by Lionel White
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.
Chapter Fifteen
At three-forty-five, Pearl finished dressing and making up and came downstairs.
“Maybe,” she said, “I should go in and get Fats.”
“No,” Dent said. “I told him to take a cab out.”
“But why?” Pearl asked. “I thought you didn’t want cabs coming out
this way. I thought—”
“From today on it won’t matter;” Dent said. “Another thing, just in case anything went wrong this afternoon, I wanted to be sure the Packard was here. Anyway, don’t worry about it. Fats will be along any second now.”
Five minutes later they heard the sound of the car approaching. Dent quickly looked out the window, then turned and nodded.
“It’s him,” he said.
Fats waited until the taxi turned around and started off before he knocked. When he entered, he smiled and held up his hand, his thumb and index finger forming a circle.
“It went like a dream,” he said.
At twenty minutes to five, Red and Pearl left the hideout. Pearl carried a small hand-drawn map in her bag. She had carefully listened to Dent’s final instructions. It was up to her from now on. Red would do the driving, and would be there if she needed him. But she’d have to carry the ball as far as the brainwork went. Dent was sure she could do it.
Red wore his leather jacket and a fishing cap. He had a .45 automatic in a holster under his left armpit. A pair of sawed-off shotguns lay under a blanket on the floor in the back of the Packard.
Dent walked out to the barn with them. He leaned on the door at Pearl’s side as she got in and Red tentatively pushed his foot on the starter.
“Remember,” Dent said, “the diner at the edge of the airport. You be there at dusk and you’ll have to watch close. The plane should be coming in any minute after you get there. A red and yellow monoplane. There can’t be more than two persons aboard. The second it lands, get on that phone. Be in the booth, just in case. And once you got the message over, get out of there quick.
“Don’t take a drink of anything, anywhere. Stay in the open; act natural. Get your dinner at the place I marked. Watch your timing on the second call. From then on you’ll know what to do. But keep your eyes open. Be careful.”
Pearl nodded. “Don’t worry, Cal,” she said.
Red pushed the clutch in. “Be seein’ you,” he said.
The car pulled out of the old barn and Dent stood watching it for a moment before he hauled the doors shut and returned to the cottage.
“God,” he muttered under his breath, “I hope they don’t muff it.”
The sun, rapidly sinking, hit Red full in the face as he drove west on the highway. When, some fifteen minutes after he had left, he cut to the north, he shook his head in relief. Pearl sat close to the door of the car and had not spoken to him once. Finally Red slowed the car slightly and spoke out of the corner of his mouth.
“Listen, baby,” he started, “about last night...”
“I don’t want to hear about last night,” Pearl said, staring straight in front of her.
Red looked ugly for a moment and then quickly he smiled. “O.K., O.K., babe,” he said. “The hell with last nig
ht, then, and the hell with
99
you.
“That’s right, Red,” Pearl said. “The hell with me. Let’s just get on about our business.”
Red gave up any further attempt at conversation until he came to the turnoff four miles to the southeast of Smithtown. He slowed down and looked over at Pearl, who had the map opened in her lap.
“Take it right,” she directed.
Red turned and then, a few miles farther on, saw the outlines of the twin hangars. He drove slowly past them to the crossroads that marked the end of the small airfield. It was not quite dark yet, but someone had already turned on the blue and red neon lights outlining the place.
As Red pulled the car into the parking lot and carefully turned it around so that it again faced the road, he noted the two trucks and the sedan pulled up in front. From where the sedan sat at the side of the diner, he figured it belonged to the place.
Pearl was quick to spot the telephone booth at the end of the diner, exactly where Dent had told her it would be. Red, however, swiftly cased the two men sitting on stools and drinking coffee. The white-aproned short-order cook was standing in front of them and talking. Next to the phone booth, at the end, were two doors leading to rest rooms. A shed attachment, built on after the diner had been trucked to the spot and placed on foundations, contained a small storage room.
Red could see that there was no one in it. Pearl went at once to a booth midway along the wall and sat down; Red went to the men’s room.
The short-order cook had brought a couple of glasses of ice water to the table and was standing waiting for an order when Red returned.
“Make mine a couple of hamburgers and coffee,” Pearl said.
“One and coffee,” Red said, sitting down.
As the cook returned behind the counter Pearl took a coin from her purse and put it in the slot on the wall and selected a jukebox number. Looking out the window at her side, she had a full view of the airport.
When the music began to play, Red leaned toward her. “Check the woman’s can,” he said in a low voice. Pearl nodded and stood up.
Twenty minutes later, after they had finished their food and Red had ordered a second hamburger, they heard the sound of a plane’s engine. Both were nervous and on edge. The sun was at the horizon; visibility was poor.