The Getaway

5

Doc went to New York the spring that he graduated from high school, a few weeks after his father's death. He was too young to hold political office, and there were no worthwhile jobs in the town. On the other hand, he was convinced,as were his countless friends, that he would be virtually able to pick and choose from the many opportunities available in a large city.

Things didn't work out that way. He had no difficulty in getting jobs, even in those times of economic depression. But he held none of them more than a few weeks. He was a disrupting influence, throwing any establishment he went into out of kilter. Other employees tended to gather around him, leaving their work undone. Minor supervisors coddled and favored him, to the detriment of morale. As an upper-echelon executive, he would have been invaluable to any company. But he qualified neither in years nor experience for anything but the lowliest jobs. And in that capacity he was simply a nuisance.

Working briefly and rarely, he lived largely on credit and small loans. He worried about these obligations (you did not let down your friends, his father had taught him), and he readily acquiesced when a bar owner-creditor offered to wipe the slate clean, and even gift him with a small bonus, in return for a "little favor."

The favor was done; the barkeep collected on his burglary insurance. A few days later he introduced Doc to the proprietor of a floating crap game-a man who needed big money in a hurry and could not depend on gambling to get it. Doc was glad to cooperate with him. He stuck up the game, with some subtle assistance from the proprietor, and they split the proceeds.

Later on, the gambler having introduced him to some «right» boys, Doc stuck up one of his games again, without prearrangement and without splitting. Nor did this in any way violate his father's code about friendship. On the contrary, the elder McCoy had believed that a man's best friend is himself, that a non-friend was anyone who ceased to be useful, and that it was more or less a moral obligation to cash in any persons in this category, whenever it could be done safely and with no chance of a kickback.

Doc was made for crime, the truly big operations which he rapidly moved into. No one could get on the inside of a job as easily as he, no one could plan so shrewdly, no one was so imperturbable and coolheaded.

He liked his work. Beginning a stiff prison sentence at age twenty-five, he still remained loyally committed to it. His take for the last five years had been more than a hundred thousand a year. For that kind of money, a man could afford to sit it out for a while. He could use his enforced leisure to relax, make new contacts, improve his criminal knowledge and plan new jobs.

Doc's ensuing eight years behind bars were entirely comfortable and often highly enjoyable. After all, a prison cannot function without the cooperation of its inmates; it cannot do so satisfactorily at least, or for very long. So a man who can lead his fellow prisoners, who can deliver their cooperation or withhold it, can get almost anything he asks for. And about the only deprivation Doc suffered was the loss of his income.

Given the same circumstances, he could have taken his second and last prison sentence as lightly as he had the first. But the circumstances differed crucially. He was married-and to a woman almost fourteen years his junior. And he was thirty-six years old.

Doc didn't fret about the situation. He never missed a meal, nor a night's sleep, nor spent a moment in futile regret. He had just one problem-to get out before getting out became pointless. Very well then, if that was what had to be done, he would do it.

He had left sixty thousand dollars on the outside with Carol. With that, and a topflight criminal lawyer, he managed to get his twenty-year sentence reduced to ten. It was a long step on the road to freedom; barring upsets, he would qualify for parole in approximately seven years. But that wasn't good enough for Doc. The seven years might as well be seventy as he saw it. And he wanted no more paroles. Trying to operate while on parole was what had put him where he was.

There were four members of the pardon and parole board, in addition to its chairman, Beynon. Exercising his unusual privileges, Doc approached them one by one. The middle-aged woman member fell for him; he was able to buy her with conversation. The three men members were open to a cash proposition.

Unfortunately Doc had run very, very low on money. He didn't have nearly the amount needed for the three-man buy. And his lawyer, who was usually open to a «good» proposition himself, refused to play banker. "Not that I don't trust you, Doc," he explained. "I know I'd get mine right off the top of your first job. The point is there wouldn't be any job, because there ain't going to be any pardon. You'd've talked this over with me in the first place, I'd've told you you were wasting your time."

"But I'd have four members. A majority of the board."

"Majority, schmority! Three of 'em are crooks, and the gal's a well-meaning imbecile. Beynon would veto them. If they tried to crowd him, he'd start swinging. Kick up such a stink that you'd probably have to do the rest of your time in the hole."

"Turn it around then. If they can't push him, can he push them?"

"He could. He could make 'em do a skirt dance on the capitol steps if he took a notion. But lay off, Doc. He didn't get that way by going for the fast dollar."

"Good for him. The better the reputation, the less the risk."

"Yeah?" The lawyer smiled bitterly. "Like to meet a guy that almost got disbarred for offering Beynon a cigar? Well, shake hands."

Doc wasn't convinced. He'd dealt with Honest Johns before, and they'd never turned out as pure as they were supposed to be. So he arranged to see Beynon alone-and that was about all he did.Just saw him. And excused himself as quickly as he could. He was too shrewd-too able an interpreter of a man's expression, the tone of his voice, his overall attitude- to do anything else. Beynon obviously wanted him to make the bribe attempt. It was also obvious that he had some very unpleasant plans for Doc as soon as it was made.

"So I'll have to think of something else," Doc told Carol on her next visit. "I don't know what it will be, but Beynon's definitely out."

"Maybe not. We can't be sure unless we try."

"I'm sure. Beynon won't take."

"You mean he never has," Carol persisted. "He won't take from you or the lawyer. Ordinarily he wouldn't take from me. But suppose I'd broken up with you, Doc-that it looked like I had. Then he'd have a double out for himself in case anyone got nasty. If I were through with you, then naturally I wouldn't be giving him a bribe. And when a man's wife quits him, it's supposed to be punishment. Don't you see, Doc? I wouldn't have any reason to bribe him, and he would have a reason for giving you a break."

It sounded pretty flimsy to Doc. But Carol wanted to try; and it was pressing four years since he had entered the penitentiary. So he told her to go ahead.

Two months passed before he saw her again. No one could have been more surprised than he when she reported success. Beynon would sell him a pardon. The price, five thousand cash, fifteen thousand within ninety days.

News of the robbery had been on the air since tenthirty that morning. Carol and Doc listened to it, the radio tuned to a whisper, as they ate lunch at a roadside drive-in.

Rudy had been identified from rogues' gallery photographs. Except forJackson, whom he had killed, there was no mention of a confederate. Rudy had robbed the bank. Rudy had driven boldly out of town with "more than three hundred thousand dollars in swag." The authorities were «puzzled» as to how he had gained entry into the bank to kill the guard. But no one raised the question as to whether he had shot Wingate.

That would happen in about two days, Doc mused, as he turned the car back into the highway. The trajectory of the bullet, and the bullet itself, would instigate inquiries about "an unnamed businessman who had been vacationing in Beacon City." And in two or three more days the businessman would be named, along with his "business." But by that time it wouldn't matter.

The news broadcast ended, gave way to a disc jockey. Carol started to doze again, and Doc leaned over to switch off the radio. Then, abruptly, he turned it up. He and Carol listened silently, tensely, to a late news bulletin.

It was over in a moment. Carol turned the switch, turned slowly, wide-eyed, toward Doc.

"Doc…?"

Doc hesitated, then shook his head firmly. "Huhuh. After all, it happened almost sixty miles away from Beacon City. It couldn't have anything to do with…"

"Why couldn't it? Who else would do a thing like that?"

"Anyone could have. Some drunk that lost his head. Some gun-happy teenager."

"You don't really believe that, Doc. I know you don't," Carol said. "You didn't kill him. Rudy's still alive."

Aimed straight at the heart, Doc's bullet felled Rudy Torrento like a streak of lightning. He stopped breathing, all conscious movement. His eyes glazed, his wedge-shaped face became a foolish, frozen mask, and he crumpled silently backward, an idiot doll cast aside by its master.

The back of his head struck against a rock in the bed of the stream. The impact deepened and extended his deathlike state. So, far from giving him a second bullet, Doc McCoy hardly gave him a second glance.

And less than thirty minutes after Doc's departure, Rudy came to life again.

His head ached horribly, and his first move was to roll on his stomach and batter the offending rock with his fists. Then memory returned and terror surged through him, and he hurled himself to his feet, clawing. Clawing off his coat and holster. Ripping open his shirt and undershirt. Ripping aside their bloody mess, and seeing and feeling-seeing-f eeling- the scarlet frightfulness of his flesh.

He snarled, whimpered, whined. All silently, his vocal cords constricted. He threw back his head and let out a long, silent howl; the shivering, heartbreaking cry of a dying animal. That was taken care of then; the last ceremony which instinct demanded. Now he could begin the actual business of dying. He breathed more and more rapidly. Feverish, poisonfilled air rushed into his lungs, his heart raced and stuttered, and his body began to jerk and stiffen.

I knew it, he thought dully, almost with his last thoughts. Back there years ago, back when I was just a kid, back as far as I can remember, I knew it'd be like this. Everything gettin' colder and colder, and the darkness getting deeper and deeper, an'-I knew. I KNEW!

Knew. The word drummed through his mind, sending a signal back through the years, through thousands of miles, through the grim gray walls and chilled-steel cages of a maximum security prison. And back through time and distance came a voice which told Rudy the Piehead, one of the nation's top ten public enemies, that he was a foolish little child who knew nothing whatsoever.

Rudy blinked, and a little color came back into his fish-gray face. "Max-?" he whispered hopefully. "You-you here, Max?"

"_But of course I am. Where else would I be, when my leetle poy Rudy is in trouble? Now, do vot I tell you, instanter!_"

Rudy did so. He was quite alone, needless to say; alone with the whispering, half-dry stream and the deep shadows of the arching trees, and the salt-sweet smell of his own blood. But in his mind he was not alone. With him was the one person he had ever loved, or been loved by. Little Max. Herr Doktor Max. Max Vonderscheid, M.D., Ph.D., Psych. D.-abortionist, physician to criminals; a man who had never been able to say no to a need, regardless of laws and professional ethics.

He and Rudy had been cellmates for three years. Those years, in a so-called tough jug, had given the Piehead the only true happiness he had ever known. One does not forget such things, or such a man. Each of his actions, his words, becomes a thing to treasure.

Rudy stretched out flat on the ground, closed his eyes, relaxed as completely as he could, and held his breath for a moment. Then he began to count slowly, «One-two-three-» exhaling and inhaling in time with the count. When he had counted to ten three times, his breathing was near normal and his heart had ceased its wild palpitating. He kept his eyes shut, waiting, and the voice spoke to him again.

He had done well-oh, but werry goot! He had remembered that shock was the big killer; shock first, infection second. If one gave way to shock, even a very minor wound could prove fatal.

"But, Max-" Rudy knew a momentary return of panic. "It ain't minor! He wasn't ten feet away, and he shot me straight through the…"

Rudy sat up. A hoarse laugh welled in his throat. Shot through the ticker? Why, hell, if that had happened he wouldn't be alive! He examined his torso again, wondering just what had happened and how.

The riddle remained one to an extent; rather, it had a bit of miracle mixed up in it. The metal-sheathed tip of the holster had obviously deflected the bullet ever so slightly, while it had been further deflected by the iron-hard botch of broken bones and cartilage that formed his rib cage. But still he was very lucky to be alive. And the wound was still nothing to laugh off.

Extending from a point immediately over his heart, the flesh had been furrowed bone-deep across his chest and halfway around the left side of his body. Probably because of the way he had fallen-his chest arching against his clothes and holster strap-he had bled relatively little, much less at any rate than he normally would have. But movement had opened the wound wide now, and he was losing blood at a dangerous rate.

He made a bandage with his undershirt, binding it tight with his belt and holster strap. That helped, but not much; nor did it help much more when he added his socks and handkerchief to the bandage. He had one thing left-two things rather-readily available for putting over the wound. The two thick sheafs of bills he had sequestered from the bank loot. But if he used them, got them bloody-and they probably wouldn't do a damned bit of good anyway…

Huh-uh. He had to keep that dough. As long as he had dough and a gun and a car-but above all, the dough-well, he had a chance. To live. To catch up with Doc and Carol. Beyond that-catching up with and killing them-he couldn't think at the moment. It seemed both a means and an end to him. In their deaths, somehow, he would find life for himself.

He climbed weakly into the car and gunned the motor, sending the vehicle roaring up and out of the creek bed and onto the road in a skidding series of jumps and jounces. It was the way it had to be. He lacked the strength for reconnoitering, the strength and the time. All he could do was come up fast, and hope for the best.

His luck held; no one was passing on the road. Luck continued with him as he skirted Beacon City's outer streets and took to the highway again on the other side. Then swiftly, with his blood, it began to flow away.

He fumbled in the glove compartment of the car, took out a half-filled pint of whiskey. He took a cautious drink, then feeling warmed and stronger, a bigger one. He capped the bottle with one hand, dug cigarettes from his pocket. He found one that was still usable and lit up, drawing the smoke deep into his lungs. Suddenly, for no reason-except that he was drunk-he guffawed.

Laughing, he took another drink, another long puff on the cigarette. Abruptly the bottle fell from his hand, and the car swerved crazily toward the ditch.

The cigarette saved him. As he fought to avoid the ditch, he jammed the burning butt between his palm and the steering wheel, and the pain screamed his mind awake, gave it the complete alertness that it needed. But it began to fade almost as soon as it came. He was conscious; then surely, swiftly, he was losing consciousness again.

"_Foolish Rudy. So little blood he has, and he mixes that with alcohol!_"

Rudy brought the car to a weaving stop. Awkwardly, gasping with weakness, he raised and turned himself in the seat, reached down onto the rear floor. His fingers found what they were seeking. Closing them with shaky tightness, he flopped down into the seat again.

The two sandwiches were dry and stale. The coffee in the vacuum bottle was cold and tasted sour. But Rudy consumed all of it, and all of the food.

Had to eat when you were losing blood. Had to pack the chow down to come off a jag. Had to-had to…

Had to get to a doctor.

He was driving again. He could not remember starting up, but the wind was whipping into his face and the highway was leaping madly beneath the car.

"D-doctor," he mumbled drowsily. "Got tuh hurry'n see a-see Doc an'…"

Awareness flooded over him again. He cursed savagely, bitterly, his dark face contorting into a baffled scowl.

How could he go to a doctor? There'd be other people around; patients, a nurse, maybe the guy's wife. And even if he could take care of them and get treated, then what? So, sure, he'd bump off the sawbones as soon as the job was done, but that wouldn't help. Doctors were busy guys. People were always calling on them, dropping in on them, and…

"_Not necessarily, my poy! Not with a certain kind of doctor. Oh, perhaps he vould haf calls. But they would be relatively few, and the callers being under no such dire necessity as would prevail in_…"

Rudy brushed the sweat from his eyes. He began to slacken his speed, to study the occasional R.F.D. mailboxes at the side of the highway.

Country doctor? Was that it? Huh-uh. Country docs didn't live in the country. Right in town, same's any other kind. And if one of 'em was killed or missing, the heat'd be on fast. Faster than fast this close to that bank job. Wouldn't take no Eddie Hoover to figure out that-that…

The highway began to blur; everything began to blur, to sink into a kind of gray fuzziness. He crouched forward over the wheel, brushing constantly at his eyes.Just before he lost consciousness completely, he turned into a side road.

He could remember doing nothing after that, yet he did a great deal. As much as he would have if he had been fully aware of his reactions. The frightful present no longer existed; he was reborn, free of all fear and the hideous savagery which festered in it. For Little Max was with him. Max Vonderscheid of the leonine head and the dwarfed, hunchbacked body. And he was laughing in a way he had never laughed before, or since.

"Aw, haw, haw! Now you're kidding me again, you little old Dutch bugger, you!"

"_But vot iss so funny, my poor paranoid friend? You should read Jonathan Svift. It viii gif you a better perspective_.

"_Vy not? Der schooling has many parallels. Even it might be said that he must know much more of medicine and anatomy than your proud M.D. The basic difference? Only that der patients are usually more deserfing and inwariably less demanding_."

Rudy came back into consciousness as quickly as he had gone out of it.

He was awake-and considerably refreshed-the moment the other car turned into the side road.

He had crouched down on the floorboards before passing out, lying on the seat from the waist up. Thus he could not be seen, unless someone peered directly into the car. And now he remained hidden, making no move except to firm the grip on the gun he had kept in his hand.

No move was necessary. He had already done everything that could be done in just such an emergency. Both windows on the left side were rolled down. The right wheels were parked on the edge of the roadside ditch. The rearview mirror was twisted to an angle which permitted him to see without raising his head.

It was a black-and-white patrol car. There were two men in it, one young, one middle-aged; apparently a rookie and a regular. They got out on opposite sides of the vehicle and started forward that way. Hands on gun butts, they kept well apart from one another. Moving up on the suspect objective from different directions.

This, of course, was and is the proper procedure, never to be deviated from under any circumstances. Due to the way the car was parked, however, it would have been bothersome if not impossible to carry it through. And since the vehicle was obviously empty, it seemed unnecessary.

So after a moment's pause, one of them shrugged and the other laughed, and they came on together. Almost shoulder to shoulder. Just that once they violated regulations.

And a split second after Rudy reared up over the seat, both of them were dead.

He took their guns and ammunition. He whipped his car around in a U-turn, running partly over the older man's body, and took to the highway again.

He knew what he had todo now, and the knowledge gave him strength. It also amused him, and he laughed as he had when Max Vonderscheid gave him the tip which he was now about to use.

Now, wasn't that somethin' though? Who'd ever think of a dodge like that?

Getting yourself fixed up by a vet, a horse doctor!