Trouble in Paradise

Okay, Jesse thought, two less bad guys. More money for the ones that are left. Neither one is Macklin. Neither one looks like the Indian.

I don't know the deal. I don't know who did the shooting, but now I know who got shot. I think they've got hostages. I don't know how many. I don't know how many bad guys there are. I can't go charging in there. I don't even know where exactly they are. Maybe they're not in there.

Jesse sca

Okay, now I know how they plan to get off. Doesn't do me much good. I cant do anything about it until I shake the hostages loose. Or even know who they've got or how many.

There was nothing to do at the moment, Jesse realized, but what he was doing. Stay here in the shadows and watch the candles glimmer in the windows and await developments. He thought about Marcy and how afraid she must be. He wondered how she was handling it. He was scared himself, he knew, but he was used to it. He'd been scared before, and he was able to put it away in one corner of himself and proceed as if the rest of him were not scared.

Marcy had no experience with this kind of scared.

Inside the restaurant, Macklin drank some of his martini and smiled at Marcy.

"Okay, Marce," he said.

"Let's get organized."

"Meaning?" Marcy said.

"Meaning you and the other ladies each take a duffel bag and carry it out to the boat."

"Through the water?" Marcy said.

"Yep, it'll only be about three-and-a-half, four feet deep. You hand the stuff up and then climb in the boat."

"You're going to take us?"

"A little farther," Macklin said.

"We'll let you go next stop."

Patty began to cry.

"I can't go. I have to go home," she said.

"Got to do what you got to do," Macklin said.

"Get 'em started, Crow."

Crow nodded and gestured at the women. All of them were terrified to go. But they were more terrified of Crow. Each took a duffel bag of pillage and started toward the water, walking awkwardly in their high-heeled shoes. Crow stood at the water's edge watching them. Freddie Costa held his boat in as close as he could. Macklin stood just outside the restaurant door, sipping the last of his drink. Waist deep in the water Judy slipped and fell and dropped her bag. Both woman and bag went under water. Crow went in and caught the bag as it started to sink and reached in with his other hand and yanked Judy up right. He put the wet duffel bag back on her shoulder and shoved her toward the boat. In deeper water, Pam floundered and Crow salvaged her. Crow and the women reached the boat. Crow went up over the side of the boat as if he were on springs. The women handed in their bags and then went into the boat as Crow, one at a time, pulled them up by the wrists and over the railing.

Crouched in the shadows Jesse realized that the hostages were going. I can't let them go. It was less a thought than a feeling, an impulse, really, that seemed to originate in his solar plexus. If I'm going to do it, I have to do it now. The Indian was on the boat. Macklin was alone on shore. If he could take him out quietly... With his gun out, he ran silently from the shadows and along the side of the restaurant. He had to compromise silence and speed. If Crow looked in and saw him... The compromise failed. Macklin heard him, or sensed him, and spun toward him with his hand moving toward his gun.

"Freeze!" Jesse said, as hard as he could say it softly.

Macklin stopped and peered at him in the insufficient light.

"Goddamn," Macklin said.

"It's you."

"Hands behind your head," Jesse said softly.

"Fingers locked.

Move."

Macklin gri

"It would have been a good move if you could have taken me out without a sound," Macklin said.

"But now you're fucked."

Jesse knew Macklin was right. He held the gun steady on the middle of Macklin's mass.

"Maybe," Jesse said.

"But I've got you, you son of a bitch."

"Or have I got you?" Macklin said, and raised his voice.

"Crow," he yelled.

"The police chief's here."

From the boat Crow said, "Yeah?"

Crow could only dimly make out the two figures in front of the restaurant.

"Shoot a hostage," Macklin said.

"Get his attention."

"I hear a shot," Jesse yelled, "and Macklin dies."

"Do it," Macklin shouted.

On the boat, Crow said quietly to the women, "Climb over the side and wade ashore."

"What are you doing?" Costa said.

"I don't hide behind women," Crow said.

"But they're our passport out of here," Costa said.

"They're Jimmy's passport."

"Get off the boat," Crow said.

The women scrambled over the side. Checkmated in front of the restaurant, Macklin and Jesse tried to see what was happening on the boat.

"Crow?" Macklin yelled.

On the boat, Marcy was the last woman over the side. As she hit the water, she heard Crow say to Costa, "Okay, crank it."

"What about Jimmy?"

"Jimmy's on his own. Get this thing out of here."

The big engines, which had been idling, roared to full throttle as the boat heeled away from the shore and headed for the open sea. The women stumbled and flailed and half swam in toward the shore. Neither Jesse nor Macklin moved out of the frozen tableau they formed in front of the restaurant door.