by W B Garalt
It was clear now that the setting would be perfect for the staged event. Mahlah would be directed to the library by Marcel’s friend the customs officer, when she arrived at the Canadian Custom House. The buyer could be in the clerk’s office behind the U.S. counter with Max. Marcel and Don Chace could be out of sight in the office behind the Canadian counter. The plain-clothes U.S. Marshal could stand on the border line with the money satchel placed at his feet on the U.S. side.
At that point the U.S. Marshal arrived having driven there in an armored transport vehicle. Chace met him at the door and, after signing an authorization, asked him to bring in the parcel. As the Marshal pulled the satchel of money in on a wheeled portable luggage cart, he was accompanied by Chace’s friend, the ‘buyer’ who walked behind with the hood of a parka pulled low to cover any facial glimpse. Chace fist-bumped hello, then led the buyer into the back office. Chace could be heard running through the plan of action and came back to show the U.S. Marshal through the library layout.
The time had arrived. Maurice got the call that Mrs. Bickford had arrived at the Canadian customs depot. All participants took their places and Maggie sat at a reading table with her closed attaché case. After two minutes of silence, except for the ticking of a spring-wound pendulum clock on the wall, the Canadian side entrance opened and a man in a camouflaged hunting parka and hood, wearing a full frost-bite protector face mask, strode into the library. His eyes could be seen moving from side to side within the slits in the face mask as he scanned the room. He didn’t speak and turned to motion-in an attractive, young-looking woman with Native Indian facial features. She was dressed in a stylish, obviously expensive hooded ski outfit with a matching shoulder bag. As the woman stepped into the room she was followed by a second hooded, face-masked man.
“I’m Mahlah Bickford,” the woman said to Maggie. “You must be Margaret Marshall.”
“It’s a pleasure to meet you in person, please call me Maggie,” was the appropriate response by Maggie as she approached and extended a hand. Mahlah looked away to scan the room as if she didn’t notice Maggie’s extended hand. As she looked the marshal up and down, her gaze lingered on the bulging satchel at his feet. As Maggie pulled back her hand her smile turned into a forced grimace. She introduced the marshal as the courier who transported the funds.
Mahlah turned to the two body guards and spoke a few words in an unknown language. One of the men grunted some sort of a response and, turning in unison they both went outside, apparently to stand guard, closing the door behind as they left.
Mahlah slid back her hood and shook a large hairdo of long jet black hair into place. Maggie motioned her to a chair at the reading table and opened her attaché case. Aware of the chill in the not-yet warmed library Mahlah, like everyone else involved, kept her exterior winter clothing in place. As Mahlah took the seat she took a packet of papers from her shoulder bag.
“These are the transfer papers which will have to be witnessed,” Mahlah stated.
“Of course,” Maggie replied. “The pilot who flew me here is a Notary Public. I’ll get him,” she added, while she rose to walk toward the U.S. side office.
“First, I’d like to see the money,” Mahlah interrupted, turning toward the marshal. Maggie stopped and motioned the marshal to bring the satchel to the table. He unlocked the bag and pulled back the hinged top to expose the contents, wrapped with bands in stacks of fifty $100.00 bills. Mahlah took out a packet and furled the ends to verify the amounts. She had taken the packet out of a stack of packets which were in cardboard sleeves.
“There are forty stacks of packets here and each packet has fifty bills,” said the marshal. Mahlah took out three stacks, reached down and pulled one up from the bottom. She furled through the end to verify the contents as real money. She commented to the marshal that some of the bills were the new style multicolored bills, and some were the older, all-green style.
“Did you request new bills?” he asked Maggie. “That would have taken a while to process.”
“Oh, that’s okay,” Mahlah interrupted. “Put them back in the bag. Where do I sign?” she asked. Maggie took out the purchase and sale agreement and handed it to Mahlah.
“Do you want to read it before I have the buyer sign?” she asked. Mahlah hesitated for a moment. Then she took the papers and walked away, reading as she walked. She stopped and glanced out of a rear window as if in deep thought. Finished with the reading, she returned to the table.
“Where is the buyer, is he here?” she asked of Maggie. Maggie took her aside, and, as if in confidence so as not to startle the buyer, she quietly pointed out to Mahlah that the buyer had strange quirks. Having been in an accident several years back, the buyer avoided any public facial exposure, feeling that it made people queasy. Maggie reiterated what she had told Mahlah over the phone, and asked if she was okay with the money. Maggie still had to have the buyer look over the ownership transfer papers before he signed.
“Whatever,” Mahlah said with a wave of her hand. “Let’s get it over with.”
Maggie took the paperwork and walked to the back office on the U.S. side. To make it sound like Maggie had to do a sales job to get the buyer’s signature, she and Max started talking loudly and shut the door to the office. While the face-down hooded buyer actually sat in silence, Max continued the muffled voice until Maggie stepped out and looked toward Mahlah while holding up her crossed fingers, faking concern. Mahlah began to fidget nervously as she flipped her hood back over her head and began to button her coat. There was shouting coming from outside the rear door and suddenly the door opened.
The library caretaker came in followed by a taller hooded man. As the intruder flipped his hood back, Maggie gasped. It was Chip Chaplain!
Mahlah wasn’t surprised. She seemed to be expecting him. Chip seemed highly agitated and asked Mahlah if there was some type of hold-up. Before she could answer, Maurice stepped out from behind the Canadian counter as Don Chace, recognizing Chip Chaplain’s voice, stayed out of sight inside the office area. Sensing some sort of trap, Chip strode quickly to Maggie and grabbed her arm. The elderly caretaker moaned and, grasping his chest clothing, he turned ghostly white and sat down against a wall.
“What’s the problem here? Is your buyer backing out?” Chip shouted loudly to Maggie. At that moment, Max burst out of the rear office.
“Hold it right there!” Chip barked at Max. Knowing the relationship between Max and Maggie he pulled her toward him and pulled a pistol out of his pocket, and aimed it at Max’s head. Max began to reach for the pistol in his belt holster but stopped when Chip told him not to try it. He now had his gun to Maggie’s head. Through the rear window, Max noticed an airplane in an open field behind the Library. The propeller was turning slowly at idle, churning up snow around it from the prop wash.
At the sight of Chip’s gun Maurice Leblanc drew his revolver and Don Chace stepped out with his pistol drawn and both aimed them at Chip. At that instant the masked front door guards burst in through the front entry with guns drawn, aimed at Maurice and Don. Chip ordered Maurice and Don to drop the guns and hit the floor face down with arms spread. The door guards felt them for any other weapons and then kicked the dropped weapons aside. While Chip had the gun to Maggie’s head they had no choice but to obey. Chip ordered Max and the Federal Marshal to join the other two. They also had no choice, and they were then relieved of their weapons.
“Mahlah, get the money,” Chip said. As Mahlah pulled the heavy metal-reinforced satchel off the table, it fell to the floor. She hoisted it onto the luggage carrier and started to pull it toward the rear exit door.
“Help me with this,” she ordered. The door guards pocketed their guns and buckled the satchel onto the luggage carrier. Each lifted an opposite end of the carrier to maneuver the bundle out through the rear door.
Maggie was helpless. Chip was way too strong and had been trained to restrain a combatant. He wouldn’t allow himself to be out witted or out maneuvered, especial
ly by a female at barely half his weight. The other four that were armed had been out-played by Chip with his move to hold Maggie hostage. The library caretaker appeared to be unconscious, suffering a stroke or heart attack.
The plan for Chace and Leblanc to bring Mahlah Bickford, and possibly Chip Chaplain, to justice was not going well. The only chance they had now to prevail in this effort, rested with Chace’s friend who posed as the buyer. The problem was that it was not known whether or not the buyer was armed.
“Wait!” Mahlah said to Chip as an afterthought. “The buyer!”
In the confusion she hadn’t realized that Chip wasn’t aware of the reclusive buyer in the back office. The weapons taken from the four reluctant onlookers on the floor had been kicked into a corner. Mahlah went to the group of weapons and picked one that she felt she could operate. It proved to be a .38 caliber service revolver discarded by Maurice. She kicked the remaining guns out into the snow. Mahlah stepped quietly over to the door of the U.S. side office and, gun first, she opened the door. A gust of wind greeted her through an open side exit door, obviously an escape route for the eccentric buyer. Strangely relieved due to Maggie’s manufactured description of the buyer’s grotesque appearance, yet eerily unnerved by the buyer’s disappearance, she returned to the main library room to complete her and Chip’s absconding with the ill-gotten treasure.
With two guns trained on the weaponless, faced-down group on the floor, and the fainted caretaker, the two outlaws with Maggie in tow began their withdrawal to the idling airplane in the snow-covered field behind the library.
Mahlah backed out of the doorway last and began back-stepping through the foot print path to the idling airplane. Max, afraid that Maggie might try to get away and get hurt, crawled to the rear window and looked out. The door guards were holding the plane doors open and pointing their weapons toward the library. Chip, dragging Maggie backwards with one arm around her neck had almost reached the airplane. Mahlah was still backing away with her revolver pointing at the open rear door of the library. Almost immediately there was a smacking sound followed by a gunshot and glass shards fell onto the floor behind Max. He quickly sidled crab-like away from the window. At that point the armored transport vehicle roared around the rear corner of the library and stopped across the open doorway. The guards and Chip let go a barrage of bullets, some of which ricocheted off the vehicle and some which slammed into the wooden clapboard siding of the library. The driver of the armored truck opened the building-side passenger door to provide safe passage, and one-by-one Chace, the marshal and Max jumped in. Maurice motioned for them to pursue as he went to his slumping friend, the library caretaker. The hooded armored truck driver moved to the back while the marshal jumped into the driver’s seat. He jammed the shift into drive and stomped on the accelerator, causing the passengers to fall backwards as it lurched forward with a roar. The marshal drove and Don Chace was in the passenger side, readying the riot gun which had been clamped overhead. Bullets were pinging on the bullet-proof windshield as the marshal, peering around the bullet impact marks, steered the fish-tailing, bounding armored truck toward the airplane. As the fleeing robbers climbed into the idling airplane, first the guards, then Mahlah, and then Chip, Maggie was cast aside into the snow. The airplane’s engine, at full throttle now, began to raise a huge cloud of snow between the aircraft and the rapidly approaching truck. The plane was moving away as the truck slid to a stop. Max jumped out from the side loading door to pull Maggie into the truck. Once they were both inside the chase resumed.
Although they could not see well through the billowing snow, the pursuers followed the progress of the blowing snow cloud as the plane moved faster and faster along the field and began to pull away. The truck could only manage about 45 miles per hour on the rough, snowy surface. The airplane needed to attain approximately 70 MPH ground speed, into the slight headwind, in order to become airborne. To the pursuers in the truck, beyond the snow-cloud ahead, an approaching tree line came into view.
Chip, apparently aware that they might not get airborne in time to clear the trees, steered the plane slightly to the north where the tree line receded somewhat. With the take-off speed slightly reduced due to the turn, and with the tail-skid still not fully clear of the snow, the airplane seemed to be incapable of a lift-off. The tree line was now too close, and Chip pulled the plane into a sharp right U-turn, to head back toward the open field behind. As it turned, the plane’s right ski lifted, as its left wing dipped and made contact with the surface. Chip instinctively corrected with a turn to the left but the plane rocked violently to the opposite side and the right wing tip slammed down hard.
Because of the changed take-off direction, the slower truck would be able to cut the airplane off at an angle that crossed its’ new intended take-off path. In order to avoid the truck Chip swung sharply to the left again. This time the tail flipped up and the propeller contacted the snowy surface. It ground a furrow, scattering snow and frozen dirt chunks into the air. The propeller immediately broke down to stubs and the right-side ski support snapped. With a piercing, high-pitched metallic screech the aircraft suddenly jerked to a stop with its nose buried and the tail tilted skyward at a 45 degree angle.
As the truck approached, the four occupants of the plane could be seen slumped forward and unmoving. From the back section of the truck Max could see part of the plane through the mottled windshield and recognized, by the ID number on its upright tail section that, to his amazement, the airplane was the USAP Cessna with the attached skis! In that instance all sounds ceased except the idling motor of the armored truck, the slight murmur of the wind and some heavy breathing from within the truck. Don Chase quickly exited the truck with the riot gun and, pointing it back and forth between the side windows of the airplane, he slowly approached. The marshal exited the driver’s side of the truck and followed Chase, one step behind. They checked for signs of fuel leakage and were satisfied that there was none.
The sound of sirens could be heard from the direction of the town. As Chase held the shotgun at ready, the marshal reached around and pulled open the rear passenger door. One of the door guards tumbled out onto the snow, followed by the money satchel. The guard was bleeding from facial cuts and was semi-conscious. Neither of the guards appeared to have fastened their seat belts. The marshal took a gun from the guard’s pocket and pointed it at the slumping second guard, who was pushing away and trying to sit back from where he had been slammed against the back of the pilot’s seat. The marshal reached in and dragged the flailing, dazed guard out onto the snow beside his cohort. Kneeling on the back of his neck, he retrieved a pistol and proceeded to snap on handcuffs, one guard to the other, and then opened the co-pilot’s door.
Mahlah, wearing no restraint belts, had been forced forward against the co-pilot control wheel by the abrupt stoppage of the airplane, and appeared to be impaled through the chest area on a metal shaft jutting up through the floor of the cockpit. Blood was oozing from her mouth and she was not breathing. It was apparent that she was beyond help and would not be going anywhere.
They moved around the imbedded nose of the airplane and opened the pilot’s door. Chip Chaplain was slumped forward in his seat. Blood was running from his nose and dripping onto his knees. His forehead had impacted the sun visor apparatus over the instrument panel, and he appeared to be stunned from the blow. Both of his hands were bleeding and apparently broken.
A rescue truck had entered the field and was approaching the wreckage.
Meanwhile, Max was holding Maggie’s head in his arm as she lay across the rear floor of the armored truck. She was groggy from being partially strangled and was breathing heavily now, but regularly. Her eyes opened up and, seeing Max, closed slightly out of relief. Max could feel her body relaxing. The stress of the ordeal was wearing off now. Don Chace’s friend who had posed as the silent buyer, looking around to see that only Max and Maggie were nearby, moved over Maggie and looked down as her hood slipped back.
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��Are you okay Maggie?” she asked softly. Max looked up and was stunned. Maggie’s eyes opened wide.
“Carrie?” she asked. “Is that you?”
“Shh,” the girl said, “I’m ‘Jeanine’ now.”
A CRT from the rescue truck looked in and asked if anyone needed help. The girl pulled her hood over her head and tied it to partially hide her flawless, naturally beautiful face.
Don Chace looked in on them. Assured that they were okay, he motioned to ‘Jeanine’. “We had better get moving now,” he said. “Say your goodbyes.”
A New Brunswick rescue ambulance was pulling away from the library to transport the library caretaker to a nearby Canadian medical center in New Brunswick. Maurice Leblanc walked toward the wrecked airplane, which by now was surrounded with police, fire, rescue and medical response team members. Three fire trucks had responded to the scene and flame-retardant foam had been sprayed on and around the Cessna as a precaution. The Federal Marshal had reclaimed the money satchel and secured it inside the armored vehicle. After Don Chace had signed to release it, the marshal drove the truck back to the U.S. side of the library to await an escort for transporting of the money back to the U.S. Treasury disposal facility, from which it had come. The Maine State Police had requested that the bullet-pocked armored truck be confiscated as evidence.
Don Chace’s friend ‘the buyer’ had not exited the armored vehicle and remained in it to await an escort back to her safe haven. She had known Max, Maggie, and Don Chace in a previous life, and was now placed, incognito, in a witness protection program.