THE GETAWAY

With the first rays of sunlight, the manure pile began to gather heat. By ten o'clock, when Carol came suddenly awake, Doc had stripped himself naked except for his shoes and socks, and was sitting crosslegged on his pile of clothes.

He shook his head warningly as she broke into startled laughter, then gri

"I can't decide." She laughed softly. "Maybe I'd better get into the act myself."

She undressed, wiping away the sweat with her clothes, making a cushion of them as Doc had with his. And now that they were alone, Doc showed a great deal of concern about her many cuts and bruises. Carol made little of them; she deserved them, she said, for making a darned fool of herself. But she was pleased by his solicitude, and completely rested and relaxed, she felt very kindly toward him.

Head tilted to one side, she gave him an impish look. Then, leaning forward suddenly, she took his bristled face in her hands and…

A soggy mass struck her on the forehead, slid down across her face. She sat back abruptly, scrubbing and brushing at herself. "Gaah!" she spat disgustedly, nose wrinkled. "Ugh! Of all the filthy, messy…"

"Now, that was a shame," Doc said. "It's the heat, I suppose. It softens this stuff up and…"

"Please!" Shegrimaced. "Isn't it bad enough without you drawing me a picture?"

That was the end of any lovemaking. Doc withdrew behind the calm mask of his face, and Carol sank back into her former listlessness. As the long hours dragged by, she talked to herself silently; jeered the vague they and them for the fools that they were.

A lot of fun, isn't it? Oh, sure! Just like the movies. Real dramatic and exciting. Two big, bad, brainy bank robbers, hiding naked in a pile of manure!

The heat brought hordes of flies. It brought out swarms of corpse-colored grub worms, which dropped down on their heads and backs or crawled up under them from the floor. And it brought a choking, eyewatering stench, which seemed to seep through every pore of their skins.

Once, in desperation, Carol started to swing back the canvas door. But Doc pushed her away from it firmly. "You know better than that. Try a chew of tobacco."

"Tobacco? That'll kill the smell of this stuff?"

"No. But it'll take the taste of it out of your mouth."

She hesitated, then held out her hand. "Gimme. I can't be any sicker than I am already."

She took a small chew. It did make her sicker, but it was a different kind of sickness, and even that was a relief.

She and Doc sat chewing and spitting, not bothering to cover the spittle, not having to. The manure dripped and plopped down on it. And the flies swarmed, and the bugs crawled. And so the long day dragged on, and at last it was night.

Earl carried several pails of water down from the house, and they were able to douse away some of the filth. But the stench and the tobacco-tainted taste of it remained with them. It flavored the little food they were able to eat; in their imagination they could even taste it in the whiskey which Earl served them from a hip-pocket bottle.

There was no one at the house, so Earl had to get back to it quickly. Which meant that Carol and Doc could not linger in the open as they had hoped to. Reluctantly they went back beneath the canvas door flap and into the wretchedness of another night. Doc settled himself down to as much comfort as he could create. Carol moved restlessly from one spot to another on the filthy floor.

Why? she whispered fiercely. Why did they have to be here? First those terrible underwater holes that even a rat would have run from, and now this-this- place. It didn't make sense. After all, there'd been plenty of heat on them after they'd jumped the train, and they'd had to hide then. But never had they holed up in anything as bad as the Santises had provided.

"We were on the move then," Doc pointed out mildly. "We weren't pi

"I don't care! I say we could hide just as well in some place that we could at least stand-that was endurable, I mean."

Doc said that they seemed to have endured thus far. Then, patiently, he went on to explain that the best hiding place was always the one which seemed utterly impossible for human habitation. The water holes, for example; as she had said, even a rat would have shied from them. And now the manure pile. If it was nauseously repellent even at a distance, who would expect anyone to take refuge inside of it?

Carol listened dully. Then ceased to listen. Or to think. She'd better not complain any more, she guessed. Her position was uncertain enough as it was. Unlike Doc, however, she had not schooled herself to accepting what she could not change, so she simply deadened herself to it. Lapsing into a blind, blank lifelessness where time was at once endless and nonexistent.

They were in the manure pile for two more nights and days.

On the third night, Earl came down to them without his usual burden of provisions.

"Grab yourself a bite at the house," he explained. "Get cleaned up, too. Looks like you're on your way."

Earl lounged on the porch, his pack of viciouslooking curs romping around him. Seated around the kitchen table were Ma, the boat captain, Carol and Doc. Carol's hair was cut short to her head. Both she and Doc wore rolled-up stocking caps, jeans, and loosely fitting sweat shirts. To all appearances they were one with the captain's crew-his three kinsmen who stood behind his chair, beaming, frowning, smiling, as the case might be, in exaggerated imitation of his expression.

Right now they were all frowning.

"But twenty-five thousan'!" The captain rolled his eyes heavenward. "What is twenty-five thousan' for such a risk? A mere pittance!"

"Then it ain't really the risk you mind," Ma said drily, "long as you get paid enough for it. That's the way it sizes up, Pete?"

"Well…"

"Sure it is. So you got a bigger risk, and you're gettin' bigger money. Twice what you ever got before. An' that's more'n fair, and it's all you're go

The two money belts were on the table. Ma opened them, and counted out an equal amount from each.

Melodramatically, the captain continued his protests. "It will not do, senhora! Me, I do not mind. We are old friends, an' with friends one is generous. But my crew-" he turned and shook his head at them. "You see? They will not do it! They insis' that…"

"Who you kiddin'?" Ma laughed. "Them ginks don't even know what we're talkin' about."

The captain scowled, then, his ma

He reached for the money. Ma dropped a hamlike hand over it.

"When you get back," she said. "When I get the word from these people that they got to where they weregoin', safe an' sound an' with all their belongins'."

"But-but," the captain sputtered, coloring. "You think I am stool pigeon? You do not trust me, yes?"

"Huh-uh. Didn't say nothin' like that."

"Then why? An' suppose there is trouble? What if! could not come back, eh?"

"Then you wouldn't get no money. An'," she gave him a steady look, "you wouldn't need none, Pete."

His eyes fell. He mumbled weakly that the matter was really nothing to dispute about; he was quite content to wait for his money. Ma nodded, wadded the bills into a roll and tucked it into the front of her dress.

Earl came in from the porch. Everyone shook hands, and Doc suggested lightly that Ma and Earl come along for the journey. They demurred, gri