The Score (Parker Novels)

by Richard Stark

  Wycza said, “What about a truck? A big-ass tractor trailer. We stash it outside of town and switch to it when the job's done.”

  “Too much loot to be transferred.”

  Grofield said, “We bring the tractor trailer into town with us. Instead of loading two cars along the main drag, we load the tractor trailer. Then we have a car at the plant, the way we figured, and another car parked near the town line for a lookout. We leave that one, and just take the tractor trailer and the other car. They space five minutes apart, and it doesn't look so bad. You see tractor trailers all hours.”

  Wycza said, “All right, that's even better.”

  “It would work,” said Edgars. “It would sure work all right.”

  Parker stood looking at the two maps and thinking it over. Twelve men. In at midnight, out by six in the morning. Everything covered, if they'd thought of everything, and if Edgars had his facts straight.

  It was a job. It would work. The thing looked like idiocy at first, but it would work.

  He nodded. “All right,” he said. “Who's financing?”

  Edgars looked blank. “Financing?”

  “This is going to cost,” Parker told him. “Walkie-talkies, the truck, the cars. Transportation out there. Food and water stashed at the hideout ahead of time. Guns. It'll cost dough to get this thing set up.”

  Edgars still looked blank, and now a little worried besides. Paulus explained it to him. “Every job has to be financed,” he said. “Whoever puts up the dough gets it back doubled if the job works out.”

  “You mean, one of us?”

  Parker shook his head. “No. It's better to get your financing done by somebody outside the operation. Otherwise the man who put the money in tries to run things.”

  “This is all new to me,” Edgars told them.

  “I'll go over to New York tomorrow,” Grofield said. “I've got a couple contacts over there. How much you figure?”

  Parker frowned, thinking it out. “Four thousand,” he said.

  Edgars said, “Four thousand!”

  “I told you, it's going to cost. The truck, the cars, the—”

  “Why not just steal the truck?”

  “You want to leave Copper Canyon in a hot truck on every state trooper's list for a thousand miles around?”

  “You mean, you just go to a used-truck dealer and buy a truck?”

  “No, not that either. Then you got problems with registration. There's outlets where you can pick up a mace pretty cheap.”

  Edgars couldn't seem to get the bewildered look off his face. “A mace? What's a mace?”

  “A car with papers that look good and license plates that look good.”

  “But they aren't really?”

  “They aren't really.”

  Edgars sat down, shook his head, and drank some beer. “I didn't know there was this much to it,” he said. “How many people have to know about this deal?”

  “Just the ones in on it. Twelve men.”

  “But Grofield's going to go talk to somebody about financing, and you're going to buy a stolen truck—”

  “The man that finances doesn't know what the job is. Just that there's a job, and it needs so much to get set up, and it should be done by such and such a date.”

  “How you going to get a man to put money into a deal without knowing what it is?”

  “He relies on the men in the deal. If he knows them, knows they do good work, he takes a chance on them.”

  “What about where you buy the truck? You don't tell him anything either?”

  “Why should we?”

  Edgars shrugged and spread his hands. “All right,” he said. “You people know what you're doing.”

  “We rather hope so,” said Grofield. He turned to Parker. “Come along with me tomorrow, okay? I know one guy in particular, he knows you. If he sees you're in he'll cover us with no trouble.”

  “All right.”

  “Now,” said Paulus. “About personnel.”

  They all sat down at the table again, and Edgars cleared away the maps. Parker said, “We need three jug men. You're one, Paulus. You work one side of Raymond Avenue, and Wycza can carry for you. Grofield, you'd be a good man for the phone company, keep the ladies from getting too scared.”

  Grofield smiled thinly. “You know my boyish charm,” he said. “I'll be happy to keep the ladies company.”

  “Edgars, you ought to be lookout at the town line. You know the town, know the circumstances there. You can figure anything that moves quicker than anybody else.”

  Edgars said, “I thought I'd be better off taking care of the police station. I know a little something about police procedure there, I could probably fake it better than anybody else if a phone call came in or anything like that.”

  Parker shrugged. “Wherever you think you'd do the most good.”

  “Police station.”

  “All right.” Parker turned to Paulus. “You got a list of the jobs? Wait a minute, the other two juggers first. I'll see if I can get Handy McKay. He could get in at the payroll as fast as anybody I know.” He looked around the table. “We need another jugger. A vault man. Any ideas?”

  Paulus said, “What about Rohatch? He's a drunk, but he's good at vaults.”

  Grofield shook his head and said, “I heard he died. The liver got him.”

  Wycza said, “I worked once or twice with a fella named Kemp. Any of you know him?”

  “He's unreliable,” said Paulus primly. “He's on the needle. He may even be in jail by now for all I know.”

  Wycza said, “All right, forget him. How about Wiss? Little guy, but fast.”

  “I've worked with him,” said Parker. “While I was having that trouble with the Outfit. He's a good man.”

  “I'll see can I get in touch with him,” said Wycza.

  Edgars said, “What about you, Parker? What's your job going to be?”

  It was Wycza who answered. “He ought to be the loose one, the troubleshooter.”

  Edgars nodded. “Fine by me.”

  “I'm writing all this down,” said Paulus.

  Parker said to him, “What other jobs?”

  “You want Wiss to work the other side of Raymond Avenue, right? So you need someone to work with him, like Wycza's working with me.”

  “We'll let him pick his own sideman. Lookout's next. We want somebody fast, and cool.”

  “Salsa,” said Grofield. “That bastard could hunker down in Times Square and disappear. You'd never see him, and he wouldn't move for a hundred years if he had to. But when it was time to move, zoom.”

  “I know Salsa,” said Parker. “He's a good man.”

  “I'll get word to him.”

  Parker turned to Paulus. “What's left?”

  “Just three. Fire department, gate guard, and plant office. Three men in place.”

  “I know the guy for the gate guard,” said Wycza. “Pop Phillips. He wears some kind of uniform just about every job he takes.”

  “Good old Phillips,” said Grofield. “Pop Phillips, the sweet old rummy.”

  “He don't drink when he's on a job,” Wycza told him.

  “You're right, he doesn't. But he's got bad breath.”

  Parker said, “Shut up, Grofield. Okay, Wycza, get Phillips. Now we need two more.”

  “The Chambers brothers,” said Paulus.

  Grofield shook his head. “Ernie's in jail.”

  “What the hell for?”

  “Statutory. You know how those hillbillies like young meat.”

  “What about his brother?”

  Grofield shrugged. “He's as good as the next man.”

  “I'll get in touch with him,” said Paulus, and wrote it down.

  Parker said, “If Littlefield's still working, he'd be a good man for the plant office.”

  “I worked with him last year,” said Wycza. “He was still going strong then.”

  “Get in touch with him, will you?”

  “Right.”

  P
aulus looked up from his notes. “That's all,” he said. “Except Wiss' sideman. He can get him himself.”

  “Day after tomorrow,” said Parker. “Here again. Nine o'clock.”

  Edgars got to his feet and rubbed his hands together. “This is going to work out,” he said. “It's going to work out.”

  They left the apartment one at a time. This time Parker waited, to be the last out. When he was alone with Edgars he said, “Something I wanted to ask you.”

  “What?”

  “What about Owen?”

  “Owen? What about him?”

  “He's dead.”

  “I know that.” Edgars was frowning at him, but then his face lit up with understanding. “Oh. You mean, what's my attitude?”

  “That's right.”

  “I couldn't care less, Parker. He was just a bum I picked up here in town. He was more stupid that I thought, and exceeded his orders. That's over with.”

  Parker nodded. “All right,” he said. “See you day after tomorrow.”

  “Right.”

  TWO

  1

  Parker pumped change into the phone box and listened to it booming. Then he waited.

  He was in a phone booth next to a gas station. June sunlight poured down everywhere. Grofield was in his car, a three-year-old black Rambler sedan, parked just down the block; they were on their way over to New York to see about financing, and Parker wanted to make the call now, early, to give Handy time to get here.

  The booming was replaced by a ringing sound, and then by a male voice. Parker said, “Arnie LaPointe, please.” You couldn't get in touch with Handy direct. Like Parker with Joe Sheer, Handy had a middleman.

  The voice said, “Speaking.”

  “This is Parker. If you see Handy McKay around, ask him to give me a call.”

  “I'm not sure I'll see him.”

  “This a pay phone, I can't hang around too long.”

  “I just don't know when I'll see him.”

  “When you do, tell him I saw the monk and he's still mourning.” That was a reference to the last job they'd worked together, so Handy would know it was him.

  “If I see him, I'll tell him. What's your number there?”

  “This is Jersey City. The number's OL 3-4599-”

  “I don't promise anything.”

  “Sure.”

  Parker hung up and waited. He pushed open the booth door to get some air, and lit a cigarette. He could see Grofield sitting in the car, relaxed and easy. Grofield was too playful sometimes, but he knew when to cut that out. The operation was shaping up to have good men in it, and with good men in a deal it was tough for the deal to go sour. Not impossible, but tough.

  A gas station attendant in blue overalls came over, wiping his hands on an orange rag. He said, “Anything wrong?”

  “They're calling me back.”

  “Okay.” He went away again.

  Parker finished his cigarette, flicked it out into the street. He leaned against the side of the booth, folded his arms, and waited some more.

  He waited fifteen minutes and then the phone rang. He picked it up and said, “Charles Willis here.”

  It was Handy McKay's voice: “What's the story?”

  “Thought you might like to come visit. I got a new place.”

  “Social call?”

  “We might work a little.”

  “Not for me, remember? I retired.”

  “You might like the weather here. And there's thousands of things to see. Maybe twenty thousand.”

  “Don't tempt me. This time I'm retired for good. I got the diner going, and I'm settling down, and everything's fine.”

  “I was looking for company. Open a can or two with me, you know?”

  “Yeah?” There was a pause, and he said, “What about Wiss? He's good company.”

  “He's already coming.”

  “Oh yeah? What do you want, a crowd?”

  “Yes.”

  “Jesus, now you got my curiosity up. But it's still no soap. Wait a second, how about Kerwin?”

  “That's an idea. You just don't want to travel, huh?”

  “Not anymore. I'm settled down.”

  “All right. I'll drop in sometime.”

  “Do that. I'll fry you an egg.”

  “Sure.”

  He hung up and left the phone booth and walked down to Grofield's car. He slid in and said, “McKay's out. He's retired.”

  “Again?”

  “This time he says it's for good. He suggested Kerwin.”

  “I don't know him.”

  “He's a good man.”

  Grofield shrugged. “I'll take your word for it. Call him.”

  “He lives in Brooklyn. I'll call him from the city, after we see your man. Who is he, by the way?”

  “Ormont. Chester Ormont.”

  “Four thousand might be steep for him.”

  “We'll see.”

  Grofield started the engine, and they drove away from there. They went through the Holland Tunnel into the city, and took the West Side Highway up to 72nd Street, and then crosstown through the park to the East Side. Grofield parked illegally on East 67th Street, between Fifth and Madison, and they walked down the block to the address. It was a fashionable brownstone, with a doctor's shingle in the window. They went up the stoop and inside, into the dimness, and there was a nurse in a white uniform at a desk. She smiled impersonally and said, “Name, please?”

  “Grofield. About my back.”

  “You've been to see the doctor before?”

  “Yes.”

  “Have a seat, please, the doctor will be with you in just a minute.”

  They went into the waiting room, a large airy room done in Danish modern. Two stuffed matrons sat in opposite corners of the room, like welterweights between rounds. One was reading Fortune, and the other was reading Business Week. Grofield picked up a copy of Time from the central table, and he and Parker sat down to wait.

  After about five minutes, the nurse appeared and took one of the women away with her. A little while later a white-haired old man came in on a cane and took the absent woman's seat and Fortune. Sometime after that the other woman was escorted away by the nurse.

  They waited about forty minutes, and then the nurse came to the door and said, “Mister Grofield?”

  Grofield said, “Come on.” He and Parker followed the nurse out of the waiting room, down a cream-colored hall, and into an office. There was no one in the office. The nurse said, “Doctor Ormont will see you in just a minute.” She went away.

  They sat in brown leather chairs and waited. They could hear a murmuring from somewhere else on the first floor. Five minutes went by, and then the door opened and a heavy impatient-looking man with pink scrubbed hands came in. He smiled sourly at them, and said, “How are you, Grofield?” and went around behind his desk.

  “Just terrible, Doctor,” said Grofield. “I've got this terrible pain in my back.”

  “Never mind that,” said the doctor. “This office isn't bugged.”

  Grofield burst out laughing. “Doctor, you're priceless!”

  The doctor didn't get it, and didn't want it. He looked at Parker and said, “You remind me of somebody.”

  Grofield said, “This is Parker, with a face job. Not just the nose, the whole face. What do you think of that?”

  “Parker, eh? Who did the job?”

  “A doctor out west,” Parker told him. “You wouldn't know him.”

  “He did a good job.” The doctor switched his attention to Grofield. “You've got something on, eh?”

  “So we have. We need financing.”

  “Obviously. This isn't a social call.”

  “Of course not. It's this pain in my back, it's killing me.”

  Parker said, “Cut it out, Grofield.”

  “Right you are.” Grofield sobered, and said, “We need four G's.”