Man on the run - By Charles Williams Page 0,56

fast. We made the turn. “Stop!” I told him. He knew something was wrong and slammed on the brakes. I dropped the two dollar bills on his lap and was out before the car stopped moving. “Get going!” I told him. He went on.

I lunged across the sidewalk and jumped into a shadowy area between two buildings, out of range of the street light. The police car made the turn on screaming rubber and went past. The taxi was about three blocks away. I cut across the street directly behind the police car, headed diagonally up toward the next corner and ran as fast as I could. Just as I reached the corner and turned down the intersecting street I heard the siren cut loose. They’d been chasing it so far merely because it was the same type of cab as that on the broadcast and they wanted to check the number, but now they’d got that in their headlights. They’d be back here in less than a minute. I reached the next corner and turned right. I was one block over now and parallel to the street they were on.

It was an industrial area, not far from Denton Street, and probably half a mile or less from the railroad yards. It was deserted this time of morning, and shadowy between the widely spaced street lamps. I reached a big warehouse on the next corner and stopped to look up the intersecting street. The patrol car shot past up in the next block, running without the siren. I ran straight ahead, across the intersection, and went on, driving hard. My only chance lay in getting as far from that place as possible before the other cars began pouring into the area. Two blocks further on, I turned left again, toward the railroad yards and the ship channel. I could hear the sirens now. They were something that would haunt my dreams for years—if I lived that long.

Two more blocks and I knew I couldn’t run any further without rest. Across the street was a vacant lot piled high with big sections of sewer pipe. I ran over, ducked in between two stacks, and lay down in the weeds behind them. It was very dark. I rolled over on my left side, because of the pain in my right, pillowed my head on my arm, and struggled for breath. I heard a car go past the corner on whining tires, but paid no attention. There’d been too much of it, and I didn’t even feel anything any more; I just avoided them mechanically, like an animal that has been trained to perform a trick at the correct signal. I wanted to reach the Marilyn, but after that I didn’t care. If I found out nothing there, I was going to quit running.

I started thinking about Suzy and kept seeing her lying on the floor beside the door in the living room, killed by that cold-blooded thug. It would be so easy for him; all he’d have to do was knock, and she’d open because she would think it was me. I tried to shake it off. She was probably all right. There must be plenty of reasons she hadn’t answered the phone. I couldn’t think of any then, though.

But worrying about it now wasn’t going to do any good. And I had a long way to go to get to Pier Five. I tried to orient myself. Pier Nineteen was at the end of Walker Avenue, but I was considerably south of Walker now and should be somewhere opposite Pier Ten or Twelve. If I turned right when I hit the railroad yards and went on another half a mile or mile it would put me pretty close to Pier Five. It was going to be hazardous all the way. They would probably reason that the address I’d given the driver was phony, but they’d search the whole waterfront, since we’d been headed that way. I flicked on the cigarette lighter briefly and looked at my watch. It was three-twenty. In another fifteen minutes I got up and went on. I was very tired. In the seven blocks to the rail-yards I had two close calls. Once a police car turned to the street less than a block behind me, and I barely made it under a warehouse loading platform before its lights could hit me.

* * *

It was four-ten. I snapped the lighter off and was in darkness again between