Play Game at Poker Room

Poker Room Story

We just stayed underneath the sports car until I heard a siren. I began to dislodge myself from my uncomfortable position, wedged between the ground and the tailpipe. But the siren faded. It was only a passing ambulance.
More sirens, finally. The police had arrived. In truth, it ad been a very short time. A newspaper boy had seen the men in ski masks carrying an axe toward the front door and had tipped the police. They arrived about five minutes after the first swing of the axe against the metal entrance. Felt like a year, though. I walked back up the alley, keeping pretty much toward the trees. A police cruiser squealed around the corner with its lights off and parked by the Bridge poker Club’s rear exit. “What are you doing here?” he asked when he spotted me. He didn’t even have his gun drawn. “I was inside when they broke in. I think it’s me they were after because...”
The cop wasn’t paying any attention. He just walked toward the rear door. Shots sounded as he started to enter. His knees buckled and he kind of bunny hopped backward, all the while trying to get his gun out of its holster. He stumbled into the trash cans, still trying in his nervousness to free his revolver.
He’d strode right up to the back door like he was John Wayne a few seconds before. As soon as the gun went off inside, he was about four feet tall, clumsy as hell and scared to death.

Conversation

I thought, Oh, Lord, I’m in trouble, expecting the kidnappers to barge out the back door at any moment. I could visualize this cop on his knees pleading for mercy while his gun remained jammed in the holster. Finally, he got lucky Bluffer and the gun worked free. Another cop car arrived, and soon I was crouching behind a squad car with an officer on each side. I could hear the cops in front bellowing on loud speakers, “Surrender. This is the police. Come out unarmed, hands up. Surrender.”
That’s when two silhouettes appeared in a darkened corner just inside the rear door.
“Stop!” yelled the officer to my right. The bandits froze. The crazy one said, “Okay, man, I’ve had it,” and threw his gun into a trash barrel. His accomplice didn’t do. A thing. Now we could make them out more clearly. The one who still held a gun was only about five-eight, but a big, husky dude over two hundred pounds. The crazy one was a bit taller and very slender. Both still wore their ski masks. Suddenly the drugged-up guy wheeled around and headed for the front door. He had another gun on him.
 (Each man carried a second gun.) He crashed through the front door waving a pistol insanely. They shot him all to pieces. All kinds of gunfire was going on  up front, and during this commotion the dude who’d been standing by the back door jumped in to the alley and started running.
“Stop! I’ll shoot!” cried one cop, while the other echoed those words almost exactly.
Heedless of this warning, the man kept running. He turned back and fired a shot which hit the police car near were we were huddled low for protection. They opened fire on him. He dropped his gun right in the alley and continued running. He was so hefty for a guy his height that it just looked like he was running in slow motion. You could hear the bullets ricocheting off the concrete buildings and the asphalt of the alley. They fired until they were both clicking.., used all six shots in both guns and never hit this guy. They just never hit him! He got down the alley, around the poker room corner and out of sight.
During the commotion I made my way back to the front of the shopping center. I found the guy who’d escaped down the alley in the other direction when the kidnappers had come through the front door. He said, “Well, I guess we ought to go back over there and tell them our stories.”