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Nelson staggered toward Hollis, badly wounded. Onlookers at the two gas stations watched in amazement as Nelson lurched over to the fallen agent. Several witnesses later claimed that Nelson fired into Hollis as he lay on the ground; he didn’t. Ignoring Cowley, who lay in the ditch, Nelson limped to the FBI Hudson and slid behind the wheel. He slipped it into reverse and managed to back it up to his car.

“Throw those guns in here, and let’s get going!” he rasped to Chase. Chase did as he was told, grabbing up guns on the ground and tossing them into the Hudson. He started to get into the front seat when Nelson said, “You’ll have to drive. I’m hurt.” Chase circled around the car, opened the driver’s door and pushed Nelson across the front seat. Blood was everywhere. “What’ll we do about Helen?” Chase asked as he slid behind the wheel.

“We can’t fool with her now,” Nelson said. “We’ll have to leave her.”

Just then Chase spotted Helen running toward the car. She hopped into the backseat with the guns and Chase drove off.

The first onlooker to reach the scene was William P. Gallagher, an Illinois state patrolman who happened to be selling tickets for an American Legion benefit at the Shell station down the highway. Hearing the shots, Gallagher had taken a rifle from the station and fired at Nelson’s fleeing car. As it drove away, Gallagher and another man, who had stopped his car upon seeing the gunfight, sprinted across the highway to Hollis. Hollis lay facedown beside the telephone pole, a gold badge pinned to his chest. The back of his head was blown off. Gallagher tried to speak to him. Hollis, who had minutes to live, managed only a heavy gasp. His eyes moved.

Gallagher then hustled over to Cowley, who lay in the ditch, his feet on the pavement, blood covering the right side of his face; there appeared to be a gunshot wound to the side of his eye. “Don’t shoot, government officer,” Cowley whispered. Gallagher leaned down.

“Was Hollis hurt?” Cowley asked.

Gallagher nodded.

“Look after him first,” Cowley said. He told Gallagher to call the Chicago office, Randolph 6226, and report what had happened. He also asked Gallagher to reach his wife and tell her he had been called out of town and wouldn’t make it home for dinner.

Traffic was backing up. A crowd was forming. Gallagher flagged down a car and loaded Hollis inside, directing the driver to Barrington Central Hospital. Hollis died en route; Gallagher lifted a rosary from the agent’s pocket and called a priest.el A few minutes later an ambulance arrived and took Cowley to a hospital in the town of Elgin.

Agents Ryan and McDade were still lying in a field further down Highway 12. They knew nothing of what had transpired; when Ryan ran to a pay phone and called Purvis with the news at 4:15, he reported only his own actions. Five minutes later Purvis was on the phone briefing Hoover when the police chief in the nearby town of Stamford called with news that Hollis was dead and Cowley had been shot.

Purvis left immediately for the hospital in Elgin. He arrived as Cowley was being rolled into surgery. Cowley asked a doctor whether he was going to die. Then he saw Purvis. Whatever tensions remained between the two men vanished for a few moments. “Hello, Melvin, I am glad you are here,” Cowley whispered.

“Rest quiet and you will be all right,” Purvis said.

“Do you have doubt about that?” Cowley asked.

“No,” Purvis said.

“I emptied my gun at them,” Cowley said.

“Who were they?”

“Nelson and Chase.”

Nelson was dying; even Helen could see it. He was bleeding from seventeen separate gunshot wounds. Five were in his stomach and side, two in his chest, and five in each of his legs where Hollis’s shotgun had done the damage; the worst injury was a wound to the left of his navel where one of Cowley’s .45 caliber slugs had struck and traveled sideways through his lower abdomen. Blood gushed from the wound, soaking Nelson’s gray slacks and trickling