The Getaway (Read a Great Movie) Read Free

they've got on hand and so on?"
    "I've seen 'em, but they never made any sense to me. I mean, well, it always looks to me like they got just enough to pay their bills with. They ain't got any more at the end of the year than they had in the beginning."
    Rudy chuckled. "I'm with you, Jackie. But they mean plenty to Doc. He can read them things like they was funny books."
    "Plenty foxy, huh? A real brain." The kid shook his head admiringly, not noticing Rudy's sudden scowl. "But how come we're goin' so far out of our way to skim out, Rudy? Why go all the way up and across the country when we're only a few hundred miles from the border here?"
    "You don't like it?" said Rudy. "You stupid sap, they'd be expecting us to travel in a beeline."
    "Sure, sure," Jackson mumbled hastily. "What about that place we're holing up in? They really can't extradite us from there? Not no way?"
    "You got nothing to worry about," Rudy told him. And again, for the moment, he was pitying. "There's this one old geezer, El Rey- that means The King, y'know, in Mex-well, him and his family, his sons and grandsons and nephews and so on, they run the place. The state or province or what the hell ever it's called. They really run it, know what I mean? They're the cops and the judges and the prosecutors and everything else. So long as you pay off and don't make no trouble with the locals, you're sittin' pretty."
    The kid whistled appreciatively. "But, look. What's to keep 'em from grabbing a guy's loot, and knocking him off? I mean-uh-well, I guess that wouldn't be so smart, would it? The word would get around, and they wouldn't get no more customers."
    "Just about one like you, and they wouldn't want any more," Rudy grunted. "You'd spread them idiot germs around, an' the whole population would turn stupid."
    "I'm sorry-I didn't mean nothin'."
    "And you don't. A big fat zero, that's you," Rudy said. And that was the end of his pity.
    They had shaved late the night before, and they managed a wash by tipping the water jug over one another's hands. They combed their hair, brushed their clothes thoroughly with a whisk broom, and then, completely dressed, checked each other's appearance.
    They wore dark suits, white shirts, and hats of a semi-Homburg type. Except for their shoulder-holstered guns and their briefcases, they took nothing with them when they went out the back door to their car. The briefcases were large-much larger than they looked-and bore a bold-letter OFFICE OF STATE above an equally bold-stamped BANK EXAMINER. The car, with its immensely souped-up motor, appeared to be just another black, low-priced sedan.
    Jackson climbed in with the briefcases, swung open the door on the driver's side and started the motor. Rudy peered around the corner of the abandoned house. A truck had just passed on the way into Beacon City. There was nothing else in sight. Rudy leaped into the car, gunned the motor and sent it rocketing down the weed-bordered lane to the highway.
    He whipped it onto the highway, wheels skidding. He relaxed, slowing its speed, taking a long, deep breath. Maybe it wouldn't have mattered if someone had seen them coming out of the lane. They could have turned into it accidentally, or maybe to fix a tire on the buggy. Still, that was maybe, and maybes were bad stuff. A very small one, one that hadn't seemed big enough to kick out of the way, had tumbled Rudy the Piehead into Alcatraz for a ten-year fall.
    He kept one eye on his wristwatch as he drove. They entered town on schedule to the minute, and Rudy spoke to the kid in a tight, quiet voice. "Now, this is going to be all right," he said. "Doc knows his job, I know mine. You're green, but it don't make any difference. All you got to do is just what you're told- just follow my lead-and we'll roll through it like smoke through a chimney."
    "I-I'm not afraid, Rudy."
    "Be afraid. What the hell? Just keep a cork on it."
    At the corner two blocks above the bank, Rudy slowed the car to a crawl,