The Green Eagle Score

8

Parker woke up when Webb touched his arm. Cartoons were jumping on the television screen. Gray light touched the drapes covering the picture window. Parker looked at his watch and the time was seven-forty.

Webb looked serious. Keeping his voice low, he said, “Better come take a look.”

Parker went with him, up to Godden’s room. Godden, his arms and legs still tied, was lying on his side on the bed, his throat cut. The sheet was soaked with his blood.

Parker said, “The woman.”

“Gone. Left this.”

The note was scrawled hastily with pencil on brown wrapping-paper, the letters large and ragged. It said:

I won’t say where you are. I have to bring Pam to my mother. I’m sorry.

Webb said, “What now?”

Parker shook his head. “I wish I knew when she left.”

“I heard the door close, that’s what woke me. Less than five minutes.”

“Then we get out of here,” Parker said.

They went down to the kitchen and woke Devers and showed him the note and told him about Godden. Parker said, “Be sober, boy. We’ve got to get out of here now.”

“Why? You think she’ll talk?”

“She won’t have to talk. A crazy woman staggering around a little town like this, seven-thirty in the morning, how far do you think she’ll get? Six blocks? Ten blocks? Then they pick her up, they say maybe the others are in the same neighborhood. Somebody says, that head doctor’s in that neighborhood. Somebody says, take a look over there, Joe.”

Devers was sober. He said, “How much time have we got?”

“Until they get organized. Until somebody notices it’s Godden’s neighborhood. Maybe an hour, maybe less.”

“Christ.” Devers went over to the kitchen sink, ran cold water, splashed it on his face, dried with a dish towel. “Where do we go?” he said.

“You ride with me for a while,” Parker told him.

They got their gear and went out to the cars. Parker and Devers took Godden’s dark green Cadillac. Parker’s suitcase, with his gear and his part of the money, and a small case of Godden’s that Devers had taken to carry his cut, went into the trunk. Parker drove.

They were in West Monequois, and the best direction to go was away, so they headed out to Route 11 and traveled west toward Potsdam. Webb’s Buick stayed behind them a while, but he turned south at Moria. Parker went on to Lawrenceville, switched to an unnumbered back road down through Buckton and Southville, and picked up 56 at Colton. He headed south.

They kept the car radio on. The robbery news was already becoming stale, being now into its third day with nothing sensational happening for the last two. No mention of Ellen Fusco yet.

Devers said, “This car’s going to get hot soon. Once they get to Godden’s house.”

“I know it.”

“What’s our chances?”

“We need a city,” Parker said. “You can disappear in a city. There’s nothing up here but mountains.”

There was a New York State roadmap in the glove compartment. Devers studied it and finally said, “Our best bet’s Albany.”

“How far?”