Free Hostage For A Hood by Lionel White Page A

from the floor above, but both of them were oblivious to it. It wasn't until the sharp double ring of the telephone reached their ears that they pulled away from each other.
    Cribbins was off of the couch and switching on the light before the sound had ceased. "Get it," he said.
    Paula got up slowly, a small, secret smile on her bruised, sensuous lips. She crossed the room, moving slowly. A moment later he heard her voice coming from the hallway, and almost before he could get to his feet she was back in the room.
    "You better take it, Harry," she said. "I think it's Goldman."
    He was several minutes on the phone and Paula strained her ears to listen. But Cribbins merely grunted once or twice, saying nothing after his original hello. Finally he replaced the receiver and came back into the living room. He reached down and took the half-filled glass which held the warm remains of his drink and downed it. He was frowning when at last he spoke.
    "It was Goldman, all right," he said. "He's heard from the boys. The cops got Mitty. Picked him up while he was trying to snatch a car in Brookside."
    "And the others?"
    "They made it back to town. They're laying low."
    Paula pulled the robe closer around her body and shook her hair out of her eyes. There was a worried, anxious expression on her face.
    "Harry," she said, "let's get out of here. Let's blow. Right now." She looked at him with a sudden sly expression. "Come on, Harry," she said. "Just you and me. We've got the money—let's get out of here."
    He looked at her speculatively, so that she knew he was considering it, considering everything. Then at last he hunched his shoulders and shook his head.
    "Don't be a damned fool, kid," he said. "Don't go panicky and blow your top. So they got Mitty. So what? Mitty won't talk. Mitty is as safe as the Bank of England. No one saw him during the stickup except possibly the driver, and he's dead. The guy in the back of the truck was out like a light. No, Mitty will keep his mouth shut."
    Paula stared at him and opened her mouth to speak, but he went on, not giving her a chance.
    "No, it's more important than ever that we stay now," he said. "Mitty will never talk as long as he knows we're here waiting for him. No one saw Mitty, and Mitty is safe."
    "No one saw Mitty," Paula said slowly, "except the girl. The girl upstairs. She saw all of you. Remember that, Harry. She saw all of you."
    Cribbins nodded. "I'm remembering. Never fear, kid, I'm remembering."

6.
     
     
    Karl Mitty was tired. Jees, it was funny what a couple of years of soft living could do to a guy. Funny how you could get out of shape so fast. He was dead tired; he could hardly keep his eyes open. Even with the bright light shining down into his face from the two-hundred-watt bulb, the hard, stiff chair under his buttocks and the occasional hard fist which was pushed under his chin to bring his face up, he still could hardly keep from closing his eyes and falling asleep.
    My God, you'd think these guys would give up, that they'd get tired too. Except of course it wasn't the same guys. They kept shifting around; new ones coming in to replace the ones who had grown hoarse and drenched with sweat as they stood in a semicircle around him and aimed the questions, like stiff-armed punches, at his head.
    He was tired, but really he had to laugh. Did they think that they could wear him down? Why, for Christ's sake, these guys were cream puffs. Soft bums who got silly in their heads from plush living. Karl Mitty had taken plenty in his day, and he could still take all these bums had to dish out—and then some. And they didn't have a thing on him, not one damned thing. He wasn't smart, but he could tell that by the questions they kept repeating over and over again.
    He'd lost track of the time a long while back and of course down here in the concrete, windowless basement room, he was unable to tell whether it was night or day, but he guessed he must have spent at least twenty hours in