“All the time we’re in the trunk,” Foley said, “we’re talking, we’re getting along, you might say.”

      Buddy said, “Jesus Christ,” turning his head, as if he didn’t want to hear it.

      “Listen to me, all right? I kept wondering if she and I had met, you know, under normal circumstances like at a cocktail lounge …” He stopped, running out of words, Buddy staring at him again.

      “You want to take her up to my place,” Buddy said, “and get cleaned up? You come out of the bathroom with your aftershave on and she goes, “Oh, I had you all wrong[148]?”

      “I want to talk to her again, that’s all.”

      Buddy kept staring at him.

      “You’re too late, Jack. You’re what you are, clean or dirty. The best either of us can do is look at nice pretty girls and think, well, if we had done it different…”

      Foley began to say – he wasn’t sure what, something; repeat himself, not wanting to give up? He heard Glenn start the car and looked over to see the headlights pop on.

      “He wants to go,” Buddy said, “get out of here, and I don’t blame him.”

      They walked toward the car.

      Then stopped and watched as it took off, tires squealing as the rubber hit pavement. They watched the taillights until they were out of sight down the turnpike, neither of them saying a word.

      Chapter Eight

      At Good Samaritan[149] they told Karen she was lucky, all she had was a concussion, but they’d keep her here till tomorrow, do a few more tests to make sure.

      Her dad came here with newspapers and magazines to watch over his little girl. When Daniel Burdon, FBI special agent, arrived he asked her dad to please wait outside, they had some business to do here. He had in his hand a copy of the statement Karen had dictated to a court reporter that morning.

      It was mid-afternoon now, sunny outside, the private room pleasant enough, flowers brought by her colleagues arranged on the window-sill.

      Burdon asked her, “ Tell me how you got the bump on your head. You tried to grab the wheel – where was this?”

      “Coming to the Okeechobee exit. I wanted to get to a phone and thought of the tollbooth. We went off the exit ramp, down the grade and I guess hit the abutment.”

      “Must not’ve had your seat belt on.”

      “No, but I did think about it,” Karen said, “once I was in the front seat. I climbed over…”

      She swung her leg over the seat in the tight skirt and told Glenn not to look. Actually told him that, Don’t look. And smiled for just a moment remembering it. Burdon was frowning at her. She said, “Glenn had it up to a hundred[150] and, blowing past cars… I don’t mean when we went off the road. As soon as I saw the exit and grabbed the wheel, he hit the brakes. We were going about fifty when we went off.”

      “When he had it up to speed,” Burden said, “where was he going in such a hurry?”

      “He didn’t know, he was running, getting away. I tried to talk to him. I said, “Look, if you come in with me you’ll be okay. You haven’t really done anything yet.”

      Burdon said, “Hadn’t done anything? The man conspired to aid a fugitive and he’s driving a stolen car.”

      “I told him not to worry about the car. Forty thousand cars stolen last year in Bade County, three thousand arrests and half of them never went to court.”

      Burdon said, “It sounds like you’re aiding and abetting[151].”

      “I wanted to bring him in.”

      “After you piled up, you didn’t see him?”

      “The next thing I knew, the paramedics were taking me out of the car.”

      “And nobody else saw him,” Burdon said, “that we know of. There a couple of points I keep wondering about have to do with the two guys that grabbed you. Buddy is it? And this fella Jack Foley. I looked him up, I swear the man must’ve robbed two hundred banks in his time.”

      Karen said, “Really?” Impressed, but sounding tired.

      “I asked him how many, he said he wasn’t sure. He’s been doing it since he was eighteen.”

      “You talked to him, uh?”

      “In the trunk, yeah.”

      “What’d you talk about?”

      “Oh… different things, prison, movies.”

      “This fella[152] has you hostage, you talk about movies?”

      “It was an unusual experience,” Karen said, looking right at Burdon. “But I wasn’t a hostage.”

      “What were you then?”

      “I was his treat after five months of servitude.”

      Burdon frowned.

      “He assaulted you, sexually?”

      “I wasn’t that kind of a treat,” Karen said.

      “Wanted to be close to a woman, so he crawled in the trunk with you.”

      “I don’t know,” Karen said, looking up at Burdon, standing by the bed.

      “See, then you let this guy Foley get away, I couldn’t help but wonder[153], you know?”

      “What?”

      “If bank robbers turn you on.”[154]

      “You’re serious.”

      “Maybe. I’m not sure I am or not. But you didn’t shoot Foley or the guy with him. They’re unarmed, you had a shotgun and you let them throw you in the trunk. Okay, now you got your Sig in your hand. You say in the report you couldn’t turn around, he had you pinned down. But when the trunk opened, how come you didn’t cap the two guys then[155]?”

      Karen said, “Is that what you would’ve done?”

      “You say in the report Glenn didn’t have a gun, but you let him get away.”

      “Have you ever shot a man? You have to know what you’re talking about.”

      She watched him shrug and start to turn away, smoothing the front of his gray double-breasted suit. He paused and said, “We’ll talk another time, Karen. All right? I’d like to know why Foley put you in that second