Stealth

by Stan Mason

  ‘I said no names!’ bleated the leader irately ‘Why doesn’t anyone listen to what I tell them?’

  Hunter was no longer at the door. He had assessed the situation and crossed the banking hall to the stairs to go down to the bank’s safe area. It was the moment when money left over at the end of the day was being stored there. Johnson was not on the staircase because it was not a requirement of the rules of the bank for him to be on guard there when money was being returned to the safe. It was a situation which favoured any bank robber and he was fortunate enough to be there at the right time.

  At the sound of the alarm, Ginger got out of the van and entered the bank waving his arms to Wilson.

  ‘I think there’s a police car coming down the road,’ he warned, trying to make himself heard over the noise of the alarm,

  ‘Get back in the bloody van!’ shouted the leader fearful that, without the driver in situ, they would all be left stranded. He looked at Brad and Sam sullenly. ‘Okay!’ he yelled. ‘Let’s go!’ He fired a burst of shots into the ceiling and they all left with the exception of Hunter who was in the bank’s safe filling a large bag with banknotes. Even though the alarm had gone off and was continuing its wailing like a banshee, he couldn’t hear it because of his deafness.

  Outside the bank, the bandits pulled off their ski-masks and raced across the road to the waiting van with Ginger chasing behind them. They all climbed into their seats quickly and Ginger started the engine.

  ‘Hold on!’ yelled Wilson. ‘Where’s Will?’

  ‘He must still be in the bank,’ replied Sam with concern.

  ’He’s deaf!’ commented Brad sagely. ’He couldn’t have hard the alarm going off.

  ‘Where the hell did he get to?’ challenged Sam argumentatively. ‘Fred was in the hall. Brad was on the counter and I was looking for the Manager. I know he was at the door when we first got there but I never saw him after that.’

  ‘Maybe he decided to give it a miss and went off,’ suggested Brad completely unconcerned about the fate of his colleague.

  ‘No... he wouldn’t do that?’ riposted the leader flatly.

  ‘Do we wait for him or do I drive off?’ asked Ginger urgently

  They all looked glumly at Wilson who clearly hadn’t a clue as to what to do in that kind of situation. However their concentration was swiftly broken by the sound of the siren of a police car which pulled up outside the bank.

  ‘What do we do?’ demanded Brad insisting on a rapid answer.

  ‘We can’t wait for him,’ uttered Wilson edgily. ‘It’s too dangerous!’ Drive on, Ginger!’

  ‘You can’t leave him here on his own,‘ cried the driver emphatically. ‘Not with the police coming!’

  ‘We have to!’ stated the leader urgently. ‘Get going... now!’

  Ginger put the clutch into gear and he drove off slowly as the police entered the bank to investigate. The robbers heaved sighs of relief as they recognised they were very lucky to escape scot free.

  ‘How much did you get?’ Sam asked Brad hopefully.

  ‘Nothing,’ came the answer. ‘It all happened too quickly. ’When the alarm went off, the cashier dropped the bag and the money fell out. He didn’t have time to pick it up.’

  ‘Do you mean to say we did all that for nothing?’ reacted Sam angrily. ‘We took all that risk and got nothing!’ He could scarcely believe his ears but the truth could not be avoided. Wilson had told them that this raid could not be worse than the last one. However he was proved to be utterly wrong. It was far worse! This time they had left a man behind! Indeed, it was Murphy’s Law. If anything could go wrong, it would go wrong! How true that axiom came to be! It was time for them to rethink their actions. They were all petty criminals who scraped a living through burglary and theft but at least they could chose their targets without fear of being caught. Now that they had upgraded their nefarious activities, the rules had changed dramatically. On assessment, robbing banks should be easy for the raiders had the surprise of attack, the use of weapons with no physical resistance, and a defenceless bank staff. However, when push came to shove, the experience proved to be far different. Advancing to a higher standard of crime was anything but simple and the penalties if captured were very severe. It was something for all of them to think about in depth for they didn’t realise what they were getting themselves into. They had upgraded their activities to more serious crime. It may be that the rewards were much greater but the penalties, if they were caught, were very much stricter!

  Chapter Nine

  Trenchard had been given the task of acting under cover outside the Banco des Agricole. He had positioned himself at a corner of the street some distance away from the bank but he could see everything very clearly from where he stood. He had been there for about an hour and his legs were starting to ache from standing in the same position for so long. He glanced at his wristwatch and decided to go for a cup of coffee as nothing untoward seemed to be happening. Customers were coming and going from the bank while no one around seemed to be suspicious. He had only take a few steps forward when a white van pulled up opposite the bank. In his wisdom, he changed tack and noted the gang of four men wearing ski-masks and carrying guns entering the bank. He felt for his mobile telephone in his pocket and dialled his superior without delay.

  Marley was sitting in his office at the Charnley Wood police station twiddling with a pencil between his fingers. If only he could work out the time and date when the bank robbers would raid the same bank he would have been delighted. However in the absence of a crystal ball he was blind to any plans that might have been made. Nonetheless, to humour Trenchard with his hunch, he had sent the man to the Banco des Agricole just in case it turned out to be right. He had also telephoned his superior to tell him to have an armed task squad team ready outside the bank. The more he thought about the situation, the more he became frustrated. After a short while he began to fret, obsessed by the desire to put Fred Wilson behind bars again, when the telephone rang. It was Trenchard.

  ‘They’re robbing it again!’ he spluttered excitedly down the line. ‘They’ve just got out of their van, and gone into the bank in with guns... and they’re wearing ski masks. I can see four of them plus the getaway driver. They came in an old white van which still has the getaway driver in it.’

  ‘How many police officers are with you, Trenchard?’ asked the senior man with equal excitement.

  ‘None. There’s no one around. I’m alone.’

  Marley grimaced and slammed his hand down on the desk. ‘Damn!’ he yelled down the line. ‘What the hell’s happened to the SWAT team? They should be there surrounding the bank with everyone armed.’ He paused to think for a moment. ‘See if you can find them. For God’s sake, don’t think of tackling the robbers by yourself!‘

  ‘I wasn’t thinking of doing that, sir. As I said, they’ve got guns and I’m unarmed,’ cut in the junior officer.

  Marley gritted his teeth but failed to reply. Although it was his earnest intention to capture Wilson in the act of committing a serious offence, he didn’t want Trenchard to sacrifice himself in order to get his hands on the bank robber. The problem was that there was only a five minute time-frame at the most before the bandits left the bank with their loot and jumped into their getaway van to drive away.

  ‘Where’ the hell is the SWAT team?’ he repeated glumly. ‘’They should be there!’

  ‘I haven’t seen any of them,’ bleated the junior officer.

  ‘Well look for them dammit and be quick about it!’ he shouted down the line feverishly.

  Trenchard hung up the receiver at his end of the line and left his position to look for support. However, except for people passing by, there was no evidence of any armed police officers.

  At the Charnley Wood police station, the door of the office opened without warning and Frazier rushed into the room.<
br />
  ‘There’s a raid on that foreign bank again,’ he said in a loud voice. ‘I should imagine it’s Wilson and his gang. Is the SWAT team in place?‘

  ‘I informed them early this morning.’ returned the senior officer solemnly. ‘They should be surrounding the bank at this very moment but Trenchard says he can’t see any of them’

  ‘I’ve been meaning to speak to you about Wilson,’ advanced Frazier calming himself. ‘I’m very concerned about you.’

  ‘Why’s that?’ asked Marley with a dull tone in his voice.

  ‘Well it’s obvious that Wilson’s become an obsession with you to put him away again. I’m troubled that you’re making too much of it.’

  ‘Don’t worry about me,’ snapped the other man. ‘I’ll get my hands on him shortly. You see, he’s an amateur at robbing banks which gives me a distinct advantage. I’ll have him behind bars very soon.’

  Frazier shrugged his shoulders aimlessly. He had made his point and had failed to make any inroads into the senior man’s mind so he used his judgement to let the matter drop.

  ‘What are we going to do now?’ he asked meekly

  ‘I don’t know about you, but I’m driving to the bank. I want to find out what’s happening there,’ came the reply.

  Both men hurried towards the door and left the police station to go to the car park. They scrambled into Marley’s car and it was driven off at speed. The face of the senior police officer was filled with determination and Frazier stared at him with concern as the senior man muttered to himself.

  ‘I’ll get you Wilson if it’s the last thing I do! You got me into trouble way back when you posted a complaint that I was hassling you. Well it’s my turn now and I’m going to have your guts for garters. They say that revenge is sweet, and I’m going to love it!’

  Frazier gave him a jaundiced look. He felt that he was perfectly correct where the senor officer was concerned. The man was so obsessed in arresting the criminal... way over the top... and it was affecting his judgement in the office with regard to other cases under his control. However, there was nothing a junior police officer could do to influence his senior officer in a situation of this kind. Like so many other disorders, the direction of intent had to come from the man himself. No manner of advice or influence could be brought to bear on a person from another source who nursed an obsession.

  Marley pulled up outside the bank and hastened inside. He approached the policeman who was taking statements from the customers and showed him his Warrant Card.

  ‘What’s going on?’ he asked curtly, realising that the bandits had long departed.

  ‘The customers told me that there were four robbers,’ explained the policeman briefly. ‘Five if you count the getaway driver. They got away with two hundred and fifty pounds from the look of it. The Chief Cashier fooled them about the money stored at the bank and then someone pressed the alarm button. I was only a short distance away at the time.’

  ‘Did you see them exit the bank?’ asked Frazier, catching up with his superior officer.

  The policeman shook his head slowly. ‘No sir,’ he replied. ‘By the time I got here they were all gone.

  At that moment, Trenchard entered the banking hall. ‘I told you so,’ he boasted. ‘I said they were stupid enough to rob the same bank again, didn’t I?’

  Marley stared at him with a dull expression on his face. ‘Yes, Trenchard, you did, didn’t you?’ he uttered sarcastically, angry at himself for not having listened to the advice given to him by his junior.

  ‘You see,’ continued Trenchard blithely pressing his luck. ‘Sometimes my hunches are right!’

  ‘Do shut up, Trenchard!’ continued his superior becoming more angry by the minute that Wilson had once again slipped through his fingers.

  Before anyone else could advance the situation, there was the sound of footsteps on the stairs leading from the area where the safe was located and they all looked in that direction, astonished to see Will Hunter entering the banking hall holding a sack full of money.

  ‘Hello,’ uttered Frazier with surprise. ‘What have we here?’

  ‘Hello!’ repeated Hunter with equal surprise. He paused for a few moments to assess the situation wondering where all his colleagues had gone. ‘You’re probably wondering what I’m doing here.’

  ‘You couldn’t have put it better,’ returned Marley with an element of hope in his voice. He had caught one of the bank robbers red-handed. It may not have been Fred Wilson but it was the next best thing.

  ‘I was just making a withdrawal,’ commented Hunter weakly, realising that the game was up as far as he was concerned.

  ‘Wearing a ski mask,’ laughed Frazier sarcastically. ‘Is that how you normally make withdrawals from a bank? What makes you think I don’t believe you?’

  Hunter pulled off his mask. ‘Oh this,’ he said in a wild attempt to explain. ‘It’s a Halloween prank.’

  ‘I could understand the concept,’ continued Frazier with an element of amusement in his voice, ‘except that we’re in the middle of April. Halloween comes at the end of October.’

  ‘I’m not much good with dates,’ went on Hunter lamely.

  ‘You certainly aren’t!’ cut in Trenchard rudely.

  ‘What do you have in the sack,’ demanded Marley, cutting to the chase. ‘In case you think you’re Santa Claus with a sack full of toys, I reiterate that it’s still April... not Christmas!’

  ‘As I said. I was just making a withdrawal,’ repeated Hunter reading their lips to understand what they were saying.

  ‘I bet you were,’ commented Frazier slowly. ‘Here... let me lighten your burden. Give me the sack. We’ll take good care of it for you. Just hand it over!’

  ‘Why does he keep staring at our lips?’ asked Tremchard observantly.

  ‘He’s probably deaf,’ explained Frazier. ‘He couldn‘t have heard the alarm. The robbers left him behind.’

  ‘That’s just like Wilson,’ remarked the senior police officer shaking his head slowly. ‘Hiring a deaf man for a robbery! That’s all I need,’ he wailed Marley bitterly. ‘A deaf bank robber!’

  ‘What can you expect from a gang formed by Fred Wilson?’ intervened Trenchard coldly.

  Frazier leaned forward and took the sack of money from the bank robber without any resistance. Marley turned to the policeman standing in the banking hall without delay.

  ‘Arrest this man, officer,’ he snapped. ‘Make sure you take him to Charnley Wood station for questioning. He’s going to help us considerably with our enquiries.’

  The policeman removed a pair of handcuffs from his pocket and forced Hunter’s hands behind his back to secure them tightly before leading him out of the bank to a waiting police car.

  ‘Let’s go and interrogate him,’ said Frazier even though he recognised the problems in demanding answers to his questions from a deaf man. ‘It might prove to be quite revealing.’

  ‘As long as it leads us to Wilson, I don’t care,‘ uttered the senior police officer hopefully.

  ‘Do you know I have a hunch...’began Trenchard before being interrupted rudely by both senior officers.

  ‘Do shut up!’ they shouted in unison.

  Trenchard recognised that it was an exercise in limitation and he decided to follow their advice without question. He did not wish to undo the value of his earlier hunch which, in hindsight, would have resolved a number of problems... firstly, the robbing of the bank and, secondly, the capture of Fred Wilson. It was something which would haunt Marley in his nightmares for some time to come. As far as the senior police officer was concerned, he knew without doubt that he would lay awake at night, twisting and turning in his bed, thinking about how Fred Wilson had managed to rob a bank and got away with it leaving a clean pair of heels behind him. The CCTV camera would show the number plate of
the white van they had used to get away but it was most likely either a stolen vehicle or one which was now hidden in a garage, away from everyone’s sight. As soon as they arrived back at the police station, the senior police officer realised that he was forced to rethink his plan for the capture of the criminal but he was totally unaware of the point at which he should start. To his misfortune, another opportunity to catch the man, whom he hated so much, had been missed.

  Marley contacted his superior officer angrily, on the telephone complaining that the SWAT team hadn’t turned up at the Banco des Agricole. The reply he received astonished him completely.

  ‘You advised that the bank which would be robbed was the Banco de Barcelona,’ stated his superior bluntly, despising the allegation of being blamed for the error.’

  Marley recognised that he was between a rock and a hard place. He knew that he had ordered the SWAT team to surround the bank which had been robbed, but what was the point of arguing with his superior who had made a terrible mistake. Was it any wonder that Trenchard was unable to see any armed police in the vicinity of the Banco des Agricole. They were all surrounding another bank some miles away! He was forced to draw in his horns and retreat diplomatically but the failure to stop the bank raid and arrest the robbers went very much against the grain!

  In Sam’s father’s house, Wilson was walking up and down in the lounge continuously as he thought about planning the next robbery, The bit was between his teeth and he was reluctant to let go. It was a learning curve and he was becoming more knowledgeable about robbing banks each time they tried to do so. The present record was one which he refused to dwell upon because the end results from both bank raids had been so negative. It was astonishing really because they had the element of surprise, they were the only ones with lethal weapons, and everyone else was at their mercy, Yet they had undertaken two robberies to come away with mere chicken-feed in terms of money. They needed to be more aggressive, more determined, and follow a plan which would bring them greater rewards, Brad was cleaning his gun, becoming more and more annoyed as Wilson continued to walk up and down.