decision.
'All right,' she said. 'Bring her on out.'
'Bring her? I thought you were going to…'
'No, dear, we can't pick you up. The car broke down last night. You get a ride out here. Is Mr. Lister's cab there?'
There was a pause. 'Yeah. It's here.'
'Fine. Do you have money?'
'Well, sure. You don't think I'd take off across two states without money, do you?'
'Good. Take the cab out here, and we'll reimburse you for it.'
'Sis, is something wrong?'
There was a real tension then, in Max and in Julie too. He could feel the stiffening in her body. 'Why, no,' she said in a very matter-of-fact voice. 'Why do you ask, darling?'
'Well, you just sound kind of funny.'
'It's just the worry over you, Sally. And Diane has a little cold. You hurry out here. I'm just dying to see you.'
'Sure thing. So long.' There was a click, and the line went dead.
Max took the phone out of Julie's hand and placed it on the cradle. 'That was a nice piece of work, sweets. You showed good sense, and stage presence too.' Julie looked at the floor. She looked like she was about to cry.
'Is the little sister comin'?' Pete asked.
'Better than that. We got two new pieces of poontang on the way. Little sister was nice enough to bring along a friend.'
The cab showed up a half-hour later. It was an old Chevy with one bumper tip missing. They saw it clear out on the road, and then it turned down the driveway and plowed along through its own dust cloud toward the house. It pulled up close to the service porch in back and the doors opened. An old guy with what looked like a telegrapher's hat got out of the front seat and went back to the trunk. He took out some bags. Two girls got out of the back. They were both small, dressed in miniskirts and both damned good-looking little chicks. One had brown hair and the other had red. The redhead was so heavily freckled Max could tell it from this distance, and through the window screen. She was still cuter than a button, though.
'Which one is your sister?' he asked Julie.
'The one with brown hair.' The one with brown hair was really the better looking of the two. He looked at her for a moment before the similarity hit him. It was uncanny. Julie saw his reaction, and she looked at him in apparent alarm. 'What's the matter?'
'Nothing.'
'But you…'
'I said it was nothing. Shut up.' He grasped her arm and pulled her into the bedroom. The baby was lying in her crib, awake but quiet. He picked her up. Julie got the fidgets. 'I'm not going to hurt her,' he said. 'As long as you do what you're told. Now get out on the service porch.'
She went, reluctantly, and he walked along behind her. 'Get them in the house, and see to it the old asshole stays outside. Don't you go out there, I want you where I can hear every word you say. I'm going to be right inside the kitchen door with the baby.' He cradled the kid in one arm and took out his.45. 'One little slip on your part, and you've got half a baby. Understand?'
'Oh, please.'
'Shut up anti get out there.'
She hugged the robe about her and stepped out onto the porch. The girls were still outside. The one with brown hair was paying the old cab driver.
'Come on in, girls,' Julie called. 'I'm sorry I can't ask you in, Mr. Lister. I'm not dressed.'
'Howdy, Miz Bradford,' the old guy said, touching the bill of his hat. 'I'll just give the girls a hand here.' He picked up the bags and carried them toward the door. Julie looked panicky. The door was shattered, and if he saw that the old asshole might start to put two and two together.
'Oh, that's all right,' the redhead said, grabbing one of the bags. Trying to be the good guest, Max supposed, and thought, Baby, you don't know how good a guest you're going to be. The girl with brown hair grabbed the other bag, and they both headed for the door. The old geezer shrugged and got back in his car. He waved and put it in gear and pulled away, making more dust than a windstorm.
'Sis, this is Connie,' the girl with brown hair said. Max couldn't see any of them now, but he could hear them very clearly.
'Come on in, girls,' Julie said.
'Hey, what happened to the door?' This from Brown Hair.
'Oh, an accident. I'll tell you about it when we get inside.' Max heard light footsteps across the service porch, and then Julie came into the kitchen, clutching her cotton robe about her. She walked right past him without glancing in his direction, and the two girls followed her like sheep into the slaughter house. Each of them was carrying a suitcase, leaning to one side from the weight. Of course they saw him the moment they were in the kitchen, but Max had shifted the gun behind his back, so they just turned and smiled uncertainly at him, still holding their bags.
'Hi, girls,' he said. 'I'm a friend of Jim and Julie. Just visiting.' Julie nodded when Brown Hair looked at her.
'Let's go into the living room,' she said.
They knew they had walked into something when they got to the living room and saw Jim Bradford trussed up on the floor. Brown Hair dropped her bag and clapped a hand over her mouth to keep from screaming. Her friend just stood there rigidly. Julie had taken the baby on the way in, and now Max stepped up behind the girls and gave them a hard shove toward the middle of the room. They both let out a yelp of surprise and fright.
'Sis,' Brown Hair said, turning to Julie, 'what's…'
'You got any questions, baby, you direct them to me,' Max said. He pulled the gun into sight, and the two girls huddled together staring at the weapon. The sight of the pistol in his hand seemed to affect them more than the rifle and the shotgun in the hands of the other two. 'Now, I guess you girls are wondering what kind of party you've wandered into. My name is Max. That's Pete. And the intellectual looking gentleman with the rifle over there is Butch. We're staying here for a few days, until some people who are looking for us get tired and go away.'
'Oh, God,' the redhead said suddenly. 'They're the…' She broke off, and Max smiled his best smile.
'The escaped murderers. That what you were going to say, Red?' He paused, smiling again. 'You know, you're right? We're the three who made history yesterday by escaping from death row. And if we're caught, we're going back to death row. So we really don't have anything to lose if we shoot holes through a couple of teenagers.
'Now, you're going to be our little guests for the next few days. You'll have to earn your keep by working around the place and by furnishing us with a little entertainment now and then. Mrs. Bradford can tell you all about that if you have any questions. But as long as you do as you're told, you won't get hurt. One little bit of bullshit, and we start using you for target practice. You got that?' They didn't answer in words, but he could see from their faces that they understood the situation fairly well.
'I want the one with brown hair,' Pete said. He came forward and grabbed her by the arm. She tried to pull away, in a panic, and he cuffed her a good one alongside the head. She gasped and stopped fighting. Pete pulled her toward the hall, and the front bedroom. She looked around in a pleading way, as though she expected help.
'Just a minute,' Max said. Pete stopped, eyeing him suspiciously. 'I want to talk this over with you, buddy,' Max went on. 'I want that little gal myself.'
'Yeah?' Pete's gun was suddenly in his hand. He didn't point it at Max, but it was there, and ready. 'Well, how do you figure you got a right to two dames and me none?'
'I don't figure that.'
'Then what you got in mind?'
'A trade. I'll give you the blonde. I'll give you Julie.' Julie looked at Max sharply, and then at Pete, to see what he would say to the proposition. Pete looked at her for a moment, and then at the young twat next to him. They
