Westlake, Donald E - Novel 32 Read Online Free PDF Page A

back around his arms, pinning him like a straitjacket. At the same
time, I lifted him and kicked the chair out from under him.
                 Nobody
thinks faster than his body. If he’d just let himself drop to the floor then,
he would have gotten away from me. Maybe long enough for his friends and some
busybody bystanders to louse me up. But his body reacted automatically, getting
his feet under him, helping him to stand, and the instant he had his balance I
turned him toward the front and ran him full speed at the door.
                 He
yelled, and tried to squirm to the side, but I had him pinned and moving. The
door was closed, but would open with a push; I pushed it with his head. We’d
gone through so fast there hadn’t been time for anybody to react along the way.
                 Lambeth
was still struggling when he hit the street. Ed was standing there, and our
Ford was parked right in front. I didn’t slow down, but kept running across the
sidewalk and slammed Lambeth into the side of the car. I wanted the wind and
the fight out of him. I pulled him back a foot or two, and bounced him off the
car again, and this time he sagged and quit fighting.
                 Ed
was beside me with the cuffs. I let go of the vest, slid my hands down
Lambeth’s arms, and lifted his arms up behind him like pump handles, bending him
over the trunk of the car. Ed clicked the cuffs on, and opened the Ford’s rear
door.
                I was shifting Lambeth over into
position to shove him into the car when somebody tapped me on the upper arm,
and a female voice said, “Officer?”
                 I
looked around at a middle-aged tourist woman in a red-and-white flowered dress
and a straw purse. She looked angry, but as though she was making a great
effort to be reasonable. She said, “Are you absolutely sure that much violence
was necessary?”
                 Lambeth’s
friends would be coming out any second. “I don’t know, lady,” I said. “ It’s how much I used.” Then I turned away from her again and
kicked Lambeth into the car and followed him in. Ed shut the door behind me, as
the coffee-shop door opened and people began to pile out into the street
                 Lambeth
was crumpled up on the right side of the rear seat like a dead dog. I adjusted
him around into a sitting position. He looked dazed, and he mumbled something
but I couldn’t tell what
                 Up
front, Ed said, “Tom?”
                 “Yeah?”
                 “Looks
like you’re gonna get another letter in your file.”
                 I
looked at him, and he was checking the rear-view mirror, looking at the
situation behind us. “Is that right,” I said.
                 “She’s
taking down the license number,” he said.
                 “I’ll
blame you,” I said.
                 Ed
chuckled, and we turned a comer, and headed uptown.
                 After
a couple of blocks, Lambeth suddenly said, “My arms hurt, man.”
                 I looked
at him. He was wide awake, and apparently rational. You don’t switch off a cold
that easily. I said, “Don’t stick needles in them.”
                 “With
these cuffs on, man,” he said. “I’m all twisted around.”
                 “Sorry,”
I said.
                 “Will
you take them off?”
                 “At the station.”
                 “If
I give you my word of honor, I won’t try—”
                 I laughed
at him. “Forget it,” I said.
                 He
gave me a level look, and then a sad kind of smile. “That’s right,” he said.
“Nobody*s got any honor around here, do they?”
                 “Not
the last time I looked.”
                 He
wriggled around for thirty seconds or so, and