Эд Макбейн - Let’s Hear It For The Deaf Man

“This is Mr. Taubman.”

“Yes, Mr. Taubman.”

“The money is here. You and the others may come for it at once.”

“Thank you, Mr. Taubman.”

There was a click on the line. Still smiling, the Deaf Man replaced the receiver on the hook and went back to his command post on the park bench.

Inside the bank, Detective Schmitt of the 86th was briefing Mr. Alton yet another time. The clock on the wall opposite the tellers’ cages read 9:21.

“There’s nothing to worry about,” Schmitt said. “I’ve got experienced men at windows number one and two, and an experienced policewoman at the car teller’s window. I’ll be covering window number three myself.”

“Yes, thank you,” Alton said. He hesitated, and glanced nervously around the bank. “What do I do meanwhile?”

“Just go about your business as usual,” Schmitt said. “Try to relax. There’s no sense upsetting your customers. Everything’s under control. Believe me, Mr. Alton, with the four of us here, nobody’s going to rob this bank.”

Schmitt didn’t realize it, but he was right.

At 9:37 A.M. Kerry Donovan, his head shaved bald and gleaming in the sun, a new but nonetheless rather respectable mustache under his nose, entered the bank carrying a large black rectangular case. He asked the guard where the manager’s office was, and the guard asked whether he had an appointment. Donovan said yes, he had called last week to make an appointment with Mr. Alton. The guard asked Donovan his name, and he replied, “Mr. Dunmore. Karl Dunmore.”

“One second, Mr. Dunmore,” the guard said, and signaled to one of the bank clerks, an attractive young girl in her twenties, who immediately came over to him.

“Mr. Karl Dunmore to see Mr. Alton,” the guard said.

“Just a moment, please,” the girl said, and walked to the rear of the bank and into Alton’s office. She came out not a moment later, walked back to where the guard and Donovan where engaged in polite conversation about the beautiful weather, and asked Donovan if he would come with her, please. Donovan followed her up the length of the bank, passing the Deaf Man, who stood at one of the islands making out a deposit slip. She opened the door to Alton’s office, ushered him in, and closed the door behind him.

The Deaf Man thought it a pity that Kerry Donovan did not know the bank was full of policemen.

“Mr. Dunmore,” Alton said, and extended his hand. “Nice to see you.”

“Good of you to make time for me,” Donovan said.

“What have you brought me?”

“Well, as we discussed on the phone, I thought we might make more progress once you’d actually seen the plans and scale model of our project. I know we’re asking for an unusually large amount of development money, but I’m hoping you’ll agree our expectations for profit are realistic. May I use your desk top?” Donovan asked, and quickly realized that the model was too big for Alton’s cluttered desk. “Or perhaps the floor would be better,” he said, improvising. “We can spread the plans out that way, get a better look at them.”

“Yes, certainly,” Alton said. “As you wish.”

Donovan opened the black case and carefully removed from it a scale model of a forty-unit housing development, complete with winding roads, miniature trees, lampposts, and fire hydrants. He put this on the floor in front of the desk, and then reached into the case for a rolled sheaf of architectural drawings. He removed the rubber band from the roll, and spread the plans on the floor.

“I wonder if I could have something to hold these down?” he said.

“Will this do?” Alton asked.

“Yes, thank you,” Donovan said, and accepted the offered cut-glass paperweight. “Just to hold down this one end of it.”

“Yes,” Alton said.

“If you’ll come around here, Mr. Alton, I think you’ll be able to...”

“Where’s the proposed location?” Alton said, coming around the desk.

“I explained that in my initial...”

“Yes, but we deal with so many...”

“It’s on Sands Spit, sir.”

“Have you sought development money out there?”

“No, sir. Our offices are here in Isola. We thought it preferable to deal with a local bank.”

“I see.”

“This top drawing is a schematic of the entire development. If you compare it with the model...”

Alton was standing just to Donovan’s left now, looking down at the model. Donovan rose, drew a pistol from his coat pocket, and pointed it at Alton’s head.

“Don’t make a sound,” he said. “This is a holdup. Do exactly what I tell you to do, or I’ll kill you.”

Alton, his lip trembling, stared at the muzzle of the gun. The Deaf Man had deliberately armed Donovan with a Colt.45, the meanest-looking handgun he could think of.

“Do you understand?” Donovan asked.

“Yes. Yes, I do.”

“Good. We’re going into the vault now,” Donovan said, and stopped, and quickly snapped the case shut. “If we meet anyone on the way, you’re to tell them I’m here to inspect the alarm. If there’s anyone in the vault, you will ask that person to leave us alone. Clear?”

“Yes.”

“No signals to anyone, no attempts to indicate that anything out of the ordinary is happening. I promise you, Mr. Alton, a felony conviction will send me to jail for life, and I have no qualms about shooting you dead. I’m going to put this gun back in my pocket now, but it’ll be pointed right at you , Mr. Alton, and I’ll fire through the pocket if you so much as raise an eyebrow to anyone. Are you ready?”

“Yes, I’m ready.”

“Let’s go then.”

From where he stood at the island in the center of the bank, the Deaf Man saw Donovan and Alton coming out of the office and heading for the vault. Donovan was smiling and chatting amiably, the black case in his left hand, his right hand in the pocket of his coat. Both men went into the vault, and the Deaf Man headed swiftly toward the revolving doors at the front of the bank. According to the outlined plan, he was supposed to initiate the second phase of the plan only after Donovan was safely out of the vault and back in the manager’s office. Instead, he walked out of the bank now, his appearance on the sidewalk being the signal to the two automobiles parked on the other side of the small park. He saw Rudy Manello pulling the first car away from the curb. Angela Gould’s car followed immediately behind it. In less than a minute Rudy had driven around the curving street and turned into the driveway on the right-hand side of the bank, Angela following in the second automobile. When Angela’s car was directly abreast of the driveway, she cut the engine, and pretended helpless female indignation at things mechanical. An instant later John Preiss stepped out of the first car and swung a sledge hammer at the car teller’s window.

An instant after that, both he and Rudy were shot dead by the policewoman behind the shattered window. Kerry Donovan, still in the bank vault stuffing banded stacks of bills into the black case, heard the shots and realized at once that something had gone wrong. He dropped the bills in his hand, rushed out of the vault, saw that the woman in the car teller’s window was armed, and recognized in panic that he could not make his escape as planned. He was running for the revolving doors at the front of the bank when he was felled by bullets from the guns of the three separate detectives manning the interior tellers’ cages.

Outside the bank Angela Gould heard all the shooting and immediately started the car. In her panic she would not have stopped to pick up the Deaf Man even if he’d been waiting on the sidewalk where he was supposed to be. But by that time he was in a taxicab half a mile away, heading for a rendezvous with the second team.