We turned back to the table. Cartley went for the mail and I checked the newspaper. He tossed the letters down in disgust. “Bills!”
“No Christmas cards? Funny, I thought he was on my list.”
“I haven’t gotten one from you either.” Cartley stared at the mail again. “If Petlovich has money, he isn’t paying off debts with it. I wonder why he waited so long to leave town. If the cops didn’t come for him, a collection agency would.”
“I don’t know about his bills, but I know why he didn’t blow town till now.” I showed Roy the Minneapolis Star, afternoon edition. In the lower right-hand corner of the front page was a human-interest story about the body that had been found hung by the chimney in an unnamed Minneapolis home. The article said the police suspected one Willem Petlovich, former second-story man.
Roy stared at it woodenly. “That shouldn’t have spooked him. He had to know he’d be a suspect.”
“Maybe,” I said. “But the paper ties him in explicitly. Maybe he figured he’d have a day or two before anyone knew where to look for him.”
“He’s that dumb?”
“He’s got caught once. By you, even.”
“By you, too. All right, quit the kidding. He got caught because he was ratted on.” We holstered our guns and left.
On the way back, I asked, “Want to report the shooting to Pederson?”
“And catch hell for playing cops without badges or a warrant?” He sighed. “Guess we better. Jon won’t like this. He didn’t take care of the kids so we could go break laws.”
“Yeah. Say, why don’t you drop me off at home? I ought to feed Marlowe, and-”
“Sure. Right after we talk to Jon.” He considered. “No. I’ll wait for you while you feed him now. Nate, I’d really appreciate it if you’d sack out on the couch at my house tonight. Bring your gun.”
It made sense. “Uh, yeah. Roy, while you talk to Jon, can I make a phone call?”
He grinned then. “Okay, coward. But after you talk to that woman nobody’s supposed to know about, you can come in and catch hell like a man.”
I ran a stop sign, unintentionally for once. “Damn it, is everyone on my private life? I suppose the kids told you while I was in the kitchen.”
He leaned back and hitched at his belt. “If you can’t fool visitors, you couldn’t fool your partner.”
“Yeah?” It wasn’t much of a crack, but it was all I had left.
The next morning I opened my eyes and found a pair of cool blue eyes, framed by blond bangs, not more than six inches from my face. I closed my eyes and tried to think. Wasn’t the hair sandier?
Then I remembered where I was and that only made it more confusing. I opened my eyes again and, after a few tries, focussed on the face around the eyes. I pulled the blanket up over my chest, feeling embarrassed and then silly about it.
“Oh! H’lo, Amy.” She was standing beside the sofa. “Sleep well?” She nodded.
I hadn’t. This house had more creaking boards and rattling windows than the House of Usher. “Had breakfast yet?” She shook her head. “What’s the matter, don’t you talk in the morning?”
She straightened her flannel nightgown and folded her arms self-assuredly. “I’m waiting till the others get up,” she said.
Great! I was guilty again. Ah, life as a hardened criminal! I went into the bathroom, brushed my teeth and changed my pajama bottoms for trousers.
I was throwing cold water on my face when I heard a whoop from Howie and a shriek from Paul. I tottered out and collided with Cartley, striding out in his bathrobe to collect the evidence and punish the wicked. He was boiling mad. He looked like a walking bathrobe with a ham roast in it.
In the living room, Amy was standing demurely by the front door while Paul tugged at it. She ran a hand over her blond hair to make sure she looked tidy and grown-up, then turned to Roy. “We caught Nathan. He’s trying to keep us shut in the house, isn’t he?”
Roy laughed, tried to unlock the door, then stopped laughing and threw his weight against it. It didn’t budge.
I was in the kitchen before he hit it a second time.
I rammed the back door with my shoulder, on the dead run. It jarred my teeth, snapped my head back, but the door barely rattled. I tried again. I might as well have hit Mount Rushmore.
I ran back through the sitting room and snatched my gun from under the sofa pillow. I could hear Roy going through closets downstairs; I charged upstairs. I flipped through every wardrobe with my gun muzzle, poked under every bed, even looked in the shower stall and the clothes hamper. Amy and Paul, watching from the living room, must have loved it.
I met Roy back in the sitting room, at the foot of the stairs. I called out before I came down-when I saw his eyes I was glad I had. He was staring every which way and pacing. His gun shivered in his fist like a live mouse.
I said in my calmest deadpan, “Nobody home, Roy. You should make your visitors sign a guestbook. You get such a lot of them.”
He relaxed. “Yeah,” he said and coughed. “I’m beginning to think I should sublet this place.”
“I-” I stopped as Howie came out of the kitchen and lounged against the doorway.
“Nice try, Nathan,” he said, looking sideways at Amy and Paul. He was pale. “Pretty good crime, huh? Lock us in, then finish us off.” He didn’t look like he enjoyed playing anymore. “I wouldn’t even have guessed, if I hadn’t poked around the basement.”
“Jesus!” I was closest. I ran to the kitchen and fumbled frantically with the basement doorknob. Roy was right behind me before I got it open.
It was in the corner near the hot-water heater. Not too surprising, since it was right in front of Roy’s fuel-oil tank. It was small, shapeless and attached to a clock. Anybody over three who watched television could see it was a bomb.
It didn’t look powerful. It didn’t have to be, so long as it set off the fuel-oil tank. I picked up a broom and was shoving the bomb along the floor gingerly, away from the tank, as Paul and Amy slipped past Roy and danced around me, chanting, “We caught Nathan!”
Howie looked relieved. I suppose I looked pretty silly, doubled over and poking delicately from a broom’s length away at a wad of clay, a battery and an alarm clock whose hands were nearly touching.
“Go back upstairs,” I said. Softly. Roy said it louder. They giggled and shook their heads. We couldn’t drag them all out. We might not have time, and if they kicked too hard-
I tossed the broom to Roy, saying, “Shove the bomb in the corner,” in a conspiratorial tone. Then I snatched up Amy and continued, “While I kidnap the girl. Ya ha ha.”
I tucked her under my arm and dashed up the stairs, with Amy laughing and struggling and Paul and Howie in hot pursuit. As I left I called out, “And set it off with your bowling ball!” I hoped he understood.
I only glanced at the front window. I’d never get the kids out in time if the boys caught up with me and tried to “arrest” me before I could break it open. I ran upstairs, to the kids’ bedroom in back; I locked the door for a second while I threw open the window and climbed onto the roof, still carrying Amy. The boys burst in and followed, right on out the window.
We were right over the pile of snow at the end of the driveway. Far below me, through the window, I could hear the muffled grind of a bowling ball rolling slowly across the basement floor; the sound was nearly covered by the hasty slap of flat feet on the basement stairs.
I snarled, “You’ll never take us alive,” wrapped Amy in my arms and rolled off the roof to land on my back in the snow nine feet below.
The wind was knocked out of me, and I felt a sharp stabbing pain in my right side. Above me, the boys were hesitating at the roof’s edge.
As Amy yelled, “Jump! It’s easy,” there was a loud boom from the basement, and the chime of broken glass on the other side of the house as Roy leaped through the front window. The boys jumped and sank in the snow almost to their waists.