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“Shit, you’re even starting to
sound
like a damn college man. Okay, so you’re here for a heist. And you want the lid kept on it.”

“Right, Bern.”

“What do you need, a car? You can have a car as long as you’re in town, Nolan. On the house. Course, if you wreck it, I’ll expect you to buy the thing. That’s only fair, I mean.”

“More than fair. But you could help me another way.”

“Whatever it is, I’ll do what I can.”

“I need some supplies for the job. And I figure the less people I talk to, better off I am. Can you get me what I need?”

“Think so. Anything short of a tank, anyway. What is it you want?”

Nolan told him.

“What the hell you need those for?”

“I don’t want the guys I’m heisting to see me. If they see me, I’ll have to shoot them.”

“Getting soft, Nolan? Ain’t fat bad enough?”

“I never been one to kill without reason, Bernie.” That was true enough, but Nolan didn’t go into the rest of it—that his main reason was, he didn’t want to subject Jon to violence that extreme. If he could help it.

“Well, okay, Nolan. You always known what you was doing. Sit and have another beer—there’s plenty in the cooler. I’ll go get a man to rustle that crazy shit up for you. Run you about twenty-five bucks per. What you want, a couple?”

Nolan nodded.

“Okay, good as done. But I were you, I’d remember those toys’re no substitute for firepower. You can’t beat a gun, no way.”

“Oh, I’ll have a gun, Bern. I may be getting soft and fat, but I’m not crazy.”

6

THE BALLROOM
was filled with long tables, tables stacked with the wares of dozens of individual dealers, and hundreds of kids-of-all-ages were filing past the tables, stopping to examine those wares. The dealers ranged from small-time local collectors getting rid of their duplicates, to big-time operators who’d come from either coast in vans loaded with boxes and boxes of rare material. The goods of both were scrutinized with equal suspicion by prospective buyers, who slipped the books from their plastic bags to make sure each was properly graded, fairly priced, going over each yellowing artifact like a jeweler looking for flaws in a diamond. A generally cordial mood reigned, however, and the horse-trading, the bickering over an item’s monetary worth, was considerably more amiable than what you might run into at a pawnbroker’s, say, or an antique shop. Jon, in his jeans and sweatshirt, fit in well with this crowd, who hardly looked prosperous, unless you noticed that greenbacks of just about every denomination were clutched in the countless hot little hands like so much paper. Though the throng included kids below teen-level, as well as men into middle age and beyond, most were closer to Jon’s age, and ran to type: male; glasses; skin problems; skinny (or fat) or short (or tall); ultra-long hair (or ultra-short); T-shirts with super-heroes on them. If Nolan were here, he’d look at this crowd and figure them for the bums of tomorrow—hell, bums of
today
—but in reality these were highly intelligent, if slightly screwball young adults, potential Supermen even if they did look more like offbeat Clark Kents.

What was going on was a comic book convention. This ballroom in a downtown Detroit hotel had been converted into “Hucksters’ Hall,” and Jon, like all the scruffy fans wandering through the room in search of pulp-paper dreams, was dropping money like a reckless Monopoly player: in his first twenty minutes, Jon passed GO, spent his $200. This is what he purchased: three Big Little Books, two Flash Gordon, one Buck Rogers; one
Weird Fantasy
comic with a story by Wood; and two
Famous Funnies
comics with old Buck Rogers strips inside and covers by Frazetta. All of it was the comic book version of science fiction; that is, pirates in outer space: Killer Kane hijacking Buck’s rocket ship; Ming the Merciless holding Dale Arden captive to lure Flash into a trap; pirates flying the skull-and-crossbones in the sea of outer space. Great stuff.

So why was he so damn unhappy?

Not about the prices he’d had to pay—he’d done all right on the items he picked up so far, by shrewd if halfhearted haggling—and not in disappointment at the size of this convention, though it really didn’t compare to the New York Cons, whose Huckster rooms were breathtaking, both in scope and prices. This convention was not, after all, totally devoted to comics, being the Detroit Three-Way Fan-Fare, a joint gathering of comics freaks, science-fiction enthusiasts and old-movie buffs. Since Jon fell into each category, he naturally was more than pleased with the arrangement.

But right now he was feeling low, an exceptional state of affairs considering he was now in the middle of the atmosphere that most nearly fit his conception of heaven: namely, a room full of comic books. Not unhappy exactly, more like unnerved. Moody. Jumpy. Ill at ease.

Tonight—the prospect of tonight—was scaring the bejesus out of him.

When Nolan had suggested going to Detroit and ripping off old man Comfort, the convention came immediately to Jon’s mind; but he decided to wait for the right moment to spring the idea on Nolan. When Jon did ask if it was okay if they stayed at this particular hotel, Nolan’s left eyebrow had raised and he’d said, “Comic books. It has something to do with comic books . . . I don’t know how in hell it can, but it does.”

Jon admitted as much, pointing out, “The convention’ll get my mind off the job—I won’t get all fumble-ass nervous about the thing. You can do your setup work, getting the car and the other stuff, and I can spend the afternoon looking at old comic books. It’ll keep my mind from dwelling too much on tonight.”

They’d been sitting on the plane at the time, having driven to the Quad City Airport in Moline for a Friday morning flight to Detroit. They hadn’t phoned ahead any hotel reservations, as it was Nolan’s intention to find a cheap motel once they got there. He’d made the intention known to Jon, who hadn’t been surprised by it, considering that right then they’d been sitting in the plane’s tourist section, another of Nolan’s money-saving tactics. Their conversation had to be couched in euphemisms, as they took up only two of three adjoining seats, the window seat being occupied by a conservatively dressed businessman who might be offended by discussion of the armed robbery pending.

Jon had discovered, through experience, that Nolan was something of a cheapskate. While Nolan had earned some half-million dollars in his fifteen years as a professional thief, he’d kept the bulk of it salted away in banks, while living a painfully spartan existence. Nolan had been satisfied with modest apartments and second-hand Fords because he lived for tomorrow—that is, had planned an early retirement from the heist game, a retirement that would include a nightclub Nolan wanted to own and operate through his “twilight years.”

But now that Nolan had been wiped out of his half-million nest egg, not once but
twice
(Jon’s along with it, the second time) you’d think the guy would’ve learned you might as well enjoy yourself today since a safe’s liable to fall on you tomorrow.

But no. With Nolan it was tourist-class seats and cheap motels and, Jon supposed, a hamburger joint for supper.

So when Nolan didn’t seem to be buying the argument about the hotel with the comics con being a way to keep Jon’s mind off the job, Jon mentioned the special room rate; if thrift didn’t win Nolan over, nothing would. “We can have a double room for twenty bucks, Nolan. That’s less than half price. People attending the convention get the rooms less than half price.”

“Okay, kid. Whatever you want.”

It pleased him he was finally beginning to find the means to occasionally come out on top with Nolan.

Not that Jon didn’t still admire the man. But Nolan’s cheapness was at least a chink in the armor; it was nice to know the guy wasn’t perfect, that he was human in a few ways, at least. Nicer still was knowing that in the ways that counted—survival, for instance—Nolan was a rock. Jon liked to cling to that rock.

He could’ve used that rock right now.

Because the convention wasn’t proving to have the distracting effect he’d thought it would.

That old man, Sam Comfort, with his spooky gray eyes and sadism-lined face, was a constantly recurring image in Jon’s mind, a strong, chilling image that could crowd out even the four-color fantasies strewn out along the dealers’ tables in Hucksters’ Hall. Tonight. Tonight Jon and Nolan would be going up against that crazy,
crazy
old man, and if all went well, they’d come away with a strongbox full of that senile old bastard’s money. Which was dandy, only they hadn’t done the thing yet; it lay ahead to be done, tonight.

And Jon was scared shitless at the thought.

He’d been eager at the prospect, sure; he was hot to get back some of that money he’d lost a month- and-a-half ago, and when Nolan outlined the plan to rip off Sam Comfort and Son, it had sounded good to him, and still did. But that was back in Iowa City, in homey, security-lined surroundings, where planning a robbery was like plotting the story of a new comic strip. The execution of the plan seemed light-years away, the hazy end result of a sharp but abstract concept. And this, this was Detroit, they were
here
already, and a few hours from now Jon would be laying his ass on the line.

He’d done it before, of course, laid his ass on the line in one of Nolan’s potentially violent undertakings (hell of an unpleasant word, that— undertaking, Jesus!) but that didn’t make things any easier. Last year, he’d gone into that first robbery with a very naive sort of attitude, an out-of- focus view, a comic-book idea of action and adventure and derring-do. Then, when everything had turned to shit, guns blasting into people and throwing blood around and turning human beings into limp and lifeless meat, Jon had suddenly realized that Nolan’s life was not capes and bullets-bouncing-off, it was the real goddamn thing. The bullets went through you, and blood and bone and stuff came flying out the other side, and afterward, Jon would’ve been glad to take Nolan’s advice to “let this cure you of living out your half-ass fantasies.” But no sooner had Nolan got out those words, than the situation erupted into violence once again, and Jon had to respond in kind, had to pull Nolan’s ass out of the fire, and get him to where he maybe could be kept alive.

When the cordite fumes had lifted from the situation, when the blood had been cleaned up and the people buried, when the bank robbery and its gory aftermath had fuzzed over in his mind and become just an exciting memory, Jon had been lulled into thinking it had been sort of fun and, after all, he’d come out of it with not a scratch. So he’d fallen into the trap again, equating Nolan’s life with goddamn Batman or something, only to be reminded, the hard way, that the game Nolan played was for high stakes, the highest—life or death—not to mention those lesser gambles, getting maimed, maybe, or jailed. He’d been reminded of that when those guys shot his uncle and stole the money and got him back in the thick again. And now, with that nightmare just beginning to fade in his mind, he was suckering himself back into Nolan’s precarious lifestyle once more, hopefully to recoup some of the money they’d both lost last go-round.

Not so many hours ago, Jon’d had a talk with Breen, and that talk was lingering in the back of Jon’s head, nagging him as much as the image of old man Comfort. Nolan had arrived around two-thirty in the morning and, after a talk with Breen, had driven out to the house on Iowa City’s outskirts to see if the Comforts were still around. Nolan figured they wouldn’t be, but felt it best to check, and had Jon stay with Breen at the antique shop, armed, in case the Comforts attacked while Nolan was gone.

During that time, while they waited for Nolan’s return, Jon and Breen had talked. Breen’s first question was, “Are you related to Nolan or something? His fucking bastard kid or something?” Breen seemed slightly irritated.

Jon was taken aback by the question. “Not that I know of. What the hell makes you come up with an idea like that?”

“I don’t know,” Breen said, shaking his head. “I known Nolan a long time, and I never seen him act like this.”

“Like what?”

“He’s goddamn pampering you, kid. Isn’t like him. You know what he said to me?”