There was a sudden, steady rattle of gunfire. One of the distant bushes seemed to burst into flame as a Thompson-gun chattered its song of death.
‘Down!’ I bawled, and flung myself flat.
Joe took two lurching steps to the door, turned slowly on his heels and dropped.
No one moved. The Thompson continued to rattle. Slugs whined through the windows, cut across the door, hammered into the opposite wall. Then the Thompson stopped as suddenly as it began.
‘Watch out,’ I said to Mac, and crawled over to Joe. The burst of gunfire had caught him across the chest. It had ripped him open the way you rip open a can with a can opener.
‘Is he dead?’ Mary asked, and by the shake in her voice I knew she was badly shocked.
‘Yeah.’
‘Well, I hope I’ll get out of this so I can tell his Ma,’ Mac said. ‘I bet she’ll hang out flags. She always hated the punk.’
‘Don’t show yourselves in front of the windows and keep down,’ I said, crawling over to where
Mary knelt by one of the windows.