Douglas Dorow - The Ninth District

The woman stood in the middle of the bank atrium. She stood there with a look of anguish on her face, staring at the gun pointed at her, and moved her hands to her mouth and to her stomach and ended up with one hand over each. She was in her early thirties, dressed in black pants and a striped top with sleeves to the elbows. She had long, dark, shoulder-length hair held back by a white headband and she was pregnant. She looked close to term the way her stomach stretched the shirt. She shook her head back and forth, her eyes never leaving the gun.

A man in a long, black trench coat stood in front of her and motioned with the gun for her to move towards the rear of the bank. She didn’t move. He finally pointed the gun at her stomach and motioned with his head for her to move. The woman wrapped her arms around her belly to protect her unborn child before moving in the direction he’d indicated. The man followed and reached out and pushed her shoulder with his gloved left hand to move her along. His right hand held the gun, pointed at her back. The woman stumbled, and shook her head back and forth; her shoulders hitched up and down as she struggled against the tears. She trudged ahead. They disappeared as they turned left around the corner into a hallway, first the woman, and then the man.

Later, they came back around the corner, the woman again in the lead. The man had a black computer bag slung over his shoulder. The woman walked to the desks in the middle of the bank lobby atrium and turned towards the man. She was crying and repeating “I don’t know” as she stared at the gun pointed at her unborn child. The man’s right arm raised and pointed at her head. She repeated the words.

The man took a step forward and pressed the muzzle of the gun against her forehead to emphasize his point.

The woman stepped back and raised her hands up. “I don’t know,” she shouted in three deliberate words. There was a puff of smoke and the woman’s head rocked back before she fell, her long hair billowing up and following her down to the floor.

The man stood with the gun pointed out for a couple of seconds before lowering it. He looked down at the woman, then walked over and nudged her with his foot. The smoke from the shot hung in the air of the lobby and swirled over the spot where the woman had fallen. He knelt and put his hand on her belly, held it there for a count of three. Then he stood. He turned towards the exit without looking back at the pregnant woman lying dead on the floor with blood pooling around her head. As he approached the door, he looked up at the camera posted over it and gave a little salute.

“Freeze it!” Staring out from the television was the face of a bank robber, a killer, in a mock salute. “What the hell? Is that who I think it is? Rewind it and play it again.”

“Jack, I’ve watched this ten times and there’s nothing there, nothing but that salute.”

“Rewind it. I want to see it again.” Jack pointed at the flat screen television on the wall and worked his thumb up and down against the imaginary remote in his hand. “Come on, let’s go, Junior. I want to see it again.”

“It’s Ross.”

Jack glanced back at Ross and then stared at the screen, waiting for him to play it again. “Listen. The SAC asked me to help you. I’m here to help. Let’s watch it again.”

Jack Miller was in no mood for a pissing match with a new agent who had four months in the Minneapolis FBI office after graduating from Quantico. The Special Agent in Charge assigned Jack to help with this case so he could tell the media he had his most experienced agent looking into solving the string of bank robberies, especially the last one that had resulted in a murder.

Ross pointed the remote at the television and the video started again. “These bank videos suck. We’re bringing in video from the other cameras at the bank, the ATM, the highway traffic cameras, and gas stations within a two-mile radius. I know it’s the same guy.”

“OK, so what do we know about him?”

“He’s on a schedule. March, he hit a Wells Fargo branch in Duluth. April, he was at the Stillwater branch. I was looking for a May job and found one in Wisconsin after talking to the Milwaukee field office. This morning, as you see him here, he was at the TCF Bank in Wayzata. That’s the June robbery.” Ross paused, inhaled, and audibly exhaled. “And no, that’s not who you think it is. It’s a guy, or a person, wearing a mask that kind of resembles a former Governor of the State of Minnesota.”

“OK, so we know what he’s done, but what do we know about him?”

“We don’t know anything about him other than he’s been robbing banks and wears a mask,” Ross said.

“Let’s call him the Governor. He hasn’t killed anybody before, has he?” Jack asked.

“Nobody has even been hurt, until now.”

“Play the video.” Jack Miller stared at the screen and watched the scene unfold a second time; he rested his chin in his hands, elbows on the table. He looked for details as he watched it again.

When it was over, Jack was talking softly to himself as much as to his new partner. “Why did he kill her? He hasn’t done that before. There was no reason to kill her. And what’s he asking her that she doesn’t know?” He shifted in his chair, raised his arms, and locked his fingers together behind his head. “Rewind it. Let’s see it again.”

Jack got up from his chair and paced the room while he continued mumbling to himself. “For the money?” He looked at Ross. “How much has he been getting?”

Ross reflexively patted his pockets for his notebook.

“Junior, just give me a rough idea.”

Ross stared at Jack without answering.

“Agent Fruen?” Jack asked.

Ross nodded and answered. “He’s grabbed between five hundred and five thousand and a couple of laptops.”

Jack returned to his monologue and paced around the table. “So, he’s not getting rich doing this.” He stopped and sat down in his chair. “What’s with the mask? And why’s he robbing these banks? A drug user would still be sleeping.” Jack looked up at the ceiling and raised his voice so Ross could hear him. “Did you check out the casinos or the card room at the Canterbury race track?”

“That’s one theory for the mask. He doesn’t want us comparing videos. I’m working on it, checking on casinos in the area.”

“Don’t forget Wisconsin. OK, Junior, so why did he kill her?”

Ross didn’t answer until Jack stared at him. “I don’t know.”

“Well, what’s your guess?”

“I’d guess he killed her either because she knew something, who he was or what he was doing there, or she was at the wrong place at the wrong time, or just to do it.”

“Tell me about her.”

Ross pulled his notes out and paged back to the information. “Her name is, was Lisa Humphrey. She’s worked at the bank for eight years and had experience in different areas. She was there this morning to open up, get things ready for the day.”

“Did she have a family?”

Ross flipped forward a page. “She was married. The husband’s devastated. There’s a two-year-old girl at home and,” Ross paused.

“And what?”

“You saw she was pregnant. It was a boy. Due in about two weeks.”

Jack shoved himself back from the table and stood up. As he made his way to Ross at the back of the room, he pushed a chair out of the way, sending it rolling across the floor until it struck the wall and fell over on its side. Ross didn’t move. Jack stuck out his hand.

“Give me your notes.” Ross handed the notes over and Jack walked to the window and leaned against the wall as he reviewed what Ross had written.