“Make no resistance, and walk slowly behind the counter!” Ruskin ordered as he wrapped his gun in a battered, old heavy woolen scarf with burn holes in it. He quickly moved behind the counter before the clerks in their cages became alert and could make a grab for the shotguns at their feet. Never expecting their bank to be robbed, they hesitated in confusion.
“Don’t even think about going for your guns!” Ruskin snapped. “Lay flat on the floor or you’ll get a bullet in your brain.” He motioned his cane at the frightened woman at the counter. “Come around the counter and lay down on the floor with the tellers and you won’t get hurt,” he said in a cold tone. Then he motioned the gun at Cardoza’s secretary. “You, too! Down on the floor!”
When all were lying on the highly polished mahogany floor facedown, he rapped on Cardoza’s door. Unable to distinguish voices outside his office, the bank’s manager was not aware of the macabre event unfolding within his bank. He waited out of habit for his secretary to enter, but she did not appear. Finally, irritated at being interrupted, he stepped from his desk and opened the door. It took him a full ten seconds to comprehend what was happening. He stared at Ruskin and the gun in his hand.
“What is the meaning of this?” he demanded. Then he saw the people lying on the floor and looked back at Ruskin in utter confusion. “I don’t understand. What is going on?”
“The first bank robbery of Salt Lake City,” said Ruskin, as if amused.
Cardoza did not move. He was frozen in shock. “You’re a director of a respectable New York bank. Why are you doing this? It makes no sense. What do you hope to gain by it?”
“I have my motives,” Ruskin answered, his voice cold and toneless. “I want you to make out a bank draft for four hundred seventy-five thousand dollars.”
Cardoza stared at him as if he was crazy. “A bank draft to whom?”
“Eliah Ruskin, who else?” answered Ruskin. “And be quick about it.”
Mired in confusion, Cardoza pulled open a drawer, retrieved a book containing bank drafts, and hurriedly scribbled out one for the amount Ruskin demanded. When finished, he passed it across the desk to Ruskin, who slipped it into his breast pocket.
“Now, down on the floor with the others.”
As if in the throes of a nightmare, Cardoza slowly lowered himself onto the floor next to his trembling secretary.
“Now, then, none of you move, or even twitch, until I tell you to.”
Without saying more, Ruskin walked inside the vault and began stuffing the bank’s currency into leather money sacks he’d seen earlier stacked on a shelf inside the huge five-ton door. He filled two of them, estimating the take at roughly two hundred thirty thousand dollars in larger denominations, none under ten dollars. He had planned well. From inside banking information, he knew that the Salt Lake Bank & Trust had received a large shipment of currency issued from the Continental & Commercial National Bank of Chicago for their reserves. The suitcase with his own money he left on another shelf of the vault.
Laying aside the sacks, he closed the vault door. It swung shut as easily as a door on a cupboard. Then he turned the bog wheel that activated the inside latches and set the timer for nine o’clock the next morning.
Unhurriedly, as if he was strolling through a park, he stepped behind the counter and ruthlessly shot the people lying on the floor in the back of the head. The muffled shots came so quickly, none had time to know what was happening and cry out. Then he raised the bank’s window shades, so people passing on the sidewalk could see that the vault was shut and would assume the bank was closed. The bodies were conveniently out of sight behind the counter.
Ruskin waited until the sidewalk was clear of foot traffic and vehicles before he nonchalantly exited the bank, locked the door, and strolled leisurely from the building, swinging his cane. By four o’clock, he had returned to the Peery Hotel, had a bath, and come down to the restaurant, where he enjoyed a large smoked-salmon plate with dill cream and caviar accompanied by a bottle of French Clos de la Roche Burgundy 1899. Then he read in the lobby for an hour before going to bed and slept like a rock.
LATE IN the morning, Ruskin took a taxi to the Salt Lake Bank & Trust. A crowd of people were clustered around the front door as an ambulance pulled away from the bank. Police in uniforms were in abundance. He pushed his way through the crowd, saw a man who was dressed like a detective, and addressed him.
“What happened here?” he asked courteously.
“The bank has been robbed and five people murdered.”
“Robbed, murdered, you say? This is disastrous. I deposited half a million dollars in cash here yesterday from my bank in New York.”
The detective looked at him in surprise. “Half a million dollars, you say? In cash?”
“Yes, I have my receipt right here.” Ruskin flashed the receipt in the detective’s face. The detective studied it for a few moments and then said, “You are Eliah Ruskin?”
“Yes, I’m Ruskin. I represent the Hudson River Bank of New York.”
“A half million dollars in cash!” the detective gasped. “No wonder the bank was robbed. You better come inside, Mr. Ruskin, and meet with Mr. Ramsdell, one of the bank’s directors. I’m Captain John Casale, with the Salt Lake Police Department.”
The bodies had been removed, but large areas of the mahogany floor were layered in dried blood. Captain Casale led the way to a man—a huge, fat man with a large protruding stomach behind a vest and massive watch chain. The man was sitting at Cardoza’s desk, examining the bank’s deposits. His brown eyes appeared dazed beneath the bald head. He looked up and stared at Ruskin, annoyed at the intrusion.
“This is Mr. Eliah Ruskin,” announced Casale. “He says he deposited half a million dollars with Mr. Cardoza yesterday.”
“Sorry to meet you under such tragic circumstances. I am Ezra Ramsdell, the bank’s managing director.” Ramsdell rose and shook Ruskin’s hand. “A terrible, terrible business,” he muttered. “Five people dead. Nothing like this has ever happened in Salt Lake City before.”
“Were you aware of the money Mr. Cardoza was holding for my bank?” asked Ruskin flatly.
Ramsdell nodded. “Yes, he called me on the telephone and reported that you had come in and placed your bank’s currency in the vault.”
“Since Mr. Cardoza, God rest his soul, wrote me out a receipt, my directors will assume your bank will make good on the loss.”
“Tell your directors not to worry.”
“How much cash did the robber take?” Ruskin asked.
“Two hundred forty-five thousand dollars.”
“Plus my half million,” he said, as if agitated.
Ramsdell looked at him queerly. “For some inexplicable reason, the robber didn’t take your money.”