Read Online skeletons by Glendon Swarthout - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Glendon Swarthout
Tags: crime and mystery
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center-fire Army Colt, nationally known as a “Peacemaker” or “Frontier Special,” bought secondhand, infrequently cleaned, and used principally to the sorrow of cacti and tin cans.
“Goddammit, Wood!” he yells. “We’re sorry, goddammit! We’re sorry!”
Somehow the salesman extricates himself, turtles from under the Coupe, runs out the rear door of the showroom.
Buell Wood lowers himself from the front seat of the Runabout to lie flat on the floor, to aim under the car and under the Coupe at one of Tigh Gooding’s boots. He fires.
The slug strikes Gooding’s left leg above the ankle, smashing both tibia and fibula. He howls. He lifts the leg. His ankle and foot hang loose from the leg, attached only by tendon and soft tissue.
“I’m hit, George!” he howls. “My God, my leg, my leg!”
He drops his pistol, tries to hop on his right leg from Coupe to Touring Car and his friend, left ankle and foot flopping grotesquely.
Behind the Runabout the attorney rises, exchanging the empty Colt for that fully loaded. Standing erect, he aims, fires.
The range is twenty feet. Tigh Gooding is hit just anterior to the backside of the neck. His spinal cord is severed. An instant quadriplegic, he dies before crumpling, for his respiratory centers fail at once to function.
One of the two “lookers” leaves his haven under the Coupe and absquatulates via the rear door of the showroom.
George Pennington has meanwhile reloaded his gun and scrambled into the front seat of the Touring Car. Here he is hidden from sight by the side curtains, designed to protect driver and passengers from inclement weather and secured from doors to top by Murphy fasteners. On hearing Tigh Gooding’s howls, he thrusts his weapon out the flap in the curtain on the driver’s side, cut to allow arm signals, peers through it, and locating the attorney on his feet behind the Runabout, fires several errant rounds at him, then rapidly withdraws the “Frontier Special.” He succeeds only in demolishing the east window of the agency, including the information that with the purchase of a 1910 Ford you will have “20 HORSES UNDER YOUR HOOD-ALL HIGH-STEPPERS!”
Wood, intent on Gooding’s fall, is unable to pinpoint the source of fire at him. But suspecting it has issued from the front seat of the Touring Car, he spaces three shots in the general area. The first hits the steering wheel spider and ricochets through the windshield. The second wreaks singular havoc. It passes through the rubber bulb of the horn, through the Stewart speedometer, Model 26, offered for the first time this year as standard equipment and calibrated to 60 mph, and finally through the Heintz coil box mounted on the dashboard.
The third pierces the door and perforates the ten-gallon gasoline tank beneath the front seat.
After this exchange the showroom enjoys a period of peace and quiet.
The last “looker” rolls from the cover of the Coupe and departs the premises in haste.
Behind the mesh, Mrs. Marsh observes.
Driven from the front seat of the Touring Car by the attorney’s barrage, George Pennington lies on the floor halfway under the four-door. He is twenty-four years old. He had hoped to flee into the garage, but knows now he cannot reach it; and he has now seen the corpse of Tigh Gooding sprawled between Coupe and Touring Car. His mental state borders on the psychotic. Except for the sphincter certainty that if he does not kill he will be killed, his contact with reality is profoundly impaired. He begins to weep. He extends his right arm, sighting the “Peacemaker” through tears on the legs of the man standing behind the Runabout. A stream of gasoline leaks from the gas tank above, causing him to urinate, inexplicably, himself. He pulls the trigger.
Muzzle flash ignites the gas. A flare of flame envelops his forearm, setting his shirt sleeve on fire, singeing hair, producing second-degree burns on arm and hand.
He screams like a girl, drops his pistol.
“Goddammit, Wood!” he yells. “We’re sorry, goddammit! We’re sorry!”
Somehow the salesman extricates himself, turtles from under the Coupe, runs out the rear door of the showroom.
Buell Wood lowers himself from the front seat of the Runabout to lie flat on the floor, to aim under the car and under the Coupe at one of Tigh Gooding’s boots. He fires.
The slug strikes Gooding’s left leg above the ankle, smashing both tibia and fibula. He howls. He lifts the leg. His ankle and foot hang loose from the leg, attached only by tendon and soft tissue.
“I’m hit, George!” he howls. “My God, my leg, my leg!”
He drops his pistol, tries to hop on his right leg from Coupe to Touring Car and his friend, left ankle and foot flopping grotesquely.
Behind the Runabout the attorney rises, exchanging the empty Colt for that fully loaded. Standing erect, he aims, fires.
The range is twenty feet. Tigh Gooding is hit just anterior to the backside of the neck. His spinal cord is severed. An instant quadriplegic, he dies before crumpling, for his respiratory centers fail at once to function.
One of the two “lookers” leaves his haven under the Coupe and absquatulates via the rear door of the showroom.
George Pennington has meanwhile reloaded his gun and scrambled into the front seat of the Touring Car. Here he is hidden from sight by the side curtains, designed to protect driver and passengers from inclement weather and secured from doors to top by Murphy fasteners. On hearing Tigh Gooding’s howls, he thrusts his weapon out the flap in the curtain on the driver’s side, cut to allow arm signals, peers through it, and locating the attorney on his feet behind the Runabout, fires several errant rounds at him, then rapidly withdraws the “Frontier Special.” He succeeds only in demolishing the east window of the agency, including the information that with the purchase of a 1910 Ford you will have “20 HORSES UNDER YOUR HOOD-ALL HIGH-STEPPERS!”
Wood, intent on Gooding’s fall, is unable to pinpoint the source of fire at him. But suspecting it has issued from the front seat of the Touring Car, he spaces three shots in the general area. The first hits the steering wheel spider and ricochets through the windshield. The second wreaks singular havoc. It passes through the rubber bulb of the horn, through the Stewart speedometer, Model 26, offered for the first time this year as standard equipment and calibrated to 60 mph, and finally through the Heintz coil box mounted on the dashboard.
The third pierces the door and perforates the ten-gallon gasoline tank beneath the front seat.
After this exchange the showroom enjoys a period of peace and quiet.
The last “looker” rolls from the cover of the Coupe and departs the premises in haste.
Behind the mesh, Mrs. Marsh observes.
Driven from the front seat of the Touring Car by the attorney’s barrage, George Pennington lies on the floor halfway under the four-door. He is twenty-four years old. He had hoped to flee into the garage, but knows now he cannot reach it; and he has now seen the corpse of Tigh Gooding sprawled between Coupe and Touring Car. His mental state borders on the psychotic. Except for the sphincter certainty that if he does not kill he will be killed, his contact with reality is profoundly impaired. He begins to weep. He extends his right arm, sighting the “Peacemaker” through tears on the legs of the man standing behind the Runabout. A stream of gasoline leaks from the gas tank above, causing him to urinate, inexplicably, himself. He pulls the trigger.
Muzzle flash ignites the gas. A flare of flame envelops his forearm, setting his shirt sleeve on fire, singeing hair, producing second-degree burns on arm and hand.
He screams like a girl, drops his pistol.
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