by R.J. Ellory
Words echoed by Victor Klein as he stood inside the entranceway of the East Coast Mercantile and looked out into the street.
Leo Petri stood behind him, in each hand a canvas holdall.
‘There’s no time for anything else is there?’ he asked Klein.
Klein didn’t speak, merely shook his head.
‘I’ll get Benedict to call Rydell and tell him we’re coming out early.’
‘Out the back of the building,’ Klein said, ‘and we’re taking a couple of people with us.’
Leo Petri nodded, turned, understood that there had in fact been a jinx somewhere, wondered when he would ever learn his lesson. Should’ve stayed home. Should’ve left New York when he had his premonition. Too fucking late now. Too late by far.
SIXTY-FIVE
‘What d’you mean, inside?’ McLuhan asks.
‘Exactly as I mean. We have someone inside one of the banks.’
Seated across from McLuhan is a smartly dressed, perhaps too smartly dressed federal agent called Robert Hennessy. Everything about him seems smooth and polished, as if he has spent his life telling people that things are happening that they don’t understand, but it’s okay, they’re not things that are meant to be understood.
McLuhan doesn’t trust the man.
‘It has been a very precise and detailed operation,’ Hennessy says. ‘Obviously there was a certain delicacy to the situation, considering the time and expense involved, and there was a particular reason we did not want to inform you of what was happening until it was absolutely necessary.’
‘Absolutely necessary?’ McLuhan asks. ‘You call an hour after a bank robbery starts the point where it becomes absolutely necessary?’
Hennessy smiled ingratiatingly. ‘This isn’t about a bank robbery, Captain, it’s about securing the arrest of Ben Marcus, Solomon Neumann, Walter Freiberg and a whole host of other unsocial elements that have been creating trouble in New York for a great many years.’
McLuhan is shaking his head. ‘But you’re federal. What the hell has this got to do with federal jurisdiction?’
‘Bank robbery is a federal offence, Captain. Espionage, sabotage, kidnapping, drug trafficking, bank robbery—’
McLuhan stops him. ‘Okay, okay, okay, enough already. So you’re here to tell me what? That there’s a bank robbery going on—’
‘Four bank robberies,’ Hennessy says. ‘East Coast Mercantile on West Twelfth, American Investment & Loan on Bethune and Greenwich, New York Providence on West Ninth and Washington, and Associated Union on West Broadway. Right now each bank is surrounded by both federal and police units, there are helicopters overhead, and the men within have not the slightest hope of escape.’
McLuhan is nodding, slightly disbelieving, and at the same time a little relieved that he does not have to handle a bank robbery all by himself. ‘I appreciate your telling me what’s going on,’ he says, ‘but why now? Why wait so long to let me know what’s happening? This is my precinct, and one of those locations falls inside my jurisdiction.’
Hennessy smiles again, his manner condescending, as though McLuhan is five and must be scolded for drawing on the wall with a Crayola. ‘Because, Captain McLuhan, you have a wild card in your hand.’
McLuhan nods. ‘Duchaunak by any chance?’
‘Frank Duchaunak, yes,’ Hennessy says. ‘You wouldn’t happen to know where he is at this moment?’
McLuhan stands. He buries his hands in his pockets. He shakes his head and looks at Hennessy with an expression of concern. ‘I think . . . I think that he might be right in the middle of this.’
‘Where?’ Hennessy asks. ‘Where do you think he is?’
‘West Twelfth. I spoke to him just before nine-thirty and I got the definite impression he was planning to go to West Twelfth. I sent a car to check at his house and he wasn’t there, and the black and white I sent over to West Twelfth was stopped by one of the units down there.’
‘You’re sure of this?’ Hennessy asks as he rises from his chair.
‘Sure?’ McLuhan echoes. ‘With Frank Duchaunak, nothing – and I mean nothing – is ever sure.’
‘Including his loyalties?’ Hennessy asks.
By the time Walter Freiberg and Raymond Dietz have accessed the ancillary safe and removed the vast majority of its contents, it is obvious that the helicopter overhead has arrived for their benefit. Cathy Hollander, back behind one of the pillars nearest the front doors, has already witnessed the staggered deployment of at least four police units and what seems like a Federal Bureau of Investigation Negotiation Unit. On the roof of the building facing the bank sharpshooters have been stationed, each of them visible only by their weapons or the odd appearance of a reversed baseball cap above the parapet.
At nine-fifty-two a.m. Cathy Hollander, dressed head-to-toe in black, a balaclava, gloves, heavy boots, on her back a radio unit with a narrow wavelength transmitter, over her shoulder an M-16 assault rifle, at her hip a 9mm Glock, steps back from the pillar and runs across the open concourse to the rear of the floor.
‘How many?’ Freiberg asks her, he and Dietz cramming tied bundles of banknotes into further holdalls.
‘Looks like four units of police, another Federal task force.’
‘Fuck ’em,’ he says, and though she cannot see his face she can tell from his eyes and the tone of his voice that he’s smiling.
Freiberg is more than fifty years old; exactly how old she has never discovered, but his energy and stamina match that of a man half his age when he’s at work.
‘So?’ she asks.
‘So nothing . . . call Kossoff, tell him we’re coming out the back, that he should come up from West to Washington and we’ll meet him between the two. Tell him there’s going to be some gunplay.’
Cathy nodded, unhooked her backpack and hurried back to the front of the bank. Behind the pillar she kneeled, undid the backpack, lifted out the handset and radioed Kossoff. She gave him instructions, aware even in that moment that the Federal unit out front would know that a transmission was occurring, some audio-geek in a van desperately trying to find the frequency before the message was relayed.
Kossoff acknowledged her, told her Good luck, to which Cathy Hollander replied, ‘A pretty overrated commodity, right?’ and then they broke off.
Cathy replaced the handset in her backpack, and then – almost as an afterthought – took off her balaclava. Sweating like a pig on barbecue day, her hair matted, the feeling of claustrophobia was almost too intense to bear. Perhaps, in the heat of the moment, a moment when sense and reason were relegated far below base survival, she figured that in escaping one should at least be able to see where one was going.
Nine-fifty-six, morning of Christmas Eve, Cathy Hollander, a.k.a. Margaret Miller a.k.a. Diane Sheridan, rises from a kneeling position on the concourse of American Investment & Loan on Bethune and Greenwich.
Outside it has begun snowing, and unbeknownst to her – unbeknownst to the vast majority of people in New York – the best plans of Ben Marcus and Walt Freiberg were even now falling apart at the seams. At each of the four locations – four banks that were due to be relieved of a combined sum approximating fifteen and a half million dollars, fifteen and a half million hard-earned Christmas dollars – police and FBI Units were deployed, rank and file, across the street, the facing junctions, the intersections, back doors, exits, entrances, underpasses and vantage points. Already news flashes have surfaced on KLMC, KMGV and Channel Nine. The scout helicopter for Channel Nine that both John Harper and Frank Duchaunak saw hovering above St Vincent’s happened to be in the right place at the right time. That helicopter was the news station’s equivalent of an ambulance-chasing personal litigation lawyer, the kind of lawyer that gave out business cards in hospital wards and doctors’ waiting rooms. The pilot had seen the police chopper streaking across the horizon and had followed it. The fact that Channel Nine caught a bird’s-eye view of the West Twelfth robbery as it happened was mere luck. Those pictures
were syndicated across three more channels before ten a.m. New Yorkers, from the Lower East Side to Central Park, were transfixed by the events as they unfolded, all of them of the view that such a thing was occurring in their neighborhood.
But these things were unknown to Cathy Hollander as she set the radio down, as she half-turned to look at the street once more, as she came up from where she’d been kneeling and started back towards Freiberg and Dietz.
What was also unknown – even as Freiberg was shouting for her to hurry, that Dietz was in the exit to the car lot at the back of the building, that they had a straight run down to the rendezvous with Kossoff – was how easily she would go down when the bullet hit her.
She was lifted bodily when it struck. The sound was unfamiliar, new, not easily described, and the point of impact – the very center of her chest – was the kind of target accuracy that would be commented on when the shooter returned to his unit later that day. Good call. Clean as a hound’s tooth. Such comments as these.
And when she hit the floor there was such finality, such an irreversible conclusion to her absolute lack of movement that Freiberg hesitated only a moment before cursing, turning, and running.
He never looked back.
Down at the entranceway to the bank’s rear car lot Ray Dietz was waiting. There were two other people, both customers of the bank, each of them carrying two holdalls. These people would not only be couriers, but would also provide sufficient cover for Freiberg and Dietz to make it down to where Kossoff was waiting. Three blocks south-west the secondary cars waited, and this was their destination. Once in the secondary cars they had a prayer.
‘Where is she?’ Dietz asked.
Freiberg shook his head.
‘Aw fuck,’ Dietz said. ‘She was cute.’
One minute past ten. Four people emerged from the rear of American Investment & Loan – Ray Dietz, Walt Freiberg, the two hostages. As soon as it was verified that there were no other gunmen inside the building, the front was stormed by a Federal Assault Unit. Inside, they found the security guard with a broken neck and the lifeless form of Cathy Hollander. Once the building was given the all-clear, fifty-three people were escorted from the foyer and into the street: thirty-one bank staff and twenty-two members of the public. All of them were shaken, some hysterical, but in all cases they had experienced a Christmas they would never forget. One of the Federal Agents stood over the prostrate body of Cathy Hollander, kicked the sole of her boot with the toe of his shoe.
‘Nightmare,’ he said to himself, his voice barely audible. ‘What a fucking nightmare.’
SIXTY-SIX
It is three minutes after ten by the time John Harper realizes that there is no way he will get close enough to the East Coast Mercantile & Savings to understand what is happening, least of all to determine whether Cathy Hollander is inside. Police are everywhere, in sidestreets, along the roofs of the adjacent and facing buildings. Federal people in dark blue windcheaters run back and forth from one sidewalk to the other, and barriers are hastily erected to keep everyone away. Members of the public from nearby houses, apartment buildings and stores are swiftly evacuated and gathered at the end of the street, and when Harper tries to press forward, to make some progress towards the scene of activity, he finds that the closer he gets the more unrealistic it is to go any further.
Eventually he backs up and returns the way he’s come. He finds a coffee shop on the corner of Greenwich Avenue. From a seat near the window he can see the front of St Vincent’s Hospital. He is unaware of both irony and coincidence. He is distraught, afraid, apprehensive. He feels there is no adequate way to describe what he is experiencing and, had he been asked, he might have done nothing more than stare blankly and shake his head. He believes a life has opened up around him, a life he never knew he possessed, and just as he’d started to appreciate what might have been involved in such a life, it has imploded, folded backwards upon itself and crushed him within.
He thinks – just for a moment – that he should go over to the hospital and see what is happening with his father. He cannot remember when he was last there. He decides against it. He cannot face it.
Harper is then aware of the sound of voices behind him. He turns to see a small crowd gathering beneath an overhead TV in the corner of the bar. He makes his way across the room, stands for a while, completely unable to focus his attention – but when he does, he realizes that he is watching reports of events unfolding at four different locations. West Twelfth is merely one of them. Something is happening in three other places, and he – John Harper – knows they all have something to do with him.
What he thinks, he is unable to believe; and what he believes he cannot bear to think.
After some minutes he turns and leaves the coffee shop. He starts walking, away from West Twelfth, away from St Vincent’s. He doesn’t look back. He is too frightened.
Joe Koenig, Albert Reiff and Karl Merrett leave the front of the New York Providence Bank on West Ninth and Washington in a hail of gunfire. The gunfire, targeted upwards, is merely designed to confuse and disorientate the police and Federal units that face them across the street. Using the same strategy as Freiberg and Dietz, they take with them four hostages, two girls, two men, and as they leave they are literally surrounded by uniforms. There is no opportunity for any clear strikes, except perhaps from overhead, and such an attempt would be considered far too risky. They intend to make it as far as East Ninth and Fifth where Ricky Wheland is waiting to take them west across the Village to the secondary vehicles.
The task force is set on standby. No clearance is given for any sharpshooters to attempt a strike. Enough innocent people have been killed already.
It is ten-o-seven by the time the awkward huddle of people reaches the rendezvous with Wheland. Only one hostage goes in the car with them, one hostage and something in the region of six hundred thousand dollars. Such scenes are replicated at two other locations – West Twelfth, as Victor Klein, Larry Benedict and Leo Petri make their way from the rear of East Coast Mercantile & Savings, again with hostages – three of them – and start running over Greenwich to the corner of Perry; also at West Broadway where Charlie Beck, Sol Neumann and Lewis Parselle start away from Associated Union Finance towards the corner of Spring and Thompson, five hostages gathered around them, where Ron Dearing waits patiently in the vehicle, his nerves taut, his mouth dry, his face drenched with sweat.
All four crews, carrying with them an estimated three million, two hundred and five thousand dollars, are expected back at the lock-up across from Pier 46 by twenty-two minutes after ten.
The West Broadway crew – Charlie Beck, Lewis Parselle, Sol Neumann, and Ron Dearing – are stopped dead in their tracks by a tirespike across Sullivan Street. In an attempt to run from the car, Sol Neumann is killed by a single shot to the head. Beck, Dearing and Parselle attempt to make it down MacDougal, but the weight of their burdens, the fact that their greed has outweighed their native instinct to survive, means that they get no more than two hundred yards before black and whites cut off the road and a dozen or more armed police officers stand between them and the way home.
They were last seen – all three of them – by another news station helicopter, this one from Channel Six, as they were spreadeagled on the road, faces down, hands out ahead of them, ankles crossed.
By the time Frank Duchaunak understood what was happening he knew that Walter Freiberg was not at the West Twelfth site. At ten-o-two he’d shown his ID to a stationed Federal Agent, a man called Liam Shaner, and Shaner had explained that they were covering four attempted robberies. Duchaunak had asked whether or not there was any indication that one of the four crews had a girl within its ranks. Shaner seemed surprised, smiled in a strange kind of way, and then said, ‘She was the first one we took out.’
‘Took out? Where?’
‘Bethune and Greenwich, American Investment & Loan.’
Duchaunak did not respond. He merely thanked the agent for his help and tu
rned away. He’d asked after Cathy Hollander because he felt certain that wherever she was, there he would find Freiberg.
He reached the junction at the end of the street and started running. Bethune was no more than five blocks away.
By the time the secondary rendezvous time had arrived only two crews remained. The West Ninth and Washington four – Joe Koenig, Albert Reiff, Ricky Wheland and Karl Merrett – had been roadblocked at the end of Cornelia Street by three black and whites. Joe Koenig and Albert Reiff were both shot, Reiff fatally, Koenig merely wounded, as they ran from the abandoned vehicle.
Arriving at Pier 46 were the two remaining crews – those led by Klein and Freiberg respectively. Few words passed between them. They understood that nothing had succeeded the way it had been planned. From the moment they had invaded their target sites the game had been over. Between them they carried a little more than two point three million dollars. There were seven men in all – Klein, Freiberg, Maurice Rydell, Larry Benedict, Leo Petri, Henry Kossoff and Ray Dietz.
‘The girl?’ Klein asked Freiberg.
Freiberg raised his hand and drew his index finger across his neck.
‘Shame,’ Klein said, but there was no emotion in his voice.
‘We use all four cars,’ Freiberg said. ‘Split the money. There’s eight bags, put two in each car, everyone goes different ways, into the city, right into the middle of the city and gets lost like we planned. We’ll speak and co-ordinate what the fuck we’re going to do in a few days, okay?’
‘Done,’ Klein said.
Larry Benedict and Henry Kossoff divided the bags between the vehicles.
‘We’re gone,’ Walt Freiberg said, and within moments, less than a minute perhaps, four bright yellow Medallion cabs hurtled away from Pier 46. Freiberg went alone, the others in twos – Klein and Kossoff, Benedict and Petri, Dietz and Rydell. They went different ways, out along West Street, hurtling away into silence as the first of the squad cars came from Perry and West Eleventh.