Merlot (26 page)

“But…”

“Shut up,” roared Mendel, before turning to
the front and pounding the wall with his fist.

Shit, thought Lucerne as his head felt the
slight vibrations through the steel-plate wall. He quickly returned
a couple of knocks with his left hand, holding the ringing cell
phone in his right, desperately scanning the milling crowd for a
light brown-haired woman looking like Tracey sounded.

Between the noise from the dancers music, the
crowd cheering and whistling, Daphne couldn’t hear herself think
let alone see Lucerne ever since that armored car had parked in the
way.

“Move that damn thing, you moron,” she
screamed red faced, waving a flabby forearm farther down the street
indicating where she wanted the armored car to move.

“Come on, answer your damn phone, Tracey,”
Lucerne swore, looking frantically across the crowd, wondering if
Tracey was all right or if that Osborne guy had done something to
hurt her. Maybe he found out Lucerne was on the way and just
freaked.

He began scanning the crowd for a
white-haired guy wearing a tuxedo, ignoring the noise, the
shimmering heat, and the crazed, sweaty, fat woman.

“Hey, move that damn thing, you jerk, I’m
waiting for someone,” Daphne screamed, eyes wild, face scarlet and
glistening.

“Jesus, what a nutcase!” Lucerne said under
his breath, doing his best to ignore the large, sunburned, woman.
Tracey was supposed to be near the ice cream truck but he feared
Osborne had already grabbed her, dragged her off, and was probably
making her dance on that air conditioner thing. That’s the way
assholes like him operated. Find Osborne and he’d find Tracey.

“Jesus H. Christ! Ya know where we’re at?
That stupid son of a bitch brung us straight to that
naked-lady-dance place, the one his girlfriend works at! The Beaver
Hut!” screamed Elvis, peering out the rear window and sucking in a
mouthful of air.

“The Beaver Hut?” Mendel responded,
shocked.

“The Beaver Hut?” Cindy asked.

“The Beaver Hut?” Merlot whispered, thinking
Osborne.

“Osborne, he’s got her out there somewhere, I
just know it, just know it!” Lucerne ranted, driving himself half
crazy. He ignored the faint pounding coming from the steel plate
wall behind him. He was sure he could find her in a minute or two,
rescue her from Osborne’s clutches, and then just drive away.

“Back in a minute,” he said, pounding on the
wall, too preoccupied to realize neither of his brothers would be
able to hear him.

Daphne was enraged, knowing full well Lucerne
would never find her with this big clunky armored car in the way.
She stormed toward the driver’s side just as the door opened and
the driver stepped down.

“What the hell are you doing? Move that
thing. I’m looking for my ride here.

He’ll never see me with you parked here!” As
she sprayed spittle, it never dawned on her that drivers of armored
cars typically didn’t wear Lynyrd Skynyrd T-shirts.

“You’re pretty hard to miss. Wouldn’t hurt
you to drag that fat ass down a couple of blocks, then just keep on
going,” Lucerne said. He quickly moved into the crowd, pushing
toward the makeshift stage, keeping his thirty-eight close.

“Shit, there he goes! Lucerne, God damn it! I
knew it. We are fucked man, major league fucked!” Elvis said,
looking back at Mendel, his good eye wide, shaking his head.

“You sure?” Mendel shouted, half jumping
across Merlot, dragging his boot back over Merlot to look out the
window.

“Oh my God!” Merlot screamed.

“It’s okay, Tony, it’s okay,” Cindy said,
stroking Merlot’s hair.

“God damn, I’m gonna have to go and get that
dumb bastard,” Mendel said, leaning his AK against the wall. “Watch
these two, I’ll be back in one minute. Now you stay put, E, you
hear me?”

Elvis nodded, his one good eye looking wild
as Mendel opened the door, stepped out, and stuck his head back
in.

“One minute, E. I’ll get him, one minute,
I’ll be back. I promise.”

As soon as the door closed Elvis peered out
the corner of the oval window and watched Mendel disappear into the
crowd.

Merlot had always wondered what he would do
if the time ever came to show real cajones. He swallowed hard,
grabbed the revolver stuffed in his waistband and thought, my ass
really hurts!

He shot a quick glance at Cindy. Then rose to
his knees and pressed the barrel firmly against the back of Elvis’s
head, pushing his face against the oval window.

“Ahh, Jesus, don’t, my nose, my nose, God,
you’re hurting me!”

“Don’t move, or so help me!”

Elvis exhaled loudly through his mouth,
drooling and steaming a portion of the window,

“Don’t you go shootin that thing, mister.
Just take her easy.”

“Lay down,” Merlot instructed, at the same
time prying Elvis’s hand from the AK and handing it to Cindy.

She grabbed the weapon, shouldered it like a
pro, and pushed the barrel into the back of Elvis’s head.

“I’ve got four brothers,” she said in
response to Merlot’s surprised glance.

Merlot opened the door, grabbed a trash bag
as he backed out, “I’ll get help. Tell anyone who looks in to get
the cops.”

* * *

“Hurry, Milton, hurry,” Osborne said half
pushing Milton down the stairs with one hand while spraying Lysol
along the handrail with the other. They were approaching the bottom
of the stairs. Osborne could see the milling crowd just beyond the
door.

“Milton, get the door, get the door,” Osborne
instructed, brushing his sleeves and adjusting the lapels of his
sport coat. “Milton, will you get the door, please!” he yelled.

Milton weaved in Osborne’s direction, stared
through glassy eyes before he turned, opened the large door, and
crashed to the sidewalk like a collapsing chimney. He bounced once
and his body wedged the door open.

“Oh, for heavens sake, Milton!” Osborne
scolded, stepping out onto the sidewalk.

* * *

Merlot, carried a trash bag stuffed with
currency and the revolver stuffed in his waistband. He painfully
hobbled around the edge of the crowd to the front door of the
Beaver Hut, just as Osborne appeared in the open doorway.

“My friends, my good friends, come in and
enjoy these tempting feminine treats in air-conditioned comfort!
Free drinks to our first fifty guests!”

Merlot didn’t notice Milton on the ground
until he had stumbled over the body.

“Jesus Christ! What’s with him? Is he dead?”
Merlot asked.

“Oh, he’ll be fine. Please, please come in
and… DiMento? Is that you?” Osborne asked, scanning what remained
of Merlot’s disguise, genuinely confused.

“Yeah, it’s me Osborne, here’s your payment,
in full, we’re even,” he gasped handing the trash bag to Osborne as
a stab of pain slashed across his rear. “Ahh, God!” he groaned.

Osborne snatched the bag from Merlot’s hand,
opened it, and stuck his head in for a quick look. In the half
second it took to register what was in the bag he wrenched it
closed and without another word fled up the stairs, leaving Merlot
in the doorway.

Merlot detected a commotion near the armored
car. He turned to make his way back to Cindy just as a large,
hairy, bearded giant with a Lynyrd Skynyrd T-shirt hovered over
him.

“Where’s Osborne?” Lucerne asked, not
recognizing Merlot without his wig and mirrored glasses.

Merlot recognized him as one of the robbers
from the bank.

“Just ran up those stairs, office at the top
on the left. Can’t miss it,” he offered.

Lucerne stepped over Milton and quickly
dashed up the staircase, taking the steps two at a time.

No sooner had he disappeared from sight when
police officers wrestled a similar guy to the ground just ten feet
away.

Mendel screamed at the top of his lungs,
“Lucerne, you son-of-a-bitch, Lucerne!”

* * *

“Officer, officer, I saw one of them. He
yelled at me and ran toward the building,” Daphne said tapping a
police officer on the shoulder. They were gathered around a woman
in a brown polyester outfit with her arms crossed, talking calmly
at the rear of the armored car. Some guy with bloody toilet paper
crammed up his nose was handcuffed and being placed in the back of
a squad car.

“Lady,” the officer said to Daphne. “I told
you before if you didn’t leave the area I was going to place you
under arrest.” He slapped a cuff on one of her sunburned wrists,
forcefully spun her around and cuffed her other wrist.

“But, I saw him, he climbed out of the
armored car, and he went into the building. I talked to him, I told
him not to park there,” Daphne said as she was led away.

* * *

Osborne dashed up to his office, closed the
door behind him, then held the bag open. It was stuffed with
bundles of currency. He inhaled deeply breathing in the sickly
sweet smell of currency.

He figured he had better get it tucked away
safely. He was just cramming the last of the bag into the safe when
he heard a voice behind him.

“Osborne?”

He jumped, slammed the safe door closed with
his foot then turned around to look at a hairy giant in a sweaty
Lynyrd Skynyrd T-shirt pointing a gun at him.

“Changed your clothes, I see,” Lucerne
growled, surprised Osborne wasn’t still wearing his tux.

“Clothes?”

“So where’s Tracey, what’d you do with
her?”

Osborne raised his hands slowly.

“I can assure you, I have absolutely no idea
what in God’s name you are talking about,” he answered calmly.

“You got one more chance to answer me, proper
like, or
we’re
gonna dance,” Lucerne said, his color visibly
rising, eyes glaring.

“Look, I can assure you, I know nothing of
this, this Tracey woman. I’ve a number of girls here. Help
yourself. Find one you like.”

“That your game, is it? You think you can
treat a pretty lady like that, make her dance with you, take time
away from her work. You do that to all your vice presidents?”
Lucerne advanced toward Osborne.

“What on earth are you babbling about?”

“I’ll show you what I’m babbling about!”
Lucerne screamed, picking Osborne up by the lapels, and throwing
him through the office window.

“Third one might be up there,” a Sergeant
said just as Osborne crashed through the office window dropping
almost on top of Milton.

They raced up the stairs, approaching the
second-floor office cautiously. Lucerne sat calmly behind Osborne’s
desk. His hand in plain view, the thirty-eight at the far edge of
the desk.

“Come on in, fellas. Look, I ain’t gonna
resist no arrest or nothing, I got enough problems to worry about
already.”

* * *

The hypo they gave Merlot and the subsequent
medications knocked him out for the night. He was lying facedown
with the middle section of the hospital bed cranked up. He wore a
hospital gown that exposed his wound to his mother, sitting in the
chair opposite his bed.

Cindy knocked on the doorframe as she entered
the room.

“Tony?”

“Oh God,” Merlot groaned.

“Well, it doesn’t look so bad from here,” she
said, trying to make the best of the situation.

“You call him Tony?” asked Rita DiMento,
taking an instant liking to this girl. “You know we named Anthony,
after his father, my Tony.”

“Mrs. DiMento, so nice to meet you. I’m
Cindy.”

“Oh, you’re the girl who was with him. He
kept calling your name.”

“Oh God!” Merlot said into his pillow.

“He saved my life! Hey, Tony, look, you’re
the big headline!” Cindy laughed reading the headline, “Man Rear
Ends Bank Robbers!”

“God!” Merlot groaned.

* * *

In the end, Merlot was the only one who ever
knew about his attempt to rob the bank. All questions were
overwhelmed by the fact that he had been shot, held hostage, and
had ultimately overpowered one of the bank robbers, leading to the
arrest and capture of all three Ditschler brothers.

Otto O’Malley was credited with, if not
foiling, at least altering their getaway attempt. Police later
discovered an unregistered Saab parked next to a bank Dumpster. The
vehicle was devoid of fingerprints with the exception of a perfect
left-hand print belonging to Mendel Ditschler on the hood of the
car. After careful consideration authorities surmised that the Saab
was to be used as a second getaway car.

* * *

Two months later, just before Halloween.
Merlot was standing at the bar, watching Cindy sip a glass of red
wine as she read him the latest article concerning the bank-robbery
trial.

“
Noted strip club owner and reputed
mobster Declan Osborne has been found guilty of being an accessory
to the crime as well as guilty of receiving stolen goods from last
August’s botched bank robbery.

Portrayed as the mastermind of the comically
ill-fated scheme, Osborne is currently awaiting sentencing while
recovering from injuries received during his unsuccessful escape
attempt from a second-floor office. Throughout the trial he denied
any involvement in the robbery. However, four sets of circumstances
seemed to outweigh his claims and after thirty minutes of
deliberation the jury found him guilty.

The three Ditschler brothers, convicted of carrying
out the actual robbery, fled directly to Mr. Osborne’s place of
business, a Minneapolis entertainment club known as the Beaver
Hut.

Second, one of the convicted bank robbers,
Lucerne Ditschler, testified under oath that after robbing the bank
he intentionally drove to the Beaver Hut for the express purpose of
meeting with Osborne.

Third, approximately one-third of the stolen funds,
in stacks of banded currency identical to those recovered from the
stolen armored car, were found crammed into an office safe just
moments after Osborne’s attempted escape. These same funds were
identified by the Minnesota State Office of Forensics as containing
a residue of bacon grease and batter consistent with that used at a
series of State Fair stands.