Manhunt. Volume 14, Number 1, February/March, 1966

He brings his arm up and I can see the gun barrel flash. I try to dive, but he catches me high on the head, and I go down. The room starts spinning and the bulb seems to go out. I’m not sure of the next few minutes. He seems to be talking but I can’t hear him. Only a sound like a leaky faucet dripping water in a metal sink. Slimy, dull, irritating sound. Then the leak takes shape and becomes words splitting through the see-saw room. “You think I’m going to let a dirty little hash-man get the drop on me?” He takes a giant step, and I see his foot pull back and I try to roll under the bed. But his shoe catches me hard under the ribs.

An all-gone feeling of flying and landing all at once. I open my eyes and focus on something that looks like a long, black snake with one fang showing. The snake is crawling out of a clear crystal cave. Then the snake becomes a pen and the cave becomes an inkwell. I think I’m sitting on the hard chair now with my head on the desk, slopping in wet ooze. I can see the color now. It’s blood all over the desk pad. I try to lift my head with my hands, but I can’t. My hands are tied. Then I see him standing over me like a monster balloon in a kid parade. I try to say something, but my lips seem huge and puffy. Then I know. He must have pistol-whipped me while I was out.

“So you found out!” he’s screaming. He grabs me by the hair and snaps my head back. “You know who I am, don’t you?”

There’s nothing to lose now. I know I’m going to die. “Yes. I know you’re Klegman.” I think he’s going to hit me again and I close my eyes hard. But sirens cutting through the walls of the cabin stop him. The racket jolts him into action. He jumps over to the bed and flips open the lid of the bag. Bleary and sick as I am, I almost laugh. That was the bulky thing under the blankets I was aiming at before. Not him!

He throws on his jacket and tweed topcoat, then starts stuffing wads of bills into his pockets. When they are full, he tucks more under his belt, even in his hat. He looks like a kid playing with funny money. He sees me watching him and laughs. “Here’s a present for you, hash man.” He heaves the bag across the room at me. “They can bury you in it.”

The one light in the room becomes many lights rolling into each other slowly then out again in crazy patterns. Klegman’s only an outline now, bearing down on me like a hawk.

“You’re taking me out of here, do you hear me!” he yells. The panic has shifted now to him. Me? I don’t care any more. I mumble something about all the roadblocks.

“We’ll cut off somewhere,” Klegman says. “You must know all the roads around here. The back roads!”

I remember something. Like a dim candle in a mammoth cave. “A car. You don’t have a car.”

“But you do!” he said. “That old Ford out front. That’s yours, isn’t it?” I didn’t say anything. He rips into my pockets and finds the keys. “You drive!” he snaps.

“We won’t get out of the driveway,” I tell him. Time. That’s what I need. Just a little time. Say anything. Do anything.

“Let me worry about that!” he says. “I know cops. They won’t shoot with you at the wheel. Little crumbs like you are precious to them. They won’t shoot you!”

“What about the roadblocks?”

“Go right through ’em. And if you try anything funny, I’ll blast your brains all over the windshield!”

“I can’t see so good. You hit me on the head. I don’t think I can drive.” Say anything. Do anything.

“You’ll drive, Pop!” Klegman grabs me by the arm and hoists me to my feet. I’m surprised how strong he is. I must outweigh him by fifty pounds. He fumbles at my wrists and my hands are suddenly free. “Let’s go.” He swings open the door and I toe out like a baby trying his first step.

Strange how you remember small things. How the moonlight falls on winter ground, shadows on dead branches, the wind in the tall trees. For a minute I feel like a guy in a theatre looking at a movie. Soon, this bloody, violent picture will be over and I’ll get up and go home. I’ll say what everybody says, “This could never happen in real life.”

There’s a sharp, whisking noise. Like the noise scrubbing brushes make on a rough floor. Traffic sounds, I guess. And the snapping of wet towels on a clothesline. Twigs breaking underfoot.

Klegman prods me along with his gun and I stumble along thinking one thing now. And it’s life, death, hell, and heaven for me. Run! Get away! But I can’t. He’d cut me down in a second. His life or mine. I must have fallen. He’s heaving me up onto my feet again... like a bag of wet laundry.

I’m at the car now fumbling with the handle. Then I’m inside trying to remember where the starter is. Button on the dash, that’s it. Now, hit it! Hit it fast! There’s a gun at my head and the driveway spins like grey ribbon in the moonlight and I’m going to die.

Off the drive, onto the asphalt. Suddenly a ring of dark metal shapes, wedged tight together and moving in from the right and left... cops! God in Heaven! Cops!

“It’s a trap!” Klegman screams. “Head for that driveway!”