Robert Moore - Hard guys and hostages

Butch tripped and fell on the way up the three steps leading to the back door, and that set a dog barking somewhere in the outbuildings. Max swore and looked at Butch in a threatening way. Pete was trying not to laugh and, at the same time, was looking a little pissed off himself at Butch. But it was really no use getting pissed off at Butch, any more than it would be worthwhile getting pissed off at a six-year-old kid. Butch looked a little ashamed of himself (as always when he'd done something stupid) and picked up the gun he'd dropped. He wiped it on the leg of the pants he'd taken off the body of the fat guy who had stopped to give Pete a ride.

Max tried the door just in case, but, of course, it was locked. Anyone living this far out in the boonies would have the sense to lock the doors at night. The dog stopped barking, and Max listened. There wasn't a sound from the house. He laid his shoulder against the door and pushed a little. It wasn't like a Greek Orthodox church, but it wasn't ready to buckle at a sneeze, either. Max beckoned to Butch, and the big gorilla leaned close to him.

"See if you can open it up without waking half the county, will you?" Butch nodded and put the gun in his pocket. A gun never looked very impressive in his hands. It always looked like a toy. He put one hand on the knob, completely obscuring it, and with the other he got as good a grip as he could on the door frame. He pushed on the door a few times, each time a little harder than the last. The door made a grating sound as metal rubbed against metal. The house was old and the wood was probably more than a little rotten.

Butch looked at Max and grinned and leaned down again and put a little of his back into it. The door went in a little further this time and stayed that way. Another shove and Butch forced the lock apart. There wasn't a chain, and if there was a latch the owner hadn't thrown it.

Inside it was like any old fashioned farm house. They walked from the service porch to the kitchen, and then into a hall that led the length of the place. There were two bedrooms to the right of the hill, and a dining room and a living room to the left. Between the service porch and the dining room was a single bathroom, and at the other end, clear across the front of the place, was a screened-in porch. There wasn't anyone in the place.

Naturally Butch started to turn on a light as soon as they had made sure no one was there. Max stopped him with an impatient gesture. "We keep the place dark," he said. "The owners will be coming back sometime tonight, and we want them to walk in without suspecting anything. Right?" Butch thought that one over for a moment.

"Oh, sure. Sure, I didn't think o' that, Max," he said apologetically.

They sat in the living room with their guns across their laps. Max made a search of the closets first and found a shotgun and a rifle in one of them. There was some ammunition, too, and he loaded the two weapons and gave the shotgun to Pete. Pete liked a shotgun. He had used one in all of his jobs.

While they were waiting, Max turned on an old-fashioned radio, and they listened to the bulletins about themselves. The bulletins would have been encouraging if they had been trustworthy. The trouble was, you could never believe them. The State Cops were cagier than that.

About one o'clock in the morning a car turned down the long, graveled drive that led from the highway. Pete sat up a little straighter with the pump action shotgun ready in his hands, and Max reached out with one foot and nudged Butch, who had been snoring softly for a half hour. He turned off the radio and hissed to Pete, "Go around to the back door, just in case they come in that way. If they see the busted door they may try to get out of here. Don't let 'em."

Pete nodded in the dimness and headed through the dining room to the bathroom. Butch looked at Max and smiled that crazy-kid smile of his that always give Max the creeps. He had his gun in his hand. Max motioned to a place beside the double doors leading from the living room to the screened-in porch. "Put the gun away," he ordered. "If they come in that way, you knock the man out of action, if there is a man. If there's a woman with him, and she starts to make noise, cool her too."

Butch grinned, put the.38 back in his pocket and walked over to the place beside the door. There was another door, a regular-sized one, leading into the hall from the porch, and Max decided to cover that one from the back bedroom. He cocked the hammer of the lever-action rifle and kept his finger light on the trigger. The dog started barking again just as the car pulled abreast of the house. It moved on to the back of the place, and Max heard the emergency brake rasp to a locked position. So they were probably coming in the back way. Max headed down the hall at a fast walk, motioning to Butch to stay where he was. He made it to the kitchen just as the doors were slamming on the car. A couple of people got out and started toward the back door. Max could see them through the window. It was very dark, but he could tell that the figures were a man and a woman. Voices reached him, too soft to be understood, but the voices sounded young. The woman laughed, a silvery sound he hadn't heard in three years. It made his bowels turn over and his cock stiffen.

The couple had closed the door after coming in, of course, as well as they could close it. They came up the stairs and the man started to fit a key into the lock, then stopped. Max could almost hear the puzzlement in his silence.

"That's funny." The words were incredibly clear at this distance.

The woman answered with a question. "What, darling?"

It was impossible to see them now because of the angle of the wall.

"Let's go back to the car," the man said, and there was a grimness in his voice. He was a sharp son of a bitch, Max thought. That would be something to remember. He moved toward the service porch as the thought took shape in his mind. He reached it just as Pete came out of the bathroom with the shotgun in his hands, and Max motioned him toward the door. Pete yanked it open with one hand and stuck the shotgun through and out into the night.

"All right, folks," he said, "just step right in."

Max was in the service porch now, and he could see the man, still standing on the stoop with his keys in his hand. He looked as though he was thinking of trying something with Pete, but then he saw Max and the rifle and apparently decided not to fuck around with two armed men. Max pointed the rifle in the direction of the woman. "You heard the man. Come in. Both of you."

The woman looked at her husband for a moment, and then they both came in. The woman was carrying some kind of a bundle, and it took Max a moment to realize that it was a child all wrapped up and asleep. Pete pointed the shotgun at the woman and baby, and Max put the rifle down against the wall and frisked the guy.

"We don't have any money," the man said.

"That's all right," Max told him. "We're not after money, friend. We just want some hospitality for a while."

"My God," the woman said suddenly. "Jim, they're the" She broke off. Max smiled at her.

"That's right, sweety. We're the escaped convicts. You two hear about us on the car radio?" He waited for her to answer, but she just stood there in the darkness, and Max asked again, "Did you hear about us?"

"Yes," she said. "Yes, we heard."

"Well, then, you know we're nobody to fuck with." The language made her start a little, and the guy looked pissed off about it, but of course there wasn't anything he could do. Max switched on the light and looked at them. They were squinting in the sudden brightness.

The woman was a real looker. She was blonde and in her early twenties, Max guessed. She was about five-four, and she had a shape like a bathing suit model, with legs to match. Her face was something you could see on the cover of a magazine, and she wore her hair long, down around her face. She was more than pretty, he decided. She was a real beauty, and that would make things pleasant for however long it was necessary to stay in this Goddamn place.