Willie the Actor

by David Barry

  He heard the bell ringing loudly deep inside the bank. He waited. A car horn blared angrily and Bill’s nervous system suffered a jolt. Presently the guard’s face appeared in the glass halfway up the door. Bill showed him the telegram. The guard

  looked at it for a moment, then at Bill, who kept his expression deadpan, though inside his stomach was churning. It was less than a second, but waiting for the guard’s decision was like the Coney Island roller-coaster drop. But the uniform seemed to satisfy him and he began to unlock the door. Bill threw his partner a glance. Jack ‘s face was like granite, tough and deadly, and it flitted across Bill’s mind that his partner might resort to using his gun if he had to. But it was only a fleeting concern, because already they were past the point of no return as the bank door swung open.

  ‘I’ve got a wire for the boss,’ Bill told the guard. ‘I need a signature. ‘

  Trying to keep his hands from shaking, he handed the guard the telegram, a receipt book and pencil. As soon as the guard’s hands were occupied, awkwardly holding the telegram and receipt book and trying to sign his name, Bill unclipped the clasp on the his gun holster, raised the flap and pulled the revolver out.

  ‘Okay,’ he said, pointing the gun at the bewildered guard, ‘just obey orders and you won’t get hurt. ‘

  At that moment, Jack barged in, pushing the guard backwards and brandishing a Colt. 45. in his face. The guard raised his hands shakily as Bill slammed the door shut and locked it.

  ‘Those chairs,’ he told the guard. ‘Line five of them along that wall. ‘

  The guard’s face was strained and he seemed unable to comprehend what Bill was telling him. But Bill figured that keeping him occupied would help him to remain calm. And he needed him to be reasonably composed for when the employees arrived.

  ‘Those chairs,’ he repeated, waving the gun at some desks at the far end of the lobby, ‘bring them over here and line them up against that wall. Do as you’re told and you won’t get hurt. But if you don’t.‘

  ‘Okay,’ the guard said. ‘I’ll do it. ‘

  As the guard walked over to pick up the first chair, Bill threw Jack a look. Jack gave him a thin, strained smile, then glanced at the bank clock. It was only five after eight. They had at least twenty minutes to wait until the first employees started to arrive. It took the guard three or four minutes to get six chairs and line them up against the wall, out of sight of the door, just in case anyone should decide to stand on tiptoe and peer into the bank. As soon as the last chair was in place, Bill instructed him to sit down.

  ‘Take the weight off your feet,’ Jack couldn’t resist adding.

  The guard sat heavily on the chair nearest the door. He stared up at Bill, trying to memorize his face. Bill stared back at him, with the gun aimed at his stomach, forcing him to look away. Jack looked at the clock again. The hands hadn’t made any progress. The time was dragging its heels. Each minute was the longest minute he and Bill had ever experienced. The silence was taut, like a time-bomb about to explode. Out in the street, they could hear life going on as normal. The traffic sounds, the clip-clop of a milkman’s horse, and the faint ring of a bicycle bell. Each exterior sound seemed to accentuate the silence inside the bank. Eventually, after what seemed like the longest fifteen minutes of their lives, the doorbell rang.

  ‘Let them in, then lock the door,’ Bill instructed the guard. ‘And don’t try anything stupid. ‘

  The guard got up and unlocked the door. ‘It’s a lovely day, Fred,’ said one of the employees as he entered.

  ‘That’s what you think,’ the guard complained.

  The employee, a small, thin man wearing an ugly-patterned tie that clashed with his shirt, halted in his tracks when he spotted the guns. His mouth dropped open, and his eyes were as fearful as a cornered animal. The guard had already bolted the door behind him.

  ‘Sit down, do as you’re told, and you won’t get hurt,’ Bill said.

  The ugly tie sank into one of the chairs. He looked as if he was about to wet himself. The bell rang again and Jack nodded to the guard to open. Two more employees entered, both women. One of them, a mousy looking girl in a purple cloche hat opened her mouth when she spotted the guns and looked as if she was about to scream.

  ‘Don’t make a sound,’ Jack warned her. ‘Keep quiet and you won’t get hurt. ‘

  Bill gestured with his gun at the row of chairs. ‘Sit next to your colleague there. ‘

  The girl in the purple hat staggered towards the chairs assisted by her colleague, an older woman dressed in a long, navy-blue overcoat and a dark beret. They both sank into the chairs, their faces ashen with shock. Bill wondered if the girl in the purple hat was going to throw up.

  Another ring on the doorbell and two more male employees were let in. Jack instructed them to keep calm and to sit on the chairs with their colleagues. Now all the staff were present, with the exception of the manager. Another minute passed in silence. The bank staff were like statues, hardly daring to breathe, let alone move. Bill noticed the ugly tie moving his neck, as if he wanted to loosen his collar but was scared to move his hands. Purple hat was staring at the floor and shaking with fear. The doorbell pierced the silence, heralding the arrival of the manager. Bill nodded at the bank guard and threw Jack a cursory look of relief. They were almost home and dry. Here was the man who knew the combination of the safe.

  The manager was a small, tubby man with graying, thinning hair. When he saw the guns, his face barely registered any emotion, as if the robbery was a commonplace event. Bill felt this man was the heroic type, the sort of man who was one-hundred percent loyal to the bank which employed him. He could see by the calm, contemptuous look in the his eyes that threats wouldn’t mean a thing to him. He would risk death rather than open the vault. Bill cocked the hammer of the revolver and aimed it at the row of employees, just above their heads.

  It was a terrible risk. Supposing it went off? And what if he killed one of them? Jesus! It didn’t bear thinking about.

  He raised the barrel slightly, to a point on the wall about a foot above ugly tie’s head, and said to the manager without looking at him, ‘All I want you to do is to open your safe. If you refuse, nothing will happen to you. But I promise you that the lives of your employees here will be jeopardized. ‘

  With a tiny, submissive shrug, the manager said wearily, ‘I guess I have no choice. ‘

  The manager’s words echoed in Bill’s head, reminding him of the day he recruited Jack’s help in the robbery.

  ‘That’s right,’ he said. ‘You have no choice. ‘

  While Jack kept his gun aimed at the staff, Bill lowered his and eased the hammer back off. Then he prodded the manager gently in the back with the butt and told him to hurry. They went behind the counter to the vault. The manager, having made the decision to acquiesce, suddenly became efficient. He span the wheels of the combination lock expertly and the door swung open within seconds. Inside the safe were two small tin boxes. Bill gave the manager the briefcase he was carrying.

  ‘Put the money in there. And hurry up. ‘

  The manager started to bundle the money into the briefcase. Bill’s excitement surged as he saw the clean, crisp bills dropping into the case. As soon as it was full, and the manager had shut the case, he grabbed it from him and took him back the other side of the counter. He made him sit on the sixth chair with his staff.

  ‘My friend and I are leaving,’ he told them. ‘We have a third member of our gang on guard outside. Anyone going through this door in the next five minutes will be shot. ‘

  He and Jack knew, of course, that as soon as they left, the manager would dash to the phone and call the police. But the warning was intended to give them the valuable couple of minutes they needed to get to the car. Bill thought the employees would hesitate before running out into the street, just in case he was telling the tru
th.

  Jack, with his gun aimed at the row of terrified and bewildered staff, backed towards the door and unlocked it. Then he and Bill slipped out the door, closing it quietly behind, and melted into the busy street. They rounded the corner and found the car. Jack slid into the driver’s seat and turned the ignition. The engine was still warm from the journey over, and he grinned as the little beauty started first time. He removed his hat and glasses, dropping them onto the floor by the passenger seat.

  Bill climbed into the back and ducked down behind the seats. Then Jack drove around the corner into the stream of traffic going along Jamaica Avenue.

  As they passed the bank, the alarm bell was jangling and the manager stood on the sidewalk, peering up and down the street. He didn’t give Jack’s car a second glance as they drove by.

  Jack chuckled loudly. ‘At the risk of resorting to cliché,’ he said. ‘It was like taking candy from a kid. ‘

  Chapter Four

  September, 1930

  ‘Where are we going?’ Louise asked for the fifth time that morning as they headed over the Queensboro Bridge. Bill smiled enigmatically before singing loudly, and a trifle tunelessly, ‘My sweet embraceable you,’ and followed it with a delighted chuckle.

  ‘Don’t be so irritating,’ she told him, though she secretly enjoyed playing along with his game.

  ‘If I’m not mistaken, we’re headed towards Queens,’ he said teasingly, and glanced in her direction.

  ‘That doesn’t answer my question. ‘ She squeezed his leg just above the knee with her finger and thumb. Involuntarily his leg shot forward. With his other leg he pushed the accelerator down and the car surged forward towards the rear of a bus, then he braked sharply.

  ‘Careful! You’ll have us in the East River in a minute. ‘

  ‘You did that on purpose,’ she admonished him. ‘And made out it was my fault. ‘

  Bill laughed. ‘I told you, it’s a surprise. You’ll just have to be patient. You don’t want to spoil the surprise do you?’

  ‘I guess not,’ she replied. She clasped her hands together and the finger and thumb of her right hand automatically span the wedding ring on her finger. She was deliriously happy. Almost too happy. It sometimes made her wary. But she couldn’t figure out why. It was like watching a rainbow bubble drifting gently in the air, knowing it would eventually pop.

  ‘Are you happy, Mrs Sutton?’ Bill asked her.

  ‘You know I am. ‘

  He followed her reply this time by whistling ‘Embraceable You’, a little more in tune than his singing. She relaxed back into her seat and chased any doubts, any pessimistic thoughts from her mind. She ran a hand over her stomach and was reassured by the sheer miracle that was happening inside her, although there was nothing showing at the moment, and her stomach remained disappointingly flat.

  After driving in silence for a while, Bill sensed a certain sadness enveloping Louise, or perhaps she was just being thoughtful and serious as she contemplated the birth, which wasn’t until the new year. But Bill was suddenly unsure of himself. He was, after all, asking her to believe a great deal when he hit her with his surprise. It would take the acting skills of a Barrymore to convince her. So he needed to keep her spirits up, get her thinking about the baby, and how he relished the role of father. He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye and could see that she was frowning hard, staring at the road ahead.

  ‘Penny for them?’ he said.

  ‘I can’t help thinking about your poor mother. She would have loved to be a grandmother, I’m certain of it. It was all so sudden. ‘

  ‘It hit my father pretty hard. He misses her terribly. They lived for each other. ‘

  It crossed Bill’s mind that his parents had lived for themselves to the exclusion of all others, even their own son. Then realized how unfair the thought was. He was the one who had let them down by turning to a life of crime. A fate they hadn’t deserved.

  ‘I’m glad he attended our wedding. ‘

  Bill grunted bitterly. ‘He didn’t want to. . . ‘

  ‘Don’t be hard on him,’ Louise broke in. “Maybe he felt it was too soon after your mother’s funeral. ‘

  ‘And if he knew you were pregnant prior to the wedding, wild horses wouldn’t have dragged him along. ‘

  They fell silent, both lost in their respective thoughts about life, death, relationships. It took them another thirty minutes to reach their destination, and they drove for the most part in silence, sometimes commenting on things they saw along the way: a man walking a beautiful Afghan hound; children roller skating; the leaves of the trees gradually changing color, giving the onset of the bleaker months ahead a false warmth. Bill eased the Pierce Arrow gently into a tree-lined cul-de-sac. He drove towards the last house in the street and turned into the driveway. Louise surveyed the house, a pretty, white clapboard detached building, neat and pristine, with a sloping front lawn and a side garage.

  ‘Who lives here?’ she asked, her voice an awestruck whisper, almost daring herself to guess the answer. Was this the surprise? Surely it couldn’t be.

  Bill beamed at her. ‘I think the Suttons live here now. ‘

  ‘Bill. . . ‘she began, and faltered. She could hardly believe it. But something flashed in her brain, like a dim warning, hazy and intangible.

  Bill chuckled happily. ‘Better than an apartment. And it has a small rear garden. It’s much better to bring up a child in a neighborhood like this. ‘

  She frowned, staring at the dashboard, unable to bring herself to look at the house, in case it might vanish before her eyes.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ Bill asked, though he could guess what was coming, and mentally prepared himself for the questions she would inevitably ask.

  ‘This house. . . are we renting it?’

  He shook his head. ‘It’s ours. I bought it. ‘

  ‘But how. . . I mean, how could we afford it? Surely not on Mr Schultz’s salary. . . ‘

  Grasping her by the hand, he interrupted her, fixing her with an earnest look. ‘This was all part of the surprise. I so wanted to tell you. For weeks now I’ve kept it to myself. ‘

  ‘What is it?’ she said, staring into his eyes, targeting the deeper recesses of his mind for reassurance.

  For it to be convincing, he had to believe it himself.

  ‘A relation of mine in the old country left me money in his will. A small fortune. I was his only living relative. ‘

  He pictured the relative, a landowner, check hacking jacket, muddy riding boots and jodhpurs, astride a chestnut gelding, riding down to the village bar and ordering a pint of stout.

  He smiled at Louise, summoning up further words of comfort and truth.

  ‘I met him just the once,’ he said. ‘Wonderful old boy. He came over here on a visit. We got on like a house on fire. ‘

  He was standing on the dockside as the boat berthed. And there was the man waving from the deck, a windswept, Celtic flush on his large, moon-shaped face, wisps of gingery hair on a balding head.

  There was still doubt clouding Louise’s expression. When she spoke, her voice was timid yet probing. ‘You say he was a relation. What was he? An uncle?’

  Bill grinned confidently. ‘You tell me. Let’s see now: I think he was a cousin to my mother. Her grandfather had several brothers, and this old boy was the son of the youngest. So what does that make us?’

  ‘Distant cousins, I guess’

  ‘Well, whatever our relationship, I guess I was just lucky, being the only living relative. And when he came to New York, he seemed to take an instant shine to me. ‘

  ‘And he left you all this money? Enough to buy this house? I suppose if your mother was still alive, she might have been the beneficiary. ‘

  ‘I guess,’ was all Bill could manage. He had already succumbed to guilt
y feelings where his mother was concerned. Had she not died, he could not have concocted this story. The only way Louise could have discovered the lie about the mythical relative would have been through his mother. And he didn’t think his father knew enough about her side of the family, having been born in New Jersey. All things considered, he had to admit that his mother’s death had been very convenient. But now was not the time for remorse. Now it was time to believe wholeheartedly in his story, to convince Louise it was the truth.

  ‘I’m sorry, I know I should have told you. ‘ he said. ‘But I really wanted it to be a surprise. Because I love you so much, Louise. ‘

  Louise let her eyes wander towards the house, which was real enough, a solid presence, solid enough in itself to convince her that here was something in which she could believe. Suddenly the tension went out of her shoulders and she gazed at him with a trusting smile, her nose wrinkling slightly, an expression he loved so much. He grinned back at her, generating warmth and honesty, and he just knew his story was going to be accepted.

  ‘Here’s to William O’Rourke,’ he added for good measure.

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Our benefactor. ‘

  ‘Even though I never met you, I think I love you, William O’Rourke,’ said Louise.

  Bill grinned at her. Even though the man didn’t exist, right now he believed that he did. He patted Louise’s knee.

  ‘Come on. Let’s go take a look around our new house. ‘

  They got out of the car and arm-in-arm walked towards the front door. Across the street, from the darkness behind the window of an almost-identical house, an elderly woman watched the couple enter their home, and commented to her husband that he looked like a successful lawyer or businessman, and what a handsome, young couple they were.

  A week later, when Bill met Jack at the Dutchman’s speakeasy, his partner was gazing into the eyes of a petite blonde girl in a shimmering, tight dress. Bill could see that, unlike other girls in this joint, she had a naturally beautiful complexion and only wore a delicate shade of lipstick and no other make-up. He took all this in at a glance, as he strolled over to their table, while a pounding ‘Way Down Yonder in New Orleans’ swung from a band that seemed in a hurry to finish. From behind Bill, a high note from the trumpet seemed to herald his arrival at the table, just as Jack spotted him.