1958 - The World in My Pocket (11 page)

‘You certainly have a bargain,’ Carter said. ‘Make no mistake about that. I’ll get my boys to couple it up with your car while we go to the office and complete the sale.’ He looked at Kitson, his smile now a little patronizing. ‘My congratulations, Mr. Harrison. You’ve certainly found a wife who can make a very sharp deal.’

Back in the little office and the sale completed, Carter seemed inclined to dally. Holding the receipt between his fingers, he looked at Ginny, unconcealed admiration in his eyes.

‘And where do you plan to go, Mrs. Harrison?’ he asked. ‘Where’s the honeymoon ground going to be?’

‘We’re going up into the mountains,’ Ginny said. ‘My husband is fond of fishing. We’re looking forward to it. It should be a lot of fun.’

Kitson reached forward and took the receipt from Carter’s hand. The way Carter was looking at Ginny was more than he could bear.

‘We’ll have to get going,’ he said. ‘We have a lot to do.’

Carter again gave him the same patronizing smile as he got to his feet.

‘I can imagine,’ he said. ‘Well, happy journey to you both. Anytime you want to trade this job in for something better, come and see me.’ He shook hands with Ginny, holding her hand a little longer than necessary.

Kitson, determined not to shake hands with him, pushed his hand deep into his trousers pockets and slouched to the door.

The caravan was now coupled to the Buick and they went down the path with Carter still talking to Ginny.

It inflamed Kitson’s anger at the way Carter handed Ginny into the car, and he could scarcely contain himself as Carter gave him a patronizing pat on his back and wished him luck.

‘This is just what we want,’ Ginny said as they drove away from the Caravan Mart. ‘Morgan will be pleased.’

Kitson said in a low, furious voice, ‘The way that jerk was looking at you. I should have taken a poke at him.’

Ginny turned her head sharply, staring at him, her sea-green eyes suddenly hostile.

‘What do you mean?’

‘What I say!’ Kitson said, beside himself. ‘The way he looked at you! The jerk! I should have hit him!’

‘What does it matter to you how any man looks at me?’ she asked, her voice ice cold. ‘You’re not married to me, are you? What are you getting so heated about?’

Kitson’s big hands gripped the wheel, his face flushing.

He maintained a sulky silence all the way back to Gypo’s workshop.

II

I
t took little less than two weeks to make the caravan ready for the task for which it was needed.

During those eleven days, Bleck took up quarters with Gypo, bunking with him in his rather sordid shed. He had done this deliberately because he realized he had lost considerable ground with Morgan, and he was anxious to show Morgan he now meant business.

Sharing the same sleeping quarters with Gypo had been a trial. Gypo was an Italian peasant. His personal habits grated on Bleck’s nerves, his sublime indifference to dirt and discomfort was something that Bleck failed to understand.

Each morning, Kitson had come to the workshop around eight o’clock in the morning and had left just after midnight. The three men had slaved on the caravan to get it ready to take the weight of the truck.

It was during this time that both Bleck and Kitson were forced to realize Gypo’s worth as a technical man. Without his skill and his ingenuity, they would have got nowhere. Bleck, who had always despised Gypo, was startled to find him so much superior to himself when it came to a technical job.

It irked him to realize that, without Gypo’s sound craftsmanship, the job they were working on just could not have been done. On the other hand, Kitson, who liked Gypo, was quick to admire the Italian’s ability, and he looked forward to the work each day, feeling that, for the first time in his life, he was learning something useful.

The work was completed on Tuesday night, and on this night, Morgan had called a meeting to be held in Gypo’s workshop. None of them had seen Ginny during these eleven days. She had given Morgan a telephone number at which she could be contacted in the case of a change of plan, but neither he nor the other three had any idea where she was living or what she did with herself during this time.

While Kitson worked on the caravan, he thought continually about her. He was now in love with her, entirely against his will, feeling sure that nothing would come of it as he felt sure that nothing but disaster would come of this job they were planning to do.

But his feelings for Ginny were too strong for him to struggle against. The girl was in his blood like a virus, and he had to accept the fact.

While the others had been working on the caravan, Morgan had been spending a lot of time on the route between the Truck Agency and the Rocket Research Station. He had been investigating every bye-road, seeking the best means of escape, timing every move, checking, rechecking and making maps. There was nothing haphazard in Morgan’s methods. Once the truck had been captured, he knew everything depended on making a quick getaway. It was essential to put as many miles between the place of the ambush and themselves as possible before the heat was turned on.

This called for the most careful planning and the familiarizing of the district. He was feeling optimistic as he drove up to Gypo’s workshop around eight o’clock for the meeting.

For the first time during the month, there was rain which fell steadily on the parched ground, releasing a smell of dampness that pleased Morgan.

There was no light showing from the carefully screened windows of the workshop and the big shed had a deserted appearance.

As he got out of the Buick and, just before turning out the headlights, he heard quick, light footfalls coming towards him.

He looked searchingly into the darkness, his hand automatically closing on the butt of his .38.

Ginny came out of the darkness and into the beam of the car’s headlights. She was wearing a blue plastic mac that glistened in the rain. Her copper-coloured hair was protected by a plastic hood.

‘First wet night for weeks,’ Morgan said. ‘I’d have picked you up if I knew where you lived.’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said, her voice curt.

Morgan moved between her and the workshop, hunching his shoulders against the rain.

‘Just where do you live, Ginny?’

She paused, the rain beating down on her and she looked at him.

‘That’s my business.’

He put his hand on her arm, pulling her to him.

‘That’s no way to talk to me, kid,’ he said. ‘You’re playing it a shade too mysterious. I don’t know who you are, where you come from, how you dreamed up this idea or even where you live. You could fade away if anything goes wrong and you might never have existed.’

She jerked free.

‘Would that be such a bad idea?’ she said and moving quickly around him, she walked up to the workshop door and knocked on it.

For a moment or so, Morgan remained motionless, his flat, black eyes narrowed, then as Kitson opened the door, he joined the girl and entered the workshop.

‘Hello there,’ he said, shaking the rain off his coat. ‘How’s it going?’

‘It’s finished,’ Kitson said, his eyes on Ginny as she stripped off her wet mac and tossed it on to the work bench. She was wearing a grey coat and skirt with a green blouse that set off the colour of her hair. Kitson felt a little pang in his heart to see how beautiful she looked. He stared searchingly at her. But for one brief glance at him, she paid him no attention. Picking up a brown-paper parcel she had brought with her and which she had put on the bench while she had taken off her mac, she walked over to where Gypo was standing by the caravan and gave it to him.

‘Here are the curtains,’ she said.

Morgan came over.

‘Well?’ he asked, looking at Gypo, who beamed at him, his fat face full of pride.

‘It’s finished, and it’s a good job, Frank,’ Gypo said, stripping off the paper from the curtains. ‘Just let me get these up and then you can see the sonofabitch.’

Bleck came out of the shadows, cleaning his hands on a lump of cotton waste. He saw Kitson was staring at Ginny and he looked at her intently himself.

He had been cut off from the society of women now for eleven days and he found Ginny irresistibly desirable. It amused him to see the way Kitson was staring at her. What did the punch-drunk bum imagine? Did he seriously think he could get to first base with a girl like her? He must be out of his head if he did!

‘Hello there,’ he said moving up to Ginny. ‘Long time no see. Where have you been hiding yourself?’

The girl smiled at him and this was unexpected. Bleck had imagined he would have had to work hard to get even a smile from her.

‘Oh, I’ve been around,’ she said casually. ‘Here and there, but I haven’t been hiding.’

‘Why didn’t you come down once in a while?’ Bleck asked, offering her his cigarette case. ‘We all could have done with a little female diversion.’

She took the cigarette and accepted the light he offered her.

‘I admit to being a female, but I don’t pretend to divert,’ she said.

Watching and listening, Kitson felt a sharp pang at his heart. The easy, silly conversation grated. He knew he could never make that sort of conversation with her and it hurt him to see that she seemed to like it.

‘Well, at least you should have come down and said hello,’ Bleck said. ‘I’ve been lonely. Imagine! For ten nights I’ve been sleeping with Gypo!’

She laughed.

‘That must have been quite a change for you,’ she said and turning, she moved over to the caravan around which Morgan was prowling, staring at it from every angle.

Hot and sweating, Gypo came out of the caravan, having put the curtains in place.

‘Go ahead and take a look,’ he invited. ‘It’s finished.’

Morgan continued to stare at the caravan.

‘How about the door, Gypo?’

Gypo beamed. This was his triumph: his masterpiece!

‘The door works. Hey, kid,’ he went on to Kitson, ‘show him how we’ve fixed it.’

Kitson went to the front of the caravan while Gypo and Morgan stood at the back.

Morgan examined the back. It appeared solid, part of the caravan’s bodywork.

‘Looks okay, huh?’ Gypo said, shuffling his feet with excitement, ‘It looks fine,’ Morgan said.

‘Open up, kid,’ Gypo said.

Kitson pulled down a lever and the back of the caravan swung upwards like the lid of a box, and at the same time part of the floor lifted and came down forming a ramp.

‘Pretty good, huh?’ Gypo said, rubbing his hands. ‘I had plenty of trouble getting the back and the floor to work together, but it’s done and it’s fast and smooth The ramp will take the weight of the truck. As you see, I’ve bound it with steel.’

As Bleck and Ginny drew closer, Morgan nodded approvingly.

‘That’s what I call a real job of work, Gypo,’ he said. ‘Let’s see it work several times.’

Before he was entirely satisfied, Kitson had to open the back of the caravan and shut it a dozen times.

‘Yeah,’ Morgan said. ‘That’s fine. Good work, Gypo.’

He walked up the ramp and into the caravan.

As proud as any housewife showing off her new home, Gypo stood on the ramp and pointed out the alterations he had made.

‘Those brackets up in the ceiling are for the acetylene and hydrogen cylinders,’ he said. ‘That cupboard there is to take the tools. The two bunks along the sides are for the stuff we take with us. The floor has been strengthened. We’ve put two steel girders across the chassis. There’s no chance now of the bottom falling out if we hit a bump.’

Morgan took time to examine everything, concentrating in particular on the floor of the caravan. He lay on his back under the caravan with an inspection lamp and checked the steel girders that had been bolted into position.

Gypo watched anxiously.

Finally Morgan stood away, his hands in his trousers pockets, his eyes glittering with excitement.

‘This is the job, Gypo,’ he said. ‘Just the way I wanted it. It’s going to be a hell of a weight when loaded, isn’t it?’

‘It’ll be heavy,’ Gypo said, ‘but the Buick should pull it. You said we don’t have any bad hills to climb.’

‘Well, no, we haven’t if we keep out of the mountains,’ Morgan said, scratching his jaw. ‘A lot depends, Gypo, on how fast you can bust into the truck. If it takes long, then maybe we’ll have to get into the mountains. That’s the one place where we can lose ourselves, but I don’t want to do it. The road up there is tricky and steep and I’m not sure if the Buick would get up there with this load.’

Gypo immediately became uneasy.

‘But you said I could have all the time in the world, Frank,’ he said, wiping his sweating hands on the seat of his trousers. ‘We’re not going to bust into that truck in five minutes.’

‘Okay, okay, take it easy,’ Morgan said soothingly while Ginny and the other two looked sharply at Gypo. ‘I don’t expect you to bust into it in five minutes. You’ve got two or three weeks, but after that, we may have to get into the mountains.’

Gypo shifted his weight from one foot to the other, his small eyes growing round.

‘But wait a minute, Frank, you said I could have a month’s uninterrupted work on the truck, now you’re talking about two or three weeks. This truck is tough. I’ve seen it. You can’t rush a thing like that.’

Morgan thought of the hundreds of men who would be thrown into the hunt as soon as the truck vanished. He thought of the aircraft checking every road and the motorcycle cops checking every car. If they were going to get away with this job, Gypo would have to rush it a little. He knew how excitable Gypo was and realized there was no point in getting him worked up before the truck was in their hands. It would be time enough then to put on the pressure.

‘Yeah, I guess you’re right,’ he said. ‘Well, maybe if we’re lucky, you’ll have a month to work on it. Who knows? You might even bust it first try.’

‘That’s a tough truck,’ Gypo said scowling. ‘It’s going to take time.’

Morgan lit a cigarette.

‘I guess we’re about ready to take it,’ he said.

The three men facing him stiffened.