said, but it was something about all hell was going to bust loose. He said he found out that man is a private detective workin’ for an insurance company. I’m not sure what he meant, but I’m scared, Pearl. T. J.’s scared. We’re goin’ to get out of here—”
“You stay right where you are,” he said coldly. “That’s the worst thing you can do—” He apparently realized that he was being listened to by people in the bar, for he went on easily. “Shucks, it ain’t nothin’. You jest sit tight. I’ll be along.”
He hung up.
I dropped the receiver back on its cradle, feeling myself tighten up. We had seven or eight minutes at most. “All right, Trudy. Stand up and turn around.”
“Damn you!” she lashed out. “He’ll kill me. You don’t know him.”
“Shut up!” I told her. “I’m trying to get you out of sight before he gets here.”
She put her hands behind her willingly then. I began tying them. “Georgia!” I called out. She came in quickly.
“What’s Frankie’s car? That panel truck?”
”Yes,” she said. Then she gave a short laugh that ended in a little choking cry, and put a hand against the doorframe to steady herself. She brushed the other across her face. The strain was beginning to get her.
“Take it easy,” I said.
“I’m all right.” She took a deep breath. “It was just the truck. The same one that backed into you—when was it? How many years ago?”
I managed to grin at her. “We were young then.” Then I jerked my head towards Frankie. “See if the keys are in his pocket. If he tries to kick you, brain him with something.”
“The keys are in the switch,” she replied. “I’ve already checked.”
“Good girl.” I finished off Trudy and hustled Frankie to his feet. “Bring the rest of those strips,” I said, and shoved them ahead of me, holding them by the arms. We went out on the porch. After being in the light, I couldn’t see at all for a moment or two. Frankie stumbled, stepping off the porch, and almost fell. I caught him. Georgia led the way to the truck. I opened the doors in back and shoved them in. She found the switch and turned on the light. I hurriedly tied their ankles. Frankie lay on his side, the black, mean eyes staring at my face. I was suddenly sick of all of them, sick to the bottom of my heart of the whole tough, cheap, crooked lot. Be a police officer and look at that all your life?
“Watch the road,” I warned. “He’ll be here any minute.”
“Nothing yet,” she said.
I slammed the rear doors and we got in and drove down behind the barn. I cut the lights and the engine, and sighed, beat-up and tired and hurting all over. I put out a hand to touch her, and she took it and held it between both of hers, in her lap.
“What are our chances?” she asked calmly.
“I don’t know,” I replied. “They pulled off a robbery that night and killed a man up in Georgia. Bringing the stuff into another State makes it a Federal case. That, and the felony murder, is what they’ve been so jittery about.”
“Can we prove it?”
“Not yet,” I said. “I’m trying to make them lose their heads. I couldn’t get anything out of Frankie, but we’ve still got Pearl and Mrs. Redfield to go.” I broke off wearily, aware that if Cynthia Redfield sat tight and didn’t panic we had no chance. We had to get her or it was nothing.
“But Kendall?” she asked. “Where was there any connection with him?”
“One of the places they robbed was a jewelry store,” I said. “They must have had some of the stuff there in the house that morning, and he saw it. Remember, it wasn’t just robbery; they knew they’d killed a man. A felony murder is the same as first degree.”
“But why would he go there?” she insisted.
I don’t know,” I said.
Well, I thought defiantly, I don’t really. It’s just a guess.
And maybe I was still wrong about the whole thing. There was the time element. Langston was apparently killed at a few minutes past four in the morning. Weaverton was nearly a hundred miles. If they’d entered the first place shortly after twelve, when the lights went out and the police converged on the fire, they still had only four hours. They might have been able to get away with the safes and drive back in