Of course the alarm had been turned in and the roadblocks must have been forming up ahead—but that half mile went by fast at the speed we were doing. It was a matter of seconds before I saw the alley mouth ahead. I turned the truck into it, at the same time pressing the button on my pocket short wave.
Along the entire length of the alley my smoke bombs ignited. They were, of course, home made, as was all my equipment, nevertheless they produced an adequately dense cloud in that narrow alley. I pulled the truck a bit to the right until the fenders scraped the wall and only slightly reduced my speed, this way I could steer by touch. The monocycle drivers of course couldn’t do this and had the choice of stopping or rushing headlong into the darkness. I hope they made the right decision and none of them were hurt.
The same radio impulse that triggered the bombs was supposed to have opened the rear door of the trailer truck up ahead and dropped the ramp. It had worked fine when I had tested it, I could only hope now that it did the same in practice. I tried to estimate the distance I had gone in the alley by timing my speed, but I was a little off. The front wheels of the truck hit the ramp with a destructive crash and the armored truck bounced rather than rolled into the interior of the larger van. I was jarred around a bit and had just enough sense left to jam on the brakes before I plowed right through into the cab.
Smoke from the bombs made a black midnight of everything, that and my shaken-up brains almost ruined the entire operation. Valuable seconds went by while I leaned against the truck wall trying to get oriented. I don’t know how long it took, when I finally did stumble back to the rear door I could hear theguardsvoices calling back and forth through the smoke. They heard the bent ramp creak as I lifted it so I threw two gas bombs out to quiet them down.
The smoke was starting to thin as I climbed up to the cab of the tractor and gunned it into life. A few feet down the alley and I broke through into sunlight. The alley mouth opened out into a main street a few feet ahead and I saw two police cars tear by. When the truckreached[?] the street I stopped and took careful note of all witnesses. None of them showed any interest in the truck or the alley. Apparently all the commotion was still at the other end of the alley. I poured power into the engine and rolled out into the street, away from the store I had just robbed.
Of course I only went a few blocks in that direction then turned down a side street. At the next corner I turned again and headed back towards Moraio’s, the scene of my recent crime. The cool air coming in the window soon had me feeling better. I actually whistled a bit as I threaded the big truck through the service roads.
It would have been fine to go up the highway in front of Moraio’s, and see all the excitement, but that would have been only asking for trouble. Time was still important. I had carefully laid out a route that avoided all congested traffic and this was what I followed. It was only a matter of minutes before I was pulling into the loading area in the back of the big store. There was a certain amount of excitement here but it was lost in the normal bustle of commerce. Here and there a knot of truck drivers or shipping foremen were exchanging views on the robbery, since robots don’t gossip the normal work was going on. The men were, of course, so excited that no attention was paid to my truck when I pulled into the parking line next to the other vans. I killed the engine and settled back with a satisfied sigh.
The first part was complete. The second part of the operation was just as important though. I dug into my paunch for the kit that I always take on the job—for such an emergency as this. Normally, I don’t believe in stimulants, but I was still groggy from the banging around. Two cc’s of Linoten in my antecubital[?] cleared that up quickly enough. The spring was back in my step when I went into the back of the van.
The driver’s assistant and the guards were still out and would stay that way for at least ten hours. I arranged them in a neat row in the front of the truck where they wouldn’t be in my way, and went to work.
The armored car almost filled the body of the trailer as I knew it would; therefore I had fastened the boxes to the walls. They were fine, strong shipping boxes with Moraio’s printed all over them. It had been a minor theft from their warehouse that should go unnoticed. I pulled the boxes down and folded them forpacking,I was soon sweating and had to take my shirt off as I packed the money bundles into the boxes.
It took almost two hours to stuff andsealthe boxes with tape. Every ten minutes or so I would check through the peephole in the door; only the normal activities were going on. The police undoubtedly had the entire town sealed and were tearing it apart building by building looking for the truck. I was fairly sure that the last place they would think of looking was the rear of the robbed store.
The warehouse that had provided the boxes had also provided a supply of shipping forms. I fixed one of these on each box, addressed to different pick-up addresses and marked paid of course, and was ready to finish the operation.
It was almost dark by thistime,however I knew that the shipping department would be busy most of the night. The engine caught on the first revolution and I pulled out of the parking rank and backed slowly up to the platform. There was a relatively quiet area where the shipping dock met the receivingdock,I stopped the trailer as close to the dividing line as I could. I didn’t open the rear door until all the workmen were faced in a different direction. Even the stupidest of them would have been interested in why a truck was unloading the firm’s own boxes. As I piled them up on the platform I threw a tarp over them, it only took a few minutes. Only when the truck gates were closed and locked did I pull off the tarp and sit down on the boxes for a smoke.
It wasn’t a long wait. Before the cigarette was finished a robot from the shipping department passed close enough for me to call him.
“Over there. The M-19 that was loading these burned out a brake-band,you better see that they’re taken care of.”
His eyes glowed with the light of duty. Some of these higher M types take their job very seriously. I had to step back quickly as the forklifts and M-trucks appeared out of the doors behind me. There was a scurry of loading and sorting and my haul vanished down the platform. I lighted another cigarette and watched for a while as the boxes were coded and stamped and loaded on the outgoing trucks and local belts.
All that was left for me now was the disposing of the truck on some side street and changing personalities.
As I was getting into the truck I realized for the first time that something was wrong. I, of course, had been keeping an eye on the gate—but not watching it closely enough. Trucks had been going in and out. Now the realization hit me like a hammer blow over the solar plexus. They were the same trucks going both ways. A large, red cross-country job was just pulling out. I heard the echo of its exhaust roar down the street—then die away to an idling grumble. When it roared up again it didn’t go away, instead the truck came in through the second gate. There were police cars waiting outside that wall.Waiting for me.
Chapter 3
For the first time in my career I felt the sharp fear of the hunted man. This was the first time I had ever had the police on my trail when I wasn’t expecting them. The money was lost, that much was certain, but I was no longer concerned with that. It was me they were after now.
Think first,thenact. I was safe enough for the moment. They were, of course, moving in on me, going slowly as they had no idea of where I was in the giant loading yard. How had they found me? That was the important point. The local police are used to an almost crimelessworld,they couldn’t have found my trail this quickly. In fact, I hadn’t left a trail. Whoever had set the trap here had done it with logic and reason.