On the Run With Bonnie & Clyde

by John Gilmore

  Henry grumbled—saying something neither could make out. Bonnie looked into the backseat and shook her head. “I wish we could get rid of him.”

  Clyde glanced at her. “We’ll be okay, honey. I don’t pity those fellas back there. Well, I said to mud-ass behind us, ‘We’ll take ’em’ and we coulda given those two laws a run like the way we’re goin’ right now. Could’ve had Henry loadin’ those cycles off the road into the brush. Drivin’ those laws with us. Could’ve let ’em off somewhere south of where we are right now, then head south ourselves so they’d get all curious and wonderin’ where we’d be headin’ and how we’d be out of Texas—gettin’ you a fat lamb chop or turkey sandwich and gravy.…”

  “That sounds good, daddy.” She rolled the window down a few inches and sent the cigarette into the wind. “Too bad he had to shoot like he did,” she said, putting her hand out the window. “Probably would’ve had to anyway soon as they got a look at us.”

  “Not if we’d brought ’em along,” Clyde said. “Could’ve been jokin’ with those boys right now.”

  “They would’ve been too scared to think we’re funny,” she said. “I just felt rain.” Rolling up the window, she stared ahead at the black road pulling fast beneath the car until sudden raindrops spattered across the windshield. Clyde turned on the wipers. “Rain,” she said. “Rain… They’re all scared of us.” She folded her coat and turned to the window. Placing the rolled coat on the ledge, she tipped her head and rested it against the coat. Drawing up her knees a little, she raised her head again and looked at Clyde. “They may be all scared of us,” she said, “but they’re bringin’ the wrath of heaven against us, aren’t they, daddy? The whole heaven.”

  Clyde smiled. “Only heaven I’m thinkin’ of is you, angel. I don’t think of none other heavens. You’re so sweet you’re enough heaven for me, baby.”

  Bonnie leaned over and kissed him, then again rested her head against the folded coat.

  After moments, the speed of the car pushing eighty straight into the rain, Clyde bent slightly forward to the wheel, again taking that lean position like a runner eyeing the hurdles ahead.

  Thirty-Eight

  Richard Cole wouldn’t forget the visitors to the small, wood-frame Texarkana house he shared with his wife and son “a stone’s throw from a truckin’ yard.”

  “It was rainin’ that day,” says Cole. “Kicked in around evenin’ and then someone was rappin’ at the door. Our dog we had back then—half Lab and shepherd—started barkin’ his head off, and I told him to shut up. I had a queer feelin’ as I unlocked the front door and opened it a little. Clyde Barrow was standin’ behind the screen, and with him was Bonnie Parker right at his side, tryin’ to keep themselves out of the rain that was beatin’ down all around them.”

  Cole had been paroled after serving four years for robbery. He says, “I made the decision to keep out of trouble, even though I had no job and it was a hell of a time. My wife was waitin’ tables afternoons and evenin’s until way late, and then I’d be out in the mornin’ tryin’ to get work. Didn’t matter. Pick and shovel or whatever I could get. That’s how it went, and every once in a while I’d run into guys that had big ideas—knockin’ over this or that joint, and makin’ big plans. I’d tell ’em thanks, but no, I’d had my fill of it.

  “A guy I’d known told me he’d once run with Buck Barrow, but they’d split off, and this guy was runnin’ still, the law always on his heels. He wanted me to go in with him and told me about the job in details I never wrote down, but kept in my head. While Buck Barrow was locked up in Texas, his brother Clyde wasn’t, and this job was a sure cinch, he’d said, like goin’ in, grabbin’ and gettin’ out fast. He said he’d written Buck, given him my whereabouts, sayin’ I was a distant cousin, thinkin’ maybe I’d go in with Clyde if the chance came up.

  “I got a Western Union telegram sayin’ somethin’ like it’s been a long time between cousins gettin’ together and he’d pay me a visit.

  “The information I had on the job was temptin’ but I wasn’t gonna be a party to takin’ action on it—I didn’t want it, but what I’d learned was with me, and then not long after that telegram, the car stopped out in front of the house.

  “My blood was turnin’ cold while Clyde and Bonnie were standin’ on the porch. I could make out some other person in the backseat of the car, but there wasn’t any resemblance with anyone I knew. It was already dark and that rain was comin’ down. Times I’d seen it rushin’ up on runnin’ boards and slappin’ around the wheels.

  “I let them in. They were wet and right away Clyde’s shakin’ my hand like a lost pal. They had practically every cop lookin’ for them, and here we all were in the same room—they were guests, and I was thinkin’ I’m on damned parole, and couldn’t consort with cons. My wife, God bless her, would’ve had a heart attack if she’d walked in.

  “I’m six feet tall and they were a lot shorter and smaller, like two kids. Our dog that didn’t trust strangers was waggin’ its tail at both o’ them, and Bonnie was pettin’ the dog’s head, scratchin’ its ears, and that dog was lappin’ it up.

  “My wife knew nothin’ about what had been brought up before, but I got scared because of what I knew, and here was Buck’s brother, Clyde, and ten times the outlaw Buck’d ever been, face to face with me and my givin’ him the rundown on a job. All the while it was like I was settin’ myself up—except God takin’ me by the neck and givin’ me a shake, sayin’, ‘Wake up, boy!’ My wife was pregnant again at the time, and nights I was takin’ care of our one little boy.

  “Our kid thought Bonnie was a little girl and he could play with her. I’ve remembered that clear as day. I thought it was funny how he was seein’ her not as a grown girl but like she was a little kid. Even later on I asked my son, ‘Why’d you think that young woman was a little girl?’ He didn’t know why he’d thought that, but he did, he said. So I said, she’s bigger than you, and he said she was just big, that she’d grown faster than he had, so he said she was a big little girl.

  “I was worryin’ that a squad of laws’d come rushin’ the house—man, I could see it, and frankly it scared me shitless of bein’ locked up again. I couldn’t take that. If such a thing as that happened I’d hang myself soon as that door slammed shut. Done with it.

  “I was embarrassed because I was scared, and I could see Clyde knew I was scared. He was armed—I could tell he was packin’ a gun on one side and had an automatic on the other, down in his belt, and he’s a walkin’ arsenal. Bonnie had that beaded, fancy handbag or carryin’ case, and damned if it didn’t look as if it had some weight, like a goddamn .38 she could’ve been carrying.

  “In short order, I sat with Clyde at the kitchen table and told him what I knew—the information I’d learned—and Bonnie was talkin’ to my kid and dog, and then wantin’ to pay me money. I said it was okay, wasn’t necessary, though I wasn’t goin’ to say absolutely no. She gave my boy a couple bills and said it was to buy ice cream and a play truck—some kind of fire truck. She mentioned a toy gas truck she’d seen, and then she insisted I take money, and I said, ‘Well, whatever you want and if you can’t, that’s alright by me.’

  “Clyde said he wanted a drink of somethin’. All I had was soda pop, but he took that, and Bonnie drank some too, then he got me aside in the kitchen and was wantin’ to know if I was willin’ to work the job with him and another guy, ‘the one’s in the car,’ he said. I said I couldn’t, that I’d done all the time I could—and my goin’ legit because of my wife and my kid and the one on the way, I couldn’t go back in that line of work. The time I’d done had branded me like a goddamn steer, and I said I didn’t think I was good to anyone anymore.

  “Clyde said he knew that already. He said, ‘Not that you aren’t any good to anyone,’ but that I’d done all the time I could do. He said he knew it when I opened the front door, and he wanted to know if I’d ever been to Eastham. That’s where he’d done time, and I said no, I never got in dutch in Tex
as. I said what I’d done was Arkansas time, and no one was gonna let me forget it. I couldn’t get ahead no-how, and in such a bad time with so many out of work. I couldn’t be sold anythin’ I’d pay for later, like folks were doin’, so we didn’t own the house—didn’t even own most of the furniture. We owned the sofa which I said had been my mother-in-law’s, and if it wasn’t for her I’m sure we’d be right now sittin’ on the floor.

  “‘I hear you, brother,’ Clyde said. He needed another guy to work with, but I couldn’t even help him out with that. I said I didn’t have any more connections, couldn’t even give him a name. Last guy I knew had been sent up again. Bonnie laughed a little, sayin’ she understood everythin’ I was sayin’, and neither of them had any hard feelin’s. She said she could see how anyone who wasn’t a con was gettin’ in line ahead of me, no matter how much effort I could put into makin’ someone else more than I’d ever have a chance of bein’.

  “Clyde said if I didn’t have the kid and the one the wife was carryin’, he’d convince me to ride with them, but he knew I wouldn’t do it anymore, and couldn’t live with myself if I did. He looked me square in the eye and said with him it was different. He didn’t have any choice anymore. I said I knew that. They had killin’ papers on him, and with a kind of smile, he said, ‘So I got no choice.’

  “He shook my hand again and said I was okay and it wasn’t any skin off his nose if I didn’t go ’cause I’d done him a decent turn, and he wouldn’t forget it.

  “The one bad thing I felt and God’ll never let me forget it, was that while he was talkin’ to me, his head cocked kinda and him grinnin’, I thought I was lookin’ face to face with a dead man. Made my skin creep up on me. One other time when I was in the jug I wasn’t supposed to be talkin’, but this one con was talkin’ to me and I had the same feelin’—an idea that hits you like I was seein’ the fella already dead except him standin’ there talkin’ like he was still alive.

  “That’s what struck me with Barrow and my shakin’ his hand. He was reachin’ out of a hole or a grave to pull me in if I walked out that door with him. God strike me dead if that wasn’t what I was feelin’—not thinkin’ it, but feelin’ it plain as day; but I kept smilin’.

  “They hurried out to that car where someone was sittin’ in the backseat, just a dark shadow. I shut the door, sweatin’ and kinda sick.

  “My boy was asking me if the little girl was coming back. I said she wasn’t as little as he was thinkin’, but no, I told him, she wouldn’t be coming back. He said, ‘Not even comin’ back for her dinner?’ I said, ‘No, sonny, not even comin’ back for her dinner.’”

  Thirty-Nine

  Near sundown, Clyde walked into a gas station, drew his .38, and asked for the money. The attendant said, “It’s been a slow day,” and gave a yawn as he emptied the cash from the register.

  “Been slow, huh?” Clyde said, stuffing the bills into his pocket. The attendant nodded. How could someone be so bored at gunpoint? It seemed a good idea to Clyde if they took the kid for a ride. Pocketing the gun but keeping it level, he said, “Come on out and give us some gas.”

  “Yes, sir!”

  Clyde followed the attendant, and stood to the rear of the vehicle, watching as the kid filled the tank. “Check the oil and water.”

  Bonnie was sitting behind the wheel as another car pulled into the station. The young driver waved. “That’s a friend of yours?” Bonnie asked the attendant. Finished filling Clyde’s tank, the kid looked around and shook his head. “He’s been gettin’ gas a few times.”

  “Let’s make him a friend,” Clyde said. He told the attendant, “Get in the backseat next to that other fella in there. He’s got a gun, too.”

  The attendant said, “You want me in the car?”

  Clyde nodded. “Yeah, and don’t be steppin’ on any weapons on the floor.”

  As soon as the attendant climbed into the car, Clyde turned to the customer at the gas pumps. He waved for him to follow the attendant into the car. The customer looked confused. He asked, “What’re you callin’ me over for?” then panicked when Clyde brought the gun into view.

  “Come on, boy,” Clyde said. “We’re goin’ for a ride.”

  “Don’t shoot—please! What do you want with me?” the boy said. Clyde motioned for him to get into the car. The customer nodded. “I’m gettin’ in!” he said. “Please don’t point that gun at me.” Without further hesitation, he squeezed in alongside the attendant, who had placed himself uncomfortably next to Henry. “This car’s full of guns,” the customer said.

  Bonnie slid over for Clyde to get behind the wheel. She then turned around from the front seat and looked at the new arrival. “What’s your name?” she asked.

  “Bob,” he said.

  “Well, Bob,” she said, “you got nothin’ to worry about, neither one of you boys, so you don’t be lookin’ so peaked just ’cause you’re ridin’ in a stolen car. This is Clyde Barrow drivin’, and I’m Bonnie Parker—the gun moll terror of more states than your granny’s got teeth.” She smiled, watching their faces drain. Then she pointed to Henry. “That man is very mean, boys. I won’t tell you what he’s called, but he’s with us, and these guns and boxes of bullets are the tools of our trade. What’s your name?” she asked the attendant.

  “I’m Wesley,” he said, staring at the back of Clyde’s head. “I knew that was Clyde Barrow,” he said. “I knew it soon as he got outta this car, ’cause I’ve seen his picture in the papers. I knew it when you came in the station with that gun.” He swallowed, cleared his throat and said, “I was gonna give you money when you walked in, so you didn’t have to hold no gun or shoot me.”

  “You’re a lucky fella,” Clyde said. “You’re actin’ so casual I was thinkin’, ‘He’s gotta be wearin’ a bulletproof vest’.”

  “We’re supposed to be the most wanted outlaws in all tarnation,” Bonnie said, her eyes gleaming. “Except maybe John Dillinger, but there’s two of us to his one, and right now three of us includin’ the fella next to you with the gun.” Faking a serious look, she said, “I hope you boys are comin’ to help us stick up a bank. That’s what we’re intendin’ this evenin’.”

  “No, thanks, ma’am,” Wesley said. “I don’t want to stick up any bank, but thank you all the same.” Bob spoke up quickly, saying he couldn’t do that because he had high blood pressure. He’d only be in the way, he said. Or worse, he could have a heart attack and be bleeding right on the bank floor.

  Bonnie said, “I don’t think we’ll be spinnin’ anyone’s blood—will we?”

  “You never know,” Clyde said.

  Henry spoke up. “This here fella’s lookin’ peaked right now.” He nudged the gun against Wesley’s ribs. “You think he’s needin’ a transfusion?”

  She looked at Clyde. “We ever been doin’ any blood transfusions? Wesley’s maybe needin’ one—”

  “—no, ma’am, I don’t need any transfusion,” the boy said. “That was this fella Bob here, talkin’ about his blood.”

  “We can’t do transfusions,” Clyde said. “Mostly we just been spillin’ it, and gettin’ our pictures in the paper.”

  “I’m—I’m not in need of any transfusions,” Bob said seriously. “I’m fairly okay right now—I mean, this minute in general, it’s just I needed to get gasoline in my car.”

  “Well, that’s a happy coincidence,” Bonne said, “runnin’ into us.”

  Shaking his head, Bob said, “Truly, Miss Bonnie, I wouldn’t be any good at robbin’ a bank. I’ve never had the experience at that sort of stuff.…”

  “There’s nothin’ to it,” she said. “You boys look pale and worried. Are you worryin’ about somethin’?”

  “Yes, ma’am!” Wesley blurted out. “I left that station wide open when I got invited for this ride, and now this here fella’s stickin’ a gun in my ribs.”

  “And if I shoot right through you,” Henry said, “I’ll get your buddy at the same time, and bust a hole through your door.�
�

  Looking at Bob sympathetically, Bonnie asked, “I can see that won’t be necessary. But are you worried, Bob, and not enjoyin’ our repartee?”

  He nodded. “I don’t know what that word means, ma’am. I just needed some gas in my car.”

  “We’ve got plenty of gas in this car,” Bonnie said, “since Wesley’s filled the tank, and we thank you, Wesley.”

  “Yes, my pleasure,” he said. “But I’m just thinkin’ about my job—”

  “—I already robbed your station,” Clyde said. “You got no worry there, unless someone’s swipin’ tires and inner tubes.”

  Bonnie said, “You boys like singin’? We can all sing ‘Bye Bye Blackbird’! It’ll cheer us up so we won’t be worryin’ so much about the unpleasant side of things.”

  Clyde said, “I’ll get my guitar outta the trunk, we can have a singin’ party!”

  Neither boy said anything, and minutes later on the outskirts of the town, Clyde left the highway and drove a short way on a dirt road. Slowing the car to a stop, he looked sadly into the rearview mirror at the two nervous riders. “Since you boys don’t want to be robbin’ a bank with us or singin’ a song with Bonnie, I reckon this here’s the end of the road....” When he reached into his pocket, Bob gasped and Wesley braced himself. Clyde pulled out a handful of bills. He unfolded several and gave each guest a share.

  Bonnie clapped. “That should get y’all tucked safely back to the gas station, but maybe we’ll be seein’ you again real soon.” The rear door flew open on Bob’s side of the car, and both unwilling passengers scrambled out. Bonnie called, “Bye for now, Wesley, and adieu Bob! Be seein’ you soon!”

  A few yards from the car, both boys ran for the highway, leaving behind the laughter trailing from the car. Bonnie said, “Oh, daddy, that was fun! You think we scared the pants off those boys?”