Bank Robbers

by C. Clark Criscuolo

  The video showed a woman in a black Chanel suit being whisked into a brown car. Her back was to the camera, until they closed the car door. The woman was looking down and away, and suddenly there was a flash and Dottie watched her look up and smile through the glass window.

  “OH, MY GOD, IT’S TERESA!”

  Arthur sank into the chair. He rested his elbows on the arms of the chair, and with his hands made a fist that he pressed against his lips. He looked up at Dottie and watched her mouth drop open in dismay. He began to shake his head.

  “Dottie,” he began as slowly and evenly as he could, “did someone else know about this?”

  She nodded slowly.

  “A woman?”

  She nodded again.

  “Who?”

  “Teresa Newhouse,” she said barely above a whisper. “She was the one I got your number from.”

  He sat still, shaking his head. The scratchy sound of the intercom echoed about, as a woman’s voice announced that their flight to L.A. was going to begin boarding shortly.

  Arthur glanced up at her, set his jaw, and stood up. He took her arm firmly, and as quickly as he could began walking her through the terminal.

  “Well, let’s get on the plane.”

  “Arthur,” she said softly.

  “No. Don’t—”

  “Arthur,” she repeated.

  “No—”

  “I can’t leave her there,” she said gently.

  She watched him shake his head, and he let go of her. Then she watched him walk over and slam the wall with his fist and glare at her.

  “Why didn’t you tell me she knew?” he choked.

  “I didn’t want to worry you,” Dottie offered weakly.

  “Worry me! Worry me! You have a woman who can identify you and you didn’t want to worry me?” His eyes slid around and he dropped his voice. “Aw, Christ, Dottie.”

  He exhaled and placed his hands on his hips.

  “What do you want to do?”

  “I have to go back.” She watched his jaw get tight, and he was furious.

  “For God’s sake, why?”

  “Oh, come on.”

  “Why? She’s going to take the rap; now let’s go.”

  “Don’t you want to know why?”

  “No. I don’t care. I want to spend the next couple of weeks on a beach.”

  “No. You heard Sid. He can’t guarantee anything. She’s in trouble because of me.”

  “That’s a lot of crap. She’s not in trouble because of you, she turned herself in.”

  “She doesn’t understand what she’s done.”

  “Dottie, the woman walked into a police station and surrendered. You can’t do that accidentally. She wants to go to jail. Do you want to go to jail? Let her! Say thank you! Take my arm, and let’s get on the goddamned plane and go to Hawaii.”

  “I can’t just leave her there. Arthur, she doesn’t even have money for an attorney. Arthur, I have to.”

  His eyes narrowed.

  “Then you do it without me.”

  Her jaw dropped at she stared at him, puzzled.

  “What do you mean?” she asked slowly.

  “I’m not sitting by and watch you throw your life away. They’ll release her as soon as she’s questioned. They’ll know immediately she didn’t do it. Now, Dottie O’Malley, you are going to”—his teeth were clenched—“get on that plane, or, or”—his voice was shaking—“or I’m going to Hawaii alone. You hear me? You can’t promise to go with me every thirty years and go back on it! Now, she’s going to be released. She doesn’t know what happened.”

  She looked at him, and frowned and shook her head.

  “I told her everything, except for the gun, but that was all over the news yesterday. Arthur, I have to go back and at least get her a lawyer. It’s the only decent thing to do,” she said and crossed her hands over her chest and stared at him.

  He shook his head and cursed under his breath. After a moment he glared at her, took her hand and they began to walk quickly, with him almost dragging her, through the airport back to the ticket area. He didn’t say a word the entire walk and she could tell he was angry. But whether he was angry at her or just at the situation she couldn’t tell.

  He stood her next to him at a pay phone on the wall, and she watched him dial a number. Arthur put one hand against the wall and leaned on it, his head hanging down, his eyes closed, and he was breathing hard through his nose.

  “Sid Arnowitz, please,” he said, and Dottie felt herself breathe out.

  “Sid—no, it’s not Dottie … yeah, I watched it. Yeah, she’s a friend who knew about the whole thing … Maybe she forgot about the woman, Sid, I don’t know. Remember, they all think she’s senile,” he nearly yelled into the phone.

  “Arthur, don’t yell at Sid,” Dottie snapped, and pulled on his coat sleeve.

  “I don’t know what to do either,” Arthur was saying, and Dottie whacked him on the arm.

  “Tell him to bail her out! For God’s sake, Arthur!”

  “Okay, she’ll meet you downtown in an hour and a half … Yes, she’ll be alone,” Arthur said and slammed the phone down. He stared at her furiously, and then began to walk away from her. She followed him, and pulled him back.

  “What are you so angry about? That I can’t let her confess to this?” She stared at him hotly, and he rolled his eyes and began to say something but couldn’t get the words out.

  “What?” she demanded.

  “I can’t watch it, I can’t stand the idea of you…” His voice withered away and he turned from her.

  “Of sitting by and watching them sentence me to jail,” she finished the sentence for him.

  They were both quiet as they both remembered the same words of this same conversation almost word-for-word from some thirty-odd years before.

  Only this time Arthur was saying them.

  “Well … I couldn’t do it for you.” Her voice was hard.

  “Dottie, I can’t—”

  “I know what it feels like. Now, give me the bag,” she said softly.

  He began to shake his head and then, looking at the floor, he slowly handed it over to her. Her hand tightened around the handle and she had to pull it away from his hand. She swallowed hard, then grabbed him and gave him a deep kiss.

  “I love you. Good-bye, Arthur,” she said, and quickly walked away from him and down the long corridor, back toward the metal detector.

  * * *

  TERESA couldn’t believe how stupid Dottie Weist was; she’d cursed herself under her breath for the last half-hour for listening to her about this whole robbery thing. So far, she’d been wrong about everything. She wasn’t going to get to spend the night in some nice clean little cell in the Sixth Precinct, for starters.

  They didn’t take female prisoners.

  As a matter of fact, it turned out there were only two precincts in the entirety of Manhattan that did house female prisoners, and they were in lousy neighborhoods. Even when it came to jail, the women were short-changed, she thought grumpily.

  And then she’d found out that she wasn’t even going to spend any time in those sewers, oh, no, now the FBI had to get into the act. So they explained that they were going to take her downtown to be interrogated at 26 Federal Plaza.

  Interrogated.

  That word didn’t sit well with Teresa either.

  She watched this woman, in a black cotton suit, come in with these two guys in olive-green suits. She first thought the two men were twins; she swore they had on the same exact outfit. They signed for her as if she were some kind of package, and they cuffed her hands in front, in cuffs so big they were nearly falling off anyway, and they walked her outside.

  That was the only fun part.

  Teresa had always imagined what it would be like to be dogged by the press. It was great. All the lights, and the cameras and the stupid questions, and the pushing and shoving, just as if she were the hottest thing since Shirley Maclaine.

  But
she’d played it discreet, kept her eyes low, as if she were guilty and embarrassed; only once did she look up at the press.

  And they went crazy. They started screaming questions at her, and deep down inside Teresa knew she was going to talk a lot to these idiots. And she also knew—whether she was going to spend her time in some FBI jail instead of the Sixth, and no matter whether it was a Federal crime instead of just a city crime—she knew that this was going to beat the hell out of sitting inside some hot, unpainted shack in Florida.

  The three agents they’d sent, two men and a woman, as though they were afraid she was going to escape or something, had driven the car way downtown, and up to a big building and around the back into a fenced-in parking lot, avoiding more of the press. They’d walked her, still cuffed, through the back of the big building, which looked like corrugated cardboard on the outside, and had uneven white stone walls on the inside. The female agent took her arm as they walked over to an enclosed bank of elevators. Large stainless-steel beams, with meshed glass windows so thick they appeared green, separated these elevators from the regular elevators. Inside was a desk with two armed guards and a sign attached over the door that read: “Floors 22–29 Only.” The agent held up the plastic identity card to the guard inside. The buzzer went off and the heavy door opened.

  They rode the elevator up in silence, got off at the twenty-sixth floor, and led her down a long carpeted hallway. She was taken into a room with a long light wood table and several chairs of the same color.

  And that was where what they referred to as the “Interrogation of Teresa DeNunzio Newhouse” began.

  * * *

  “I DON’T believe this, where the hell could she be?” Tracy’s voice rang out.

  Her husband watched his wife put her hands on her bony hips and shake her head. Fred had just put the last box in the back of the van.

  Tracy’s eyes darted down to her watch.

  “The flight’s in less than two hours, Tray. Where did she say she was going?”

  “Church,” Tracy spat out through clenched teeth. “I’ll get her.”

  Tracy clacked down the stone steps of her mother’s building, mumbling angrily. She walked outside and turned up First Avenue, ignoring the throngs of kids and the old men sitting in front of the stores. She turned up 114th Street and began to walk toward the beat-up old red brick church building. She stomped up the rectory stairs and pressed on the bell. A small nun opened the door. Tracy walked inside, and down the hall toward a room. The sound of a television echoed on the stone floor. Father Dominick, a stout man of about sixty, was sitting in a lounge chair in front of the set. His collar was open at the top, and he was frowning, disturbed, at the screen. His eyes lifted to Tracy as she entered, and he slowly, but firmly rose from the chair and held both arms out to her.

  “Father Dominick? My mother…” Tracy began, but before she could say anything, the priest’s arms were around her, and she felt him give a heavy exhale.

  “Oh, my dear, I had no idea of the trouble in your house,” he began, and she stepped back.

  “Yeah, well, it ain’t so bad where she’s going, no matter what she says about it.”

  “What?” He blanched at that, and Tracy crossed her arms over her chest.

  “Oh, come on, Father, wouldn’t you rather see her there than living all alone in this neighborhood—”

  “But you can’t mean this. Where your mother’s going is … is horrible.”

  Tracy stepped back, and felt her mouth drop open; she whipped the large sunglasses off her nose and stared at him, her thin lips twitching.

  “I resent that! You didn’t actually tell her that, did you? Don’t you think that’s a bit of an exaggeration? I mean, I assumed you were going to reassure her; help her get used to the idea.”

  The priest took one step back and looked at her, horrified. Tracy’s eyes darted around the room, and landed on a door.

  “Tracy, I don’t think this is an idea you get used to. I mean, she needs a lawyer.”

  Tracy’s eyes darted back to him, and they narrowed.

  “You told her to get a lawyer? What kind of a priest are you? She doesn’t need a lawyer. She needs a plane ticket and a bathing suit.”

  “What?” Father Dominick asked, gaping at her.

  Tracy looked at her watch again, and then at the door.

  “What do you mean, ‘What?’ Where is she?”

  “She’s not here,” he said, and he blinked, and a look of concern came over his face.

  “Oh, great! Just great! She has to be on a plane for Florida in less than two hours and—”

  “Tracy, when was the last time you saw your mother?”

  “This morning. She said she was coming here to church to say good-bye. She’s going to Florida to live with my brother and his wife.”

  She watched him wince, and slowly shake his head.

  “I don’t think your mother’s going to Florida today.”

  “Why not?”

  * * *

  TERESA sat in the chair chain-smoking and staring narrowly at the woman with a plastic laminated card pinned to her which read FBI. She blew out the smoke hard and the woman grimaced disapprovingly.

  A man the other two called Ted, wearing an olive lightweight suit was sitting on the table, dangling one leg.

  “You should talk to us.”

  “I ain’t got nothing to say.”

  “It’ll be better if you cooperate.”

  “Give me a break.”

  “Again, did you have an accomplice or not? We know you did it, we just want the details.”

  “Yeah, yeah.”

  Teresa watched them glance, frustrated, at one another, and the female agent looked at her and smiled.

  “Let’s go back to the timing here. What time did you rob the bank?” she asked, studying Teresa grimly.

  “Ain’t you looked at the tape? It’s right there in little numbers on the bottom left-hand side of it, and that’s all I’m saying.”

  “You have to give us more details than that. We have been at this for three hours now—”

  “Yeah, and you’re beginning to whine like my kids—you tell ’em what’s gonna happen and they ignore you and keep pesterin’ you. I told you, I ain’t saying anything,” she said, stubbed out her cigarette, and crossed her arms over her chest.

  Ted glared at her and came close to her face, snarling. “We’re gonna keep at this. As long as it takes, maybe another three hours, how about that?”

  Teresa’s eyes narrowed. “Three hours? Buddy, I was trapped for four months in an apartment during winter with a three-year-old and a two-year-old in diapers … Three hours? Give it your best shot.”

  The man stood up and exhaled. He put his hands on his hips and suddenly screamed out, “You’re in a hell of a lot of trouble here, lady! You better talk, NOW.”

  The other agent, in an identical suit, came up to the first agent, and Teresa narrowed her eyes at him sternly.

  “Ted, calm down, she’s an old woman,” he said, and then looked unsympathetically at Teresa. “Look, just tell him something, unless you’d like to sit here for the rest of your life, huh? Never see your grandchildren.”

  Teresa let out a cackle, and pulled out another cigarette.

  “Who the hell are youse kidding? What? You gonna make me disappear? Some ‘old’ woman? You think they gonna like that?”

  “Who?”

  “Them newspapers, the television, the Gray Panthers … Cut the crap, boys. I ain’t sayin’ one word to nobody until I talk to a lawyer. Period. Now take Mr. I-Can’t-Control-Him, and get the hell outta my face.”

  * * *

  ARTHUR MACGREGOR stood in the main terminal just inside the doors. He watched Dottie standing on the platform outside, on a long line waiting for a cab. He found himself cursing.

  They’d missed the plane.

  So close. They’d almost made it. He turned and his eyes landed on the newsstand. He marched inside and pointed to a box of Partagas
cigars, which was the only smokable brand in the whole case, as far as Arthur was concerned. He bought one and a cheap lighter. He bit off the end of a cigar and spit it into a garbage can, and watched a guard stare at him and clear his throat, pointing to a NO SMOKING sign on the wall right near where Arthur was standing.

  Why the hell do they still sell smokes when you can’t smoke anywhere on the planet anymore? he thought and stuck the cigar in his mouth anyway. He turned and stared across the terminal. He took the tickets out of his pocket and tried to resist the urge to rip them into confetti.

  Christ, what a martyr she was. What a martyr she’d always been. How the hell had he ever gotten mixed up with her in the first place?

  Stupid. That’s what she was. And that’s what he was too. Getting all out of breath over her again, only to have to watch her throw it all away.

  Yeah, he thought to himself. Throw it all away, see if he cared. It wasn’t as if she’d stuck around for him all those years ago. He was in for what, a trifling twenty-four months, and what had she done for him? Mailed him care packages of cookies and cakes and love letters professing her undying love for him? Was she standing at the gate along with the other women when he walked out a free man?

  Hell, no. She’d gone out and gotten married and pregnant. And even that he’d been willing to overlook. But this …

  Well, to hell with her! he thought, and chomped down hard on the cigar. He ought to be happy to be rid of her. He was going without her.

  He looked at both the tickets.

  Hell, he was going first-class to Hawaii. He was going to cash in her ticket and go in style. Then he was going to sit on a beach in Hawaii and order as many of those fruity drinks with all the toys in them that he could and drink toasts to what a sap she was.

  He went back to the ticket line and stood behind a woman and two small boys. He took out the lighter and was just about to light the end of his cigar when the woman in front of him turned around and glared.

  “Secondhand smoke is a killer, you know. There’s no smoking in this area,” she huffed.