Bank Shot

29

“There they go!” Victor shouted.

“At goddam last,” said Murch’s Mom and started at once undoing the straps on her neck brace.

Dortmunder had been sitting at the table with May, practicing holding his hands together as if he had the cuffs on. Now he cocked an eye toward Victor and said, “You sure they’re leaving?”

“Gone,” Victor said. “Absolutely gone. Made a U-turn out there by the sign and took off.”

“And about time,” May said. The floor around the chair where she was sitting was littered with tiny cigarette ends.

Dortmunder sighed. When he got to his feet his bones creaked; he felt old and stiff and achy all over. He shook his head, thought of adding a comment, and decided just to let it go.

The last four hours had been hell. And yet, when he and Kelp had first seen this spot, it had seemed like a special dispensation from Heaven. The big sign out by the road, the empty gravel parking lot, and a blank space where the diner should be; who could ask for anything more? They’d rushed back to the Wanderlust Trailer Park, where Murch already had the bank attached to the horse van, and quickly they’d brought the whole kit and caboodle over here, except for the stolen station wagon, which they’d left in somebody’s driveway along the way. Victor and Kelp had gone a block or so ahead in the Packard, to watch out for cops, and Murch had followed with the horse van and the bank — his Mom and May riding with him in the cab of the van, Dortmunder and Herman back in the bank. They’d gotten here with no trouble, positioned the bank, parked the van and the Packard out of sight behind it, and gone back to business as usual, the only changes being that Herman had to use battery-operated power tools again and the hearts game had been resumed by flashlight. Also, the rainwater drenching down the metal skin of the bank quickly chilled the interior, and made everybody feel a little stiff and rheumatic. But it hadn’t been terrible, and they’d mostly been in a pretty good mood — even Herman, who had regained his belief in his ability to get into any safe, if given sufficient time.

And then the cops had arrived. Kelp had seen them first, glancing out the window and saying, “Look! Law!”

The rest of them had crowded to the windows and stared out at the police car parked out by the sign. May had said, “What are they going to do? Are they onto us?”

“No.” That had been Victor, always ready with an opinion based on his experiences with the other side of the law. “They’re just on patrol,” he’d said. “If they were interested in us, they’d handle the situation differently.”

“Like — surround the place,” Dortmunder had suggested.

“Exactly.”

Then the one cop had gotten out of the car and come over, and it had turned out their cover was working. Still, it was hard to concentrate with that damn police car everlastingly parked outside the bank you’d just stolen, and the hearts game had finally just dwindled away and stopped. Everybody had sat around, irritable and nervous, and every five minutes or so somebody would ask Victor, “What the hell are they doing out there?” Or “When are they going to go away, for the love of God?” And Victor would shake his head and say, “I just don’t know. I’m baffled.”

When the other police cars started showing up, one and two at a time, the whole crew inside the bank began to bounce around as agitated as kittens in a sack “What are they doing” everybody asked, and Victor kept saying, “I don’t know, I don’t know.”

It later turned out, of course, that the other cars had all been delivering orders of coffee and Danish. When Dortmunder had finally come to that understanding, he’d told the others and added, “which means they’re as loused up as we are which gives me hope.”

Still, the time had passed slowly. The extra coffee and 9 Danish they were given by the cops helped a lot — they were all getting pretty cold and hungry by then — but as the hours went by they all began to see themselves either starving or freezing to death, trapped in this stupid bank forever by a bunch of cops who didn’t even know they were in the same county.

Also, Herman was restricted in the attacks he could make on the safe while the police car was parked out front The grinding on the circular hole could continue, but things like explosions had to wait. This made Herman fretful, and he tended to pace back and forth from one end of the bank to the other and snarl at people.

Then there was the business of the neck brace. Murch carried on so much about it that his Mom finally agreed to wear it as long as the police car was out front, but she was supposed to be testy while her head was propped up by the thing, so that made two soreheads prowling around, which didn’t help matters any.

And then, all at once, they left. No reason, no explanation, their departure as abrupt and senseless as their arrival, they up and went. And suddenly everybody was smiling, even Murch’s Mom, who had flung the neck brace into the farthest corner of the bank.

“Now,” Herman said. “Now I get to try what I’ve wanted to do for the last two hours. Longer. Since before noon.”

Dortmunder was walking around in a figure eight, moving his shoulders and elbows, trying to loosen up. “What’s that?” he said.

“That circular groove,” Herman told him. “I think we’ve got it deep enough now, so if I pack the groove with plastic explosive, it just might pop it out of there.”

“Then let’s do it,” Dortmunder said. “Before the Health Department comes around to inspect the kitchen and the bread man starts making deliveries, let’s do it and get the hell out of here.”

“This’ll be a bigger explosion than before,” Herman warned. “I want you to know that.”

Dortmunder stopped figure eighting. Voice flat, he said, “Will we survive it?”

“Oh, sure! Not that big!”

“That’s all I ask,” Dortmunder said. “My wants are simple.”

“Take me about five minutes to set up,” Herman said.

It took less. Four minutes later, Herman made everybody get around on the other side of the partition from the safe, explaining, “This might throw a little metal around.”

“Good,” Dortmunder said. “I feel like doing the same thing myself.”

They all waited out in the main part of the bank while Herman, out of sight, did his final bit of work. After a few seconds of silence, they watched him back slowly into view around the end of the partition, holding a length of wire in each hand, gently drawing the wires after him. He looked at the others over his shoulder. “Everybody set?”

“Blow the damn thing,” Dortmunder said.

“Right.” Herman touched the exposed ends of wire together, and from the other side of the partition came a Krack! The bank rocked, much more than with the earlier explosions, and a stack of empty plastic coffee containers fell off the desk over in the corner where May had left them. “Got it,” Herman said, smiling all over his face, and a bit of gray smoke came curling around the edge of the partition.

They all crowded around the partition to look at the safe, and damn if it didn’t have a round hole in the side. Kelp shouted, “You did it!”

“God damn!” Herman cried, delighted with himself, and everybody pummeled him on the back.

Dortmunder said, “Why’s the smoke coming out of there?” They all got quiet again and looked at the wisp of smoke curling up from the hole. Herman said, “Wait a minute now,” and stepped forward to take a quick look around on the floor. Then he turned to Dortmunder, outraged, and said, “You know what happened?”

“No,” Dortmunder said.

“The goddam metal fell inside,” Herman said.

Kelp had gone over to look in the hole, and now he said, “Hey. The money’s on fire.”

That caused general panic, but Dortmunder pushed his way through the mob and took a look inside, and it wasn’t as bad as all that. The hole in the side of the safe was perfectly round and about a foot in diameter, and inside there was a round piece of black metal the same size, like a midget manhole cover except much thicker, and it was resting on stacks of money, and it was setting them on fire. Not very much, just browning and curling them around the edge of the circle. However, a couple of little flames had already puffed into life, and if left to themselves they would spread and eventually all of the money would turn into ashes.

“Okay,” Dortmunder said, partly to calm the people behind him, partly to challenge the fates. He took off his right shoe, stuck it in through the hole and began to slap the fire out.

“If only we had water,” Victor said.

Murch’s Mom said, “The toilet tank! We haven’t flushed since we left the trailer park, the tank should still be full!”

That had been another problem, four hours stuck in here without toilet facilities, but now this one too turned out to be a blessing in disguise. A coffee-container brigade was set up, and pretty soon Dortmunder could put his shoe back on and pour water on the smoldering bills instead. It took only four containers, and the last ember was out.

“Wet money,” Dortmunder grumbled and shook his head. “All right, where’s the plastic bags?”

They’d brought along a box of plastic garbage-can liner bags to carry the money in. May got them now, pulled one out of the box, and Dortmunder and Kelp started filling it with charred bills, wet bills and good bills while May and Victor held the bag open.

And then Murch’s Mom shouted, “We’re moving!”

Dortmunder straightened, his hands full of money. “What?”

Murch came running around the partition, looking much more agitated than Dortmunder had ever seen him. “We’re rolling,” he said. “We’re rolling down the goddam hill, and we’re out of control!”