James Chase - The World in My Pocket

He suddenly grinned viciously in the darkness.

Seven hundred and fifty thousand bucks was a lot better than two hundred and fifty thousand. He lay for a long time in the darkness, planning what he would do with the money.

Maybe, he decided suddenly, it might be an idea to get rid of Gypo too — to make a clean sweep of them all.

A million was better than seven hundred and fifty thousand.

Talk about the world in your pocket!

With a million in cash, a man was a king!

The next two days followed the same pattern. At dawn, Bleck and Gypo went into the caravan, and Kitson came back to the cabin.

After a few hours sleepy Kitson then went out with Ginny and spent the day with her, swimming and walking or going on the lake.

Bleck sat on the floor of the caravan reading the papers while Gypo toiled at the truck door.

The news as reported in the papers was encouraging. The police and the Army were plainly baffled. Although the search was being continued, there was now a note of helplessness in the police statements to the press. They had finally decided that the truck must have been driven away in another vehicle. There could be no other solution as to how it had vanished so completely. It was thought by now the truck was out of the State. The search had been extended to a five hundred mile radius, and the reward had been raised to five thousand dollars.

Two hundred soldiers and police were combing Fox Wood and hover planes were still patrolling the roads. Sooner or later, Army headquarters announced, the truck must be found. It was a physical impossibility for it to vanish the way it had and stay vanished!

If the police and the Army were having their troubles, so too were Bleck and Gypo.

The result of Gypo’s two days’ work had come to nothing.

He had sat on his stool in the broiling heat of the caravan all day, moving the dial, listening, sweating, cursing and listening again, but the second tumbler had refused to fall into place.

With nothing to do but to watch Gypo and read the newspapers, Bleck’s nerves by now were crawling out of his skin. Added to the insufferable heat in the caravan and the tension of expecting to hear from Gypo at any second that the second tumbler had dropped, he also had the maddening thought that Ginny and Kitson were out in the open air, enjoying themselves.

Surely even though Kitson was a punch-drunk bum, Bleck argued to himself, he must by now be making an impression on the girl. No man, going around with a woman for three solid days, could fail to make an impression. If he — Bleck — had Ginny on his own for twelve hours, she would have surrendered to his technique by now. So the thought of them alone together added the bite of jealous acid to his already frayed nerves.

Around six o’clock on the third day as the evening sun dropped behind the mountains, shedding an orange-red light over the lake, Gypo cracked.

For three days he had slaved at this lock in almost impossible conditions, and now he felt he was completely defeated. The second tumbler had refused to fall. He had moved the dial a hair breadth by a hair breadth over the whole circuit, and still it hadn’t fallen. It meant he was moving the dial just that much more than it should be moved. It meant that the hand he was so proud of wasn’t sensitive enough to control the knob on the dial.

‘I can’t do it!’ he suddenly moaned, slumping against the door of the truck. ‘I can’t do it, Ed! It’s no use! If I try for twenty years, I won’t do it! If I don’t get out of here I’ll go crazy!’

Alarmed by the hysterical note in Gypo’s voice, Bleck jumped to his feet and came around the truck, gun in hand. ‘Shut up!’ he snarled, ramming the gun into Gypo’s ribs. ‘You’re damn well going to open that truck or I’ll kill you!’

Gypo began to cry helplessly, his fat body trembling with exhaustion.

‘Go ahead,’ he gasped. ‘Kill me! Do you think I care? I’d rather be dead than work anymore on this sonofabitch! Go ahead and kill me! I can’t stand any more of it!’

Bleck hit Gypo savagely across his face with the barrel of the gun. Gypo flinched away, blood running from a cut in his fat cheek down his face into his collar. He sagged against the side of the truck, his eyes shut.

‘Go ahead!’ he cried, his voice shrill and as hysterical as a frightened woman’s. ‘Kill me! I can’t go on! I’m through!’

‘Pull yourself together, you creep!’ Bleck shouted, alarmed to see how bad Gypo was looking, and thinking if he was going to get out of control, the whole plan would blow up in their faces.

‘I tell you I can’t do it!’ Gypo wailed and collapsed on the stool, hiding his face in his hands.

At that moment there came a gentle tap on the door of the caravan: a sound that made Bleck stiffen and his heart skip a beat. He had seen Ginny and Kitson go off in the Buick for a shopping trip to town so he knew it couldn’t be either of them knocking on the door.

As Gypo started to moan, Bleck grabbed him and shook him, whispering fiercely, ‘Shut up! There’s someone outside!’

Gypo stiffened and stopped his noise.

The two men waited, listening.

The knock came again.

Bleck signalled to Gypo to remain where he was. His gun in his hand, he crept to the curtained window. Keeping to one side, he peered forward to look through the curtain.

At the door of the caravan was a small boy of about ten, knocking and frowning and staring up at the caravan. In his hand, he held a toy pistol which he pointed at the door.

Bleck watched him, his lips drawn off his teeth in a snarl.

The boy, clad in jeans and a white and red checkered shirt, his feet bare, a battered straw hat on the back of his head, stared curiously at the door of the caravan, his sunburned face puzzled. There was a long pause as the boy continued to stare at the caravan, then, as if making up his mind, he moved forward and hooked his fingers on the windowsill, preparing to hoist himself up to peer through the window.

Gypo, seeing the sudden murderous, frightened expression on Bleck’s face, got up off the stool and joined Bleck at the window. He caught his breath sharply when he saw the boy, and his hand clamped down on Bleck’s wrist.

‘No!’ Gypo hissed. ‘Not a kid! Are you crazy?’

Bleck wrenched his wrist free, relaxing as he saw the boy hadn’t the strength to pull himself up as far as the window. The boy dropped back, and again stared up at the caravan, his expression frustrated. After staring at the caravan for some moments, he turned abruptly and hurried off down the path that ran along by the lakeside.

‘Do you think he heard us?’ Bleck asked anxiously.

‘I don’t know,’ Gypo said. The shock of the boy’s unexpected appearance had brought him abruptly to his senses.

‘He certainly scared me,’ Bleck said and wiped his face with his hand. ‘Here, you sit down, Gypo, and take it easy. Suppose I try to fix this goddamn lock?’

‘You?’ Gypo’s face wrinkled in disgust. ‘No! You could dislodge the first tumbler if you don’t have the feel of it. Keep away from it!’

Bleck reached out and took hold of Gypo’s shirt front, giving him a hard shake.

‘So if I don’t do it and you damn well won’t do it, how do we open it?’ he demanded, his voice thick with rage.

‘Don’t you understand?’ Gypo said. ‘We’re not going to open it! For three days I’ve worked on it! Hour after hour after hour! What happens? One tumbler falls, then nothing. That lock has at least six tumblers. I’ve got five more to find. Okay, maybe in a week I’ll find the second one; maybe I won’t. If I find it, I’ve got four more to find. By that time I’ll be crazy in the head! No one can work in this heat! No one! I’m quitting! I can’t do any more! I’ve had enough! No money is worth this! You hear me? No money can be worth this!’