Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine. Vol. 18, No. 5, May 1973

The Duty of Every Citizen by James Holding

Avoiding involvement is often a matter of good timing.

I suppose it established some kind of a record for solving crimes in a hurry. It was no thanks to me, however, even though I’m the sheriff of Penton County and officially got the credit for it.

I was having my “wake-up” coffee at my desk early Monday morning when I got the first call.

It was from Bud Clinton, manager of the BeeBee Supermarket in our shopping center. “Harry,” he said, very excited, “we’ve been robbed! Over the weekend, somebody took the safe out of my office!”

“Ouch!” I said. “You mean the safe itself is missing?”

“Absolutely. Somebody broke in at the back of the store, picked up my safe, and carried it off.”

“Wait a minute,” I said. “You don’t just pick up a three-thousand-pound safe and saunter off with it under your arm.”

“I know that,” Bud said. “But with the help of my stock-room forklift, that’s exactly what somebody did.”

“Anything else missing?”

“No. Only the safe.”

“What was in it?”

“Eleven hundred in cash and about three million trading stamps, I guess,” Bud said with a sigh.

“Okay. We’ll get right on it, Bud,” I said. “Somebody from my office will be over to have a look at things in a few minutes.”

That was at 6:31. I hung up, and immediately my phone rang again. It was Lonnie German from the German Roofing Company, reporting that one of his trucks had been stolen over the weekend.

“Give me its license number, Lonnie,” I said, “and I’ll send out an all-points on it. Does the stolen truck have your company name on it?”

“Yeah,” Lonnie said. He gave me the license number.

“Insured?”

“Of course. But I need that truck on the job today, so I’d appreciate fast action, Harry. Extra fast.”

“We’ll do our best to give it to you,” I said. “Our fast sleuthing.”

“Thanks,” Lonnie said. “I guess it helps to know the sheriff personally, eh?”

“All our citizens get the same fast, dependable service from the Sheriff’s Department,” I said. We both laughed and I hung up.

That was at 6:34.

At 6:36, just as I got the description and license number of Lonnie’s truck on the air, my phone rang again. This Monday morning was busier than most Saturday nights. I picked up the phone.

A man’s voice asked, “Is this the sheriff’s office?”

“Right,” I said. “Sheriff Boyle speaking. What can we do for you?”

“I want to ask you something, Sheriff.”

“Ask away,” I said impatiently. I had to get over to the BeeBee Supermarket.

“Did somebody steal a big iron safe out of the BeeBee Supermarket?” this guy asks me.

I gulped and sat back in my chair. “Maybe,” I said cautiously. “Why?”

“I got it for you,” said the voice. “Ran across it just now on my way home from work.”

“How about that?” I said. “Who are you and where’s the safe?”

He took them in order, “I’m Joe Stevens, the night man at Sachs’ Service Station at Pontiac Road and Kleiff Highway. Right now, me and the BeeBee safe are both half a mile north of Kleiff Highway on Pontiac Road.”

“Where you calling from, Joe?”

“Jenkins’ farm, Sheriff. Right nearby.”

“Get back to where the safe is, Joe,” I said, “and stay there. I’ll be with you in twenty minutes. And thanks for calling in. Okay?”

“Okay,” Joe said.

I had an inspiration. “Say, Joe, is the safe in a German Roofing Company truck?”

“Yeah,” Joe said.

“License number?”

“It’s got out-of-state plates tacked on over local ones. I didn’t get the numbers.”

“Never mind,” I said. “See you in twenty minutes.”

Before I grabbed my hat and took off for Pontiac Road, I couldn’t resist making a couple of calls myself.

First, Lonnie German. “Lonnie, you said you wanted fast action. I think I’ve located your stolen truck.”

“What!” Lonnie said. “In five minutes?”

“Our usual fast service,” I said smugly. “Remember it when I come up for reelection, Lonnie.”

Next, Bud Clinton. “Bud, how many trading stamps you giving for the prompt return of your stolen safe?”

“You got it? Already?” Bud shouted, unbelieving.

“Child’s play when your sheriff has an instinct for the work,” I told him. “Remember to vote for me next fall, Bud,” and I hung up.

Then I hightailed it to Pontiac Road in a patrol car with the siren going.

I turned right off Kleiff Highway at Sachs’ Service Station without stopping. I covered the next half mile like the dog racing home for his dinner in the dog food commercials. I came over the brow of a hill and there it was.

A truck, with both back tires flat and the German name on the sides, was slued around at the side of the road, tipped backward at a slant. Ten feet below the shoulder of the road, down a steep bank, a big black safe was lying on its side with one corner actually in the water of Page Creek, which runs beside the road there.

A kid with medium-blond hair, and a thick blond moustache that hung down on each side of his mouth like a Chinaman’s, was sitting on the tailgate of the truck. He jumped down when I skidded my patrol car to a quick stop.

“Hi, Sheriff,” he said. “Twenty minutes, right on the nose.”

“You Joe Stevens?”

“Yep. I’m the one called you.”

“Glad to know you, Joe.” I shook hands with him, thinking that kids have a vote now. “Let’s see what we’ve got here.”

Looking over the setup, there were two possibilities, I figured. Theory One: that the thieves who stole the safe got it this far into the country, opened it, took out the cash and the trading stamps, dumped the safe into the creek, abandoned the German Roofing Company truck, and escaped in another car they’d stashed here ahead of time for their getaway. Theory Two: that the weight of the safe had been too much for the truck’s rear tires and they’d blown, sluing the truck around, tipping it backward, and the safe had just naturally slid out of the truck and down the bank into the creek of its own weight.

I went down the bank and looked at the safe in the water. The combination lock and front door were uppermost. As far as I could see, the safe door hadn’t been opened. So, scratch Theory One.

I turned to Joe Stevens, who was watching me intently. “Well, Joe,” I said, “let’s see how good a detective you are. What do you think happened here?”

Joe shrugged. “Pretty plain, ain’t it? Heavy safe... not secured in the truck. When the back tires went, the truck skidded and tilted and the safe slid out. Ain’t that the way you figure it?”

“Pretty close,” I said. “And you think the thieves just took off when the tires went?”

“Sure. What else could they do? Daylight coming soon, traffic would be passing, they’d be caught with the stolen safe. So they left everything and split.”

I nodded. “That’s how I figure it, too. You must have been pretty surprised when you ran into this mess on your way home from work.”

Joe said, “I wasn’t too surprised. I figured I’d run across it right about here.”

I gave him a sharp look. “Wait a minute,” I said. “Did I hear you right? You mean you expected to find the truck and safe here?”

“Just about here,” Joe nodded, “give or take a quarter of a mile, maybe.”

“What the hell do you mean by that?”

“Sheriff, I knew the safe was stolen soon as I saw that BeeBee name on it when they stopped for gas at my station about four this morning.”

“At Sachs’ Service Station?”

“Sure. And besides having that BeeBee safe in a German Roofing Company truck, they had out-of-state license plates masking the local ones underneath, like I said. And they all turned their heads away so I couldn’t get a look at them, even when they paid their bill.”

“You saw them, then!” I said urgently. “How many were there, Joe?”

“Three.”

“But you couldn’t describe them?”

“No, sir. I’m sorry. They kept inside the truck cab in the dark, and they didn’t say a word to each other the whole time. The driver ordered the gas while he was coughing pretty hard, and I figured it was to disguise his voice. Oh, I could tell they were crooks, all right!” Joe said proudly.

I was disgusted. “That was at four o’clock this morning, Joe! And you waited till after six-thirty before you reported this to the police! How come?”

Joe was evidently a TV fan. “You think I wanted to get involved with a bunch of crooks?” he asked. “Turn them in to the police, and have them gunning for me when they got out of jail?” He shook his head. “Not me, Sheriff. I don’t want any trouble with crooks. I know better than that.”

I gave him my lecture number three. “Joe,” I said sternly, “that’s not the way we control crime in this county. It’s the duty of every citizen who sees a crime being committed, or even suspects a crime is being committed, to do something immediately to help the police enforce the law. Immediately, Joe. That means right away — not two and a half hours later. You should have done something at four o’clock this morning, Joe. When you first saw this truck and safe at your station.”

“Well,” Joe said, considerably abashed by my serious reprimand, “I did do something, Sheriff.”

“Then? At four o’clock this morning?”

“Yes, sir.”

“What did you do?”

“When I was putting the gas in their truck,” Joe said, “I unscrewed the valves in the rear tires enough to make both tires go flat in about half a mile...”

I gawked at him.

“Give or take a quarter mile,” Joe finished apologetically.