Going to Chicago by Rob Levandoski Page B

gun.”
    Gladys could barely tell us the next part. She laughed and gasped and pressed on her bladder so she wouldn’t pee. “That milkman curdled right before my eyes. ‘Oh my! Oh my! Get in! Get in!’ he said. ‘I’ll drop you off at the sheriff’s. I’ve got to start my deliveries right at six. But I can drop you! I can do that! You’ve always got a friend at Willow Farm Dairy! Yessiree Bob!’”
    So Gladys got in and the milkman sped off. “I can’t begin to thank you,” she said. “He’s such a deadly shot.”
    With the immediate danger of getting shot behind him, the milkman’s heroism returned. So did his libidinous stare. “It’ll be fine, miss. It’ll be fine.”
    â€œHe is the most jealous boyfriend I’ve ever had,” she told him. “Killed a man once just for admiring my shapely legs. Do you think my legs are shapely?”
    The milkman’s eyes shot back to the road. “Why don’t you have a bottle of milk to soothe your stomach. Courtesy of the Willow Farm Dairy.”
    Gladys couldn’t resist toying. She opened a bottle of cream and slowly licked it. Wrapped her eyes around his. “He turned straight into cottage cheese,” she told us. “Then I screamed ‘Dear lord! There he is!’”
    The milkman frantically looked out of every window in his little truck. “Where? Where? Where?”
    That’s when Gladys produced the pistol from her suitcase, with the silver kitten on the pink pearl handle. “Hiding under that bridge up there,” she said. “Waiting for his sweet little biscuit to bring him a big white sucker fish.”
    We witnessed the rest for ourselves. The milk truck skidded to stop. Gus, shotgun over his shoulder, climbed slowly to the road. We followed. He waved his fedora at the milkman like he was an old friend. The milkman crawled out, arms over his head, relieved he’d fallen victim to highway robbery and not that jealous boyfriend.
    â€œGreat little actress, ain’t she?” Gus said.
    The milkman agreed.
    â€œDid you really believe I was a woman in distress?” Gladys asked him. “Distress is one of the hardest emotions to play. And really be convincing.”
    The milkman assured her he’d been completely bamboozled. Gladys was thrilled.
    We unloaded several wire baskets of milk and cream. Gus made Will take a picture of the milkman with Gladys and him, then launched into his speech about the three of us being unwilling kidnappees. He made the milkman promise to report the holdup as soon as his route was finished. The milkman promised and drove off fast.
    That’s the way the ruse went. By midmorning Gus and Gladys had hooked more than a dozen such suckers. Stacked in the cabbage by the river were trays of bread, cases of Coca-Cola, several big bags of ready-mix cement, baskets of eggs, a salesman’s sample case full of doorknobs and hinges, two bundles of the Indianapolis Star , all that milk and cream of course, three gumball machines and a bag of pennies, assorted wallets, watches, pocket change, and jackknives. Every victim got his picture taken with Gus and Gladys.
    After a few hours traffic completely stopped. Which made Gus a happy man. “I’m sure roadblocks are up by now,” he said. “Only a matter of time before we see the law sneaking up. This is all so perfect, ain’t it Gladys? I couldn’t have picked a better spot to die if I was George Armstrong Custer.”
    Clyde asked who George Armstrong Custer was.
    Will, nose in his Official Guide Book of the World’s Fair , told him.
    The morning wore away. So did the afternoon. No sign of the law. Gladys sat on the ground and went through the wallets, then counted the pocket change and finally the bag of pennies liberated from the gumball machine man. She announced the take: “Forty-nine dollars and thirty-seven