murderous clawing wrestle on the floor. But I had had enough of that. I slipped to one side
and jolted my right in his face. That hurt him, but it didn’t stop him. He was tough. It’d take
more than a slam in the face to put him down.
He came at me again, and this time I went in at him. We met like two charging bulls, I felt
his hands grab my coat front. I grinned into his savage, blood-soaked face, then I brought
over the left hook: the same punch that had broken MacCready’s jaw, that had floored
Waller, that had put paid to the Miami Kid. It landed flush on the side of his jaw3 and I felt
the jar run up my arm. I didn’t care. He was out long before he hit the floor.
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Gasping for breath I turned to look for Ginny, but she wasn’t there.
“Ginny!”
I rushed into the passage. The front door stood open. Turning, I ran back into the sitting-room and to the window.
I saw her running down the long drive towards the gates. She was staggering as she ran,
and she was holding her hands in her face. I leaned out of the window.
“Ginny! Wait for me!”
But she didn’t look round, although she must have heard me. She kept running, and beyond
her, at the gates I saw two prowl cars swing to the kerb. Two cops tumbled out of the first car
and started up the drive. She ran slap into them She was falling as she reached then, and one
of them caught her and lowered her to the ground. Two more prowl boys spilled out of the
second car and came pounding up the drive.
They looked up and saw me. I was looking at Ginny. There was a tightness in my throat
and a sick, empty feeling inside me. I had a premonition I was looking at her for the last time.
Then I turned and ran into the kitchen.
Benno lay stiff in death, his fat, vicious face seemed to snarl at me. I jumped over him,
climbed into the box elevator and loosened the brake.
Seconds later I was running down the weed-covered path to the back gate. No one fired at
me. I jerked open the gate and scrambled into the waiting Packard. I was shooting down the
narrow alley that led to the boulevard when I heard police whistles. At least I had a car under
me, and a fast car at that.
Where was I to go? The general alarm would be out in a few minutes, and every patrol car
would be looking for me.
Who would hide me from the police? I thought of fat Zoe Eisner who ran the Liberty Inn
on Bay Street. If I could reach her I might buy a hide-out.
I headed for Bay Street.
Half-way down Lincoln Avenue that runs parallel with Lincoln Beach’s main street, I
spotted a cop ahead, looking towards me from the sidewalk. He began waving at me. I shoved
down the accelerator and the Packard surged forward.
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The cop ran out into the street. He had a gun in one hand and a night-stick in the other. The
people on the sidewalk stopped to stare. He was a pretty brave cop, but at the very last second
he jumped aside. His night-stick came hurtling at me, and instinctively I ducked my head.
The stick smashed a jagged hole in the windshield, I heard shooting behind me and felt the
thumps of slugs as they made holes in the back panel of the car.
I kept on, switched the car around the corner and came out on to the wide boulevard that
runs the length of the promenade and terminates at the gates of the casino.
I wouldn’t get far now with a smashed windshield. Already people on the sidewalks were
staring at the car as I shot it towards the big underground car-park.
I pulled up behind a line of parked cars at the bottom of a brilliantly lighted ramp. I was out
of the car and opening the boot when a white-coated attendant came up. I saw his eyes go to
the smashed windshield.
“What happened to that?” he asked
“Hit a bird,” I said, hauling out the suitcase. “I’ll be back …”
I saw his eyes light on the bullet holes in the back panel. I closed my fist and smashed it at
his jaw. He went down, his head bouncing off the fender.
I looked to right and left. At the far end of the park three white-coated attendants stood
around a car, talking. They didn’t look my way. There was no one else in the park to pay me
any attention. I walked rapidly up the ramp. The suitcase weighed a ton. I wouldn’t be able to
travel far with this burden hanging at the end of my arm. But I wasn’t going to ditch it. With
all that money I might still buy my life: without it I was done for.
As I reached the top of the ramp I spotted two prowl cars coasting along the boulevard, and
heading in my direction. Across the way a cop stood on the edge of the sidewalk. On the
corner, fifty yards farther on, was another cop.
I had to get under cover, and at once. There was no hope now of reaching liberty Inn.
Within ten yards of the cop opposite me was the imposing entrance of the Lincoln Hotel, a
forty-storeyed skyscraper that dominated the promenade.
I crossed the street with a crowd of sun-worshippers as the traffic lights turned red. I kept in
the middle of them, rubbing shoulders with a fat man in a beach wrap and on the other side a
blonde in halter and shorts. She looked curiously at me.
205
The bulk of the crowd were headed for the hotel. I went with them. As I was pushing
through the revolving doors I looked back over my shoulder: a mistake. The cop on the sidewalk caught my eye. He stiffened, stared, then started towards me.
I kept pace across the lobby with the blonde in the halter and shorts. She and a couple of
tanned lounge lizards got into the elevator. I got in with them.
The starter looked sharply at me.
“Tenth,” I said curtly, before he could open his mouth.
The cop came through the revolving doors like a jet-propelled rocket. He was charging
towards the elevator as the doors swished to. No one in the elevator had noticed him, except
of course, me.
Not so good. In a few minutes the hotel would be teeming with police.
The car stopped on the fifth floor and the two lounge lizards got off: nobody got on. That
left the starter, the girl and myself.
“Twenty-second, please,” the girl said, and ran her thumb along the length of the halter, just
inside.
The starter goggled at her, his eyes shifting to her suntanned legs.
“Yes, miss,” he said. He looked at me as he closed the doors. “What’s your room, mister?”
“I’m making a call.”
“Sorry; against the rules. You have to check at the desk first.”
“A little late for that, isn’t it?”
The blonde was staring at me now. She dug her thumbs into the elastic top of her shorts,
pulled it away from her waist and let it snap back again. She seemed full of cute tricks.
“I’ll have to take you down, sir,” the starter said, his mind more on the girl’s shorts than on
me.
“Please yourself,” I said, shrugging.
The car stopped at the twenty-second floor and the doors swung open. The blonde got off.
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She began to walk down the long corridor. The starter paused to watch her go. Her behind
jiggled as she walked: it seemed to fascinate him.
I tapped him on the shoulder. As he turned my fist connected with his jaw. I hit him so hard
I nearly tore his head off his shoulders. He folded down on hands and knees and stretched
out. I picked up the suitcase, stepped out of the car and pressed the outside button, closing the
doors. Then I set off down the corridor after the blonde.
I caught up with her as she was putting a key into the lock of a door marked 22/4454. She
was opening the door when she became aware of me standing behind her. Her eyes popped
open and she took a hasty step forward that took her inside the room. I had Benno’s .38 in my