Herman: “Sorry.”
Victor (garbled a bit, as though he had fingers in his mouth): “That’s okay.”
Then there was a hollow drumming sound, and Herman laughed. “Sure!” he said, obviously pleased with himself. “You know what it is?”
“No,” Dortmunder said. He was getting very irritated that the drinker wouldn’t own up to what he’d done and starting to suspect it was Herman, now trying to distract them all from the question with a lot of foolishness.
Herman said, “It’s Canadian!”
Kelp sniffed loudly and said, “By God, I think you’re right. Canadian whiskey.”
More hollow drumming, and Herman said, “This is a fake wall. Up here behind the cab, it’s a fake wall. We’re in a goddam smuggler’s truck!”
Dortmunder said, “What?”
“That’s where the smell’s coming from, back there. They must have broken a bottle.” Dortmunder said, “Smuggling? Prohibition’s over.”
“By golly, Herman,” Victor said excitedly, “you’ve stumbled on something important!” Never had he sounded more like an FBI man.
Dortmunder said, “Prohibition’s over.”
“Import duties,” Victor explained. “That isn’t directly the Bureau’s responsibility, that’s Treasury’s department, but I do know a bit about it. There are outfits like this strung all across the border. They smuggle Canadian whiskey into the States and American cigarettes up into Canada, and they make a pretty profit in both directions.”
“Well, I’ll be,” said Kelp.
“Uncle,” Victor said, “where exactly did you get this truck?”
Kelp said, “You’re not in the Bureau any more, Victor.”
“Oh,” Victor said. He sounded slightly confused. Then he said, “Of course not. I was just wondering.”
“In Greenpoint.”
“Of course,” Victor said musingly. “Down by the piers.”
There was another thud, and Herman cried, “Ouch! Son of a bitch!”
Dortmunder called, “What happened?”
“Hurt my thumb. But I figured out how to get it open.”
Kelp said, “Any whiskey in there?”
Dortmunder said warningly, “Wait a minute.”
“For later,” Kelp said.
A match flared. They could see Herman leaning through a narrow partition in the front wall, holding the match ahead of himself so they could make him out only in silhouette.
“Cigarettes,” Herman said. “About half full of cigarettes.”
Kelp said, “True?”
“Swear to God.”
“What brand?”
“L and M.”
“No,” Kelp said. “I’m not mature enough for them.”
“Wait, there’s some others. Uhhh, Salem.”
“No. I feel like a dirty old man when I try to smoke a Salem. Springtime fresh and all, girls in covered bridges.”
“Virginia Slims.”
“What?”
“Sorry.”
“That’s May’s brand,” Dortmunder said. “I’ll take some of them with me.”
Kelp said, “I thought May got them free at the store.”
“That’s right, she does.”
“Ow,” Herman said, and the match went out. “Burned my finger.”
“You better sit down,” Dortmunder told him. “You’re choppin’ up your hands pretty good for somebody’s gonna open some locks.”
“Right,” Herman said.
They rode along in silence awhile, and then Herman said, “You know, it really stinks in here.”
Kelp said, “Everything happens to me. I looked at this truck, it said ‘paper’ on the side, I figured it would be nice and clean and neat.”
“It really smells bad,” Herman said.
“I wish Murch wouldn’t jounce so much,” Victor said. He sounded small and distant.
Dortmunder said, “How come?”
“I think I’m gonna be sick.”
“Wait,” Dortmunder urged him. “It’s only a little farther.”
“It’s the smell,” Victor said miserably. “And the jouncing.”
“I’m beginning to feel that way, too,” Kelp said. He didn’t sound healthy.
Now that the idea had been suggested, Dortmunder too was starting to feel queasy. “Herman,” he said, “maybe you ought to rap on the front wall, signal Murch to stop a minute.”
“I don’t think I can get up,” Herman said. He too was sounding very unhappy.
Dortmunder swallowed. Then he swallowed again. “Just a little longer,” he said in a strangled voice and kept on swallowing.
Up front, Murch drove along in blissful ignorance. He was the one who’d found this place, and he’d worked out the fastest and smoothest route to reach it. Now he saw it, up ahead, the tall green fence around the yard, surmounted by the sign reading, “Lafferty’s Mobile Homes — New, Used, Rebuilt, Repaired.” He slowed to a stop in the darkness just beyond the main entrance, got out of the truck, walked around to the back, opened the doors, and they shot out of there like they’d been locked in with a lion.
Murch said, “Wha …” but there wasn’t anybody to ask; they’d all run across the road to the fields on the other side, and though he couldn’t see them, the sounds they were making reminded him of clambakes. The endings of clambakes.
Puzzled, he looked into the interior of the truck, but it was too dark to see anything in there. “What the hell,” he said, making it a statement because there was nobody around to ask a question of, and walked back up to the cab. In his usual check of the glove compartment he’d seen a flashlight, which he now got and carried back to the rear of the truck. When Dortmunder came stumbling across the road again, Murch was playing the light around the empty inside of the truck and saying, “I don’t get it.” He looked at Dortmunder. “I give up,” he said.
“So do I,” said Dortmunder. He looked disgusted. “If I ever tie up with Kelp again, may I be put away. I swear to God.”
Now the others were coming back. Herman was saying, “Boy, when you go out to steal a truck, you pick a real winner.”
“Is it my fault? Can I help it? Read the truck for yourself.”
“I don’t want to read the truck,” Herman said. “I never want to see the truck again.”
“Read it,” Kelp insisted. He went over and banged the side. “It says paper! That’s what it says!”
“You’re gonna wake everybody in the neighborhood,” Herman said.
“It says paper,” Kelp whispered.
Murch said to Dortmunder quietly, “I don’t suppose you’re going to tell me about this.”
“Ask me tomorrow,” Dortmunder said.
Victor came back last, rubbing his face and mouth with a handkerchief. “Wow,” he said. “Wow. That was worse than tear gas.” He wasn’t smiling at all.
Murch shone the flashlight around the inside of the truck one last time, and then shook his head and said, “I don’t care. I don’t even want to know.” Still, on the way back up to the cab, he did pause to read the side of the truck, and Kelp had been absolutely right; it said “paper.” Murch, looking put-upon, got into the cab again and shut the door behind him. “Don’t tell me,” he muttered.
Meanwhile the other four, also looking put-upon, were getting their gear from inside the truck; they’d traveled light the first time out of it. Herman had a black bag similar to the kind doctors used to carry, back when they made house calls. Dortmunder got his leather jacket and Kelp got his shopping bag.
They all went from the truck over to the fence, where Kelp, looking pained, reached into the shopping bag and pulled out half a dozen cheap steaks, one at a time, and threw them over the fence. The others all faced the other way, and Kelp’s nose wrinkled at the smell of food, but he didn’t complain. Very quickly after he started throwing the steaks over, they heard the Doberman pinschers arrive on the other side and start snarling among themselves as they gobbled the meat. Murch had counted four of them in his daytime visit here; the other two steaks were just in case he’d missed a couple.