“By gad, sor, thot’s bad,” Larry shouted back from the other room. Then I heard him chuckle, “Shall I take me little kit o’ tools?”
“Of course take it. Do you want them to find it?”
A moment later we were both packing like mad. We threw a few things into a couple of bags, and then with a last look around we closed the door of my apartment behind us for an indefinite period, and turned our faces toward the cold world, or, at least, toward the elevator which was to take us into the cold world. I always kept a considerable amount of cash available, so that at least we had money.
Events that day had gone as badly as they possibly could go. I was desperately worried about Moore and about Natalie also, although she might simply have been delayed in getting home. But somehow Larry’s chuckle had changed the trend of my thoughts, and I faced the prospect of venturing forth into hiding with a good deal of elation. I was free and comparatively undamaged. And if Moore could not be rescued by a man with the whole weight of the Secret Service behind him, then something was wrong. Anyway, when there was work to be done, even bombing reluctant Germans, I had always appreciated the opportunity of something stirring and immediately forgotten to worry about the event.
But our first glimpse of the outside world was a good deal warmer than either of us cared about.
We were just approaching the front door when a police patrol wagon drew up in front of it outside. Of course it was quite dark by this time, but the arc light on the corner showed me the patrol wagon and several policemen besides the driver. I hesitated an instant, but two policemen jumped down at once and approached the entrance and there was nothing to do but put a bold face on it and walk out.
“Come on, Larry,” I muttered. “If they stop us we’ll bolt in opposite directions and meet at ten o’clock in the Times Square drug store.” And so we sallied forth.
We walked out calmly enough, looking the two policemen casually in the eye, and they stepped back to let us pass. But when we reached the sidewalk I looked back, like a fool, and one of them had his eye on us. The other was talking to the elevator attendant and I suddenly realized that he was probably being told that I had just passed him.
I glanced away at once, and my eye suddenly fell on the car that Larry had hired that afternoon, still standing where I had left it. I found out afterwards that Larry had hired it for the entire evening, and the driver figured that if he stuck around he could claim pay for that time, as I had not dismissed him. It was questionable ethics, as he must have believed me to be nearly killed and very unlikely to want him again, but I blessed him for it.
“There’s the car, Larry. Jump in!” I told him quickly. As we approached it, there was a shout from behind us in the doorway.