I shoved past him, jerked open the door as Della cried, “Wait!”
But I didn’t wait. In three or four seconds she would know I’d beaten her to the punch. I
had to get out and get out fast.
I jumped into the elevator and rode to the ground floor. Moving fast, I crossed the lobby,
pelted down the steps and vaulted into the waiting Buick.
I shot away from the casino steps and down the carriageway like a bat out of hell. Half-way
down I lowered the windshield until it was lying flat. I crouched down in the seat. By the
time I saw the gates ahead of me I was driving at sixty miles a hour.
The two guards were there. The green-eyed one had his gun in his hand. They had heard me
coming, and probably she had phoned I was to be stopped, but I wasn’t stopping.
Those gates looked big and impressive, but they had two weaknesses. They opened
outwards and they were held shut only by a single bolt. Moving at this speed I didn’t reckon
they would hold me, and they didn’t.
The guards jumped clear as I swept down on them. I held the steering-wheel as tightly as I
could and lowered my head. The solid steel bumpers smashed into the gates, and they flew
open. The car rocked and swerved, but I straightened it, shoving my foot down hard on the
accelerator. I heard the bang of a gun, but I didn’t care. I was through those gates and on to
the highway. I went on feeding petrol into the cylinders: the speedometer needle flickered up
to eighty. They would have to move to catch me!
A couple of miles down the road I came to the bends: the climbing switchback that led
across the dunes to the Miami Highway. I had to cut speed, but that didn’t worry me. They
would take a few minutes to get after me, and they couldn’t go faster on this road than I
could.
Well, I had beaten her! I wanted to sing and yell. I had outsmarted her in spite of her
smartness. I’d got the money and I was out, and before she could get things moving I’d be
safely hidden in Cuba. I was riding higher than a kite!
After driving for fifty miles or so, I turned off the highway and got on to the secondary
183
road. The Buick was an obvious car to spot, and I was less likely to be noticed on the
secondary road than on the highway. Before long I would have to get petrol.
I was running low.
As I drove I remembered Ginny was staying with a girl friend in Miami, and I knew her
telephone number. I decided I’d stop at the next filling-station and call her. I’d get her to
charter a plane this night, and if I could persuade her to go with me to Cuba, and I thought I
could. I’d be sitting on top of the world!
About a couple of miles farther on I spotted a filling-station and I pulled in.
An old guy with a goatee beard came waddling out of the shabby little office.
“Fill her up,” I said. “Have you a phone here?”
“Right in there, mister.”
I suddenly remembered I had only three one-hundred-dollar bills on me. I bent down and
flicked them out of my shoe.
“I got nothing smaller than a C. Can you give me change?”
“Sure. You go right ahead and phone. I’ll get you change.”
The phone was on a battered desk by an open window. I called Ginny’s number. The light
was fading now. It was getting on for nine. I could see the old guy pumping petrol into the
Buick. On the desk was a packet of Camel’s. I took one and lit up.
“Hello,” a girl said over the line. It wasn’t Ginny.
“Miss Laverick there?”
“No, she’s out, but I’m expecting her any minute now.”
