It was like a movie. One shot he was in the shack bundling Bibby in a blanket the next he was in the Saab pushing it at its top speed and the next he was in his own parlor.
And there was Ellen, flying from the rocker, grabbing Bibby from him, sitting down with the child in her arms to rock her the way she used to when Bibby was an infant. And staring up at him with such fear in her eyes that he wondered if he wasn’t dreaming.
“What is it, Ellen? What are you so scared about? Wake up, honey, I got Bibby back and she’s okay, they gave her a shot of whisky to keep her quiet, that’s why she’s sleeping and smells like that but it won’t hurt her, don’t worry, maybe give her a headache tomorrow morning, that’s all. Now you put her to bed while I call John to shoot some cars over to Balsam and pick those three hoods up,” he could not seem to stop talking, something was terribly wrong, her eyes said so, and he didn’t want to know, it was too much, he had had enough for one day, “and we’ll give John the bag with the money-”
Ellen mouthed, “It isn’t here any more.”
Thursday-Friday
The Money
“What do you mean?’5 Malone said. “What do you mean it isn’t here any more?”
“Somebody took it.”
“Who? How? I told you not to let it out of your sight!”
“Don’t yell at me› Loney. I don’t think I can take any more.”
“Will you answer me, for God’s sake? How did it happen?”
Ellen got out of the rocker with Barbara. She pressed her lips to the child’s defenseless neck. “After I’ve got this baby in bed.”
He sank onto the sofa staring. Halfway up the stairs she turned. “Did you say whisky? They gave a nine-year-old whisky?”
He did not answer. She hissed something profane and vicious and ran the rest of the way.
Malone sat there listening to the small sounds from upstairs.
I got Bibby back. The money is gone. Now what?
His elbows dug into his dirt-soaked knees and he took his head in his hands and tried to think. But the thoughts were stuck, going round and round like a toy train.
When Ellen came down she was calmer. Give a woman her kid to tuck in and she doesn’t give a damn about anything else. She took his cap off and got him out of his hunting jacket and smoothed his hair. “I’ll get you some coffee.”
Malone shook his head. “Now tell me what happened.”
She sat down by his side and held on to her own hands.
“There’s not an awful lot to tell, Loney. It happened so fast. I had to go to the bathroom this afternoon-”
“And you left the money in here?”
“What was I supposed to do, take the bag to the toilet with me? Why didn’t you chain it to my wrist? How was I supposed to know-?”
“All right” He did a swiveling exercise with his head, making his neckbones creak. “I can’t seem to get this tiredness out. I could be coming down with the flu.”
“You’re such an optimist. You could be fighting it off.” She smiled at him, anxious to get away from the money. She didn’t want to talk about it.
“You went to the toilet and you left the bag here in the parlor,” Malone said. And he could think of nothing else. “You came out and it was gone?”
“No, he was still here.”
“Who was still here?”
“The man-”
“What man? What did he look like?”
“I’ll tell you if you’ll only let me,” Ellen said sullenly. “He must have heard me flush and realized I was coming out so he hid in the hall next to the bathroom door. I guess. Anyway, just as I stepped out something hit me on the head and I fell down.”
“Hit you?” For the first time Malone saw the bruise. It was well up in her hair, a purple and yellow-green lump the size of a robin’s egg. The hair around the lump was stiff with clotted blood. “Christ!”
He clutched her. She made a hard bundle in his arms.
“And I sounded off at you! We’d better get Dr. Levitt to look at your head right away.”
“I don’t need any doctor. It throbs like hell, that’s all. The main thing, Loney, we’ve got Bibby back.”
He cursed. He did not know whom or what he was cursing-the unknown thief, the punks, Tom Howland, himself, or fate. The main thing, yes, but it was not over, not by a long shot. Not with that money gone. They’d have real blood in their eyes this time.
“I don’t get it,” Malone said, trying to. “Who could it have been? Did you get a look at him, Ellen?”
“Barely, as I was falling. And then it was all in a blur, sort of. It’s a wonder I saw anything at all. I don’t even remember landing on the floor. I must have been out fifteen minutes.”
“Can you give me a description? Did you see his face?”
“Not hardly. He was wearing something over his head.”
He was startled. “One of those Three Bears masks?”
“No, it was a woman’s stocking. You know, like they use in movie holdups. That they can see through, but you can’t make out anything clear.”
“Did you see what he hit you with?”
“No, but I found the pieces afterward,” Ellen said grimly. “It was my St. Francis.” Ellen’s St. Francis had been given to her by her father’s sister Sue, whose name became Sister Mary Innocent. It was a cheap ceramic, but Ellen prized it. “I tried to paste the pieces together with Epoxy glue, but there were too many little ones.”
He knew what losing her St. Francis meant to her. Her aunt had died in a Bolivian mission, throat cut by a crazy bush Indian convert.
Crazy. This whole thing is crazy.
“Did you see anything else, Ellen? What about his clothes?”
“A jacket, pants.”
“Anything else?”
She shook her head and he saw her wince. He clutched her tighter.
“How big was he?”
“I don’t know. Not very big. I’m not sure of anything, Loney. It’s like I saw it all in a dream.”
“Did he say anything? Did you hear his voice?”
“No.”
“It’s one of those three.”
It was Ellen’s turn to be startled. She twisted in his arms.
“One of them doublecrossed the other two. It’s got to be, Ellen, nothing else makes sense. I fell asleep in the bushes out there while I was spying on the cabin. I was so exhausted I slept the whole day. Any one of them could have gone into town and I wouldn’t have seen. They could even have taken turns. It figures. Nobody else knew the money was here. And if he wasn’t big, like you say, it couldn’t have been that Hinch. So it looks like it was the gun-happy one, Furia. You didn’t see or hear a car?”
“I told you, I was in the bathroom not paying attention. And afterward, by the time I came to, whoever it was was gone. I ran outside and there wasn’t a soul on the street, no car, anything.”
Malone was glaring at the carpet.
“What is it, Loney?”
“Listen, baby, I’ve got to tell you. We’re in a worse spot than before.”
“But we’ve got Bibby back,” Ellen said, as if that wiped out everything. She pulled away and jumped up. “I think I’ll go back up and see if she’s all right.”
He reached for her. “You don’t understand-”
“I don’t want to!” And that made a lot of sense, that did.
“You’ve got to. Will you please listen, honey? They’ll be back for their blood money. They’ll be mad as mad dogs because I got Bibby away from them, and when they find out the money’s gone, too, our name is mud.”
“But one of them took it! You said so yourself.”
“You don’t think he’s going to admit it to the other two, do you? Ellen, you and Bibby are in terrible danger. I’ve got to get you both out of here fast. I’ll phone John right now. You go on up and get Bibby awake and dressed-”
“You do and you’re dead,” said the spinning voice.
They filled the archway.