He threw back his head and laughed. ‘Jesus, will Lillian be mad.’
But Martha Ryan simply sat there, the coldness growing within her, aware only of Dillinger’s final words to her. That he knew the road he was taking. That he knew what lay at the end of it.
It was still raining and they were over the border into Illinois when Blunk, on Dillinger’s orders, pulled up at the side of the dirt road they had been following.
‘OK,’ Dillinger said. ‘This is where you two get off.’
They got out of the car reluctantly, uncertain as to his intentions, but Dillinger just drove away, the wheels of the big Ford churning mud, and Dillinger hoping some of it would land on Blunk’s suit.
Youngblood started to sing loudly in the rear seat. A few miles further on, Dillinger stopped the car to light a cigarette, then he took a few crumpled bills from his pocket and counted them.
‘Fourteen dollars isn’t going to get us very far.’
‘And that’s a fact,’ Youngblood said. ‘I guess there’s only one thing to do. You’ll just have to rob a bank, Mr Dillinger.’
He started to laugh and Dillinger, loving the feel of being behind the wheel of a fast-moving car, feeling as exhilarated as a kid, tossed him the cigarette pack and drove away through the rain, wondering what the newspaper headlines would be saying in the morning.
Doc Floyd came up out of the hollow and followed the overgrown path through the trees, pausing at the edge of the swamp to light his pipe. He was seventy years of age, with a worn and wrinkled face, the grey moustache stained with nicotine. His straw hat was frayed at the edges and the old alpaca coat hung from bony shoulders.
The garden on the other side of the track was overgrown, the fences broken and the clapboard farmhouse beyond was dilapidated, shingles missing in places from the roof. There was an atmosphere of decay to everything.
An old hound dog nosed out of the undergrowth and limped towards him and Doc Floyd leaned down and fondled its ears.
‘All wore out, Sam, just like you.’
He straightened at the sound of a car approaching and said softly, ‘Looks like they’re here, Sam. Let’s go.’ And he went up through the broken fence towards the house, the dog trailing him.
When he went round to the front, a de Soto sedan was parked there. The man in the dark suit who leaned against it, wiping sweat from his face, fanning himself with his hat at the same time, was middle-aged and overweight. His name was George Harvey and he was manager of the Huntsville National Bank. The man beside him could have been any one of a hundred local farmers to judge by his faded jeans and sweat-stained felt hat. The only difference was the deputy’s badge on his chest and the pistol in the holster on his left hip.
Harvey said, ‘Ah, there you are Doc. You know Larry Schultz?’
‘Sure I do,’ Doc said. ‘Mary OK now, Larry? I heard she was under the weather.’
‘It was nothing. She’s fine now.’ Schultz was embarrassed and it showed.
‘OK, let’s get down to business,’ Harvey said. ‘The bank’s been very patient, Doc, but enough is enough. I have to ask you formally now. Are you in a position to settle?’
‘You know damn well I’m not,’ Doc told him flatly.
Harvey turned to Schultz. ‘Serve your papers.’
Schultz produced a folded document from his shirt pocket and held it out to the old man who took it from him. ‘Sorry Doc,’ he said.
Doc shrugged. ‘Not your fault, Larry, we all got to eat.’
Harvey got behind the wheel of the de Soto and switched on the motor. ‘OK, Larry, let’s go. I’m a busy man.’
Schultz went round to the other side and got into the passenger seat. Doc ran a finger over the gleaming paintwork. ‘Some car, Mr Harvey. I suppose a car like this must cost a heap of money?’
‘Seven days, that’s what you’ve got,’ Harvey said. ‘Then the bank forecloses and that means everything, Doc, so don’t you move a damn thing out of here.’
He drove away very fast, spraying dirt, and disappeared along the track through the trees towards the main road. Doc Floyd stood there for a long moment, then turned and mounted the steps to the porch and went inside, the dog following him.
He found a half-full bottle of whisky and a glass and sat at the table in the untidy, shabby room, drinking slowly, savouring it as if it might be the last drink he was likely to have.
His eyes roamed around the room, taking in the sagging furniture, the worn carpet, and finally came to rest on the photo of his wife in the old silver frame.
‘Not much to show for forty years of living, old girl,’ he said softly.
He toasted her, emptied the glass in a quick swallow and poured another.
It was perhaps an hour later that he became aware of the sound of a car approaching up the track outside and by then he was drunk enough to be angry.
‘The bastard, Sam,’ he said softly to the dog. ‘Back already.’
He stood up, took an old double-barrelled shotgun down from the wall, found some cartridges in a drawer, and loaded it as he went to the door. The hound dog whined anxiously and followed.
Doc stood on the porch outside, the gun ready in his hand, only the car which had stopped in the middle of the yard wasn’t the de Soto. It was a Ford coupé and the man in the black felt hat and neat dark suit who slid out from behind the wheel was definitely not George Harvey.
‘Hello, Doc,’ he called softly. ‘That’s a hell of a welcome.’
Doc lowered the shotgun in astonishment. ‘Jesus Christ,’ he said. ‘Johnny Dillinger. You shouldn’t be here. They come looking for you just day before yesterday.’
‘Who’s they?’
‘A bunch of lawmen. Come in two cars. Fellow who asked about you stutters. Tall, wiry, big fellow.’
Dillinger laughed. ‘That must be Matt Leach. He runs the Indiana State Police.’
‘I wouldn’t laugh, Johnny. He said he’d break my ass if I was lying to him about your being here. He said he’d break your ass when he caught you.’
‘Somebody sent him a dime book called How To Be a Detective’, Dillinger said. ‘He thinks it was me.’
‘Was it you, Johnny?’
Dillinger rolled his eyes like Al Jolson. A picture of innocence.
‘Oh you’re a terrible man, Johnny.’
Somewhere thunder rumbled and there was that sudden quiet moment before a storm when everything seemed poised
