Finally, moving with exquisite slowness, Patty crouched down, peered out under the cow to where Susan had been, and then gave him a thumbs-up sign. They crossed the corral and slipped out through a gate. Patty, now limping even more noticeably, moved close to him and took his arm with one of hers, then appropriated the pitchfork to use as a walking stick.
“If we split up,” she said, “and you go that way toward the forest and I go that way, one of us might make it.”
“No go. We’re getting out of here together. Besides, neither one of us is moving very well. We look like that painting of the Spirit of Seventy-Six, only no one’s bothered to bandage us up. Now, let’s get to the tractor. You can really hot-wire it?”
She shrugged at him modestly.
“I can try. It may be tricky in the dark.”
Rather than cross between the main house and the barn, they chose to work their way back around the barn and the small, empty corral on the other side. Taking that route, they would be in clear, easy range of the farmer, Sanderson, should he spot them, but they would be concealed from Watkins until they were no more than twenty- five yards or so from the tractor, and also from Susan when she reemerged through the back door. No matter what, they knew that there was little chance of their making it unseen to the tractor, getting it started, and avoiding the bullets of two heavily armed professional killers.
“I don’t like these odds,” Will said.
“We can do this.”
Cautiously, more than grateful for the heavy overcast, they hobbled along the vast wall of the barn until they had reached the corral. To their right, past Sanderson’s house, they could just make out the silhouette of the farmer as he patrolled the broad, grassy field that separated the working farm from the forest. To their left, well beyond the far corner of the corral, facing the entrance to the barn, stood the tractor. With five-foot wheels in back, three- foot wheels in front, and a snout like a submarine, it was larger than Will had initially appreciated-certainly large enough to tow serious attachments for threshing or plowing and also, he hoped, to generate some speed with the two of them on board. If they could somehow make it out to a paved road, there was at least a chance of piling up some distance before Susan or Watkins reached their cars and caught up.
With Will keeping an eye on Sanderson, and Patty watching for Watkins, they reached the end of the corral.
“I know it’s weird,” Will said, “but after all that’s happened, after all I’ve been through and dealt with, all of a sudden I’m scared stiff.”
“That’s because all of a sudden we have a chance. I’m thinking that these are not the people I want to have end my life.”
“Amen to that,” Will whispered, slipping his arms around her. “Well, I guess we’ve got to go for it.”
“We do.” She took his face in her hands. “You’re a hell of a guy, Will Grant-very brave and a terrific lover, too. That’s a combination I like.”
Their kiss was brief, but intensely sweet.
“How long did you say it takes to hot-wire a tractor?” he asked.
“I didn’t. Let’s hope we don’t have to find out. Listen, though, one thing-you’ve got to drive. Even in your sneakers I can’t step down very well with my right foot. If any of them get in our way, you’re probably better off trying to run them down than avoid them. Sometimes people don’t react well with something coming at them head on.”
“Got it.”
“I’ll do what I can with this.” She held up the pitchfork. “Okay, Doc, ready. . and. . now!”
There was no sense trying to conceal their movement any longer. Hand in hand, they loped awkwardly across the grass as rapidly as Patty could manage. Just as they reached the tractor, the dense night was pierced by a piteous, screeching wail coming from the farmhouse. Susan.
“The key,” Will said. “It’s here.”
“Thank God,” Patty muttered.
Will scrambled up onto the broad seat.
“There’s not much protection up here.”
“Try praying.”
Ahead of them, Watkins had appeared at the doorway of the barn and, without looking in their direction, started toward the commotion in the house.
Patty balanced herself on the metal step, hanging on to the seat with one hand and the pitchfork with the other.
Will turned the key, and with a brief cough, the powerful engine kicked over, thrumming loudly.
“How do I make it go forward?” he asked, suddenly panicked.
Patty, anticipating the problem, grabbed the shift lever beside the seat and snapped the huge tractor into gear.
“I was the Four-H queen in junior high!” she explained.
“Amazing.”
Watkins had swung around and was lumbering toward them, his gun drawn, when the tractor lurched forward.
“Duck down!” Patty cried. “Head right at him!”
They were gaining speed when Watkins began firing. Bullets clanged off the grill, and one splintered the top of the steering wheel. Will was crouched awkwardly on one knee, peering along the side of the engine casing, reaching overhead to steer by one hand, wondering how long he could survive a bullet between the eyes. To his right, Patty was now hanging off to the side of the tractor by one arm, completely exposed to the gunfire, the pitchfork extended forward like a lance.
“That’s it!” she hollered. “Right at him, Will! Then keep him on my side!”
For several frozen seconds, the massive killer looked confused. Then, with the tractor bearing down on him, he took several clumsy steps to his left, stumbled, and fell to one knee. Although he still had a grip on his pistol, he never got the chance to fire it again. As the tractor rolled past him, Patty drove the pitchfork straight through the softness beneath his chin and then upward, almost to the hilt, in his brain. His death was instantaneous.
“Stop, Will!” she yelled.
Will slammed down on the brake. Clambering off the tractor, Patty retrieved the pitchfork, grabbed Watkins’s gun, and was quickly back on the step as Will again accelerated.
“I think that way,” he said, pointing.
“You’re in charge.”
“Boy, am I glad that isn’t true.”
Will swung the tractor to the right in a wide arc that would take them around to the front of the house. At that instant Susan appeared on the back porch brandishing the submachine gun and screeching at them hysterically.
“You killed him, you bastards! You killed my Marsh!”
She rattled off a burst, then raced down the stairs, but the tractor was moving away to her left, and it seemed as if none of the shots had hit. Firing like a commando as she ran, Susan took a line that would cut them off before they made the far side of the house.
“What should we do?” Will called out over the wailing engine.
“Just hold us steady,” Patty answered. “Real steady.”
She gripped the seat with her left hand and lay her right arm down across her left, sighting down the barrel of the pistol.
“Payback time,” she murmured, as she cracked off a single shot.
Through the gloom, thirty yards away, Susan cried out and fell, clutching her thigh and cursing. She was up with incredible quickness, though, hobbling after them, almost dragging her leg. But what chance she had to cut them off was gone.
Will swung the tractor to the left, alongside the house.
“That was an unbelievable shot!”
“It was a terrible shot. I was aiming at her chest. Take me past those cars. If she gets ahold of the keys to
