The glass cases held about everything you needed to get by in the country: milk, sausage, ice cream, Popsicles, and big sacks of frozen biscuits. He looked up at the circular mirror in the corner and spotted a man, two aisles in, moving fast toward the front of the store. Quinn walked back the way he came to cut him off, past the bags of potato chips, cheese puffs, beef jerky, and mixed nuts.

Pookie had his head down, hands cradling his bulging sweatshirt like a pregnant woman as he walked. When Quinn called out his name, Pookie looked up, said, “Oh, shit,” and dropped sacks and cans of food on the floor. He darted back the way he’d come and disappeared around the corner.

Quinn knew he wasn’t armed, but letting Pookie Williams escape the sheriff in the Blackjack Dollar General might prove embarrassing as hell. He moved back toward the front of the store and nodded to Buddy. “Back door locked?”

“’Course it’s locked,” Buddy Smallwood said. “Dang. You think I like getting robbed just for the fun of it?”

“Exit door?” Quinn asked.

“Fire door?” Smallwood said. “Oh, well. Yeah, but it’ll set off the alarm.”

Quinn ran back toward the far corner of the store, toward the big paper towel display. Pookie had gone in the opposite direction, back where they sold kids’ clothes, T-shirts, and underwear. The back displays offered Christmas and Halloween decorations year-round for fifty percent off.

“Pookie?” Quinn said.

He heard feet in the next aisle and turned to see Pookie running down the toy aisle, knocking down boxes of Barbies and action figures behind him as if it would block Quinn’s path. He got nearly to the front of the store when Buddy Smallwood blocked Pookie’s escape with a revolver in his hand. Quinn called out for Buddy to put it down but Buddy wouldn’t listen, standing there in a Dirty Harry pose, legs wide and chomping on his toothpick. If Quinn didn’t get him settled, they’d be picking up Pookie’s brains on aisle 6.

“Pookie,” Quinn said. “Son of a damn bitch.”

Pookie ran so fast he got tangled up in a Mylar balloon display, tripping and falling but getting back to his feet, running like hell with several pink and green balloons wrapped around his legs. Quinn headed for the fire exit, knowing that it was the only way out, but Pookie was hopped up and ready, beating him there and busting through the door, the alarm going off in the store. Quinn finally caught him by the dumpsters and throwaway boxes outside, tackling him to the ground, balloons and all.