Rudy glanced at the clock, gestured. They took up positions on opposite sides of the door, Rudy drew his gun, and there was a knock-knock-knock, and a _knock- knock_.

The kid hesitated, freezing for a split second. Then as Rudy nodded to him, gravely encouraging, his nerve returned and he opened the door.

Four months before, when it was certain that Doc was getting a pardon on his second and last jolt, his wife, Carol, had quarreled violently with him while visiting the prison. She announced that she was suing him for divorce, and had actually started proceedings against him; leaving them in abeyance, ostensibly, until she could acquire the money to carry them through. Soon afterward, with the announced intention of changing her name and making a new start in life, she boarded a train for New York-coach-class, unreserved seat- and that seemed to be that.

Except that she did not go to New York, did not and had never meant to get a divorce, and had in fact never for a moment entertained the slightest desire for any life other than the one she had.

Back in the beginning, perhaps, she had had some conscience-impelled notion of reforming Doc. But she could not think of that now without a downward quirk of her small mouth, a wince born more of bewilderment than embarrassment at the preposterousness of her one-time viewpoint.

Reform? Change? Why, and to what? The terms were meaningless. Doc had opened a door for her, and she had entered into, adopted and been adopted by, a new world. And it was difficult to believe now that any other had ever existed. Doc's amoral outlook had become hers. In a sense, she had become more like Doc than Doc himself. More engagingly persuasive when she chose to be. Harder when hardness seemed necessary.

Doc had teased her about this a time or two until he saw that it annoyed her. "A little more of that, "he would say, "and we'll send you back to the bookstacks." And Carol wasn't angered by his funning-it was almost impossible to be angry with Doc-neither did she appreciate it. It gave her a vague feeling of indecency, of being unfairly exposed. She had felt much the same way when her parents persisted in exhibiting one of her baby pictures; a trite display of infant nudity sprawled on a woolly white rug.

It was her picture, all right, and yet it really wasn't her. So why not forget it? Forget also that more than two decades after the picture was taken, she was just about as dishwater-dull, dumb and generally undesirable as a young woman could be.

She had been working as a librarian then; living with her stodgy, middle-aged parents and daily settling deeper into the pattern of spinsterhood. She had no life but the lifeless one of her job and home. She was fine-featured, her small body beautifully full. But people saw only the dowdy «sensible» clothes and the primness of manner, and thought of her as plain and even homely.

Then Doc had come along-still on parole, he was already doing research on another job-and he had instantly seen the woman that she really was; and with his easy smile, his amiable persuasiveness, his inoffensive persistence, he had pulled that woman right out of her shell. Oh, it hadn't been a matter of minutes, of course. Oreven days. She had been pretty skittish, as a matter of fact. Snubbing and glaring at him; putting him in what she thought of as "his place" But somehow you just couldn't do things like that with Doc. Somehow they seemed to hurt you worse than they did him. So she had relented-just a little-and the next minute, seemingly, she was through that marvelous door. And kicking it firmly shut behind her.

Her parents had washed their hands of her. _Some parents!_ she thought comtemptuously. She had lost her friends, her position in the community. _Some friends, some position!_ She had acquired a police record.

Carol (Ainslee) McCoy. No alias. Photo and f-prints reclaimed by court order. Three arrests; no trial or convictions. Susp. of complicity in murder, armed robbery, bank robbery, in consort with husb. «Doc» (Carter) McCoy. May work as steno; general office. May appear attractive or unattractive, very friendly or unfriendly. Five feet, two in.; 110 lbs.; grey to green eyes; brown, black, red or light blonde hair. Age 30–35. Approach with caution.

Carol smiled to herself, winked at her reflection in the car's rearview mirror. _Some record!_ It had more holes in it than their little fat heads.

Since her ostensible departure for New York, she had been working as a restaurant night cashier in a city some five hundred miles away. Under a different name, of course, and looking not at all like she looked now. Yesterday morning she had quit her job (to join her Army-sergeant husband in Georgia), slept all day, taken delivery on a new car and started driving toward Beacon City.

At eight o'clock in the morning she was within sixty miles of the town. After breakfasting on the rolls and coffee she had brought with her, and a quick wash in a filling station, she felt quite rested and highspirited despite the long hours at the wheel.

Her rollneck cashmere sweater snugly emphasized her narrowness of waist, the flaring fullness below it and the rich contours above. A long-billed airman's cap was cocked pertly on her head, and her hair- tawny brown now-flounced out from beneath it in a jaunty ponytail. Her bobby-socked ankles tapered up into a pair of slacks which were really much less than skintight, although they did seem pretty well filled to capacity in at least one area.

She looked heartbreakingly young and gay. She looked-well, what was wrong with the word-sexy? Tingling pleasantly, Carol decided there was nothing at all wrong with it.

She had not seen Doc since their phony quarrel at the prison. Their only contact had been through brief, cautious and emotionally unsatisfying long-distance phone calls. That was the way it had to be, and Carol, like Doc-being so much a part of Doc-did not quarrel with what had to be. Still, that did not keep her from being almost deliriously happy that the long months of their separation were over.

Doc would be very pleased with her, she knew. With the way she looked; with everything she had done.

The car was a flashy yellow convertible. Stacked along with the baggage on the rear seat and floor were golf clubs, fishing rods, tennis rackets and other vacation impedimenta. The bags were bright with the stickers of assorted hotels and tourist courts. One of them contained a cap similar to her own, sunglasses and a gaudy sports jacket. That was all it held since it was meant to accommodate the loot from the bank.

They would be very conspicuous as they traveled, and the conspicuousness would give them safety.The more obvious and out in the open a thing was, Doc had taught her, the less likely it was to attract attention.

She began to drive slower, to glance more and more frequently at the dashboard clock and the speedometer's mileage indicator. At nine she saw a puff of black smoke spout up in the distance; then a billowing oily cloud of it. Carol nodded approvingly.

Doc was right on schedule, as always. The smoke signaled the successful accomplishment of the second half of his part in the robbery. Which meant, since one part was dependent upon the other, that he had also pulled off the first one.

She took another look at the clock, drove still more slowly. At the crest of a hill she stopped the car and began raising the canvas top. A truck and two cars went past, the driver of one slowing as though to offer help. Carol waved him on in a way that let him know that she meant it, then slid back behind the wheel.

She lighted a cigarette, flipped it away after a puff or two, and stared narrowly through the windshield. Nine-fifteen-no, it was almost nine-twenty. And she hadn't got the signal yet, the winking left headlight. True, one of those distant oncoming cars had suddenly disappeared from the highway-there went another one right now-but that didn't mean anything. There were many turnoffs; up through tree-lined farm lanes, or. cutting between one farm and another.