“You can’t get away with this. I know my rights. This is harassment; you can’t get away with it.” But the trembling in the old man’s voice was more pronounced now, and from a different cause.
Younger said, “The way you get all excited, Joe, over nothing at all, somebody might think you had something to hide. That’s no way to carry on.”
“If you think you’ve got something on me, then why don’t you do something about it?”
Younger smiled into the phone, and let a few seconds go by before he answered, seconds for the old man to hear what he’d just said, hear the echo of his own words, hear what they sounded like. Then he said, “What do you suggest, Joe?” His tone purred, like a cat.
There was silence again, until finally the old man said, “Just leave me alone.”
“I’ll leave you alone, Joe. All you have to do is tell me how to spell your name, that’s all, tell me if I’ve got the right spelling here. That’s all I called for, Joe.”
“Sure.” The old man sounded exhausted.
“Now, here’s the spelling I got, Joe, I’ll give it to you again. You listen close, and if it’s—”
“I heard it the first time,” said the weary voice. “You know it’s wrong.”
“Well, that’s what I figured, but I wanted to be sure. Now, how’s the right spelling, Joe?”
“Do we have to go through this?”
“Just spell it out for me, Joe. Slow and clear, and I’ll write it down here.” Younger smiled and picked up his cigar from the ashtray and said, “I’ve got a pencil right here.”
The old man spelled out his alias, slowly, saying each letter as though he were too worn out to hold the phone, as though he’d fall over any minute. He spelled the false name, and when he was done Younger said, “There, now, that wasn’t so tough, was it? Why’d you carry on like that, Joe? You get up on the wrong side of the bed this morning?”
“Is that all?”
“For now, Joe.”
Younger hung up, and put the cigar between his teeth, and smiled to himself.
6
Younger pulled to a stop in front of the old man’s house. He rolled down the windows and turned the two-way radio up to full blast; nothing was coming from it right now but static. Then he got out a fresh cigar, unwrapped it, lit it, and settled down to wait.
After a minute the radio sounded off, a guttural voice, distorted so much by the extra volume that the words couldn’t be made out. Younger just sat there while the voice thundered away, and then the voice stopped and there was just the scratching static again.
He didn’t look towards the house. He didn’t have to. He knew the old man was in there, and he knew the old man could hear that radio, and he knew the old man would have to look out and see him sitting here. Younger didn’t have to watch the house to see a curtain rustle, see an old face appear in a window; he knew what would happen, without watching.
Still, nothing happened for a while. Every now and then the loud voice roared out words that couldn’t be understood. Between times the static crackled away, and Younger smoked his cigar down to a stub and threw the stub out the window into the street.
Half an hour went by. Younger didn’t move. Nothing happened.
Finally, the screen door on the old man’s porch slammed open, crashing around into the wall. Younger turned his head and saw the old man come storming out of the house. He came down the front stoop and along the walk, his knobbly old hands closed up into fists. He came over to the car and bent forward and looked in the window and said, “What are you doing here?”
“Hi, there, Joe. You over your mad?”
“Why are you parked in front of my house?” The old man was trembling all over, hands and head and voice. He looked as though any second he’d leap for Younger’s throat.
Younger spread his hands, being innocent. “I’m just taking it easy, Joe,” he said. “Out on patrol a while, and then pull to the curb and rest a few minutes.”
“You’ve been out here half an hour!”
“Joe, about that phone call the other day. I’ve been thinking it over, and if I said anything to offend you, I want you to know I’m sorry.”
“You can’t keep this up forever, Younger.”
“Joe, all I want in this world is for us to be friends. I told you all about my Army experiences because I want you to know about me, just like I want to know about you. Friends, Joe, that’s all. Share our experiences.”
The old man closed his eyes. He was bent forward, his forearms on the car door, his head framed by the open window. With his eyes closed that way, he almost looked dead; lines of age mingled with lines of weariness and worry in his face, making it look like an overdone pencil sketch.
“Abner Younger and Joe Sheer,” Younger said thoughtfully. “It sounds like one of those old-time vaudeville acts, doesn’t it? You ever do any vaudeville, Joe?”
The old man’s eyes were open again, staring at Younger. “What did you say?”
“I asked you if you ever did any vaudeville.”
“What did you call me, you son of a bitch? What name did you say?”
Younger laughed and said, “Oh, come on, Joe, we’re pals, you don’t have to put on the act for me. I’ve known your name from the beginning.”
The old man shook his head. He acted dazed now. He pushed away from the car, turned and started back for the house, walking as though he were drunk.
Younger let him get halfway to the stoop and then called, “Sheer!” He put steel in his voice now, let all the familiarity and jollity drain out of it. “Come back here!” he shouted, and it was the way a first sergeant shouts it.
Now was the moment of decision. At this point, the old man had to make up his mind for good and all; he couldn’t wait and hope and let things ride any longer. He could choose to try a hopeless bluff, or he could choose to go into the house and lock the doors and break out whatever artillery he had in there for a last-ditch stand, or he could give in completely and come back and turn himself over to Younger for whatever Younger wanted with him.
Nearly a minute went by while the old man stood in front of his house, back to Younger, unmoving, making up his mind. When he finally made his decision, it was the only one he could have made, really, considering everything. He was too smart to try a hopeless bluff, and too old to try a last-ditch stand. He turned around and came back to Younger.
Younger said, “Get in the car.” The steel was in his voice to stay; he was in command now, the free ride was over.
The old man got into the car, and sat there wordlessly.
Younger handed him the clipboard and a pen. “In chronological order,” he said, “I want you to write down every robbery you were ever in, what year it happened, and how much you got out of it. Not the whole take, just your cut.”
Hopeless, the old man whispered, “What do you want from me?”
“I just told you. Now listen close. Do it in three columns, date first and then what city it was and then how much you got. You don’t have to worry about the month or anything, just the year.”
The old man looked at the pen in his hand and the clipboard on his lap with the blank sheet of paper ready on it. With the same hopelessness in his voice, he said, “I’m not sure I can remember everything.”
“You’ll remember.”
It took nearly half an hour. Younger smoked a cigar and listened to the occasional calls on the radio and watched the little traffic on the street; he felt no impatience. Everything would come, everything in its time. He’d waited fifty-one years, he could wait a little longer.
Finally, the old man said, “There. That’s it.”
Younger took the list and studied it, and saw nothing listed for Cleveland in 1953. He shook his head and put the list down and smashed the old man backhanded across the face. “Don’t lie to me,” he said. “Don’t ever lie to me again, Sheer.” He ripped the top sheet off and handed the clipboard back. “This time,” he said, “do it right.”
The old man wordlessly started writing again. When he was done this time, there was an entry for Cleveland in 1953. Younger nodded and said, “All right, Sheer, that’s good. You can go on now.”
The old man looked at him in surprise. “I can what?”
“Get out of the car. Go home.”
“For God’s sake, Captain Younger, what do you want from me?”
“I’ll be back,” Younger promised him. “And you’ll be here. If you know what’s good for you.”
7
“One million, eight hundred and seventy-six thousand dollars.” Younger said it slowly, in rich, round tones, enjoying the sensual feeling of the numbers in his mouth. “You made an awful lot of money, Joe,” he said. “An awful lot of money.”
They were sitting in the old man’s living room, three days after the list had been made up. The old man seemed thinner than before, and more lined, and more hopeless. He was getting ripe, slowly getting ripe, but Younger was in no hurry. When he made the final move, he was going to know the old man was ready.
Besides, anticipating was half the pleasure. There was no need to hurry the chase to its conclusion.
“Tell me about it, Joe,” he said. He was being affable again today, letting a little slack in the line, not wanting the old man to get so desperate he’d do something stupid, like leave everything behind and run away. He said, “Tell me how these robberies are done. Tell me about, say, the Cleveland robbery, the one in ’53.”
The old man looked at him. “Why?”
Younger shrugged and smiled and said, “I’m interested, that’s all. You’re the first man in your job I’ve ever met. Tell me the whole thing, Joe. First the Cleveland job in ’53, and then the Des Moines robbery in ’49, and then . . . well, just start.”
The old man said, “I don’t understand you. I can’t figure you out.”
“Don’t even try, Joe. Just tell me the story of your life.”
The old man started, talking hesitantly at first, with long pauses, trying to find the words and trying to understand why he was supposed to talk now. But gradually the tempo speeded up as the old man got into the story, and all the details began to flow: how a robbery was set up, what each man did, what was done in this particular job and that particular job, what went wrong here and what went right there.
From time to time he mentioned a name, and each time, Younger quietly wrote the name down, just to have.
The old man talked, and Younger listened, and slowly the old man was relaxing, was getting interested in the process of telling his stories, treating them like anecdotes, like conversation. Younger was interested, too, enjoying listening as he had earlier on the train enjoyed telling his own anecdotes.
Afternoon lengthened, and the room turned semidark, and the old man’s voice droned on. Younger smiled and nodded and listened, making his interest obvious. In some strange way it was a good afternoon, one of the best either of them had ever lived.
When it was over, the old man said, “I don’t understand you. You’re a policeman, you know all this about me, but you don’t arrest me. You push me and push me, but then you don’t do anything about it. I just can’t figure you out, I can’t figure out what you want.”
Younger, at the door, turned and smiled. “What I want? That’s easy. Half. See you soon.” He put on his cowboy hat and left.
8
“But I don’t have that much!”
“Sure you do, Joe.” Younger was being patient, as patient as a saint. “I showed you the figures, and that’s the way it’s got to be.”
The old man sat there on the sofa, wringing his hands. “You know where all my money is,” he said. “It’s in banks and mutual funds; it’s all invested. I wouldn’t have money around in cash like that. Why would I do something as stupid as that?”
“Half a million, Joe,” Younger said, enjoying the phrase, liking to say it. “Half a million at least, at the very least. And I want half of it. And my patience is wearing thin, Joe.”
“I swear to God, I swear I don’t have that much, I don’t have anywhere near that much. I swear to God.”
Younger sighed and shook his head. “Every one of these sessions I have to wind up slapping you around. I hate to do that, Joe, honest I do. Now let’s quit fooling around, for good and all.”
“Wait! Wait, please!”
Younger stood over him, hands bunched.
The old man said, “I’ll give you what I can, what I have. . . . I have a thousand dollars in the house, I’ll give you that. And I’ll get the rest of it, everything I have.”
“A thousand? Let’s see it.”
Younger smiled at the old man’s back as they went out to the kitchen. A thousand, one measly thousand? It would lead to the rest, at last.
But it didn’t. In the kitchen, the old man took a pouch from the flour canister and there was the thousand dollars. But no hint about the rest of it; a half a million couldn’t be hidden in flour canisters.
The old man gave him the money, saying, “I’ll get you what I can, I’ll close out my accounts, sell back my mutual funds—”
“Never mind that stuff, quit talking about that stuff!” Younger slapped the wad of money down on the kitchen shelf, really irritated now. “You think I give a damn about your mutual funds? It’s the cash I want like this thousand bucks. This is the first thousand, Joe, now where’s the rest?”
The old man closed his eyes. He shook his head.
Younger knocked him down.
9
After ringing the bell three times, Younger kicked the door in. He knew the old bastard was in here, so what was he trying to pull? He’d regret this, the old fart, he’d live to regret this.
Except he wouldn’t. Younger looked all over the house and finally found the old man hanging from the shower ring in the bathroom, naked and blue, with a face like a gargoyle.
Younger couldn’t believe it. Why’d he do it, the miserable bastard? It wasn’t as though that was the only way out; he could have handed half his money over to Younger and that would have been an end to it. He could have gone on living, no trouble. Yeah, and still have more money left than most men make in a lifetime.
What about the money now? Younger paced around the house, thinking, thinking. Was it gone for good now? His roving eyes searched and searched, trying to see the money, trying to look through brick or stone or earth or wood or metal or whatever was hiding the money from view, trying to see it there in stacks and stacks of green, somewhere, somewhere . . .
But where? In the two weeks since the old man had given him the first thousand Younger had gone over this house like a man looking for the other cuff link, and he was just about willing to swear it wasn’t here. It wasn’t buried in the cellar or the back yard, it wasn’t under the floorboards in the attic or behind a false back in a closet or stuffed inside a mattress, it wasn’t in the walls or the ceiling or the floor, it wasn’t in the furniture or the fixtures, it wasn’t anywhere in the house or on the property.
No, and it wasn’t in the apartment in Omaha, either. Last week Younger had driven the old man down there and gone through the apartment, and there wasn’t anything hidden there at all.
Nor was there any safety deposit box key anywhere in either place. Nor a railroad station locker key. Nor any kind of map. Nor anything else that would even hint where the money was.
Sheer didn’t have a car. He didn’t travel anywhere except to Omaha, and only by train. The area of his life was narrow and prescribed, and Younger knew every inch of it. The money had to be within that area somewhere, and that’s all there was to it.
So he’d find it anyway, the old bastard hadn’t cheated him after all. Sheer might be dead, but the money was still alive and so was Younger, and sooner or later they’d be getting together.
But first things first. The old man was dead, his body hanging there, and that had to be taken care of before anything else.
It couldn’t be called a suicide, he knew that much. Younger hadn’t kept h
is interest in the old man entirely hidden. He’d used patrolmen to help him keep an eye on Sheer, and he’d left Sheer’s phone number with the police switchboard as one of the places he might be reached in an emergency. If the old man’s death were listed as suicide, with the normal investigation that would follow, this whole business might backfire.
Like the autopsy. If the death was a suicide, there’d be a routine autopsy, and the first thing the doctor would see would be the marks Younger had made on Sheer, the bruises and burns, the cuts and rope marks, the whole history of what Younger had done to try and pry the half million out of the stubborn old bastard’s carcass. The doctor would know someone had tortured Sheer, and from there on Younger would be in trouble.
How to make it something other than suicide, though, that was the problem. Younger gnawed at it, pacing back and forth in the living room of the dead man’s house, puffing away at a cigar, and finally he remembered Dr. Rayborn.
All that was needed, after all, was a death certificate that didn’t say anything about suicide, and Dr. Rayborn should be happy to make one out as a little favor to Captain Younger. Rayborn was another interesting citizen Younger had come across in his first few months on the job; he’d do a favor for Younger, no question. Younger put his cowboy hat on and left the dead man’s house and went to see Dr. Rayborn.
Rayborn didn’t want to do it, until Younger mentioned Dr. Wash in Omaha, and then Rayborn didn’t make any more trouble. Referring a patient to someone else to get an abortion is just as much a felony as doing the abortion yourself.
Gliffe, a little later, was easier to handle. He was in local politics, he wanted to be the county’s next coroner, and he was more than happy to do a favor for someone on the inside like Captain Younger, especially after Dr. Rayborn told him they weren’t covering a murder but only a suicide. And covering the suicide, Younger added, only to protect the reputations of some innocent parties slandered by the dead man in his suicide note.
The Jugger Page 10