came out. He was wrapped around her like kudzu around a telephone pole. Zapata bumped into them
and the girl stepped back and Stick grabbed both his elbows and jerked them back, slid his hands
down Murphy?s arms to his wrist, and twisted both of Murphy?s hands inward. Murphy hollered and
jerked forward, and as he did, Stick snapped the tiny cuffs on his thumbs, twisted him around?, and
shoved him into the back seat of the car. The girl saw the wire-caged windows.
“Goddamn it, you?re the heat, you goddamn lying—”
Stick dangled the twenty in front of her. She snatched it out of his hand and stuffed it down her bosom.
“Better than busting up the place, isn?t it?” Zapata said as Stick tipped his hat, jumped into his car,
and sped off.
“He?s like that,” Zapata said, walking toward his hog. “Impetuous.”
“What d?ya mean, you snatched Weasel Murphy?” Dutch bellowed after Zapata had finished his
story.
“He said you wanted we should hustle Weasel outta that joint and bring him out here on the QT. So
that?s what we did. He shoulda been here by now, he got two minutes? head start on me.”
“Maybe it?s the international Simon Says sweepstakes,” Kite Lange said.
“Will you stop with the wisecracks, Lange,” Dutch grumbled. “Things?re bad enough without you
imitating Milton Berle. What I wanna know is, where the hell?s Stick and Murphy?”
“Perhaps I should put out an all points on Parver?s vehicle,” Charlie One Ear suggested.
“Why don?t we just bust everybody in town,” Callahan said. “We can put them in the football stadium
and let them go one at a time.”
Dutch buried his face in his hands. “What is it, is the heat getting everybody?” he moaned. “I
shoulda known when I was lucky, I should of stayed in the army.”
74
