“Heard they had an autopsy on that bandit,” he said.
Tony said, “You must have an in with the police.”
The bookmaker raised one eyebrow. “A councilman can find out most everything, if he goes to the bother.” His pleasant expression faded and his voice became ominous. “Hand it over.”
“What?” Tony asked, then decided pretended ignorance would only delay the inevitable, and started to reach for his pocket.
“The box, Shorty,” Harry said.
The little man’s movement toward his pocket stopped and his face flushed at the nickname. “Come and get it, you yellow-faced ape.”
The red-headed Jack casually stepped behind Tony’s chair. The little man’s head turned to follow him warily, then snapped back toward Short when the bookmaker rasped, “Eyes front, or I’ll blow your head off.”
At the same moment a gun barrel crashed down on Tony’s head...
A surging, then diminishing roar, such as the breaking of surf against a cliff, awakened Tony. For nearly a minute he lay in throbbing pain, dully trying to figure out how the ocean could have moved itself to southern Missouri. Then he realized the noise was all within his head. He waited with closed eyes until the pain subsided to a persistent ache, then opened them to equal darkness.
He lay on the rear floor of a speeding sedan, he discovered, and his hands were bound behind him so tightly they were numb to the shoulders. His legs were tied together both at the ankles and knees, but not so tightly that circulation was stopped. His forehead pressed against someone’s foot, and the person’s other foot casually rested on his shoulder.
“This is about far enough,” said the owner of the feet. Tony recognized the voice as that of the yellow-faced bookmaker.
Obediently the car came to a halt. The front door on the driver’s side opened, then slammed shut again. At the same time Harry Short pushed open the rear door on the other side. For a moment his full weight rested on Tony’s shoulder as he stepped from the car, and the little man had to clench his teeth to prevent a groan of pain.
A moment later he was unceremoniously dragged from the car and dumped on the ground. Giving no indication of consciousness, Tony allowed his eyes barely to slit open. A half moon had now risen, and by its subdued light the bound man made out that they were parked on a graveled road running parrallel to a railroad track. In the distance he heard the slow whistle of a freight.
Between the tracks and the road was a shallow ditch choked with weeds and small bushes, some of the bushes being nearly shoulder high.
“All right, snap it up,” Harry Short ordered his companion roughly.
He stooped to grasp Tony’s shoulders as the driver caught him beneath the knees. Like a sack of grain the two carried the little man into the ditch, dropping him between two bushes.
The freight’s whistle sounded again, clearer this time, but still a mile or two away. Harry Short kneeled over the bound man, unexpectedly flashing a light into his eyes.
Instead of snapping shut his barely opened lids, Tony rolled his eyeballs upward so that only the whites showed. A palm slapped him solidly across the mouth. He let his head roll loosely with the slap, which faced it away from the light and allowed him unnoticeably to close his eyes.
Fingers groped for his throat, pinched together a bit of the tender flesh beneath his chin and squeezed until tears of pain gathered beneath the little man’s closed lids. But he managed to keep his face vacant of expression and his body limp.
“Still out like a swatted fly,” Harry Short decided, rising to his feet. “Get to work on his legs and I’ll take his hands.”
“Wouldn’t it be safer to leave him tied?” the dubious voice of cashier Jack inquired.
“How the devil would you explain it as an accident with ropes around him?” Short asked. “Snap it up. If we miss this freight, we got a two-hour wait till the next.”
Tony felt hands fumbling at his bonds, and a minute later he was free. But he might as well have remained bound insofar as use of his arms was concerned, for the tight cords had stopped circulation and both arms were asleep. Attempting to flex his muscles, the little man discovered neither arm would respond to his will.
Although his legs tingled, Tony learned both were in working order by wriggling his toes within his shoes.
The train whistle blew a third time, seeming only hundreds of yards away, and now the roar of wheels and the rumbling rattle of freight cars could be heard. Then the track in front of them was suddenly bathed with light.
Above the growing noise Harry Short shouted to his companion, “Keep down till the engine is past, so they don’t see us in the headlight!”
With a hiss of escaping steam the locomotive swished past, dragging behind it a long row of box cars which seemed as though it would never end.
“Now!” the bookmaker yelled, slipping his hands under Tony’s shoulders and pulling him half erect.
Tony felt his arms flop limply, tried to propel some power into them by force of will, then gave up the struggle as hopeless. His feet were grasped by the red-headed Jack and he was lifted bodily.
“Let him fly on three!” Short yelled above the train roar. “And time it right, so he goes clear under.”
Together they swung his limp body forward slightly. “One!” Short counted. They swung Tony back, and as he reached the peak of the back swing, the bookmaker said, “Two!”
At the same instant Tony jerked both knees to his chest, pulling the red-head off balance, snapped his legs straight again and felt Jack release them as though propelled from a catapult.
There was one wild scream which cut off suddenly at a sickening crunch.
Beside thrusting Jack beneath the train, Tony’s kick expended part of its force in the opposite direction, causing Harry Short to stagger back and sit down with a crash. Immediately he sprang to his feet again and threw himself at Tony.
With his arms flopping uselessly at his sides, Tony rolled to his back, again brought both feet to his chest and kicked the larger man solidly in the stomach.
Short staggered backward, teetered on one foot inches from the speeding box cars, and for a horrified moment gyroscoped his arms in an attempt to keep from falling beneath the wheels. He fell to one elbow, at the last instant twisting from beneath the wheels, and started to scramble to safety on hands and knees.
But his moment of terrified balancing had allowed Tony to leap to his feet. Aiming deliberately, the little man swung his right leg back and kicked the scrambling bookmaker solidly on the jaw.
It took Tony ten minutes to restore circulation to his dead arms, and another ten to tie his unconscious opponent and drag him to the car. The box of pills he found in Short’s coat pocket, and the automatic in a holster under his arm. He relieved the man of both. Half lifting and half heaving, he managed to get the big man on the car’s rear floor. Then he turned the car and drove back to town, the bookmaker tied and unconscious in the back seat.
They had been nearly ten miles out, Tony discovered, and the city hall clock struck midnight as he parked on the town square. The only lights in the city hall were in the basement, on the side containing the jail and police headquarters. Over the basement entrance to police headquarters a small green light was burning.
Quietly Tony moved to a lighted window and peered into the main office. A single uniformed policeman slept in a chair with his feet elevated to a desk. Beyond him, down a hall, the little man could see the open door of the chief’s office, and a light burned within it.
Without sound the little man tiptoed under the green light, past the sleeping policeman and down the hall. Next to the open door of the chief’s office he paused, drew the automatic he had taken from Harry Short and ruefully felt the twin bumps on his head. Then he took a deep breath and entered the office.