Seven Silent Men (10 page)

“Mister Corticun, I'm Lutheran to my eyeballs,” Brewmeister told him. “German Lutheran. Hardly a promising recruit for divine revelation … being reborn. We had an agent here for a time who claimed always to be dying and reborn, it wasn't me. I don't believe in such things. But in those tunnels something miraculous happened. I crashed through the brick wall headfirst and lived. A brick wall lay in the path of the avalanche of water I was riding. I was ramrodded through and sprained a shoulder … and I wasn't unconscious. What I saw on the other side of that wall, it was like I was in God's temple, water was swirling around me, spinning me in a circle and when I looked up I saw the domed roof of a great cathedral … and all the walls around me, while I spun, they were tall and arched—”

Corticun broke in. “And how long did you dwell in God's temple?”

Brewmeister looked at him, looked hard. “Only a millisecond, then I shot out through one of the arched doorways. Was shot into another tunnel and carried along on another crest of rampaging water. You know what I did then, Mister Corticun?”

“… What did you do, Mister Brewmeister?”

“I sang. I went whizzing along on my back through the darkness with a shoulder badly sprained and leg fractured and I sang my damned fool head off—”

The knocks on the door were sharp and impatient. Corticun squared his shoulders and motioned. Quinton slipped the note pad inside his jacket, barely managed to unlock the door when it burst back into his face, shoving him to the wall.

Big and burly and unkempt Ed Grafton strode through, followed by Happy de Camp and Cub Hennessy.

“What the royal hell is that enema doing here!” Grafton's voice was as stentorian as his full, large-featured face was ruddy. “I told that enema not to come here.” Grafton looked at de Camp but was pointing at Corticun. “What's he doing here?”

“Why are you here?” asked Happy de Camp.

“… I had a few follow-up questions,” Corticun said.

“I told the enema it wasn't to bother my people!” Grafton walked to the bed, looked down at Brewmeister. “How you feeling, lad?”

“Good, Graf, thanks.”

“How's the brick wall?”

“Strom told you?”

“Yep. One helluva trick. Might come in handy sometime.” Grafton patted Brewmeister's cheek. “What's that D.C. bunghole bothering you with?”

“Interviewing me about the cave.”

“You need anything? Food, booze … a broad?”

“A cigarette.”

“Smoking's bad for ya.”

“I know, but that's what I'd like.”

“Who's got a cigarette?” Grafton faced the others.

Corticun held out a pack.

“Not you, someone human.”

Cub Hennessy tossed over a pack of Kool Milds. Grafton gave one to Brewmeister, lit it. Brewmeister took a long, satisfying puff.

Grafton moved into the center of the room, stood with his back to Corticun. “I need a chair.”

Corticun pushed his empty chair forward.

Grafton sat. “Ask the enema what it was he wanted to know about caves in particular.”

“What did you want to know about caves?” Cub asked.

Corticun stepped beside Quinton. “I wished to know how agent Brewmeister found the cave and survived the flooding.”

“Tell the enema that's what he asked permission to do earlier. And I said no.”

“You heard the man,” Happy told Corticun.

“… I have to get back to Washington and wanted—”

“Brew,” Grafton called out to Brewmeister, “this bunghole give you his crime-of-the-century routine? Rave on about it being the slickest loot ever?”

“That he did, Graf.”

“There were electric lights in the cave, hundred-watt bulbs,” Corticun said. “A line of them. And a portable scaffold.”

Grafton turned in his chair, studied Corticun, who backed closer to Quinton. “Look at those two fuckers, would you? Pinstripes. Who would have ever fucking believed pinstripes in the FBI?” He shifted around so he could half-face Brewmeister and partially see Corticun and Quinton. “Okay, you two walking dildos think you got the crime of the century on your hands, I won't discourage you. Only take notes.” He pointed at Quinton without looking at him. “I want you to report every last word of this back to Washington.”

Quinton had the stenographic pad out and ready.

“Everything I told you back at the office checks so far,” Grafton began. “We've put together a couple of more things since then, including, a little present or two we brought over for Brew. But now we'll share.” Grafton beckoned. Cub handed him a large, damp brown paper bag.

“The robbers probably escaped from under the bank on rubber boats.” Graf's hand went into the bag. “Big black rubber boats made of this.” Graf tossed a piece of shredded, black heavy-duty rubber at Corticun. “They found this not far from where they found Brew on that delta island. They've got the rest of it over at the River Patrol boat house. It's a six-man boat or what's left of it.”

A strand of waterlogged, gray window sashing was tossed at Corticun as Graf explained, “Several of these were connected to inner rungs on the gunnels of the boat. And one of these was connected to the rope.”

Corticun caught a soggy gray canvas bag in both hands, held it away. A small, open padlock dangled from the zipper opening at the bag's top. Stenciled on the bag's side was the name “Brink's.”

“Reach inside,” Graf ordered.

Corticun obeyed, removed a thick packet of one-dollar bills. A water-drenched packet.

“Guess the crooks were in too much of a hurry to take it along, but it's Mormon State money okay.” Graf brought the packet of bills to Brewmeister. “Fifty dollars in all, and believe you me, they're going to miss it dearly.”

Grafton returned to the chair. “So now we know the crooks not only took in safe-cracking equipment, a scaffold, electricity … oh, by the way …” He tossed a mud-caked orb to Corticun. “There's a light bulb under that goo. A hundred-watt light bulb. A string of them were tangled in the boat's rudder, or what remains of the rudder.”

The paper bag dropped on the floor beside the chair. Grafton bit into a plug of tobacco. “Like I was saying, now we know for pretty damn sure those crooks beat it the hell out of there in rubber boats. That's why they flooded the tunnels. And if you think they were a slick crowd in cracking the vault, wait till you hear the razzle-dazzle they pulled with the flooding.

“According to the Sewerage Department, the crooks did a bigger and better job with the flooding than anyone thought. The sewage people think as much as an extra four to eight million gallons came through their pipes over the weekend, only they can't be sure. The extra water knocked hell out of their monitoring equipment. Ripped lots of it clean away. The water knocked hell out of the sewage system itself too. It wasn't till Sunday afternoon, with the beginning of those mud explosions over west, that engineers started going down into the tunnels and saw that all hell had broken loose.

“Another thing about that extra water is they don't know where it came from exactly. Up north of the city, around the bank, a couple of old irrigation and water systems hook up together or at least intertwine. They link into the city's water and sewage systems at different places. If you think the riddle can be solved by asking who the hell is missing four to eight million gallons of water, don't. No place seems to be. What they do know is the area under the bank was probably flooded three times.

“As for the matter of intelligence, we have two choices. Did the crooks have an inside source of information, a human source, say at Brink's, to tell them when the money was going to be shipped to the Mormon State National Bank? Did they have someone inside Mormon State itself giving them tips? Or did they rely on the bank's own monitoring system? Did they tap into the bank's main monitoring cable and see for themselves when an armored truck pulled up on the street outside and began unloading money … see the money sacks being brought downstairs and put into the vault? There were splice marks found on the main monitoring cable of the bank's security system.”

Grafton nodded to himself, took long and studious notice of Corticun … pointed to an empty chair. “Sit!”

Corticun came forward and seated himself. Crossed his legs.

“This sound like the crime of the century so far?” Grafton was less abrasive.

“… I would say,” Corticun cleared his throat, “it sounds extremely well planned and well executed.”

Grafton spit tobacco into the potty. “One way or another the crooks knew when that first shipment of money arrived. It was delivered by Brink's armored truck number 12–311 at four
P
.
M
. on Friday, August twentieth, and put in the vault. By Sunday morning, August twenty-second, the shipment was missing from the vault. So was everything the crooks had used to pull the job except for a demolished boat and piece of rope and string of mud-caked, hundred-watt light bulbs.”

Grafton leaned forward and smiled at Corticun. “Assuming you were me, what would you do now?”

The legs recrossed. “You mean after going to the assistant United States attorney?”

“Go to the assistant U.S. attorney? Why?”

“To receive jurisdiction,” said Corticun.

“Jurisdiction for what?”

“To investigate the robbery you just described.”

“That's what you would have done, barreled ass right over to the assistant U.S. attorney and got yourself some jurisdiction?”

“Mr. Grafton, that is what Director Hoover expects to be done.
Must
be done.”

“Make this here robbery an official FBI investigation, no matter what, huh?”

“Absolutely.”

Grafton looked over at Quinton writing. “You getting all this down, son?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Tell you what, Mr. Headquarters Pinstripe Junior G-Man,” Grafton said to Corticun, “you go see the assistant U.S. attorney on your own and claim jurisdiction. Claim it for Edgar Hoover or whoever else sent you sniffing around down here. Claim it and bring in all the photographers and reporters and TV cameras and hire a fine brass band to march up Main Street investigating your crime of the century. My men, they're keeping as far away as possible from that robbery.” He got up and stretched. “Me personally, I'm keeping a thousand miles far away and pronto. I'm catching the first airplane back to Montana and finishing out a duly earned vacation just like planned. Anything pops up, wire me at Silver Lake.”

Grafton walked to Brewmeister. “Know what these fancy pinstripe desk jocks forgot to ask? They forgot to ask how much money was in those sacks Brink's delivered to the bank. How much money was stolen. How much money them dumb bastards who call themselves bank crooks made off with.”

“How much?” Brewmeister asked.

“Guess, Brew.”

“It's too good to tell you outright,” Cub added.

Happy was smiling. Cub fought not to smile.

Brewmeister made a deflated estimate. “Half a million dollars?”

“Sixty-five hundred dollars!” Grafton broke up. “… Sixty-five lousy hundred dollars …”

“In singles,” Cub spit out between belly laughs. “… There were only one-dollar bills in those money sacks … only singles.”

“Those poor dumb crooks did all their labor and digging and planning for probably under a thousand bucks a man.” Happy nearly choked laughing.

“… Under a thousand
in singles
.” It was the funniest thing Cub had ever heard.

“Those dumb clucks would have been better off on unemployment.” Happy doubled over in pain laughing.

“Sixty-five hundred, oh my God!” Brewmeister nearly ripped down the traction rig laughing.

“It's the crime of the century okay …” Grafton pounded his fist against his leg and roared louder than ever, “… the poorest crime of the century.”

“The Polish crime of the century,” Cub howled.

Grafton dropped to his knees in laughter, with tears streaking down his face, gasped, “There ought to be a law against doing that to crooks.”

Happy fell into the wall laughing, laughing even harder he shouted, “Good Lord, I'm peeing in my pants!

The twin-engine blue and white Cessna 210 airplane dropped through a rip in the early evening cloud cover, banked steeply, leveled off and, maintaining an altitude of five hundred feet, droned downstream above the Mississippi River; passed over a turn in the river known as Cyclone Bend and an enormous gray rock cliff rising from the turgid water of the western bank called Warbonnet Ridge and a patchwork of forest preserve and lagoons and reservoirs and recreational areas; on down above the outer limits of the city of Prairie Port and a midriver current known as the Treachery and riverfront rock palisades on which loomed the construction sites for the Grange Association's nearly completed high-rise complex and the just-begun Prairie Farmer Industrial Park and the River Rise project, which housed Mormon State National Bank; further downstream over Lookout Bluff and the recently constructed 60,000-seat sports stadium; over the twinkling evening lights of Hennings Wharf and Steamboat Cove and Nigerton and ten blocks of downtown “Old City” and twenty-five modern acres of New City, which was ringed to the north and west by wooded and lush hills of riding trails and hunt clubs and golf courses and fashionable homes and large estates and low, modern industrial buildings housing much of the area's burgeoning aerospace and electronics industries; on above the river's delta islands, one of which contained a softball field, and a grand turn-of-the-century waterfront luxury hotel and gabled houses and the university and the last ridge of high ground and horse farms and pastures; on out over the prairie whence the city received its name.

As the plane banked to start an upstream sweep, the lights of Prairie Port began to dim and raise … dim and raise in geometric clusters of approximately four square blocks each … dim and raise with no cluster in synchronization with the next.