"searchlightsontheriver" - читать интересную книгу автора (Barton Gary)

A gun blasted from outside; flaming tongues biting into the darkness. I rolled on the floor,
my own gun free from my shoulder holster, now, jumping and vomiting death in my fist. Two
fast shots at the window, then two more.

Norma was screaming.

I held back the trigger of my automatic till the hammer clicked emptily. The gun was hot
in my hand.

But my last shot had drawn a terrified cry from outside the window. The gunfire had
stopped, and there was the sound of someone fighting his way back through the bushes and
shrubbery.

Norma's frightened sobs came from over near the bookcase, and the radio was blaring.
For a long time I stayed where I crouched on the floor, not moving. Then I reached up and
snapped on the light switch.

Ricky Sloane was standing in the archway from the hall. His face was sallow and almost
gray; his eyes were like hot coals in a skull. The brown tweed suit he wore was soaking wet.

"Don't move, Ricky," I said. I leveled my automatic.

"Don't kid me, copper." His voice was raw and bitter. "I counted the slugs you sent
through that window."

He moved quickly across the room and took the gun from Norma. "My best pal, weren't you,
Johnny? My sister's sweetheart." He laughed nastily; it wasn't funny. "My best pal in on the
frame that sent me up on the Rock.

"Remember what I told you when they took me away, Johnny? I said that, somehow, I was
going to beat that place just long enough to get you. Well, here I am, copper. And this is
where you hear slow music."

His gun came up slowly, and even from where I was I could see his finger turn very red,
then white.

I don't know how I kept my voice from shaking. Everything else about me was shaking.

I said, "It looks as though someone else remembered what you told me, Ricky." I nodded
toward the broken window, at the charred, round holes in the window shade and the chipped
plaster on the wall. "Who wants to rub me out besides you, Ricky?"

Some of the coldness went out of his eyes for the moment, and the gun wavered. Then his
lips drew tight against his teeth. The gun came up again.

There wasn't any use talking now. Ricky Sloane was on the kill, and nothing was going to
stop him. His eyes were like the eyes of a crazy man. I was waiting for the slug when the
news announcer cut in on the radio.

"Another bulletin on the Richard Sloane escape. Barney Walters, State's witness in the