The Long Ride (4 page)

He nodded, enjoying her directness. “I’m interested.”

She smiled softly. “This is my stop coming up. It’s been very pleasant.”

He watched her walk down the block toward an apartment house. There was a fine poise and confidence about the way she moved, as though the world could tumble down around her and she would take it as it came. He leaned back as the bus moved forward, rubbing his chin with the back of a hand. He was still aware of her presence, and he had not felt that way about a woman since the first day he’d met Maggie. He’d been certain he would never feel that way again…

Five blocks farther into the downtown section, he got off and strode briskly to the Walton Hotel. He went directly up to his room. Ray Hannah was inside, waiting for him.

“You make it, John?”

“I made it. The last one. Seven of us altogether.”

“Wells?”

“He’ll be there.”

“Good. I just talked to the mother of that kid who was killed in the motel. We want to get that son of a bitch and get him all the way. Sit down. I’ll mix you a drink from your own booze.”

CHAPTER

Ray Hannah was blond, square-shouldered, with the full, healthy-looking face of the born athlete. At 32 he was the head of the Loma City FBI office, and carried out his responsibility with animal energy.

When John Benson had been called into the office of his chief, Frank Terrill, in Washington, Frank had explained the situation briefly and quietly. “They want someone from out of town, John. Hannah’s a good man and I trust his judgment. I think he’s right. We’ve had you locked up in this office for four years—how about going into the field again?” John Benson knew that he might be right for this job, but he also knew that Frank was worrying about him, purposely urging him into something that might break him out of the shell. Frank Terrill was a wise man.

Ray Hannah mixed two drinks hastily, then began pacing. John took off his jacket and sat down on a straight chair, propping his feet on the bed. “How about going over it again?” He’d come in last night. Ray Hannah had given him the facts briefly. But he wanted to get everything securely in mind. He would be all the way into it in two days. He couldn’t afford any mistakes after that.

“From where?” Hannah asked.

“From the beginning.”

Hannah nodded. “All we’ve got since it happened. The kid who was choked to death, Norman Austin, didn’t know how much that satchel had in it—nor where it was going. We’re sure of that, because the bank was definite about who knew about it. I don’t know whether I explained or not. But when that money was put together for the Fort Allison payroll, it was moved from the big Federal on 13th to the Midwest Federal, in the satchel, to hold until the armored car picked it up and carried it out to the fort. They figured it was a simple enough dodge to keep things safe—especially since only three people at the Midwest Federal knew how big it was.”

“And you’ve checked them out?”

“Positively. Norman Austin sure as hell wasn’t one of them. He could have known about the satchel itself, that it contained some money. But he wouldn’t have known it was a hundred thousand.”

“So you started figuring it from the fort side?”

Hannah nodded. “Somewhere in the finance section. Harry Wells, as a top sergeant out there, knew what was going on in the finance section. He could have known about the satchel. He could also have found out what bank it came from.”

“But nobody else?”

“No. But we’ve checked out everybody else who could have known about it. We, at least, got a general description about Wells’s build, the sound of his voice. Only the guard saw his face directly. But the guard’s dead. The cop he shot it out with in the alley didn’t get a clear picture in that kind of action. But we got his build, and Wells’s build fits. We got his voice, and his voice fits. Nobody else who could have known about that payroll at the fort fits the description as closely. All of those that are hairline were accounted for during the time of the holdup.”

John Benson sipped his drink thoughtfully. “But no record on Harry Wells?”

“Not a thing. He was clean before he went into the service. He was clean for twenty years in the Army.”

“Not even an AWOL?”

“No.”

“Then he does this.”

Hannah shrugged. “He’s tough. Leans to the sadistic side. But nothing you’ll get in a record. No emotion. No compassion. Everything all down the line.”

“Good combat record?”

“Hell of a combat record.”

John Benson shook his head. “What triggers a thing like this?”

“Maybe it isn’t just triggered. Maybe this is where he was heading all the time. Man like that can stand at attention for twenty-four hours and never twitch a muscle. Then tear things up. I figure he went by the numbers all his life, then, when he was ready, went for it all the way. A hundred grand, tax free. To a guy like that, it wouldn’t matter if he had his whole life invested in it, this would be worth it.”

“How smart?”

“Not too smart. Medium IQ. That probably accounts for the mistakes he made.”

“Like the kid he brought in—Willy Tyler?”

“That’s the big mistake. It’s the positive tie that hooks him. We checked back. Wells had Tyler under him in California. When he started figuring on going for the payroll, he just naturally thought of Tyler. Tyler doesn’t have a record either, but he must have been ripe for a deal like this—the report on him indicates he was hungry to make it big but hadn’t done much about it, kept looking for something for nothing. Wells could have leaned him into the deal, all right. We figure it that way.”

“But no evidence they were together anywhere, anytime, since Wells came out here and was discharged?”

“No. But remember this was the big one for Wells. He would have been careful from the beginning.”

John Benson nodded. “So when this kid, Norman Austin, got a job in the bank, Wells realized he was pretty close to Tyler’s build and looks, and figured it out that way.”

“Yeah. Kidnaped Austin, tortured as much information out of him as they could get—I think Wells did that—and then you know how they pulled it at the bank. It was Tyler who screwed it up.”

“He didn’t fire his gun at all?”

“Not once. It must have been Wells, all the way. He got the money, all right. But we know who he is. And that’s going to nail him.”

“And you think this is the right way, Ray? Let him run? Let him trip himself?”

“How else? If we pick him up now, how much can we get him for? He’s no doubt got an alibi figured for his time. He’s got no record. We could pull him in, hope to crack his alibi. But if we don’t have enough, we lose not only the money but Wells too. Identification by the people at the bank just isn’t enough. He was masked, and it won’t hold up. What we’ve got to do is get him with the money. We’ve got the serial numbers, all right. But we can’t wait until it starts showing up spread all over the country, maybe. We’ve got to get him with the package. Then we can really slam him.

“Hell, he killed that Austin kid in the purest cold blood. I’m certain of that. He also killed the guard. He’s responsible for heisting one hundred G’s of Uncle’s sugar. We’re going to get him, John. It’s going to be a sweet, dangerous job for you. But it’s the only way. This bastard may not be an old pro, but he’s damn cagey. He left no fingerprints anywhere. We couldn’t get a particle of anything out of the car he ditched. It’s going to be a real job.”

“The money—the Tyler kid was the one who took it out of the vault?”

“Had it going out of the bank. Still had it when the patrolman knocked him down in the alley. The kid crawled into a lot off the alley. Then Wells came back and got it.”

“Did the patrolman see him get it?”

“No. Wells was splattering so much lead he couldn’t get a good look. He was flat up against a wall, backed up in a little recess, just firing in Wells’s direction. But Wells didn’t run back through that fire for his health. There’s one apartment that looks over that lot—a young couple live in it. But the wife was at work. And the husband was eating breakfast at a cafeteria a couple of blocks away. We checked the company where the girl works, and they verified her. The cashier at the cafeteria remembered the husband being in there about the time the robbery came off.

“We’re sure Wells got the satchel, high-tailed it up the alley, took off in that stolen sedan, then ditched the car. That’s where we stand with it right now. We’ve had a tail on Wells, ever since we got it down to him. He hasn’t done one solitary thing out of line—only put in for a ride to California with your new friend, Mrs. Landry. And that is going to sink him. He’s going to make a move for that money, and you’re going to be there when he does.”

John Benson sat silently, studying his glass. It had been four years since he’d done any field work. He felt rusty for it. But there was a small flicker of excitement deep in his middle. It was a welcome feeling—he’d been too long absolutely dead-numb inside.

“You’re playing it pretty close,” Ray Hannah said. “Using your own name and some of the other things. Your wife’s parents living in Chicago, your kids staying with them.”

“I know,” John Benson nodded. “But I’ve been out of this end of it too long. I’ve got to have an advantage, to give me less room for a slip. If somebody called me by a phony name, I’d forget to turn around. This is better.”

“Did you really go to Indiana University or live in Lafayette at any time?”

“I didn’t graduate from Indiana—I graduated from California. But I was at Indiana for a while during the war. I remember Bloomington. I was in Lafayette a couple of times. I had some dates with a girl whose home was there. I’ve got some folders on the town. I’ve memorized the map. I’ll be all right.”

“How about the advertising? Know anything about it?”

“I had a part-time job with a small ad agency while I was in college. I don’t think I’ll run into trouble, unless—”

“Unless what?”

“Well, I haven’t met everybody that’s going on that ride. If—”

“I wanted to get into that. We don’t want to spook Wells any way at all. So we’ve allowed nothing to leak. As far as the news outlets are concerned, the city cops and the FBI are purely stupid and don’t have a lead to their names. The tail on Wells has been a careful thing, buddy. When Wells went into the Landry lady’s house, we walked very softly. Had a guy show up in the neighborhood as a telephone repairman until he found out she was advertising for riders to go to the Coast. Then we checked Mrs. Landry, very roundabout, then we laid off. You’re all of it now. We’ll check the people riding for you as well as we can. Seven? What the hell is she going to drive? A bus?”

John Benson smiled faintly. “Station wagon.”

Hannah shook his head. “Well. Mrs. Landry. If there’s any connection between her and Wells, we don’t see it.”

“If my instinct’s any good, there isn’t.”

“Do you know the rest of them now?”

“There’s a Miss Kennicot. A librarian at the Loma City Memorial. I met her. She looks genuine.”

Hannah got out a pencil and a small pad of paper. “Okay.”

“Then Wells.”

“Amen.”

“And a woman named Mrs. Margaret Moore. She lives in an apartment on Twenty-first Street, just off Lodge. I’ve talked to her. Says she’s divorced. Hell of an attractive woman, but she doesn’t seem to fit in with this group. She doesn’t think I do either, by the way.” He paused, then: “I’d check her heavily, Ray.”

“We’ll try. But we’ve only got two nights and one day. Who else?”

“A young couple. I didn’t see them. Newly married. Mrs. Landry said the boy had one arm.”

“Which?” Ray Hannah said quickly, staring at John Benson.

“One arm.”

“Name?”

“Allan Garwith.”

Ray Hannah put a hand to his forehead, closing his eyes. “That’s the kid who’s been renting that apartment that overlooks the lot where Willy Tyler died!”

John Benson blinked once, staring back at Ray Hannah. He whistled softly. “Wow.”

“Yeah,” Hannah said, starting to pace again excitedly. “Wow, indeed, brother…”

CHAPTER

Late Monday afternoon wind and rain swept down on Loma City with such intensity that windshield wipers were pressed motionless for seconds at a time and drivers were forced to stop their cars in mid-street blinded by the wash of water over their windshields. Lightning flashed and thunder rumbled like large beaten drums in the dark sky, an aged elm on Carter Street at the north edge of the city was split down the center and dead limbs were torn from other tree trunks and strewn over the city’s residential avenues. The storm lasted for twenty minutes and was followed by a gray, airless lull of intense humidity. By Tuesday morning the air was cooler, less humid, and the early sun had evaporated the last silver rain puddles on sidewalks and streets. Birds were calling. The sky was blue-white and clear except for a scattering of fragile floating clouds to the west.

When John Benson got out of his cab and stepped onto the broad front porch of Mrs. Landry’s house with his suitcase, the door was open. There was an odor of freshly made coffee coming from the interior, mixed with the smell of baking. The station wagon was parked in the driveway, and several bags were resting on the grass beside it. Inside there was the sound of laughing female voices.

“There you are!” Mrs. Landry called, coming through the house. “Here’s Mr. Benson, everybody! We’re all set now!” She was wearing a brilliantly patterned blue and orange dress. Her gray hair was neat and shining.

“I hope I’m not late,” he said.

“Of course not, Mr. Benson. Come in and have some coffee.”

He followed her through the living room. Dust covers had been thrown carelessly over the furniture. Numerous vases had been emptied and the lack of flowers gave the room an entirely different look. Drapes had been pulled together, and the interior was lighted only by shafts of bright morning sunlight that escaped through the few spaces where the drapes had not come entirely shut.

The kitchen was flooded with light, however, and everyone was standing around a yellow-painted kitchen table loaded with freshly filled thermoses of coffee, a large sandwich basket and an equally large box of fresh-baked cookies.

“Here he is, everyone,” Mrs. Landry said gaily. “The last one.”

Miss Kennicot, a cup of coffee in her hand, was wearing a black skirt and an extremely lacy white blouse that was transparent and showed, quite primly, a similarly lacy white slip. She tipped her head back and laughed loudly, eyes on John. “As dear William said, ‘All’s well that ends well!’” She laughed again, looking at him in a way that made him feel faintly nervous. He then noticed her eyes flicker to Margaret Moore with an unmistakable look of distaste.

Mrs. Moore, in a simple white dress that emphasized the handsome mold of her body, looked at John with a lazy smile. “Welcome, John. Can I pour you coffee?”

“I’ll do it!” Miss Kennicot said shrilly.

“Let’s see now,” Mrs. Landry said. “You’ve met everyone, I think, Mr. Benson, but the Garwiths and Mr. Wells here. Mr. Wells, I want you to meet Mr. Benson. Mr. Benson’s in the advertising business. And Mr. Wells is the retired Army sergeant I was telling you about.”

Harry Wells, dressed in his well-pressed washable suit, looked at John with cold, expressionless eyes. He shook hands briefly. “Benson.”

John smiled at him, thinking: alert, in tremendous shape, and with, I’m damn sure, blood that runs as cold as a mountain stream. Don’t make any mistakes with him. It won’t be good if you do. “Glad to meet you, Sergeant.”

“And here are the Garwiths. Allan and Cicely Garwith, I want you to meet Mr. John Benson.”

John looked at Allan Garwith carefully. He was dressed in dark gray slacks and a blue and white short-sleeved sport shirt. He had the look of an athlete, John thought: neck straight and muscular, body held with an unconscious grace, his one arm smoothly muscled. He put down a coffee cup to shake hands with John. John noticed that when he placed it on a saucer on the table it rattled. His handshake was firm, but he would not look at John straight-on.

Cicely smiled at John. She was not pretty, but her smile was. She had a look of freshness, of untroubled innocence, standing beside her husband in a new, inexpensive yellow dress. Garwith said nothing, but Cicely said, “I’m so delighted, Mr. Benson, to make your acquaintance.”

“Thank you, Mrs. Garwith,” he said, thinking that Garwith looked nervous, certainly. And so did he have the money? Or did Wells have it? Or were they working together? Was that the reason they were traveling this way? Maybe Garwith did pick up the money and Wells knew he got it—figured it out by going back to that lot and rechecking who could have seen that satchel dragged in there. He could even have done that the same day of the robbery, before Ray Hannah got the tail on him. But who knew? Garwith
looked
like he had it—frightened-looking, as though he were ready to bolt any minute. They knew from the state registration that he bought a pistol. But that didn’t really prove anything. One thing was certain. If he spooked one, then he spooked the other. He had to wait until he was sure. Then he would, he knew, have to move very fast or it would be too late. “It’s my pleasure, I’m certain.”

Miss Kennicot handed him a cup of coffee, giggling coyly, so loudly that it made John’s ear hum. He thanked her and looked again at Margaret Moore. The main thing, he thought, was to look calm, wait and be ready. And while he was doing that, concentrate on something to help keep the pressure off. Margaret Moore?

Yes, he thought, she’s easy enough to concentrate on so that he didn’t give anything away. But how would Maggie look at that? Is that how Maggie would like him to learn to live again?

But Maggie was gone, and there was no use trying to figure any more what she would or wouldn’t want him to do. He had to face it alone. It was hard to do, after all the years. To give up on Maggie, even if she was dead. To try to stop worrying about how the boys were doing without her, in Chicago. Very hard. But there was no other way.

So go ahead, he thought. Enjoy that look Margaret Moore was giving you, the fine warmth of it. Who was she, really? Ray Hannah hadn’t been able to get much on her, and he would still, he knew, have to worry about where she fitted into this picture. But he was still going to enjoy the pleasure of her presence, as he stood beside Harry Wells, the murdering butcher, smiling with polite respect at everyone as this group prepared to board the waiting station wagon and move on its cross-country way…

The sandwich basket and cookie box were packed, the coffee percolator and the cups that had been used washed, dried and put away. The group moved out to the front lawn. There Harry Wells volunteered to load the bags. John Benson helped him. Allan Garwith, nerves jumping, volunteered to do nothing, but instead stood off to the side, wishing Cicely would stop hanging on to his hand, looking up at him every five seconds like a sick dog. Think of the money, he told himself, and how it’ll be pretty soon. He was going to ditch, he knew, and that would be the end of Cicely. Could she tell anything? He’d bought that pistol, packed it in the bag. But she’d taken his word for it when he’d explained that they ought to have it on a trip like this. No. He was certain she didn’t suspect anything. She was just being herself, and that was enough against her. Ditch her, he thought, just as soon as he could. So long, Cicely. And good-by.

He turned his head and looked at Margaret Moore standing beside Mrs. Landry as Benson and Wells loaded the baggage. Concentrate on that, he thought, and the nerves’ll stop singing. She looks so soft, so capable, so easy—she could stop your nerves from singing, all right.

But the money—he knew he should have mailed it to Cheyenne right away. Friday, not yesterday. But he’d had trouble thinking clearly. His brain kept spinning. How long, he wondered, did it take first-class mail to get to Cheyenne? And why, he thought, hadn’t he sent it airmail? He couldn’t afford to make any more mistakes like that.

What if the package broke? What if the stupid post office people stuffed the package into the parcel mail by mistake? No, he thought. Don’t think about that. It’ll be there today. It’s got to be. Tomorrow I’ll walk up to the general delivery window and it’s mine. That’s when I ditch. They’ll never get me after that.

What was it about that Wells guy loading the bags into the wagon? Something familiar. But, no. Imagination. Caused by the way his brain kept spinning. He had to think clearly, he knew, every minute, every second.

Harry Wells loaded the suitcases into the station wagon carefully. He placed one bag in the rear and then decided it should go in later. He handed it back to John Benson and took another. Benson, he thought, looked out of place somehow. But that wasn’t the thing to worry about. The only thing to worry about was that kid. And there it was, the kid’s bag. Heavy, he thought, fitting it behind the rear seat. Was that where he’d put it? In that bag? One hundred thousand dollars…

Wells’s face became a fraction more grim. Did Garwith think he could get away with it? Picking up Harry Wells’s money, the money he’d worked and planned so hard and so carefully to get? Didn’t he think he could go back? Figure out that only one place looked out on where that foul-up Tyler crawled to and died? That Garwith had to pick up that bag? That he could trail him out here and watch him go into Grandmother’s house? That he could buzz Grandmother on the telephone and ask to talk to her under a phony name and have her ask right away if it was about the ride to San Francisco and then know, all of a sudden, what Garwith was trying to do? That he could come up later, in his own name, and jump on too? Was he as stupid as Tyler? The cops didn’t know Harry Wells had failed to get that money. But Garwith knew it, because Garwith had it.

All right, Harry Wells thought. It was better if he was stupid. It was going to make it easier to follow him around, wait for him to make one small mistake, his last.

Oh, he was going to have had it then, Harry Wells thought. Just like that punk kid in that motel. Three dead, and he didn’t feel a thing. It was no different than the rotten Heinies dead by his gun, the rotten Gooks dead by his gun. What was the difference? It was the way the world turned around. Some lived, some died.

He was going to get that money, all right. Because he was going to do it right and very damn carefully. And that kid would never know what hit him, once he made his mistake. But where, he asked himself, had the kid put it? In that bag? Right there, at the end of the wagon? He was going to sit on the back seat, he told himself, and lean against that bag and watch that kid. And all he had to do was breathe wrong. Then it was over for him, absolutely over…

When the baggage was loaded, the riders selected their seats. Mrs. Landry got behind the steering wheel and started the engine. Beside her, in the front seat, Miss Kennicot plumped down, clutching her collection of poems, the cover blotched from her perspiring palms, giggling loudly. Behind them, in the next seat, Allan and Cicely Garwith sat on the left side, Margaret Moore on the right.

Cicely took hold of her husband’s hand, failing to notice the slight rhythmic tensing of muscles that had begun on the right side of his mouth. Mrs. Moore waited for the station wagon to move, holding her hands loosely in her lap, a calm but alert look of awareness on her face.

Behind them, on the last seat, John Benson sat on the right, Harry Wells on the left. John leaned back, watching that flickering muscle at the side of Allan Garwith’s mouth. Directly behind Garwith Harry Wells rested one arm on top of a bag which contained a leather-framed tag strapped to the handle, announcing:
This belongs to Allan Garwith.

Carefully Mrs. Landry put the car in gear, drove out of the drive and rolled the station wagon very slowly down the quiet residential avenue. Mrs. Moore lit a cigarette, then John Benson also lit one. Miss Kennicot suddenly laughed for no apparent reason. Mrs. Landry said, “Oh, I just wonder if I turned off the stove after we made the coffee?”

Cicely Garwith leaned forward and said in her clear, youthful voice, “I checked as we were going out, Mrs. Landry. The right front burner was on a little, but I turned it off.”

“Oh, that was so sweet of you, dear. I always seem to forget something.”

“I think everything’s all right now,” Cicely said positively.

Allan Garwith detached his hand from his wife’s and turned to John Benson, saying in a harsh whisper, “Does she figure on getting to Cheyenne tonight? Isn’t that what she said?”

John Benson nodded. “That was the plan.”

The station wagon moved very slowly onto Lodge Boulevard and started west, toward the outskirts of town. Allan Garwith turned his head impatiently forward. Cicely smiled at him worshipfully and reached for his hand again. He moved it out of her reach.

Miss Kennicot switched around in her seat, suddenly laughing again. “Isn’t this fun, everyone?”

Allan Garwith looked at her with thin eyes and then stared disgustedly out of the window to his left, that muscle moving steadily beside his mouth.

At the city limits the flat brown prairie fields stretched ahead. The land was almost treeless, and the highway, narrowing to two lanes, moved in a straight line ahead, the flatness creating the perspective of a painting. Faint mirages glimmered ahead on the blacktop. The telephone poles and wires running down on either side of the highway added to the sharp look of perspective.

“Our ship of adventure!” Miss Kennicot shouted. “‘She starts—she moves—she seems to feel the thrill of life along her keel.’ Longfellow!”

“I’ll Longfellow her right in her mouth,” Allan Garwith whispered to Cicely. Cicely caught his hand and pressed it tightly, smiling brightly at Miss Kennicot.

As Mrs. Landry drove past the white sign marking the outer edge of Loma City she said, “All right! Here we go now!”

“Away and away!” Miss Kennicot yelled.

“Let’s,” said Mrs. Landry joyfully, “everybody sing. Altogether now. California, here we come…!” Her voice lifted in lusty off-key exuberance. She suddenly floored the gas pedal.