On contact there was a shudder, followed by a metallic boom and flash of light. Finally a sharp breeze wafted up the stairs and glass crashed as a picture of George Washington blew off the wall.
After giving a moment for dust to settle and their ears to stop ringing, PT and Miles took out their earplugs and hurried down the stairs.
Miles leaned anxiously into the hole to check that the blast hadn’t damaged the tunnel. There were externally sealed steel doors at the top of the staircase and armed security guards at the end of a long, first-floor corridor, so the tunnel was the only way out that didn’t involve the inconvenience of federal prison.
‘Few bits of floor crumbled into the chamber,’ Miles observed. ‘Looks OK apart from that.’
PT was more interested in the door of cage two. The vault was locked using three heavy-gauge pins sandwiched inside the door. Opening was via a dual-key mechanism that required two people turning locks built into the wall on opposite sides of the door. This was designed to stop a single staff member getting inside the cage and helping themselves to a handful of untraceable notes.
The array of cogs and gears inside the heavily armoured door led to a single bolt which ran through its centre. This secured the main handle locking the pins in place. Any security system is only as strong as its weakest element and while the double locking system prevented pilfering, its complexity played into the hands of any decent safe breaker.
Miles had stolen the vault plans from a lightly-guarded archive in the Federal Reserve offices above. He’d calculated that four precisely-placed explosives would create a shockwave that cracked the central lever holding the locking pins in place. If Miles had his sums right, PT only had to pull on the lever, the lock pins would slide across and the two-tonne door would glide open.
PT raised the handle. There was a clank, followed by an anxious moment as nothing happened. A more powerful tug did the trick and the huge door took on its own momentum, forcing PT backwards as it glided silently into the room.
The door opening triggered three light bulbs and they lit up steel innards – four metres deep and lined with metal shelving. PT stepped around the door and went inside. The air was stale and the thick walls ate every sound.
The shelves were full of football-sized white cotton bags. Each was stamped FOR INCINERATION, and a handwritten tag detailed the contents: Bank of Manhattan – $9,270 mixed values. Deposited 12.4.38 counted and swapped by CLK 12.6.38.
Miles stood in the doorway as his middle son snapped off the tag, peered at the bundles of crumpled notes inside and broke into an enormous grin.
‘So Dad,’ PT said. ‘How’s it feel being a millionaire?’
CHAPTER FOUR
Bert’s Joint had been on the same corner for thirty years, doing a good trade from one of the best all-day breakfasts in town and pies made by Bert’s old lady. It wasn’t unknown for Wall Street types and shoppers to come by and pick up whole pies to take home in the daytime, but most custom went to cab drivers, print workers and late-night cleaners who sat at the tables taking their time.
After dark it was a warm crowd. A fat old cop named Vernon and his young partner Perkins got friendly glances and a couple of waves as they came inside and sat at a table well away from the cold near the doorway. Vernon was hobbling and a cab driver looked over the rim of next morning’s newspaper and had to ask.
‘Watcha do, Vern, slip on the ice? It’s deadly out there, ain’t it?’
Vernon’s gut squeezed between the bench and a table, while his younger colleague told the story.
‘Got a call over to A and H Hardware. Skinny damned kid put a garbage can through the front window.’
‘A and H.’ The cabbie nodded. ‘Smash and grab?’
The young cop batted the snow off his cap as he shrugged. ‘Except the kid didn’t grab anything. Left his scarf behind and twenty-three dollars in the register. Made a bit of a mess looking for something, then legged it out the back way.’
‘You get him?’
The younger cop sniggered into his moustache, unsure whether to answer. Vernon was senior, and he wasn’t certain he’d want people knowing.
Vernon raised his hands. ‘Damn it, Perky, someone’s gonna tell ’em, so it might as well be me. Perkins was driving, so I was inside the store first. Saw the little runt go out the back window – but let’s just say I ain’t as svelte as I was in the day.’
Perkins laughed. ‘You’da loved it. I came in that back room, there’s Vernon with his fat ass wedged in the window. Get me outta here, Davie! If I get my hands on that little mother I’ll …’
Half a dozen regulars who’d tuned into the story rattled with laughter.
‘And you got your ankle hurt in the window?’
‘That was afterwards,’ Perkins said. ‘Vern was so stirred up he came straight out on the pavement, fell on his ass and landed up in the gutter.’
This payoff got an even bigger laugh, as Bert’s son put two coffees on the table in front of them. ‘One black, one white,’ the waiter said. ‘You know, officers, I mighta seen something. If that kid came out the back of A and H, he would have emerged through the archway across the avenue, right?’
Officer Vernon waved his hand uninterestedly. ‘We cruised for a half-hour trying to pick the brat up; he’s long gone, and good riddance.’
‘Let me finish, Vern,’ the waiter said. ‘I was outside, right? Maybe forty-five minutes ago. Kid came running across the street, barely looking, and I mean, you don’t run in this ice unless you really have to so it been your boy. Thing is, I’ve seen that kid loadsa times at our other diner, a few blocks down. Kid comes in at night, always pretty late, and sometimes he’s wearing this overall spattered with mud. He buys coffees and sodas, speaks with an accent – Italian or French or something. I asked him why he was out so late one time and he said he was working on a crew with his dad, digging drains.’musta
Perkins looked interested. ‘You know where?’
The waiter nodded. ‘I’ve seen him go in that parking place. You know, red sign – horse with the spike coming out of its head?’
‘Unicorn,’ Perkins said, grabbing his cap off the table and rising up out of his seat. ‘We’ll go check it out.’
But Vern grabbed his partner’s arm and pulled him down, before looking up at the waiter. ‘Listen, no offence but you’re probably putting two and two together to make five. I appreciate your trying to help, but I mean, how much can you really see of a face flashing by in the dark?’
The waiter looked affronted, but he wasn’t going to start an argument with a tip-paying customer. ‘I was pretty sure it was him,’ he said. ‘But you’ve got a lot of experience, Vern, you’re probably right.’
Perkins looked at his partner. ‘It’s only two blocks down, boss. Two-minute drive. I can’t see what harm it’ll do.’
Vernon grunted. ‘OK, we’ll go over and see if anyone’s working over there – but first, I’m gonna eat. I want my usual grilled steak and fries and, what pies you got today?’
‘Peach, cherry, chocolate cream and key lime.’
Vernon nodded enthusiastically. ‘Slice of chocolate, slice of peach, both with ice cream.’
One of the cab drivers laughed when he heard this. ‘Two pieces of pie and a steak at four in the morning, Vern. No wonder you go around getting your fat can jammed in windows.’
*
PT had been waiting for months. He’d got so used to coming out every night that his nerves were numb to the whole thing: digging in the tunnel until you almost passed out from lack of air, loading dirt into the truck, dead rats, tunnel floods and curse-filled nights when it seemed the train was never going to run right.
He’d imagined the payoff a million times, but something popped in PT’s head when he ripped open the first cotton bag and saw the crumpled notes inside. With the bags of money in his hands it was no longer the latest in a line of petty scams and pawnbroker’s safes. This was all he’d ever dreamed of.
Ev
eryone’s role had been planned out. PT was the first link in the chain, carrying bags of money from the safe and packing them into cardboard boxes. Two boxes slotted perfectly on to a wooden carriage and when six had been passed into the chamber and stacked on board the train by his father, the bell would be rung and Leon would haul the loaded carriages through the tunnel.
At the far end, Leon unloaded the train, threw the bags up to seven-year-old Jeannot, then rang the bell for his father to bring back the train. Jeannot took the bags of money from the storeroom and threw them inside a truck parked on the exit ramp with its rear doors hanging open. By the time the train returned to the station, PT had six more boxes ready for the next trip.
*
Vernon thought checking out Unicorn Tyre and Parking was a waste of time and with his bad ankle and two slices of pie in his belly he didn’t even get out of the car, which his partner Perkins had parked in front of the main gate.
‘Careful on that ice, Perky,’ Vernon said, as his partner got out.
The twenty-five-year-old officer had joined NYPD intending to make sergeant inside three years. It hadn’t happened because it’s hard to shine when you’re partnered with a low-flyer like Vernon who’d sooner eat pie than bust criminals. Still, Vern was a nice old guy and Perkins earned enough to feed three kids, which is more than a lot of people could say during the worst economic depression in history.
Perkins rattled Unicorn’s main gate and saw that it was locked. Peering through the bars revealed nothing except the attendant’s booth and the up and down ramps. Only as he stepped back did he notice the small gate-within-a-gate. It didn’t appear locked, so he slid the bolt across and stepped through. A mouse scuttled from somewhere to somewhere else and he smelled the piles of fresh rubber out the back of the tyre shop as his soles squeaked on the concrete.
It seemed dead, but the unlocked gate was suspicious, so Perkins hooked the long flashlight off his belt. He shone it along the up ramp, then on to the down ramp where he saw a truck parked halfway up with its back doors flapping open. This was an unusual spot to park, but things really got interesting when he noticed small brown shoes moving around behind the rear tyres.
‘Bags are in, Leon,’ Jeannot shouted. ‘Ready for the next train.’
If it had been a man’s voice Perkins would have backed off and called for help. But he’d look stupid if he called in extra officers for a couple of homeless kids playing trains in a parking lot. And he was intrigued by that fact that this was a kid. Maybe the waiter in Bert’s had been right and he’d stumbled on a little gang that had robbed A&H Hardware. It was no career case, but it was the kind of solid police work that would impress the shift lieutenant.
Perkins flicked off his torch, backed up to the wall and stepped gingerly into the narrow gap between the side wall of the ramp and the body of the truck. He heard some thumping inside the truck and realised that the kid had noticed the torchlight and dived inside for cover.
As Perkins pushed gently to move the rear doors of the truck so that he could get past, a small bell sounded. He leaned past the end of the truck, noticing the door into the storeroom, and a rubber hose dribbling water.
He couldn’t see any movement, but he could hear breathing like a man doing physical labour and there was a deadness to the sound, as if it came from below. Perkins could make no sense of it, but whatever was going on he didn’t like it. It was time to back out, but as he turned around he saw two shotgun barrels aimed at his chest from the end of the truck.
‘I’m not here to hurt you, sonny,’ Perkins said warily, surprised by the determined look on seven-year-old Jeannot’s clay-spattered face. But he didn’t believe for one moment that someone so small would pull the trigger.
At point-blank range the muzzle flashed and pellets tore through Perkins’ face and chest, sending him crashing back to the ground. The recoil knocked Jeannot back inside the truck into the bags of money. He found his feet and jumped down, gun still in his hands, as seventeen-year-old Leon shouted from down in the hole.
‘What was that, Jeannot? What did I tell you about touching Dad’s gun?’
‘I shot someone,’ Jeannot shouted, as he moved closer and saw an NYPD badge shining on the blood-spattered chest. ‘A cop.’
Leon didn’t believe what he was hearing. He wanted to pull out of the hole and investigate, but he’d almost got the train home and when it was heavy it had a nasty tendency to jump the tracks if there was a sudden change of speed.
As soon as the train clattered into the station at his feet, Leon vaulted out of the hole and found his brother frozen stiff, staring at a big red mess on the concrete.
‘Is he dead?’ Jeannot asked.
Leon snatched the shotgun. ‘Jeannot, if your brain’s spread up the wall like that, you can be sure of it.’
Jeannot’s voice went all high like he was about to cry. ‘But,’ he blurted, after a pause, ‘Dad always told us to shoot first and ask questions later.’
Leon gave his little brother a pat on the back. ‘You did the right thing, but now we need to get out of here. Did you see anyone else?’exactly
‘Just him,’ Jeannot said.
Leon thought for a second. ‘Cops work in pairs. I’ll go look for the other one. You jump down the hole and do the emergency ring on the bell. You know how that goes?’
Jeannot nodded. ‘Three rings, stop, three rings. Repeat after ten seconds if they don’t respond.’
As Jeannot raced into the storeroom, Leon stalked his way around the side of the truck, clutching the shotgun and moving slow with his back close to the wall. At the top of the ramp he saw the outline of a fat man looking through the open gates.
‘Perky, watcha got down there?’ Officer Vernon shouted.
Leon made a dash from the top of the ramp to the rear of the ticket booth and crouched down low. The fat man heard but didn’t see.
‘That you, Perkins?’
Leon poked his head out and watched as the fat cop took a couple of steps. The cop was limping badly and clearly in no state to go far; he backed up to the car. As he leaned inside to radio for backup, Leon came out of hiding and rushed him.
‘Officer Vernon requesting assistance, I’m at Unicorn Tyre on the corner of—
The radio operator back at the precinct heard the bang. Vernon felt a shower of pellets hitting his back and thighs, but Leon had shot from too far away and most of the pellets chinked against the car. As Leon pulled down the shotgun barrel to reload, Officer Vernon got his hand on his service revolver and shot back blindly.
The first shot went wild, but the bang made Leon jump, giving Vernon time to take aim second time around. The bullet exploded inside Leon’s chest, blowing his lungs apart as he crashed backwards into the gates of the Unicorn parking lot.
A burst of adrenaline had kept Vernon upright while he was under attack, but once Leon was down Vernon succumbed to the pain of the hot pellets buried under his skin and collapsed into the snow beside the car.
Vernon tried reaching inside to grab the microphone, but gave up when he realised he didn’t need to. The operator at the precinct had heard the shotgun blast at the end of his last transmission.
‘Code one,’ the operator yelled through the radio static. ‘Possible officer shooting. All units head for Unicorn Tyre and Parking. Priority one!’
*
PT ran out of cage two and jumped into the hole as soon as his father yelled.
‘They rung a three and three,’ Miles explained. ‘Time to get outta here.’
PT was startled. ‘Half the money’s still in there. Isn’t Leon bringing us back on the train?’
Miles sounded impatient. ‘If your brother was sending the train he’d have given us a four and a two. It’s probably water building up in the tunnel again, but you know the rules: three and three signal means we’re coming out.’
The tunnel was a thirty-second ride when you were being pulled. When you powered yourself, you lay on your back instead of your belly and
propelled yourself by kicking against the ground or pulling on the ceiling props. The journey took two minutes, longer if there was a lot of standing water.
PT lay on a trolley and his father tucked a stray bag of money between his legs.
‘Just in case we don’t get back down here,’ he smiled, before giving his son a push start.
As PT rolled head first through the blackness he hoped it really was the last time he’d have to do it. They’d pulled out two million dollars, and that was enough to be getting along with. Leon had stopped pumping water when they started running the money on the train and a waterlogged section of tunnel apparently confirmed his dad’s theory that they’d have to halt operations and do a pump-out. This was a pain, but it was something they’d done a hundred times before.
But everything seemed wrong as PT sighted the end of the tunnel. Instead of Leon’s muddy arms he saw Jeannot crouching tearfully in the mouth of the tunnel.
‘What’s the matter, squirt?’ PT asked, grabbing his cart off the tracks because he could hear his father rolling up a few metres behind him.
‘Cops came. I shot one, but Leon went up after and they shot each other.’
The news hit PT like a fist in the balls. ‘Is Leon OK? Where is he?’
‘By the gate,’ Jeannot sobbed. ‘He’s dead.’
By this time Miles was out of the tunnel and he quickly picked up the gist. ‘Why’d it have to be tonight?’ he screamed. ‘Of all the shitty luck you can have. Jeannot, did you see more cops out there?’
‘Nope,’ Jeannot answered.
Miles led his sons out of the hole. He burrowed inside his trousers and pointed at the truck. ‘PT, get in the front and get the engine running. Jeannot, in the back with the money and make sure the doors are locked behind you.’
As his sons entered the truck Miles jogged up the ramp, where he found his eldest son slumped against the gate. The cop car was still parked across the exit, but Officer Vernon had passed out from the pain.
Miles wanted to stop and say goodbye to his eldest son, but he only had time to take back his shotgun and give him a quick kiss on the cheek.