"Chicago, sir?" "Evanston." "No." "No call for Evanston." "Nightfall and you" "Lovely you" "Underneath a wreath of heaven's pale blue" "You are poetry" "You are melody" "You're a prayer that's granted" "I'm enchanted" "Nightfall and dreams" "Lovely dreams" "Underneath a wreath of golden moonbeams" "In those hours small" "You're my all in all" "You're my poem" "Of nightfall, dear" "Got a light?" "Yeah." "Thanks." "Thank you." "Ah, those busses always run late at this hour." "Traffic." "It's gonna be a hot one tonight, huh?" "Yeah." "Oh, I wonder how they stand it in the tropics." "They're born into it." "Yeah." "Yeah, I guess that does make the difference." "That's for me, though." "You know, the tropics?" "Have you ever been there?" "During the war." "I didn't make it." "Bum ticker." "See much action?" "A little." "Uh-huh." "Where were you?" "Okinawa." "Oh." "The furthest I ever got off Hollywood Boulevard was Yosemite." "We used to go up there in the summers, you know, before things got tough." "Hard going, huh?" "Ah, lately." "What do you do for a living?" "Research." "I'd better be getting home." "My wife'll think I stopped off to get a couple of shots." "Thanks." "Is this one free?" "She's alone, if that's what you mean." "Vodka on the rocks with a lemon twist." "A little twist or a big twist?" "You look like the big-twist type." "What would you think if I asked you to loan me five dollars?" "That's what I thought." "What makes you think I've got five?" "You smell like you just came from a barbershop." "A man doesn't go to the barbershop when he's down and out." "You're very bright." "I'm in a silly spot, that's what I am." "Look, I forgot my wallet or I lost it." "I don't know." "But I do know that man's going to want his money." "I can't sit here all night with a warm martini." "I understand." "How about letting me buy you a cold one?" "From that last remark, I can see you don't understand." "I'll send it to you in the morning." "You sound as if you mean it." "Here's my license." "You can copy the serial number down." "Marie Gardner." "807 North Normandy." "The serial number is usually here in the upper right-hand corner." "So it is." "Please!" "Oh, everybody seems pretty busy." "Thank you." "Check, please." "Seventy." "Out of five." "Wait a minute." "Can I buy you a drink?" "No girl ever has." "What's that you're drinking?" "A vodka." "And I'll have another martini." "Do you mind if I just look?" "See anything familiar?" "Familiar looks very different." "Do you make it a habit of rescuing girls in bars?" "Only girls who drink martinis on empty purses." "How come you're in here in the first place?" "My girlfriend stood me up for dinner." "I didn't want to eat alone." "But it's all right to drink alone." "I was hoping I'd run into somebody nice to talk to." "A girl like you?" "The men I usually run into don't want to talk to anybody but their wives." "Or secretaries." "They seem to think conversation's old-fashioned." "You sound bitter." "Case hardened." "Guys have probably been swarming around you ever since your second teeth came through." "Maybe you're disillusioned." "I don't know, but I don't think to the point where you're ready to throw all men aside." "Do I hear a click?" "Yes." "I, uh, like to skip all the jockeying around." "It saves a lot of grief later on." "What makes you think there's going to be a later on?" "I mean like dinner, maybe?" "As long as we understand each other." "I'd certainly appreciate it." "You sound like a man with a problem." "Vanning." "Jim Vanning's my name." "Yeah, I got problems." "Who hasn't?" "Would you like a booth?" "Yes, please." "Hello, Mrs. Fraser." "Hello, Mr. Fraser." "Tired?" "Yeah, a little." "Yeah." "Anything new?" "Still checking." "Vanning still there?" "Yeah." "Yeah, I talked to him tonight." "You talked to him?" "Well, you know," "I went up and asked him for a light." "Did he say anything?" "Nothing I could use." "My, it's a tough one." "I took your brown suit to the cleaner's today." "Uh-huh." "You could use another pair of shoes." "Well, I'll wait for the sales." "You never buy yourself anything." "I do all right." "You do fine." "Someday you'll be important." "Honey, there's nothing important about being an insurance investigator." "Boy, I wish this one was over with." "You'll handle it." "Hmm, thanks." "He didn't get much work done this afternoon, you know." "He just kept walking up and down his room." "He kept looking at a calendar he's got tacked up on the back of the closet door." "Do you think he knows he's being watched?" "I had the glasses on him." "He kind of grows on you." "You know what I mean, Laura?" "It's almost..." "Well, almost like he needs protection." "What you need is a drink and some lamb stew." "Come on." "Okay." "You know, I still don't understand it." "A lot of nice people get together in bars and restaurants." "Yeah, to cry on each other's shoulders." "And to go back to their wives the next morning." "Is that a question?" "Do I look like a married man?" "You've told me so little about yourself, you might be any one of several people." "Or the creature from 20,000 Fathoms." "I was just curious." "Thanks." "What time is it?" "Early." "I have an 8:00 sitting in the morning and a 12:00 fashion show." "You're a model?" "How do you think I pay the rent?" "Well, I should have figured." "Your being a model, I mean." "Believe it or not, I'm an artist." "Soup cans or sunsets?" "Soup cans, toothpaste, automobiles, and girls once in a while." "I bet you must be good at it." "I freelance, work at my own place." "I do all right." "I have a rush job for a magazine story." "You wouldn't pose for me, would you?" "I'm expensive." "But, for you, I'll waive the fee." "You're actually smiling." "Back there at the bar, you acted as though you had some big trouble on your shoulders." "They come and they go." "Troubles?" "Smiles." "Would you write your phone number and address for me?" "I forget things." "Not important things, I hope." "How about tomorrow?" "All right." "Pick me up at Robinson's, Beverly Hills." "I should be finished around 2:00." "Okay." "Is this the later on you were talking about?" "The first part." "Any questions about the rest of it?" "You mean the later, later on?" "No questions." "Providing you don't ask any." "Okay." "All right, Rayburn." "Thanks, miss." "You can go now." "You did a nice job getting our friend here so relaxed." "Why, you..." "You do your talking later." "You run along home now, and forget you ever saw this character." "You're not going to run anymore, are you?" "Don't!" "Come on, we'll all go down to the beach and get some breeze." "We're gonna need clear heads." "You've been giving us a bad time, Rayburn." "Or what are you calling yourself these days?" "Anyway, you cost us a lot of money trying to find you." "And it ain't deductible, either." "Will you shut up?" "I don't mind that." "I like the way you handled yourself." "One, you didn't go to the police." "Fat chance!" "And two, you didn't make trouble." "You just disappeared." "I like that, too." "Only it's a little too soon for you to disappear." "And now all you got to do is tell us what we want to know, and we'll let you out and you can go home." "We're not even gonna tell the cops." "I got a picture of that!" "You're going to tell us sooner or later." "That's something I can't do." "Well, that's 'cause you're tough." "But after we get you where you're not so tough anymore, you're going to tell us." "You'll say anything we want you to say." "I'm not trying to get hurt." "If I knew, I'd tell you." "That's in the hearts and flowers department." "You know where that'll get you!" "Nowhere." "Then we'll all be nowhere." "He's too tough, John." "A lot too tough." "What do you say, John?" "I say he's too tough." "I'm not tough." "I'm scared stiff." "Oh, now he's being funny." "You want to drive, John, and let me sit back there with him?" "No, you take it easy, Red." "You hold on a little while, you can have your fun later." "Fun?" "The tougher they are" "The more fun they are" "Tra-la" "Feel better?" "Yeah." "Look, Red, tonight's his night." "Might be a short one, might be a long one." "But he's going to keep breathing until we get an answer out of him, you got that?" "Oh, John, you got a soft spot." "Like the top of your head!" "That's your whole trouble, you know that?" "The top of your head never closed up when you were a kid." "Neither did your mouth." "Smart boy." "No identification." "No address." "That way, if he's got it where he's living, we don't know where he's living at." "What about laundry tags?" "Now, what if you found a mark on his collar?" "What would you do with it, huh?" "Well, now the police are always tracing guys with laundry tags." "Huh." "Well, well, well." "Marie Gardner." "807 North Normandy." "It must be the one he was with tonight." "Welcome back, friend." "Why don't you get it over with?" "That's a switch." "What do you think I'm going to do, kill you?" "Yeah." "Yeah, I think you're going to kill me." "It could have been any time since last winter." "So it's tonight." "He's acting pretty cool." "Why not?" "With 350,000 clams, why couldn't he be cool?" "I guess it's the money, huh?" "It gives you that nice, easy feeling?" "I don't know where the money is." "Now say that again." "Say it over to yourself and see how ridiculous that sounds." ""Don't know where the $350,000 is."" "That's the way it is." "Nice suit." "I like it." "Pick it out yourself?" "Yes." "Expensive?" "Not bad." "Not the kind of suit I'd buy if I had all that money you're talking about." "Now, listen, you've got a fair amount of intelligence." "You're on one side." "I'm on the other." "So, we'll take it from there, huh?" "Now, if you want to stay alive, in order for you to have a nice, long, happy middle age, you're going to tell us where you put that cash." "Then we're going to keep you here until we get it." "Then we'll let you go." "Make sense?" "Makes wonderful sense, but I can't tell you where the money is 'cause I don't know where it is." "Does that make sense?" "No, no, it doesn't." "I can see a man misplacing a tenner or maybe even $100." "But it just don't tabulate he's going to let a big boodle like that slip through his fingers." "And that brings us to another angle." "If you lost that loot, you lost it up in Wyoming in the Jackson Hole country." "And that means you wouldn't be here, because if you didn't have it, you'd be up there looking for it." "Right?" "Wyoming's a big place." "$350,000 is big money." "Most people I know would be up there with a magnifying glass going over every inch of the state." "We're getting nowhere." "Now put yourself in my place." "I'm real hungry for that cash." "I'm so hungry for it, I'm even liable to cut you in for a slice." "$50,000." "How does that sound?" "It sounds great, but I tell you I don't know where it is." "Is that final?" "As far as I'm concerned, they're his final words." "No, not yet." "Not final." "Get up!" "Now, don't get any ideas about night watchmen." "You got all the company you're gonna get right now." "Come on!" "Ben?" "It's okay, honey." "Go back to sleep." "Can I get you something?" "No, no, thanks." "What is it?" "Why can't you sleep?" "Oh, angles." "Angles I can't figure." "Aw, you'll work it out." "Yeah." "With what I've got now, I could take him in tomorrow." "With what they've got on him in Chicago, it's 100-to-one he'd get the chair and the money would still be missing." "That's why it's hard to go to sleep." "Well, if that's what he deserves. lf!" "Is there an "if"?" "If I could only talk to him, really talk!" "You know, get him to tell me just what happened." "Ben, you're doing all you can." "Yeah, that's what's driving me crazy." "It's the best shadow job I've ever done." "I know every move he makes." "It's gotten to the point" "I can drop him at night and pick him up again in the morning." "I know he likes split pea soup for lunch." "He leaves a dime tip when, you know, sometimes he should have left 15 cents." "He washes his own socks at night." "He goes to sleep with the radio on." "And, oh, incidentally, it's got a bum tube." "The static is terrible." "Yeah, I know everything about him except what I need to know." "He's clever then, living the way he does and hiding the money." "Maybe." "Or maybe he's innocent." "You keep feeling that, don't you?" "He can't be alone in this." "There's got to be more than a single in the picture." "I've been walking in his footsteps for three months, day after day, hour after hour." "I've been through his room when he was out." "I've been living his life, practically." "You know, I feel as if I understand this man, as if I really know him." "I'm glad you followed me, Ben, 11 years ago." "Really glad." "Yeah, and you'd be even gladder if we could get back to sleep tonight, huh?" "Oh, honey, look at the time." "Once every five seconds, watch." "One, two, three, four, five." "How's your memory now, friend?" "Now think back." "You were out camping," "Wyoming, just you and your pal, the doc." "Right?" "And maybe you'll remember what you did with the money." "Our money." "... could give the area its first below-freezing night." "The highways are expected to become icy and very dangerous." "Special bulletin from the ranger station in this area." "Campers are advised to leave as soon as possible to avoid the danger of being snowed in." "Now turning to the international scene..." "We'd better pack up and get out of here." "Temperature's dropping below freezing." "The weather station reports a snowfall of eight inches in the mountains and more coming." "They're closing down the highway north of here." "If that cold front moves in on us, we're really in trouble." "Cold or no cold, Doc, right now we're gonna eat trout, fried the only way to fry them." "Plenty of butter and bread crumbs." "Well, I've always been a cornmeal man myself." "Doc, you stick to the medicine." "I'll stick to the cooking." "That's a deal." "Well, what do you think we ought to do?" "Do what the man says." "Take the road south, first thing in the morning." "We haven't even had two weeks of this, and I could use two months." "No deadlines to meet, no art directors calling in the middle of the morning." "How about you?" "You ready for surgery?" "Far from it." "Anyway, we came to do some hunting." "What's it gonna look like if we get back to Chicago without a set of horns?" "How about that big buck we saw yesterday morning across the valley?" "Standing there like the Statue of Liberty." "A beauty, wasn't he?" "Why didn't you shoot?" "Why didn't you?" "Hey, you know, I think you're right." "The bread crumbs are better than the cornmeal." "Great coffee, huh?" "Eh." "Better than I ever got in the Navy." "You know, you'll make some gal a good husband." "Oh, yeah." "She just hasn't come along yet." "Is that it?" "Yeah, I guess that's it." "Well, you'll know it when she does." "Just like I knew Eva was right for me." "Of course, I suppose 20 years does make a lot of difference." "Probably a lot of people figure that" "I should have married someone more my own age." "Oh, what's 20 years?" "Has she ever said anything about it to you?" "No." "Why should she?" "Well, you're our best friend." "You know, I've been wanting to talk about this ever since we got up here." "I figured that up here, away from everything and everybody, that I could tell you how much I appreciate..." "Doc!" "...your strength of character." "Eva's still young, and she hasn't shaken herself down yet." "And some other man might have..." "It's been a good 10 days." "Good for all of us." "Look!" "He's going to go over!" "You got the car keys?" "They're in the car." "You two are pretty lucky." "Anybody else down there?" "There now." "Here." "There, let me have a look at that arm." "We'll get this coat off." "Careful now." "Come on, it's all right." "This goes with my job." "There we go." "Now, let's see here." "All right." "Well, that feels just like a simple fracture." "I'll put a temporary splint on it." "Oh, you're really lucky." "This could have been an awful lot worse." "Well, you got a point there." "Uh, get me a couple of flat sticks." "All right." "The man here says we're lucky." "Yeah, we're loaded with luck." "Here, Doc." "Oh, those are fine." "Here, put this one here." "All right!" "All right!" "Come on." "Come on." "Snap it up!" "Will you shut up?" "I'm trying to think of what we gotta do." "We'll take you into Moose." "It's only about seven miles from here." "I want to get some X-rays of this arm." "Oh, that's all we need." "There we are." "I'll have to take your tie." "It won't make much of a sling, but it'll do temporarily." "Fix the sling, Doc." "Whose car's that?" "Mine." "Give me your wallet." "Come on, give me your wallet." "I'll need your registration, driver's license." "I wouldn't drive anyplace without that." "Here?" "Too public." "Well, the snow'll cover 'em over, and the roads will be closed." "Nobody'll be coming in here until spring." "I said it was too public, Red." "You guys camped around here?" "Don't make me use my head, will you?" "Let's go." "Look, why don't you just take the car and leave us here?" "We don't know who you are or anything about you." "Well, you've had plenty of time to think." "How about it, coming back?" "Well, maybe we can get this thing straightened out and everything will be fine." "And dandy." "Don't forget the dandy." "Oh, yeah, dandy." "What do you say, John?" "This is what they call the point of no return, friend." "Suppose you knew you were going to get killed if you didn't talk." "Wouldn't you talk?" "Would I talk?" "I'd be a one-man filibuster." "You think I wouldn't?" "I think you're sore." "I think you're sore 'cause we caught up with you." "Either that or you're one of those birdbrains who figures it's a trend to be brave or something." "All I can tell you, it's still up there." "Where up there?" "I don't know." "Well, just let me put one of his feet in, John." "Just one." "He's not fooling." "When Red was a kid, they didn't have enough playgrounds." "He's sort of an adult delinquent." "I've seen him in action." "How are you at belly shots, Red?" "Or do you only shoot at backs?" "Red!" "Go ahead, Red." "Pull the trigger." "Yes?" "Vanning." "Go away!" "Please!" "What do you want?" "A few honest words." "From you?" "There's an explanation due." "I don't want to hear it." "The only thing you'll hear is yourself talking, start now!" "You need a doctor." "Nice place." "I'll try not to bleed over everything." "There might be one doctor I know I might reach at this hour." "Skip the milk of human kindness routine." "Remember me?" "I've already been set up in Alley One." "I'm back from the wars, honey." "I'm a vet!" "How'd you get tied up with those two?" "You don't belong in the picture with them and you know it as well as I do." "Money!" "Sure." "That's why you did it, you did it for money." "Do you always answer your own questions?" "Then why did you help them?" "I wasn't helping them." "And so what if I had been." "What difference would it make?" "You did something wrong." "You were running away, and you were bound to be caught." "That's all I know." "That's all I want to know." "Are you being clever with me again?" "I'm not the clever type, Jim." "It is Jim, isn't it?" "Give me a light." "What did you do?" "How'd you get yourself involved with the police?" "Police?" "You thought they were police?" "Weren't they?" "That's why you took off so fast." "I came here..." "I came like a homing pigeon." "I didn't even look up your address." "I must have remembered it from the bar, from your driver's license." "But that piece of paper you gave me, they must have it." "And they'll figure I came back here." "Look, you can't stay here." "Put something on and pack a bag, or are you thinking nice people don't run?" "They stay." "Call the police." "That's exactly what they do." "Right now two men are coming over here to pull you out of your respectable little world so fast, you won't know what hit you." "So, call the police." "Maybe you'll be all right tonight but what about a week from tonight?" "Or next month?" "Why me?" "I used to ask myself the same question, "Why me?"" "Because you were unlucky enough to talk to me tonight." "You've got to trust me." "I'm trying to." "Believe me, I'm trying." "It would be easier if I knew about the men." "I'll tell you about them when you're dressed." "Leave the door open a little so you can hear me." "I'm waiting." "Can you hear me now?" "Not too well." "Any better?" "Much better." "It was in Wyoming last winter." "Doc Gurston, a friend, a good friend and I were helping these two men." "Their car had gone off the road." "Better kill those bedroom lights." "I won't be able to see." "Pack in the dark." "You were saying their car had gone off the road." "And they made us take them back to our camp." "Okay." "Okay, over there, over there by the fire." "Sure." "Sure." "Why not?" "Why not what?" "A shooting, then suicide." "That way, it keeps us clear." "You surprise me." "It's this mountain air." "I always think better." "I like it, Red." "That's neat." "Real neat." "I don't know what you two have done that makes you so desperate." "Are you scared, Doc?" "I should be." "But I can't believe this is happening." "Why, we haven't even had our second cup of coffee." "Oh." "I'm scheduled to perform an operation in Chicago, Monday." "We were driving into Moose tonight to call my wife and tell her we were leaving in the morning." "It's no use, Ed." "We were only trying to help you!" "Oh, this is very sad." "This is strictly downhill." "Shut up, Red." "You got a point, friend." "You're entitled." "A man shouldn't die unless he knows he's got a reason." "And you boys got the best." "You see, Red here and me pulled a bank job, real sweet, no prints, no identification." "No previous criminal record." "We gotta protect that, see?" "We wouldn't want to get a bad rep." "We got about 300 grand right here." "So, try to see it our way, will you?" "Okay, Doc," "I'm going to count to five." "You run." "When I get to five, I'm gonna shoot." "You got the picture?" "Hold it!" "One!" "Two!" "Three!" "I never could count past three." "Oh!" "You didn't get your second cup of coffee either, did you?" "Go ahead." "Well, don't say I didn't ask you." "Is your car paid for?" "I just got it." "Oh, you're lucky." "You won't have to make any more payments." "Give it to him." "Turn around." "Sit down!" "Don't look back here, just look straight ahead." "Now, here's the action." "I'm gonna toss you a shell." "Now, you pick up the shell, put it in the chamber." "Then you pick up the rifle." "You look it straight in the eye, then you push the trigger." "How do you like that?" "I give you the perfect suicide." "I won't do it!" "I'll tell you why you're gonna do it." "If I have to work you over from back here," "I figure it's gonna take me five, maybe six rounds to finish the job." "So, make it easy on yourself." "See?" "Clean, quick!" "Come on, Red." "Quit playing around." "You decide." "Want me to start counting like for the doc?" "I'll be in the car." "Why are you holding us up, buster?" "Oh!" "You're thinking maybe a quick try with the rifle, huh?" "You want to try?" "Well, go ahead!" "Go ahead!" "Try!" "Give me a minute to get used to the idea, will you?" "Oh, no, that's too long." "Half a minute!" "Okay." "Come on, Red." "Red's shot bounced a piece of rock off my skull." "It looked like I was a goner." "At least they thought so." "They drove off." "Hey, do you got a back door?" "Marie Gardner." "Afraid of a girl?" "Maybe Vanning's inside." "He's not that stupid." "Now, you're taking things too easy to suit me." "I don't like it!" "Oh, a model, huh?" "Yeah, they all carry these portfolio things." ""Compton Model Agency, Dunkirk, 7-3-8-9-9." That's all we need." "Oh, you're smooth, John." "Real smooth." "Yeah, I got a soft side." "A guy can't have everything, can he?" "Nope, I don't suppose he can." "Hello." "Ben?" "Yeah." "You're..." "You're not here!" "No, well, you fell asleep, honey, so I got dressed and I came over here, and it's a lucky thing that I did." "Ben, what time is it?" "Oh, about 4:00 a.m. Talk about intuition." "I told you he was getting ready to make a move." "Is he still there?" "Yeah, yeah, there's a girl with him, Laura." "My hunch is beginning to pay off." "I told you I didn't figure him to be in this thing alone." "Look, honey, you'd better stick around the apartment today, see, in case I have to call you in a rush, you know, and get you to pack a suitcase and bring it to me over here." "Where are you going?" "I don't know, Laura, but, well, I've got a hunch it's going to be cold." "Now, look, you pack a bag for me, honey, huh?" "And then go back to sleep." "You still have enough coffee in that penthouse you're renting?" "Yeah, yeah, sure, coffee, dancing girls, everything!" "Okay." "Goodnight, hon." "There." "Thanks." "You should have met a nurse tonight, not me." "Is that the, uh..." "Oh, I'll take it." "My laundry." "What on earth are those?" "Sock stretchers." "And they talk about women!" "Did you say you had an early call tomorrow?" "Uh-huh." "I'll get you some sheets." "This will be yours." "You can't imagine how many times I've stood here and watched it get dark." "I know how every shadow falls." "The telephone pole, the rooming house across the street, that old iron fence down there." "And every night, I got that much closer to tomorrow, my chances got that much better." "What's tomorrow, Jim?" "Mind if I..." "Tomorrow?" "Maybe the next day, they open up the roads to the spot where we camped." "The snowplows have been up there two weeks now." "I've been waiting for weeks for that date." "I get within one day of it and bingo, I gotta run into those two." "Maybe you've forgotten." "Organized society has a department for your kind of complaint." "P-O-L-l-C-E?" "Okay, let's say you're the police." "I tell you two strange men have a wreck." "The doc and I run out to help them." "They shoot the doc, wipe the prints off the rifle, try to make me kill myself." "It sounds like a nice routine case, doesn't it?" "An everyday occurrence?" "Things that really happen are always difficult to explain." "You haven't heard anything yet." "There I was, coming out of..." "I don't know how long." "No motion, no nothing." "And then I..." "I remembered!" "I went to get Doc's bag, so I could patch myself up." "Patch myself up?" "Here was a way out." "Somehow they'd taken the wrong bag, taken Doc's bag and left the money behind." "I could drop this satchel on any police desk and say," ""Find the men who stole this, and you'll find the men who killed the doc!"" "Hey!" "I knew I had the bag with me." "I must have dropped it someplace." "Maybe near that shack." "Well, can't you remember?" "No." "It started to snow pretty hard." "I got into Moose by morning." "A ranger had already found Doc's body and my rifle." "They were looking for me." "Well, right then and there you should have told them the whole story." "It doesn't check." "What, boogeyman with a bag full of money?" "They must have left footprints." "The snowfall covered 'em." "Well, you should have shown them the wrecked car." "The car they were driving." "That still doesn't put 'em on the spot with me." "No, Marie, I needed a witness, something that could talk." "You know, something like that satchel full of money." "And there was another little detail." "Doc Gurston had a young wife." "She'd written me some indiscreet letters." "The Chicago Police found them in my apartment." "Look." "My prints checked out with those on the rifle." "Did you love her?" "Doc and I were old friends." "Is that an answer?" "Somehow I find it very important that you believe this right now." "I might have been looking, but she was shopping." "And it never went any further than that, believe me." "I believe you." "I rode freights south to New Orleans and got a job on the waterfront, changed my name to Wilson." "Then I went west to Dallas." "Drove a truck there for a while." "Finally, I came out here, bought myself some paints and holed up right here." "Changed my name to Vanning." "Finally, after about a month I got my first assignment." "You know, the payoff," "Eva, that's the doc's wife, she puts up a reward for my arrest." "I guess she could afford it." "She inherited a quarter of a million without ever leaving Chicago." "You said you were going to Wyoming as soon as the roads were cleared to find the money." "Why does it have to be tonight?" "Because they got to me." "But you got away." "They get to you once, they get to you again." "Anyway, I'm scared." "You don't know what it is to live with your back against the wall, Marie." "Inside, you change." "You really change." "I'll get those sheets." "I'm always meeting the wrong man." "It's a talent, forming what the psychiatrists call "doomed relationships."" "Meaning me?" "You won't quit?" "I can't." "They caught up to me tonight." "Sometime, I'd like you to meet my girlfriend." "The one who stood me up for dinner tonight." "Right." "They tell me I can get a bus through to Moose, Wyoming." "We're expecting a clearance on that run along about 9:00 or 10:00 tonight." "How much?" "One way?" "No, round trip." "$39.11." "One?" "Uh, two, please." "Gate Three." "11:05 tonight." "All right." "That's fine." "Hey, I just started." "Oh, excuse me, I wondered, uh, has my buddy been here yet?" "A young fellow about six feet tall, a gray suit and a blond hair?" "Yeah, you just missed him." "Oh." "Did he pick up the tickets?" "Yeah." "Uh-huh." "I think you can still catch him." "He's probably still in baggage." "Oh, right." "What time does the bus leave tonight?" "Gate Three, 11:05." "All right, thanks." "Thanks very much." "Underneath, a handkerchief linen chemise top." "The new look of back interest and the open effect toward the back of the coat around the décolletage." "Her violet cloak gives the new heavenly flowered effect." "One eighty-nine." "Who's wearing 189?" "I am." "Out you go, honey." "Our next mannequin is wearing one of the new slim sheaths in pale, pale beige linen." "It has a double-breasted button effect in the front, the back panel is slightly contoured, buttoning just under the knee." "The perky little white pique bow under her chin sets off a large brim sailor of rough straw." "She has been beautifully accessorized in tones of pale beige." "Notice her gloves and slim shoes." "Go." "Over there, honey." "The beige chiffon, number 372." "What time is it?" "1:30." "How many more changes have I got?" "Three." "Can't he wait till 2:00?" "That's just it." "I told him to meet me here at 2:00." "Oh, we'll be finished by then, honey." "You know me, never off one second." "Aren't you ready yet?" "Hurry!" "Hurry!" "You're on right away." "This next lovely little dress, suitable for a summer afternoon, is in the tones of soft, soft peach and beige." "It has three-quarter sleeves, a high neck and a beautifully, softly flowing skirt of tiers and tiers of chiffon." "Go." "Number 18." "Loretta will help you into it." "Oh, your company is here." "They were asking when you'll finish." "They?" "Frankly, honey, it's none of my business, but a girl like you?" "These two look like unmatched bookends." "Where did they go?" "They said to stay around." "Mrs. Lipton, please send me in right away." "Well, fast as you can, skin in number 18." "Our mannequin's dress is a ball gown of electric blue starched chiffon." "The gown has the very new look of high in front, low in the back." "The uneven hem line has been brought back from the '20s." "Her midriff is wrapped in electric blue velvet." "Our mannequin is wearing a ball gown designed by Jean Louis." "The gown is a slender sheath of mauve sequins, worn with one of the very new Capris collared capes of yards and yards of multicolored organza." "A beautiful symphony in shades of mauve and pink and deeper cerise." "Okay." "Yeah." "Let's go." "But didn't you say $1.30?" "Come on, come on!" "No, ma'am." "$1.40." "It's on the receipt in your hand." "Let's go." "Oh, oh, yes." "Here it is." "My apologies, young man." "Just head out." "I'll tell you where to go." "Last night, you said I should have met a nurse." "What you just did back there was pretty effective first aid." "Mrs. Lipton must be furious." "She runs the show." "Meet one of her favorites, number 18." "$650 worth of sequins." "Mrs. Lipton's never seen what a.45 can do to a set of sequins." "I want to stop at a surplus store and pick up a pair of jeans and a jacket and some field boots." "It's going to be pretty cold where we're going." "Yesterday, my biggest problem was how I was going to break a date with a fellow I knew for tonight." "Of course, I could call him up and tell him I can't make it." "I'm on my way to Wyoming in a pair of field boots with a man that's wanted for murder." "If I left you here, they'd find you in no time." "Even if they didn't, I'd still want to go with you." "You're the most wanted man I know." "Good morning, ladies and gentlemen." "We'll be stopping for breakfast in a few minutes." "It'll be a 30-minute stop." "I hope you all had a good night's rest." "I'm glad I'm not a man." "Have to face that every morning." "That's where you're wrong." "You're going to have to face that every morning of the rest of your life." "Is that a proposal, sir?" "I don't have any real right to ask you, I guess." "Do you think I'd let you get away now?" "After spending two of the most unusual nights of my life with you?" "Hey, haven't I seen you someplace before?" "I was just thinking the same thing." "Yeah?" "Got it!" "Couple of nights ago, on Hollywood Boulevard," "Las Palmas, remember?" "I asked you for a light." "Oh, yeah, yeah." "You were waiting for a bus and we talked about the tropics." "Sure, sure, that's it." "Oh!" "What're you doing here?" "I was just going to ask you the same thing." "Oh." "I'm on my way up to Butte, Montana, to see about a job." "I didn't notice you." "You on the same bus?" "I guess so." "I didn't see you either." "Hey, you'd better snap it up if you want some breakfast." "You know, these boys stick right to schedule." "I'll see you, huh?" "We'll be in Moose in a little while now." "You got your driver's license with you?" "Serial number still in the upper right-hand corner?" "When we get off, I want you to go to Charley's, a garage." "He's got cars for rent." "Rent one." "Where will you be?" "There's a church at the edge of town." "I'll be hanging around there somewhere." "Just honk the horn." "I'm glad we got rid of those two characters." "Yeah, what makes you think we did?" "The next stop is Moose, Wyoming." "We'll be there in about 10 minutes." "You can get a fine view of the mountains from this little town." "The Alps of America, that's what they're known as, rising vertically 7,000 feet above the valley floor." "The highest peak is 13,766 feet." "What do you want?" "Does the name Rayburn do anything for you?" "Is it supposed to?" "Hey, let's take a little walk, huh?" "Who are you?" "Well, my name's Fraser." "Ben Fraser." "So what?" "I work with the police." "Oh." "Well, what'll we do now?" "Well, we, you know, walk a little, talk a little." "About what?" "You're taking me in?" "Well, there's more to it than that." "Well, you're the doc." "That's funny you should say that." "You know, I always wanted to be a doctor, always wanted to help people." "You picked a great way to do it." "Anyway, now I want you to help me." "Look, just take me in, will you?" "Take me in." "Come on." "We'll walk." "I'm tired." "More tired than you know, Mr. Fraser." "To tell you the truth, I'm glad you finally caught up with me." "Now will you please just take me in?" "You're getting a little monotonous with that "take me in" routine." "Hey, come on." "You know, I've had my eye on you for quite some time." "Where's the girl?" "She's not in this." "Oh, how do I know?" "I just met her." "Well, how do I know that?" "You might have known her before." "Well, there's something I do know." "A man with $350,000 doesn't sit up all night with a set of watercolors to meet an agency deadline." "And I watched you ordering dinner." "Picking out the hamburger instead of the filet mignon." "It must be kinda tough to pass up those shrimp cocktails." "What kind of a cop are you?" "I didn't say I was a cop." "Did you ever hear of Bankers Blanket Bonds?" "No." "Well, look, suppose you knock off a bank." "The bank don't lose the money." "They're covered by a bond." "My company does." "They've got to pay back every penny." "Insurance, huh?" "When I started up in Seattle, the only trail I had was a sequence of stolen cars." "I finally found the last one." "It had Washington plates." "Back the road up there a ways." "Then a little further up, the rangers discovered the body of a doctor." "They claimed a man by the name of Rayburn, a commercial artist from Chicago, killed him." "But I figured it otherwise." "You figured otherwise?" "Mmm-hmm." "How come?" "Know what these are?" "Ejects." "That's right." "From a.38 automatic." "I picked up these two up there by the campfire." "Only, the doctor was killed by a bullet from a 30-30 rifle, so these don't figure." "Except for one thing." "One of the bandits up in Seattle was carrying a.38 automatic." "Yeah, Red!" "And one of the men that followed you out of Robinson's." "Well, then somebody must have seen him in Seattle!" "You see, when they stuck up the bank, he pegged a shot at one of the tellers who started to go after him." "Well, he missed the teller, but I picked this up in Seattle." "The mark of the firing pin on this one is the same as the two I picked up there by the campfire." "All right." "Start talking." "I'm ready to listen." "I want to hear everything." "Every move, the whole business, right from the beginning." "I'm happy to meet you, Mr. Fraser." "Well, maybe we can put each other on the starting line now, huh?" "The money?" "It's out there somewhere." "Incidentally, what should I call you?" "Art or Jim?" "Might as well make it Jim." "I get to like it better all the time." "Are you going to come with us, or are we going to go with you?" "Well, I'll go with you under one condition." "We charge off the car on my expense account." "Okay." "Cutback's just up there." "Do you have a gun?" "No." "We never use them." "That's why we pay taxes, so the police can carry them for us." "Let's go." "I remember climbing a fence like this and crossing a pasture." "Uh-huh." "Look at those prints." "It can't be anybody but them." "You'd better stay here, honey." "That's gotta be the shack over there." "It might be around here someplace," "I remember I stopped and rested." "It's all here." "I just counted it." "You're unlucky, fella." "You're not lucky at all." "It's a little soggy, but it's gonna dry out, I guess." "One more minute, two maybe at the most..." "We'd have been gone!" "Oh, yeah." "You got a bad sense of timing." "Who are you?" "A friend of Vanning's." "Boy, that makes you unlucky, too." "Well, we'll tie 'em up and leave 'em here." "Don't get worried." "There's snowplows around here." "There'll be a road gang in by night." "Well, my way's sure." "And noisy." "You can hear a shot for 10 miles here." "We'll tie 'em inside." "There's rope there." "Come on." "Come on!" "Come on!" "Come on!" "Hear a shot in the mountains, so what?" "It could be some kid hunting squirrels." "Go on in." "Vanning, too." "He ain't paid his bill yet." "Are you going to do like I tell you, Red?" "Okay." "Okay, one thing at a time." "Put your hands behind your back." "I worked for a guy one time." "He owned a yacht." "He used to sit out in the stern of that thing, smoking cigars, soaking up the sun." "He was a big man, real big." "As for me, a Pacific." "Say, about a 40-footer." "Diesel power plant on it." "Go around from island to island, look 'em all over, and I pick one out for myself." "All for me." "You wouldn't stay there." "You'd start thinking about another bank, another $350,000." "No." "Not me, I wouldn't come back." "What are you going to do with your end of the money, Red?" "I'm going to set up a scholarship at Harvard." "Okay, sweetheart." "Here she comes." "Put it away, Red." "You still soft on Vanning?" "Come on, finish tying them up, all of them." "You don't like me, do you?" "No." "I've had about all I can take of you, Red." "After we split up this loot, I don't have to look at you anymore." "Well, why don't you like me?" "Don't crowd it!" "No." "I gotta know!" "I gotta know real bad!" "I'd feel better if you'd put that rifle down." "Maybe." "How about you put yours away first, huh?" "What do you say, Red?" "I got a mind to make you an extra belly button." "The gun, Red." "Come on." "Well, you're asking for it." "I'm in an asking position." "You know, we could stay like this all day." "We could." "Or we can start something, huh?" "See how we make out." "How'd you like that?" "All right, you play it your way, I'll play it mine." "I'll tell you what I'll do, Red." "Remember when you shot the doc, how you counted?" "Well, I'm gonna do that now." "I'll count to three." "See?" "You don't put that away by the time I get to three," "I'm gonna kill you." "Right?" "One..." "Two..." "Okay." "Okay, boss." "I'll give you two minutes, three at the most." "It's not going to take me that long, friend." "It won't take the federal agents any longer than that to move in here." "Now let me tell you a funny story!" "Hold it, Red!" "I could kill you easy now, couldn't I, Red?" "You don't know how many times I've thought about this." "Every time I thought about it, I pulled the trigger." "But I'm not going to unless you move." "Stop!" "I'm surprised those federal men of yours haven't shown up." "I'd be very surprised if they did." "You see, uh, I forgot to call 'em." "That bag full of money looks kind of small out there, doesn't it?" "Sitting out there, all by itself." "It does now." "Let's go keep it company."