Red Highway

by Loren D. Estleman

  The other three men proceeded to clean out the cash drawers and empty the contents into a cotton sack. This done, they backed out the door, got into their car, described by witnesses as a dark blue Hudson sedan, and drove off.

  Honeywell described the machine gunner as “tall and blond, wearing a gray suit and hat,” and sporting a pair of expensive-looking shoes. This description, police said, fits Virgil Ballard, Public Enemy Number One, who is wanted in Missouri, Kansas, and Oklahoma for crimes ranging from bank robbery to murder. Police also believe that the man at the door with the shotgun may have been Alex Kern, who, since helping Ballard escape from the Oklahoma State Penitentiary at McAlester two years ago, has been riding with the Tri-State Terror.

  Mrs. Alvina Peevy, the guard’s widow, was unavailable for comment.

  Subject of the most massive manhunt in the history of the Tri-State area, Virgil Ballard.…

  Virgil snatched the paper from Alex’s hands before he could read further. “How do you like that?” His face was flushed an angry red.

  “We sure are busy, ain’t we?”

  “Busy, hell!” Virgil dashed the paper to the floor in a flurry of pages. “What do you think we’re doing, sitting around here twiddling our thumbs in this Godforsaken nothing town? We’re supposed to be laying low until the papers lose interest in us. So now they got us robbing a bank in Haileyville, for God’s sake!”

  “I never thought that bank’d go for twenty-seven thousand. Maybe we should of hit it.”

  “Didn’t you read it? We just did! ‘Tall and blonde … gray suit and hat!’ That must fit a million guys in Oklahoma alone. Why’s it got to be me?”

  “You do wear expensive shoes.”

  Virgil ignored him. “What the hell’s the matter with them damn cops, anyway? They ought to know better than to tag something on me just because a guy’s tall and blond. Christ, they might as well arrest Jimmy Cagney!”

  “Cagney’s not tall. Look, Virge, why let it get to you? It’s happened before.”

  “Yeah, but it’s so damn unfair.”

  Alex picked up his screwdriver and used it to pry straight the fitting on the bottom of the yellow glass tube he held in his hand. “Well,” he said, “that’s the price of fame, I guess.”

  Hazel came in from the kitchen, carrying a cut-glass bowl of fruit. She was wearing a gray dress and flowered apron, and had a thin sweater buttoned at the nape of her neck like a cape. “Where have you been?” she asked Virgil, setting the bowl on the coffee table.

  “I went downtown to get that tire fixed.” He took an apple from the bowl, felt it suspiciously, and rapped it on the edge of the table. It made a sharp knocking sound. “Wax.” He tossed it disgustedly back into the bowl.

  “Did you get a newspaper?”

  “No.” Virgil turned away.

  Hazel bent down to pick up the tangle of pages on the floor. “Then what’s this?” She straightened it out, found the front page and read it. Her expression was unchanged as she looked up from it. “Does this mean we have to leave?”

  “No reason. It’ll blow over.” Virgil took the paper gently from her hands and placed it on the coffee table. “These punks who got to storm banks like they was forts don’t last. The cops’ll pick ’em up on their next job and the heat’s off.”

  “They’ll run a big investigation in the area.”

  “Wrong again. Haileyville’s too close. The cops’ll expect ’em to be hundreds of miles away from here by nightfall, and they’ll be right. No crooks in their right minds would stick around after hitting for twenty grand.”

  “Except maybe us.” Alex sat back on his heels and plugged the radio into the wall. The tubes glowed.

  Virgil looked at him. “Yeah. Except maybe us.”

  Hazel said, “As long as we’re talking about money, has anybody paid the rent lately? The landlord called about it yesterday.”

  “Let him stew,” said Virgil. “The guy’s a creep anyway, all that nut talks about is religion, fish-eyeing everything the minute he gets in the door.”

  “You think he suspects something?”

  “Nah, I doubt if nuts like him even read the papers.”

  The dog began barking outside, loud and full-throated.

  “That damn dog again,” said Virgil, heading for the door. “I’ll shut him up.” He went out.

  “He’s nothing but a lot of trouble,” Hazel said. “I don’t know what you brought him here for, Alex. He eats more than any of us.”

  The radio hummed. “It’s worth it for the protection we get. If any of them laws come around here, boy, we’ll know it.”

  “I don’t see how, the way he barks at every little noise, all the time. It could just as well be a screech owl as—”

  The dog, a big spotted pointer, came bounding into the room and proceeded to smother Alex’s face in wet kisses. “Easy, Josh. Down, boy.” He slapped the dog reassuringly on the rib cage. Josh panted joyfully.

  Virgil came in, brushing dog hairs off his jacket. “We got to get him a new collar. He’s almost wore the old one clean through.”

  “Another one?” Alex was astonished. “How’s he do it?”

  Annabelle came in, wearing a bathrobe and slippers, her hair tied up in an orange bandanna. The dog spotted her and ran toward her. She squealed and backed swiftly out of the room, slamming shut the door just as Josh planted his paws against the lower panels. He scratched at the door, whimpered, then gave up and returned to Alex, tail wagging.

  “Come on out, hon,” Alex called through the door. “He just wants to make friends.”

  “I’m not coming out till you get rid of that animal.” Her voice was surprisingly strong.

  “He won’t even chase a cat. He’s friendly.”

  “I’m not coming out till you get rid of that animal,” she repeated.

  Virgil made a growling noise in his throat. “Dogs, radio repairmen, women scared of animals. ‘The Ballard Gang!’” He struck the door jamb with the heel of his hand.

  “Hey!” exclaimed Alex, one ear clapped against the speaker. “Music! I think I fixed the radio!”

  In his one-room bungalow on the other side of Shawnee, the landlord awoke to hear the news commentator’s voice booming from the battered Philco atop the high-boy. He was seated in a low cane chair, his Bible lying open across his knees, marker ribbon hanging down from the spine. He had slept through the morning sermon, clean into the twelve o’clock news.

  “… But legislators are confident of a quick victory. On the home front, the search for Public Enemy Number One Virgil Ballard has shifted to southern Kansas, where local police yesterday found abandoned the car believed to have been used by the Ballard Gang during the daring holdup of the Haileyville Oklahoma Savings and Loan Company last month. The car, a 1932 Hudson, was discovered in a farmer’s field just outside of Lawrence, hidden beneath a pile of loose brush. It is registered to Alvin A. Christie, an Oklahoma cattle buyer who reported it stolen November 15.

  “Virgil Ballard is thirty-two years old, stands six feet tall, weighs 170 pounds. He had blond hair and blue eyes, and has a small mole above his right elbow. He may be traveling with fellow bank robber Alex Kern, who is also six feet tall, weighs 159 pounds, has black hair and blue eyes. If you see either of these men, report it to your local police headquarters. They will send it on to the Division of Investigation in Washington, D.C. We pause here for a message from Woolworth’s department store, who has something to say about your Christmas shopping list,” the smooth voice droned.

  The landlord got up and switched off the radio. Raindrops were beginning to tap at the window, swimming down the glass and collecting in tiny puddles on the sill outside. The landlord felt a chill, and drew on the ratted old sweater he had left draped over the back of the cane chair. “Six feet tall, blond hair, blue eyes, mole just above—” He came out of his lethargy and grasped the telephone from the end table, knuckles whitening on the upright cylinder as he dialed.

  Chapter Eighteen />
  “Yes, sir. We certainly will, sir. Thank you, sir.” The redheaded desk sergeant looked bored as he hung up the phone.

  “Anything important?” The plainclothesman, leaning across the end of the wooden counter, looked up from his newspaper.

  The sergeant shook his head, feigning a yawn. “Another Ballard sighting. Seems this guy rented a house to him on the South Side.”

  “Think there’s something to it?”

  “You got the paper. Long way between here and Lawrence, Kansas.”

  “Yeah.” The detective turned to the funny pages. “I guess you’re right.”

  It was drizzling steadily by the time the sun settled behind the jagged city skyline, its descent hidden by the thick cloud cover. Hazel, in a flowered dressing gown, was flinging handfuls of glittering tinsel onto the branches of the small Christmas tree Alex had brought home and set on the table before the tall front window. Annabelle was curled up on the couch reading a movie magazine. She was wearing the same bathrobe and slippers she’d had on the day the dog had chased her into the adjoining room. The radio was playing Christmas carols.

  Hazel paused in her work to look out into the drooling rain. “Don’t tell me Alex is still out walking that dog,” she said.

  “Maybe he stopped somewhere,” suggested Annabelle, staring at a full-page shot of John Barrymore posing beside his custom-built automobile.

  “Where?”

  “Oh, a bar or something. Alex gets lonely at times.”

  Virgil came in from the master bedroom, hair mussed, shirttail hanging untidily outside his pants. “Damn music,” he grumbled, flipping the radio off. “How’s a guy supposed to get rid of a headache with all that going on?” He went into the kitchen, came back out before the door stopped swinging, a bottle of aspirins in one hand and a glass of water in the other. He downed two tablets, emptied the glass, and set the remains beside the pygmy tree. “I feel better already.”

  “You’d feel even better if you cut down on your drinking,” said Hazel. She hung a shining red globe on one of the branches, bowing it almost to the level of the table.

  “Says you. Where’s the boy and his dog?”

  “Still out.”

  “In that?” Virgil cupped his hands about his eyes so he could see out the window. “Christ, I hope he brought his night glasses with him.”

  “Annie says he might’ve stopped off at a bar.”

  Virgil turned to Annabelle. “What bar?”

  Annabelle looked up from John Barrymore. “Any bar. Alex likes to get acquainted with bartenders.”

  “Yeah, I’ll bet.”

  The door opened and Alex came in, raincoat streaming water. “Man! That ain’t gonna let up tonight.” He closed the door on the hissing rain.

  “Where’s the dog?” Hazel asked.

  “I tied him up out front. He can take it.”

  “Stop anywhere?” Virgil wanted to know.

  Alex slid out of the raincoat. “Yeah, at a saloon. Why?”

  “What if it gets raided?”

  Alex looked thoughtful. “Yeah. Hey, I never thought of that.”

  Virgil’s eyes were hard. “Well, from now on, think about it.” He flopped into a chair and fished a cigarette out of his pocket. “Any news?”

  “Not much.” Alex hung his coat on the hall tree. It dripped loudly on the raised floor before the door. “Oh, yeah, we’re in Kansas. Cops found the car that bunch used in Haileyville, and that’s where they’re looking.”

  “Let ’em keep looking. Anything else?” Virgil lit his cigarette.

  The other robber glanced suspiciously in the direction of the women. Annabelle was still engrossed in her magazine, and Hazel was adjusting the silver angel on the top of the tree. When Alex spoke, his voice was low. “I got us a bank.”

  Virgil appraised him in silence, squinting through his cigarete smoke. A long, low, whooping sound drifted into the room from the front yard. Virgil stirred in his seat. “There goes that damn dog again,” he said.

  The red-haired sergeant lifted the paper cup of coffee to his lips, then paused to remove the slip of paper which had adhered to the bottom, and set the cup back down untasted. It was the bulletin that had come in during his break, the one he had put aside to read later. He had forgotten about it until this moment. Now, five minutes before the end of his shift, he wondered if he should leave it for Sergeant Kirby, who would be taking over presently. If it were something important, however, the delay wouldn’t look good on his record. He sighed and unfolded the missive.

  As he read, his eyes widened. He snapped up the telephone, letting the report glide to the floor, and dialed the number of the Oklahoma headquarters of the Investigation Division of the Department of Justice. Kansas State troopers had apprehended the men who had abandoned the getaway car outside of Lawrence. Neither of them knew Virgil Ballard.

  Virgil spread a map of Shawnee he had picked up at the neighborhood service station on the dining room table. Hazel had turned the radio back on, and Christmas carols slid underneath the closed door. He looked questioningly at Alex.

  “Right here,” said Alex, pointing out a narrow street near the river. “The Shawnee National. Set between a flophouse and a candy store. Cathouse across the street.”

  “Nice neighborhood.”

  “Listen, it’s better than having a gunshop next door. You never know what these rubes are gonna do when they get a whiff of that reward money. Anyway, this is the biggest bank in town, and one of the largest in Oklahoma. There’s gotta be, oh, ninety, a hundred thousand in that place on any given day.”

  Virgil looked doubtful. “They don’t leave money like that laying around unguarded.”

  “Well, that’s the catch. There are six regular guards in all, four in the lobby and two in the vault. Two of them are plainclothes. Also they got a guy stationed above the door with a tommy gun.”

  “What? No tank?”

  Alex ignored the sarcasm. “The guys in uniform are easy. We can get the drop on them the minute we come through the door. Plainclothesmen are easy to spot, ’cause they look like cops, and we can grab them at the same time. The guards in the vault, we got them when it opens. Simple.”

  “And the guy with the chopper?”

  “Window dressing. What’s he gonna do, cut loose in a room full of innocent bystanders? I tell you, Virge, this is gonna be an easy hundred grand. Then we can split up and get the hell away from the heat. Mexico maybe.”

  “We’re gonna need more guys.”

  “I know a few of the local boys. They’re dependable, and they know how to follow orders. Whattaya say?”

  “I don’t know. Let me think about it.”

  Alex straightened. “Okay, that’s your privilege. But I wouldn’t wait too long. Bank jobs rot just like everything else.”

  The rain-soaked scene outside the window was draped in the purplish black of late evening, leaving only the water-streaked glass for Virgil to contemplate. At last he stretched mightily, arching his body and driving his long arms straight toward the ceiling. “Mexico, huh?” he said, yawning. “What do you suppose it’s like down there?”

  It was nearly midnight by the time the lawmen in Oklahoma City had organized themselves for the trip to Shawnee. There were three big sedans lined up at the curb in front of federal headquarters, one of them a black-and-white sheriff’s patrol car, the other two unmarked government vehicles. The damp night air was alive with the clicks and rattles of over a dozen firearms as their owners made last-minute checks of their weapons in the glare of the headlights. Pump shotguns rattled beside submachine guns, the breeches of assorted automatic pistols banged and slammed, their checked grips squeaking in the tense wet fists of their handlers, bulletproof vests were hefted gruntingly into the back seats of the first two cars. When the noises of preparation had died down, William Farnum turned to Sherifff McCracken and asked him how far they had to go.

  “Forty-three miles. We ought to be there in three hours.”

 
; “Make it two,” snapped the federal agent, and ducked into the back seat of the lead car. The sheriff glared.

  Five minutes later, the caravan of heavy vehicles pulled out on the first leg of its forty-three-mile journey.

  “Whose car we gonna use on this job?” Virgil, his shirt collar wilted and the knot of his tie hanging in the vicinity of his breast pocket, was sitting across the map-covered table from Alex, an ashtray overflowing with cigarette butts at his side. The mantel clock in the living room struck one.

  Alex shrugged. “The Pontiac, I guess. Your job’s still at the garage, ain’t it?”

  “Transmission trouble,” replied Virgil. “In a brand-new car, not a hundred miles on it. How about that?”

  “Yeah, Detroit’s getting pretty careless. My car, then?”

  The other nodded. “We’ll probably need another one, too, what with more men going along.”

  “No problem. We’ll snatch one tomorrow.”

  The radio in the living room squealed and the music changed. Hazel had tuned to another station. Kate Smith belted “Moonlight Bay” through the closed door, vibrating the loose panels.

  “Say we get ninety,” Virgil proposed. “How many ways we gonna split it?”

  “Five. We’ll need that many to keep everyone in line. Six, with a man at the wheel.”

  “Forget the man at the wheel. We’d have to have two anyway, one for each car, and we can’t afford that.”

  “Okay, make it five. That’s eighteen thousand apiece.”

  Virgil grinned. “Not a bad piece of change, for one day’s work. How much we got in the kitty?”

  “About eight thousand.”

  “Four grand for each of us, plus eighteen from this job. That should set us up pretty good in Mexico.” Virgil put a match to yet another cigarette. “Man, them greasers is gonna get a load of some genuine rich gringos this time around. You can bet on it.”

  The door opened and Hazel entered, pulling the dressing gown about her. “Virgil, it’s getting late. Don’t you think it’s time for bed?”