by Mike Cooper
“The First Amendment? Due process? They haven’t committed any crimes?”
“Bah.”
David beckoned Sean across the room. In a low voice he said, “What do you think?”
“The Newark guys are doing fine. Grumbling and all, but you know.” Sean had been outside, walking among the various police forces. “Those ESU cops from the city, well, honestly they kind of scare me.”
“Their lieutenant called them his ‘warfighters.’”
“Shit.” He grimaced. “‘Warfighters.’ Great.”
“Look, I need a break.” David glanced at Boggs, who was reprimanding one of the technicians because his coffee wasn’t hot enough. “Let’s go check the perimeter. They might be planning another firebomb or something.”
“Good idea.” They slipped through the rear doors, down the fire stairs.
“The train’s only a couple hours away,” Sean said. “They’re making up time.”
“Can’t get here soon enough.” David zipped his coat as they approached the outside door. “I just want to get this over with.”
“I’m right here,” said Corman. His voice came over the radio, so Nicola heard him as well, but he was walking into the warehouse.
A blast of snow came in with him, and he pushed the door hard to close it. Asher stuck his head up from the shaft—he was standing on the jacking frame, pulling over the rattling conveyor sections and dropping them in front of the tunnel opening. Each one sounded like a can-collector’s shopping cart going off a cliff.
“Where the fuck have you been?” CRASH. “Starting to wonder.” CRASH. “Because some of us are doing all the fucking heavy lifting around here.” CRASH.
“Getting a smoke.”
“Where the fuck’s your radio?”
“Dunno. Didn’t work out there.”
“The weather,” Finn said from inside the vault, over the wireless. He sounded a little out of breath himself. “Still snowing, I assume. How do the roads look?”
“Slow.”
“Hope it doesn’t get worse than that. Nicola, what’s up at the yard?”
“More vehicles,” Nicola said. “More troops. And more protesters—another bus.”
“There’s PATH service out here?”
“No, a charter. School bus or something. Only it wasn’t a football team. They were carrying signs.”
Asher gestured to Corman. “Hey, help me out here. Get the rest of the roller slides.”
The last sections didn’t fit into the pit, which was already too crowded. Asher crawled out. “Your turn,” he said.
Corman clambered in. Jake had dragged the winch to the top of the tunnel, unrolling steel cable as he went. Its end was fixed to the jacking ram. Corman examined the hook. He clipped it to the first ten-foot section of the slide and shoved it into the pipe.
“Go,” he said.
A pause. “You mean me?” Jake, on the radio, from inside the vault.
Grunt.
“Right.” A moment later, the winch cable tightened and slowly pulled the section up the pipe. As it went past him, Corman picked up the next piece of the conveyor, snapped it onto the end, and fed it in. Asher helpfully pushed in the last sections down to him as they began to run out. He missed Corman’s head by six or seven inches easy.
In less than ten minutes, they’d installed the entire belt. It poked from the opening of the tunnel pipe, and ran up to the top, by the hole into the vault. Now they had their extraction mechanism: Anything dropped at the top end would slide and rattle all the way to the warehouse. More than one hundred yards, like a kid down a waterslide.
That, at least, was the theory.
“Better try it out,” said Asher, who was watching from above. “Things start to get jammed up in there, gonna be a fucking nightmare going in to unclog it.”
“Good idea.” Finn, on the radio. “Give me a minute here … Jake, try this.”
Some muffled noises and muttering, apparently as Finn handed something up to Jake and he cleared the top of the belt for it.
“Ready?”
“Just send the fucking thing down already.”
A faint noise, increasing after a few seconds. The spinner wheels clashed and rattled. The object came closer, closer … and Corman reached in and grabbed it, just as it reached the end of the pipe.
“What’s that?” Asher, peering down. The conveyor’s little roller-skate wheels spun to rest.
Corman held it up. The ingot was small but bright silver, glinting in the ceiling lights.
“Damn,” said Asher.
Finn, over the radio: “Did it work?”
“Like a UPS warehouse.”
“Good. Asher, come on up. You have trouble scooching along the conveyor, Jake can send the winch cable down for you. It’ll be fastest to shift the metal into the tunnel with a bucket brigade. Corman can catch.”
Asher looked at Corman. “Shouldn’t we both be here? One to grab the bars, the other to load the truck?”
“I want to get out of here as quick as we can.” More rattling began, suggesting that he was wasting no time. “It’s going to take an hour at least. Once we’re done up here, we’ll all come down and help with the transfer.”
“Whatever.” Asher began to climb into the pit. “How much is that one little ingot worth, anyway?”
“Assuming it’s not one of the counterfeits, about sixty thousand dollars.”
“Mother of fucking God.” Asher held it for a moment, then reluctantly handed it back to Corman and boosted himself into the pipe. “I’ll be right up.”
Despite how tense she was, Emily began to doze off on the futon. Some long, late nights recently, and full-time at Heart Pine during the day. She didn’t want to behave abnormally while Wes was around—or Finn, every one of the last three nights. She hadn’t been getting nearly enough sleep.
A ringtone, blaring unexpectedly, jerked her awake. She grabbed the phone, already standing up and turning toward her trading computer.
“Yes?” A moment later, “Awesome. We are go.”
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
Now that they were in, Finn only wanted to get out of the vault as fast as possible.
“Three racks here,” he said. “Lots of shelves, lots of weight, but it should go easy.”
Jake stayed up in the tunnel opening, ready to take each rhodium ingot from Asher and send it on its way down the belt. The bars had to be centered and pushed off with a consistent velocity—a level of finicky detail that Asher might be inclined to let slip.
Finn enlarged the hole through the cage, removing bars until his hand hurt from the cutters. The remaining security was equally light: a few padlocks and, on the racks, a pair of vertical bars that slid through holes aligned in each drawer, more to keep them in place than to keep thieves out. He’d already taken the one ingot, and the first drawer hung open. He studied gleaming rows of metal.
“We can probably carry eight or ten at a time,” he said. “No need to overload Jake.”
Asher ran his hand across the small, smooth, rounded blocks. Their top faces were like neat silver tiles. “Beautiful,” he said and lifted the first ones out.
They emptied the first two drawers at a steady pace. The rattle of the conveyor wheels never stopped.
When Finn slid open the third drawer, he paused.
“You know,” he said, “these don’t seem to be fixed into the frame.”
Asher crouched next to him and peered along the slider. “Lift it up and maybe push back. There’s a bobbin latch.”
They tried it, and after one false start, the drawer came right out. It was heavy—eighty or ninety pounds, but the two of them could carry it without trouble.
Manhandling it through the pipe opening, seven feet above the floor, took some effort.
“Just the right width
,” said Jake. “About two inches narrower than the belt.”
“Give it a try.” Finn clicked on his mic. “Corman? Watch out, we’re sending down an entire flat.”
Jake aligned the tray and pushed it off. The rattle was louder, then diminished.
A minute’s silence. “Got it,” Corman said over the radio.
“We’ll do this way from now on.”
It only took another half hour. When they were finished, Asher dropped on a chair.
“Need to rest a minute,” he said. “Those things get heavy.”
“We’re done!” Jake looked out from the broken hole in the wall. “Let’s get out of here.”
Finn checked his watch. “Yeah …”
“Corman’s gonna need help getting everything into the truck.”
Back to the radio. “Nicola?”
“Yes?”
“How’s everything look?”
“I think the special train might finally be approaching. Chatter on the yard frequencies—they use all this jargon, it’s like Navajo code talkers, but it sounds like something’s happening. Hang on a sec.”
“I want a beer,” said Asher. They’d gone through a number of water bottles, which Finn had been collecting in the large plastic bag they’d use to carry out all their trash. Same thing for the granola bar and Snickers wrappers. Also several latex gloves, torn or damaged while they worked, which they’d exchanged for new ones.
“Looking forward to sleeping about fifteen hours, myself,” said Jake.
Finn sat on the floor, waiting. “We’re not done yet.”
“Okay.” Nicola’s voice. “I’ve got a reasonable view to the front of the yard, and the snow seems to be lightening up some. The train’s definitely on its way. I think they’re escorting it in—I can see blue lights. Is there an access road running alongside the tracks?”
“I don’t know. Corman, you have any idea?” Pause. “Corman?”
“Yeah.” He sounded winded, which was maybe no surprise. He’d been loading the same material that had required three people in the vault. “Not sure in that direction, but probably. Line to the north has a service road.”
“So they’re protecting it from demonstrators.” Finn considered. “Are the police at the yard moving? Doing anything?”
“Hard to say, but nothing major. A car goes in and out now and then.”
“Right.” He stood up. “Listen up. Everyone on the wire?”
“Yes.”
“Yeah.”
Grunt.
“So we’ve got all of Wes’s metal out. That’s our payday.” He paused. “But … Wes is only one of the people with space here. There are other racks, in other units. Who knows?”
Asher was on board immediately. “Let’s do it!”
Jake hesitated. “We have a schedule …”
“And we’re running well ahead of it right now. We’ve got, uh, twenty-three extra minutes.”
“I guess if nothing unusual is happening upstairs, maybe.”
“Corman?”
“Yes.” No questions.
“Nicola?”
“On one condition: If I see or hear anything that looks the least bit odd, you stop immediately and leave. Okay?”
No one disagreed, though Finn privately thought Asher might have trouble just walking away from the treasure horde if it came to that. “Immediately,” he said. “Yes.”
“Then let’s go ahead.”
“Okay.” Finn turned to the next cage. “Back to work. Let’s see what we can find.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
They were in Sean’s patrol car, a half mile down the road, when David’s cell phone rang.
“Hello?”
“Chief? This is Hagan.” The Newark commander, presumably still in the tower.
“What’s happening?”
“The special is a mile away. They’ll be entering the yard in a few minutes.”
“Where are you?”
“Still in dispatch. We can see it out the windows. Somebody gave them an escort—must be a half dozen cruisers driving alongside.”
“Which fucking moron’s idea was that?”
“Not ours. I thought maybe you.”
“No.” David cupped the phone and said to Sean, “Who the hell ordered a ticker-tape parade?”
“What?”
He passed on Hagan’s description. “If we can see it, the protesters can sure as hell see it. They’re going to be all over it now.”
“Chief”—Hagan spoke up—“we’ve got movement. People getting into cars … Something’s happening at the entrance portal.” He broke off.
David rubbed his eyes. “Back to the yard,” he said. “Might want to use your siren.”
Sean backed the car over a rubbled stretch of asphalt, turned, and hit the accelerator. “Trouble?”
“Sounds like it.” David clicked off his call with Hagan and redialed the chief dispatcher’s line.
“Yeah?”
“This is Keegan. Are you on the special?”
“Of course.”
“Send it through receiving track five.”
“The old line?”
“That gate’s a little farther from the road—might help keep the mob clear of the locomotive.”
“Got it.” Indistinct noises as the dispatcher conveyed the order. He came back a moment later. “They’re doing it. Where does that track go, anyway?”
“Past the vault building,” David said. “Between it and the road. Hardly ever gets used.”
Another muffled conversation. “That works,” the dispatcher said. “We can switch it right back to the transfer siding on the other side of the vault.”
“What are the hippies up to?”
“They’re stringing out along the road, next to the yard perimeter. Is it still snowing where you are?”
“Some.” Sean had left the wipers on, but they were squeaking against mostly dry glass. The car careened through a red light, siren blaring.
“Not here, either. The riot cops are staying put. I guess they figure the fence is good enough to keep them out.”
“Anyone tries to go over the razor wire, they’re going to regret it.”
“We’ll be there in two minutes.” David braced as Sean squealed through a turn, wheels finding pavement to burn rubber on even through the snow. “Or maybe less.”
“No hurry,” Sean said. “It’s under control.”
“Protesters are on the road,” Nicola said over the radio. “Police still holding their positions in the lot.”
Finn and Asher were hauling a tray of gold ingots, working as fast as they could. The first unit next to Wes’s had been a bust: racks nearly empty, a few platinum bars. But the one beyond—jackpot.
“Hearing anything from the FBI?”
“Their traffic’s encrypted.”
“Railroad security, then.”
“It’s confused. Half are trying to deal with the incoming freight, half are still with the protesters at the entrance. Some of the guys are getting snappish.”
“Excellent.”
“Wait a minute.” Nicola went silent.
Finn helped shove the tray up to Jake, who sent it down the belt, and immediately turned back with Asher for another. “What?”
“The special is just entering the yard, but it’s taking a sidetrack. The one … It looks like they’re going to come right past the vault building.”
“It is? Which side?”
“The track along the fence. Close to the road.”
“Fuck.” Finn stopped dead and hollered, “Time to go! We need to get out of here!”
Asher, who was already back at the rack they were pilfering, looked up with a frown. “What? We’re not half done!”
“Don’t waste time wi
th that. Go!”
“There must be a hundred more gold bars!” Asher yanked at the drawers, revealing row after row of shining gold ingots. “There’s a fucking million dollars here!”
“Guys?” Nicola’s voice, losing some of her cool. “Is there a problem? Because the train is almost on top of you.”
“Jake, shove off!”
“What’s going on?”
“A million fucking dollars!”
And then Nicola was shouting, all control gone. “Don’t go down the tunnel!”
“Nicola?”
“Stay there,” she yelled. “Don’t leave! Don’t move!”
CHAPTER FORTY-SEVEN
The special train was short. Two SD70 locomotives, an empty gondola as a spacer, then the articulated flatcar carrying the excavation arm. The huge mining claw was eighteen feet tall, well above the height of the rear locomotive, and its long mechanical arm extended to the very end of the bed. Another spacer gondola and several more flatbeds with other components lashed down under steel bands. The equipment was all oversize gears and massive metal struts and long, heavy hydraulics.
Snow had covered the horizontal bits and accumulated on the flatbeds’ decking. The locomotives rumbled slowly through the yard. The police vehicles that had joined it a few miles back stopped at the perimeter fence, blocking any demonstrators who might think to chase the train through the portal on foot.
Dispatch had cleared the train’s way, making sure there was a free line straight through to the transfer siding. The operations crew waited there, stamping their feet and trying to keep cigarettes lit in the wind, ready to begin shifting the machinery to the next leg of its journey. A hostler in a switcher pulled a cut of boxcars and containers down the next siding. Somewhere outside the yard, a train whistle blew.
Asher’s tunnel bore was just under the track next to the vault building. They’d started deep in the ground, but in order to maintain the angle, the jacking pipe was almost at grade ten feet from its destination. Just a few inches from the surface of the earth.
Just a few inches below the crossties of the sidetrack. So close that it had cut through as much ballast gravel as clay.
The locomotive engineer didn’t know it, but he was about to pilot his two-hundred-ton behemoth over a patch of ground that was supported by nothing more than a thin concrete pipe wall.
