How to Rob an Armored Car (17 page)

Mitch was amazed; Doug had been able to pick these guys out of a crowd. That had to be some kind of a marketable skill. He was a human drug dog, able to detect a possible customer in a crowded room. In the parking lot, they made their introductions and Mitch shook the two men’s hands and instantly forgot their names, as usual. Then they went to sit in their car, a luxury SUV. Mitch stretched out, enjoying the comfort of the seat, assuming his role was the heavy, the henchman. If the deal went bad, he was supposed to watch Doug’s back. But these guys seemed enthusiastic about the pills and perfectly friendly, so Mitch stared out the window and listened to the conversation.

“These are the good ones,” Doug was saying. “They’re seven-point-fives. This is about the strongest shit you can get, except for the tens, but those suckers are impossible to find anymore.” He sounded professional, like he was giving a presentation in a boardroom. Mitch almost expected him to start pulling charts and graphs out of his pocket and review the strengths of hydrocodone tablets with a laser pointer.

The bald-headed guy rolled a pill around between his thumb and forefinger for a few seconds, then asked if he could take it. Doug nodded. “Sure, man. It’s cool when the buyer takes a pill ’cause it means you’re not a cop.”

Eager to prove that he also wasn’t a cop, the other guy reached into Doug’s little box and took a pill too.

“How much you want for ’em?” he asked.

“I can get five bucks a pop for these, no problem,” Doug said. “It depends how many you want. If you buy in bulk, you’ll get a price cut.”

Doug, Mitch realized, was a good businessman. He had a thousand pills in the box, and the shifty doctor who gave them to Kevin only wanted two dollars a pill. So Doug had started out the negotiations with a possible three-thousand-dollar profit.

Staring out the window, oddly excited by the whole thing, Mitch listened as they haggled. The final price they agreed on was $2,800, which the bald-headed guy produced by just reaching into his wallet. This guy carried around more money than Mitch had seen in months. The only time Mitch ever had a stack of hundreds in his hand, he was on his way to the post office to get a money order for rent. These two didn’t look rich, yet they had a luxury SUV and three grand in cash. He was tempted to ask questions about their lives: What did they do for a living? Who were they? Did they have families? But he was smart enough to know that a parking-lot drug deal wasn’t the occasion for exchanges of real information.

The deal completed, they said their goodbyes and shook hands again as they got out of the car. Eight hundred dollars, just like that. Mitch felt a surge of adrenaline as they got back into their car.

“Holy shit, dude, that was awesome! You’re the man!” He punched Doug’s shoulder. “Eight hundred bucks! We can get a great car for that.”

“We have to get ski masks and Tasers too,” said Doug, who was hunched in the passenger seat, counting the money.

“I can’t believe it was that easy. Dude, we ought to do this full time.”

Doug shrugged. “Do you want to? I mean, do this instead of robbing the armored car?”

Mitch started his car, mulling the idea over. Today had certainly been easy money but he knew that every day wouldn’t be that easy. They had just gotten lucky. And besides, Doug had all the skill, knowledge, and bargaining ability. Mitch really didn’t bring much to the table.

“Nah,” he said. “I mean, it was impressive and all, but you did everything. All I really did was give you a ride.”

“I could do this full time,” Doug said. “Maybe we should do this instead of robbing the armored car.”

“Are you having doubts?”

“I don’t know. I’m getting kind of scared about the whole thing,” Doug said. “I mean, I just need a little bit to live off. I don’t need to be rich and shit. I don’t need millions of dollars. Money doesn’t buy happiness.”

“Sure it does,” said Mitch cheerfully.

“Look at Kurt Cobain.”

Despite the giddiness of the moment, Mitch felt anger welling up. He hated this logic on which so many people operated, the quaint, pat little platitudes they used to comfort themselves, the bumper stickers and refrigerator magnets that supposedly summed up all their struggles. Money doesn’t buy happiness. God has a plan. It will all work out in the end. It was brainwashing, calculated and perfect, the final bitch-slapping to top off a lifetime of stocking shelves or filing papers or answering phones. If he was going to spend his life making money for someone else, Mitch thought, that was fine. It was inevitable. But don’t insult my intelligence by trying to convince me money is worthless, just so you can keep the whole fucking pile to yourself.

He knew that Doug was a man of simple needs and that he really would be happy with very little. So, for that matter, would Mitch. But it wasn’t all about the money. It was about Accu-mart, about the army, about Doug’s car getting impounded. It was about everything that had ever made him feel small, that had given him the message that he owed someone something, that he had to do more, that his behavior wasn’t good enough.

“Kurt Cobain was a drug addict,” Mitch snapped. “All the people who killed themselves when they got rich were drug addicts. Janis Joplin, Hendrix, Jim Morrison. Money doesn’t buy happiness for drug addicts because they can buy so many drugs all of a sudden that they just freak out. Then rich people look at that and they say, ‘Money doesn’t buy happiness, fuckers. See what happened to Kurt Cobain? So stop asking for more money, ’cause it ain’t gonna help.’ They just use that bullshit as an excuse to not give us raises. Then
they
take the money and laugh on the beach in Bermuda. Dude, fuck that. If money doesn’t buy happiness, why do guys guard it with guns?”

He drew a deep breath, then continued his rant while Doug sat in the passenger seat staring at him. “They
expect
us to eat that shit up. They expect us to say, ‘Wow, money doesn’t buy happiness. Boy, I’m sure glad I don’t have any money. Otherwise, I’d just overdose on all the drugs I could buy. Yessiree, it’s much better if the rich people keep all the money, ’cause if I had any of it I’d just spend all day jamming heroin into my arm.’”

“Wow, dude,” Doug said, taken aback by Mitch’s sudden ferocity.

“Money buys happiness for everyone else. You fucking bet it does. It gives you mental peace, man. You know why? Because if you got money, you stop worrying. And not worrying all the time is happy enough for me.”

“You worry?” Doug asked. He sounded innocent, like a little boy, and Mitch felt a twinge of regret that he had cut short their celebration of the successful drug deal with an outburst of bitterness. But he hated seeing his friend act . . . brainwashed.

“Of course,” Mitch said. “Don’t you?”

“No,” Doug said softly. “I just figure everything will work out in the end.”

Mitch gritted his teeth. “I worry all the fucking time,” he said. “I worry about bills, about the rent, about not being able to ever afford anything. I can’t go anywhere or do anything. Shit, even any of that stuff you see people doing during the commercials in football games: mountain-biking, traveling, going to the beach, concerts, vacations. It’s like there’s this great big fucking world out there full of all this great shit, and man, we’re never gonna be a part of it. We can’t even have a little taste, you know? So, yes, I worry.”

They pulled onto the interstate, and as Mitch brought the car up to highway speed, he wondered if Doug’s silence was disagreement or contemplation.

“It’s like we’re all in this big beehive, man,” he continued, “and we’re just these worker bees. And all we’re ever gonna do is bring honey to the queen.”

“Hmm,” said Doug, which didn’t really clear up for Mitch whether Doug agreed with him or not. He didn’t feel he had made his point well.
Honey for the queen.
That was pretty damned poetic and Doug didn’t appreciate it. He knew Doug wasn’t as angry as he was but Mitch felt he ought to be. He’d just been laid off, for chrissake. It was like the dude never got mad

In reality, Mitch knew that the reason he wanted Doug along for the armored car robbery was because it was going to be a part of his life, and he knew that if something important to him was not also a part of Doug’s life, they would start drifting apart. Lately, Mitch had been getting an increasing sense of their eventual separation’s inevitability.

There was a long stretch of silence as they focused on the road, the lights of the city fading behind them, and Mitch tried to think of the perfect sales pitch to get Doug to commit. He knew he was terrible at sales. The truth always burst out of him at inconvenient moments. It was one of the reasons his attempt at working in the corporate world at Accu-mart had ended so badly, and he had the sense to know that any further forays into corporate life would end the same way.

They crested a hill and Pittsburgh became just a muted glow in the rearview mirror. The gentle thumping of the concrete road cast a hypnotic spell in the car, like white noise. Mitch’s voice was softer when he spoke again. He had decided on the positive approach.

“I’m looking forward to robbing this damned armored car,” he said. “I’m actually looking forward to it, like we’re going on vacation or something. You know why?”

“Why?”

“’Cause ever since I was in school, everyone has been trying to teach me a lesson, you know? Accu-mart, the army—always someone telling me to sit up straight, quit smoking pot, do this, do that. Stop getting in trouble for stupid shit.”

Doug nodded.

“Well, I’ve learned my lesson. I’m not going to spend any more time getting in trouble for stupid shit. No more. You understand? No fucking more. I don’t want to be the guy who is always getting in trouble for stupid shit. Next time I get in trouble, it’ll be for something serious.”

“Hmm,” said Doug.

10

CHAPTER

“T
HIS IS IT. This is the place,” said Kevin, pulling into a driveway that was little more than frozen mud. At the far end of the driveway, by a garage that looked like it was a day from total collapse, was the car they had come to buy, a 1980 Chevy Impala which had been listed in the paper for $300.

They had been excited after reading about the Impala, because in a big old car like that, there was plenty of room to work on the engine. Kevin was always ranting about how cars nowadays crammed everything in so tight, all the computerized gizmos and gadgets, so that you practically had to remove the engine block to check the oil. But not on these old babies. You could crawl under the hood and sleep in there after your wife threw you out, he said, a comment which made Mitch and Doug look at each other in concern.

“I just meant there’s a lot of room in there,” he explained, noticing their reaction.

The plan was to check the car out, maybe do some work on it, and get it running—all without registering it. The Impala, with its eight-cylinder engine and bulletproof appearance, was the perfect getaway car. They would slap the Nevada plate on, drive it to the bank, then drive with the money to a preselected spot in the woods where they had parked Kevin’s truck. Then they would push the car into the ravine (the preselected spot required a ravine) and speed off, rich men.

It was important, therefore, to give the guy who sold them the Impala fake names, in case the cops ever found it in the ravine and traced it back to the last registered owner. They had practiced their fake names so there would be no slipups. Doug had even suggested wearing fake mustaches and wigs, but after consideration, that suggestion had been discarded because none of them knew enough about applying a fake mustache to be able to guarantee that it would work. The possibility of a mustache falling off while they were talking to the guy who was selling them the car was too great. Anyway, the town where they were buying the Impala was fifteen miles from Wilton and over twenty from West-lake, where the robbery was going to occur, so they figured they’d just take their chances.

Before going to look at the car, they had also reiterated the final part of the plan, the aftermath: Absolutely, positively, no spending any of the money for at least six months. The money was to be buried in three packages, one for each of them, in the exact same spot where they had parked the Ferrari on their most humiliating night of crime, a location chosen because it was neutral ground that they all knew well and also because burying money there would be a symbol of their new status as successful criminals, as opposed to bungling ones. It would be like giving the finger to the LoJack company and their fine product.

“Dude, this car stinks,” said Doug, who was sitting in the backseat. Kevin had driven Linda’s car because all three of them had decided to go and look at the Impala, and Mitch and Doug were sick of being crammed in the pickup. Linda’s car had a backseat, and to Doug, it smelled like something really bad had happened in it quite recently. “Do you think Ellie, like, had an accident back here?”

“She’s nearly eight, douchebag,” Kevin snapped. “She doesn’t have accidents anymore.”

“It reeks back here,” said Doug.

“Whatever.”

“Remember our names,” said Mitch, becoming the embattled paratroop commander again. They were bitching about smells while he was trying to get into character as “Rick.” Rick, his Chevy Impala–buying alter ego, was a devoted employee of a major discount retailer, and Mitch was eager to try out this new fake personality on the man who was selling the car. He was disappointed that neither Doug nor Kevin had bothered to fabricate any details to go with their fake names, and he wasn’t even sure if Doug remembered his. They didn’t seem to think the fake identities were important, but screwing up something like that would be as bad as a fake mustache falling off while you were shaking hands. They were acting like amateurs.

Mitch went up to the front door and knocked. There was no answer. He had spoken to the guy on the phone not more than an hour ago, and he had sounded very old. Perhaps he had just hung up the phone and gone out and forgotten all about them.

“Dude, I’m telling you, it reeks. There’s something in there,” he heard Doug saying. Standing on the front porch, Mitch rolled his eyes. They were still bitching about whether or not Linda’s car smelled. Obviously the car smelled. It had nearly made Mitch gag on the ride over, but so what? Couldn’t these guys see the need to focus? He wondered how they were going to pull this robbery off if they kept getting sidetracked and bitching about trivial shit.

“Come on, you guys,” Mitch said, deciding that he had to be the leader of this crew. They hadn’t even gone over to look at the old Impala. Instead, Doug was digging around under the driver’s seat of Linda’s car and pulling out a bag.

“Ohmigod,” said Kevin. He had turned pale.

“What are you guys doing?” said Mitch, but he was alarmed enough now by Kevin’s reaction that he was no longer angry.

“God, this bag REEEKS,” said Doug, holding it at arm’s length. It was a heavy, dark green trash bag that unfurled as he held it out, and as it was upside down, the contents fell out and landed with a thud at Doug’s feet.

It was Scotch Parker.

Doug yelped and hopped away from the dead terrier’s little body. Released from the trash bag, the full odor of the rotting carcass hit all of them at the same time, and Mitch gagged and felt his eyes water. He looked over at Kevin, who had covered his face with his hands, seemingly more ashamed than disgusted.

“Dude,” Doug croaked. “Why are you driving around with, like, a dead dog under the seat?”

Kevin was strangely silent.

“Seriously, man,” Mitch said after a second. “That’s a good question.”

They all stared at the little terrier’s body, bloated and gray. Mitch took a deep breath and went in closer to get a better look. The dog’s eyes were half open, his tongue hanging out of half-open jaws, his tiny teeth exposed. For most people, the sight of a dead body of any species was a cause for emotion, so seeing a dead animal that he had never known in life was a rare opportunity to study death in a neutral context. Then he breathed and got a whiff of the decaying carcass, and he gagged again.

“Kevin, man, we gotta bury this thing,” he said.

“His name’s Scotch,” Kevin said, his voice flat.

Mitch was taken aback by Kevin’s tone and turned to Doug. “You wanna help me bury it?”

Doug nodded and walked over to the half-collapsed garage. Leaning against some rotting firewood was an old, rusted shovel.

“FUCK!” Kevin screamed.

Doug and Mitch, who were about to start digging a hole by the pile of rotting firewood, flinched.

“FUCK, FUCK, FUCK!” Kevin was screaming at the top of his lungs. He walked over to the front of Linda’s car and began savagely kicking a headlight. This isn’t good, Mitch thought. The whole aim of this transaction was to keep everything cool, to pay cash for a junk car and leave, and not be remembered.

“What the hell is his problem?” Doug asked Mitch.

“I dunno,” said Mitch, looking equally mystified. He handed Doug the shovel and ran over to where Kevin was screaming. “Dude,” he said, putting his hand firmly on Kevin’s shoulder. “What are you doing? What’s the matter with you?”

Kevin seemed to run out of energy and slumped forward. “Fuck,” he mumbled.

“Is this about that dead dog?”

Kevin suddenly lurched forward, full of fury again, and kicked the bumper. “FUCK!” he screamed. Mitch tried to hold him back.

“Settle down,” said Mitch softly.

“I’ve got . . .” Kevin said, panting from the effort of his outburst, “a goddamned dead dog under the seat of my car.” He threw his arms up and turned around to face Mitch. “That’s like the story of my fucking life.”

“Well . . .” said Mitch, trying to think of something helpful to say, “I wouldn’t go that far. But as long as we’re on the subject,
why
is there a dead dog—”

“I’VE GOT A DEAD DOG UNDER THE SEAT OF MY CAR AND A FERRARI IN A FOREST AND A FUCKING DRUG-DEALING DOCTOR MAKING ME SELL HIS PILLS FOR HIM!” Kevin was bellowing like a wounded animal and Mitch’s only thought was that he was glad they were in a neighborhood where the houses were fairly far apart. If he’d had an outburst like this back where they lived, neighbors would have been peering out their windows and calling the cops by now.

“Dude, keep your voice down!” yelled Doug from over by the garage, where he was dutifully digging a hole.

“Goddammit! Fuck my life! Fuck my fucking life!” Kevin kicked the front of the car again, but the burst of energy was gone, though the fading rage seemed all the more heartfelt. “Fuck, dude,” he said to Mitch, as if imparting a profound piece of wisdom. “I mean,
fuck.
”

Mitch nodded.

“I can’t do anything right. Not one fucking thing.” Kevin sounded like he was about to start sobbing. He was wearing a frozen half-smile, though, and Mitch wasn’t sure which of his senses he should be guided by. “I mean, I leave a goddamned dead dog in the car and let my wife and my daughter drive around with it in there for a fucking week and . . . and . . . they fucking poisoned him with antifreeze, man.”

“Poisoned who?” Mitch ventured, trying to piece the rant together.

“ANTIFREEZE!” Kevin screamed and Mitch flinched, realizing the tirade wasn’t nearly over. “And the cop wouldn’t do a goddamned thing about it, and he said I could investigate myself for five hundred dollars. Five hundred dollars! Do you have five hundred dollars to investigate . . .”

Kevin seemed to be pausing for breath so he could bellow some more incoherent syllables, but Mitch put his hand up, almost as if he were requesting a turn to speak in class.

“Dude,” he said. “It’s OK. We’re going to rob an armored car.”

Kevin considered that for a second and Mitch thought how odd it was that robbing an armored car was the only hopeful thing he could offer. Maybe things really were that bad. “I’ll probably fuck that up too,” Kevin said, but more softly, and Mitch thought the outburst really was over. Thank god the old guy wasn’t home.

“We’re not gonna fuck it up, man. We’re gonna do it right.”

Kevin stared into the grass of the old man’s yard for a moment, then looked up, suddenly cheerful. Suddenly enough for Mitch to be a little alarmed. The switch in emotion was almost psychotic.

“OK,” Kevin said, brimming with energy. “Let’s do it.”

“You wanna have a look at the Impala?” Mitch asked cautiously.

“Yeah,” said Kevin, his eyes now insanely bright. “Let’s have a look at the Impala.”

“You OK, man?” asked Doug, who had just finished burying the dog by the garage. He tamped down the last piece of earth and put the shovel back against the woodpile.

“I’m great!” said Kevin, with an enthusiasm that made Doug and Mitch glance at each other. Mitch shrugged. They opened the hood and looked at the Impala’s engine, which was in surprisingly good condition.

There was the sound of footsteps behind them and Mitch was startled to see an old man dressed in jeans and a flannel shirt standing there.

“Hey,” Mitch said, trying to hide his surprise. “I didn’t see you there. Where did you come from?”

The old man appeared annoyed. “Came out the back door. To see what all the commotion was. You fellas wanna buy this thing? It’s three hundred dollars.”

“I’m Rick,” said Mitch, extending his hand. The old man grabbed it and then let go. This grumpy old bastard was barely looking at them, so the subterfuge was, hopefully, unnecessary.

“You wanna buy this thing? It’s three hundred dollars.”

“Does it run?” asked Kevin.

“Yeah it runs. It runs OK. What do you want, a goddamned new Cadillac? It’s three hundred dollars, for chrissake. Get it outta here.”

You had to love grumpy people, Mitch thought, because they didn’t ask questions. Foul, grumpy people were the opposite of nosy neighbors. If only there were more of them.

Doug pulled three hundreds out of his pocket and gave them to the man.

“You a dealer?” he asked Doug as he was counting the bills.

“Nah, man. I just have long hair. It doesn’t mean anything.”

The old man looked at him, confused.

“I think he means a car dealer, dude,” Mitch said. Doug burst out laughing, which only irritated the old man more.

“Get this damned thing outta here, and you go too.” He began to walk back into the house. “Making all that commotion. Disgraceful. Goddamned disgraceful.”

Well sonofabitch, Mitch thought, watching the old man climb the steps back into his house. That was easy. They had a getaway car.

THE GETAWAY CAR, it turned out, had a top speed of about fifteen miles an hour and labored mightily up even the slightest grades. As the Wilton area was nothing but steep grades, it became apparent to them that the getaway car wouldn’t get them away from very much until it had a tune-up or, at the very least, some new sparkplugs.

“I can do that,” Doug said. “But for a tune-up I’ll need to buy a timing light. That’s going to cost, like, two hundred dollars.”