“No,” she repeated wildly. “Stay with me. Stay with me. I’m alone. Stay with me.”

He clapsed her again in his arms, felt the warmth of her breasts, her hair, the tears against his cheeks. “I love you so much, Maria,” he whispered. “And I killed someone you love. Help me—please help me.”

“Hold me tighter,” she answered. “Make your arms tighter. I am so cold.”

How could there be any hours or days or future beyond tonight, beyond the moment when her mother and father returned from the movies?

“You must rest,” she said. “On my bed. Anton, please.”

“I’ve gotta go,” he said.

“To the police?”

“To the police.”

“After the rest.” Maria stood and offered him both hands. “A little while ago I was talking to the girls on the roof about my wedding. And we were married, Anton. Don’t you remember, this afternoon?”

“If we could only go back to the afternoon.”

“It is afternoon. It will never be later for us. Now you must rest.”

CHAPTER EIGHT

Baby-John called on Superman, Batman and Robin, Wonder Boy and Planet King, Green Arrow and Green Hornet, Spaceman, Jack Blastoff, and Orbit Oscar to come to his rescue.

Sitting in the dark body of the wrecked truck, knees drawn to his chin, and eyes fixed on a star that he could see through a break in the metal side of the truck that rested on its axles in the junk yard near the river, he waited for a bright streak of light, like that of a meteor, marking the path made by one, possibly all of his heroes.

This was no ordinary signal for help that Baby-John was radaring to outer space, but a call that had to be heeded, for he had just seen two hard guys go down for the final count—Riff, whom he admired and wept for with affection, and Bernardo, whom he hated but also had to admire because he had proved himself a hard guy.

True, Tony Wyzek hadn’t been a slouch—the way he had used the knife was artistry—but it was his fault that Riff and Bernardo were dead. Riff was eighteen, Bernardo about the same, Baby-John figured, and he was fourteen, which meant that if he ever succeeded in becoming as hard a character as Riff or Bernardo, he only had four years to live, maybe five. Which wasn’t much time at all, especially if he might be spending two or three of the four or five years in the reformatory.

Only minutes before Baby-John had scaled one of the fences of the auto yard, wondered how far he could walk along the top, and decided to find out. With arms extended, fingers stiff, he moved slowly along the fence top so that his heroes, from Batman to Orbit Oscar, could see that he was worth saving. Baby-John sent them hard thoughts, because someone had better come get him before the cops did.

They had seen how he’d just got away from Schrank and Krupke—man, he had really spilled Krupke on his ass—but the cops would be bound to catch him eventually and Krupke would use the stick on him without mercy. A telephone pole was only inches from the end of the fence and Baby-John reached over to stand with his right foot on the cleats.