Vince followed us, but not before glancing back at the woods and apple trees.
I heard Mary crying as soon as we entered the back door. They unlocked the cuff that held her to the radiator and she clung to me. The episode in the Lowell mill yard flashed back into my mind for an instant, and I couldn't believe that what was happening to us was related to that incident, with the stranger picking away at the old factory wall. I gripped her tightly and spoke to her. I told her we only had to wait it out and it would be over and everything would be back to normal. I was lying. I don't think she knew it. They cuffed. us together and had us sit on the couch while Vince got one of Mary's raincoats and some casual shoes. He found a scarf too, and a pair of dark glasses for her to wear. They got a medium-weight jacket for me, saying I'd have a long walk later that night.
Maybe they weren't going to kill us after all, I thought. But I didn't really believe it.
They counted out the money on the coffee table. DeLucca moved fast, looking at his watch. He had trouble with some of the bills owing to his bandaged hand, so he let Vince do it. Marty, the kid, was hopping up and down on the seat, grinning from ear to ear.
"Stop it," said DeLucca.
But the kid kept it up. His eyes were shiny, and I noticed a string of saliva snake down out of his mouth.
"I said stop it."
Marty stopped, and tried to wipe his mouth with the back of his hand, which didn't seem to be working right. He quieted, then rocked to and fro on the couch making sucking sounds. DeLucca and Vince looked at each other. Vince scowled, looking at the kid.
"When it rains it pours, eh? Why now?"
"It won't work," said DeLucca softly. The kid didn't hear him.
The money was divided into two equal piles. DeLucca and Vince each took one.
"Where's my- un?" said the kid, who was bouncing again. His teeth were clicking. He took out the four-inch sheath knife and tapped the blade into the table. His tongue was hanging out. He looked at Mary and managed a laugh. Then he looked sideways at the other two men and tried not to. He stood up and wobbled, then hummed.
"Where's mine?"
"Vince's got it, Marty. He'll give it to you when you get to the room. Now come on, Mrs. Adams, time to get your coat on."
They unfastened her cuff, leaving it dangling from my left wrist. Mary put on her coat, shoes, scarf, and dark glasses. They had me put on the jacket and we started toward the back door. Then Marty started to bleat like a sheep. He took out the knife again and Vince grabbed it. DeLucca walked up to him and slapped him across the face. That seemed to straighten him up.
"I promise I won-" he began. "I promise… I prom-ise."
DeLucca hit him again. The kid bounced back against the kitchen wall. He was gurgling, and his face was slack. DeLucca looked at his watch. Vince had the door open. I heard the dogs barking outside. DeLucca told him to shut it and led the two of us back to the hallway, where he passed the chain from my handcuff through the banister railing and fastened Mary to the other end. I would have tried to whang him with one end of the handcuffs if Mary hadn't been there. As it was, Vince stayed three feet away with his pistol pointed right at me.
"Get him down the basement," DeLucca said softly to Vince.
Vince went over to the kid, who was leaning in the corner, and put his long arm over his shoulder, comforting him. He patted him on the back hard, just like old buddies. He led him over to DeLucca, who put his arm around him too. They helped him along. I heard the kid crying. We could just peek around the hall corner and see the three of them standing at the head of the basement stairs. Then Marty realized what was happening. He stared into that black hole and bawled, grabbing the edge of the door frame with hands that didn't work.
"Come on, Marty. Be good. I just want you to sit down on the floor," said DeLucca softly, as one rebukes a child.
They hauled at him but he wouldn't budge. He still had enough strength and control left to hang on and keep from going down that dark stairway.
"We just want you to sit down on the floor and rest," DeLucca repeated softly, tugging at the kid's waist.
"Puuuu-leeeeze!" wailed Marty, his feet pointed out and his knees bowed like a toddler's. His lower half was shaking violently now.
"Mister Deeee-loooo… Deeeee-"
Vince took his pistol and struck Marty's hands, which slid away from the door frame. The two men helped the kid down the stairs. We heard him blubbering and wailing. Then a door slammed shut and everything was quiet. I looked at Mary. Her teeth were clenched tight on her lip. There was a little blood. I kicked at the railings with my feet. and knees with all I had, and finally managed to break two of the oak uprights, which weren't very thick. I yanked them out of their sockets, leaving a wide hole under the banister.
"Hurry, Charlie. Hurry!"
I pulled Mary underneath the banister. We were still fastened together. I ran down to the front door and yanked. No go. I flipped the bolt; it still wouldn't open. It had been deadbolted. As we went back down the hall and into the kitchen we heard a sound beneath us. A muffled explosion. Then fast feet on the stairway, coming up.
I had the back door open now and we went through it. Out of the corner of my eye I saw Vince in the kitchen raising his arm. His hand held a pistol.
We were running across the terrace when I saw a piece of the brick wall fly away. I jumped over the wall and yanked Mary after me. She was making little high sounds. Vince was raising the pistol again when I pulled Mary off to the right and began to circle the house. I knew we'd never make it across the open meadow to the woods.
But around the first corner we stopped dead, looking right down the muzzle of DeLucca's automatic. His meaty chest and shoulders were heaving as he panted. He'd"gone around the other way and cut us off. We heard Vince coming up behind us. I grabbed Mary tight and shut my eyes, waiting.
I felt a rap on the head and opened my eyes. I was half-stunned. I looked up and saw Vince grab the chain that held us together. DeLucca, panting loudly, was behind us, pushing the gun muzzle into our backs.
"You blew it, shithead," he growled. "Now you're gonna have to go down the cellar."
Again I felt tingling around my head and mouth. The ground shook under my feet. I was afraid to look at Mary.
"Let her go. Have Vince take her to the motel."
"Too late," he said, smacking the back of my head with the barrel. I felt a warm trickle down the left side of my neck from the previous blow. We were back around to the terrace again. The kitchen doorway was only twenty feet away. Once they had us through that door we'd never get out again. I decided to shout for help at the top of my lungs before all hope was gone, and had just taken the biggest lungful of air I could manage when I heard a gigantic roar. Instantaneously I felt a stinging on my right cheek, and the arm tugging the handcuffs went slack.
Next to us, Vince was falling. His head had come apart into a big red wet cloud. And part of that cloud was stuck all over my face, stinging it.
DeLucca had his pistol up. He was pointing it at a huge dark shape that was flying at his head. The thing hit him with a deep rumbling snarl and threw him to the ground. Popeye had him by the upper arm, right near the shoulder. He had his big steam-shovel mouth wrapped around DeLucca's upper torso and was shaking it, tearing it. DeLucca couldn't hold the gun; nobody could have. Then the dog was off him and waiting by in a crouch. DeLucca sat up for a second, then lunged for the pistol and I brought it up. But before he could fire the roar came again and he was flung backward, spinning around like a top. He lay on his stomach and didn't move. There was motion in the yew trees, and Sam Bowman came walking toward us, the big silver revolver held up in his hand. He came up and looked down at Carmen DeLucca, who was now moaning and flipping his left arm on the grass like a seal pup. The big soft-nosed slug had left his back just below the left shoulder blade. A lot of his back was gone. I peered down at him and could see a shiny pink balloon sliding around in the gore beneath his splintered ribs. It was his lung.