Kiss Me Hard. Thomas B. Dewey

up high, but suddenly she crumpled forward, her head fell onto the wheel and she began to cry.

      “Oh, God,” I said.

      “I can’t, Chris,” she said, the words broken and indistinct. “I can’t do it—I haven’t got—”

      “I know it,” I said. “Just get me out of here. Now.” Before I could react, she had opened the door and was scrambling out of the car. She pushed the door shut and stood with both hands on it, looking at me across the seat. “Take the car, Chris. Go ahead. Forget about me.”

      “Look, baby—”

      “Take the car, Chris! It’s yours. Only go away and don’t come back. He’ll kill you.”

      I didn’t have time to argue. I slid back under the wheel, she crumpled up again, backing away from the car with her hands over her face.

      “So long, baby,” I said. “Have a happy life.”

      I don’t think she heard me.

      I jammed the thing into reverse and backed in a half-circle over the rough ground. The lights flashed on the edge of the clearing, the clump of trees where we’d been a short time before, and I saw Danny Boy come charging out. I gunned the car and twisted the wheel, heading for the road a few feet away. There was another car parked now just beyond the place where we’d turned off. The rear end partly blocked the narrow lane. The left rear fender of the convertible crumpled as I skinned by and twisted into the road. I didn’t look back.

      When I came out of the wooded area and looked across the fields I saw that it was getting light in the east. Straight ahead of me, in a shallow valley, the lights of the town still glowed feebly.

      When you’re in a panic and half your blood has turned to alcohol, you don’t always think straight. As I plunged down toward town in the convertible I remembered two things in my hotel room. One was a five-dollar bill I’d tucked away under the mattress. The other was a pint bottle of whisky. I couldn’t get them out of my mind. All I had in my pocket was three dollars and some change. Two of the dollars had come from Hazel. I wondered whether she’d got her money’s worth.

      I knew it would be silly to hang onto the car. They’d find me right away. I’d have to leave it, and not far from town. I figured that by the time Danny and the redhead got into the other car and got it turned around, I’d have enough head start for a quick stop.

      All right. But that’s the way I figured it out at the time.

      I raced into the sleeping town toward the main street. It would be broad daylight in a few minutes. Two blocks from the hotel I slowed down and finally cut the engine. I turned the corner and stopped opposite the side entrance, where Hazel had picked me up. I wondered who had been watching us—who had tipped off the ape-man husband.

      I went into the hotel and glanced at the desk. The clerk was asleep, as usual. I tiptoed to the stairs and went up two at a time. The window of my room was open and as I unlocked and opened the door I heard the roar of a car coming into town and then a sudden braking. I looked out the window. Danny’s car was stopped at the corner and he was climbing out, moving toward the convertible. I ducked back from the window as he glanced up at the hotel.

      So my time had run out. I couldn’t remember where I’d hidden my bottle. On my way past the bed I slid my hand under the mattress, feeling for the five-dollar bill, but it wasn’t there. I went on out into the hall.

      At the rear end of the hall was a window giving on a fire escape. I went back there. The window was closed but unlocked. I raised it and stepped onto the rickety iron framework. It trembled under me. I went down the steps toward the alley that ran behind the building on the main street.

      I walked fast, away from the street where I’d parked the convertible, toward the south end of town. Two blocks ahead of me the alley angled to the left and found its way back to the main street. From there I would have to cross the railroad tracks, get into the woodlands on the other side of town and head for the highway three miles beyond. It would be a long run, but it could work.

      I came to the turn in the alley and moved along to the street. There was a red-brick building fronting on the main street and I made my way along it slowly to where I could look around the corner, back toward the hotel. I heard a freight train rumbling over the nearby tracks, but didn’t think much about it.

      The street and sidewalk were clear and I stepped out of the alley, and walked fast along the walk toward the tracks.

      The freight wasn’t going to stop. It had slowed to maybe thirty-five miles an hour and it looked like a long one.

      I heard a quick shout behind me.

      “There he is!”

      I looked back and saw half a dozen men grouped in front of the hotel. One of them was Danny, the gorilla. They started after me along the walk.

      The long freight blocked my path to the woods. I couldn’t jump between the cars to the other side and I didn’t have time to wait for it to pass. If I could catch it, I might get away. But it was speeding up now and I still had fifty yards to go to reach the tracks. I started to sprint, hearing the shouts behind me over the train’s rattle. I heard a powerful car coming, first behind the shouts, then drowning them out as it passed the running men.

      I didn’t look back any more. I couldn’t hear the crowd now because of the noise the train made. It was making good time and I forced myself to speed up as I came alongside, running on the gravel beside the ties. I reached for a ladder on a boxcar, but it came too fast and my hands tore loose before I could get a grip. The next car was an oil tanker and I leaped for the wooden catwalk, got one arm and a leg over it and held on, waiting for my bursting lungs to quiet down.

      When I looked back, the mob that had chased me out of town was standing in the field, looking after the train. One, who looked like Danny, limped back toward them from the tracks. He looked as if he might have tried to grab the rattler too, and missed.

      I lay still for a long time with my arm and leg hooked over the edge of the catwalk and the next time I looked back I couldn’t see any of the town.

CHAPTER 3

      The rattler didn’t slow down. It just went on and on for what seemed like a week. Really, it was from early morning to dark evening, maybe thirteen hours. Not long on the inside of a train, but hell and all on the outside. I traveled almost as far up and down, bouncing, as I did forward. Where I was headed, I had no idea. I didn’t even know the direction we were traveling.

      My stomach growled with hunger and I needed a drink. My head ached from the battering of the long, rough ride. My eyelids were sandpaper. I was ready to get off. But the train wouldn’t slow down. I finally made up my mind that I’d get off at the next town whether we slowed down or not. If I busted my head, then I wouldn’t worry about my stomach and if I didn’t bust it, maybe I could get something to eat.

      A thick woodland loomed on the opposite side of the tanker and I inched around to have a look. We were following the course of a small river and the woods grew along the near bank. Up ahead, on the far bank, was a cluster of bright lights. They didn’t look like the lights of a town. Pretty soon I saw a huge, slowly turning wheel and knew the lights belonged to a carnival.

      The town was on the other side of the tracks, at least a mile ahead. The rattler showed no signs of even pausing and I got ready to jump when the lights came nearer.

      The right-of-way had been cleared to a distance of about fifteen feet and most of it was gravel. But grass had grown up over some of it and the line of trees was less than twenty feet away. If I jumped far enough and hard enough I might be able to hit the grass when I fell. I crouched down on the narrow catwalk and braced myself for the shock.

      I took a deep breath. And then the brakes went on. I felt the quick shock, heard the squeaking groans of the cars bumping together, the clanking couplings. Then it eased off and came back again and we had slowed to about twenty miles per hour.

      That would make