The Goldfish Heist And Other Stories

by Jay Stringer

  “They do. That’s why I did the job, to watch and see. And in every case they paid up. To the exact penny. Banks can’t afford any bad publicity right now.”

  “Good for them. I don’t see the profit in it though. I mean, we steal a bit of money, the bank pays back a bit of money, and everyone goes home happy. But we’re still only up by five grand.”

  “But what if we were the ones being stolen from?” said Claire.

  Nobody spoke for a moment.

  “Exactly,” said Ed. “We combine the short and the long con. We go through with it as normal. We also provide some victims. Some expensive and trusted clients. Say, for instance, the daughter of Ransford Gaines. The bank will cover whatever amount she was to have written on her receipt.”

  Everyone set their drinks down and didn’t pick them up again.

  “Brilliant,” said Jake.

  “Fucking brilliant,” said Jamie.

  “I don’t get it,” said Tom.

  “If that’s the end of your presentation,” said Claire, “What was the laptop for?”

  Ed picked it up and dropped it; it made a hollow plastic thud.

  “Case in point. Its all about making people believe in what you’re doing.”

  Everyone nodded. Everyone drank several more drinks. The last two to leave, Ed and Claire, sat on the pool table talking through the plan.

  “You’ll need to find out which bank your father has most of his money in and, if you haven’t already, open an account with them.”

  Claire looked at Ed over her final drink.

  “You’re scared of me aren’t you?”

  “I think we all are.”

  She had very dark eyes.

  “You can kiss me, if you want to.”

  **

  On the first of April, Ed Baker walked into the bank in Solihull and opened an account. He opened it with a deposit of three thousand pounds and over the following month he paid in another two. Five thousand pounds in a month was enough for the Bank Manager to earmark him as an important customer.

  Claire Gaines already had an account. She’d been having large sums of money paid in on a regular basis from her father’s account, and similar sums going out.

  On the first of May, at four in the afternoon, an unmarked van pulled into the alley beside the bank.

  Josh and Tom, dressed as security guards, took a thin metal sheet from the back of the van. Using cow gum glue they fixed it into place over the deposit box. Ed had given them a sign with the bank’s insignia printed at the top, stating that the deposit box was out of service. Ed had even put the bank’s phone number on.

  Jake didn’t like that last touch because it made him nervous. “Everybody’s got a mobile,” he said, “It won’t take them nothing to ring and check before depositing the cash.”

  “Relax. Its just like the laptop, its all for show. They’ll see the number and they’ll assume everything’s okay. I promise you they won’t call.”

  “And if they do?”

  “Run like hell.”

  “We get to carry guns?”

  “Nah. You ever see a guard carry a gun? Not over here. Nobody will give you money if you carry a gun. Unless you’re pointing it at them.”

  At quarter past four, they got their first drop. A local shop owner making his weekly drop. He put seven thousand pounds in the case. Jake wrote him out a receipt on official bank slips.

  At twenty past the hour, Ed Baker walked up. He was wearing his best suit and he made a point of walking past a couple of cameras near the bank. He stopped to chat with a traffic warden. Outside the bank, he let the security guards explain the situation to him. They pointed to the sign. Ed opened his briefcase and handed the bigger of the two guards, the one who was writing the receipts, four bundles of plain paper. The paper was cut to look like bank notes. The fake money was locked in the case and Ed walked away with his receipt.

  Between twenty past and half past, they received two more drops totalling thirteen thousand.

  Claire was late.

  It had been arranged that she would turn up at half past, and be the last customer. At thirty-one minutes past, maybe thirty-two, the guards were due to get into their unmarked van and drive away.

  By thirty-four minutes past, Claire still hadn’t turned up. Ed had never heard of this job going longer than thirty-five minutes, which is why he’d planned it the way he did.

  There was some scientific study he’d heard of once, where scientists proved that neutral observers will watch crimes like this for twenty minutes before calling the police. Violence or murder, or crimes committed against themselves, they’ll call straight away. But if they are watching something like this, they will wait twenty minutes before it annoys them enough to call the police. Factor in the time it takes for the cops to turn up, or to get through to the bank manager if they call ahead, and anything over thirty minutes is a stupid risk.

  At thirty-six minutes past the hour, with Claire still not turned up and Ed starting to sweat, a police car cruised past. It stopped at the traffic lights, ten feet away from the bank, and sat there while the light stayed at red.

  Tom’s nervous tick kicked in, and Jake began deep breathing.

  When he’d wrestled in front of crowds, he’d learned that the only way he could get by was to block out the audience. Think through the script, think a few moves in advance, and you’re not thinking of what’s going on outside the ring.

  He blocked the police car out.

  He thought about Claire turning up, they’d talk for a minute. She’d deposit her fake money. Tom would put the case in the back of the van, Jake would pull down the metal plate, and they’d drive away.

  That’s what he thought about.

  The lights took forever to change. The police looked right at the bank, one of them made eye contact with Jake. He nodded a strangers greeting, uniform to uniform.

  The lights changed and the car drove on.

  Ed was no longer keeping track of the time when Claire turned up a few minutes later. Even from the safety of a coffee shop across the road, he was preparing to run. Claire strolled up, carrying half a dozen shopping bags.

  “There was a sale on.”

  She deposited her fake money, and collected her genuine receipt. She was barely ten feet away when Jake and Tom pulled away in the van.

  **

  Police were called. By the time they got there, all they could do was canvass for witnesses and speak to the bank management.

  The banks security cameras picked up the whole thing, but it was impossible to make out the features of the security guards. They did pick out the faces of the people depositing their money, and the cash as it was handed over.

  Everyone held their breath and waited.

  They didn’t have to wait long. Three working days later, the first of the shopkeepers noticed that the money hadn’t appeared in their account, and they came in to complain. Not long after that, another victim came in; bringing a copy of the local newspaper that ran the story of the crime.

  It was a full week after the crime that Ed Baker came in with a receipt for ten thousand pounds and demanded the bank cover his loss. The bank was still reeling from that blow when, the following week, Claire Gaines visited the manager. She bought with her a young ambitious lawyer by the name of Jamie Prescott. She produced a receipt showing that she had, in fact, paid two hundred thousand pounds into the bank that day.

  Her lawyer not only pointed out the banks liability, but also how much he would enjoy making his name out of suing them if they refused to cover the loss.

  **

  “And they paid?”

  “They paid.”

  Claire, Jamie and Jake were sharing a drink in one of Ransford Gaines’ restaurants. It was after hours, they could talk about whatever they wanted.

  “It took some major bluffing.” Said Jamie, “For awhile I thought they were going to call us on it.”

  “I just had to mention my daddy’s name a few times, the man
ager shit himself.”

  “Hey, don’t talk down my contribution. That was my best suit that I wore, and my best legal bullshit.”

  Jake called a taxi and left while Claire fetched drinks. She sat down close to Jamie, toying with her glass..

  “Does your Dad mind you doing things like this?”

  “Oh no. He’s always offering me work. But, you know, it’s impossible to make your own name when you’re a Gaines. My sister’s had to leave town to try and have a life. I can’t get a normal job, and I don’t want to work for him. I mean, he’d let me run any of his places, but I’d hate it, and the staff would hate me.”

  “Must be tough.”

  “It is. I keep trying to find something that’s all my own, you know? Even this, the whole thing revolves around cashing in on my daddy’s name.”

  “Sorry.”

  “You’re scared of me, aren’t you?”

  “A little bit.”

  “You can kiss me, if you want to.”

  **

  Once Ed gave the all clear, they met in the old church hall. Four guys, one woman, several beers and a pile of money

  Tom and Jake had been first, bringing in the twenty thousand pounds they’d collected on the day. They emptied the money out on the table, piling the bundles as high as they could for the best effect. Ed was next, bringing a crate of beer and a briefcase holding twenty five thousand pounds. They sat and drank for an hour, talking about football and films. They tried not to show how worried they were that Claire was, again, late.

  It was just over an hour late when Claire and Jamie walked in. They were carrying a suitcase each. Two hundred thousand pounds, they set it on the table.

  Everyone who wasn’t already drunk caught up.

  Jake drank the most but didn’t really show it until he got opinionated. “You guys know the problem with modern wrestling?’

  “Yeah, you said it was because it was fake.” Tom thumped the table.

  “No, I said it was the endings. Everyone knows how a match is going to end. The finishing moves are all that anybody bothers with.”

  “But isn’t that what they pay for?”

  “No. They pay for the drama, we sell them a story, the hard way. The little guy, the monster, people giving in or people going the distance. It’s about guys who have no right to win, but do. Its-”

  “Its about selling tickets. Its about money.”

  Everyone turned to see who the new voice belonged to. It was Ransford Gaines, flanked by an armed escort.

  “Dad,” said Claire. “What kept you?”

  Everyone now turned to stare at Claire. Everyone except Jake, who kept his eyes fixed on Gaines.

  “I was busy,” said Gaines. “I had a few other things to do. Is this all the cash?”

  “Yes.”

  “Come on kids, get it together.”

  Claire and Tom stood and shovelled the cash into the bags while nobody else moved.

  “Think of it as a lesson,” Gaines said. “Next time you decide to use a man’s name, make sure you’ve asked first. And you really want to take a man’s money? Point a gun at him.”

  His escort smiled and waggled his gun.

  Gaines reached into one of the bags and tossed a bundle of notes onto the table.

  “Get drunk and learn your lesson,” he said to all of them. He turned to Jake, who was still staring at him, “What you staring at?”

  Jake just shrugged and leaned back in his chair.

  Gaines smiled, “You’re the guy who held up a store with a banana, right? Give me a call, you’ve got balls.”

  He nodded and left, followed by his escort and, holding hands as they carried the cash, Claire and Tom.

  The room stayed silent for a long moment.

  Jake reached for a fresh beer and took a long swig. “Now that there? Exactly the kind of ending I’m talking about.”

  Now I Have A Staple Gun, Ho Ho ho

  Santa Claus is a mean old bastard.

  That’s one of the first things I ever learned. My fourth Christmas I asked for Castle Grayskull. I got chocolate. The next year I asked for Optimus Prime but I got a road atlas. Seven years old I asked for the Michael Jackson album but got a pack of blank videotapes. Long play. The following year I was the only kid who had a staple gun sitting under the tree on Christmas morning.

  It wasn’t even wrapped.

  It didn’t matter what I asked for, I would get whatever Santa could pick up from the all night garage on his way home from the pub. My favorite was when I was thirteen. That year I’d asked for a Sega, but got a few packs of condoms and a little note instructing me on how to use them.

  Fifteen and sixteen he got me good presents; Liquor. First cheap bourbon and then single malt. That final year we spent Christmas day drinking our way through the presents and talking. We started to understand each other a little more somewhere between the final drop of amber and the first kick of the hangover.

  Maybe it would have been different if my mum hadn’t walked out. Mrs Sanderson across the way once told me that Dad fell apart after that. Somewhere between a baby son and a full time job he couldn’t find enough of himself to hold it together. If you go for that kind of excuse.

  Seventeen was the year. I’d been home from work a few hours when dad got back. One look at me as he came in the door told me he’d forgotten it was Christmas eve, he was empty handed. He mumbled something about being right back and headed out into the cold.

  I set out two empty glasses and waited for him to come back.

  And waited.

  4 AM two police officers knocked the door. A tired looking man in his forties and a very serious looking woman about ten years younger. She flashed her ID but said her name was Laura, and when she used her first name I already knew what they were going to say.

  Hit and run. He’d been on his way back from the garage on foot, holding two bottles of whiskey and a plastic robot. Laura said he wouldn’t have seen the car, it came up behind and the driver didn’t have his lights on. He was trying not to be seen because he’d had a few drinks. My dad was flipped over, landed on his back but somehow had kept the bottles from smashing. He'd crawled to the side of the road, to a payphone, and struggled to his feet to reach the receiver.

  Laura didn't come out and say it, but it sounded like it was the exertion that finally finished him off. His broken body couldn’t cope with the movement. A passerby found him a short while later, already dead.

  The driver had turned himself in an hour later. He said he'd been drinking and fled the scene, but couldn’t face his family when he got home. It was an open and shut case.

  The male cop handed me a bottle of whiskey, the glass was all scratched and the label was wet. He said it hadn’t really been evidence and nobody would mind if I found a use for it.

  One other thing, Laura said, my dad had managed to dial a number. She passed me a piece of paper with a phone number written on it and asked, before she got someone to check on it, if I knew who’s it was?

  I said I had no idea and she took the paper back, but I’d had enough time to memorize it. I’m good with numbers.

  The two cops said they’d be back later with photographs for the formal identification. I sat and drank to him for a couple of hours. After I’d worked up enough Dutch courage I dialed the number. A woman answered on the other end, and I caught my breath.

  I said, Mum?

  She hung up.

  Santa Clause was a mean old bastard, but he was the only dad I ever had.

  The Tin Foil Heist

  “Hey”

  “What’s up Cal?”

  “That Joe?”

  “Yes, course it is. What’s up? Why are you whispering?”

  “I’m not whispering, I’m talking quiet.”

  “Okay, but why, what’s up?”

  There was a pause on the line. I could picture Cal looking around to make sure nobody was listening, about as subtle as an explosion.

  “I’m in the Asda, yeah?”r />
  My Saturday afternoon had been planned to perfection; a day to myself, no house calls or problems to solve for the boss. Just veg out on the sofa, smoke a little dope, and watch the football.

  Simple.

  Easy.

  But now I had the boss’s son on the phone. Calling from a supermarket and whispering. The best laid plans of mice and men have nothing on Callum Gibson.

  “What are you doing, Cal?”

  “They got this big TV, man, like 46 inches or something, You imagine the porn on that? “

  “You need me to come pick you up, drive you home?”

  “That’d be cool, yeah. Could you park round the corner, that street at the back, aye?”

  “….Cal?”

  “An’ have the motor running, aye?”

  “…..Cal?”

  “Yeah man?”

  “You’ve got that credit card your dad gave you, yeah? Just walk up to the till, swipe the card, and buy yourself the telly.”

  “You’re a fanny sometimes, Joe, you know?” He laughed down the line, and then went quiet and I could picture him again looking around like a cartoon coyote. “So I been watching the door, aye? It’s easy man. There’s just the one security guy, and he’s stood ten feet inside the doors, where its warm, and he looks a bit out of puff to me. I think I could outrun him, easy. Then they got these gates, aye? The sensors, they go deet deet deet, lights flash an’shite. Anytime the alarm goes off, the guard waddles up to whoever started it, looks at their receipt and then waddles back. Like he don’t really give a shit, aye?”

  “I’m sure he doesn’t want you steal a telly.”

  “An that’s if the alarm even goes off. I remember you said that if you put a 2p coin over the tags, then the gates don’t go off?”

  “You planning to wrap a 46 inch TV with coins and sneak out?”

  “What I was thinking, right, is I lifted a couple boxes of tin foil from the cooking bit, right, then I carry those in each hand while also carrying the TV. Then maybe the gates wont go, and I just walk out like I paid for it.”