From Cop Out

It had been a good Indian summer and there were still leaves on the tiring maples behind the plant. It was the evergreens that looked expectant, under the moon they stood like girls waiting to be asked by the tall dark handsome sky.

Howland turned away from the window, unadmiring. He hated November. November meant December, and December meant Christmas bills. He had no feeling for nature or religion or almost anything else but money. It seemed to him that for all his fifty-seven years he had been reaching out for money that would stick to his fingers. The irony was that so much of it had passed through them.

He compared his watch with the steel hands over the Manila driftwood door, lettered in computer-type characters CURTIS PICKNEY, General Manager.

Almost ten.

Howland went back to his desk. He studied the payroll.

So near and yet so far is the story of my life.

It had started with his first job out of the commercial course at New Bradford High. Old man Louie Wocjzewski had taken him on to tend register in the sandwich shop across the blacktop from Compo Copper and Brass. It had seemed to him then that there could not be so much cash in the world. They were working six-day shifts in those days and eight to nine hundred dollars a week had gone through the register. What he had got from it was twelve greasy singles, counted out in cautious cadence by old Wojy every Saturday night.

It had been worse at The Taugus County National Bank during his cage days when he had handled thousands belonging to everyone in town but Teller Howland. He had not even been able to afford a checking account at first because he had just married Sherrie-Ann and she had stupidly got herself pregnant and sick and then aborted in a mess of hospital and doctor and drug bills, she was still that way throwing their lousy few dollars around like he was a millionaire, my personal dollar drain, Howland’s Sewer I ought to call her. Why I didn’t ditch her long ago I’ll never know, she even makes rotten chowder.

He sat down at his desk before the greenbacks.

He had felt the tiny kick of hope when Curtis Pickney hired him for the new New Bradford branch of Aztec Paper Products. Pickney had spoken rapidly of company expansion, opportunities for advancement (to what?), fringe benefits (and no union), salary to start $103 (take-home $86.75, but you know those g.d. do-gooders in Washington, Mr. Howland), and after nine years he was all the way up to $112.90 take-home and he was still the bookkeeper of the New Bradford branch of Aztec Paper Products. And he would remain its bookkeeper at Pickney’s pleasure or until he was hauled out feet first or he made a stink, in which case he’d be still breathing but out on his canister. And where would a man of fifty-seven get a decent job in New Bradford? Or anywhere else?

What in hell is keeping them?

As he thought it he heard the triple knock at the back door of the plant.

Howland jumped.

One, two-three.

But he stood there.

The payroll was in undistributed sheafs of rubberbanded bills beside the canvas bag as he had brought it from the bank in the afternoon accompanied in their every-Wednesday waltz by Officer Wesley Malone, the town cop with the eyes that always seemed to be scouting for Indian sign or something.

I wonder what Wes would think of this, probably stalk me like he did the bobcat that showed up from Canada or some place and played hob at Hurley’s chicken farm. And put a bullet between its eyes.

The thought turned about and it strengthened him. Still, as Howland hurried to the back door through the dark plant his lungs labored and his heart punched away at his Adam’s apple.

But his head held true-blue to his plans. They did not include Sherrie-Ann. They did not even include Marie Griggs, the twitch-britches night counter-girl at Elwood’s Diner.

He was not sure what they did include.

Except $6,000.

A year’s pay practically, tax-free.

Howland unlocked the door.

#

Hinch was at the wheel. My wheelman, Furia called him. Hinch drove into the empty parking lot behind the plant and stopped the car on the tarmacadam ten feet from the rear entrance. It was a Chrysler New Yorker with a powerful purr, like Hinch. Black satin under the dust and not a dent. Furia had picked it out personally on the main drag in Newton Center, Mass, in broad daylight. They had switched plates on a back road near Lexington and Hinch crowed. It was a sweet bus, the neatest they had ever copped. It even had a police band on the radio. Furia was sitting up front with Hinch. Goldie was in the back seat flipping one of her Lady Vere de Vere cigarets, gold-tipped what else.

Furia got out.

He had a stiff’s skin, tight and yellow, and Mickey Mouse ears. Goldie, who was gone on Star Trek and Leonard Nimoy, had once called him Mr. Spock for a gag, but only once. Furia wore an executive three-button Brooks, a no-iron white shirt, a bleak gray silk tie, a two-inch Knox, black gloves, built-up heels, and amber goggles, the latest type, that made him look like a frogman. His London Fog he had left on the front seat.

He stood there like a spinning top, motionless to the eye. He looked around.

"No." He had a spinning sort of voice, too, so hard and tight it practically sang.

Goldie stopped in the act of stepping out of the car. Hinch did not move.

"Why not?" she asked.

"Because I’m giving you the word."

"Bitch," Hinch chortled.

Furia looked at him. Hinch gave him a rather embarrassed spread of the hand.

"I gave you the word, Goldie."

Goldie shrugged and stepped back into the Chrysler banging the door. When Goldie shrugged her long gold hair shrugged with her. She had borrowed the effect from the TV commercials. She was all gold and scarlet, a girl of bottles and pastes. Her miniskirt came eight inches under her crotch. She was wearing gold fishnets and tall gilt boots.

Her eyes sat on purple cushions, not eye shadow.

"Looks okay," Hinch said.

"Don’t kill the engine just in case."

"Don’t worry, Fure."

Furia stepped up to the plant door. He walked on the balls of his feet like an actor playing a thief. As he walked he felt for his shoulder holster the way other men feel for their zippers.He knocked three times. One, two-three.

The pair in the car sat very still. Hinch was looking into the rearview mirror. Goldie was looking into Furia.

"He’s taking his sonofabitch time," Furia said.

"He chickened out maybe," Hinch said.

Goldie said nothing.

The lock turned over and Howland stood in the moonlight like a ghost in shirtsleeves.

"Took your sonofabitch time," Furia said. "Where’s the gelt?"

"The what?"

"The moo. The payroll."

"Oh." Howland yawned suddenly. "On my desk. Make it snappy." His teeth clicked like telegraph keys. He kept sneaking looks at the deserted lot.

Furia nodded at the Chrysler and Hinch got out in one move: he was behind the wheel, he was on the macadam. Goldie stirred but when Furia gave her the look she sat back.

"Has he got the rope?" Howland asked.

"Come on." Furia jabbed at Howland’s groin playfully. The bookkeeper backed off and Hinch laughed. "What’s the stall? Let’s see that bread."

Howland led the way, hurrying. His steps echoed, Furia’s and Hinch’s did not. Hinch was wearing gloves now, too. He was carrying a black flight bag.

Howland’s desk was in a corner of the outer office near the window. There was a greenshade light over the desk.

"Here it is." He yawned again. "What am I yawning for?" he said. "Where is the rope?"

Hinch pushed him aside. "Hey, man," he said. "That’s a mess of bread."

"Twenty-four thousand. You don’t have to count it. It’s all there."

"Sure," Furia said. "We trust you. Start packing, Hinch."

Hinch opened the flight bag and began stuffing the bundles of bills in. Howland watched nervously. Into his nervousness crept alarm.

"Hey, you’re taking too much," Howland protested. "We had a deal. Where’s mine?"

"Here," Furia said, and shot him three times, one-and-two-three in a syncopated series. The third bullet went into Howland no more than two inches above the first two as the bookkeeper’s knees collapsed. The light over the desk bounced off his bald spot. His nose made a pulpy noise when it hit the vinyl floor.

Furia blew on his gun the way the bad guy did it in Westerns. It was a Walther PPK, eight-shot, which he had picked up in a pawnshop heist in Jersey City. It had a double-action hammer and Furia was wild about it. "It’s better than a woman," he had said to Goldie. "It’s better than you." He picked up the three ejected cases with his left hand and dropped them into his pocket. The automatic he kept in his right.

"You cooled him pretty," Hinch said, looking down at Howland. Blood was beginning to worm out on the vinyl from under the bookkeeper. "Well, let’s go, Fure." He had all the money in the bag, even the rolls of coins, and the bag zipped.

"I say when we go," Furia said. He was looking around as if they had all the time in the world. "Okay, that’s it."

He walked out. Hinch lingered. All of a sudden he was reluctant to leave Howland.

"Where’s the rope, he says." When Hinch grinned his mouth showed a hole where two front teeth had been. He was wearing a black leather windbreaker, black chinos, and blue Keds. He had rusty hair which he wore long at the neck and a nose that had been broken during his wrestling days. His eyes were small and of a light, almost nonexistent, pink-gray. "We forgot the gag, too, pidge," he said to Howland.

"Hinch."

"Okay, Fure, okay," Hinch said. He catfooted after Furia, looking pleased.

#
"I knew it," Goldie said. Hinch was backing the Chrysler around.

"You knew what?" Furia had the flight bag on his lap like a child.

"The shots. You killed him."

"So I killed him."

"Stupid."

Furia turned half around and his left hand swished across her face.

"I don’t dig a broad with lip neither," Hinch said approvingly. He drove across the lot on the bias, without lights. When he got to the turnout he braked. "Where to, Fure?"

"Over the bridge to the cloverleaf."

Hinch swung left and switched on the riding lights. There was no traffic on the outlying road. He drove at a humble thirty.

"You asked for it," Furia said.

There was a trickle of blood at the corner of Goldie’s pug nose. She was dabbing at it with a Kleenex.

"The thing is I don’t take names from nobody," Furia said. "You got to watch the mouth with me, Goldie. You ought to know that by this time."

Hinch nodded happily.

"What did you have to shoot him for?" Goldie said. In his own way Furia had apologized, they both understood that if Hinch did not. "I didn’t set this up for a killing, Fure. Why go for the big one?"

"Who’s to know?" Furia argued. "Howland sure as hell didn’t sound about our deal. Hinch and me wore gloves and I’ll ditch the heater soon as we grab off another one. So they’ll never hook those three slugs onto us, Goldie. I even picked up the cases. You got nothing to worry about."

"It’s still the big one."

"You button your trap, bitch," Hinch said.

"You button yours," Furia said in a flash. "This is between me and Goldie. And don’t call her no more names, Hinch, hear?"

Hinch drove.

"Why I plugged him," Furia said. "And you had a year college, Goldie." He sounded like a kindly teacher. "A three-way split is better than four, I make it, and I never even graduated public school. That shlep just bought us an extra six grand."

Goldie said fretfully, "You sure he’s dead?"

Furia laughed. They were rattling over the bridge spanning the Tonekeneke River that led out of town; beyond lay the cloverleaf interchange and the through road Goldie called The Pike, with its string of dark gas stations. The only light came from an all-night diner with a big neon sign at the other side of the cloverleaf. The neon sign said elwood’s diner. It smeared the aluminum siding a dime-store violet.

"Stop in there, Hinch, I’m hungry."

"Fure," Goldie said. "My folks still live here. Suppose somebody spots me?"

"How many years you cut out of this jerk burg? Six?"

"Seven. But—"

"And you used to have like dark brown hair, right? And go around like one of them Girl Scouts? Relax, Goldie. Nobody’s going to make you. I’m starved."

Goldie licked the scarlet lip under the smudge on her nostril. Furia was always starved after a job. At such times it was as if he had been weaned hungry and had never made up for it. Even Hinch looked doubtful.

"I told you, Hinch, didn’t I? Pull in."

Hinch skirted the concrete island and drove off the cloverleaf. Neither he nor Goldie said anything more. Goldie’s face screwed smaller. She had a funny feeling about the caper. Fure was flying. It never works out the way I plan it. He always queers it some way, he’s a natural-born loser.

Hinch swung the Chrysler into a slot. A dozen others were occupied by cars and trucks. He turned off the ignition and started to get out.

"Hold it." Furia turned to examine Goldie in the violet haze. "You got blood on your nose. Wipe it off."

"I thought I wiped it off."

He ripped a tissue from the box over the dash, spat on it, and handed it to her. "The left side."

She examined her nose in her compact mirror, scrubbed the smudge off, used the puff.

"Do I look all right for Local Yokel?"

Furia laughed again. That’s twice in three minutes. He’s real turned on. He’ll try to be a man-mountain in bed tonight.

"We don’t sit together," Furia said to Hinch. "You park at the counter. Goldie and me we’ll find a booth or somewheres."

"That’s using your tank, Fure."

"Goldie don’t think so. Do you, Goldie?"

He was sounding amused. Goldie risked it. "Does it matter what I think?"

"Not a goddam bit," Furia said cheerfully. He got out with the black bag and made for the diner steps without looking back.

That’s what I love about you, you’re such a little gentleman.

#
The diner was busy, not crowded. Furia went in first and snagged a booth from four teenagers who had been nursing cheeseburgers and malts. Goldie managed to join him at the cost of a few stares. She saw no one she recognized. She slipped behind the partition and hid her miniskirt under the fake marble top. I told Fure I ought to wear slacks tonight but no he’s got to show off my legs like we’re on the town, these studs will remember me.

She was angrier with Furia than when he had struck her.

Hinch slouched in a minute later and settled his bulk on a stool a few feet away. He became immediately enchanted with one of the girls behind the counter, who had just come out of the kitchen. The girl had spray-shine black hair done up in exaggerated bouffant and a rear end that jerked from side to side as she moved.

"You’d better watch the pig," Goldie said. "He’s already got his piggy eyes on a girl."

"Don’t worry about Hinch," Furia said. "What’ll it be, doll? Steak and fries? Live it up."

"I’m not hungry. Just coffee."

Furia shrugged. He had stripped off his gloves and he began to drum on the table with his neat little nails. His Mediterranean eyes were glazed. In the glare of the fluorescents his skin had a greenish shine.

The diner was jumping with soul music, orders, dishes, talk. There was a lively smell of frying onions and meat. Furia drank it in. The overcast in his eyes was from pride at his achievement and regret that these squares could not know his power. Goldie had seen it before, a recklessness that would later rush to relieve itself. She had her own needs, which involved perpetual thought. His violence kept her squirming.

"Hey, you," Furia said. The girl with the versatile rump was delivering a trayful of grinders to the next booth. "We ain’t got all year."

Goldie shut her eyes. When she opened them the girl was clearing the dirty dishes from their table. She was leaning far over, her left breast over Furia’s hands.

"I’ll be right back, folks." She flicked a rag over the table and seesawed away.

"That chick is stacked what I mean," Furia said. "As good as you, Goldie."

"I think she recognized me," Goldie said.

"You think. You’re always thinking."

"I’m not sure. She could have. She was starting high school when I left New Bradford. Her name is Griggs, Marie Griggs. Let’s split, Fure."

"You make me throw up. And if she did? It’s a free country, ain’t it? Two people having a bite?"

"Why take chances?"

"Who’s taking chances?"

"You are. With that bag between your legs. And packing the gun."

"We’ll take off when I’ve ate my steak." His lips were thinning down. "Now knock it off, she’s coming back. Steak medium-well, side order fries, two black. And don’t take all night."

The waitress wrote it down. "You’re not having anything but coffee, Miss?"

"I just told you, didn’t I?" Furia said with a stare.

She left fast. His stare warmed as he watched her behind. "No wonder Hinch got his tongue hanging out. I could go for a piece of that myself."

Flying all right.

"Fure—"

"She don’t know you from her old lady’s mustache." His tone said that the subject was closed. Goldie shut her eyes again.

When his steak came it was too rare. Another time he would have turned nasty and fired it back. As it was he ate it, grousing. Steaks were a problem with him. Cooks always thought the waitress had heard wrong. He hated bloody meat. I ain’t no goddam dog, he would say.

He hacked off massive chunks, including the fat, and bolted them. The fork never left his fist. Goldie sipped carefully. Her skin was one big itch. Psycho-something, a doctor had told her. He had sounded like some shrink and she had never gone back. It had been worse recently.

Hinch was working away on the girl behind the counter, she was beginning to look sore.

One of these days I’m going to ditch these creeps.

At eleven o’clock, as Furia was stabbing his last slice of potato, the short-order man turned on the radio. Goldie, on her feet, sat down again.

"Now what?"

"That’s the station at Tonekeneke Falls, WRUD, with the late news."

"So?"

"Fure, I have this feeling."

"You and your feels," Furia said. "You’re goosier than an old broad tonight. Let’s hit it."

"Will it hurt to listen a minute?"

He sat back comfortably and began to pick his teeth with the edge of a matchpacket cover. "First you can’t wait to blow the dump—"

He stopped. The announcer was saying: "—this bulletin. Thomas F. Howland, bookkeeper of the Aztec Paper Products company branch in New Bradford, was found in his office a few minutes ago shot to death. Mr. Howland was alone at the plant, preparing the payroll for tomorrow, when he was apparently surprised by robbers, who killed him and escaped with over twenty-four thousand dollars in cash, according to Curtis Pickney, the general manager, who found the slain bookkeeper’s body. Mr. Pickney was driving by on his way home from a late Zoning Board meeting, saw lights in the plant, and investigated. He notified the New Bradford police and Chief John Secco has taken charge of the case. The Resident State Trooper in New Bradford is also on the scene. A search is being organized for Edward Taylor, the night security guard, who has disappeared. Police fear that Taylor may also have been the victim of foul play. We will bring you further bulletins as they come in. In Washington today the President announced..."

"No," Furia said. "Stay put." He nodded at Hinch, who had turned their way. Hinch was blinking his pink eyes. At Furia’s signal he tossed a bill on the counter and ran out with two truck drivers who had jumped up and left their hamburgers uneaten.

"I told you, Fure!"

"Say, Miss America, how’s about two more coffees?"

The waitress took their empty cups. "I can’t believe it," she said. "That nice old guy."

"Who?"

"That Tom Howland."

"The one they say got shot? You knew him?"

"He ate in here all the time. Used to bend my ear by the hour. I can’t believe it."

"You never know," Furia said, shaking his head. "Step on those coffees, huh, doll?"

She went away.

"Some day you’ll learn to listen to me," Goldie muttered. "I told you to just tie him up. No, you’ve got to go and shoot him."

"Goddam it, Goldie, you bug the living hell out of me sometimes, you know that?"

They drank their second cups in silence. There was no music in the diner now. The cook had turned the radio off, too. People were arguing about the robbery and murder. Furia said, "Now," and rose. Goldie slid from the booth and made her way safely to the door. Furia, carrying the black bag, strolled up to the counter and said to the waitress, "How much for the lousy steak and javas?"

Goldie slipped out.

Hinch had the motor running when Furia got in beside him. "Turn on the police band."

Hinch turned it on. The air was full of directives and acknowledgments. The state police were setting up roadblocks throughout the area.

"Now what?" Goldie had her arms folded over her breasts. "Big shot?"

"You want I should shove your teeth down your throat, is that what you want?" Furia said. "I ought to let Hinch work you over."

"Any time, pal," Hinch said.

"Who asked you? I got to think."

"What’s to think?" Hinch said. "We hole up in the hideout till the heat goes away, like we said. No sweat. Let’s drag, Fure."

"If you had a brain you’d be a dope." Furia had a roadmap of the area spread on his lap under the map light. "To get there from here we got to cross this intersection. There’s no other road in. That’ll be one of their main checkpoints. We can’t make it tonight. We got to think of something else."

"You’d better get rid of the gun," Goldie said remotely. She was burrowed as far as she could get into the corner of the rear seat.

"Not till I get me another one."

"You going to kill somebody else for one?"

"I told you!"

"Why didn’t you take the watchman’s gun?"

"Because it landed in some bushes when we jumped him. We couldn’t hang around looking for it in the dark. I’ll get one, don’t worry."

"It’s a wonder you didn’t shoot him, too."

"You’re asking for a rap in that big moosh of yours, Goldie. I’m telling you! When Howland sent this Taylor into town for coffee and we hit him on the road, he put up a fight and we had to cool him with a knock across the ear. We tied him up and threw him in some bushes. How many times I got to tell you?"

Hinch said, "We parking here all night?"

"Let me think!"

Goldie let him think. When she thought the time was ripe she said, "Maybe if we think out loud."

Furia immediately said, "So?"

"The watchman can’t finger you, you hit him in the dark. Nobody saw us at the plant except Howland, and he’s dead."

"That’s why I hit him. That and the extra cut. But you got to make out like I’m a dumdum."

"If we’d worked it the way I said," Goldie said, "he’d have cut his throat before he fingered us. But I’m not going to argue with you, Fure. The big thing went sour was the manager driving past the plant. So now we’re hung up here. For a while they’re going to stop every car trying to leave New Bradford."

"I know," Hinch said brightly. "We bury it."

"And have the paper rot or be chewed up? Or somebody find it?" Goldie said.

"We sure as a bitch ain’t throwing it away," Hinch growled.

"Who said anything about throwing it away? It’s got to be put somewhere safe till they stop searching cars. The shack would be good, but we’re cut off from there till they get fed up and figure we made it out before they set up the blocks. Meantime—the way I see it, Fure—we need help."

"The way she sees it," Hinch said. "Who’s fixing this match, Fure, you or her?"

But Furia said, "What help, Goldie?"

"Somebody to keep it for us."

"That’s a great idea that is," Furia said. "Who you going to ask, the fuzz?"

Goldie said, "Yes."

Hinch jiggled his bowling-ball head. "I tell you, Fure, this broad is bad news. Some joke."

"No joke," Goldie said. "I mean it."

"She means it," Hinch said with disgust.

Furia picked a sliver of steak out of his teeth. "With a far-out idea like that there’s got to be something in it. What’s on your mind, Goldie?"

"Look," Goldie said. "I’ve been keeping in touch with my family off and on through my kid sister Nanette—"

"That is absolutely out," Furia said. "I ain’t stashing no twenty-four grand with a bunch of rubes."

"Are you kidding? They’d break a leg running to Chief Secco with it. Ma’s the big wheel in her church, and my old man thinks having a bottle of beer in your car is a federal offense." Goldie laughed. "But Nanette’s no square. She’s looking to cut out one of these days, too. I know from her letters. She does a lot of babysitting nights and one of her steady jobs is for a couple named Malone, they have a kid Barbara. The Malones live in a one-family house on Old Bradford Road. It’s one of the original streets of the town, never any traffic, and the neighbors pull their sidewalks in at nine o’clock. Well, Wesley Malone is a cop."

"There she goes again," Hinch said.

"On the New Bradford police force."

"What gives with this dame?" Hinch demanded of Taugus County. "Some idea! We should park our loot with the town cop!"

But Furia was heavily in thought. "How old did you say their kid is, Goldie?"

"Must be eight or nine by now."

"You got yourself a deal."

"But Fure," Hinch protested.

"That’s the beauty part," Furia said. "A cop’s got to know the facts of life, don’t he? He ain’t going to panic and try something stupid. Okay, Hinch, get going."

"Where to?" Hinch asked sullenly.

"This Old Bradford Road. Direct him, Goldie."

Goldie directed him. They went back into the cloverleaf and across the bridge, past three blocks of midtown, and sharply right into a steep road called Lovers Hill, Goldie said, because there was a parking strip on top where the town kids necked. Halfway up she said, "Next right turn," and Hinch turned in grudgingly. There were no street lights, and towering trees. It was a narrow street, almost a lane, lined with very old two-story frame houses in need of paint.

The road swooped and wound in an S. At the uppermost curve of the S Goldie said, "I think that’s it. Yes. The one with the porch lit up."

It was the only house on the street that showed a light.

"Almost," Furia said, sucking his teeth, "like they got the welcome mat out."

Copyright © 1969 by Ellery Queen. All copyrights renewed by Ellery Queen. All works reprinted by permission of The Frederic Dannay Literary Property Trust & The Manfred B. Lee Family Literary Property Trust.

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