The Jack Finney Reader

by Jack Finney

  And you've just seen the names of your other two pals.

  I shook my head firmly, looking straight into his eyes. No. They're not here. I handed the list back. They left Reno that evening.

  He continued to smile at me. A lot of people left Reno that evening, by plane, train, car, and bus. And every day and evening since. But not the men who robbed Harold's Club, or any one of them.

  I shrugged. How can you tell? How would you know?

  He just kept on smiling. Don't talk foolishness; what do you think our business is? You think a casino robbery would catch us flat-footed? That we wouldn't know what to do? He closed his folder and walked on toward the concrete steps. They haven't left town, they're here in Reno, and I'll give you ten to one they're in this station by midnight. The rest of us followed him, up the steps, down the halls, and back to the office we'd left.

  Now it occurred to me, walking up those stairs — the point of what had just happened. No one had beaten me up in a windowless police-station cellar. No one had questioned and threatened me for hours, a strong light glaring into my eyes. No one had touched me, but in ten minutes' time I'd been softened up all the same. I was finished, absolutely defeated by what I'd just seen, and I was suddenly bone-tired, helplessly and impotently angry. Because it wasn't fair! We'd done everything anyone could possibly have done! We'd missed nothing anyone could hope to think about. Who could guess some ridiculous kid would write his name on the side of our trailer!

  And yet even if he hadn't, what about that list, shrinking and shrinking in length, yet always containing our names? Even if we had assumed other names, what difference? I felt finished, hardly caring any more. The man in the tan suit walking casually down the corridor ahead of me had known exactly what he was doing down in that garage.

  Brick was standing in the office. When we entered, a uniformed cop folded the newspaper he'd been reading, got up from the desk he'd been sitting on, and walked out.

  Brick turned, seeing me and Tina, but his face was expressionless. Tina and I took the chairs we'd had before, facing him. The tall man in tan sat on a window ledge. The younger detective carried a chair from one of the empty desks and put it beside the man on the window ledge. Sit down, he said tonelessly to Brick, and Brick had to sit facing us. He slouched in the chair, crossing his ankles, a careless, defiant pose. But he couldn't look at me, and sat staring at his feet, moving the toe of one shoe a little. The two detectives sat down at their desks.

  Where's the money? the tall man said quietly, talking to me. I don't want you to give us the trouble of finding it ourselves. You're caught; get that into your head. You're caught, and the only thing left is to make the best of it. Make it easy on yourself; don't try to be a hard guy. Where is that money?

  I was ready to tell; he had me completely drained of resistance or hope. Then — it was either pure accident or the tall man overreached himself, I don't know which — the door opened and Jerry and Guy stepped in, a cop behind them. They just stood there then, looking around the room at all of us. I saw the tall man raise his brows inquiringly, and the cop at the door said, The other two. Cruikshank and Weiner.

  Good, said the tall man, and watching him I thought two things: I mustn't recognize Jerry or Guy by a word or look; and I was suddenly convinced that the man on the window ledge was faking. This was too staged, this timely arrival of Jerry and Guy; the whole thing was too staged; it seemed to me suddenly all designed to demonstrate to me how hopelessly and completely we were caught and break me down. Instead, energy and fight roared up in me again.

  I don't know what's going on here, I said, but if I'm supposed to know these guys, I don't.

  Jerry smiled wanly. Thanks, Al, he said, but don't bother. They know us, all of us.

  Okay, I said to the tall man, but you're faking just the same. I don't think you had any list yesterday. I don't think you had any way of narrowing it down to just our names. I think the whole thing was typed up today, just for my benefit — after you got Brick. He gave you Guy's and Jerry's names and addresses, and you brought them in; they've probably been here an hour. Brick would do that for a candy bar, or your used cigarette butt, wouldn't you, you pathetic dog! I jumped to my feet; I couldn't sit still.

  The man on the window ledge shrugged, still smiling. You'd have been caught. All of you, he said. With or without the kid from Salt Lake, with or without Brick's assistance. Though it's true — he reached out and tousled Brick's hair in mock affection, but he was actually rough about it, his eyes contemptuous — that he's on the side of law and order now. Brick just stared at his shoes, eyes murderous. The point is, the tall man went on, that it doesn't matter how you were caught. When a thing like this gives at any point, it's like a leak in a mud dam; the whole thing crumbles and collapses. Now, don't give me any trouble; we want to wrap this up. Where's that money?

  But he was too late. Ask him — I stepped forward and stood looking down at Brick. Brick lifted his face to stare up at me, and I said, Ask the talking machine; he made the big promises; he said he'd get you the money. Well, let him deliver. I looked down into Brick's eyes. Go ahead, Brick; save your neck. Tell the man where the money is. I spit into his face.

  The room was utterly silent, Brick looking up at me, eyes alive with hate, while I stared back. Then he looked away, down at his shoes again.

  Waiting till he was quite sure nothing more was going to happen to his possible advantage, the tall man glanced tolerantly at Brick and said, Don't be too hard on him. You're mad, but don't let yourself get so mad you use less sense than he did. He knew he was caught and made the best of it. You better do the same.

  I'm not mad, I said, and it was true now. I walked back to my chair, smiling. But if he could make a bargain, I can too. The same one; only I can deliver. I nodded at Tina. She had no part in this. She begged me not to go through with it, and I mean begged. And she couldn't stop it. Here in Reno she had absolutely no part in the robbery, nothing. She wasn't even around. I want her out of it.

  The tall man looked at me for a few moments, then smiled. All right. If what you say checks out, if she took no part in the robbery, she's out; that's a promise.

  Al— Tina started to speak, but I cut her off.

  Shut up. It'll be easier for me to take what's coming; you can see that, Tina. I want you out of this. I turned back to the man on the window ledge; I had no real hope of this, but I couldn't help trying. And I want us out too: Cruikshank, Weiner, and me. You can have Brick; he's the guy who forced this through, and I can tell you exactly how he did—

  The smiling man was shaking his head. Quit while you're ahead, Mercer; that's a good rule in Reno. We can find the money ourselves if we want to put in the man-hours to do it. It's worth something to wrap this up now, and the girl's out if she didn't participate. But that's all. Now, where's the money? Don't make me lose patience.

  And no deals with him? He gets it? I glanced toward Brick.

  Right along with the rest of you.

  All right. I stood up. I'll show you the money. Right now. Sick as I was feeling, it was some satisfaction to see this cool, imperturbable man startled, even slightly. He stood up, frowning now, not knowing what I could possibly be talking about. Brick's face was blank and astounded, and he started to stand; the little grandfather put a hand on his chest and shoved him down again, hard. Then the tall man and the young detective followed me to a window at the other end of the room.

  I raised the Venetian blind a few feet, then pointed. There's your money, I said. Right in plain sight all the time. Take a good look. For a moment they stared out the window, then turned back to me, scowling, and I realized I'd better not be too smart. On top of the balloon, I explained then. The Harold's Club balloon. It's shoved under the netting on top, in the canvas sack.

  They stared out across the city at the miniature gray dirigible hanging there in the cloudless blue sky over Reno, shining in the late-afternoon sun. Then the tall man turned to me, smiling again. Pretty good, he said, noddin
g his head. I like it. Life can be interesting every now and then. It'll be a pleasure to break the news.

  He crossed the room to one of the desks, picked up the phone, and said, Get me Harold's Club, and tell them who's calling. The detective and I walked back to our chairs. Jim? the tall man said into the phone. What's wrong with you people? He grinned. I mean all this complaining about a robbery. Don't you ever look around your own place? He paused, listening. I mean it's been there right on the premises all this time. He grinned again, kidding the man at the other end, enjoying this, prolonging it, having a good time; and I was suddenly lower and more heartsick than I'd been till this moment. Because this was happening to us, to me, and the friendly, smiling man on the phone really didn't care, it was nothing to him — he could joke about it! Our freedom was lost, for years, or forever. And it was just an incident in the day's work to him and the other cops, something to kid about over the phone. I've never felt more lost and alone in all my life.

  The tall man replaced the phone, then nodded at Tina. All right; you can go. Get out of Reno. Quick.

  Tina stood and walked toward me, but the tall man slid off the desk and stood between us. No! he said, and gestured at the door with his thumb. Out! Right now.

  But we're married! Tina's voice was a cry of anguish.

  You are? he seemed surprised. Well, in that case, don't leave Reno. Stay here for six weeks. Get your divorce. You might even get an annulment; talk to a lawyer. Tina tried to step around him, to me, but the tall man blocked her off. No! he said. Can't you understand? It's finished, it's over. He's going to jail — for years. You've seen him for the last time in your life, unless you hang around for the trial. Break it off! Get out, get your divorce, and forget him. I mean it; get out of here now.

  She had to go. The tall man herding her toward the door, blocking her view so she had to turn and stoop to get even a last frantic glimpse of me, forced her out, closing the door after her, while I sat there hating him.

  Walking back, he looked at me. You think it's cruel, don't you? A pointless bit of police viciousness. Well, it isn't pointless. He stood in the center of the room, glancing from one to the other of us. You poor fools, he said softly, and shook his head in disgust. Don't you know what's happened to you yet? he said furiously. Don't you know that it's over! And that it's time to break off with wives and women and everything else outside the walls of the Nevada State Prison? Good God! he burst out suddenly. You've kicked your lives away! How old are you — eighteen, nineteen, twenty? Not much more!

  He stood there in the center of the room, glaring at us, actually breathing hard; then he went on softly. Well, I don't prosecute, and I don't sentence, but I know what you'll get. Thirty years, and you'll serve a full twenty. You know something? The people you've gone to school with — some of them will have children as old as you are now, children in college, by the time you get out.

  He swung to me. Married, are you? he said viciously. Well, congratulations. I hope you had a wonderful two days of it, because it's all you'll ever have. You think she'll wait for you? Well, so does she, and she will; for a year, maybe. That's the usual average. Sometimes it's two years, sometimes three or four. The longest I ever heard of was seven. But she won't wait twenty years, you fool, because she can't! Life isn't that long. She's got to divorce you. And marry somebody else. It's the only life she has; she can't wait.

  He began pacing the room, his face set and angry, staring at the floor, turning his head often to dart vicious glances at us. She'll have children. She'll lie in a bed with somebody else, not you, and she'll have children, and two years from now she won't be able to remember your face. And you won't be able to remember hers. Five years, ten years, and she'll never even think of you any more.

  Once more he stopped to stare at our faces, one after the other. You can't imagine twenty years, he said softly, almost whispering it. Your minds won't take it in, and you think you'll start life all over when you get out. You think about it, and you picture yourselves just about the way you are now when you get out; a few gray hairs, maybe, but otherwise just the same, like in the movies. You think you'll be married. Well, you won't, ever. What can you do, you poor rats, when you get out? How will you earn a living? And who will marry you? He walked to the window ledge and sat down again. Because do you know what happens to you in prison? You get fat, usually, and it's a different kind of fat, prison fat, and it's like nothing you see outside a penitentiary. It's a puffy, unhealthy, bloated kind of fat. There are guys less than thirty with big bellies, fat arms and legs, and rolls of fat on their necks. You don't exercise much; there's nothing but food in your life any more, and it turns to fat. He lowered his voice, leaning toward us intently. And I don't know why, but you lose your hair and you lose your teeth. Yeah! Your teeth fall out! People ask me — they visit the prison, and they ask me — why are there so many old men there? He laughed, a short, bitter sound. They aren't old! They're twenty-eight and -nine, thirty, thirty-one, thirty-two, and they're bald as eggs, not a tooth in their heads, and fat — you wouldn't touch one of them without scrubbing your hands for twenty minutes afterward. That's the young ones. The older ones go the other way; they're dried-up skeletons.

  He sat there nodding his head at us, smiling a little. Think about women, boys, he said softly. Think about them, because that's all you can do for the rest of your lives now; just think about them. He sighed. Lord, you never had a chance. You planned it smart; I couldn't have improved it. And you never had a chance. The bad breaks didn't matter; one way or another, we'd have had you; the thing was impossible. You got nothing, and you threw your lives away. You're dead men, all of you; it's over for you! Why, you make me sick. All of you.

  Then he just sat there, swinging one leg a little, angrily, the way a cat switches its tail. I wasn't even thinking about what he'd said; instead, I was wondering how soon I'd get the chance to kill myself. Because I knew in my bones that what he'd told us was true. That morning we'd stood on Mount Rose, Tina and I, the sun warm on our backs, the sky high and blue all around us. We'd had lunch at Lake Tahoe, looking at the pines and that incredible blue water. That was all true, and now it was only a few hours later and I'd never see those things again, never see Tina again, except for maybe a few minutes' visit with nothing to say, and steel netting between us. I knew I'd have the nerve to kill myself.

  Well, boys, how do you feel?

  No one answered. I looked up, and Guy glanced at me, but there was nothing in his eyes. Jerry just stood, deathly pale, withdrawn into himself, looking at something not in this room. Brick sat, elbows on his knees, head hanging, and I could see the bald spot beginning on the crown of his head.

  A man came into the room, tall and thin, shoulders stooped slightly, his face harassed. He wore rimless glasses, had brown eyes and straight black hair; he was about thirty-five years old. Under one arm was a canvas sack, and I recognized it — our sack. Well — he was crossing the room toward the man on the window ledge, his face puzzled and frowning — here it is. He handed the sack to the tall man in tan and stood waiting inquiringly.

  Thanks, Jim. The tall man took the sack without answering the other's unspoken question, then walked toward a desk, untying the cord from the neck of the sack. I want you to know, he said to us, stopping at the desk, what fools you really are. You had the man fooled with that cart of yours. He believed there was a man inside it; why not? Inside that cashroom at Harold's Club the money lies there on plain unpainted pine shelving. Quite a sight; almost gives me ideas. He smiled. Jim, here, likes to give people the impression that there's a big, steel, burglarproof vault in that room, and it's not for me to contradict him, but— Anyway, people do funny things. The guy thought the man in that cart might kill him, and was scared, and he packed your sack for you. You think there's a lot of money comes into Harold's Club? You're right, but what form do you think most of it is in — cash? Not as much as you'd think; they take in thousands and thousands in checks, you fools! Cash more checks than a b
ank! The guy's hands on those shelves couldn't be seen from your cart; he knew it; and here's what he filled your sack with! He dumped out the sack on the desk, shaking it, and the paper spilled, piling up in a mound: green, white, pink, yellow, hundreds and hundreds of checks cascading onto the desk.

  That's what you stole! That's what he gave you! The tall man shook his head. Hard to say why he did it; people do funny things. The checks would be no good to you, it's true. But to Harold's Club they're money, just as big a loss, if they weren't recovered, as cash. Anyway, there you are, boys; look at it. He gestured at the mound of paper. That's what it's all been about.

  For several long moments he just stood, letting us look at that useless, foolish heap of paper; then he began stuffing it back into the sack. You didn't use a gun, he said, almost as though he were talking to himself. Not a real one; we found that cap pistol where you threw it. Whose idea was that, not using a gun?

  No one answered for a moment, then I said, His. Jerry's.

  Jerry looked up then and shrugged. We all agreed to it, he said. No one was to be hurt.

  Well — the tall man nodded — that much I like. I hate them — the punks with guns. Take a life, cut a man down; they don't care; they even like it. You didn't use a gun, he repeated, his voice mildly surprised, and that was part of your plan. I like it, all right. He continued scooping checks back into the canvas sack for several moments, then he said quietly, Harold's Club won't prosecute. They don't like it that you got even as far as you did. They don't like it that you were even half successful. And they don't want it discussed and yammered about all through a trial. Nobody's too sure of what they could get you on, or just what you stole, legally speaking. As far as you or anyone but Harold's Club is concerned — he nodded at the sack in his hands — this is so much wastepaper. And did you steal it, or only try to? It never left the premises. The defense might do very well with these things. And was it armed robbery? Not exactly. He shrugged. You could be got on something, all right. You'd get some sort of term, but for what and how long, nobody will come out with a firm opinion.