John Gilstrap - At all costs

If the clerk suspected anything out of the ordinary, she showed none of it. “Of course,” she said as she reached for a shelf somewhere below the register. “Plastic or paper?”

Carolyn grinned. “Paper, please.”

The Johnston’s Corner branch of Phoenix Bank and Trust was nothing special-just a community bank, serving the needs of suburban families and the service businesses that supported them. Jake had felt that a smaller bank would have fewer rules and regulations to deal with. In homage to its clientele, the place was devoid of pretense; no big chandeliers, marble floors, or gilded teller cages. Phoenix Bank and Trust was a working-class establishment, catering to customers for whom tile floors, fluorescent lights, and wood-paneled teller stations were just fine.

The lobby was packed, as it usually was around lunchtime, and Carolyn waited as patiently as she could, seated in one of the imitation-leather guest chairs in the tiny lobby. Elusive bank logic prohibited tellers from helping customers with their safe-deposit boxes. Such was the domain of the manager and assistant managers whose elevated status was marked by tiny desks in a carpeted corner, separated from each other by shoulder-height glass partitions. Of these various anointed ones, all were serving other customers; mostly young couples with the sheepish look of people trying to qualify for loans they weren’t sure they could afford.

As Carolyn waited, the chairs around her filled with still more customers, each awaiting his or her own audience with the senior staff. Conversation flowed easily among these people, allowing her to relax just a bit. No one seemed to suspect anything. In the ten minutes that Carolyn sat waiting, she checked her watch at least twenty times.

Every second is a liability. She was oblivious to the constant, nervous tapping of her heel against the floor. What can possibly be taking this long?

As if on cue, all the meetings concluded at once, and the desk-dwellers motioned for the next wave. It didn’t seem fair to Carolyn that the lady who’d been waiting for only a minute or two got to speak with someone at the same time she did.

A hunky young guy-maybe twenty-five, with eyes that matched his blue Oxford button-down-extended his hand to Carolyn. “Hi,” he said, flashing an expensive smile. “My name’s Jeff. How can I help you?”

His voice was so smooth and his smile so genuine that Carolyn wondered just how many pretty young hearts had melted under the heat of his greeting. Fifteen years ago she might have been one of them, but today she was in a hurry, and the tone of her voice said so.

“I need to get into my safe-deposit box,” she said, handing him her key ring.

Jeff’s smile changed from personal to businesslike but never disappeared completely. “Yes, ma’am.” He left for a few seconds, then returned with the other key and a signature card. “Here,” Jeff said. “I need you to sign this.”

After Carolyn scrawled her name on the card, Jeff compared it to the sample signature above it. “First visit in five months,” he observed.

Carolyn launched a glare that rendered Jeff instantly repentant. “I’m very sorry, Mrs. Brighton. That’s none of my business.”

Carolyn said nothing, but her look told him that she couldn’t have agreed more. Together, they walked into the vault, and Jeff used a set of rolling stairs to reach the Brightons’ box. The lock seemed stiff, resisting his efforts to turn it. Finally, he pulled the door open and slid out a long black metal container. He handed it down to her. Carolyn could tell that he wanted to comment on its weight, but he wisely kept his thoughts to himself.

“You want a viewing room, I trust?” Jeff was sucking up to her now as he climbed backward down the steps.

Carolyn smiled patiently. “Yes, please.”

Jeff led the way to one of two six-foot-by-four-foot cubicles and opened the door for his customer. “Take your time,” he told her.

“Thank you.”

Inside, Carolyn locked the door, and after a quick scan overhead for security cameras, she opened the box and smiled. There it was: $62,000 cash. She’d forgotten what that much money looked like, all broken into hundreds. She pulled the Safeway bag from under her jacket, and as she stuffed the banded bills inside, she tried not to think about how much interest the money could have earned over the years, had they invested it properly. Yet another reality of life on the run.

Not that there’d been much choice. IRS regulations required banks to report large cash transactions, so that was out of the question. So were other standard investment vehicles. The key to this particular fund was instant and total liquidity. If and when the day came that the Brightons needed their cash, they would want it right by-God now; there’d be no time for a phone call to some broker. They could have kept it in the house, she supposed-in fact, for a while, they’d done just that, but not here in Phoenix. Farm Meadows was such a frequent target for burglars that many of Carolyn’s neighbors had stopped locking their trailers during the day, just to save the wear and tear on their doors and windows. Then there was the risk of a fire. All things considered, the safe-deposit box made the most sense.

Carolyn wondered if the bag would be big enough to hold it all. The space seemed to be filling up faster than the box was emptying. It was heavier than she’d expected, too.

What’s this? As she reached back to get the last of the bills, she found a pistol: a little. 380, just slightly bigger than her hand. She didn’t remember this from the memorized plan, but leave it to Jake to think of everything. She dropped the magazine out of the grip and took a look. Sure enough, loaded to the top. Like there was ever a doubt. She eased back the slide and found one more in the chamber. Jake was a planner, all right. He must have envisioned some scenario where she’d have to use more than words to get to the staging area, and he wanted her to be prepared. For the hundredth time over the years, she wondered if she’d have the guts to fire a gun, then she shooed away the thought and concentrated on her next move.

It turned out that there was plenty of space in the bag for the money, with enough room left over to fold the top closed. Slipping the. 380 into her jacket pocket, she hefted the bag under her left arm and, with her right arm clutching the deposit box, opened the door to retrieve her keys from Jeff.

“Carolyn!” a lady’s voice boomed. It was Mary Barnett, her next-door neighbor, sounding for all the world like they hadn’t seen each other in years. “How wonderful to see you!” Virtually deaf, Mrs. Barnett-“Mrs. Bullet Boobs” to the boys-was incapable of quiet speech.

Oh, God. “Hi, Mary. How are you?” She waved to get Jeff’s attention. He acknowledged her with a nod but appeared to be stuck on the phone.

“Happy and hearty as can be,” Mary bellowed. With her girth and baggy yellow dress, she looked like a have-a-niceday balloon. “The question is, how is little Travis? He looked awful last night.”

This I don’t need.

If Mrs. Barnett had dedicated one-fifth the effort she invested in other people’s business to a real business of her own, she’d have been a millionaire. “Oh, he’s fine,” Carolyn said, her spirit dancing as she saw Jeff hang up his phone.

“I didn’t see you go to a doctor.” Mrs. Barnett’s comment was leaden with disapproval.

Carolyn ignored her, concentrating instead on Jeff’s return. “Here you go,” she said, handing him the box.

He walked back into the vault and returned in twenty seconds with her keys. “Thank you, Mrs. Brighton,” he said earnestly.

Mrs. Barnett followed Carolyn to the door, chatting the whole way. “That’s some bag you’ve got there. Didn’t rob the place, did you?” She tittered at her little joke, until Carolyn froze her with a startled glare. “Oh, dear, Carolyn,” she apologized. “I’ve offended you. “