All three men are sipping adult beverages, a couple of beers and scotch as Sal picks up the conversation, “Did you get called out on this one, Bob?”
Bob answers, “No, hell no, they let the rookies partake of the easy ones. You got one bank robbery and one dumb shit amateur bank robber dead crook, uh . . . DOA at the scene . . . even a rookie Junior Field Agent can figure who the bad guy is under those delicate circumstances.”
CW, now laughing and kidding, pointing at the TV, “Are you sure?”
“Talk about an idiot!”
“Two guys out of our office made the scene; this joker doesn’t even case the joint, uses his girlfriend’s car and gets shot in the puss by a two-bit security guard,” answers Bob.
“Yea, these kinds of guys make it easy for us to clear a small number of cases every now and then. Hell, I even heard the President making a speech the other day saying something about crime being down just a bit.”
Sal subsequently asks, “Have you learned anything else out of DC on the bank pro guys?”
“No,” comes Bob’s reply, “but none of this deal surprises me much anymore. It’s definitely about time for them to hit again . . . ya’ know, it’s been about three, four, or five weeks now. Who cares, anyway?”
He does know for certain they won’t hit in Houston, that’s for sure. These bad guys always hit some small town out of the way bank.”How about other round, boys,” reverberated throughout the air?
CW continues, “Hey Bob, ask my ol’ partner here what he’s doing with all the free time he has on his hands now that he’s one hundred percent officially retired.
“OK, I’ll bite,” Bob comes back, “yeah, so what are you up to these days?”
Sal jumps right back in, “Hey, I think I damn sure deserved a little time off after working my butt off for the last 25 years.”
“Now if that’s not a dodge, I don’t know what is. Please . . . what have you been up to?” asks Bob once again.
“Uh, well, I watch a little TV and surf the web now and then,” comes back the reply.
CW gets in with, “Yeah, you watch old movies all day long on cable, come by here for a few beers, and later surf the web till five in the morning.
Sal continues, “It’s not like it sounds, you know. Actually, I’ve been looking into your professional bank robber cases on the web.I simply pulled up every newspaper or news article that I could find and have been doing a little bit of basic Investigation-101 on my own,” with a little bit of a brag.
CW simply has to get a jab in and quips, “I thought you wanted to retire?”
“I did,” answers up Sal, “but I’m doing this because I want to, not because I’m required to . . . and you would be amazed at just how much information I can access from my home computer. I’ve got copies of every newspaper article written on this guy. Hell, I’ve even got access to court records . . . man, I have even been able to track down the origin and history of the green army uniform he was wearing—Air Cav. Remember them in the movie Apocalypse Now? You ought to get on-line, partner, you might simply discover something new.”
CW offers a prompt “Screw that, I spend enough time at my day job messing with those damn computers . . . anyway, so, so . . . don’t change the subject here, what have you found out?”
“For one thing, because I am a real civilian again, now I am eligible for the $100,000 reward money which has been posted by the National Banker’s Association.” Sal continues, “Oh, yeah, that’s right. Civilian, huh? Uh . . . now I see. Now I see.”
They carry on drinking, kidding each other, and chatting until the wee hours of the morning. Same old same old bickering back and forth, picking on each other just like they were all a group of siblings . . . a group of brothers.
Chapter 5
Current Weather or current METAR: KNQX
1203KT 1 1/4SM—RA OVC04 20/19 A29.89 or in plain language:
Winds are 120 degrees at 3KTS, 1 & ¼ SM, with light rain, overcast sky at only 400 feet above the ground, temperature is 20C, dew point 19 and the area altimeter setting is 29.89
Key West, Florida
Tomorrow is another day. This day is cloudy and overcast; a low fog hangs in the air. Off in the far distance, we can spot a small strip center parking lot with only a few cars parked, facing forward. From a distance, things appear again as one engine is running, a bit of steam and heat rising in the vicinity of the car’s exhaust pipe.
This is merely a typical white four door rent-a-car with a paper tag sort of taped in the back window. The car is occupied by two men and getting closer, we see that it is the boys. Tom is driving, and John is dressed up in a blue suit, including the ever present regulation Ray Ban pilot sunglasses. He’s holding a small Motorola radio transceiver in his left hand and an even smaller ear piece in his right.
On the seat next to Tom is another radio. Next to it are two Apple I-Pads connected to the city’s Wi-Fi network. One is tapped into the local traffic cameras so he can monitor all the surrounding streets. The other one is being used as a police scanner to monitor all the local police, sheriff, and even some of the basic FBI dispatches frequencies. A frequency meter is in the top right corner. Below on the glass face, the state of the art roaming police scanner scrolls as the scanner searches through all the acknowledged police emergency frequencies.
They are serious, today, no cutting up, and no horseplay, as Tom states, “Five minutes—you ready?”
John without looking up, adjusts the ear piece in his right ear and offers back, “Yeah, sure. Radio check, over?”
Tom next picks up the radio and moves it to his lap, where he keys the mike button and talks to his lap. Tom follows with, “Test, one, two, three, test.”
“It’s good,” comes back John, “it’s good.”
The car slowly pulls out of the parking lot and drives off down the street. A block down is a small bank on the right.
The car drives east-bound a few yards. Then the mid-size rental car turns toward the south about to make the block. When it comes back into view, we note that Tom is all alone as he sits waiting at the stop sign. The light drizzle somehow has now turned into a steady rain, thereby decreasing the forward visibility to less than a quarter of a mile.
John subsequently appears into the picture and turns the corner, walking in his normal stride toward the front of the bank. The car at that moment drives off to make another trip around the block.
For some, the fog and rain may have made today a miserable day to be out . . . that is—for most folks. John is standing at the lone teller’s counter conducting another transaction—not a withdrawal, not yet. What he’s doing is a good thorough recon of the bank’s inside lay out. He notes the building . . . since the structure is such a small bank, there are only two people inside it, the teller and the branch manager stuck in her back office on the phone answering questions about CD rates. His brain thinks, “All good here, all fantastically good.”
John, in a kind voice, offers, “Good morning, I need a twenty dollar money order, please.” He hands her a bit of a worn out twenty dollar bill with his right hand.
“Yes sir. I’ll be glad to get that for you. Mind you the cost to you is 85 cents unless you have an account with us” is the teller’s response, far too concerned about what the rain did to her hair, than giving anything other than basic good customer service. John at that moment pulls a single one dollar bill from his right front pants pocket and hands the bill over to the clerk.
Within moments, he exits the bank and walks off, down to the corner and turns, gets into the rental car, and the two of them drive off. Tom, curious, offers, “What do you think?”
“This one will work,” is John’s response as the car drives off down the street and into the rainy day.
* * * * *
Across the county, in a quaint 1087 square foot,
one bed room study condo, we witness a cluttered, but somewhat organized mess. This place has been Sal’s home since the almost divorce some four years ago. Some sort of formal court approved separation was dropped in his lap. It was the better of the two deals he worked out with his ex-wife . . . wife. Deep down inside, he is still married . . . they’re merely going through a rough patch.
At one time, he had it all—a big two story house, kids, a dog, a swimming pool in the backyard, but his wife couldn’t handle the stress of being a cop’s wife anymore. With the kids off in college she had too much time to think, to worry. She had done OK for years and years being a cop’s wife. She was able to deal with the long hours with his job always coming first, but sometimes one simple thing just seems to push some people over the edge of the cliff.
That one thing was when their good friend TJ was killed while running a felony robbery arrest warrant. He caught a 12 gauge shotgun blast in the upper chest and face because some three time ex-con didn’t want to go back to prison or TDC for the fourth time. Due to his injuries, the service was a closed casket funeral. The damage was too extensive, and the morticians could not work their magic on TJ. Fortunately for the tax payers of the great State of Texas, Mr. Ex-con was sent straight to Hell by a return volley of gunfire from the other detectives in the robbery warrant squad.
Sal wasn’t in on that particular raid, but he, like all the other robbery division detectives, ran felony arrest warrants almost every week. It definitely wears on the wives and the family. She basically told him he could get off the Robbery Detective Squad or get out of the house. What could he do? He was a cop, a robbery detective cop. It is in his DNA. He is the DNA.
All around are papers, faxes, books, beer cans, and empty pizza boxes . . . basically a mess. Next to the couch is a cheap metal desk with a computer setup on top. Sal, himself, is looking like a mess; he’s drinking coffee, his first cup of coffee, at three o’clock in the afternoon. In the background is an old style cut-rate 19” color TV with Casablanca playing on the set.
He’s surfing the Internet, doing some research on the serial bank robbers, printing out anything and everything that appears to be related to the case. Some of the pages coming out of the printer fall off the desk and float to the floor. We can just distinguish what is on some of them; newspaper headlines: “Bank Robbed; Hoax Bomb Found,” “Man Robs Credit Union With a Bomb,” etc. Even though he’s in a cluttered ragged mess, he’s in the zone. Poking around his desk top, he’s looking for his pair of reading glasses. It’s tough getting old.
Later in the evening, a bit early for most folks who gather at Fuzzy’S Bar, Sal is seated at his usual bar stool at the far end of the bar. The time is only 8:45 pm according to the bar clock, and it’s rather quiet in here after the “happy hour” crowd, the day shift guys and gals have all gone home. It will be a bit quiet until the second shift men and women start strolling in; they haven’t gotten off duty yet. Sal is seated, in fact sort of half standing, at the far end talking with Louis.
Louis begins, “. . . so what else did you find out?”
Sal comes right back with, “Well, I’m telling you, I’m 99% sure this guy is ex-military,” as he pauses to takes a drink. “No, no, it just dawned on me that this guy could still be in. Hell, he could still be in wearing his actual uniform the day he hit in Canton.”
“Why do you think so?” questions Louis.
“Well,” answers Sal, “this is actually rather simple—you and I have been around this for over 25 years and don’t even notice it anymore . . . it’s his walk, like he’s marching, his demeanor when he pulls a job. He’s cool under stress. He may or could be highly trained in covert undercover type of operation, like our guys who do that deep undercover work—our deep undercover narcotics guys.”
Louis comes right back with, “In that case, why couldn’t he be a cop?”
Laughing, Sal next adds, “Actually, you’re right, but at least it’s something to start with.” Pulling off his dark rimmed glasses, he rubs the right side of his nose. The twisted frames don’t quite fit as good as they once did. They bug Sal, just where the little nose bridge plastic piece presses down. Hell, they haven’t fit right since the day he left the eyeglass store.
A grinning Louis next offers, “OK, my friend, what else have you come up with?”
“Well,” he continues, “most, uh no . . . look here, all of the robberies occurred in the southern half of the country. The southern United States is part of the key to solving these cases. My friend, somewhere . . . there is some logical reason they only hit in the south, southeast part of the country . . . and get this, every one of them was either on a Monday or a Tuesday . . . he’s never hit on any other day of the week, and not after 10:30 a.m. Really, I seem to recall maybe only one, I think, was after 10:35 in the morning.”
“OK,” said Louis, “so you’ve been working on this hot and heavy for almost a month now . . . so where is he going to hit next?”
A quick response comes back, “Actually, I believe they’re goanna’ hit somewhere east of here, somewhere between Louisiana and South Carolina. I believe, I think . . . or my first bet is gonna’ be Louisiana, Mississippi. Possibly the Florida panhandle; because they started out in Arizona, followed by New Mexico, West Texas, and basically these bandits have sort of been working their way east ever since.
“Damn, now this sounds like good info to me,” says Louis. “Well, uh . . . however it just about covers a third of the country, sir.” An extremely serious Sal adds, “No, serious, he’s hit in Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Arizona, Tennessee, I’m telling you they’re gonna’ hit in the south either this Monday or Tuesday . . . or next.”
Louis, not too convinced, moves off to tend to a new set of customers sidling up to the bar, leaving Sal to ponder all they discussed. He knows deep down he’s correct. His little sixth sense that cops develop is telling him so. His gut feeling—his hunch, borders on being a bit freaky, sort of like a unique version of ESP. All good cops develop one, but if truth be told, some exceptional detectives take the gift to an entirely different height, sort of like the talents of the distinguished golfer Arnold Palmer or Joe Namath, the legendary quarterback for the New York Jets—sometimes you are definitely in the zone. You know that you’re going to win today’s contest before the game even starts. He merely has to sort things out . . . all the little details.
Sipping on his beer, Sal stares at the overhead television sets, but he’s not watching; he’s deep in thought. Off to his right, Ha Tran carries in a large bucket of fresh ice from the rear freezer and pours it into the two beer coolers hidden behind the bar. He looks up at Detective Sal and smiles a nice general greeting kind of smile.
“Hey, Mr. Tran, how are you doing tonight, sir,” offers Sal.
“Good, sir, and good to see you again, is his answer.
Sal looks at the still young man and wonders what may have been . . . what many things would have been like for Ha Tran if the War had changed or gone in another direction.
Sal asks, “Captain Tran, do you still have any contact with the old country?”
A smiling Mr. Tran looks up and at that time his expression changes. His look is blank and completely changed from five seconds ago. “No sir, not at all,” is his response. “All my family, my living family escaped with me . . . as far as I understand, my parents, my aunts and all of my uncles are long dead.”
“Sorry,” offers Sal.
“This is OK, it is our fate . . . It is our Karma. Why do you ask? Do you miss it . . . the War?”
“No, not the War, but part of me was lost over in Vietnam too. Part of my soul is still over in your country,” says Sal.
* * * * *
Up high above the ground, in the sky at 33,000 feet is a fine place to be tonight. It’s a good night to fly; as the boys are flying east, southeast bound down to Florida, specifically Key West Interna
tional Airport. Just some high cirrus clouds float by as the 500 mph jet covers the ground at a bit over eight miles a minute. The cockpit is aglow with the soft mix of yellow, white, and soft green lights scattered all over the cockpit. The whole lot of airplane, engines, flight crew, and ATC is working fine. The boys are doing their pilot jobs, and they are doing them well.
Tom picks up the mike draped over his right leg and speaks into the small black device.”Once again from the flight deck here,we would like to thank all of you for flying with us today. We are about sixty-five miles out from Key West and should have you at the gate just a . . . maybe ten minutes early.”
John, afterwards snidely states, “You do that soo-ooo well.” They both laugh.
Tom adds, “Hell, young man, I am a professional—trained by your Uncle Sam a long time ago whileyou were still in junior high school dreaming about girls and wanting to get laid on Saturday night.”
They laugh briefly before getting back to flying the airplane, setting it up to land, as each crew member starts running the required checklists in the correct and proper order. All in all, completing their descent and in-range checks, their approach and landing check lists, lowering the gear, and finding the airport’s runway number one-three.
Looking toward the airport and the runway, the loud noise of the twin-engine jet airliner roars overhead, across a sea of white, green, and red approach lights and lands. The huge plane then dissolves out of sight at the far end of the runway, as it taxis right, then left as the plane makes her way up to the gate area. This is their parking place for the night. They will be officially off duty in less than one hour.
This night is clear and warm at the Holiday Inn Express where the crew is staying tonight. A cool Caribbean ocean southeast breeze causes the palm trees in the parking lot to gently sway in what appears to be a well choreographed dance. Once again, the flight crew is in another city, another hotel, another bar where airline crews kick back and relax, mingle, and enjoy some fun. All around are other people, some tourists and a few business men, along with the flight crew members.
Con Trails/200 Sky Obscured Page 6