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moment, as the four-man scrum scuttled across the sidewalk toward the waiting getaway car, no one spoke. Dillinger locked eyes with at least one of the officers, several of whom stood no more than twenty feet away. They were just steps away from the car, and for a fleeting second it appeared Dillinger could brazen it out. Then one of the officers, a forty-three-year-old detective named Patrick O’Malley, shouted, “Wilgus!” Officer Wilgus turned, giving O’Malley a clear shot at Dillinger. O’Malley fired his pistol four times, at least one of the bullets striking Dillinger’s bulletproof vest.

Dillinger appeared stunned. For the first time in his career, he appeared to lose his temper. “Get over!” he snapped to Wilgus, shoving him aside. “I’ll get that son of a bitch.”5 He raised his submachine gun and fired a burst directly into Detective O’Malley. The policeman, a father of three little girls, fell dead on the sidewalk, eight bullet holes across his chest.

As O’Malley crumpled, the six remaining officers opened fire. The sidewalk erupted in gunshots. Dillinger and Hamilton dashed for the getaway car, jumping between a line of parked cars. Hamilton didn’t make it. He was struck by several bullets, one passing through his bulletproof vest, and fell to the ground. Dillinger stopped and helped him into the car, grabbing the money satchel as well. Miraculously the two managed to dive into the car’s open door without further injury. As bullets pounded the getaway car, the driver careened off down Chicago Avenue, eluding police pursuit. In minutes they were gone.

Eyewitnesses made the identification, and the evening newspapers made it official: John Dillinger, the man who many in Indiana cheered for fighting greedy bankers, was now a murderer. For the rest of his life the killing clearly weighed on Dillinger’s mind. He would repeatedly deny shooting Detective O’Malley, to lawyers, lawmen, and friends. More than once, he volunteered this to complete strangers. His denials probably had less to do with the prospect of a murder conviction than with his own sense of self and his public image. At the heart of his appeal, Dillinger knew, was his joshing Robin Hood spirit, the sense people had that he was a regular guy making the best of hard times. Dillinger didn’t want to be the bad guy. He wanted to be someone people like his sister Audrey and her family could cheer.

After murdering Detective O’Malley, Dillinger drove the badly wounded Hamilton to the hotel where Pat Cherrington was staying. Together they spent most of the evening locating a doctor to treat Hamilton’s wounds. One bullet had hit him in the stomach, at least one more in the left shoulder. For the next few weeks Hamilton remained in a Chicago apartment with Cherrington nursing him back to health.

Dillinger, meanwhile, after splitting the $20,000 in proceeds with Hamilton, picked up Billie. They stayed in Chicago just long enough to visit a divorce attorney; as soon as Billie could end her marriage, she and Dillinger planned to wed. Afterward they drove south to St. Louis, where Dillinger wanted to visit a large auto show. There they bought a new V-8 Ford, checked into a downtown hotel, and spent an evening dancing in its roof garden. Then they struck out west on Route 66, looking forward to a vacation in the Arizona sunshine.

East Texas, near Huntsville Tuesday, January 16 Dawn

The morning after Dillinger’s East Chicago raid, a black Ford coupe bumped along rutted dirt roads through pine woods lining the Trinity River bottoms in a remote corner of East Texas. A thick fog rose from the river, making driving difficult. Behind the wheel sat Clyde Barrow, Bonnie beside him. In back sat a cadaverous forty-eight-year-old heroin addict named Jimmy Mullins. The car crossed a thin wooden bridge and came to a stop. Clyde got out, tucking a Browning automatic rifle beneath his arm. Mullins did the same. Leaving Bonnie in the car, they walked into the woods, disappearing into the mist.

For six months Bonnie and Clyde had been alone, living out of their car on handouts from