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The girl's face cringed. "I just had to sit there and pretend that I didn't care. Spang
stayed and listened and watched me. Then they checked up on the ropes and slung
you into the waiting room and everyone went happily to bed. I waited an hour in my
room and then I got busy. The worst part was trying to wake you up."
Bond tightened his arm round her shoulders. "I'll tell you what I think of you when it
doesn't hurt so much. But what about you, Tiffany? You'll be in a jam if they catch up
with us. And who are those two men in the hoods, Wint and Kidd? What are they going
to do about all this? I wouldn't mind seeing a little more of those two."
The girl glanced sideways at the grim curl of the bruised lips. "Never seen them
without those hoods on," she said truthfully. "They're supposed to be from Detroit.
Strictly bad news. They do the strongarm work and special undercover jobs. They'll all
be after us now. But don't you worry about me." She looked up at him again and her
eyes were shining and happy. "First thing is to get this crate to Rhyolite. Then we'll
have to find a car somewhere and get over the state border into California. I've got
plenty of money. Then we'll get you to a doctor and buy you a bath and a shirt and think
again. I got your gun. One of the help brought it over when they'd finished picking up
the pieces of those two guys you wrassled with in the Pink Garter. I collected it after
Spang had gone to bed." She unbuttoned her shirt and dug into the waistband of her
slacks.
Bond took the Beretta, feeling the warmth of her on the metal. He flicked out the
magazine. Three rounds left. And one in the breach. He replaced the magazine, put the
gun on safe and tucked it into the top of his trousers. For the first time he realized that
his coat was gone. One of his shirt sleeves hung in tatters. He tore it off and threw it
away. He felt for the cigarette case in his right-hand hip pocket. It was gone. But in the
left-hand pocket there was still his passport and note-case. He pulled them out. By the
light of the moon he could see that they were cracked arid dented. He felt for his money
in the note-case. It was still there. He put the things back in his pocket.
For a while they drove on with only the purr of the little engine and the clickety-click of
the wheels to break the looming silence of the night. For as far as they could see, the
thin silver line of the rails spun on towards the horizon with only an occasional break,
marked by a points lever, where a rusty branch line curved off into the dark mass of the
Spectre Mountains on their right. To their left, there was nothing except the endless
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floor of the desert on which the hint of dawn was beginning to edge the writhing cactus
clumps with blue, and, two miles away, the gun-metal shimmer of the moon on Highway
95.
The handcar sang happily on down the rails. There were no controls to bother with
except a brake lever and a kind of joystick with a twist-grip accelerator which the girl
held fully open with the speedometer steady at thirty. And the miles and the minutes
clicked by, and every now and then Bond turned painfully in his seat and inspected the
blossoming red glow in the sky behind them.
They had been going nearly an hour when a thin humming undertone in the air or on
the rails made Bond stiffen. Again he looked back over his shoulder. Was there a tiny
glow-worm glimmer between them and the false red dawn of the burning ghost town?
Bond's scalp tingled. "D'you see anything back there?"
She turned her head. Then, without replying, she slowed the engine down so that
they were coasting quietly.
They both listened. Yes. It was in the rails. A soft quivering, not more than a distant
sigh.
"It's The Cannonball," said Tiffany flatly. She gave a sharp twist to the accelerator and
the handcar sped on again.
"What can she do?" asked Bond.
"Maybe sixty."
"How far to Rhyolite?"
"Around thirty."
Bond worked on the figures for a moment in silence. "It's going to be a near thing.
Can't tell how far away he is. Can you get anything more out of this?"
"Not a scrap," she said grimly. "Even if my name was Casey Jones instead of Case."
"We'll be all right," said Bond. "You keep her rolling. Maybe he'll blow up or
something."
"Oh, sure," she said. "Or maybe the spring'll run down and he's left the key of his
engine at 'home in his pants pocket."
For fifteen minutes they sped along in silence and now Bond could clearly see the
great pilot-light of the engine cutting through the night, not more than five miles away,
and an angry fountain above it from the woodsparks flaming out of the great dome of
the smoke-stack. The rails were trembling beneath them and what had been a distant
sigh was a low threatening murmur.
Perhaps he'll run out of wood, thought Bond. On an impulse he said casually to the
girl, "I suppose we're all right for gas?"
"Oh, sure," said Tiffany. "Put in a whole can. There's no indicator, but these things'll
run for ever on a gallon of gas."
Almost before the words were out of her mouth, and as if to comment on them, the
little engine gave a deprecating cough. 'Put. Put-put.' Then it ran merrily on.
"Christ," said Tiffany. "D'you hear that?"
Bond said nothing. He felt the palms of his hands go wet.
And again. 'Put. Put-put."
Tiffany Case gingerly nursed the accelerator.
"Oh, dear little engine," she said plaintively. "Beautiful, clever little engine. Please be
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kind."
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