Kelp said, "Hey! Wait a second!"
Chefwick came up off his chair and ran around in front of Dortmunder. "I understand how you feel," he said. "Honestly I do. At first, when Kelp and Greenwood came out to see me, I had the same attitude as you. But I listened, I let them explain it to me, and when they did-"
"That was where you made your mistake," Dortmunder told him. "Never listen to those two, they've turned all of life into a quick game of smack."
"Dortmunder," Chefwick said, "we need you. It's as simple as that. With you running things we can get this job done once and for all."
Dortmunder looked at him. "Job? Jobs, you mean. Do you realize we've already pulled three heists for that stinking emerald, and we still don't have it? And no matter how many heists we pull, our take is still the same."
Greenwood had come over now to the door, where Chefwick and Dortmunder were standing, and he said, "No, it isn't. At first it was thirty a man, and then for the police station it went up to thirty-five."
Kelp came over too, saying, "And the Major will go up again, Dortmunder, I already talked to him. Another five thousand a man. That's forty gee for walking into an insane asylum and walking back out with crazy-like-a-fox Prosker."
Dortmunder turned to him. "No, it isn't," he said. "That would be the fourth heist, and that one's a kidnapping, which is a Federal offense and they can give you the chair for it. But even just talking economics, that's the fourth heist, and four heists for forty grand is ten thousand dollars a caper, and I haven't worked a job for ten grand since I was fourteen years old."
Kelp said, "You gotta think about the living expenses too. That's another couple grand, by the time we're done. Twelve thousand dollars isn't all that bad for a heist."
"It's a jinx," Dortmunder said. "Don't give me any more horoscope stuff, all I'm saying is I'm not superstitious and I don't believe in jinxes, but there's one jinx in the world and that emerald is it."
Greenwood said, "Just look at it, Dortmunder. Just go out on the train and look at it, that's all we ask. If it doesn't look good to you, we'll forget it."
"It doesn't look good to me," Dortmunder said.
Greenwood said, "How do you know? You haven't even seen it yet."
"I don't have to," Dortmunder said. "I already know I hate it." He spread his hands. "Why don't you people just go do it yourselves? Or you need five men, get somebody else. You can even use my phone."
Chefwick said, "I think we should put our cards on the table."
Greenwood shrugged. "I suppose so," he said.
Murch, the only one still seated and still sipping away at his beer, called, "I told you that in the first place."
Kelp said, "I just didn't want to put pressure on him like that, that's all."
Dortmunder, looking around at everybody with grim suspicion, said, "What now?"
Chefwick told him, "Iko won't finance us without you."
Greenwood said, "He's sold on you, Dortmunder, he knows you're the best man around."
"God damn it," said Dortmunder.
Kelp said, "All we want you to do is look at it. After that, if you say no go, we won't bother you any more."
"We could take the train up there tomorrow," Greenwood said.
"If you're willing," Chefwick said.
They all stood there and watched Dortmunder and waited for him to say something. He glowered at the floor and chewed his knuckle and after a while walked through them and back over to the table where he'd put down his bourbon. He picked it up, and took a healthy swallow, and turned around to look at them all.
Greenwood said, "You'll go take a look at the place?"
"I suppose so," Dortmunder said. He didn't sound happy.
Everybody else was happy. "That's great!" Kelp said.
"It'll give me a chance to get my head examined," Dortmunder said and finished his bourbon.
3
"Tickets," said the conductor.
"Air," said Dortmunder.
The conductor stood in the aisle with his punch poised. He said, "What?"
"There's no air in this car," Dortmunder told him. "The windows won't open and there isn't any air."
"You're right," the conductor said. "Could I have your tickets?"
"Could we have some air?"
"Don't ask me," said the conductor. "The railroad guarantees transportation, pick you up here, put you down there. The railroad isn't in the air business. I need your tickets."
"I need air," Dortmunder said.
"You could get off the train at the next stop," the conductor said. "Lots of air on the platform."
Kelp, sitting next to Dortmunder, tugged his sleeve and said, "Forget it. You're not gonna get anywhere."
Dortmunder looked at the conductor's face and saw that Kelp was right. He shrugged and handed over his ticket, and Kelp did the same, and the conductor made holes in them before giving them back. Then he did the same for Murch, across the aisle, and for Greenwood and Chefwick in the next seat back. Since the five were the only occupants of this car, the conductor then strolled slowly down the aisle and out the far end, leaving them once again alone.
Kelp said, "You never get any satisfaction from those union types."
"Sure," said Dortmunder. He looked around and said, "Anybody carrying?"
Kelp looked startled, saying, "Dortmunder! You don't bump off a guy for no air!"
"Who said anything about bump off? Isn't anybody heavy?"
"Me," said Greenwood, and from inside his Norfolk jacket - he was the spiffiest dresser in the group - he produced a Smith and Wesson Terrier, a five-shot.32 caliber revolver with a two-inch barrel. He handed it over to Dortmunder, butt first, and Dortmunder said, "Thanks." He took the gun, reversed it to hold it by the barrel and chamber, and said to Kelp, "Excuse me." Then he leaned across Kelp and punched a hole in the window.
"Hey!" said Kelp.
"Air," said Dortmunder. He turned and handed the gun back to Greenwood, saying, "Thanks again."
Greenwood looked a little dazed. "Any time," he said and looked at the butt, studying it for scratches. There weren't any, and he put it away again.
This was Sunday, the tenth of September, and they were on just about the only passenger train running in this direction on Sunday. The occasional platform they stopped beside was empty except for those three old men in baggy work pants who lean against the wall of every small-town railroad station platform in the United States. The sun was shining outside, and the fresh air blowing in through the hole Dortmunder had made was pleasantly scented with the odors of late summer. The train clackety-clacked along at a contemplative seventeen miles an hour, giving the passengers an opportunity to really study the landscape, and all in all it was the pleasant sort of leisurely excursion you just can't find too often in the twentieth century.
"How much longer?" Dortmunder said.
Kelp looked at his watch. "Another ten or fifteen minutes," he said. "You'll be able to see the place from the train. On this side."
Dortmunder nodded.
"It's a big old brick place," Kelp said. "It used to be a factory, they used to make prefabricated fallout shelters there."
Dortmunder looked at him. "Every time you start to talk to me," he said, "you tell me more facts than I want to know. Prefabricated fallout shelters. I don't want to know why the factory went bust."
"It's a pretty interesting story," Kelp said.
"I figured it probably was."
The train stopped just then and Dortmunder and Kelp looked out at the three old men, who looked back. The train started up again, and Kelp said, "We're the next stop."
"What's the name of the town?"
"New Mycenae. It's named after an old Greek city."
"I don't want to know why," Dortmunder said.
Kelp turned to look at him. "What's the matter with you?"
"Nothing," said Dortmunder, and the conductor came back into the car and walked down the aisle and stopped beside them. He frowned at the hole in the window. He said, "Who did that?"