Comeback

when we got the right place, the right circumstances. You don't want any risk, right?'

'That's right,' Carmody said. He stared at Parker like an antelope looking at a lion. 'Mr. uh, Grant, is it?'

'Yeah.'

'I never did anything like—'

'We know,' Parker said. 'George told us what your idea is. You want to do good.'

'Whereas,' Mackey said, 'W want to do well.'

Ignoring that, Parker said to Carmody, 'If

something goes wrong, the cops won't ask you what your motive was. You see what I mean?'

'Absolutely,' Carmody said.

'So we'll pick the right time, the right place, the right circumstances,' Parker told him. 'We'll decide when it's safe to make our move. And then we'll say to you, now.'

5

The money room was long, low-ceilinged and windowless. There were bright fluorescent lights in the ceiling, the walls were off-white plasterboard, and a pale gray industrial carpet was on the floor, but even with all that lightness and brightness the place had the feeling of being a cave or a tunnel, far underground. Air conditioning produced a flat dry atmosphere, in which sounds became muffled and small. The hymn-singing could not be heard in here.

Parker and Liss and Mackey came into the room fast, ski masks on their faces, the shotguns pointing outward, slightly over the occupants' heads, the blued-steel barrels moving back and forth as though looking for a target. Liss cried out, 'Everybody stop! Stop now! Hands on desks! You! You'll die!'

The fat man with the black necktie stopped reaching for the phone. He and the other five people in the room all became very still. Three of them—the fat man and two middle-aged women, all seated at desks with open ledgers and calculators and video terminals—were employees of the arena, and would calm down when they stopped to remember it wasn't their money in any case. The other three, all slender short-haired young men in dark slacks and white shirts and narrow ties, were Reverend Archibald's people, and might take a robbery more personally.

These three had all been on their feet, standing around the long tables piled with money, still only partially counted. Now they all stood bent slightly forward, palms flat against the counting table as their eyes darted around, glancing quickly at one another, at the money, at the shotguns, at the lights and the floor and everything in the room. All three were thinking about trying something, even against the guns.

Mackey stepped forward toward the money table, keeping to the side so he didn't block Parker's and Liss's aim. He was jittery on his feet and bunching his shoulders up and down, giving them all kinds of body language about how wrought-up he was. His voice loud and ragged, full of tension, he yelled, 'You three! Get away from the money!'

They stared at him, not moving. Mackey shook the shotgun in both hands. He bobbed on his feet. He yelled, 'I gotta blow one of you bastards away! I gotta! So move!'

Liss angrily yelled, 'Don't get blood on the money!'

'Move away!' Mackey screamed at the three. 'Move away!'

Now finally one of them found voice. Frightened, gasping through the words, he said, 'What do you want to shoot us for?'

Parker stepped forward. 'Ed, don't do it,' he said. 'Not unless they give you a reason.'

Mackey jittered forward close enough to touch the shotgun barrel against the white shirtsleeve of the one who'd spoken. 'Give me a reason,' he begged. 'Give me a reason.'

Parker, as though he wanted to calm Mackey down as much as anybody, said to the trio, 'Down on the floor. Right where you are. On your backs. Ed won't shoot unless you're stupid.'

The three went down fast, and lay blinking up at the ceiling. Like upended turtles, they felt more exposed and helpless on their backs than if Parker had let them lie face down, where they could have felt hidden and coiled. Between their position on the floor there and Mackey's apparent blood-hunger, they wouldn't be causing any trouble after all.

Parker had taken the bag of duffel bags from Mackey on the way in, to leave Mackey's arms free for when he went into his act. Now Parker turned to the two women seated at their desks, trying to be invisible, and tossed the duffel at them. 'Take the bags out and fill them. The faster you do it, the sooner we're out of here.'

The women hurried across to the money table, stepping over the supine men. Awkward with haste, they stuffed money into the gray canvas bags, while Mackey kept pacing around, muttering to himself and rubbing the top of his head. Liss stood near the door, the shotgun in his hands moving in arcs, like a surveillance camera. Parker went past him and back out to the small anteroom, where they'd left Carmody, who was still out, lying on the floor where they'd dragged him. He went back inside and Mackey was fidgeting back and forth, pointing his gun at the men on the floor and mumbling incomprehensible things, while the two women kept sneaking terrified looks at him and filling the duffel bags as rapidly as they possibly could.

Parker went around the room, unsnapping the phone cords connecting all the phones to their jacks, then bringing the phone cords over to the money table and stuffing them into a bag that was already half full.

Liss said to the fat man, 'You can make that important call now.'

The fat man was doing dignity; he sat, unmoving, head bent forward, gazing at a spot on the desk midway between his splayed-out hands. He pretended Liss hadn't spoken.

They'd brought six bags, but it only took five for all the money. 'Give me the empty one,' Parker told the women as they loaded the last of the cash, and they did. While he moved the duffels two at a time out to the anteroom, Liss told the people, 'You'll stay in here a while. Ed's gonna hang around outside the door, hoping to