Two for the Money

by Max Allan Collins

  “That must mean Nolan’s right up there on the Family’s list of open contracts.”

  “Well, not really, the heat’s off Nolan pretty much, except with Charlie. To tell you the truth, most of the sentiment on the Family council at the time was good riddance to Gordon. And remember, it’s been a long time since this happened, too, twenty years or so.”

  “Twenty years?”

  “Fifteen maybe. More than fifteen, I think.”

  “You figure maybe it was Nolan who went to see Werner the other night, Nick?”

  “I don’t know . . . I heard . . . you keep this in strict confidence?”

  “Sure, Nick.”

  “There’s a guy that works for Werner, they call him Irish, I think . . .”

  “Yeah. Herman Cavazos.”

  “Anyway, this guy Irish is supposed to be a friend of Nolan’s. Nolan’s reportedly turned into a heist artist of the first order since he split with the Family.”

  “How’s that tie in with Cavazos?”

  “Well, a friend of my brother’s worked with Nolan once, and according to my brother, this Irish guy was mechanic on the job. Under the hat, okay?”

  “Sure, Nick.”

  After that Calder spent his off hours parked near Cavazos’ warehouse, watching for Nolan. Thursday, Friday, and Saturday went by, and today, on Sunday, just when Calder was chewing himself out for wasting so much time and weighing whether or not to go in and put the squeeze on Cavazos, Nolan showed. Calder had waited till Nolan left the warehouse, not wanting to involve any of Werner’s other employees if possible, and had followed him to the head shop on the hill.

  In the front seat the kid said, “Who’s got fifteen cents for the bridge?”

  Calder dug in his pocket and tossed a dime and a nickel up to Grossman and sat back as the car eased onto the Centennial bridge.

  “As you’re coming down off the bridge,” Calder said, as the boy slowed to toss the change into the toll basket, “there’s a cut-off to a fourlane, on your right. Take it.”

  “What do you figure to do?” Nolan asked.

  “Oh, I’ll give Werner a chance to explain you.”

  “What?”

  “I suppose I could take you to Chicago myself and deliver you to Charlie, and probably pick up some points along the way, not to mention some heavy bread. But Charlie? Charlie’s on the down ride, Werner’s going up. So I’ll give Werner a chance to make it right by me.”

  “How?”

  Grossman cocked his head around. “This the turn-off?”

  “Yeah, kid, and don’t get over thirty-five.”

  Nolan repeated, “Make it right, how?”

  “Like I said, Werner’ll be moving up, and a good man’ll be needed to take over the Quad Cities operation.”

  “You.”

  “Me. Of course I’ll have to keep you on ice for a while, Nolan. Wouldn’t do to have you and Werner pull a little cross or anything.”

  “Then what?”

  “Well, I’m afraid once you’ve served your purpose, you’ll be nothing but an embarrassment to the Family, and a threat to me. Let’s just say I wouldn’t go planning anything for next year.”

  “Werner said something about you once,” Nolan said, “and I guess maybe he was right.”

  “Oh?”

  “He said you think too much.”

  Calder laughed. “And fucking pussies like you and Werner don’t think at all.”

  Nolan smiled.

  Calder didn’t like the smile; it was disquieting, more a line than a smile, a line turning up ever so slightly at its corners.

  Nolan said, “Goose it, kid.”

  Grossman nodded.

  There was a thud as the boy punched the accelerator to the floor. The car lurched forward as the motor kicked in, and the speedometer climbed to ninety-five before Calder could get his mouth working.

  “What the fuck are you doing?”

  Grossman said nothing, kept the pedal to the floor. Nolan still wore the disquieting smile.

  “I said what the fuck do you think you’re doing?”

  Neither Nolan nor Grossman spoke.

  Calder grabbed a fistful of Nolan’s shirt and jammed the .38 barrel to his forehead. “I’ll kill him, kid!”

  There was no sound other than the throb of the engine and Calder’s own hard breathing.

  “I’ll kill him! I will, honest to Christ, kid! I’ll splatter him all over the backseat if you don’t slow back down!”

  Grossman said, “Go ahead. I don’t like him much. Do I, old man?”

  “That’s right,” Nolan said. “We don’t get along. Couldn’t you see I was knocking him around when you grabbed us?”

  “Goddamn it, I’m not playing with you, Nolan! I’ll kill you!”

  “Nothing I can do about it. Grossman doesn’t like me. He doesn’t give a damn if you kill me. Simple as that.”

  Calder’s eyes went to the speedometer; the needle was quivering near one hundred and ten.

  “You let me do some work on this crate, mister,” Grossman said, “and she’ll really fly.”

  “I think the kid’s doing a pretty fair job of driving,” Nolan said, “considering he was high as a kite when I dragged him out of that head shop.”

  Calder abandoned Nolan and shoved the .38 barrel against the back of Grossman’s neck. “Goddamnit, then, I’ll shoot you, smart-ass!”

  “I don’t think you’d want to do that,” Grossman said. “Going as fast as this? Shoot me and the car’ll rack up bad. Ever see a car hit at this speed? Totals ’em every time. Face it, it’s going to kill you, too. Shit, you don’t even have your seat belt on.”

  “Goddamn it!”

  “He’s right, you know,” Nolan said.

  “He’ll kill all of us!”

  “He’s a wild kid, I’ll grant you that.”

  “Goddamnit!”

  “How you doing, kid?”

  “Fine, old man,” Grossman said. “Take a look at that speedometer. Needle’s buried now. Only reads to one-twenty, but we’re doing better than that.”

  “I’d guess one-thirty,” Nolan said.

  Calder gripped the left side of his face with his free hand; his fingers ran up and down the bruise. “Goddamn it, stop this car! How can you be so goddamn calm!”

  “He wants to know why we’re calm,” Grossman said.

  “Why don’t you hand me the gun,” Nolan said, “then maybe I could talk Grossman into slowing down.”

  “No! Slow down or I’ll shoot!”

  “You aren’t shooting anybody. Hand me the gun.”

  The car was vibrating, and Calder had a sudden vision of it as a mass of nuts and bolts just waiting to fly apart.

  “All right!” he said. “All right.” He handed the gun to Nolan, who reached over and retrieved his own .38 from Calder’s belt.

  “Slow down, Grossman,” Nolan said.

  “Okay, old man. Stop sign up ahead, anyway.”

  Grossman pumped the brakes and with a screeching slide the car came to a halt a few feet beyond the stop sign and the flashing yellow light beside it, a stream of traffic racing by inches away. “Where to?” he asked.

  Nolan scratched his head. “Pay phone around here?”

  “Yeah,” Grossman said, “there’s one in the Cinema parking lot. Couple blocks from here.

  “Okay. I got a call to make.”

  Calder shut his eyes. He didn’t feel good. He wanted to get his heart down out of his throat.

  The car pulled into the mammoth theater lot, which was three-quarters full, stopping at the phone stall that was at its farthest and most deserted side. Nolan left the car and made his call.

  Calder sat and worked at slowing his breath, stroking the left side of his face with his fingertips.

  Five minutes later a gold Lincoln Continental with a black vinyl top and lettering on the side saying “Club Maricaibo” drew up next to Calder’s Charger. Werner stepped out.

  Nolan walked over to him. They sh
ook hands. Nolan said, “Your boy’s in the backseat.”

  “Okay,” Werner said. “I’ll handle it. You and your young friend can take my Lincoln back over to Davenport and pick up your own car. Have him drop the Lincoln off at the Concort some time tomorrow.”

  “Fine,” Nolan said. “See you, Werner. Grossman, let’s go.”

  Nolan and Grossman got into the Lincoln and glided away.

  Werner stood outside by the window and Calder stayed in the backseat and three more minutes passed. Calder looked up and saw another car arrive, a recent-model black Ford. The door sprang open and a big black guy crawled out and ambled over to Werner.

  “Tillis,” Werner said, “there’s a pile of garbage in the backseat of that car there. Do something about it.”

  The black guy yanked the door open and pulled Calder out by the arm and dragged him toward the Ford.

  Just before he was pushed into the front seat of the car, Calder looked over at Werner and said, “You’re still a fucking pussy.”

  8

  Nolan crouched down by the fireplace and prodded the burning logs, studying the flames.

  Jon walked in from the kitchen, shirtless, sipping a can of beer. “It’s past midnight, Nolan. You going to bed pretty soon? You know what tomorrow is.”

  “Tomorrow’s today, kid.”

  “Huh?”

  “It’s past midnight, you said. So it’s Monday now.”

  Jon came over by where Nolan was kneeling and the reflection of flames ran up and down the boy’s face. He looked very young in his new short hair, freshly cut this afternoon, the curly hair tight against his head. Nolan only hoped that now the boy wouldn’t look too young.

  “Butterflies, Jon?”

  “Guess so.”

  “Go to bed.”

  “You know, it’s just a few hours away, isn’t it, Nolan? I never saw a week go so fast. Just a few hours and we’ll be . . .”

  “Yeah. Go to bed.” Nolan stood, took the boy by the shoulders, and turned him toward the bedroom. “It’ll take you a while to get to sleep, so get started.”

  “Good night, Nolan.” The boy headed for the doorway, got half-way and looked back at Nolan. He said, “Hey, thanks for not getting pissed off about that, you know, that deal with Shelly.”

  “It’s okay. Night.”

  “Night.”

  “Uh, Jon.”

  “Yeah, Nolan?”

  “I might go out for a drive later. So don’t worry about it if you wake up and I’m not around.”

  “Oh. Okay.”

  He disappeared into the bedroom and Nolan turned back to the fire.

  Jon was right about the week going fast; a fast full week had passed since the encounter with Calder, and tonight, Sunday night again, had been Nolan’s last meeting with his little task force before the Monday afternoon job.

  Nolan lit a cigarette, inhaled deep, and sank into his thoughts.

  Over all, things had shaped up, and not too badly.

  On Monday he’d gone ahead and explained the plan in detail to each of them, making Jon, Grossman, and Shelly memorize not only every aspect of their own roles, but everyone else’s, as well. They had a lot of questions, and that pleased Nolan, and all kinds of angles were explored in what turned out to be a five-and-a-half-hour discussion.

  He’d done further target shooting with Jon on Tuesday, and with Grossman, too, who hadn’t really needed it. Surprisingly enough, it turned out that Grossman’s stepfather, his mother’s third husband, had been a sheriff out in some small Eastern town, and Grossman had grown up with a pistol range in his basement, which also had been the basement of the county jail. When the target shooting was over, Nolan filled in Jon and Grossman on the rules of the use of firearms on a job.

  “Never shoot on the job,” Nolan said, “unless fired upon. Don’t shoot in reaction to a sudden movement, or even a sudden sound. Drop to the floor in such a case, and find out what’s going on. If you must shoot, shoot into a glass window and cause some confusion. And if it’s absolutely necessary to return fire, aim for an arm or leg.”

  “Hey, old man,” Grossman said, “what about the big talk you fed us that time about all the notches on your gun?”

  “Guys I shot and killed,” Nolan said, “were mostly guys on the job with me. Guys who crossed me.”

  Grossman said, “Oh,” and got thoughtful for a while.

  For the most part, Nolan was pleased with the way Grossman had come along, though he still had many of his initial doubts about him. But Grossman’s outbursts of stupidity seemed on the wane, in addition to his working hard on the preparation of the job—not to mention the way he’d come through under stress in the crisis with Calder a week ago, where his handling of himself and the car was strictly pro.

  On Wednesday Nolan sent Jon to Iowa City to pick up the faked credentials at Planner’s, and worked with Grossman in figuring out a good route for him and Shelly to take to Canada after the hit, which would include Nolan’s doubleback to Iowa strategy; only Grossman was to cross over at Fort Madison, not the Quad Cities. After that sidetrack to the south, Grossman would head back north through Iowa. It had been decided and agreed upon by all that when the four split up, Jon and Nolan would take Grossman’s and Shelly’s share with them, since there probably wouldn’t be time to divide the money properly and because it was unlikely that Grossman and Shelly could make it to Canada without a thorough car search by some official somewhere along the line. The money would be kept by Planner in his big downstairs safe, and Jon would drive up to Canada to meet Grossman and Shelly when sufficient cooling time had elapsed, using a satisfactory smuggling method to get the money to them safely.

  On Thursday Nolan had taken Grossman over to Port City and had run him over the escape route from the bank to the bridge. They did it half a dozen times, by the end of which Grossman had it down to a minute and three seconds. And Nolan had made him take it easy at that, so they wouldn’t attract attention. The actual time on the job would be well under a minute.

  Grossman really was a hell of a driver, Nolan had to admit. In many ways that run-in with Calder had been a good thing, not only giving Nolan a chance to see Grossman function under fire, but giving Grossman an idea of the seriousness of this kind of work.

  Friday Nolan drove Jon and Grossman down to Burlington to get fitted for the business suits. They went to Burlington because an appearance of that kind in Port City or even at Iowa City at this point was out of the question, and they’d already done far too much in the Quad Cities as it was. All three purchased similar suits, dark ones with vests, and Nolan made sure everybody got a tie just loud enough to attract people to it and not the wearer’s face, but not so unconventional as to be suspicious. In the suits the trio looked like two junior execs and their boss. Grossman would be light years away from his counter-culture image in the suit and short haircut.

  Since Sunday would be busy, Nolan let his young co-workers have a day of rest on Saturday, doing little himself outside of a drive to Geneseo, Illinois, which was picked only because it was fairly close and was safer than Port City, Iowa City, or any of the Quad Cities. At Geneseo Nolan took care of getting some odds and ends, including three briefcases, three pairs of expensive sunglasses, two laundry bags, and the necessary tools for the Sunday haircuts due Grossman and Jon, sharp-bladed scissors and thinning shears.

  Off and on throughout the week, Grossman had worked over all three cars, the Country Squire, the Chevy II, and his own Mustang, making sure they were in topnotch running order.

  Sunday evening Shelly had shown up wearing her “new hair,” a very natural-looking black wig that could easily pass as her own cut short. When everyone had said a word to two about the wig, she yanked it off and revealed her own long hair pinned up underneath, now colored a pale platinum blonde, which she then undid and let fall around her shoulders.

  “Looks very nice,” Nolan told her. “Dye it this afternoon?”

  “Last night,” she said.

&n
bsp; “With your blue eyes it looks natural. And you won’t have to worry about roots showing, since you just dyed it. Ought to fool your own mother.”

  Shelly had done a good job, and her inside information proved every day to be more and more valuable. Nolan’s whole plan, in fact, revolved around specific information she’d provided.

  But there were still problems, and Shelly lurked behind them.

  Several hours before the meeting, Jon had come to Nolan and said, “We just got to talk, Nolan.”

  “What is it, kid?”

  “I fucked up, Nolan, I really fucked up bad.”

  “Go on.”

  “It’s . . . it’s Shelly.”

  “Oh?”

  “Remember when we talked about her, and you said you thought she had hot pants, and I said I thought you were out of your mind?”

  “I remember.”

  “Well . . . ever since you told Grossman not to see Shelly, and since you been having me drive over to Port City to pick her up for the meetings and then drive her back again, well . . .”

  “Well, well what?”

  “It’s just that, uh, Shelly’s been making these little plays for me. You know, little things.”

  “Like putting her hand in your lap.”

  Jon made a face, nodded.

  “I said she’d be a problem, Jon.”

  “Grossman’s going to blow up if he ever finds out what a flirty little bitch she is.”

  “Likely.”

  “Nolan.”

  “Yeah.”

  “There’s more.”

  “I figured as much.”

  “The other night—last night, you know? When I said I wanted to go out for a beer by myself and think?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I, uh, went over to Port City. It was a stupid thing, I know, but Shelly said if I should happen to be around Saturday night I could, uh, stop up, and, uh . . .”

  “And you did, and lost your cherry.”

  Jon made another face, nodded again. “That sums it up pretty good, Nolan.”