Maclain sat down on a stool right by the booth. A quick thought struck him that someone might be calling him at Nick’s—from the hospital or hotel. Cursing his own stupidity, he reached in the booth without leaving the stool, found the receiver, and put it to his ear.

Nick’s voice came over the telephone, trembling in intensity: “A hundred a week is cleaning me now. I’ll blow the works before I’ll double it. Kate don’t know nothing, but I’m leaving her a list that’ll jail everyone in the whole damn state if anything happens to me. Now go to hell!”

When the swinging door swished as Nick came back, the captain was sitting with his elbows on the counter.

There was a tinkle of keys, the snip of a lock, and the unmistakable ring of a bell and slide of a drawer as the cash register opened. A clink of change followed, and the crisp dry rustle of currency. Then came the tap of bills being straightened on edge against the top of the counter.

Nick went back through the swinging door. An instant later something clanged.

An atmosphere of menace had suddenly seeped into the diner. The captain was as sensitive to the coming of trouble as he was to the brewing of a storm. Nick was frightened. His voice and words had told all that on the extension of the pay phone. Now, after locking the cash register up for the night, he’d opened it again and removed all the money to hide it somewhere in the pantry.

“I hope he’ll trust me for some cigarettes,” muttered Maclain.

Nick came back, shut the cash register drawer, and said, “It’s a helluva night. If that car don’t show from the hotel, you’d better stay here. There’s an extra little room at the back. It ain’t much, but it’s dry. I’ll fix your eats.”

Gas popped under a grill, ignited from the pilot light that Nick turned on. It was followed by the soft slap of a piece of ham tossed on the grill. The captain heard the crack of eggs against the edge of a bowl, and a second later, a comforting sizzle.

The captain nerved himself, as if for a great ordeal. “I left my cigarettes at the camp—with all my money. I hate to impose on your kindness, but I was wondering—”

“Name your brand,” Nick said.

Then it happened.

Accompanied by a gust of wind, someone came through the diner door, about ten stools from where Maclain was sitting. In a voice that was high with terror, a woman screamed from behind the swinging door: “Nicky, don’t shoot! Don’t kill anyone!”

A gun went off, firing three times. The muffled footsteps of slippered feet stumbled off in the pantry.