Frank Herbert

by Frank Herbert

  Paul looked at the rifle. An M-1!

  “What about the ammo?” asked Carlos.

  “You have a full clip,” said Finch. He turned around, faced Paul. “Needless to say, young man, it is required that you stay away from this counter unless you are waiting on a customer. And then, you must remember: if you think of becoming heroic, Carlos—whose chief characteristic we both recognize—will be forced to shoot both the customer and yourself, using the small automatic he carries for such purpose. And then …” Finch shook his head sadly. “… the nice old man, too. You understand?”

  Paul found it difficult to control the trembling in his chest. He nodded.

  “Good. Good!” Finch returned to Carlos, glanced at the stairwell, and shot his left cuff to look at a wristwatch. “It is now 3:05.”

  Carlos looked at his own wristwatch. “Yeah.”

  “The latest word on the delivery time is that it will be very close to ten minutes to four. That gives us forty-five minutes.”

  And Paul thought, Maybe I could get a note into a shoe!

  Carlos said, “You going out now?”

  “Yes.” Again, Finch glanced up the stairwell. “I’ll return as soon as I have everything set.”

  Carlos rubbed at his neck. “Okay.”

  “You know what to do?” asked Finch.

  “You can trust me, Finch,” said Carlos.

  “I am trusting you,” said Finch. “Now, take no chances. If you believe a customer is suspicious, detain him. I’ll be back in plenty of time to help you get set. You’re not nervous, now?”

  Carlos swallowed, wet his lips with his tongue. “Me?”

  “Yes,” murmured Finch. “Well …” He patted Carlos’s arm. “… just remember how nice it’ll be in Mexico City this time of year, eh?”

  “Sure, Finch.”

  “And take no chances with the lad back there. He is nervous.” Finch let himself out, moved out of sight up the stairs.

  Presently, Paul saw the feet go past the little window—comfortable brown shoes, the kind worn by a man who pampers his body, heels slightly run over. Then he looked up to the brownstone across the street, saw a curtain fluttering at an open window, a man standing there, just into the light. Is that the one they mean to kill? he wondered.

  “Go on, get to work,” said Carlos.

  Paul glanced around, saw Carlos leaning on the counter. The look of panic that Paul had detected in Carlos’s eyes lay close to the surface, and Paul thought, He’s scared! The punk’s as scared as I am!

  “You heard Finch say you’re to act natural,” said Carlos.

  “Okay,” said Paul. He found himself suddenly heartened by the realization of Carlos’s fear. He turned his back on Carlos, pulled one of Mr. Levy’s brogans against his apron, and began rubbing the leather.

  “I can’t see what you’re doing there,” said Carlos. “What’re you doing?”

  Paul lifted the brogan. “You want me to work? I’m working.”

  “See that you do!” snapped Carlos.

  Paul listened to Carlos’s restless pacing at the front of the shop, thought, The little punk’s scared! He palmed the pencil stub out of his apron pocket, leaned over a scrap of wrapping paper on the bench. His heart was suddenly pounding. I mustn’t look back, he thought. It might make him suspicious. I can hear him. Quickly, he scribbled:

  “Mr. Levy, call police. Man with me is criminal, dangerous. Name Carlos Besera. Other name Finch. Help.”

  He stuffed the note into the toe of the brogan, pushed the pencil back into his apron pocket.

  “What a dump!” muttered Carlos.

  Heel taps on the sidewalk. Paul thought he recognized them even before they came into view—the same alligator pumps. She stopped at the corner, clattered down the stairwell.

  “It’s your girlfriend!” hissed Carlos. “Get rid of her! And act natural, see?”

  She came into the shop, flicked a glance across Carlos, advanced to the counter, and gave Paul a hesitant smile. There was an ink smudge along one freckled cheek. Her red hair was windblown.

  Paul stood rooted at the bench, heart hammering. His mouth tasted dry, fuzzy.

  “When I was here earlier …” she said. She hesitated. “Well, I forgot something. Your uncle has a pair of my shoes. He brought them down himself about a week ago. They needed …” She broke off. “Do you know if they’re finished?”

  Paul tried to still the trembling in his legs. He saw Carlos leering at Jean. Carlos nodded, dropped a broad wink at Paul. And suddenly Paul thought, Mr. Levy’s shoes! The note! If I give her the wrong shoes … will she suspect something, look in them?

  “I’ll have them for you in just a minute,” said Paul.

  “I’m just on my coffee break,” she said. “Will it be long?”

  “No.” Paul shook his head. He turned his back on them, concealing his actions with his body. A length of used wrapping paper from under the bench … Uncle Angie never threw away anything! He swathed Mr. Levy’s brogans in brown paper, took them to the counter, reached down.

  Carlos tensed, relaxed when Paul lifted a length of fresh paper.

  “I’ll just take them like that,” said Jean.

  “Paper’s a little dirty,” said Paul. “Liable to get it on your clothes.”

  “These old things?” she said.

  But Paul already had the new paper around the package. He tied the bundle with string, broke the string.

  “There you are.” He pushed the package across the counter.

  She said, “Lucky thing you didn’t need the number. I forgot it. Your uncle didn’t have a tag at the office, and he gave me a number.”

  “He told me which shoes were yours this morning,” said Paul.

  “About the bill,” she said. “I don’t know what your uncle was going to charge.”

  “You can catch it next time you’re in,” said Paul. And he thought, Just get out of here! Please! Just get out!

  Behind Jean’s back, Carlos was frowning, nodding toward the door.

  Jean lifted the package, glanced back at Carlos, returned her attention to Paul. “About … when I was here earlier … I’m sorry I flew off the handle. I just …” She stopped, lifted the package, balanced it in her hands. “Are you sure these are my shoes?” Again, she hefted the package. “They don’t feel … well, they’re so heavy.”

  Paul felt a choking sensation.

  Carlos moved up beside Jean, kept his right hand in the gun pocket, pushed the package down to the counter with his left hand. The arm in the gun pocket looked steel taut.

  Jean released her hold on the package, stepped back, stared from Carlos to Paul.

  “Maybe Paul’s made a mistake,” said Carlos. He kept his attention on Paul. “Let’s open up and see.” He smiled at Paul. “Anybody can make a mistake, eh?”

  Now Jean sensed the tension in the room. “I really don’t want to cause any trouble,” she said.

  Carlos used his left hand to tear the paper off the shoes, glanced down, back at Paul. “Imagine! Shoes like that for such dainty feet!”

  Jean spoke to Paul. “It was just that the package felt so heavy. Maybe I’d better come back when your uncle’s here.”

  “You just wait,” said Carlos. He fumbled in one of the shoes then the other, pulled up the note, shook it out, glanced at it. “Notes yet!”

  Jean’s attention suddenly riveted on Carlos’s right hand in the gun pocket. She lifted a wide-eyed stare to Paul—grey-green eyes full of question marks.

  “Maybe you had better come back when Uncle Angie’s here,” said Paul.

  “Well, I am just on my coffee break,” she said. She turned as though to leave.

  “I said wait!” snapped Carlos.

  She turned slowly, looked down at Carlos’s hand in his pocket.

  “That’s right, honey,” said Carlos. “It’s a gun.”

  Freckles stood out along her cheeks as she paled. She looked at Paul.

  Carlos spoke to Paul. “Now, why
did you have to complicate things by making her suspicious? You know what Finch said.”

  “You can’t kill everybody who comes in the shop!” rasped Paul.

  “Who said anything about killing?” asked Carlos. He leered at Jean. “My motto is you never throw away good merchandise.”

  She opened her mouth, closed it silently, and shot a frightened glance at Paul. And Paul felt an abrupt surge of anger at her. Why couldn’t you have just walked out with the package? Why make a fuss about it? Of all the … He realized suddenly that Carlos was speaking.

  “I said everybody in the back of the shop,” repeated Carlos. “Move!” He herded Jean ahead of him around the counter.

  “What is this?” whispered Jean.

  Paul backed toward the bench. “Look, Carlos, why can’t you just let her go?”

  “Now?” Carlos shook his head. “What a square!”

  “Put her out in the truck with Uncle Angie, then.”

  “You know better than that,” said Carlos. “Now, don’t you? You called her attention to me. She got a good look. Tomorrow, the cops have her downtown looking at pictures, and she makes me.” He shook his head. “And not at all the way I want.” Carlos stopped halfway between counter and bench. Jean stood at his left, attention fixed on Carlos.

  And Paul was thinking, So I was right! They do intend to kill anyone who can positively identify them!

  “What is this?” repeated Jean.

  “Just keep it quiet, honey,” said Carlos. “Like you’ll get the picture in time.”

  Paul pushed himself away from the bench, eyes on Carlos.

  Instantly, Carlos was alert, menacing with the gun in his pocket. “Let’s keep our distance, chum!”

  Paul stopped, swallowed. If I can only get within reach of him …

  Jean said, “What’s all this talk of killing and … Please, won’t someone tell me?”

  Carlos looked at Jean. “Now, there’s no real reason you have to get hurt, honey.” He smiled. “This time tomorrow, I’m on my way to Mexico City with a bag full of hot ice. One hundred grand! My share. How’d you like to come down with me, help spend it?”

  She said, “Spend …”

  “Sure! Nice-looking doll like you, what do you see in a square like him?” He nodded toward Paul.

  She stared at him, backed away along the counter. Carlos had to turn farther away from Paul to watch her. His eyes were focused hungrily on her body. “Now, me,” he said, “I can show you a real good time.”

  Jean backed away another step.

  “No need to be scared, honey,” said Carlos.

  “I’m …” She shook her head. “… not.”

  “Good!”

  She took a deep, trembling breath, backed away another step, and turned to face the front of the shop. “Did you say you’d have one hundred thousand dollars?”

  “Sure, honey. There’s five of us. We split half a million five ways.”

  Jean looked down at the corner of the counter. “What if I say yes?”

  And Paul, who had been watching her feet, thought, My God! She’s deliberately taking his attention off me! That narrow little line where inhibitions did not extend, the marionette feet just as they were framed by the shallow window over the bench: cautious, controlled—stepping only far enough to keep Carlos from growing suspicious!

  Carlos was grinning. “Why, then I buy two tickets on that plane!”

  She turned, faced Carlos, seemed to be looking for something in his expression.

  Carlos swallowed. “I’m leveling, honey.”

  She nodded. “Okay.”

  Again the grin stretched Carlos’s mouth.

  Paul acted. One quick step forward, his left hand grabbed Carlos’s gun arm just above the wrist, his right hand swung in a vicious chop that caught Carlos full on the throat. All the pent-up desperation of this day went into the blow.

  The gun exploded as Carlos dragged his arm upward. Paul ducked a wild, gouging, left-handed clutch at his eyes, broke the gun arm with a single motion of knee and downward pressure of hands. The gun clattered against concrete, skidded across the floor.

  Gurgling sounds came from Carlos’s mouth.

  Paul swung him around, sent a knee to the groin, another chop to the side of the neck, and yet another to the back of the neck.

  Carlos pitched forward.

  From the corner of his eye, Paul saw a glint of metal outside the shallow window. He acted without thinking, dove across Carlos as glass exploded inward. There was a whining ricochet against the concrete floor.

  Jean shouted something, but the words were lost to him. He scrambled for the wall at the end of the counter, yelling at her, “Get behind the counter!”

  A popping sound—like a cork being pulled from a bottle. Another bullet screamed off the floor.

  Finch! Thought Paul. He’s back early! Why? Frantically, Paul groped under the counter for the rifle, kept his attention on the window above him. His fingers closed on the M-1 as though it were an old friend. He slid it out, levered a cartridge into the chamber, saw Jean scramble around the end of the counter toward him.

  “He’s coming down the front!” she hissed.

  “Keep your head down,” he said.

  Glass shattered at the front of the shop. A bullet splatted into the face of the counter.

  “Is somebody shooting?” whispered Jean. “I can’t hear the gun.”

  “Silencer,” said Paul. He reached under the bench for a shoe to throw, hoping Finch would shoot at it, leaving an opening for counterfire.

  Finch’s voice echoed from the stairwell. “All right! I told you what’d happen! The old man gets it!”

  Paul threw the shoe, leaped up and sideways, snapping off a shot that thundered in the narrow length of the shop.

  But Finch was gone.

  Running feet pounded along the sidewalk at the corner. Paul whirled, swept the rifle muzzle against the window. Glass showered onto the bench, on the sidewalk.

  Finch was slanting across the street toward a large green-and-white van parked to the left of the brownstone. He ran bent over, fat legs pumping, the overcoat billowing out behind. He had lost hat and cigar. A woman with a shopping basket stopped on the sidewalk to the right, stared.

  Paul slapped the rifle against his shoulder, elbow out, the forestock smooth and familiar under his left hand. He could almost hear the sergeant at the Fort Ord infiltration range hissing in his ear, “Lead him a little! Lead him!”

  The rifle bucked—a roaring explosion that reverberated in the shop. Finch slammed forward onto his face, rolled over, and lay without moving. His right hand clutched a long, bulge-snouted revolver.

  The cab door of the truck banged open. A skinny, hard-faced man in white coveralls leaped out, lifted a sawed-off shotgun toward the shop window.

  Paul aimed low, slammed a bullet into the man’s legs, and saw him pitch sideways, the shotgun skidding from his hands and under the truck.

  The woman on the sidewalk had dropped her shopping basket, and was screaming, hands up to her face. Paul heard brakes screech to the right, saw the armored car lurch to a stop against the curb. He thought, The delivery! It’s early! That’s why Finch came back so soon!

  An abrupt roaring explosion filled the street. Paul jerked his gaze upward, saw a man standing at a second-floor window of the brownstone, holding an automatic shotgun pointed down toward the far side of the truck. The guard they were going to kill! thought Paul. He got somebody getting out the other side of the truck!

  “What’s happening?” demanded Jean. She arose from behind the counter, her red hair disarrayed, and stared at him.

  But Paul was thinking, Uncle Angie’s in that truck!

  He almost knocked Jean over rushing past her, out of the shop, and up the stairs.

  “Where’re you going?” she shouted after him.

  He ignored her, raced for the corner. Part of his mind registered faces framed in windows above him, querulous voices, distant wailing of a siren.
Then he was at the corner, skidding to a stop as the guard in the second-floor window of the brownstone shouted, “You down there! Drop that rifle!”

  Paul looked up, saw the shotgun centered on him. “My uncle!” he called. “They’ve got him in that truck!”

  “You the one shot that guy in the street?” shouted the guard.

  “Yes! I tell you they’ve got my uncle in that truck!”

  “Then relax, son! That truck’s not going anywhere! I just …”

  Sirens filled the street, drowning his voice. Police cars roared down the street from both ends, skidded to stops. Uniformed men leaped from them, pistols ready. The banshee wailing droned away to silence.

  Paul’s gaze went to Finch’s body in the street near the rear wheels of the truck. A dark stain spread along the overcoat beneath one arm, and a rivulet wandered off toward the gutter. One of Finch’s run-over brown shoes had slipped off, exposing a hole in the heel of his sock.

  Abrupt reaction hit Paul. He felt that if he moved, his muscles would collapse. He saw the frightened eyes of the woman with the shopping basket peering from behind steps down the street, police hurrying toward him, the guard still staring down from the upper window of the brownstone.

  Revulsion swept over Paul. He thought, I’ve killed a man! The rifle dragged at his arm. He wanted to drop it but could not will his fingers to release their grip.

  A policeman with sharp features stepped warily up beside him, slipped the weapon from his hand. “All right, mister,” said the policeman. “You mind telling us what’s going on here?”

  In a dry, shallow voice, Paul told him, beginning with Carlos’s visit. Presently, it seemed that he drew back from his own voice, listened to it droning on and on and on and on …

  There was a brief interruption when the ambulance came to take away a pale but still breathing Uncle Angie and the wounded bandit from the street. A police car drove away with an ashen, stumbling Carlos Besera after the ambulance attendant immobilized the broken arm and gave him a shot.

  And later—after all the questions, the avid faces, the flaring flashbulbs—Paul stood at the corner in the gathering dusk. Police technicians still worked around the big truck across the street, but the only reminder of Finch was a chalked outline on the pavement and a dark, irregular stain growing dim in the twilight.