First an application of crowsfooter around my eyes and on my forehead. As soon as this colourless liquid was applied wrinkles appeared and the calendar of my age rushed forward a number of years. A few wattles under my chin blended in well with the wrinkles, while the final touch was a nasty little moustache. When I pulled on my shapeless, under-office-clerk jacket, my own mother would not have recognised me if she had passed me in the street. In fact this had happened about a year ago and I had asked her the time and even then no spark of recognition had brought a glint to her bovine eyes. Taking an umbrella from the closet, since there was absolutely no possibility of rain, I stepped from the office and proceeded to the nearest shopping mall.
I must say, my subconscious was really working fast this day, as I shortly found out. Even after all the beers I still had a thirst. That dry stay in the barn had left its mark. Therefore I turned smartly under the platinum arches of Macswineys and marched up to the serving robot that was built into the counter. The plastic head had a permanent grin painted on it and the voice was syrupy and sexy.
‘How can I be of service, sir or madam?’ They could have spent a few bucks on a sex-recognition program I thought as I scanned the list of TUM-CHILLER YUMMY DRINKS on the wall.
‘Let me have a double-cherry oozer with lots of ice.’
‘On the way, sir or madam. That will be three bucks, if you please.’
I dropped the coins in the hopper and the serving hatch flipped open and my drink appeared. While I reached for it I had to listen to a robotic sales pitch.
‘Macswineys is happy to serve you today. With the drink of your choice I am sure you would like a barbecued porcuswineburger with yummy top-secret sauce garnished with sugarfried spamyams …’
The voice faded away from my attention as my subconscious heaved up the answer to my little problem. A really simple and obvious answer that was transparent in its clarity, pristine pure and simple …
‘Come on, buster. Order or split, you can’t stand there all day.’
The voice gravelled in my ear and I muttered some excuse and shuffled off to the nearest booth and dropped into it. I knew now what had to be done.
Simply stand the problem on its head. Instead of me looking for The Bishop I would have to make him look for me.
I drank my drink until my sinuses hurt, staring unseeingly into space as the pieces of the plan clicked into place. There was absolutely no chance of my finding The Bishop on my own – it would be foolish to even waste my time trying. So what I had to do was commit a crime so outrageous and munificent that it would be on all the news channels right around the planet. It had to be so exotic that not a person alive with the ability to read – or with a single finger left to punch in a news channel – would be unaware of it. The entire world would know what had happened. And they would know as well that The Bishop had done it because I would leave his calling card on the spot.
The last traces of drink slurped up my straw and my eyes unfocused and I slowly returned to the garish reality of Macswineys. And before my eyes was a poster. I had been staring at it, without seeing it, for some time. Now it registered. Laughing clowns and screaming children. All rapt with joy in slightly faulty 3-D. While above their heads the simple message was spelled out in glowing letters:
SAVE YOUR COUPONS!! GET THEM WITH EVERY
PURCHASE!!
FREE ADMISSION TO LOONA PARK!!
I had visited this site of plastic joys some years before – and had disliked it even as a child. Horrifying rides that frightened only the simple. Rotating up-and-down rides only for the strong of stomach; round-and-round and throw up. Junk food, sweet candy, drunk clowns, all the heady joys to please the very easily pleasable. Thousands attended Loona Park every day and more thousands flooded in at weekends – bringing even more thousands of bucks with them.
Bucks galore! All I had to do was clean them out – in such a very interesting way that it would make the top news story right around the planet.
But how would I do it? By going there, of course, and taking a good hard look at their security arrangements. It was about time that I had a day off.
CHAPTER SEVEN
For this little reconnaissance trip it would be far wiser for me to act my age – or less. With all the makeup removed I was a fresh-faced seventeen again. I should be able to improve upon that; after all I had taken an expensive correspondence course in theatrical makeup. Pads in my cheeks made me look more cherubic, particularly when touched up with a bit of rouge. I put on a pair of sunglasses decorated with plastic flowers – that squirted water when I pressed the bulb in my pocket. A laugh a second! Styles in dress had changed which meant that plusfours for boys had gone out of fashion, thank goodness, but shorts were back. Or rather a reprehensible style called short-longs which had one leg cut above the knee, the other below. I had purchased a pair of these done in repulsive purple corduroy tastefully decorated with shocking-pink patches. I could scarcely dare look at myself in the mirror. What looked back at me I hesitate to describe, except that it looked very little like an escaped bank robber. Around my neck I slung a cheap disposable camera that was anything but cheap, disposable – or only a camera.
At the station I found myself lost in a sea of lookalikes as we boarded the Loona Special. Screaming and laughing hysterically and spraying each other with our plastic flowers helped to while away the time. Or stretched it to eternity in at least one case. When the doors finally opened I let the multichrome crowd thunder out, then strolled wearily after them. Now to work.
Go where the money was. My memories of my first visit were most dim – thank goodness! – but I did remember that one paid for the various rides and diversions by inserting plastic tokens. My father had furnished a limited and begrudging number of these, which had been used up within minutes, and of course no more had been forthcoming. My first assignment then was to find the font of these tokens.
Easily enough done for this building was the target of every pre-pubescent visitor. It was a pointed structure like an inverted icecream cone, bedecked with flags and mechanical clowns, topped with a golden calliope that played ear-destroying music. Surrounding it at ground level and fixed to its base was a ring of plastic clown torsos, rocking and laughing and grimacing. Repellent as they were they provided the vital function of separating the customers from their money. Eager juvenile hands pushed buck bills into the grasping palms of the plastic Punchinellos. The hand would close, the money vanish – and from the clown’s mouth a torrent of plastic tokens would be vomited into the waiting receptacle. Disgusting – but I was obviously the only one who thought so.
The money went into the building. Now I must find where it came out. I strolled about the base and discovered that the regurgitating dispensers did not quite girdle it. To the rear, behind the concealment of trees and shrubs, a small building snuggled up to the base. I pushed my way under the shrubs and found myself facing a private policeman stationed beside an unmarked door.
‘Get lost, kid,’ he said sweetly. ‘Employees only.’
I dodged around him and pushed against the door – and managed to photograph it at the same time. ‘I gotta go to the bathroom,’ I said crossleggedly. ‘They said the bathroom was here.’
A hard hand pulled me away and propelled me back to the shrubbery. ‘Not here. Out. Back the way you came.’
I went. Very interesting. No electronic alarms and the lock was a Glubb – reliable but old. I was beginning to like Loona Park after all.
It was an excruciating wait until dark when the park closed down. Out of boredom I sampled the Glacier Ride where one hurtled through mock ice caverns with Things frozen into the ice on all sides – though they occasionally lunged out at the screeching riders. Rocket Rovers was equally bad, and in the name of good taste I will draw the curtain down over the heady joys of Candyland and the Swamp Monster. Suffice to say that the time did arrive at last. The token dispenser closed down an hour before the park shut. From a nearby vantage point I wat
ched with avid interest as an armoured van took away a great number of solid containers. Even more interesting was the fact that when the money went – so did the security. I imagine that the logic behind this was that no one in their right mind would want to break in and steal the tokens.
So I wasn’t in my right mind. As darkness fell I joined the exhausted celebrants as they staggered towards the exits. Except that I didn’t get that far. A locked door at the rear of Vampire Mountain unlocked easily under my gentle ministrations. I slipped into the darkness of the service area. High above me pale fangs showed and fake blood dripped; I felt very comfortable indeed tucked in behind a coffin filled with dirt.
I let an hour go by, no more. This should clear the employees out of the way, but still leave enough revellers in the streets outside the park so that my disgusting outfit would not be noticed when I finally made my exit.
There were guards about, but they were easily avoided. As I had expected the Glubb opened easily and I slipped quickly inside. The room proved to be windowless, which was fine since my light would then not be seen. I switched it on and admired the machinery.
A simple and clean design – I appreciate that in machinery. The dispensers were ringed about the walls. Silent now, but still obvious in their operation. When coins or bills were inserted they were counted and passed on. Machines above released the measured amount of tokens into the delivery chutes. Beside them pipes sprang out of the floor and terminated in a bin above. Undoubtedly, they were filled from underground conveyors that returned the tokens ready for re-dispensing. The bucks, untouched by human hands, were being conveyed through sealed and transparent tubes to the collection station where the coins fell into locked boxes. They were not for me since they were too bulky to move easily. But, ahh, the bills, they were far lighter and worth far more. They slipped along the chutes until they dropped gracefully through an opening in the top of a safe. An operation that appeared to be relatively secure from light-fingered employees.
Wonderful. I admired the machinery and thought about it, then made notes. The dispensers had been manufactured by a firm by the name of Ex-changers, and I took pics of their trademark on the machines. The safe was a secure and reliable brand that easily yielded to my ministrations. It was empty of course, but I had expected that. I made a note of the combination, then opened and closed it a number of times until I could do it with my eyes closed. A plan was taking shape in my head and this was to be an integral part of it.
Finished at last, I slipped from the building without being seen and with little more effort escaped from the park to join the frolicking throngs. They were less boisterous on the return journey and I only had to use my spray-glasses twice. I cannot describe the relief I felt when I finally staggered through the office door, stripped off the outlandish garb, then buried my nose in a beer. Then, metaphorically of course, I put my thinking cap on.
The next weeks were busy ones. While I worked at the equipment I needed for my operation I followed the news accounts closely. One of the prison escapers, after a fierce struggle, had been recaptured. His companion had not been found, despite the help rendered by the one who had been caught. Poor Stinger; life wouldn’t be the same for him once the will to fight was taken from him. However life would still be the same for the man he had planned to kill so I did not feel too sorry for Stinger. And I had work to do. Two things to do in tandem; plan the robbery – and lay the trap for The Bishop. I am proud to say that I accomplished both with some ease. After this I waited until there was a dark and stormy night to visit Loona Park again. I was in and out as quickly as I could, which was some hours since there was a good deal of work to be done.
After that it was only a matter of waiting for the right time. A weekend would be best, with the tills overflowing. As part of my plans I had rented the garage quite legally, but had stolen the small van most illegally. I used the waiting time to repaint it – a better job than the original if I must say so – to add new identification numbers, and to fix nameplates to the doors. At last Saturday came and I had to work hard to control my impatience. To pass the time, moustached and crowfooted, I enjoyed a good and leisurely lunch, for I had to wait until late afternoon when the coffers would be full. The drive into the countryside was pleasant and I reached my appointed spot at the appointed time. Close to the service entrance to the park. I had some apprehension as I pulled on the skin-tight and transparent gloves – but the feeling of anticipation was far greater. With a smile on my lips I reached out and switched on the apparatus fixed underneath the dash before me.
An invisible radio signal winged out and I tried to visualise with my mind’s eye what happened next. Fast as light to the receiver, down the wires to its target – which was a tiny charge of explosive. Not much, just a carefully measured amount that would destroy the latch on one of the token dispensers without rupturing the tube at the same time. With the latch destroyed a steady stream of coloured plastic wafers should now be rattling down into the dispensers, filling it and flowing over – gushing on in a never-ending stream. What a benefactor I was! How the children would bless me had they but known my identity.
But that wasn’t all that was going to happen. For every minute now another radio signal pulsed out of my transmitter, another latch was destroyed, another gusher of tokens spouting forth each time that this happened. Another and then another. At the proper moment I started the van’s engine and drove to the service gate of Loona Park, opened the window and leaned out above the sign on the door that read EX-CHANGERS DISPENSING MACHINES.
‘Got a radio call,’ I said to the guard there. ‘You got some kind of problem here.’
‘No problem,’ the guard said, heaving the gate open. ‘More like a riot. You know where the building is?’
‘Sure do. Help is on the way!’
Though I had visualised the effects of my unexpected largesse I quickly discovered that reality far surpassed my wildest expectations. Screaming, cheering kiddies rushed about laden with tokens, while others fought for places around the gushing dispensers. Their happy cries were ear-splitting and the attendants and guards could do nothing to stop their wave of exuberance. It was slightly less crowded on the service road, but I still had to drive slowly, hand on the horn, to make my way through the stragglers. Two guards were pushing kids back through the shrubs when I drove up.
‘Got some trouble with the dispensers?’ I asked sweetly. The guard’s snarled response was lost in childish cries of delight, which was probably all for the best. He unlocked the door and all but pushed me and my toolbox through.
There were four people there, struggling ineffectually with the machines. They could not be cut off since I had taken the liberty of shorting the switchbox. A bald-headed man was working on an armoured cable with a hacksaw and I made tsk-tsking sounds. ‘That is a recipe for suicide,’ I said. ‘You got a four-hundred volt line in there.’
‘Can you do anything better, buster,’ he snarled. ‘They’re your damned machines. Go to work.’
‘I shall – and here is the cure.’
I opened the sizeable toolbox, which contained only a shining metal tube, and took it out. ‘This will do the job,’ I said, turning the valve at the top and hurling it from me. The last thing I saw were their eye-popping expressions as the black smoke billowed out and filled the room – blocking out all vision completely.
I had been expecting it, they had not. The toolbox was in my arms as I took four measured paces in the darkness and fetched up against the side of the safe. Any noises I made were drowned by their shouts and screams and the constant chugging of the token dispensers. The safe opened easily, the lid of the toolbox fitted neatly against the lower edge. I leaned in, felt the mounds of bills, then swept them forward into the waiting container. It was quickly filled and I snapped it shut. My next task was to make sure that the right person took responsibility for this crime. The card with its inscription was in my top pocket. I slipped it out and laid it carefully in the safe, which I then
locked again to make sure absolutely sure that my message would be received and not lost in all the excitement. Only then did I pick up the now heavy toolbox and stand with my back to the safe, turning and orientating myself.
I knew that the exit was there in the darkness, nine easy paces away. I had taken five when I bumped into someone and strong hands grabbed me while a hoarse voice shouted in my ear.
‘I got him! Help me!’
I dropped the box and gave him exactly the help he needed, running my hands up his body to his neck and doing all the right things there. He grunted and slid away. I groped for the box – for a panicky moment I couldn’t find it. Then I did, clutched the handle and seized it up and stood …
And realised I had lost all sense of direction during the fracas.
My panic was as dark as the smoke and I shook so hard that I almost dropped the case. Seventeen years old and very much alone – with the unknown world of adults closing in upon me. It was over, all over.
I don’t know how long this crisis lasted, probably only seconds, although it seemed infinitely longer than that. Then I grabbed myself by the metaphorical neck and shook myself quite hard.
‘You wanted it this way – remember? Alone with everyone’s hand turned against you. So give in to them – or start thinking. Fast!’
I thought. The people screaming and banging all about me were no help or threat – they were as confused as I was. All right, hand outstretched, go forward. Any direction. Reach something that could be identified by touch. Once this was done I should be able to work out where I was. I heard a thudding ahead, it had to be one of the dispensers, then I bumped into it.
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