Panic in Pittsburgh (7 page)

“I guess,” Travis said.

He knew if he said no, there would be no end to the teasing from his big-mouth friend. Nish would carry on as if Travis and Sarah were going off for some romantic stroll in the moonlight, which wasn’t the case at all. It wouldn’t stop Nish from teasing, though.

There was a sharp wind coming in off the river. The Owls all had their jackets zipped tight to the throat and hats pulled down over their ears. Nish, with no gloves, had his hands stuffed deep into his jacket pockets.

A light snow swirled across the water. The river looked cold and gray. Much better, Travis
thought, for lakes and rivers to freeze hard, as they had back home. He didn’t like this damp cold and half wished they’d just met to talk in one of the fast-food outlets in the square.

But he didn’t want anyone else to hear. Not yet, anyway. Not until he knew what he had. Or could accept that in reality he had nothing.

He told them the whole story. He admitted that he’d been confused and confessed that for a while he had thought it was all in his imagination, a dream of some sort, or a misunderstanding. Maybe it had been a television program on loud. Maybe it had been nothing.

He told them about cutting his foot on the broken glass and how that made him realize he had really overheard something being planned in the other room. He did not mention the chocolate bar, as he knew that would immediately send Nish’s thoughts elsewhere, and he needed all three of his friends to concentrate hard on what he was saying.

The two girls listened intently. Nish half listened, but at least he shut up and let Travis do all the talking.

Sam was the first to say it was the Stanley Cup. She said it so matter-of-factly that Travis instantly knew this was exactly what he himself believed but had been too afraid to say. He’d thought for sure they would tell him he’d been dreaming, that there was no way someone would try to steal the cup again.

“They plan to steal the cup,” Sam said again, carefully thinking it through. “They have some inside help with the key to the room where it’s being kept. And they have to do it in the morning before the cup is taken over to the Winter Classic.”

“I say it’s a bank machine they’re after,” said Nish, trying to look and sound serious at the same time. A difficult task for Nish.

“Too heavy for a duffel bag,” said Sarah.

“But it’s money!” Nish protested. “What are you going to do with the Stanley Cup? Hide it in your basement and hold it over your head like you won it or something?”

“Ransom, dummy,” Sam sneered. “You couldn’t find a bank machine with as much money as they’d get for giving the cup back.”

“I think Sam’s right,” said Sarah. “Besides, what would they need to switch a room key for if it was the lobby bank machine they were after? If what you heard is right, Travis, then the plan is to get it away from the hotel as quickly as possible, and without anyone seeing or becoming suspicious. That’s why they have the guy pretending to be a hockey player and why they’re going to use the Incline. Once he gets up top with the cup in the equipment bag, he can load it into a car and be away without anyone seeing.”

“Without surveillance cameras,” Nish said. “They have them all around the hotel parking lot.”

Travis looked anew at his old friend. “You’re sure?” he asked.

Nish nodded knowingly. “I’m sure.”

“Nish always likes to know when he’s on camera,” Sam giggled.

“Har! Har!” Nish sneered.

“Makes sense,” said Sarah. “If they loaded it into a car anywhere near the hotel, they’d have it on video. The cameras would pick up the license
plate number. But up on top of the hill, there’d be no danger of that.”

Travis posed the question that had been troubling him all along.

“How do we stop them?”

A plan was in place.

The four Screech Owls – Travis, Sarah, Sam, and Nish – agreed that there was little point in going to anyone with a story about how Travis, groggy from concussion, had overheard two men planning to do something Sunday morning that involved one of the hotel staff. He had never heard them specifically mention the Stanley Cup. He had never seen their faces, so there was no possibility of identifying them from police photos.
Not only would the Owls be dismissed outright, likely even laughed at, but the robbers, if they were indeed robbers, would get away once they realized a security watch had been put on the room where the Stanley Cup was stored.

The Owls’ plan was to assign watches: someone to watch the front desk, someone the room, someone the exit to the fire escape. And, if necessary, they needed to get quickly to the Incline up Mount Washington. That was where, if Travis was right, the thieves planned to take the bag containing the cup to a getaway car waiting at the top. Travis was sure he had overheard that, as sure as he could be of anything lately. Whenever he tried to think it all through, he felt dizzy, almost sick. But he said nothing to the others.

They would keep each other informed by texting. Sam had a phone, and Fahd was happy to hand his over to Travis for the morning. Travis hadn’t explained what it was for – it would be too embarrassing if nothing happened – and Fahd assumed Travis was calling his parents in Tamarack.

They met early Sunday morning, gathering first in a quiet corner downstairs. The four went over the plan carefully, step by step, each one repeating the plan exactly so it would be memorized.

They rapped their fists together in a pact. Sarah had the last words.

“Let’s roll!”

Travis’s job was to watch the front desk. He found a seat in the lobby and pretended to be deeply interested in
The Hockey News
. Reading still bothered him, so he just flicked through the magazine and looked at the pictures. He could hear the kitchen staff setting up for the Sunday brunch, and some of the guests were already gathered about the coffee machine talking and refilling their cups.

“
I’m right!
” Travis said to himself when he saw the elevator doors open and the keeper of the Stanley Cup step out. The man looked slightly
miffed. He had the key card for his room in his right hand and was impatiently tapping it on the thumb of his left hand.

The keeper of the cup crossed immediately to the reception desk. There was a face behind the desk that Travis hadn’t seen before – a man with a white goatee and wire-rimmed glasses. He looked like a kindly doctor, Travis thought. But he knew different.

Travis could not hear what they were saying, but he didn’t need to. The keeper of the cup handed over his key, and the white-bearded man, obviously apologizing, took it down to the far end of the long mahogany desk.

Travis moved closer to the desk. The keeper of the Stanley Cup wasn’t watching his key being reprogrammed. He was scanning the sports section of
USA Today
. But Travis saw what was happening. The man behind the desk reprogrammed the keeper’s key, then slipped a second plastic card into the machine, waited a moment, and removed it. There were now two keys to the room that held the Stanley Cup.

With another apology, the man handed over one of the keys to the keeper of the cup.

“Not to worry,” the keeper replied with a smile.

But Travis knew there was plenty to worry about.

He took out Fahd’s phone and sent the others a message.

“They have a copy of the key!”

Sarah was watching the room. Sam walked by her, relayed what Travis had reported, and kept walking. Sam would set up watch at the far end of the hall, where the stairs for the fire escape were.

Sarah stood, flipping through one of the newspapers stacked on a small table near the elevators. It wasn’t long before one of the elevator doors opened and the keeper of the cup got off. She waited until he had turned down the corridor before following. He tried the key by waving it
near the lock on his door, there was a quick buzz, and he opened the door and stepped in.

If this key worked, then the copy would also work.

Sarah stayed down at the far end of the hall, kneeling, as if she were retying her shoes. Very shortly, the door to the room opened again and the keeper stepped out and headed for the elevators. He was going to brunch downstairs. He would return for the cup later, as the final was scheduled for 1:00 p.m. at Heinz Field and the cup was to be on display for the fans to take photographs. The winning team would then pose with the cup for their championship photo.

Sarah knew this was never going to happen unless the four Owls could stop the thieves from making off with the cup. She walked quickly down the hall to where Sam was waiting, and Sam sent Travis a message.

Travis and Nish were together in the lobby when the message arrived. “Room now empty.” They watched as the elevator doors opened and the
keeper of the cup stepped out. He went immediately to the dining area, which had just opened for the Sunday brunch.

As the keeper of the cup passed by the two Owls, two men passed them in the other direction. One was short and heavy, the other tall and skinny. They made an odd couple. The tall one had long hair, the short one no hair. The tall one wore all black, the short one a rainbow of colors, a bright-green down jacket, and orange track pants. Pretty dumb, Travis thought, if you want to pass unnoticed.

The two men waited to make sure the keeper was indeed going into brunch, then pushed the elevator button to go up. Travis noticed that the short, stumpy man carried something folded tightly and wrapped in plastic. He knew what it would be: a brand-new hockey equipment bag.

Travis sent a quick text message to the girls: “They’re coming.”

He and Nish watched as the numbers on the elevator rose, finally stopping at the floor where the girls were keeping watch.

“Let’s go!” Travis said.

The boys moved toward the back of the building and pushed through a rear door that overlooked the river and the city on the far side. It was snowing more heavily now, large flakes floating down slowly onto the river and vanishing as they hit the water.

“Over there!” Nish hissed, and poked Travis in the ribs.

Travis turned. Standing to the side of the building was a young man, and he had a hockey stick in his hands.

“Keep going,” Travis whispered. They headed around the building in the opposite direction, not even looking back.

They were headed for the Incline.

Sarah and Sam held their breath as they crouched in the stairwell with the door partially opened so that they could see down the corridor. They heard the elevator doors open and close and then saw the two men moving along the hallway.

Sam giggled. Sarah knew why. The tension was one thing, but you couldn’t help laugh at the sight of these two strange men.

The short man had a key card out. They stopped in front of the room that held the Stanley Cup and he waved the key in front of the lock. There was a buzz, the lock opened, and the two men quickly entered the room.

“We’d better hightail it,” Sarah said. “They might come down by the stairs.”

The two girls raced down the hallway, past the room, to the main elevators. They were fairly certain the two men would not come that way, and if they did, the two girls would simply act as if they were guests waiting for the elevator, just like the men.

After several minutes, they heard a door close in the hallway. Sam couldn’t resist a look.

It was the men. This time the tall one was carrying a new hockey equipment bag – and it was stuffed with something heavy. They weren’t heading for the fire exit; they were coming in Sam and Sarah’s direction.

Sam’s intake of breath caused Sarah to look. The elevator announced its arrival with a
ping
, and Sarah pulled Sam closer to the doors. They had to
follow the plan, even if it meant getting on the same elevator as the thieves.

But the men weren’t coming. They stopped at the service elevator. The doors of the service elevator opened, and Sarah caught a glimpse of one of the hotel staff – a man with a white beard and glasses. She hadn’t seen him before.

The doors closed on both elevators.

When the girls arrived at the lobby, they got out and moved to the corridor where the service elevator came down, but it had stopped at the second floor.

“They must be getting out there and taking the stairs,” Sarah said.

“It’s coming again,” said Sam.

They heard the elevator stop, and the doors opened. Out stepped the white-bearded man, who headed immediately for the front desk. He seemed nervous, licking the sides of his mustache like a snake.

“C’mon,” Sarah said.

“I can’t do it!”

Nish seemed frozen, unable to move.

Travis was frantic. He shook off the rising dizziness once, twice, cleared his head, and acted. “We have to do it!” he shouted at his friend. “
Now get on!
”

The plan was on the verge of falling apart. Travis knew the thieves were on their way. The two Screech Owls were to go up the Incline ahead of the robbers and see if they could get a photo of the getaway car with Fahd’s phone. Then, if they could
do it, they were to stop the thieves from getting all the way to the top by shutting down the Incline.