Стивен Хантер - G-Man

Les never entered. His job was to slide down the block and station himself at the corner of Michigan and Wayne, since any big cop action would come hauling ass down Main and it was his job to persuade them to seek other objectives with a few T-gun bursts that would send them crashing onto curbs or into parked cars. He sort of hoped it would happen. There was nothing he loved more than the hydraulic surge of the gun’s recoil, the spew of spent shells, spurting gases, a radiance like a sustained photo flash from his muzzle, and above that wonderful drama, a vision of the world gone to chaos and anarchy, as his bursts ripped anything they touched.

Then he heard the burst from inside the bank.

Oh, boy, he thought, this is going to be fun.

Then he heard a shot from the bank entrance, where Homer patrolled with his long rifle.

Homer saw the cop before the cop saw him. Homer had no joke for the cop, since all humorous impulses had left him and now he was down to business, to his own personality, which consisted of little other than the willingness to use force and the hunger to succeed as a bank robber. The money wasn’t even the important part. His bad jokes hid an ambition to be good at his job. It got him nice clothes, late-model cars, and hot women like Mickey Conforti who knew stuff he didn’t even realize existed.

But even though images of Mickey’s creamy thighs were never far from his mind, when he heard the Thompson burst from inside, knew it was loud enough to rattle teacups and window frames and policemen, he knew instantly that everything had changed, that what was to be a quick in-out would now be a crazed gun battle, and if you didn’t push the attack, you ended up caught in an alley.

At the same time, he immediately found the cop, who had been directing traffic in an intersection, approaching with caution, a kind of low infantryman’s jog, unsure, wary, but his revolver in his hand. Homer didn’t wait a second. The .351 went smoothly to shoulder exactly as the finger found the trigger and the muscles locked the gun tight against the body and the dominant eye found the bead sight, brought it into focus, while behind it the blue tunic of the officer seventy-five yards out was fuzzy. His finger, educated in trigger craft, pressed nicely and the rifle fired, much of its recoil absorbed by the mechanics of the automatic function, ejecting an empty, admitting a new round to chamber, locking it in, resetting the trigger. The cop seemed to elongate under the impact of the center-chest hit, then lost all energy, tried to keep upright with compensatory leg action but instead twisted, turned, and went hard to street, where he lay, flattened and splayed. But then there was nothing else to shoot at, as it seemed the crowds on the street had panicked and people were racing crazily to get out of the fire zone. Homer hunted for targets in blue.

With the shot, Les abandoned all pretext of being man hiding machine gun and became man holding machine gun. It came out from under, and he felt a surge of love for the big thing, true beauty in his eyes, feeling his fingers clutch hard into the front grip, clutch hard into the pistol grip (no need for safety switch off, because he didn’t believe in safeties and went everywhere with his guns hot), buttstock wedged between his arm and pressing ribs.

The image alone — gangster man, heavily armed, pivoting and swinging the muzzle of the Thompson, face grim and merciless, jaw clenched, fedora low, from half a hundred picture shows — drove the masses at his end of the street into panic, and he watched — it was almost funny, people dropping their bags, moms snatching up babies, dads putting themselves between the gunman and their kids — as all seemed to go into spasms and lurches, all thoughts of dignity gone, running wildly, some tripping, sprawling, picking themselves up. They looked like clowns! This was fun!

Then he got shot.

Plaster fell from the ceiling where Charlie’s shots had torn it up. As expected, all customers went into paralysis, then, on Charlie’s second order, fell to the ground in sloppy, demeaning fear. Johnny busted through the gate, holding his .45 and yelling, “Tellers, hands up, don’t be no hero, the bank don’t care.”

Fast and professionally, Johnny scooted down the aisle, pulling out a clutch of flour bags tucked into his pants under his coat and flipping one to each teller.

“You throw the big bills in, take as many of the small ones as you can get into your pockets, cinch up the bag, and hold it out for me. That means you too, sister,” putting the .45 close to the head of an older woman, who had momentarily frozen.

She swallowed and unfroze.

“Attagirl,” he said, “knew you wouldn’t let me down.” He threw her a wink.

He moved down the aisle until he’d passed out six bags, moved back, picked each one up, felt each heavy with wads of cash. But that wasn’t the big money. With the six bags looped over his left arm, he kicked in the door to the administrative office, where men in suits stood, gray-faced, in a nest of desks and adding machines.

“I am John Dillinger,” he said, “and you know why I am here. Where’s the postal money? You, pops, you look important, where is it?”

He had chosen wisely. The old man had no need to defy him, no urge for heroics, no desire for trouble or pain, and weakly gestured to the two canvas sacks, secured by padlocks, on the desk, U.S. MAIL, in official typeface, emblazoned hugely on the outside.

“That’s what we came for, pops, you’re a peach!” Johnny said, and as a strong fellow had no trouble scooping up the two bags in his left hand while keeping the .45 in motion, sweeping the rigid managers and vice presidents.

“Nice doing business with you folks,” he said, smiling in his charming way, then turning to join Charlie, and as they turned to leave, at that moment it seemed that the Great War had come back to the earth again and landed square on Michigan Street, U.S.A.

It occurred to Les he wasn’t going to die, though it felt like someone had kicked him in the center of the chest. He fogged a second, then remembered: bulletproof vest! What a smart move that had been. But in the next instant rage flashed hot and white and spastically, and he turned, seeing no shooter, and decided, what the hell, this’ll get their heads down.

He squeezed off a long burst in the general direction of everywhere, and his bullets danced everywhere, and everywhere they shattered storefront windows in cascades of sleet, pulled hurricanes of debris up from the street, or whanged hard with thrumming vibration as they drilled half-inch blisters into fenders and hoods of abandoned cars.

That was so much fun.

And then — what is it with these people, first he gets shot, then this! — some monkey lit on his back and began smacking at his arms, as if he was trying to get him to drop the gun.

You sonovabitch, thought Les, and he drove himself hard backwards against the wall, felt the man on his back flatten with the impact, wriggled an arm free from the pinioning arms engulfing him, and managed to drive three or four hard elbows into the monkey’s rib cage. Then he rammed the cargo against the wall again, heard the creature grunt in pain, all the while Les twisting energetically to break the grip.

It had all gone away. No bank robbery, no Tommy gun, no goddamned South Bend, just this sonovabitch riding him, holding on hard for life, as if Les were some kind of bucking animal, and at last Les felt his grip loosen, so again he smashed backwards and this time, groaning in pain, the hero slipped off.

Les spun to confront him, discovering a teenager under a mop of disheveled hair, stepped back as the boy raised his hands in fear, as if to ward off what fate had in store for him, so Les drove gun butt into face, feeling a wet, satisfying thud on impact, driving the kid back into plate glass, which surrendered, and the boy went down in a waterfall of sparkles and lay, covered by diamonds and shards and splinters, in a jewelry-store window frame.