Jean-Patrick Manchette - The Mad and the Bad

“Slow down,” Thompson ordered. “Look for signs to Boen or Roanne.”

“Christ alive!” shouted Coco. “There! Look there! Stop! Over there! The girl! She’s here!”

Nénesse slammed on the brakes. The Simca pulled to the left as it slowed. Eyeing his rearview mirror, Nénesse spun the wheel frenziedly. He felt a violent force applied to the side of his body. Skidding, the Simca performed a U-turn on the spot, blocking a Renault 4CV coming the other way. Coco and Thompson were half thrown from their seats. Their car had gone some fifty meters past Julie and Peter. The girl stood motionless, stricken, at the edge of the sidewalk, which was lined with plane trees.

“We kill her immediately and leave via the National 496,” declared Thompson.

He reached inside his jacket.

“We’re not hanging her anymore?” asked Coco in bewilderment.

“We kill her. That’s all that matters.”

The Simca hurtled towards Julie with its engine roaring. The girl seemed to come alive. She took Peter by the arm and ran between cars parked on the sidewalk.

Thompson’s hand emerged from his jacket armed with a bizarre-looking SIG automatic of the kind used for target practice. It could have been mistaken for a rather unrealistic toy gun. With his other hand he rolled down the window of his car door as quickly as he could.

Ten meters from his goal Nénesse downshifted. Braked by its transmission, the Simca slowed rapidly and leant forward on its tired suspension. Thompson heard Coco’s shot detonate right by his ear. Julie dived headlong into the dust, but Thompson spotted the bullet’s impact point, too high, on the roof of a parked Renault 4. Julie was crawling as fast as she could around the car. Thompson’s innards were in the grip of an iron hand. He saw Peter’s pale face lined up with his sighting mark and squeezed the trigger of the SIG just as Nénesse gave the steering wheel a violent twist. The round passed just beneath the little boy’s ear.

“I’m going to crush them,” said Nénesse.

The Simca, turning so sharply that it almost flipped over, mounted the sidewalk, lost contact with the ground, and swiveled head-to-tail.

“Fucking shit!” cried Nénesse.

Julie, still holding Peter by the hand, set off in the opposite direction, zigzagging among the parked cars. Coco fired just under Thompson’s nose for the second time, his hot powder scorching the Britisher’s face. The Simca, still skidding, collided with the R 4 and tore off a fender. Julie dashed between two vehicles.

“Pull out of here, Nénesse!” yelled Coco. “We’re fucked.”

Coco emptied his revolver at random. Rounds ricocheted wildly off bodywork. Triplex glass rained down. Its motor still roaring, the Simca jounced back onto the roadway, leaving Julie behind.

“Stop, you idiot. I order you to stop,” said Thompson in a steely voice.

Nénesse was not listening. His lips were blue. Thompson struck his fingers with the barrel of his automatic weapon. Nénesse braked hard.

“What do you. . you want?” he stammered. “You want. . want us to be picked up on the spot?”

“The kid and the girl. They must be killed.”

“In three minutes the cops will be here.”

“In three minutes I’ll have killed them. U-turn!”

Nénesse did nothing.

“U-turn or I kill you,” said Thompson, digging the barrel of the SIG into the man’s ribs.

Nénesse blinked and started up.

“Three minutes,” he said between gritted teeth.

A hundred meters behind them a crowd was gathering. Farther away, Thompson saw Julie and Peter disappearing down a side street. People were running. The Simca turned round and headed for the throng.

“There they are,” cried the locals. “It’s them!”

“Drive right through the lot of them,” said Thompson. “Then take the first left.”

The Simca drove right through the lot of them. The locals scattered, shouting. Nénesse clung tightly to the steering wheel. The tires sang as the car turned sharply into a little cobbled street. At the far end, Julie and Peter were running. They were crossing a bridge. The Simca bounded after them. The roadway was crowded with people. They were forced to press themselves against the walls and the shopwindows. Cries of protest filled the air.

On the far side of the bridge milling hordes completely blocked the street. Peter and Julie melted into the mass. Nénesse braked vigorously. Once again the car pulled to the left as it came to a halt.

“That didn’t get us very far,” said the driver.

Just round a sharp turn thousands of people were besieging stalls set up in the middle of the street. Vehicular traffic was out of the question. Julie’s gray-and-brown silhouette could be glimpsed in the crowd. Thompson punched violently at the inside of the car door.

“Coco and I will continue on foot. Nénesse, you go and park this car on the boulevard and then steal another one.”

“You’re cracked,” Nénesse hissed.

“We’ll meet in the café-tobacconist you just saw on the boulevard. It’s called Les Fleurs. In a quarter of an hour. Don’t forget my case.”

“A quarter of an hour!” groaned Nénesse.

“Bye-bye,” said Thompson.

He got out of the Simca and shouldered his way roughly into the crowd. Coco did not move.

“Let’s get the fuck out of here,” he said.

“No,” sighed his brother. “He’s the boss. And he’s a pro. Just do what he says.”

Julie was dazed. Her head, her eyes were in a fog. When a gap in the crowd opened up, she bounded through it, tugging Peter along behind her. The little boy was stupefied with terror. Over the hatted heads a clear space could be seen. Julie turned to look back. Amid the crush she spotted Thompson getting nearer with great long strides, a tall silhouette, thin and dried-up and gray-haired. If he got a clear shot he would be able to pot the girl like a target at a fairground shooting gallery. From a hundred meters Julie could make out the man’s teeth gleaming in his lined face. She raced straight towards a Prisunic fronting the street and entered through the glass doors.

She charged down the aisles. The store occupied the ground-floor level of an entire block. Beyond the vast accumulation of commodities more glass doors opened onto another street and an esplanade black with people. Julie charged in that direction. She must get out ahead of Thompson. Melt into the crowd. She jostled housewives as she passed.

The girl was no more than a few meters from the exit doors when Coco materialized on the other side of the glass. Blinking, he looked at Julie, who had pulled up short. He seemed hesitant, almost fearful.

Julie made an about-turn, twisting Peter’s arm. The boy began to cry.

“Oh, shut up! Shut up!” cried Julie. “It’s over.”

She rushed up to a salesgirl.

“Mademoiselle, call the police right away.”

“What?”

“The police! Call the police!”

“But what’s going on?” demanded the salesgirl, taking a step back.

She scrutinized Julie with a suspicious smile tugging at her lips; twenty meters away, Coco came in through the glass doors. Suddenly he dashed forward. Julie whirled round. Tableware was on display close by, and she swept a pile of unbreakable plates onto the floor. They did not break.

“You’re crazy!” exclaimed the salesgirl, taking another leap backwards.

“Murderer!” yelled Julie with all her might.

Pirouetting once more, she slapped the salesgirl violently across the face and set off at a run. She never let go of Peter, who lost his balance and fell forward still firmly in Julie’s grasp. She did not release him, hauling him along at top speed, his feet dragging on the tile floor. He was bawling at the top of his lungs. At the other end of the Prisunic, Thompson had entered the store and stood motionless, his pistol dangling at the end of his arm, barrel pointing towards the floor.