Magic Line Read Free Page A

bright eyes on Zeb and mouthed, Tap it . Zeb laid three fingers of his left hand on the glass, tapped them once lightly with the handle of the cutter, and felt the glass move. Robin pulled out the circle, set it quietly on the cement, and replaced the suction cup very carefully in the center of the circle on the inside pane. Zeb began cutting around the cup, close this time, working carefully so he didn’t cut himself on the outer glass.
    The doorbell rang: chimes, a little tune.
    A voice inside, quite near, said something like ‘Who the fuck’s that?’ softly, like he was deciding whether to answer it or not.
    Footsteps – two sets or three? Zeb couldn’t decide. He finished the second cut and Robin hit the puller gently with the heel of his hand. When the glass gave he pulled the circle out, set it down, stuck his hand inside and slowly, gritting his teeth in concentration while he listened, raised the latch. It rolled up without a sound. Zeb, who hadn’t known he was holding his breath, exhaled.
    A different voice, from further forward in the house said, ‘Carpet cleaners. Must have the wrong house.’
    The first voice, moving away, said, ‘Or maybe not. Wait’ll I get the—’ Zeb couldn’t understand the next word. Slowly, ready to stop if he made a noise, Robin slid the window sideways. Dusty venetian blinds hung just to the waist-high sill. Robin moved one slat aside an inch and they saw a stained cotton lining inside a flowered drape. Robin nodded, looking pleased, and turned his back to the opening. He set both hands behind him on the sill, hoisted his butt onto it, mouthed, Let’s go , turned sideways and swung one leg over.
    Inside there was some quiet scurrying, a hinge squealed on what sounded like a cupboard, and the doorbell rang again. There was a whoosh of air as the front door opened and the blind and drape bellied out the open window. Robin was briefly wrapped inside plastic slats and the clinging drape. He pushed it all away and swung his other leg inside. Homer’s big gun roared at the front door; Earl’s barked right behind it. Another gun answered from inside and then a chattering weapon cut loose and drowned out everything else. Somebody screamed in the front yard. Robin dropped inside, ducked under the blind and disappeared.
    Zeb turned his back to the window sill, ready to push himself up and follow Robin into the house. But then there was another great burst of gunfire, and a bullet blew through the left side of the back window, close to the jamb, carrying fragments of flowered drape and plastic blind along with many shards of glass. He felt the wind as it passed his head, and a sliver of glass lodged in his cheek.
    The screaming out front stopped abruptly. There was one more shot inside the house, then silence. And then Zeb heard, from somewhere amazingly close and coming on fast, a siren. It felt like a knife slicing into his brain – the cops were already here!
    He ran like a rabbit. Dropping his glass-cutting tool on the cement, he abandoned Robin, great deeds and easy money – the money he had imagined so clearly, he would have sworn he could feel it weighing down his special pockets.
    There was a break in the wooden fence, down by the corner post. Not large, but he sucked up his gut, held his breath and slithered into the neighbor’s yard. He ducked under sheets on a clothes line, climbed through a wire fence into another yard that was open to the street. Running east on Chardonnay Drive he reached Oak Tree Drive and ran south along it, his tattoos and body piercings flashing in the late-afternoon sun.
    A second patrol car turned into the street, siren screaming. Zeb saw him slow at the sight of a running man, muttered, ‘Oh, shit,’ and began looking for a yard to duck into. But the car’s radio clattered with urgent orders, ‘ten-ninety-nine, see the officer at . . .’ and the address on Spring