Handy grunted. “Saved you the trouble, huh?”
Parker shrugged. He’d wanted to kill her, to even things, but when he’d seen her he’d known he couldn’t. She was the only one he’d ever met that he didn’t feel simply about. With everybody else in the world, the situation was simple. They were in and he worked with them or they were out and he ignored them or they were trouble and he took care of them. But with Lynn he hadn’t been able to work that way.
He’d felt for her what he’d never felt for anybody else or anything else, not even himself, not even money. She had tried her level best to kill him, and even that hadn’t changed anything, the way he felt about her or his helplessness with her. He didn’t want that to happen again, ever, to feel about anybody that way, to let his feelings get stronger than his judgment. Oddly enough, he missed her and wished she were still alive and still with him, even though he knew that sooner or later she would have found herself in the same kind of bind again and done the same thing.
Ahead of him, the green Dodge turned into a driveway next to a small faded clapboard house. This was an old section here; all the houses were small and faded — most of them with sagging porches.
There was no garage. The green Dodge turned into the back yard and stopped. Parker pulled up beside it, and he and Handy got out. Alma and Skimm were waiting for them, by the back door. There were three warped steps up, and a small back porch half the width of the house. The kitchen door had masking tape over a break in the window. Skimm lived in places where broken things were patched with masking tape.
They all went into the kitchen and Alma told Skimm to open up some beer….’
“Sure,” said Skimm. He wasn’t nervously happy any more, he was sullen now.
Alma told the others to come on into the living-room. She’d argued most of her belligerence out on the drive. She was sure of herself now, and in charge.
They went through the dining-room, going around a scarred table. The house was one storey high, with a living-room and a dining-room and a kitchen and two bedrooms. One bedroom was off the dining-room and the other one was off the kitchen. The bathroom was off the kitchen on the other side, next to the steps to the basement.
Alma clicked a wall switch and a ceiling light went on, four forty-watt bulbs amid a cluster of stained glass. Alma led the way into the room. “Look at this lousy place. Just look at it.”
It wasn’t very good. The sofa was green mohair, worn smooth in some places and spiny in others. The two armchairs both rested the weight of their springs on the floor, and one of them had an old deep cigarette burn in one overstuffed arm. The rug was faded and worn, showing trails where people had done the most walking, to the front door and the dining-room archway. There was an old television set with an eleven-inch screen and a wooden cabinet with a folded matchbook under one leg.
Alma pulled the wrinkled shades down over the three living-room windows. “Sit down.”
Parker and Handy took the armchairs. Skimm came in, carrying four cans of beer, and passed them around. Then he and Alma sat on the sofa.
Alma started. “Skimm tells me you don’t like the plan.”
“Did he tell you why?” Parker asked.
“I don’t mean the tear gas,” she said. “The rest of it.”
“Which rest of it?” Parker asked.
“We need five men,” she said. “We can’t do it with less. For God’s sake, it’s an armoured car.”
“You want to lay a siege and starve them out?” Parker asked.
“Don’t be a wise guy.”
Handy didn’t have a cigarette going, he had a match poked into his mouth. He took it out and said, “Who’s running this operation?”
Nobody answered him. Parker looked at Skimm, and Skimm looked at the floor. Alma looked at Handy.
Handy pointed the wet end of the match at Alma. “You’re the finger.” He pointed the match at Skimm. “You brung us in. You running it, Skimm?”
Skimm looked up, reluctantly. “I never worked an armoured car before.”
“I ain’t running it,” said Handy. “I’m not the type. So that leaves Parker.”
Parker said, “I don’t like this situation. More and more, I don’t like it. The finger sitting in, doing a lot of talking. I just don’t like it.”
“I’ve got a stake in this too, you know,” Alma said. She was getting hot again, a slow flush creeping up her face.
“Skimm, who’s running this operation? Parker asked.
Skimm was even more reluctant to answer this time. When he finally spoke, it was to Alma. “Parker knows this kind of job.”
Alma said, “Let’s hear what he has to say.”
“It’s simple. Three men. One in a uniform like the guards wear. We get the two trucks, and one car. One of the trucks we rig up so we can lock the guards in it, keep them cooled for a while. The driver and the guard from the back go in first. While they’re in the diner, we get in position. When they come out, we grab them at the back of the armoured car, where the other guard in the cab can’t see us. We wait till they open the back door. Then we grab them, and the one in the uniform takes the driver up to the cab. The guard inside opens the door when he recognizes the driver, and the other one — that’s one of us — hangs back, so the guard’ll just glimpse the uniform out of the corner of his eye. He opens up, and we’ve got him, too. We sap all three of them and lock them in the truck. Then we transfer the cash and take off in the car. We leave the trucks there because we don’t need them any more.”
“That’s what I don’t like,” said Alma. “That’s the part I don’t like.”
Parker drank some beer and looked at her.
“They’re going to see your car,” Alma said. “It’s going to be at the back of the U, blocking vision, so they’re going to see it. That’s why I wanted the trucks to be in it, too. We’d have vehicles going off in all directions and they wouldn’t know which way to look for us.”
It didn’t matter which way they went, or how many people saw them go. Parker knew that but he didn’t say anything about it. This Alma was a busher, a new fish, she didn’t know how this kind of operation was handled. Parker knew this, because it was his line of work, but he didn’t say anything about it. All he said was, “Tractor-trailers don’t outrun police cars. We leave them at the diner.”
“I still want cars going off in different directions.”
Parker nodded. He knew why she wanted it, but she didn’t know he knew. He said, “So what’s your idea?”
“My car,” she said, “my car, that’s the Dodge out there. It’ll be parked behind the diner, like always. When you get the money out of the armoured car, you put it in my car. Then you take off on route 9, going south, and circle around back to Old Bridge. When I know the job’s finished, I’ll get in my car and take the back road. Then we meet at the farmhouse outside Old Bridge. That way, even if you get stopped they’ve got nothing on you because you aren’t carrying the money.”
Parker glanced at Skimm. He was studying the carpet, lines of worry creasing his forehead. Parker said to Alma, “I don’t like it. That leaves you holding the cash, and the rest of us holding the bag. I know Skimm, and I trust him, and I know Handy, but I don’t know you.”
“So one of you rides with me,” she said. “Skimm. He can ride with me. All right?”
It was bad. The whole idea was stupid. It was sloppy, it was bad business.
But Parker nodded. “That’s all right. Just so one of us goes along with the money.”
If he let her keep her original plan he could be sure of getting the money back. If he forced her to change by making the grab more sensible, then maybe he wouldn’t be able to figure out her cross in time. He’d had to argue so she wouldn’t get suspicious. The only one he had to worry about was Skimm. Skimm, if he was thinking sensibly, had to know the two-car scheme was nonsense. He would have to wonder why Parker was going along with it. If Alma had talked him into her plans, that would make him dangerous because
he’d realize that Parker was on to the cross. But it made more sense that Alma was playing a lone game, that she was figuring to cross Skimm, too.
“What about bankrolling?” Handy asked.
“I got it,” Parker said. “Three grand.” He pulled a long white envelope from his jacket pocket. “I brought five C with me,” he said, “in case there was any need for it.”
Handy nodded. “You going to equip us?”
“Yes.”
“Then I don’t need any.”
Alma was staring at the envelope. “Skimm could use some money,” she said.
“This isn’t for personal expenses. This is bankrolling. That means to buy what we need for the operation.”
Skimm said, in a small voice, “I don’t need any.”
Parker put the envelope back in his pocket. Alma watched it disappear, a vertical anger line between her brows. Parker asked, “Is there anything else?”
Alma blinked, and said, “When do we do it? Next Monday?”
“Dry run next Monday. The week after that, maybe, if it looks right. Or the week after that. Whenever it looks right.”
“I don’t want too much delay,” Alma said.
Parker got to his feet. “We do the job when we know it’ll come off right. That’s why we don’t go to jail.” He turned to Handy. “I’ll give you a lift.”
Handy stood up. “Fine.”
Parker turned back to Skimm. “You got a phone?”
“Yeah. Clover 5-7598.”
“I’ll give you a call.”
“All right.” Skimm looked at Parker for just a second, and then his eyes slid away. He still looked worried.
Parker drained the beer can and tossed it into the chair he’d just left. “Nice to meet you, Alma.”
She struggled, and said, “Nice to meet you, too.”
Parker and Handy walked through the house to the kitchen and out the back door. They got into the Ford and drove out to the street, and Handy said, “I’ve got a room in Newark.”
“Right,” Parker said. He headed back towards Springfield Avenue.
Handy poked at his teeth with a match. After a while, he said, “That’s garbage, that stuff.”
“About the two cars?”
“Yeah.”
“You know why I went along.”
“You’ve got her figured.”
Parker nodded. “I wonder where Skimm is.”
“I’ve always trusted that little bastard,” said Handy. “We worked together a couple times. Once in Florida, once in Oklahoma.”
“I never work in Florida,” said Parker. “I play there.”
“You got a good system.” He poked at his teeth some more. Then he said, “I’d like to know about Skimm, though.”
“I don’t think he’s in it. She’s got him tight, but not that tight. She figures to cross him too, and take the whole pie for herself.”
“That poor bastard.”
“You want to wise him?”
Handy considered, the match working in his mouth. “I don’t know,” he said. “He’ll be in the car with her.”
“He wouldn’t believe you.” Parker shrugged. “You fall in love with a woman, you’ve got a blind spot.”
Handy glanced at him, and away. “I suppose.” They rode a while longer and then he said, “You think she’ll bump him?”
“Yeah.”
“Maybe she’ll flub it. Then Skimm’s got the boodle.”
“He’ll split.” Parker shrugged. “Skimm’s getting old. Old and worried. I don’t think she’ll flub it.”
“That poor bastard.”
“He’ll be better off,” Parker said. “Hooked the way he is.”
“I suppose so.”
They rode a while longer, and then Handy said, “I wish it was simple, Parker. I wish to Christ it was simple. Can you remember the last time a job was simple?”
“A long time ago.”
“It sounds like a good set-up.” Handy reached for his cigarettes. “The way you talked about it, it sounds fine. But there’s this Alma.” He lit the new cigarette, lipping it. “There’s always an Alma. Every damn time. Why can’t we put together a job without an Alma in it?”
“I don’t know,” Parked said. He was thinking of a guy named Mal, the reason he’d had to change his face.
Handy sat for a while, thinking. “This is the last one for me.”
“Uh huh,” said Parker. There was an Alma in every job, an Alma or a Mal or whatever the name was. And there was a Handy in every job, too. There was always one that was ready to quit; this was the last job and he was going to buy a chicken farm or something and settle down. There was a Handy in every job, and he always showed up for a job again a year or two later.
Thinking about it, it surprised him that there were always the same people in every job. There was always one that had to be watched, like Alma. There was always one who was quitting after this grab, and this time it was Handy. And there was always one who had probably a hundred thousand dollars to his name, buried in fields and forests here and there across the country in tin cans and metal boxes, and this one was probably Skimm. Skimm always looked and acted like a bum, so he was probably the kind that buried it, buried it all.
Parker had known others like that, there was one in almost every operation. They took their share and peeled off of it two or three thousand, just enough to carry them for a while, and then they went off by themselves somewhere and buried the rest of it. They figured to dig it up again some day, but they never did. The day never got rainy enough and that was why bulldozer operators working on new housing developments every once in a while turned up a metal box with thirty or forty thousand dollars in it.
After a while, Handy said, “You turn right the next corner.”
They turned right, and the car behind them turned right, too.
Parker watched it in the rear-view mirror and said, “Son of a bitch.”
It didn’t make any sense, and that bothered him.
The next street was one way the wrong way, but the one after that Parker made a left. So did the car behind him. He went two blocks and made a right and then another right and then a left. The car stayed with him. He drove along until he saw a “Dead End Street” sign and turned into it. He slowed down to almost a crawl, going around the corner, and stayed slow like that, so the car behind him came around the corner and was all of a sudden a lot closer.
It was a short street, with a railroad embankment crossing it at the end. The street was a kind of valley, with the houses on high land on either side, stone or concrete steps leading up from the sidewalk to the house level.
Parker turned into a driveway on the right, going very slowly, the Ford straining against going up the steep slope of the driveway so slowly. The other car went on by, down towards the embankment. Parker pushed the clutch in suddenly, and the car rolled back down the embankment and out across the street. It was a narrow street; with the parked cars, the Ford blocked it completely.
“Back me,” Parker said.
He left the motor running, and pulled the emergency brake on. Then he got out of the Ford and walked down to the end of the street, where the other car was stopped facing the embankment. It was a black Lincoln. Looking through the rear window as he walked forward, Parker could see the driver alone in the car. He came around the left-hand side, and opened the door.
Stubbs was wearing his chauffeur’s costume, complete with hat, and he was holding a -45. He pointed it at Parker, and said, “Hold it right there!”
Parker stood where he was, with his hand still on the door handle.
Stubbs said, “I got to know where you was Saturday.”
Parker kept looking at Stubbs, not to the right where Handy was crawling along the pavement, coming up alongside the car, keeping low out of Stubbs’s range of vision.
“What for?” Parker asked.
“The Doc was killed Saturday,” Stubbs said. “One of you bastards did it.”
“I was here i
n Jersey,” said Parker, as Handy reached up and plucked the automatic out of Stubbs’s hand. Parker leaned in and clipped him on the side of the neck. While Stubbs was getting over that, Handy got to his feet pointing the automatic. “Get out of the car.”
Stubbs got out, holding his neck. “You better not kill me,” he said. “If May don’t hear from me, she sends letters about your new face.”
It irritated Parker, another useless complication. He slid in behind the wheel of the Lincoln and parked it in an open slot by the embankment. Then he came back and said to Handy, “Your place?”
“It’s the closest.”
They put Stubbs in the front seat of the Ford, next to Parker, who was driving. Handy sat in the back seat, watching Stubbs, the automatic in his lap. He gave Parker directions the rest of the way to his place.
Handy had a room in a building that had started out as a private home and then become a boarding house and now was just a place with furnished rooms. But the furniture was clean, and not quite as ugly as at Skimm’s place.
The phone was out in the hall. They stood there, Handy holding the automatic in Stubbs’s back, while Parker dialled Skimm’s place. The ring came in his ear three times, and then Skimm answered, sounding sleepy. Parker told him who it was. “Alma there?”
Skimm hesitated. “Yes. She was just leaving.”
“Sure. I got somebody here I want her to talk to. He’ll ask her when she saw me in the diner. It’s okay for her to tell him.”
“What’s going on, Parker?”
“I’ll tell you sometime. Put Alma on.”
“Okay, wait a second.” There was mumbling, away from the phone, and then Alma came on the line. She sounded snappish.
“Hold on,” said Parker. “Tell this guy when I was in the diner.” He handed the phone to Stubbs.
Stubbs took the phone, frowning in concentration. It was getting too complicated for his battered brain. He said. “Hello? What time Saturday? Where is this diner?”
After that he frowned some more, staring heavily at the phone box on the wall, until he said, in answer to something from Alma, “I’m thinking,” and hung up.
“You happy?” Parker asked.
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