old tricks, but this time they didn’t work. Red had a strictly one-track mind. And his mind was on the ransom money. He pushed her away.
“Get some clothes on and come down and cook some grub,” he said brutally, turning to the door. “We’re gonna see it through.”
They ate hash and soft-boiled eggs, Gino cursing at the pain he suffered each time he opened his jaws. Pearl stacked the dishes in the sink, not bothering to wash them.
“Let that dame in the other room wash ‘em,” she said. “It’s time she earned her keep around here.”
Later, when the rain slackened off, Dent told her to drive back into town and pick up some more food.
“But be careful,” he warned. “If you run into that cop, play up to him a little bit. Try and find out just what he’s thinking. Offer to buy him a drink, but be careful you don’t get tight yourself. I want to find out just what’s on his mind.”
“He makes me nervous,” Pearl said.
“All right, be nervous. But be careful. You can handle it. Remember, he’s just a small-town clown. All you gotta do is keep him quiet for an-
other day. Play him along.”
* After Pearl left, Gino went back upstairs to try to get some more sleep. Dent helped him up, and when they were alone in the room, Gino once more spoke of the possibility of getting away from the shack. Dent went out of his way to reason with the little hoodlum and finally was satisfied that he had convinced him that the best policy was to sit tight until the next night.
When Dent returned downstairs he went at once to the door leading into the back bedroom. He told Terry to come out and get something to eat for the two of them.
Dent then sat at the table with an oil can and a rag. Carefully he began dismantling and cleaning the submachine gun as the girl made sandwiches. As she was about to return to the other room with the food for the child, he looked up at her.
“After you eat,” he said, “come back and clean up the dishes.”
Terry nodded and went into the bedroom.
“I got somethin’ for the kid,” Red said suddenly. He went over to the mantel above the fireplace and took down a hand-carved wooden gun. “I made it out in the garage yesterday,” he added, pride on his face as he held it out for Dent to see.
Dent looked at it and nodded his head toward the door.
“When she gets through eating, take it in to her,” he said.
Red waited for Terry to return, pacing the floor. When she re-entered the room, he walked over to her and smiled eagerly.
“It’s for the kid,” he said, holding out the toy gun. Terry looked up at him, surprise on her face. And then she smiled.
“You’d better give it to her,” she said.
Red went into the back room.
Dent was conscious of the girl at the sink, as he worked over the gun, but he kept his eyes on his work and didn’t look up. Occasionally Terry looked surreptitiously in his direction, and there was a puzzled expression about her eyes. The door to the back room was open and she heard Janie laughing. Red’s voice reached them now and then as he talked with the child. They heard him tell her that now that she had a gun, he would make her a member of the mob. Janie said, “Fine. I’ll shoot Gino first.” Red laughed uproariously.
Finally Dent looked up at the girl
“Your blankets get soaked in there?” he asked.
“Not too bad, but I’d like to dry them before the fire. The dampness here gets through everything.”
“Bring 'em in,” Dent said.
Terry hung the heavy Army blankets over the backs of a couple of chairs.
She glanced at Dent and then, seeing that he was staring at her, quickly looked away.
“How long—” she began, when he quickly interrupted her.
“Another day,” he said. “Maybe two at the most. You’ll just have to keep her quiet for a little longer. It will be over soon.”
Terry took a deep breath. Her face contained an odd mixture of fear and relief.
“And then?”
“And then the kid will go back.” As he said it, Dent suddenly saw the girl’s face blanch. “And you too,” he quickly added. “Both of you— you’ll both be all right.”
Later, after the girl had again returned to the back room, he wondered why he had said it. Certainly, at this point, he had made no definite plans, not even in his own mind, for the safe return of the girl. The child, yes. He would see that the child was returned safely, in spite of Gino and in spite of Fats. But the girl?
Suddenly he cursed her under his breath. What the hell was she to him, after all? A cypher, that was all. A mere cypher. Why was he beginning to worry about her? And why, above all, was he going out of his way to reassure her?
Dent felt a peculiar sense of confusion as he attempted to straighten out the thoughts in his own mind. Finally he shrugged and went back to oiling the weapon in his hands.
His mind was no longer on the girl. It was a thousand miles away.
He was climbing aboard the charter boat from the dock in Miami, the boat that would eventually, after a week’s deep-sea fishing, drop him off on an obscure shore not far from Havana. With him would be the suitcase with the money.
He sat motionless, staring out toward the sea through the rain-streaked window, as he projected his imagination ahead. Yes, it was all set in his mind’s eye. First Miami, then Cuba, and then South America. Within hours of the time he got his hands on the money, he’d be on his way. It would be the last he would see of Red and Fats and Gino. Of any of them. Except possibly Pearl. About her, he still hadn’t made up his mind.
But, he rationalized, why Pearl? Hell, with a quarter of a million dollars, why should he take any chances at all? Alone and traveling light, he could go far and he could go safely. And his plans were already made. Made for himself and his flight south to that life of money and freedom.
The others? Well, the hell with the others. Let them look out for themselves, once he had the ransom dough. And then his thoughts suddenly went back to Terry Ballin and the child.
Yes, there was one thing he would do if it were at all possible. He would see to it that the kid was released without being hurt. Not only for her sake, but for his own as well.
And at that moment Dent finally decided that he would definitely leave Pearl behind. For a second he had a passing and fugitive sense of regret that he had not taken her while she was available. But, he reflected, there were many Pearls—especially for a man with a quarter of a million in unmarked cash.
The sound of the car’s engine brought Cal Dent back to reality.
The rain had fallen off to a drizzle and the wind was dying as Dent put the pieces of the gun on the table and went to the window.
This time Pearl stopped at the door only long enough to wait for Red to come out and get the two large bags of groceries. Then she drove the car around and left it in front of the barn.
Entering the house, she told Dent she had failed to see the cop in town, even though she had stopped at the tavern as well as the grocery store. She seemed to have calmed down and stopped worrying for the time being, Dent noted with relief.
When Dent turned the radio on at four o’clock, they were all in the living room; that is, all but Terry.
Red sat on the couch, the child on his lap, half asleep. Gino stood by the mantel, his back to the fire, and Dent and Pearl were at the table.
With the exception of a number of false rumors, which the announcer himself mentioned, there was no news on the Wilton case.
Several moments later, Janie Wilton herself woke up as her mother’s voice came over the air. She sat openmouthed as she listened.
“This is Mrs. Gregory Wilton.”
The voice was very low and held an oddly calm note. “I want to talk to the men who are holding my baby, Janie Wilton.”
For a moment the voice broke, and then it went on, this time a little stronger.
“Whoever you are, and wherever you are,” she continued, “I want you to know that we will meet your ransom demands. Just please don’t hurt my baby.”
Again there were several seconds of silence and once more the voice continued, speaking softly but very distinctly.
“Janie, if you can hear me, this is Mamma. Be a good little girl and do what Terry tells you to do if she is with you. Whoever is with you, please do what they say and obey them. Daddy and I will bring you home soon.
Janie...”
And then the voice broke for the last time and a moment later the announcer returned to the air.
Janie had squirmed out of Red’s arms and was standing in front of him, looking baffled as she stared at the radio. Dent quickly turned it off.
Turning to Red, the child smiled up into his face. “That was my mommy,” she said proudly. “I bet she doesn’t know I’m a member of your gang.”
“Take her back in the other room, Red,” Dent said shortly.
Gino laughed, for no particular reason.
“They’re willing to pay,” Dent said. “Don’t worry, they’re willing to pay.”
Pearl said nothing, but walked to the window and looked out.
Red came back a moment later.
“She’s some kid,” he said. “Some kid—a real sweety!”
“She’s a half million dollars,” Dent said. “Who wants a beer?”
Pearl left the window and walked over to the icebox.
Thursday had been a tough day on all of them.
It had started with the heavy winds and the rain, but by evening the air had cleared and it had developed into a typical gloomy, bleak fall evening. Nothing in the world can be more depressing than a summer seaside cottage that time of the year, in that kind of weather.
Pearl had always been sensitive to weather, and the heavy atmosphere had combined with her natural fears to put her in an unhappy mood. Her emotions were ever near the surface, and even when the fear began to leave her, she still felt a forlorn sense of foreboding. During dinner she had eaten little.
Red had nerves of iron, but the inactivity of the last few days was beginning to wear on him. He wanted people and gaiety, and with the exception of the child, Janie, the others either bored or annoyed him. He would have liked to talk with Terry but those others, particularly Pearl, had made that impossible. His restlessness hadn’t interfered with his appetite, but shortly after dinner he began to pace the floor and mumble angrily under his breath.
Gino was probably having the worst time of all. With him it wasn’t a matter of nerves; it was a matter of pain. Red had given him a brutal beating, and he still ached all over. But even more than the physical pain
was the agony of his emotional pain. He seethed with a cold hatred for tall of them, but mostly for Red.
Dent was quick to sense the tension and he regretted that the weather had held up their plans for an additional twenty-four hours. From the very beginning he had realized that this was the sort of job that must be consummated as quickly as possible. He had a keen sense of judgment as to just how much the others would be able to stand.
Terry and the child had gone to bed soon after dinner. Pearl sat on the couch and her eyes followed Red as he paced the floor. Finally she threw the cigarette she had just lighted halfway across the room.
“For God’s sake,” she said, “will you plant yourself someplace? You’re driving me nuts.”
Red swung around and faced her. “Listen, you—”
Dent quickly stood up. “Take it easy,” he said. “I know everyone is keyed up. I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I got a little surprise upstairs in my bag. Take it easy a second, and I’ll go up and bring it down.”
They all watched him as he walked to the staircase.
Dent went into his bedroom and pulled a canvas satchel from under his cot. He drew open the zipper and reached under a half-dozen shirts and some underwear. He pulled out a fifth of brandy.
“Well, I guess this is an emergency,” he said under his breath as he closed the bag. His face was very sober.
Pearl looked up from the sink as Dent returned with the bottle.
“My hunch was right,” she said. She put four glasses on the table.
“Drinking,” Dent said, “is a lousy idea. But I guess we all got one coming.”
Gino pulled himself out of his chair and crossed to the table. He took his straight and his face showed pain as he drained the shot glass. Red drank his quickly and laughed nervously. Pearl and Dent mixed theirs with water. They sat around the table and Dent poured seconds.
Red downed his drink, then looked up and smiled.
“Can you imagine,” he said; “a guy can dig up a half-million bucks. Jeese, you wouldn’t think there was that much money in the whole damn world!”
“There’s that much,” Dent said, “and we’ll have it in another twenty-four hours.”
“Or maybe they’ll have us,” Pearl said.
Red looked at her and scowled. Dent laughed and Gino’s face cracked into an ironic grin.
The liquor had its usual effect, and gradually the tensions that had been building up all day were relaxed as they sat and talked. Once or twice
Red addressed a remark directly to Gino, and even that dour little man’s face seemed to lose its perpetual mask of bitterness.
Pearl was quick to react to the alcohol, and she rapidly assumed an air of wild gaiety. Dent himself drank sparingly and watched the others. Red found a hillbilly band on the radio and drummed on the table with a spoon in time with the music. For more than two hours they sat there talking of the money they would get and what they would do with it.
After his third short drink, Gino had pulled himself to his feet and gone over to the couch. The alcohol had given him momentary surcease from his physical pains, and for the first time he lay back completely at ease. His mind was soon trapped in the vicious circle of his own dreams and desires, and he no longer listened to the others.
At eleven o’clock Dent got up and twisted the radio dial until he found a news program.
Outside of wild speculation and false rumors, there was nothing new on the Wilton kidnaping. Dent soon snapped it off.
“Let’s kill it,” he said, motioning to the almost empty bottle, “and then hit the sack.”
Pearl poured the remaining brandy into three glasses. Realization that the bottle was empty, combined with the radio news, had suddenly sobered her.
Dent downed his drink and set the glass on the table.
“You all get some sleep,” he said. “I’ll hold the fort.”
Gino looked up from the couch. “No,” he said. “I can’t sleep anyway. The rest of you go up and I’ll sit here for a while.”
Dent looked at him closely for a minute before answering.
“O.K.,” he said. “Call me when you get tired and I’ll relieve you. But be sure to call me. We’re too close to home now to take any chances. Somebody’s got to be awake all the time from now on.”
Gino grunted.
He stared open-eyed at the ceiling as Pearl and Red started for the stairway, followed a second later by Cal Dent.
Twenty minutes later, as he pulled the gray Army blanket up to his chin, Dent heard Red and Pearl quietly quarreling in the next room. There was the sudden sound of blows and a moment later he heard Pearl crying. For another fifteen minutes he was kept awake by the sounds coming through the thin partition of the wall separating the two rooms, and then all was quiet.
He couldn’t sleep.
After turning and tossing for more than half an hour, he finally reached over for the flashlight at the side of his bed. He snapped the switch and directed the beam on his wrist watch. Then he got up and pulled the light cord. He went back and sat on the side of the bed and reached for a cigarette.
For Cal Dent, insomnia was almost a totally new experience. He had always been able to drop off within minutes after going to bed. The house was as still as death and there was no sound but the noise of the surf as the breakers crashed on the sands a couple of hundred yards from the cottage.
Cal realized that there was something disturbing him. He thought about the job. But it wasn’t that. Things were coming along just as he had planned them. He admitted to himself that the situation was tense, that the others were keyed up. But he himself wasn’t a worrier and he had been in plenty of tighter spots. No, it wasn’t worry over the job that was keeping him awake.
Red and Pearl? It was true that the sounds from the other room had annoyed him. But being an unwilling witness to their warfare hadn’t bothered him, and he had only been glad when they had quieted down.
He drew long drags from his cigarette and wondered what it was that was keeping him awake. At last, when the butt became too short to smoke, he stubbed it out in the ash tray and stood up. He pulled on a pair of trousers and stepped into, his shoes without bothering to lace them.
Gino looked at him curiously when he entered the downstairs room.
“Go up and hit the sack,” Dent said. “I can’t sleep, and one of us might just as well get some shuteye.”
Gino grunted and sat up. Wordlessly he nodded and started upstairs.
For a number of minutes Cal sat and stared into the dead fireplace. He felt very strange. The drinks? No, it couldn’t be that. He hadn’t taken enough to feel it. Anyway, liquor had never had much effect on him.
It was only when he became conscious of the movement in the next room that it came to him.
It was the girl, Terry. Somehow, all along, she had been in the back of his mind. Her very presence seemed to have been upsetting him from the very moment she had entered the hideout.
As he listened intently, he once more heard a slight sound, as though she were tossing in her sleep. He sat there thinking of her; thinking of her lying on that hard Army cot not more than ten feet away. There was nothing between them but the thin wallboard partition.
Dent stood up and crossed the room. He made no noise as he carefully turned the doorknob.
The light fell obliquely across the bedroom and he stood half in the doorway. He could see the outlines of the child as she slept curled up in a tight ball. He could hear her heavy breathing. He opened the door a little wider and looked over at the other cot.
Terry lay bathed in the light. Her flaming hair was a halo around her white face on the pillow. Her large eyes were wide and she was looking directly at him. For a full minute they stared at each other, neither one moving.
Dent took a step into the room. As he moved toward her the girl suddenly swung her feet to the floor, pulling the blanket up to her chin.
“No,” she said. “No.”
There was the urgency of fear in her voice.
Dent stopped short, as though he had suddenly walked straight into a concrete wall. Again he stared at her.
“I can’t sleep,” he said finally. His voice was a dull monotone, almost without meaning.
Terry rose to her feet, winding the blanket around herself. She nodded toward the other cot.
“I don’t want her to wake up,” she said in a low whisper. “I don’t want to wake her. Please go.”
“I can’t sleep,” Dent said once more.
“I’ll come out,” Terry said. “But please go now. I’ll come out.”
Wordlessly Dent backed to the door. He half closed it as he went into the other room.
Within less than two minutes Terry followed him into the room. Carefully she closed the bedroom door on the sleeping child. Dent was vaguely conscious of the fact that she had swiftly pulled on a sweater and skirt. Her legs and feet were bare.
The girl walked into the room, watching him as she moved. She went over to the couch and sat in the corner of it, tucking her legs under herself.
“The others have all gone to bed,” Dent said aimlessly.
Terry nodded.
“And you,” she said. “You have to stay up?”
“I couldn’t sleep,” Dent said. “I was thinking about you.”
He looked over at her and for the first time he was fully aware of her in the room with him.
Now there was no fright in her, only a strange look of curiosity.
His eyes followed the lines of her slender body up to the white column of her throat. And then once more he stared into her face. He repeated himself.
“I was thinking of you.”
“What were you thinking of me?” Terry said.
“What kind of a girl are you?” Dent asked. “Who have you known— what have you done?”
Terry half-smiled. “I guess I’m just an ordinary girl, like all girls,” she said. “I’ve known a lot of people, but never anyone quite like you and these other men here.”
“I’m not like the others,” Dent said.
“Yes, I know. But I’ve never known anyone like any of you. And as to what I’ve done—well, I’ve never done much of anything, until this happened to me.”
“Men?” Dent said. “Have you known many men? Are you married? Do you have a boy friend?”
Terry laughed softly. “I’m not married,” she said. “I have a lot of boy friends.”
Dent walked over to the couch and looked down at her for several minutes. She looked up into his face and still there was no fear in her.
He sat down, suddenly, beside her. He reached over and took one of her hands.
“I’ve never known anyone like you,” he said.
He felt her go taut as he held her hand in his own, but she made no effort to withdraw it. And then in a moment she relaxed and her head fell against the back of the couch.
Dent turned his body toward her and his other hand reached out and he took her arm. He pulled her toward him until their faces were only inches apart.
For a moment he stared at her and then quickly he pulled her close and his lips found her mouth. He felt her slender body stiffen in his arms.
A moment later he drew back. His eyes were suddenly cold and bleak.
“What’s the matter?” he said. “Haven’t you ever been kissed before?” His voice was bitter and vicious as he spoke. He still held her arms above the elbows and her body was still pressed close to his.
Terry looked back at him and there was still no fear in her face.
“I’ve been kissed,” she said. “I’ve been kissed. Only...”
“Well, then, kiss me,” Dent said. Once more he leaned toward her. Her lips were slightly parted as he found her mouth again. Her hands came up between them and she pressed slightly against his chest but she didn’t struggle.
Dent’s right hand fell from her arm and went around her waist.
Terry shook her head quickly and Dent took his lips away for a brief second.
“No,” she said. “No. You don’t understand. There has never been anyone....
“There is now,” Dent said. “There is now.”
He reached across her and found the light switch on the lamp at the end of the couch. A moment later only the moonlight streaking across the floor gave illumination to the room.
Terry started to say something, but once more Dent found her mouth. He lifted her from the couch and stood her on her feet, never taking his lips from hers. She began to fight with him silently and he breathed heavily. His lips drew away from hers and he kissed her neck hungrily. His arms held her tightly and his hands caressed her. She moaned.
Time stood still in that moon-sprayed room, and the sound of the surf roaring and breaking on the sands outside played an obbligato to the surging blood racing back and forth through his constricted veins.
They fell to the floor and Dent felt the softness of her. Only dimly was he aware of the girl’s struggles, and he failed to understand when she cried out in pain. It seemed to him then as though for a moment she willingly yielded to his demands. He didn’t realize that she was unconscious.
The fury of his desires mounted to a higher and ever higher pitch and his passion was a hard, cruel thing. He was consumed with an abandoned exaltation that knew no control and no point of satiation.
He could taste her tears as he kissed her face.
It must have been more than a half hour later when he picked her up as gently as though he were lifting a child and carried her into the other room. He laid her on the bed, then fell beside her, and once more his arms found her.
Long after, he roused himself and stood up. He closed the door behind him as he returned to the other room.
Like a man in a hypnotic trauma, he tossed some kindling into the fireplace and lighted newspapers under it. He didn’t turn on the light again, but he was vaguely aware that the rain had fallen off to a slow periodic drizzle and the wind had died down to a whisper.
He lay on the couch and stared sightlessly at the ceiling.
The wonder of the last hour overwhelmed him. Nothing, nothing ever in all the years of his strange and wild life, had prepared him for this night.
Pearl lay there for several minutes, her eyes still closed, and tried hard to remember where she was. There was an odd roaring noise in her ears. At first she was completely unable to identify the sound, and then, suddenly, she knew that it was the muffled drone of a high-powered engine. For a moment she thought she was back on that old white iron bed in the tenement on Tenth Avenue and that what she was hearing was the growl of a truck or bus pulling up the avenue in gear.
She turned in her half sleep to face the wall and tried hard to drop off into unconsciousness again. But the whine of the engine grew deep and close.
She opened one eye and tried to open the other, but it was frozen tight with sleep. And then she knew where she was. She was in the second-floor bedroom of the beach cottage, out on the south shore of Long Island. Looking toward the window, she knew that it was already daylight, although the room itself was still shrouded in shadows. She pulled herself into a sitting position on the side of the bed and shivered.
Reaching to the floor, she found her dressing gown and lifted it up across her shoulders. She stood up and pulled the cord hanging from the socket in the ceiling. She was alone in the room.
Walking unsteadily to the mirror that hung from a nail on the wall, she stared at her face. The eye that was still closed was encircled by a large black bruise.
Pearl cursed Red as she poured water from a pitcher into an old-fashioned basin. She splashed at her face and pulled a broken comb through her hair. Reaching for her wrist watch a moment later, she saw that it was ten after eight.
From the dark brown taste in her mouth, Pearl knew that she was in for a bad morning. She hoped that she would be able to hold a drink when she got downstairs. She hoped that there was a drink.
Once more she heard the roar of a powerful engine and this time she was able to identify it. There was a plane someplace overhead and it must be circling. She reached for the slippers lying at the foot of the bed and put her bare feet into them. She shivered again as she opened the door and found the staircase.
The first thing she saw on entering the living room was Dent, peeking from behind the curtains of the window next to the door. Gino and Red stood by the mantelpiece, their backs to the fireplace, staring at the ceiling of the room as though they could see through it. A moment later Dent reached for his field glasses and opened the window. He trained the glasses on the sky at an angle, through the window.
Pearl had a sudden overwhelming sense of fear.
After another two or three minutes, Pearl was aware of the sound of the plane fading off in the distance. Dent slammed the window shut and walked to the table, carefully laying down his glasses.
Gino was the first to speak.
“Well, was it?” he asked.
Every eye in the room was on Dent as he answered.
“It was,” he said. “A helicopter. No Army or Navy insignia that I could see. Probably the New York City police, but I couldn’t tell for sure.”
Pearl felt herself go faint and she staggered to the couch and half fell on it.
“It figures,” Dent continued. “The radio said they’re making a search of Long Island.”
“Let’s get out of here.” Gino’s voice was high and thin. Dent turned to him savagely.
“Don’t be a goddamned fool,” he said. “They’re probably patrolling the beaches and the roads all over the island. They have no way of knowing we’re here. After all, what the hell can they see from the air? They buzzed the place only once. What they’re probably looking for is a sign of the kidnap car. That’s all they could be looking for. Well, the car’s in the garage. There’s nothing to worry about.”
Red shook his head a couple of times. “Alla same, I don’t like it,” he said. “What the hell would they expect to find, if they didn’t know something?”
Dent turned to him and made an obvious effort to keep his voice calm. “Listen, Red, you got better sense than that. Sure they’re checking up. A case like this they check everything. As long as we sit tight, we’re safe. They can’t know about this hideout. The only giveaway would be if we got jittery and started to light out. The trouble with you,” and his eyes went from one to the other of those in the room, “the trouble is you’re all on edge and you got hangovers. This is the time you gotta keep control.”
Pearl stood up and there was a glazed expression in her eyes. Normally large and vivid, they were shot with blood this morning and had an oddly tarnished appearance, as though someone had blown his breath softly across them.
“1 gotta have a drink,” she said.
“Breakfast,” Red said. “That’s what you gotta have. All’s wrong with you, you’re hung.”
Pearl looked at him quickly and hatred spread across her face.
I “You rat,” she said. “You lousy rat. Look at my face! Look what you
did to me!”
“Shut up,” Red said, “or I’ll do a lot more. Just shut up, now.”
He raised his right arm and closed his fist, moving quickly toward the girl-
Pearl started to scream.
Gino, moving with a casual but deceptive speed, quickly stuck out his foot and Red tripped and fell. Dent crossed to Pearl. He slapped her hard, twice, across the mouth. Pearl suddenly stopped screaming and fell to the couch.
“I wanna get out of here,” she said in a muffled voice. “I wanna get out.”
Terry Ballin’s soft voice could be heard in the next room, and then a laugh from the child.
“Try to quiet Red down,” Dent snapped. “I’ll take her upstairs.”
He reached down and took Pearl under the arms and lifted her to her feet. She walked like a somnambulist as Dent guided her to the staircase.
Gino sat at the table and laughed cynically.
“Dames,” he said. “Dames. That’s what you get for pulling one in on a job like this.”
Red, back on his feet, looked at him dully.
Dent was upstairs for less than five minutes. When he returned, he got a glass and filled it with tomato juice. He went back upstairs.
Pearl took the tomato juice first and then Dent went into his room. He came back with a whisky flask. He poured out a couple of ounces. The girl looked at it and shuddered, but nevertheless she reached for it. They sat side by side on the edge of the bed.
She took a sip and shuddered, her whole body trembling. And then she quickly lifted it to her lips once more and drained the glass.
The glaze gradually left her eyes and her body quieted.
Putting her arms suddenly around Dent, she pulled him toward her and let her head fall on his shoulder.
“Cal, I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m sorry I started to blow my top. But I’m frightened. Frightened half to death. And that Red. He didn’t have to do what he did to me last night. Damn him, when he gets a few drinks in him he’s as bad as Gino.”
Cal Dent stroked her hair softly, but his eyes were cold and lonesome as he stared over her head at the wall. He didn’t speak.
And then Pearl lifted her head and shook it as though to clear her thoughts.
“I’ll be O.K. now,” she said. “Only just keep that lousy sonofabitch away from me.”
“This will be the last day,” Dent said softly. “Hang on for today, kid. Then it’ll all be over. Just try to get through today.”
Pearl looked at him and she smiled.
“Let something happen to him, Cal,” she said.
“We’ll get the money first,” Dent said. “And then we’ll see. Take it easy for a while and I’ll go down and get some breakfast going. And hang on to yourself.”
“I’m O.K. now,” Pearl said. “The drink straightened me out. I’ll be O.K. now.”
Dent stood up and went to the door.
“Better get some clothes on,” he said.
When Dent got back downstairs he was surprised to see Terry Ballin, sweater sleeves rolled above her elbows and her long auburn hair tied in two tight braids, standing over the two-burner kerosene stove frying eggs and bacon. He looked inquiringly at Red, who sat next to Gino on the couch, staring at the girl.
“I told her to,” Red said. “We gotta get something to eat around here somehow or other.”
Terry turned from the stove and became aware of Dent quietly standing and watching her. For a moment she looked straight into his eyes, and as he stared back at her, neither seemed aware of the others in the room.
There was no softness to her face. Her eyes were huge and unblinking as she looked at him. She was completely unsmiling; her sensitive lips quivered imperceptibly.
Wordlessly she turned back to the stove and took the bacon from the fire and put it on a cardboard plate, replacing the frying pan with the old-fashioned coffeepot. She put plates and cups and saucers on the table while she waited for the coffee to come to a boil.
The three men moved to the table and Dent was quick to observe that the girl had set only three places.
Later she made a plate of bacon and eggs for herself as the men ate. Dent watched her without expression as she carried the food into the other room and then returned for some milk and cereal for the child.
Red, looking over at Dent, said, “Some toots, eh, kid?”
Dent turned and stared at him. “Shut up,” he said.
Pearl came downstairs before they had finished. When Dent asked her if she wanted to eat, she shook her head.
“Coffee for me,” she said.
Dent poured her coffee and he noticed that Red carefully avoided look-f ing at her.
Red finished and stood up. He walked over and reached for the leather jacket hanging in back of the stairway door.
“How’s it coming?” Dent asked.
“Coming,” Red said. “The paint is almost dry. I put the Pennsylvania plates on het; got the body stripped right down. She’s going to look like a college kid’s hot rod.”
“Just so it don’t look like it did before,” Dent said.
“Look,” Red said, “when I change a car over, no one can recognize it. Those damned limousines are a tough job, too.”
“How’s the engine in her?” Dent asked.
“Good,” Red said. “She’s fast, and with all the weight I’ve taken off her, she’ll move right out. You won’t have any trouble with her at all.”
He closed the door carefully as he went out.
“At least he’s a good mechanic,” Gino said. “But I still think we shoulda picked up another load.”
“No,” Dent said. “The snatch car will do all right. Don’t forget, we only got a very few miles to travel in it. We’ll all end up in the Packard after the deal tonight and after we come back here for you.”
“That’s the one thing I don’t like about the whole thing,” Gino said. “Leaving me here, especially without any kind of car at all.”
“Don’t worry,” Dent said. “You won’t be here long.”
Later, as Pearl cleaned up the dirty dishes, Dent again twirled the radio dials. He finally got a news broadcast, and again there was little new on the Wilton case. The announcer merely said the rumor was out that the child was on the verge of being returned. He did add, howevei; that television cameras had been set up near her Connecticut home pending the arrival of the child.
Pearl shook her head as she heard it.
“How the hell do they do it,” she said. “How do they know? My God, you’d think those news hounds were psychic.”
“It doesn’t mean anything,” Dent said. “They’re just guessing—trying to play it safe in case of a break. They’re guessing, but for once the guess makes sense.”
Gino laughed without humor. “Be funny,” he said, “what with television and everything, if something should happen and the kid don’t show up.”
Dent swung to him, his face bleak and his voice very low. “Listen. Don’t get any ideas. Nothing’s going to happen to either the money or the kid.
I want that kid to be delivered safe and unhurt. As long as they get her
back all right, the heat won’t be on too tough. Anything happens to her; though, especially after we get the dough, they’ll never stop till they get us. And another thing you want to keep in your head: Something should happen to that kid and our insurance policy goes out the window. And if we should be picked up then, brother, they’d never let you get as far as the jailhouse. You’d be torn in a million pieces.”
Gino shrugged. “Don’t tell me about it,” he said. “I’m not going to do anything to her.”
“Be sure you don’t! Because if you should, what I’ll do to you—or rather, what I’ll have Red do to you—will make a cop’s going over seem like a day in a rest home.”
“You made up your mind about the girl yet?” Pearl asked.
Dent stared at the floor for a second before answering.
“Yes,” he said at last. “And don’t let that bother you. That’s my department. Just do what you’re supposed to and let me worry about the details.”
Pearl looked over at Dent as he spoke and her lips curled.
“Play it smart, Cal,” she said. “Play it smart and don’t leave any undone business behind you.”
“I won’t,” Dent said.
Pearl walked over to the clock and picked it up. She shook it, and then began to wind it.
“Ten-thirty,” she said. “Well, I guess Fats is making his call about now.”
Dent nodded. He walked to the window and looked out.
“Kinda muggy,” he said, “But it’s clearing. That helicopter got up all right, so I guess Dunleavy won’t have any trouble.”
Gino went upstairs soon after that. Dent piled some logs on the fire and pulled the card table in front of it.
“Might as well sit down,” he said to Pearl. “We got some time to kill.” He reached for a deck of cards and began to shuffle them.