1958 - The World in My Pocket (8 page)

Morgan put one hand on the bar and vaulted up on to it. He kicked glasses and bottles out of his way and the sudden smashing of breaking glass brought people to their feet and the buzz of conversation to an abrupt silence.

‘Take it easy!’ Morgan bawled, sweeping the room with the muzzle of the machine gun. ‘This is a hold-up! Don’t make a move and you won’t get hurt! Sit down, all of you! Anyone who starts anything will get a gutful of lead! Just stay still and you’ll be okay!’

Nearly blinded by sweat, his heart hammering so violently he could scarcely breathe, Bleck dragged down the handkerchief mask which was suffocating him. He held his .38 in a hand that was shaking, while he looked across the packed cafe, praying that some fool wouldn’t start something.

A woman screamed. Two men started to get to their feet, but were immediately dragged back into their seats by the women with them. Everyone else in the cafe froze into statues.

‘Okay,’ Morgan said, pitching his voice high. ‘We want cash. Put your wallets on the tables. Come on! Get moving!’

Most of the men began fumbling in their hip pockets and this was Ginny’s cue. She pulled the canvas sack that Morgan had given her from her pocket, then, holding the sack in her left hand and the .38 in her right, she started her lone walk down the aisle, stopping at each table to pick up the wallets that were lying on the table and dropping them into the sack.

Bleck, standing by the door, watched her. She moved slowly and cautiously like someone walking on brittle ice, but there was no hesitation. She paused at each table, collected the wallet that lay there, dropped, it into the sack and moved on.

Morgan yelled: ‘Come on! Come on! Get your wallets out! I’ve got an itchy finger, but I don’t want to hurt anyone unless I have to! Get those wallets out!’

Bleck began to relax.

Morgan and the girl were swinging this, he thought. Talk about nerve! The snap in Morgan’s voice was something to hear and the way he stood, slightly crouching, his machine gun pushed forward made him a blood chilling, menacing figure.

The girl suddenly stopped her mechanical movement forward.

She had reached a table where a woman, wearing a mink stole and a fat, hard-faced man were sitting. There was no wallet on the table.

She looked at the man, who stared at her, his small grey eyes glittering.

‘Come on, mister,’ she said softly. ‘Hand it over.’

‘I’ve got nothing for you, you tramp,’ the man said. ‘I don’t carry money.’

Bleck began to sweat. He smelt trouble. He looked anxiously at Morgan, who stood motionless, the machine gun rigid. He was watching Ginny, his lips slightly off his teeth, his expression wolfish.

‘Hand it over!’ Ginny said, raising her voice.

‘I’ve got nothing for you, you little bitch,’ the man said, staring at her.

His companion suddenly went as white as a fresh fall of snow and shut her eyes. Her massive body began to sag against the man who shoved her off impatiently.

Ginny lifted her gun.

‘Shed it, fatso,’ she said, her voice suddenly strident, ‘or you’ll get a dose of lead poisoning!’

The man’s face tightened, but he said, ‘I’ve got nothing for you! Get out of here!’

Morgan shifted the muzzle of his gun around to cover the man, but he knew the movement was futile. He knew the man must realize he wouldn’t shoot because Ginny was in the direct line of fire. This was Ginny’s show, and Morgan watched her anxiously, knowing this was the test. The cards were down and the pressure on. Would she crack?

He got his answer sooner than he expected it.

Ginny smiled at the man: a flickering smile that came and went beneath the mask, but showed for a brief flash in her eyes. Then she pistol-whipped the man across his face. Her movement was so quick he had no chance of protecting himself. The barrel of the .38 slashed him across his nose and cheek and blood spurted. He fell backwards, his hand going to his face, a grunting sound forcing itself out of his mouth.

She leaned across the table and hit him again. The barrel of the gun coming down hard on the top of his head, so he slumped forward, half unconscious. The woman in the mink stole gave a shrill scream and slid out of her chair in a faint.

Morgan yelled, ‘Hold it! Just one move out of anyone of you and you’ll get it!’

His voice was so loaded with menace that even Bleck froze for a brief moment.

Ginny stepped close to the half-unconscious man, jerked him upright and pulled out his wallet from his inside pocket. She gave him a hard shove so he fell across the table as she dropped the wallet into the sack.

That was enough.

Wallets appeared on the tables as if by magic. All Ginny now had to do was to walk swiftly down the aisle, picking them up and dropping them into the sack.

Bleck was so fascinated that he had taken his attention off the door, and it came as a shock when the door jerked open and a big, broad-shouldered man came in.

Bleck stared stupidly at the man. The big man looked from Bleck to the gun Bleck was holding slackly in his hand. The big man moved swiftly. His hand came down in a chopping blow on Bleck’s wrist. The gun flew out of Bleck’s grip and slid across the floor to land near the bar.

As the big man set himself to throw a punch at Bleck, Morgan shifted the machine gun in his direction and yelled at him: ‘Hold it! Get your hands up! You hear me?’

The big man’s eyes went to Morgan and the machine gun and his courage sagged. He backed away from Bleck and put up his hands.

A thickset man with a pugnacious face who had shed his wallet and who was sitting at a table at which Ginny was standing, seeing Morgan’s gun wasn’t aiming in his direction, made a sudden grab at Ginny’s .38 as she picked up his wallet. His hand closed over the gun butt and her wrist and he tried to jerk the gun out of her grasp.

She held on to the gun and looked into his reckless, scared eyes. She squeezed the trigger. The gun went off with a crash that rattled the windows of the cafe. The man released his grip as if he had caught hold of something red hot. The bullet cut through his sleeve, grazing his arm.

Ginny stepped back, threatening him with the gun while Morgan yelled and cursed at him.

‘Get on! Get on!’ Morgan shouted to Ginny. ‘Hurry!’

As calm as a model at a dress show, Ginny moved on, picking up the wallets and dropping them into the sack. No one moved. They sat frozen, white-faced, their fear riveted on their faces.

Outside in the car, Kitson heard the crash of gunfire and he flinched. It needed a tremendous effort of self-control not to put the car into gear and drive away.

He sat motionless, his hands gripping the wheel, sweat on his face, holding on to himself, willing himself to stay where he was.

Then suddenly it was all over.

There was a sound of rushing of feet. He heard the rear door of the Lincoln jerk open and bodies spilt into the car. He felt a hot, sweating body thud against his as Bleck sprawled on to the front seat. Automatically, he started the car moving.

‘Go on! Go on!’ Morgan bawled in his ear from the rear seat. ‘Get the hell out of here fast!’

Kitson, his breath whistling between his clenched teeth, sent the car surging forward. He swung left with a scream of tortured tires, cut down the narrow alley and out into the in street.

With the skill that was his natural talent, he skipped the car cross the main street, and into another side street, slackening speed slightly, flicking on his headlights and flicking them off immediately as he drove across the intersections.

Morgan twisted around, was staring out of the rear window, intent on seeing if they were being followed. After a half a mile of such driving, he said abruptly, ‘Okay, no one is on us, let’s

get over to Gypo’s place.’

There was a general relaxation of tension.

‘Well, that was rugged!’ Bleck said, wiping his face with the back of his hand. ‘That could have turned pretty sour if we hadn’t had the chopper with us. Phew! When that jerk tried to grab Ginny’s gun.’

‘What happened?’ Kitson demanded, his voice shaking. ‘What was the shooting? Did anyone get hurt?’

‘No. Some guy tried to grab Ginny’s gun and the gun went off. No one got hurt. It certainly put the fear of the devil into that punk. Then a guy took me by surprise and knocked the gun out of my hand. That was pretty rugged too.’

Ginny was sitting next to Morgan, and he could feel her body was trembling. He looked sideways at her, and as they passed under a street lamp, he saw she was looking bad, her skin a bluish white.

He patted her knee.

‘You did fine, kid,’ he said. ‘You really did fine. The way you handled that fat jerk! I’ve never seen anything like it for nerve.’

She moved her knee away.

‘Oh, stop it!’ she said, and to his surprise, she turned her head away and began to cry.

Neither Kitson nor Bleck, sitting in front, knew what was happening, and Morgan shifted away from the girl, leaving her alone.

‘What’s the loot like?’ Kitson asked, driving carefully now as he headed for Gypo’s workshop.

‘Should be okay. At least fifty wallets and the till was loaded,’ Morgan said. He lit a cigarette, noticing with a sense of pride how steady his hands were.

He could still hear Bleck’s laboured breathing. He had watched Bleck while they were in the cafe, and he had an idea he might crack. This bothered him. He had been under the impression that Bleck’s nerve was reliable, but the way he had acted and the way he had let that big jerk knock his gun out of his hand warned Morgan that from now on Bleck would have to be watched.

Kitson too had been in a pretty bad way when they had scrambled into the car. He hadn’t got going as he should have done. If Morgan hadn’t yelled at him, he would have driven away so slowly someone from the cafe could have got a description of the car.

Before the big one, there would have to be some tightening up. At least he was now sure of the girl. She had handled herself magnificently. She was the best of the whole bunch.

He glanced at her again. She had stopped crying, and was sitting up, her white face wooden, her eyes a little glassy, and she was staring out of the window.

Morgan pushed his cigarette towards her.

‘Here, take it,’ he said curtly.

She took the cigarette and put it between her lips, not saying anything.

As Morgan lit another cigarette for himself, Kitson drove up the rough road that led to Gypo’s workshop.

The workshop consisted of a big shed and a wooden shack in which Gypo lived. It was in the shed that he did occasional welding work, made wrought iron gates when anyone wanted gates, which was seldom, or cut a key or fixed a lock for the hardware stores in town.

The workshop gave Gypo a legitimate excuse to keep a few cylinders of acetylene as well as a few cylinders of undiluted hydrogen which were useful when he had to cut into a safe. He scarcely made enough profit from the workshop to pay for the rent of the shed.

They found him waiting anxiously for them, and as the headlights of the Lincoln lit up the double doors, he appeared, shoving open the doors with the frantic clumsiness of a frightened man.

Kitson drove the Lincoln into the shed, and they all got out.

‘Well?’ Gypo asked as soon as he had closed the doors. ‘What happened?’

‘It’s okay,’ Morgan said. ‘We could all do with a drink. Here, Kitson, get those number plates off and drain out the water from the radiator and fill it up with cold. You never know: the cops may give this joint a rumble. Snap it up. Gypo, get us a drink.’ He looked over at Bleck who was lighting a cigarette with a shaking hand. ‘Give Kitson a hand.’

Having got some action, he crossed over to Ginny and smiled at her.

‘Okay?’

Her mouth tightened. She was still looking pretty bad and her skin still had the bluish tinge.

‘I’m all right.’

‘You handle the big one the way you handled this one,’ Morgan said, ‘and you’ll do.’

‘Oh, stop talking to me as if I were a child,’ the girl said irritably and turned away, moving over to the workbench where she began to finger the tools aimlessly.

Morgan shrugged, then when Gypo came hurrying up with a bottle of whisky and glasses, he made five drinks and carried two glasses over to Ginny. He offered her one.

‘If you need this the way I need it, you need it,’ he said.

She took the whisky and swallowed a little, grimacing, then the blueness went out of her face.

‘It was tougher than I imagined,’ she said. ‘I nearly cracked.’

‘But you didn’t.’ Morgan paused to drink half his whisky, then went on, ‘You were fine. Let’s get over there and see what the haul is.’

While Gypo, Kitson and Bleck worked feverishly on the car, Morgan emptied the contents of the sack on to the workbench and began to strip out the wallets. Ginny worked with him.

‘This is his,’ the girl said, picking up a pigskin wallet. ‘The one I hit.’

‘Let’s see what he was trying to protect,’ Morgan said. ‘How much?’

She hooked out ten one hundred dollar bills and laid them on the bench.

‘No wonder he acted tough.’

The other three, having fixed the car, came over and stood watching. After a few minutes, Morgan and the girl finished stripping out the wallets, then Morgan sat down on a box and began counting the money.

The four watched him.

Morgan looked up as he laid the last five—dollar bill down on the bench.

‘Two thousand, nine hundred and seventy-five bucks,’ he said. ‘Well, here’s our working capital. Now we can go straight ahead.’

‘Is that right she had to hit a guy?’ Gypo asked, his eyes as round as marbles.

‘She hit him,’ Morgan said, carefully stacking the money. ‘He asked for it and he got it. She handled him better than I could, better than any of you could.’

Ginny turned away and walked over to the car.

The four men looked at her and exchanged glances.

‘She’ll do,’ Morgan said quietly. ‘If you boys do as well, the big one is in the bag.’

He looked directly at Bleck who tried to meet his eyes, but couldn’t make it. He took out a cigarette and went through an elaborate search for a match, aware that Morgan’s glittering eyes were still probing at him.