Read Online with These Hands (Ss) (2002) by Louis L'amour - Free Book Online

planning a Galahad. But he had died for messing with something out of his league.
    This setup still smelled wrong, though. The house was too big. The layout cost money. No fly-by-night hoodlums who might use a girl as a plant to pick up some change would have a place like this, or a girl with diamonds like she had.
    I did an Indian act going through the trees. When I got close, I dropped my raincoat on the grass behind some shrubbery and laid down on it where I could watch the house.
    There was a distant mutter of thunder, growing off among the clouds like a sleepy man you're trying to wake but who doesn't want to get up.
    The house was big and the yard was beautiful. A drive made a big circle among the trees. Another drive went past the house to a four-car garage. One of the cars was in front of the house. Another one, facing out, stood beside it.
    The last car had a Chicago license-an Illinois plate with the town name-strip above it.
    There were two lighted windows on the ground floor, and I could see another on the second floor, a window opposite a giant tree with a limb that leaned very, very near.
    Suddenly, a match flared. It was so sudden I ducked. In the glow of the match, as the guy lighted his cigarette, I could see Blubber Puss. His nose was taped up, and there were two strips of adhesive tape on his cheekbones. His lips were swollen considerably beyond their normal size.
    Blubber Puss was standing there in the darkness. He looked like he had been there quite a while.
    Footsteps on the gravel made me turn my head. Another man, skinny and stooped, was walking idly along the drive.
    He stopped close to Blubber, and I could hear the low murmur of their voices without being able to distinguish a word.
    After a minute, they parted and both began walking off in opposite directions. I waited, watching them go. I took a quick gander at the luminous dial of my wristwatch. After almost ten minutes, I saw Skinny come into sight ahead, his feet crunching along the gravel, and then Blubber Puss came into sight. This time they were closer to me when they met.
    "This standin' watch is killin' me," Skinny growled.
    "What's the boss figure is goin' to happen anyway? We're not hot in this town."
    "That's what you say." Blubber's mouth shaped the words poorly. "You suppose they won't have word out all over the country? Then knockin' off that kid was a tough break. Why'd he have to stick his nose into it?"
    "That's what comes of not havin' any dough," Skinny said. "We had to make a raise. What easier way to do it?"
    "Well," Blubber said, with satisfaction, "we'll get plenty out of this before we're done. Gettin' in here was a break, too. Nobody'd think to look here."
    "We better keep movin'," Skinny suggested. "The boss might come out and see us loafin' on the job. Anyway, it's near time for our relief."
    The two walked on, each in their respective ways. I stared after them trying to make sense from what I'd heard. One thing was sure. A relief for these two meant that at least two more men, aside from the mysterious boss, were inside. At the very least that made me one against five. It was too many, this late in the evening, especially when I hadn't eaten any dinner.
    The ground-floor window looked tempting, but I decided against it. I'd not have time for much of a look before Skinny and Blubber would be back around, and the chances of being seen were too great. I didn't care to start playing cops and robbers with real bullets until I knew what the setup was.
    Picking up my coat, I slid back into the bushes and weaved my way toward that tall tree. A leafy branch should offer a way into one of the upper rooms. It didn't seem like so desperate a chance as going for the groundfloor window.
    A few drops of rain began to fall, but this was no time to be thinking of that. I looped my raincoat through my belt and went up that tree. From a position near the bole, my feet on the big limb, I could see into a window.
    There were two people in the