Man Number One went to the window. As he moved away from the table I got a better look at him. He was wearing blue jeans and some sort of black, shiny plastic coat.
No, a garbage bag. He had a black plastic garbage bag on. Along with the surgical mask, and the cap made from the same green fabric. As he turned around, I saw his eyes. I could see that he had fair skin, and eyebrows so blond they were invisible.
He looked right at me and saw me looking at him. I quickly looked away, but it was too late. I heard him come toward me, and then once again I felt the weight of the gun press against my left temple.
“Close your eyes,” he said.
This is it, I thought. This is the last thing I feel. The carpet against one side of my face, the gun against the other. A dog scratching at a door, the last sound I’ll ever hear. Until the gunblast.
I waited for it. The gun didn’t move.
“What’s taking them so long?” the other man said, his first words. This man didn’t sound Canadian. “Maybe one of us should go check on them?”
“Just relax,” the man above me said. I felt the gun leave my head. “Give ’em another minute.”
“I should have shot that dog.”
“You don’t shoot dogs.”
“That one I would shoot. It’s not even a dog.”
“Thing’s so small you would have missed it.”
There was a sudden commotion from upstairs. It sounded like glass breaking.
“The fuck’s going on up there?”
“It’s okay. He told you to expect that.”
“Sounds like he’s destroying the place.”
“You know what he’s doing.”
There was another crash, and then another. A few seconds passed, and then there was another crash that had to be a window breaking.
A minute later, the third man came back into the room.
“Where is he?” the first man asked.
There was no answer, not one that I could hear.
“Are we done?”
Again, no answer. Maybe the man was just gesturing with his hands, or nodding his head.
“All right, let’s get the hell out of here then,” the first man said. “Gentlemen, here’s what you’re going to do. I see a very fancy oven in that kitchen. I’m sure it has a timer on it. I’m going to set it for fifteen minutes. During that time, you will not move, eh? Do you understand me? You will not move a muscle. I hope you appreciate the fact that we didn’t shoot anybody. In fact, you’ll notice that you still have your wallets, your watches, your wedding rings. Please don’t make us change our minds. It would really spoil the evening, don’t you think?”
On that note, they left. We heard the door close. A vehicle started up in the driveway and then drove away. We all kept lying there on the floor. There was no other sound except the dog in the closet.
“Like hell I’m staying here for fifteen minutes,” Jackie said.
“How’s everybody doing?” I said. “Bennett? You all right?”
“I think so,” he said, sitting up.
“Get down!” Kenny said. “Didn’t you hear what they said?”
“Kenny, if they come back,” Bennett said, “I’ll be sure to tell them not to shoot you.”
“Where’s Vargas?” Gill said. “I don’t think he came back down.”
We all looked at each other-not including Kenny, who still had his nose buried in the carpet. “Why don’t you guys make sure they’re gone,” I said. “And call the police. Jackie and I’ll go see about Vargas.”
“You got it,” Bennett said. “C’mon, Gill.”
Jackie rubbed his legs as he stood up. “I’m too damned old for this,” he said. “You reach a certain point in your life, you shouldn’t have guns pointed at you.”
“I can’t argue with that,” I said. We went up the stairs.
Jackie stopped midway up, leaned over with one hand on his knee, the other on the rail.
“Jackie, are you all right?”
“Is this what it felt like, Alex? When you were a cop and that man was pointing the gun at you?”
“Yeah, it was,” I said. “Right up until he shot me.”
“Do you think they would’ve shot us if they had to?”
“I don’t know,” I said. “I’m glad we didn’t have to find out.”
“Which room is he in?” Jackie said, pulling himself back up. He went to the first door and pushed it open. “He’s not in here.”
“All that glass breaking,” I said. “I’ve got a feeling he’s down here…” I led him to the last door in the hallway. It was closed. I gave Jackie one more look, and then I pushed the door open.
Vargas was on the floor, his hands on his face. The rest of the room was in a complete shambles. All the maps had been torn off the walls. The display cases had been broken, every single one of them. The window overlooking the river was shattered.
“Vargas!” I said, bending down next to him. I put my hand on his back. He was alive.
“Oh God,” he said. “Oh God oh God oh God.”
“Are you all right?” I helped him up. He got halfway up and then sat back down against the wall. He looked at me, and then at Jackie, and then at what was left of his room.
“What happened downstairs?” he finally said.
“Everybody’s fine,” I said. “They just left.”
“The dog’s still in the closet?”
“Yes.”
“Anybody call the police yet?”
“Bennett’s probably doing that right now,” I said.
“He put the gun on the back of my neck and said, ‘Open the safe, or this bullet will come out right between your eyes.’ When I opened it, he made me get down here on my knees and cover my face with my hands. And then he started smashing everything. I was afraid to look.”
“You did the right thing,” I said. “Nothing else you could’ve done.”
“He knew about the safe,” Vargas said. “He even knew what room it was in.”
I turned and saw the open safe on the far wall. It had been hidden behind one of the maps.
“Why destroy the place?” Vargas said. He pushed himself up against the wall until he was on his feet. “Why did he do that?”
“Look down here,” Jackie said. He was standing by the window.
Vargas crunched through all the broken glass, picking his way across the room. When he got to the window, he stood next to Jackie and looked out. A breeze brought the damp smell of the river into the room.
I went to the window, making the same sounds as Vargas on the broken glass. Peeking over their shoulders, I saw the wreckage on the ground below. One of the maps was halfway out of its frame, a corner flapping as the wind picked up. Vargas’s telescope lay a good thirty feet from the house, right on the shoreline, half of it on land and half in the dark water. A thousand shards of glass twinkled in the light from the back deck.
Vargas looked out for a long moment. Then he looked at Jackie and me again. “They knew where the safe was,” he said. “That’s the thing. How did they know that?”
I didn’t think it was a question we were supposed to answer, so I didn’t even try.
“How did they know that?” he said again.
“Come on,” Jackie said. “Let’s go downstairs.”
He took Vargas by the arm. Vargas didn’t seem to want to move at first, but finally he did. We all crunched our way out of the room and down the stairs. Kenny had finally gotten off the floor, God bless him, but he still looked like somebody needed to slap the color back into his face.
“Win!” he said. “What the hell happened up there?”
“He made me open the safe,” Vargas said. “Then he smashed the window and every fucking thing in the room.”
“Police are on the way,” Bennett said. “Gill is outside.”
“Where’s my dog?”
“They broke one of your doors,” Bennett said. “I guess the other two must have been unlocked.”
“Yeah, I didn’t figure on getting invaded,” Vargas said. “If they hurt that dog…”
The shock was wearing off, I thought. I’ve seen this before. Now it’s time for him to start getting mad…