"It had better be worth it, Schemer."
"It will be." He sounded confident. "Where shall I mail the kit?"
"To Earl Drake. General Delivery at-" I stopped to think.
"Washington, D.C.?" Frenz asked.
I knew the General Delivery window in the mail post office in Washington, D.C. It certainly wasn't my first choice. It could be staked out for a look at a man picking up an envelope. I didn't know that the Schemer was that curious, but I didn't know that he wasn't, either.
"Make it Richmond, Virginia," I decided. The General Delivery office there was a cubbyhole no one could hang around without making himself conspicuous. "And this is only for a look, Schemer. If I decide to take on the job, I'll call you again."
"Right," Frenz said briskly. "The plans will be in Richmond tomorrow afternoon."
And I won't be far behind, dear boy, I thought, but I didn't say it. "I'll be in touch," I said before hanging up.
It had worked out well.
If anyone should become curious about Carl Kessler, former partner of Ed Morris, any backtracking would lead only to Morris's grave in potter's field in Santa Fe.
I drove on to the motel and went to bed.
I started early in the morning.
I slept well, something I had been doing infrequently recently. I used to think I didn't have a nerve in my body, but recent events made me aware that even at a subconscious level, I knew I was in a tighter financial box than I had been in years.
My money was running out. I still had the jar buried in the Colorado mountains, but if I retrieved that and got into a jam afterward, I had absolutely nothing else to fall back on. Without a reserve such as the Colorado jar represented, a situation like the one I'd found myself in at the prison hospital in Florida could well have been the end of the line.
It was a relief to be in action again, however tenuously. I wouldn't really know if it was action or not until I saw the contents of the Schemer's kit, of course. The week of making no progress with Rudy Hernandez hadn't been wasted, though. I had time to practice with the contents of the makeup kit the blonde in Pensacola had sold me, and I was satisfied that now only a professional eye would be able to discern the plastic-surgery scars beneath the makeup. It was a bonus that with further practice I could become adept at making subtle changes in my appearance. I could sufficiently alter skin tone and shadows before going on a job so that descriptions would be confusing. All I really needed was to knock over a quick one and remove the hot breath of financial insecurity from the back of my neck.
I reached Richmond at noon the second day. I used the driver's license supplied by Blind Tom Walker when I asked for mail at the General Delivery window. The clerk handed me a large manila envelope that had seventy-two cents worth of stamps on it to cover the indicated first-class postage.
The bulk of the envelope disturbed me. It suggested an extremely detailed plan, which in turn pointed to a complicated job. I hadn't time for such a caper. I went back to the VW and drove to the Holiday Inn on Route 301. After checking in, I stopped off in the coffee shop for a chicken sandwich and a glass of iced tea, then went to my room. I locked and chain-latched the door, sat down in an armchair, and opened the envelope.
The bulkiness of its contents was explained immediately. It was made up of sheet after sheet of stiff-paper line drawings, which in effect were blueprints of the floor plan of a bank. In addition, there were page after page of biography on the habits of the bank employees, both at work and at home.
There were an additional two pages in single-spaced elite type describing the police routines for the area. The bank was in a suburb where official jurisdiction overlapped, and the typewritten sheets gave chapter and verse on the schedules of both the city police force and the sheriff's department of the county. On a separate sheet was plotted possible escape routes, with traffic lights indicated in red and one-way streets in blue. Robert "The Schemer" Frenz was nothing if not thorough.
Clipped to the top sheet, which was labeled "Summary," was a typewritten note. Its message was brief. "Three-man job," it said. "Known available workmen: Sandy Bascombe, Dick Dahl, Thirsty Huddleston, Preacher Harris, Bob Wolfe, Jess Burkett. Call me."
I pushed everything else aside while I scanned the summary sheet. The bank was in Thornton, a suburb of Philadelphia. I knew the area, which helped. It was apparent at once that the pivotal point of the proposed job was that the suburban bank received cash by armored car after closing each Wednesday afternoon. On Thursday mornings the cash was separated among the tellers for making up factory payrolls and cashing checks. If the bank were entered before business hours on a Thursday morning, it should be possible to pick up the armored car delivery still in bulk before the usual distribution.
A complication was that the vault combination was shared by the bank manager and his assistant. Each had only half the combination. This meant that both had to be separated from their families early in the morning on the day the job was to be pulled. They would have to be herded to the bank together. The other employees would have to be immobilized as they entered the bank until the time lock on the vault went off and permitted it to be opened by the manager and assistant. Otherwise it appeared that the job called for standard operating procedure.
I set the summary aside and stared at the blank gray face of the room's television set. I didn't like the plan. There were so many variables in the Schemer's proposal that I hesitated on the brink of instant rejection. The plan called for too many people to be managed, in too many different places, by the unknown quantities in the way of partners I'd be forced to employ.
But what choice did I have? I could ask Frenz for a one-man package, but if he didn't have one on the shelf, what then? Walk in off the street cold with a brown paper bag and show a teller a gun? I'd seen too many men panicked by circumstances who'd gone that route when squeezed. It kept the jails full.
I picked up the summary sheet again with its attached note and reread the names. Sandy Bascombe, Dick Dahl, Thirsty Huddleston, Preacher Harris, Bob Wolfe, Jess Burkett. Huddleston I knew. He had nerve, but he wasn't called Thirsty for nothing. I drew a line through his name.
Dahl rang a bell. I sat there thinking about it. Finally it came to me. Hernandez had mentioned Dahl's name at the Golden Peacock. Rudy's remarks had coupled Dahl with the memory of Clem Powers, a fantastic cocksman. "La-dykiller," Hernandez had called Dahl. It was hardly a recommendation. I drew a line through Dahl's name.
Wolfe I didn't know. Burkett I didn't know. Two more drawn lines. Harris I knew. Preacher Harris, although I'd never worked with him, had the reputation of being a cool and steady operator everywhere except at the card and dice tables. Harris was a compulsive gambler, but when he was broke enough he was all business. I put a circle around his name. Bascombe I didn't know. Another line drawn.
So I had one possible from the list. Could two men do the job? I spread the floor plan of the bank in front of me and went over it carefully, then referred to the summary again. Fifteen minutes later I reached a conclusion. Two men couldn't swing it. Too much maneuvering would be needed to get the right people to the right place at the right time.
I put everything back into the envelope again, put the envelope under my arm, and left the room. I called Frenz from the pay phone in the lobby, a few feet away from the registration desk. When he came on the line, I gave him the number of the pay phone. "I'll call you back in ten minutes," he promised.
I sat in the phone booth waiting for his call. When it came, I heard the ding-ding-ding of coins, indicating that Frenz had moved to a pay phone, too. I went right to the point. "You've handed me a three-man package, Schemer, and I'm alone. What do you have in the way of a solo shot?"