The Desperate Hours

by Joeseph Hays

  Slowing down, Jesse held the car to a steady pace because as he passed the house, which would be on his left, he wished to give himself sufficient time for observation and at the same time he felt that too slow a speed or any abrupt change in it might call attention to his presence. His first impression of the house was that it was rather large, set off by itself, flat fields to the west of it, and two or three vacant and wooded lots to the east. The windows were dark, and there was a certain reassurance in this natural-appearing fact.

  In the driveway, there was a long, recent-model blue sedan with its nose pointed toward the street. Jesse recorded this, understanding its meaning; then twisting about only slightly, he let his eyes climb from window to window. Nothing. Darkness. But they were still in there—one, perhaps both.

  Then he was passing the woods, coming abreast of the closest house. Walling, his memory reminded him, Ralph Walling. On his right, across the boulevard from the Hilliards, there were no structures of any sort, only an expanse of meadow with a realtor’s sign advertising lots for sale.

  They chose well, the bastards, he said to himself in grim silence, wishing that he had had more time to study the exact locations of the porches, garage, doors. But he had a fairly accurate picture now. At the first street he made a left turn, intending to pass all the way around the four sides of the block. But he remembered from the map that it was not an ordinary block here; there was no cross-street or road behind the Hilliard house—that is, north of it—for perhaps a quarter of a mile. It was this area behind the house in which he was particularly interested as he turned left again on the graveled back ‘ road that paralleled the boulevard.

  If a man made his way through the woods that extended rather densely from the rear of the Hilliard property to this road on which he was now traveling west, and if he could approach the house unseen from behind, especially in the heavy darkness now-

  But this was, he concluded swiftly, the sort of conjecture that could lead nowhere really because the point you missed, when you began to figure this way, was that the back door of the house would be locked tight and alertly guarded from inside, especially now that young Griffin had gone. His brother was smart enough to realize exactly what danger was involved in this.

  Jesse’s job now was to find a place for a lookout, a place where a man or preferably several men could keep watch on the Hilliard house. Considering the flatness and low underbrush of the fields to the west and across the boulevard from the house, it would be a tough job, too. This was what he was working on, arranging it in his mind for presentation to Carson and Fredericks, when he caught sight of something which caused him to come to a complete halt on the road a quarter-mile behind the Hilliard house.

  What he saw, at first, was a gleam in the woods, the woods he had been studying. But when he walked back to investigate with his flashlight, what he examined was a powerful low-slung foreign sports car enveloped in the trees, off the little road but not quite completely concealed. He dismissed at once the idea that it might be another getaway car: too conspicuous, too small, despite its power.

  The upholstery was leather. The glove compartment contained a book of instructions, in English, on the repair and care of the motor car, a few packages of cigarettes, a discarded fountain pen, a bottle opener. He picked up from the seat and examined a small cardboard box, which was empty. On the lid there were three Oriental-looking symbols in a vertical line; they meant nothing to him. He was about to replace the box when it occurred to him to smell it. The odor was distinct: acrid and metallic—the smell of gunpowder. And then he remembered the odd-shaped automatic on the bureau top in Chuck Wright’s room at his club.

  But what Jesse Webb was thinking then was so ridiculous and impossible that he refused, for a second or two, to give credence to the suspicion. Finally, though, he fixed the number of the license plate in his mind and drove, rather swiftly now, to the restaurant where Tom Winston and the others were waiting.

  Time seemed to stand still now for Chuck Wright. He lay on his back, watching the tops of the trees, not wishing, even in darkness, to expose his head around the corner of the Hilliard garage any more times than was necessary. The darkness had been, of course, in his favor; but he was looking forward to dawn. Now, while nothing moved in or near the house and no sound reached him except an occasional car passing on the boulevard, he could not see well enough to know whether either man was keeping watch out the rear windows.

  Twenty minutes ago, when he had seen the blue sedan still in position in the driveway, he had known that the two other men remained in the house. Before he dared make any move at all now, he had to know pretty well where those men were. With no lights in the house, he would probably have to wait till morning and hope then that he could make out in which room or rooms the men were staying. Until that time, he could only lie here, flush against the rear wall of the garage, and consider all the possibilities of his position.

  The principal idea was to slip inside, unseen, silently, through the rear door, using the key that Cindy, in her excitement, had accidentally left in his hand the night before last. Once inside, the arrangement of the small back hall was in his favor; it gave him access, through the kitchen, to the downstairs area of the house; the rear stairway offered a way to the second floor; and the steps leading to the basement provided a place for him to conceal himself if he decided to wait and listen inside the house.

  At any rate, with any luck at all, he’d be in there and only the two against one and the advantage of surprise on his side.

  But there was gnawing in him, a sense of reluctance. Cindy and her father did not want this.

  They’re going to take someone along, Cindy, he argued in silence. Maybe you.

  The tall deputy, that Webb, had convinced him that Glenn Griffin would not leave the house without taking every precaution for himself; this was the meaning of Mr. Hilliard’s letter, too. The realization of this, not as potential but as certainty, had caused Chuck, after seeing Cindy’s car, to go back to the club, change into tight slacks, sneakers, a sweater; all the while, too, he had been thinking of that State Police lieutenant, the one with the hard-as-nails voice whose impatience to act had pushed Chuck further along toward his decision. And there was the chance, too, that Webb’s superior might return, might reverse Webb’s caution in favor of the State Policeman’s approach. By now, Chuck guessed, or very soon now, the police would have the name, the address, everything. If they did start to move in, somebody had to be inside that house to see that nothing happened to any of the Hilliards.

  Chuck examined his watch: 4:17. Not more than two hours, perhaps less, until the sky would begin, slightly, to whiten. Then another two and a half hours before, normally, Cindy and her father would leave for work. Would they let them leave the house today? Would they still struggle to keep up that appearance of a normal routine?

  The thought of the Hilliards in there now—sleepless like him and wondering whether they would ever again be able to look forward, without dread, to anything—moved him strangely. It was the first time in his life that outrage and compassion had made him feel a part of something. He felt involved now, one of them. And he wondered about this feeling, letting the idea occupy the vast stretch of empty time that lay ahead.

  He realized, lying there, that he had never given himself time to think, to figure out anything: what he had, what he wanted, what he needed. But it came to him now, at this most unlikely time, that he had never really felt a part of his parents’ life; he hadn’t blamed them then and he didn’t blame them now. But he recognized his loss for the first time, and began to understand, faintly at first and then in a vivid rush, that the fast driving, the footloose girls, the drinking and general rebellion, the desperate filling in of time, all had been his feeble attempts to conceal from himself the aloneness. Because he did not have it, he had scoffed at Mr. Hilliard and what he had—involvement, love.

  Cindy. Would he ever be able to tell her? Were there words, after all, to describe th
e brilliant illumination that was in him here in the darkness, on the damp ground, behind her garage?

  The strength grew in him, not the strength of the Marine who really hadn’t cared much one way or the other there in the jungle, but the solid knowing determination of a man who knew that he was not going to allow anything to happen to the people he loved. Yes, love. The word had scared him once, in that far-off time when he was too blind and stupid to realize its meaning. He was going to see to it that nothing happened to Cindy or to any of the people who, by his own secret and mystifying adoption, had become his family. He loved them all with a deep and certain love that was like an ache in him.

  It was a slow murky dawn, and it came well after 6 o’clock; the winter chill explained why. By this time, Jesse Webb was ready for it, for anything. As ready as he would ever be, since it had been determined, at the low-voiced meeting in the restaurant kitchen, with Carson making the decision after a telephone call to his office, that they were not to shoot if Glenn Griffin and Samuel Robish came out of that house with any member of the Hilliard family. They were to hold fire and wait. Lieutenant Fredericks had insisted, with some vehemence, that this was stupid because those filthy killers would not let their hostages live anyway. So the situation was utterly impossible, from any point of view, and it was his idea that one life sacrificed now— although of course every reasonable precaution should be taken not to sacrifice it—could not be weighed against the people those two might kill if they bluffed their way out of this trap. But the decision was against him, with Carson leaning to Jesse Webb’s view that there was always the chance that Griffin wouldn’t want another murder rap hanging over him: he might let the hostages go once he felt he was safe.

  “You’re putting a tool into the hands of every felon in the country,” Lieutenant Fredericks had said, biting at the words.

  And Jesse Webb had sat there, knowing it, acknowledging the truth of this and beginning to wonder in what direction his responsibility really lay. Here was an immediate human situation, and all your training had not really prepared you to deal with it. Why? Because once you brought theory down to reality, this is what faced you: that on one side there was a vague sort of allegiance you owed to society in general, the unknown human beings who might suffer at the hands of these men if they got away; and on the other, the more immediate and sharply defined obligation to these few specific people who might live or die because of your actions within the next few hours.

  But the decision had been made, and now all precautions had to be taken, nothing overlooked. Given a chance, the police had to be ready to capture or kill the fugitives. Jesse himself mounted a ladder on the east side of the Wallings’ house and climbed carefully, in the first light, over the peak of roof while Tom Winston and Carson showed their badges and explained to the startled people inside what was taking place, although not completely why. From the front corner of roof he ascertained, without standing up even then, that a man placed here could command, over the trees between, a view of the Hilliard residence, including the side door, a small section of side yard, and that length of driveway that lay between the blue sedan and the boulevard. From higher, it might be possible to see more.

  An hour later, therefore, one state trooper and one man from Jesse’s office were seated in a television installation-and-repair truck, wearing the coverall uniform of an established dealer, and waiting for their signal to appear at the Walling home, there to set up, innocently but as slowly as possible, a television antenna on the Wallings’ roof. The truck was three blocks away. That was at 7 :35.

  At 7:50, in the attic of the Wallings’ home where a police radio apparatus was being assembled, Jesse Webb received word from the State House that the license number on the plates attached to the small foreign sports car he had discovered back there in the woods had been issued to Charles K. Wright, Jr. Jesse’s guess on this had been right, as had been his earlier certainty that the black coupe which Hank Griffin had been driving belonged to one of the Hilliard family. Bonham at the license bureau had confirmed this, with details. The coupe was owned by Cynthia Hilliard, age nineteen.

  Thinking then of his wife, Kathleen, who was probably waking up at his mother’s house, far across town, safe now, never really threatened, Jesse understood young Charles Wright, Jr., comprehended his reluctance to talk and also the impulse that had now brought him back to this area. But where was the boy and what was he doing? Didn’t the young fool realize that he could snarl up everything now if he startled or frightened those caged animals in there? Where was Wright? What was he doing?

  Jesse paced the attic, bent low, his head narrowly missing the studs. He was smoking. He hadn’t shaved. He felt tired and excited and on edge. It was almost ten after 8, and he was still angry at himself over another report he had received several hours ago, this one from the telephone company. Since Wednesday morning—in the two full days since the three had escaped—one long-distance telephone call had been received at the Hilliard home. This had been a person-to-person call, collect, with charges accepted, to a Mr. James from a Mrs. Dixon. It had lasted four and one half minutes and had been placed from a pay-station phone in a bus station in a town named Circleville, Ohio—which town, as Jesse had quickly ascertained, was twenty-six miles south of Columbus. Trust those rotten clever swine! Helen Lamar was too smart to place a call from Columbus; it was almost as though she had looked ahead, in her desperation, to the list that Jesse had spent so many fruitless hours checking and rechecking. She had bought her car, probably from some fence dealing in stolen automobiles, and she had traveled south, not spotted now, no longer under surveillance, and had called Glenn Griffin and made arrangements of some sort. What these were, Jesse Webb did not know, yet, but he had hopes along that line, too.

  This hope was based on the interesting fact that at 3:22 this morning, barely an hour after Hank Griffin was killed, someone at the Hilliard number had placed a prepaid person-to-person call to a Mrs. Dixon in Cincinnati, Ohio. Did this mean that Glenn Griffin knew or suspected that something had happened to his brother? Did he want to make sure that this Mrs. Dixon —who was undoubtedly Helen Lamar—was still waiting, that she was carrying through with her part of some scheme? Whatever the answer to that, Jesse Webb now had hopes that the FBI and the Cincinnati police would soon have Helen Lamar under arrest.

  He stomped down the attic stairs of the Wallings’ house, then down another flight and into the kitchen. “Would you mind if I made some coffee?” he asked Mrs. Walling who was at the stove.

  Mrs. Walling, a plump woman with large, soft brown eyes, still puzzled at the sudden invasion of her house by police who kept entering with great caution from the east, turned and looked at the tall deputy. What she saw made her shove a kitchen chair in his direction and say, “I have some made, Sheriff. My, you do need it, don’t you? You look almost sick. Why don’t you lie down on the sofa a little?”

  But Jesse was unable to finish the first cup before Tom Winston pushed in from outside and leaned against the table. “A man and a red-headed girl just left the house, Jess. They’re walking along the boulevard, toward the bus line probably. The man has a big freckled face and he looks worse than you do—which is saying something. The girl’s a beauty and she looks sore at the world.”

  “That would be Dan Hilliard and his daughter, Cynthia,” put in Mrs. Walling.

  “Cocky, aren’t they?” said Jesse. “Letting ’em out of that house even now. Getting real cocksure now, aren’t they, the—” He stopped. “Pardon me, Mrs. Walling.” Then to Tom Winston: “That leaves the wife and the little boy, huh? I reckon they figure that’s enough. And I reckon it is, too.”

  Chuck Wright also witnessed the departure of Dan and Cindy Hilliard on foot at 8:30. He crept, his muscles stiff, hugging the wall low, around the far side of the garage and watched them walking down the driveway. She’s not in there now, he said to himself, with a lifting in his chest. Now there’re only two Hilliards in the house, and the two men. The sight
of Cindy’s slender back and the defiant swing of her shoulders sent a warmth charging through him. Now, he thought, if you can get both of those guys to the front of the house for half a minute or so-

  On the bus ride downtown, Dan Hilliard noted without interest that the day promised to brighten; a crisp golden sunlight occasionally appeared, then vanished. It was four minutes to 9— after a long ride in almost total silence, their closeness intensified by that silence—when Dan stepped off the rear door into the early morning crush, held his hand for Cindy. Then, on the sidewalk of Monument Circle, with the shoulders jostling them from all sides, Cindy continued to clutch her father’s hand as though she were reluctant to let go of the reassurance it held for her.

  “About Chuck,” she whispered, her head thrown back and the wind sharp against their faces, “about Chuck, Dad: don’t worry about him. I know exactly what I’m going to tell him now. He’ll believe me.”

  Dan only nodded, a haggard sort of agreement with no heart in it because he had almost, but not quite, forgotten his encounter with Chuck Wright last night. Then Cindy rose up on her toes, and Dan was astonished to feel his daughter’s lips on his. He was aware that several heads turned, grinning, and while he would normally have been embarrassed by such a public display, he found that instead he was grateful. Grateful and humble and shot clear through with the despair that had been growing in him all night.

  Walking along the familiar streets in the direction of his office, Dan tried to look at everything with a keen but unemotional eye. He knew that panic was his enemy; and as 9:30 moved slowly closer, he had to force himself to look ahead and yet to let the numbness inside—or hopelessness—deaden his emotions. The long night had worked a narcotic spell on him in that sense, and he felt fortunate this morning.