The Big Thaw

21

I'd made it out of bed at 0702. Nearly a record. After a quick shower, I'd pulled on sweatpants and a shirt, and made a pot of fresh coffee. The Weather Channel gave me a new shot of my blue and pink worm, coiling through North America. The upward bump was edging closer and closer. Ah, warmth was on the way. Soon.

Sue didn't flinch when I got up. Still mad about Madison, I guess. I promised myself that I'd make it up to her somehow, but then thoughts of the "five banks" took over. I decided to go see Hester again and get her thoughts before hitting the office. I called George and he agreed to come with me. He must be as addicted to the buffet as I am.

The three of us sat looking out at the red-neon-framed Beau, glittering in the clear morning and reflecting on the small patch of liquid water that surrounded her. The Mississippi, except where the slight heat from the Beau's pumps and disturbed water flow kept it from freezing, was covered with a thick coat of ice. Hester told us that she'd seen cars carrying ice fishermen on it as late as yesterday. It was warming a bit, though. I would hesitate to drive on the stuff myself, now.

"So," said Hester, wistfully, "things looking up?"

We brought her up-to-date on the interviews, and the "five banks" business.

"Five?"

"Yeah, five. Why five? We don't have the foggiest."

"Does Gabe have access to a good safe man?" asked Hester.

"Not that we're aware of," said George. "But with his training in explosives, he probably could do it very well himself."

"Daylight," said Hester. "I'll bet on daylight. He can't be in five places at once, and explosives require a high level of competence."

"That's true." We'd spent the better part of the afternoon on it, and Hester had just zipped in with an excellent point we'd overlooked. Another reason I liked her so much.

"How much cash you got floating on the old Beau out there?"

"Oh, maybe thirty to fifty thousand at any given time. They use some tokens, coins, and cash, but it's hauled to the banks very regularly…" She grinned. "You thinking piracy?"

"Well, I was…"

"They keep the cash on hand to a minimum, just for that reason." She suddenly got very serious. "They might have a lot more than that in the local bank," she said. "Especially on a weekend…"

"'Bank'?" It was George's turn to look concerned. "We considered this one, but felt that the cash flow would be small. You know. The workers here wouldn't get that much cash on a payday…"

"They take it off the boat," said Hester. "It's gotta go somewhere. I think I heard they distribute it between several banks, but I'm not really up on this operation yet. Want me to check?"

"I'll check," said George.

"So," said Hester, "Super Agent Volont have the principals wired on this one?"

"Everybody but Gabe," I said, grinning. "He says he's lost him, and I think that's true."

"Even if it wasn't," said George, "I think he'd be a lot better off trying to take him out in the world, than he would be trying to arrest him wherever he's holed up." He shrugged. "I think we can be pretty sure that Gabe will find us."

I couldn't have agreed more. Gabriel would be able to not only hold off a small army, but I wasn't so sure he wouldn't take the offensive and break out. With lots of unnecessary bodies in his wake. The man was really good at that sort of thing, and I believed he had access to more dangerous tools than even the FBI did.

"So where's Volont?" asked Hester. "I would have thought he'd be with you two."

"Last we saw of him," I said, "I think he was off to meet one of his famous sources." I took a sip of coffee. "I wonder who they are, anyway?"

"Wouldn't it be funny," said Hester, "if he was calling a psychic?"

That made my day.

As we left, she said, "Hey, look on the bright side. At least you know who did the brothers in the shed. The big case is all over but the shouting."

"Yeah, and Art'll take care of that."

When I got back to the office, I met with Mike Connors. Since he'd been with the department for over fifteen years, he was pretty much in charge of the night shift. He was also renowned for being able to keep his mouth shut.

I checked with him on the general stuff happening with the night shift. Who or what was moving. Anything suspicious. Mike just shook his head.

"You might want to keep an eye on all the banks in the county…"

He raised an eyebrow, but said nothing. He'd been one of those tunnel rats in Vietnam. It took a whole hell of a lot to get a rise out of him. Whether it was a case of the chicken or the egg being first, I couldn't tell you.

"We might have a problem there," I said. "There might be somebody scouting some of 'em. You see anything unusual…?"

"Sure."

"But don't tell the other people on the shift," I said. "Just you and me for now."

"Got it."

"Hey, by the way, do you know either Harvey or Linda Grossman?"

He smiled. "Linda. You should remember her, too."

"Me?" I grinned. "Sure I do, I just met her a couple of days ago."

"No, no. She was a Perrin. Married a fellow named Voshell before she got hitched to this Grossman guy. You remember now?"

Not at all.

"You remember Nola Stritch?"

Did I. She had been heavily involved with the whole Gabriel business back in '96.

"Linda's her sister."

"'Sister'? I didn't know she had a sister…" I was dumbfounded.

"Yep. Well, half sister. Nola's maiden name was Jaekel. Divorce in the family. Little sister's maiden name was Perrin. Linda Perrin. Remember her? Charlie Perrin's kid. We got her twelve, thirteen years ago for beer."

It never occurred to me to question a beer ticket from a dozen years ago. He had that kind of memory.

"I'll be damned," I said. "Be really aware around the banks. You remember the Gabriel dude who did all the shit at the courthouse?"

"Oh, yeah…"

"He's back, and he's the one we think is going for the banks."

He got very serious, very quickly. "No shit?"

"No shit. Without any names, bring the night folks up to one hundred percent, okay? I think something's gonna happen between now and Monday."

"Yep. Who else knows about this?"

"Me, and Lamar. Sally, at least part of it. Two DCI. FBI, of course. Gabriel," I added, grinning.

"Right."

"And Mike? One more thing. I think it's about one hundred percent that Gabriel offed the Colson brothers. You can figure he's in a mood."

George came in with a look in his eye.

"Let's take a drive up to the Frieberg bank."

I drove. Less conspicuous that any U.S. government Ford. Even if George had drawn one of the better ones. Forest green as opposed to navy blue.

"This could be a good day," I said.

"Let me guess. You're thinking, 'Thirty minutes of Frieberg. Minimum of thirty minutes at the bank. Time for lunch. The pavilion of the General Beauregard. Buffet.'" He looked up from studying the photographs of the field. "Right?"

It's embarrassing to be that obvious. I said as much.

"We all have our needs," he said.

The news we got at the bank took the fun right out of the day. In response to the ruse that we were engaged in a routine survey of all banks, the branch manager had been very reluctant to talk with us, even though he knew me on sight. George hit him with the Credential from God, and we got the straight dope right away.

It seemed that this little branch bank was often holding more than five million dollars in cash. Cash.

"Why didn't you tell us?"

"Well, it was all so hush-hush, you know. The casino people told us that nobody was supposed to know." Consequently, nobody did.

We asked where it was. All in the new vault. He checked his computer screen. "Well, right now, we're way down. Only one-point-three million."

Swell. And when did they expect the ante to rise?

"We do our greatest business beginning Thursday with the last deposit of the day. By end of business on Friday, we normally have about three-point-five million, and by start of business on Sunday, after the weekend drops, probably a little over five million."

Holy shit. And, it turned out, they had somebody in the bank on odd hours. One employee, to supervise the cash deposit and exchange. The casino was open, after all, twenty-four hours a day. And it appeared that there was no deposit slot in the area that could handle that volume of cash, without forcing the boat courier to spend an unconscionable amount of time standing around with the trunk of the car open.

"I wouldn't worry too much," he said. "We expect nearly half a million to be in coinage. Maybe more. Nobody would ever take that much weight in coins."

"Uh, just how much would that be?" I asked. "Would it weigh, you know?"

"Well," he said, "a thousand dollars in quarters weighs about fifty pounds. That would make ten thousand dollars weigh in at five hundred pounds, a hundred thousand dollars at five thousand pounds… so half a million dollars in quarters would run in the neighborhood of, oh, say twenty-five thousand pounds."

George and I looked at each other. I chuckled. "Nobody without a dump truck."

It was noon before we connected up with Hester in her office. I went right to the phone, while George gave her the bad news.

"Hey, Sally, can I talk to Lamar?" I waited, watching Hester react. I'd never seen her jaw drop before. "Lamar? Uh, I think we found the bank that's gonna get the most attention."

The term "flurry of activity" doesn't even begin to approach what was happening in the next thirty minutes. We were wanted at meetings with both Lamar and Volont, and even Art was trying to contact us. I dug my heels in, and finally convinced everybody that we'd attract a lot less attention at the DCI boat office than we would back at the Sheriffs Department.

Hester caught on immediately. "You're shameless. You know that, don't you?"

"It's the only buffet in the whole damned county," I said. "You've just become desensitized because you get to eat here every day."

"You do, too," she said.

Yeah. Anyway, as we waited for the conference to congregate, I asked Hester if she had some quarters. She fished six from her purse. I asked George, and he came up with four. I added them to the seven I had in my pocket, and stacked them on Hester's desk.

"You got a ruler?"

"Houseman," she said, fishing around in her desk drawer, "what are you doing?"

She handed me a ruler. I stacked the quarters, and removed two.

"There's fifteen quarters to an inch," I said.

"Well, I always wanted to know that. Thanks, Houseman. Can I have my ruler back now?"

"Sure. You got a calculator?"

This time, she didn't say anything. Just pushed it over to me.

"Did you know that a million dollars in quarters would weigh about fifty thousand pounds?" I asked.

"No."

"That'd be four million quarters. At fifteen to the inch, that would be a stack just about four-point-two miles high."

There was a pause. "Can I have my quarters back, now?"

"Oh, sure." I handed them to her, and gave George his. "The banker said they'd likely have at least half a million dollars in change at the bank, over there. Since they use quarters on the boat, I figured that'd be a hell of a lot of quarters." I smiled. "Four-point-two miles, stacked."

She just stared at me.

"Twenty-five thousand pounds," I said.

Hester sort of giggled. "Is there a point to this?"

"Yeah." I grinned. "That's a lot of fuckin' quarters."

It was a great lunch. And, with any luck, the conference would last until suppertime. We did need to be there, though. You could see the bank from Hester's window. You could also see about three easy routes to and from, and all sorts of places for the good guys to hide. Not to mention the bad.

After lunch, I took Volont aside for a second.

"Did you know that Linda Grossman was Nola Stritch's half sister?"

He waited a beat. "Really?" No expression.

"Really. Just found it out. Want me to check further?"

"Sure. But not a high priority. Not now."

Just then Art and George came up, and the four of us rode the elevator to third. I made a mental note to tell George about Linda and Nola. Just in case Volont "forgot."

Back in Hester's office, we got down to it in earnest. One of the first rules is you never, repeat never, take the bad guys while they're in the bank. One of the other first rules is that you never, never prevent them from leaving. And in our case, you wanted to positively encourage them to think they had a clean getaway ahead of them. This leaves you with two basic choices.

First, you take them on the way to the bank, in which case you have a potential problem with proving that they actually intended to hit the bank. You also have a bit of trouble when you don't know just how they intend to do the job in the first place, and just who is involved, and what they might be using for transportation. So, that was out.

Second, you take them shortly after they've left the bank. Wait long enough to not jeopardize the bank staff, but move soon enough to catch them before they could disperse. That was the only sensible plan. If they actually went to the bank, of course. There are no certainties.

"What if they get the cash courier instead?" Art, sitting on the edge of one of the boaties' desks, was the first to put that card on the table. I think we'd all been dreading dealing with that.

"He needs mucho cash," said Volont. "Why go for part, when you can get it all?"

"How big a part?" Hester has a way.

"What?"

"How big a part can they get if they take out the courier? How much do they transfer, and when?"

Hester, George, and I found ourselves walking onto the boat, headed for the security office, and asking ourselves a question. How do you tell the chief of security about what we thought was going to go down, and then get him to be nonchalant? Well, you just don't. Do the basics, but leave out the hot information. Besides, the three of us were bound to get his interest up.

Harmon James was the head of security on the General Beauregard. Nice guy, about thirty-five, fit, bright. Probably made three times as much as I did. He already knew Hester. He met George and me. As we sat, he pressed an intercom button and said, "Agnes, could we have some coffee and mints, please?" I heard a voice on the other end. There hadn't been any secretary in evidence.

"So, what can the General Beauregard do for you?"

If it had been a month or two before the bank job was going to go down, we'd have had a little more leeway. As it was, I was the designated liar.

"We're going to have a disaster drill, and we need something that will involve federal, state, and local law enforcement. You're all we could think of." I shall likely rot in hell.

We talked a bit. Agnes brought the coffee. She was as close to a showgirl as you could get. Short black skirt. Net stockings. Heels. Classy white blouse. Not your typical government employee. The mints were chocolate-covered.

"How do you get a job like this?" I was flattering him. I was also very curious.

He'd been a deputy sheriff in Nevada. No kidding.

"Yep," he said, "this is where we go when we die…"

After that, I began to think we could trust him.

At any rate, we did find out the information we needed. They never transferred more than a quarter of a million at a time.

"That's what dictates the scheduling. And that's the beauty of it," he said. "There's no way somebody can get onto our schedule, because there isn't one. Different employee takes it each time, different vehicle, different route. No way to even know how much we've got onboard. Works."

"Cool." I thought it was.

"We were going to use an armored car service," he said, "but there isn't one available, except the one that services the banks. They can't fit us on anything like the schedule we'd need, and they aren't about to buy a new truck just for us. We really don't want to keep much more than five hundred thousand on the boat, anyway. And even that is divided up by a cash cage on each of three gaming decks, and a counting area under the waterline. A hit on one of them, and all of them are notified and close down. Piece of cake." He had a glimmer in his eye. He knew. Or, rather, he suspected. Either way, I had the feeling that things were going to tighten up on the boat for the next while.

"And," he said, "we transfer coins once a week. Lots and lots of quarters." He grinned broadly. "They accumulate around our slot machines the same way they do on your dresser at home."

As we left, I purloined another chocolate-covered mint.

They sure seemed to have it covered on the boat. Security at the bank, though… a different question altogether. As with most banks, they relied on structures, not people. Structures, and lots of alarm functions that were going to alert law enforcement.

The guessing game was going on when we got back to Hester's office.

"Why Sunday?" Art was saying. "Why not Friday or Saturday?"

"More money." Point to Lamar.

"If Gabriel is still around after all this excitement," added Hester.

"He's here," said Volont. "Don't worry about that."

"Well, now, just a minute," said Lamar. "Let's clear this up right now. Do you actually know he's here, or are you just guessing?"

Volont, I'm sure, wasn't accustomed to being talked to in quite that manner. He handled himself well, I thought.

"He's here, Sheriff. What we do is use several things. Elimination is one of them. We have informants in three or four places he is most likely to be if he isn't here. He's not at those places. We use deduction based on knowledge gained over a long period of time. He's invested heavily in this operation, with the heaviest investment being the two Colson brothers that he killed. He doesn't like to do that. He's got plans. Accomplices. He needs the cash. He's not the type to let a subordinate run the main operation. He's here. All the indications are, he's here." He looked at Lamar.

"So," said my boss, "you boil it down, and skim off the fat, you're still guessing. I'm not saying it's not a good guess. But it is a guess."

"That's right. But it's a truly good guess, and it's right." Volont flicked out one of those tight little grins of his. "Let's see what to do with the bank."

"Good guess" my ass. Volont was lying through is teeth, and if I hadn't had that conversation with George, I'd have bought it hook, line, and sinker. He was good. As it was, I was now certain that he knew exactly where Gabriel was. And he really was close.

In the end, we decided to go really light on the other four banks. Whichever ones they might be. The main forces, so to speak, were to be concentrated on Frieberg. The "daylight, bank open" plan was to set up around the bank, at enough distance to ensure they would be well clear of the place before we hit them. Roadblock vehicles, surveillance teams, chase cars. All concealed. Manned mostly by FBI and DCI SWAT team members.

Our "nighttime, bank closed" plan was very similar, but brought the ring in a bit closer. Both plans included a helicopter on standby at Maitland Airport. We felt we had to use Maitland, because the only other airport with gas and any sort of facility was just across the Mississippi from Frieberg, in Jollietteville, Wisconsin. A Huey sitting there, so close to the Frieberg bank, would possibly be spotted by the bad guys. Tip time. We did send a delegation across the river, to meet with their people, and let them know they might have a bank robbery on Sunday, too. Just being neighborly.

For our cohorts in Conception County, this was a definite "need to know" situation. They were just across the Mississippi bridge, a trip of 1.6 miles without a turnoff. The actual width of the Mississippi there was about a mile, but the approaches on both ends of the bridge extend the trip. The Iowa and Wisconsin spans met on a small island in the middle. I really mean small. No structures, just a lump of dry ground about halfway across. Once on the bridge, a bank robber either had to cross, stop, or come back. No exits. Besides, if we actually got into a pursuit, crossing the bridge was as good a route as any for flight. The 1.6 miles would go by in a minute, literally, in a high-speed pursuit. Without forewarning, it was very possible that Wisconsin wouldn't be able to get the bridge blocked in time.

Covered on that one.

Lamar was still skeptical of the entire plan. "Don't forget, we want him for murder. Two counts, at least. Maybe more if we reopen an old case. What's wrong with, we see him, we grab him?" He addressed Volont directly. "Is it good if we let him commit a bank job, too?"

"No, it isn't. Not at all. But," said Volont, "it is important that we be sure we have him. If we go to take down a suspect in a car, based on a glimpse of somebody, we might get the wrong man. We might tip off the right man. We can be sure," he said, emphatically, "that he'll be with the bank team. I have good information on that. Very good."

"Wait a minute," said Lamar. "You keep pullin' this information out of your hat every time you need it, and we're supposed to buy it." He looked around the room. "Doesn't it seem that way to you all?"

Before any of us could answer, Volont spoke rapidly. "My rules keep me from telling you certain things until you demonstrate a 'need to know.' When you ask the question, I can sometimes give an answer under those rules."

Lamar sighed, and stood up. "I gotta get back to the office." And he walked out. Just like that.

Well. There was a pretty thick silence after he left. I broke it with "Looks like you better be right on this one." I could say that. I'd been shot the last time Volont had made a mistake. In the vest, admittedly. What the hell, it's the thought that counts.

"Confidence," he said, blandly, "is high." I thought of what Hester had said about a psychic. I caught her eye and grinned at her, but she was too worried to catch it.

We made tentative assignments, and the call went out to begin gathering reinforcements. I headed back to Maitland. Tomorrow was Sunday. Sunday was Bank Day. Time was getting short.