bashing Walker’s ear with them.
Burt was coming around the side of the bank. Hargit backed out the door prodding Hanratty ahead of him. Hanratty was dragging two bulging duffel bags like cement sacks along the ground, bumpety-bump down the bank steps, walking backwards; the Major had a duffel bag over his shoulder and a shotgun braced in the crook of his elbow. In the stocking masks they looked like sinister creatures out of science-fiction films. The Major waited in the doorway, covering the room with his gun until Hanratty had dragged the two big sacks around behind the car, lifted them into the trunk and slammed the lid. Then the Major took the steps in one leap, tossed the last duffel bag into the back seat and crowded in beside Walker in front. Hanratty got in back, with the duffel bag between him and Burt. Doors slammed. Baraclough had already popped the transmission into Drive and run the engine up against the footbrake to prevent stalling; now the Buick squealed away from the curb and lurched wildly toward the head of the street. Under the mask Baraclough seemed white. He hurled a glance at Hanratty in the mirror. “You stupid fucking son of a bitch.”
The Major said, “Everybody keep your gloves on.” They didn’t want to leave prints in the Buick.
The burn scar on Baraclough’s wrist, on the wheel by Walker, seemed livid and pulsing. Baraclough uttered a snarl. “It was a piece of cake and you had to blow it.”
Walker twisted his head toward the Major. “What the hell happened? Will somebody please tell me what happened?”
“You bought a ticket. You’ll find out. Sergeant, where’s the bag of nails?”
It was Baraclough who answered: “Somewhere on the floor back there.”
“I’ve got it,” Burt said. He twisted down the rear window on the left side of the car. They crested the last hill and swooped toward the flats. Hargit was twisted around in the seat, head low, looking for pursuit.
Hanratty’s mouth flapped open and shut a few times, and finally he squeaked, “Shit and shinola, I didn’t mean…”
“Shut up,” Burt said; he was lifting the heavy canvas sack, pouring the twisted spikes out onto the road. He had his arms far out, spraying the tire-breakers from side to side to cover the width of the pavement.
Baraclough said with bitter contempt, “The smaller the man the bigger the gun, ever notice that? Hanratty, for two cents I’d…”
“At ease,” the Major said mildly.
“Nuts. We could all take a fall for murder.”
“Nobody is going to take any falls,” the Major said. “Everything’s right on schedule. Just keep calm.”
“Schedule may get shot up a bit,” Walker said. “Have a look at that weather up ahead.”
“Nonsense,” the Major said.
The bag of nails was empty. Burt discarded it. “So how’d we score?”
“Nobody’s counted it,” Baraclough said, “but it’s big.”
“As big as we figured?”
“I think so.”
Walker felt a hard constriction in his gut. It was real: they had done it. He looked over his shoulder at the duffel bag on the seat between Burt and Hanratty. Hanratty had swept the crumpled men’s trousers away and laid both hands on top of the duffel bag as if he wanted to make sure the money wouldn’t get away from him. His eyes were fever bright and he was breathing through his mouth.
Walker said, “Look. Somebody got killed, is that it?”
Baraclough told him what had happened. It took a few sentences and then the Buick wheeled in through the gap in the fence. Spewed dust and bucketed toward the grove. Baraclough concluded, “There was no excuse. He got rattled and he blew the whole thing.”
“That’s a crock,” Hanratty said. “He was trying to pull his gun-he wanted to be a hero.”
“Stick it up your ass, Hanratty,” Baraclough said.
The Buick half-skidded around the trees and stopped beside the plane with a jerk, its tail going up. The doors popped open and Hargit said, “Get the engines running. We’ll carry the things.” And Walker slammed into the Apache and reached for the controls. It was no time for a by-the-book preflight check; he started to flip levers, switched things on and fed fuel. The engines started with belches of smoke and he ran them up against the brakes while the fuselage bounced and sagged with the weight of equipment and money and men coming aboard. He heard the passenger door slam and felt the crack of a hand against his shoulder as the Major settled into the copilot’s seat. “Go.”
12
… Now they had turned to run before the storm, reaching for altitude to get above the mountains and never mind the Nellis radar. The weather front was uneven and when they crossed patches of it they were pitched violently around. Somebody-Hanratty? — was retching. The magnetic compass was not pointing at much of anything. A sudden downdraft, like the flat of a palm, pressed them sickeningly toward the ground and Walker’s stomach surged up into his chest. He had maximum power now, rich mixtures, but in this air and with this deadweight the Apache was heavy, sluggishly responding to his control. The downdraft had knocked them down more than fifty feet; the altimeter bobbed and flickered and began once again to climb through the “7” on the thousands dial but that was seven thousand feet above mean sea level, disregarding the variants in air pressure caused by the front, and up here the plateau was more than four thousand feet high and the mountains loomed eight thousand feet above that; Walker still had to pick up several thousand feet of altitude before it would be safe to turn across the razorback summit of the mountain range. With all this weight aboard he wasn’t sure the Apache could attain or keep that kind of ceiling but it was that or turn south instead of north, and south was where the highways were, where the airports and Nellis AFB and the police were…
He glanced at the gauges; the tanks were out of balance-there was more fuel in the starboard wing tank than in its mate-so he reversed the flow switches to close off the port tank and draw on the starboard one. Momentarily he recalled that the threads of the starboard filler cap hadn’t looked good when he’d screwed it on after topping up the tanks this morning in Reno. But it would have to do. What the hell, another three or four hours and the whole plane could collapse for all he cared. But to make sure he leaned as far forward as he could without pushing the elevators down and peered around past the Major’s shoulder, trying to get a glimpse of the tank cap on the starboard wing-and saw a plume of grey-white liquid pouring straight back from the wing.
Baraclough, at the window behind the Major, was rubbing at the pane and talking in a taut voice thinned by fear: “We’re losing fuel.”
The Major twisted around. “ What? ”
“That does it,” Walker breathed. His hand shot forward. Switch back to the left-hand tank. Close off the leaking starboard tank. Bring up the trim.
He leaned forward to look out again. The Major was barking, at him: “What is it, man?”
But the fuel was still streaming out. It would: the low pressure of fast-moving air over the wing would pull it out. And with high-octane flowing straight across the hot exhaust system…
It was no good. He flicked switches again-cut all starboard power flow, switch off magneto, feather starboard propeller: the sudden drag pulled her severely around to the right and he had to stand on the rudder and crank the wheel left to keep her flying.
Hanratty was bawling and Eddie Burt exploded in oaths and Walker saw the Major’s hands gripped white on the edge of his seat
She was flying on one engine and the mountains were a looming threat off the port wingtip. The gasoline was coming out of the tank in a fine spray now and that was likely to keep up for a long time.
The Major grabbed him by the arm. “Captain…”
“Shut up.” He shook off Hargit’s hand. He was tipping her over on one wing to look at the ground below.
“What are you doing?”
“Looking for a place to land.”
