The Art of the Heist

Three

As the summer of 1965 drew to a close I was in serious need of a vacation. My regular late nights at the Lewis Room, combined with the stress of marital trouble and the demands of my newfound passion for art, left me little time for relaxing. Even a Wild One needs a break from time to time.

I had spent a good portion of my childhood summers with my mother’s family in Sullivan, Maine, a small community on the Atlantic coast, not far from Bar Harbor and just north of the larger town of Ellsworth. My mother’s uncle was a lobsterman, and my aunt, and later my cousin, owned a campground and general store in Sullivan, from which the family made a modest living. They lived on a picturesque stretch of property overlooking Frenchman’s Bay and the green hills of Mt. Desert Island. I’ve never known a more tranquil or beautiful place.

The summers I spent in Sullivan as a boy were some of the most magical times of my life, and I still recall them with great fondness. In the early mornings I would wander down to my great-uncle’s little clapboard house by the sea and he would take me out in his lobster boat with him. In the afternoons my sister, Patsy, and my cousin Emmy Lou and I played in the woods or swam in the ice-cold waters of the bay.

Not surprisingly, these annual trips to Maine were a legacy I dearly wanted to pass on to my own children. Though Vicky and I were no longer living together, we had managed to remain friends. When I suggested that we all head north to spend a few weeks in Sullivan, she agreed.

My exploits had not gone unnoticed in Revere, where rumors of my extracurricular activities had reached the ears of the boys at the Lewis Room, contributing to their ever-growing opinion of me. Knowing my fascination with firearms, one of my Revere associates offered me a good deal on some guns he was looking to off-load, including an antique German 7.65 millimeter rifle and several army carbine-type rifles, one of which was fully automatic. Partly out of genuine interest in the firearms, and partly because of the impact I knew acquiring them would have on my reputation, I quickly agreed to the purchase.

Even back in 1965 there weren’t many places in the Boston area where a man could try out these kinds of weapons without drawing unwanted attention. Thinking our trip to Maine would be the perfect opportunity to test out my new acquisitions, I loaded the guns into the trunk of my old Cadillac along with our suitcases and sleeping bags.

Like many small, rural communities, Sullivan, Maine, was a place that thrived on rumor. In July 1965 the big story making its way around the county concerned the recent death of an elderly widow and the imminent redistribution of her property. Apparently, she and her children had had a severe falling-out some years earlier. That her demise would be a source of financial gain for these ungrateful offspring was a topic of heated discussion among my relatives and their friends.

Being the altruist that I am, I immediately saw an opportunity to remedy the situation in the dead woman’s favor. I would, I decided, take it upon myself to liberate any valuables the widow had left behind before her greedy children had a chance to do so. That I stood to benefit from my good deed was merely a happy consequence.

The house, which was conveniently vacant, was set back into the trees on the ocean side of Route 1, down a narrow dirt driveway bordered on one side by a steep ravine. It was a perfect setting for a burglary. Aside from the hundred-year-old locks on the windows and doors, there was nothing to stop me from walking inside and making myself at home.

On Tuesday night, the twentieth of July, Vicky and I set out for a drive along the coast. It was a beautiful evening, clear and warm, fireflies blinking like Christmas lights in the trees along the highway. Dusk had long since faded to darkness, and the moon was not yet up. The sea was a black void, glimpsed now and again through the trees, punctuated at rare intervals by the running lights of a boat or the patchwork reflection of a house window. My intent had not been to involve Vicky in my plan, but as we neared the widow’s property, I found myself slowing the car. This was merely another reconnaissance mission, I reasoned as I turned off the highway and onto the narrow driveway, a chance to get the lay of the land and iron out any final details. I would take Vicky home and return the next night to carry out my plan.

I parked just up the driveway from the house, instructed Vicky to stay with the car, and made my way on foot through the darkness. As I had expected, the house offered little in the way of resistance. Within a matter of minutes I jimmied the front door lock and was inside. At this point it seemed ridiculous to let such an opportunity go to waste. I could take what I wanted and be back on the highway before anyone, including perhaps even Vicky, was the wiser.

Of particular interest to me were a pair of Tiffany lamps I had glimpsed through the living room window on my previous visit. I soon had the lamps in hand and was heading back up the driveway.

But as I came over a small rise I was disturbed to see a pair of headlights snaking down through the trees. The rifles! I thought, suddenly remembering the weapons in the trunk of my car. As much as I didn’t want to get caught burglarizing the house, the discovery of the guns would have been far worse. The possession of automatic weapons is never something to be taken lightly, and the carbine rifles were, essentially, machine guns. The lamps might have gotten me a few months in the county lockup, but the guns could have led to a good chunk of time in a federal facility.

Abandoning the lamps, I continued up the driveway. Perhaps it was just some local kids out for a joy ride, I told myself optimistically, watching the car pull to a stop in front of the Cadillac, its headlights swarming with dust and black flies. But as I drew nearer I saw the unmistakable silhouette of a sheriff’s cruiser. Abruptly, the car’s engine switched off and a figure climbed out.

“Good evening,” I said, immediately recognizing the man as a local deputy sheriff, Henry Hosking. Then I nodded reassuringly to Vicky, who had left the Cadillac and was walking down the driveway to meet me.

“Hello, Myles,” Hosking said. “A neighbor called about your headlights. You know this is private property?”

“I heard the house was for sale,” I replied, gesturing over my shoulder. “Thought we’d come take a look.”

“Really,” Hosking mused, plainly not buying a word of my story.

“Yeah,” I persisted. “I didn’t mean to cause any trouble. If you move your car, we’ll be on our way.”

Hosking shook his head. “I’m afraid I can’t do that,” he said. “In fact, I’m placing you and your wife under arrest for trespassing.”

The deputy walked back to his cruiser, where he reached for his radio and began calling for backup. Realizing this might be my only chance to shift the balance of power in my favor, I lunged for the Cadillac’s open passenger door and the glove compartment, where I kept a spare pistol.

Seeing me move toward my car, Hosking leaped out of the cruiser. The deputy was fast. Fortunately, I was faster. I had my pistol trained on him before he had finished unholstering his weapon.

“Listen,” I told him. “I don’t want to hurt you, but I’m going to get out of here.”

Hosking blinked, sizing me up, silently debating my character and capabilities. For a moment I thought I had him; then he shook his head again. “Oh no you don’t,” he snapped, grabbing my wrists and forcing my hand, and the gun, toward the ground.

Hosking knew me to be the son of a cop and must have guessed I wouldn’t intentionally shoot a man who was merely doing his job. He was right-but as we struggled the pistol went off. Surprised, as I was, by the sound of the gunshot, Hosking took an involuntary step back, moving off the shoulder of the driveway toward the edge of the ravine. Sensing an opportunity, I palmed him once in the chest, hard enough to send him sprawling backward down the hill.

“Get in the car!” I yelled to Vicky. Then, aiming into the woods well away from where Hosking had fallen, I fired a warning shot. As the crack of the pistol faded I could hear scuffling in the darkness below.

Quickly I jumped into the cruiser and pulled it to the far edge of the driveway, unblocking my escape route. Figuring I could buy myself some time, I tore the keys from the ignition and tossed them into the woods, then fired a single shot into the police radio. Confident that I had disabled the deputy’s two best options for pursuit, I raced back to the Cadillac, where Vicky was already waiting for me, and barreled up the dirt drive and onto the highway.

I knew it was only a matter of time before Hosking managed to get out of the ravine and find a telephone from which to sound an all-out alert. I also knew my best hope was to be long gone by that time. But where Hosking had failed to stop me, the utter desolation of downeast Maine would soon succeed. Snaking over hills and along the rugged Atlantic coast, with few viable outlets, Route 1 was, and still is, a notoriously slow road. Though I sped south as quickly as I could in the old Cadillac, I was eventually apprehended by a state trooper and taken to the Hancock County Jail in Ellsworth. That’s how I wound up treading water in the frigid Union River.

Staring at the lights on the far shore as I kicked to stay afloat, I faced the choice of swimming forward into the arms of an angry mob or backward toward the craggy riverbank and the looming brick jail from which I had just escaped.

It was not the easiest decision I’ve faced in my life, but exhaustion and the very real threat of hypothermia prompted me to make my choice with remarkable speed. After only a moment’s hesitation I turned and began swimming back in the direction from which I had come.

I have since found out that it is widely believed that I doubled back to the jail itself and hid for some time in the attic above the sheriff’s home, as candy wrappers and other debris were later discovered there. Someone else, at some other time, must have taken refuge in that attic. My actual hiding place was not far away.

After crawling out of the river and scrambling up the steep embankment, I headed for the Ellsworth public library, which was situated in a large Federal-style mansion next door to the jail. Though the brunt of the search efforts were focused on the far side of the river, there was plenty of activity on the jail side, and I was well aware of the fact that I could be discovered at any moment. Moving quickly and stealthily through the darkness, I soon reached the back of the library and found a basement window through which I could squeeze myself.

Once inside, I quickly made my way up to the second floor. I’d had a decent view of the library building from inside the jail, and I remembered seeing a cupola on the roof. My hope was to take shelter there while the frenzy over my escape died down. Up on the second floor I raced through the stacks, searching the ceiling for an access panel or trapdoor. Finally, I found what I was looking for. Clambering up onto a nearby bookshelf, I managed to hoist myself up into the rafters.

For the moment at least, I was safe.

That night I spent in the library’s rafters was one of the longest of my life. Even at the height of summer, the nights in downeast Maine are uncomfortably cool. I was miserable and shivering in my wet clothes. From my perch in the rooftop cupola I was able to watch people coming and going from the jail next door. The activity continued into the wee hours of the morning. Sometime during the night a front blew in, bringing with it a stiff ocean breeze, in which the old building shifted and creaked like a ship at sea. Twice I descended from the rafters to use the telephone in hopes of reaching a friend in Revere, and both times I was convinced that there was someone else, either living or dead, in the library with me.

As the morning wore on, activity at the jail began to wane until, sometime just before dawn, it ceased almost entirely. Realizing that once the sun came up I would have no choice but to spend the remaining daylight hours in the library, I decided to leave the relative safety of my hiding place. I exited the building using the same basement window and, under the cover of darkness, made my way out of Ellsworth.

It was obvious to me that I would need some help if I was to get out of Hancock County undetected. Having been unable to reach my friend in Revere, my rough plan was to walk the thirteen miles back to Sullivan and somehow manage to contact my family without arousing the suspicions of the local authorities. Though I hadn’t seen her, I’d been told by the sheriff that Vicky had been released not long after our arrest.

After leaving the library, I headed for the woods outside of town with the intent of following the railroad tracks north. As the morning wore on and the sun rose, drying my clothes and warming my body, the previous night’s specters began to slowly recede. Though I was hungry and tired I felt confident that the worst was over. That afternoon my spirits were buoyed even more by the sight of a picturesque farmhouse in the distance. The farm, with its well-kept fields, red barn, and white clapboard house, was right out of a Norman Rockwell painting, conjuring in my mind images of a kindly old farmer and his wife. Certain such gentle folks would be willing to help a poor wayfarer like me, I veered from my path on the railroad tracks and began picking my way across the fields.

I hadn’t gone five yards before the farmhouse door swung open and a figure in denim overalls stepped out onto the porch. The kindly old man, I told myself, come out to welcome me. The figure raised a long, thin object to his shoulder. There was an instant’s delay, then the sound of a shotgun discharging reached my ears. I turned tail and ran, sticking to the cover of the woods for the rest of the afternoon.

The going was slow, and by evening I still had not reached Sullivan. As dusk fell I spotted an old railroad car diner along Route 1, and beside it a phone booth. Recognizing a possible opportunity to contact my family in Sullivan, or even my friend in Revere, I waited until dark, then crept from the woods.

As I approached the diner two young women in a car hurriedly rolled up their windows and peeled out of the parking lot. I assumed my escape from the Ellsworth jail wasn’t a secret, but I had no idea the extent to which the story had been publicized in the local press. At the time I attributed the girls’ reaction to my scruffy appearance.

Fishing for loose change in my pocket, I headed for the phone booth, which was occupied by a middle-aged man in lobsterman’s gear. As I drew closer the man looked up and, upon seeing me, quickly hung up the phone and stepped out of the booth.

“Hey pal,” I said, holding out the single quarter I’d dredged from my pocket. “You got change?” In those days, a phone call cost a nickel, and I wasn’t about to waste my last twenty cents.

The man nodded. Then he reached into his pocket and, coming up with a good handful of spare change, shoved at least a dollar in coins into my hand.

By now I could see people looking out the window of the diner and I knew the cops were likely on their way. Keeping an eye on the road in either direction, I ducked into the booth and dialed my cousin’s house in Sullivan. After speaking to Vicky and assuring her that I was unharmed, I hung up and tried my friend in Revere one last time. He wasn’t home, but his girlfriend answered. Aware that this might be my last chance to contact him, I instructed her to convey a message: to meet me in two days at ten o’clock in the morning at the toolshed behind the red railroad car diner on Route 1 between Ellsworth and Sullivan, Maine.

As I hung up the phone and began walking back toward the woods, I heard the sound of several cars pulling into the parking lot behind me.

“Halt!” a man’s voice barked. “Don’t move!”

By now it should come as no surprise to you that the command didn’t have its desired effect. In an instant I was off and running. I leaped from the road into an adjacent field of unmowed hay, where I immediately took cover by lying flat on the ground. I stayed like this, not moving, my body pressed against the warm earth, while the deputies passed by, their boots coming within inches of my face.

When I was confident they were gone I cautiously rose to survey my situation. I was right about the deputies: they had reached the far end of the field and were moving into the neighboring woods. In the meantime, however, backup had arrived. Route 1 was awash in headlights and flashlights. Above the din of car engines I could hear the ominous sound of rustling as dozens of volunteers swarmed into the hayfield.

Knowing just how lucky I’d been to escape detection the first time, I sprang from my hiding place and bolted across the field and into the woods, well away from where the deputies were searching. My plan was to pick the first tree I saw that looked unclimbable, shimmy up it, and spend the night in its branches. And that’s what I did.

As I said before, I’d had no idea of the extent of the manhunt my escape had triggered. But from my perch I now had a perfect view of the mayhem. Dozens of flashlights flickered through the woods below, far more than had been visible that first night on the banks of the Union River. Christ, I thought, they must have deputized every able-bodied man in the county.

As I sat there contemplating this fact with no small amount of pride, my reverie was broken by a disturbing sequence of noises from below.

“There!” came a shout, the voice pitched in my general direction. “He’s up there!”

A dozen heads shifted upward, followed by a deafening boom, the sound of a shotgun discharging at close range. A moment later there was a dull thud as a small animal hit the forest floor.

“It was only a porcupine!” someone called out.

The men’s willingness to shoot was disturbing; the next time, I realized, I might very well be the unlucky target. I couldn’t sit and wait for that to happen.

I took a deep breath and leaped into the darkness. I hit the ground hard, landing close enough to two of the men to knock them down and scaring the daylights out of the whole crew, who immediately set off running in different directions. It was like a bad slapstick routine, and even in my anxious state I couldn’t help chuckling.

In an instant I was running as well, dodging low-hanging tree limbs and fighting the underbrush as I careened through the dark woods. With my pursuers far behind me, I scrambled up another tree, shimmying a good twenty feet to the first branch, then clambering higher still. I stayed in this tree for several hours, watching the frenzied flickering of flashlight beams combing the woods.

Sometime in the very early hours of the morning I heard several voices in the darkness below. “Hey!” someone called. “He’s not here, guys!”

Then a second voice, louder this time-a stage yell, clearly meant for an unseen audience of one. “There’s just been a report he was spotted in Sullivan! Let’s go, everyone!”

This pronouncement was followed by an exaggerated rustling and shuffling of feet. I could discern several figures moving away in the direction of the road. But clearly, many more had stayed behind. Within minutes a match flared, revealing a craggy face. Soon after, a handful of cigarettes winked on. Obviously, I would not be leaving my tree branch anytime soon.

But as the night drew to a close and the first hints of dawn appeared over Frenchman’s Bay I realized I couldn’t stay where I was for long. Once the sun came up I would be visible to those below.

Cautiously, I began my descent. In the early morning quiet the sounds of tree limbs creaking and snapping under my weight seemed deafening. As I neared the lowest branch I was certain the entire county had heard me. I hung for a moment, then dropped to the ground and froze, fear prickling the back of my neck.

This is it, I thought, turning slowly, feeling someone behind me. In the spare light of the gloaming a figure revealed itself: two eyes and the barrel of a gun, pointing straight at me. For a moment my stomach leaped upward, scrabbling at the back of my throat. Then, much to my relief, I realized the man was sleeping. In fact, sleeping figures littered the woods around me. Country folk used to being in bed by nine, the men had fallen asleep on their watch.

I tiptoed past them, then made my way across the hayfield, finally disappearing into the thick woods on the other side of the highway.

My second full day on the run passed uneventfully. Though I could hear the sounds of small airplanes and boats scanning the shoreline and the occasional baying of bloodhounds, I had no more close run-ins with my pursuers. I kept to the woods on the west side of Route 1. That evening, after making a supper of green apples I’d scavenged, I finally succumbed to exhaustion and fell asleep in a dense thicket of trees.

In the wee hours of the morning I was awakened by my mother’s voice. Thinking I was dreaming, I sat up and rubbed my eyes, peering into the woods. A thick fog had rolled in since I’d fallen asleep, distorting the distant lights of a police roadblock on Route 1.

“Myles!” It was my mother, and definitely not a dream. It sounded like she was talking through a megaphone. “Give yourself up or you’re gonna get hurt,” she called, her voice breaking.

The police must have brought her up from Milton, I realized.

“We know you’re in there, Myles,” a cop’s voice spoke up.

Through the dense undergrowth I spotted the red roof light of a cruiser-a bubble gum machine, as we liked to call it-raking the pitch dark woods as the sheriff’s vehicle slowly mad its way down a dirt fire road.

“Please, Myles,” my mother pleaded. “Please come out before they hurt you.”

Her concern was genuine, and I felt instantly guilty. But before I could do anything I would regret, I heard a third voice over the megaphone.

“Myles!” It was Al Dotoli. “There’s more cops out here than Heinz has pickles!” he called. “They’ll shoot you for sure.”

That was the last I heard from him, but it was enough to convince me to stay right where I was.

By dawn I was shivering and exhausted but still not ready to give up. Not long after daylight I made my way toward Route 1, intending to scope out the situation at the diner and determine whether a rendezvous with my friend was still possible.

Whether the sheriff had been tipped off to my intentions or whether the presence of law enforcement at the diner was luck, I do not know. But as I scrambled up the highway embankment on my hands and knees, I heard a familiar phrase: “Halt! Don’t move!”

Fully prepared to run, I looked up to see a sheriff’s deputy standing directly over me with a shotgun.

At this point I must have been slightly delusional. I made a move for the deputy, intending to take him on. He hit me squarely on the head with the butt of the gun. The blow knocked me down, but it didn’t knock me out. Enraged, I struggled up again. But by this time a small crowd of law officers had gathered around us. I was hit again, and this time I went down for good.

As I lay on the ground I could hear the small-town cops standing over me, discussing what had just happened.

“What the hell did you have to do that for?” one of them asked. “He’s just a little guy.”

Then the deputy who had hit me first spoke up in his own defense. “He tried to take a swing at me,” he said guiltily.

It was a conversation I would soon come to look back on with the same tender nostalgia with which I regarded my boyhood summers in Sullivan. Though I didn’t know it at the time, it was only a matter of months before I would find myself in the same position once again, injured and on my back, surrounded by cops on all sides. Unfortunately, the conduct of the officers involved the second time would not be nearly so courteous.