Stumpy (1)
Matthew Lett

 

It was going to be an easy job. Bust in, grab the cash, bust out. Just like that. Three simple steps, which if done quickly and correctly, would result in a net payoff near a quarter of a million dollars. At least that’s the way Jake Clemmons of Rock Springs, Wyoming saw it. He wasn’t exactly sure how his partner Roddie saw it. In fact, he wasn’t even sure if Roddie saw any of it.
     Roddie Gumbler was a bit slow--and a bit meant that others considered him an outright dimwit. A faulty light bulb that never seemed to flicker in the right places; tall in stature but short on intelligence was Roddie’s lot. But despite this shortcoming, Roddie was likeable enough guy who possessed a characteristic that in today’s world of the “quick buck” (ironically enough) that had attracted Jake to him immediately: Loyalty. Pure and simple unwavering loyalty, a trait usually reserved for mongrels of the lowest breed, but held by Roddie like a badge of honor.
     Currently, Roddie was standing behind Jake shivering in a sub-zero blast of December wind, a cigarette chattering between his stained teeth. They were around the corner of Oldfield National Trust, the one and only financial institute in the small township of Deeroak Vale, population 705. The bank itself was an unremarkable brick structure; erected in the late 1940’s in a post-World War Two America, Oldfield National had been an eye-sore for generations since time out of mind. And today it was going to be robbed, an event never before recorded in the annals of the bank’s colorful history.
     “Wh…what n…now, Jake?” Rod asked. He was dressed in a black sweatshirt complete with a black hood that was pulled up over his head and tied down below his chin in a neat little bow. A pair of torn blue jeans, worn but comfortable, were cinched around his waist. He was stamping his feet on the curb where Broadway met Elm Place, hopping from foot-to-foot in an effort to stay warm.
     Jake didn’t answer immediately. He was busy looking around the corner of the bank, waiting for its double-oak front doors to open up for business. He checked his watch: two minutes till nine, and again ran the plan through his mind a final time--
     At the stroke of nine as soon as those doors swung open, Rod and Jake were to going be Oldfield National Trust’s first customers of the morning. First Jake, and then Rod. Jake would break to the left across the stone-tiled foyer toward the row of teller’s cages. He was hoping he wouldn’t have to brandish his .357 Magnum unless absolutely necessary, but ultimately knew that --somehow, someway–- someone would decide it was their day to be appointed a super-hero and get stupid. And along with stupid, said super-hero could add severely injured or murdered to his or her list. Jake knew it wasn’t exactly inevitable, but when you were robbing a public place of commerce, people tended to get squirrley ideas often putting themselves into harm’s way without first considering the consequences.
     On the other side of the bank’s foyer beneath its steep vaulted ceiling, would be Rod protecting Jake’s flank, watching out the east bay side windows for any signs of impending trouble. Good old Roddie --faithful Roddie—whom Jake had only known for a scant two years but already trusted like a brother.
     “In a minute, Rod,” Jake answered. He was wearing a faded bomber’s jacket, a gift from his late uncle, its wool-lined collar pulled up tight around his neck. “Remember the plan? Remember how were going to do this, right?”
     Rod nodded, the tip of his nose bright red in the gray shades of a waking morning. “Got it, Jake,” he said. He patted the waistband of his jeans, the butt of his Colt .45 peeking over the top like a forlorn gopher. “I’m locked and loaded and ready to get rich!”
     “Okay, okay,” Jake agreed. “Just remember, I’m in charge. Just do what I tell you to do and we’ll be in and out of there in five minutes tops.”
     Rod nodded, again, seemingly too cold to respond. The temperature was lingering at a frosty fifteen degrees with promises of snow and blizzard like conditions due to hit by early afternoon. But Rod was past caring about what was going to hit this afternoon or what wasn’t. The here and now was what mattered, and he was freezing. Literally; the tips of his gloveless fingers now numb, every breath a drawn in gasp of arctic death. He wondered briefly how people could survive in conditions such as this: people huddled around campfires like cavemen in Alaska hunting bear and caribou, or idiots jammed into sleeping bags with nothing but the thin plastic of their tents to protect them in the Antarctica, undoubtedly researching the patterns of ice flow or the shitting habits of the Emperor penguin. Crazy!
     Rod suddenly felt a tug on the arm of his sweatshirt. “Now!” Jake ordered, and off the two of them went around the corner, down the sidewalk facing Oldfield National, and then up the cracked concrete steps leading into the mouth of the bank’s main foyer. Jake stopped just inside the entrance, reaching out to take hold of Rod’s arm. Wafts of blessed warm air were coursing around them, caressing soft kisses that both stung and tingled their extremities, but were immediately welcome.
     “Wait just a second,” Jake whispered. “Let’s see who were dealing with today.”
     Rod nodded, his narrow hazel eyes soaking in the expanse of Oldfield’s dilapidated lobby:
     Near the back was Mr. Peterson, Oldfield’s president, seated officiously behind his dark maple desk. The wallpaper behind him and pasted across the length of the back wall was masked in soft teal; light perfect images of topsail schooners and Spanish galleons laden with treasure sailing across treacherous seas in search of a friendly port. Mr. Peterson was dressed in a blue-black suit, a fussy if not admirable red tie with blue stripes collared about his thin neck.
     Across the way were tellers counting out their tills. A direct shot to the left from where Jake stood, but something Jake had planned and already known since last week. There were only two of them in the cages that chilly morning. One a younger woman of about twenty or twenty-five. She had medium-length hair the color of old coffee, the horn-rimmed glasses balanced on her nose a direct throwback to the fifties that reminded Jake of his ninth grade English teacher. Miss Spokatski, her name had been.
     The second teller was a short, beefy woman in her mid-to-late forties. Her complexion was pale, the folds of her flabby skin doughy and soft, and most certainly in hidden areas considering the lady’s ample bulk--odiferous.
     “Did you lock the door, Rod?” Jake asked quietly.
     “Sure did. Right behind me when we walked in, just like we planned, Jake.”
     “Good…good. Then let’s get this show on the road--”
     “EVERYBODY! HANDS UP NOW!” Jake suddenly roared, his baritone voice reverberating through the empty lobby. He was moving forward, Rod heading away and to the right, toward Mr. Peterson’s desk parallel to the bay windows. “GET’UM UP, PEOPLE! RIGHT NOW, AND NO ONE GETS HURT!”
     Except for the ticking of a grandfather clock set back in one dusty corner, Jake’s last demand was met with stony silence. All souls accounted (with the exception of Jake and Rod, of course) now had their collective arms in the air, staring at Jake as is if he’d just announced the Second Coming of Christ. There had been no screams of terror or gasps of surprise, or even nervous, unbelieving laughter. Nothing, but utter and total silence.
     Jake was stunned into silence himself, but only for a moment. It wasn’t what he had expected, far from it, but what could prove to be a benefit to the cause. A quiet crowd (if a person could call three people a crowd, Jake thought) is an easily controlled crowd. Better than he and Rod could have hoped for, actually.
     “You two…,” Jake motioning toward the tellers, “come out from around those desks so I can keep an eye on ya’. Rod? Escort Mr. Peterson over here and make sure he doesn’t piss himself on the way. Smells bad enough as is in here without him stinking it up anymore. Hurry up!”
     Rod was in front of Mr. Peterson’s desk, the little man sitting behind it with his arms raised, now staring at him with open contempt. He’s gonna’ cause trouble, Rod thought. I know he is, and then Jake is gonna’ shoot him straight through the mouth and out the back of his bald little head. Jesus wept.
     “Better do as Jake says, Mr. Peterson,” Rod warned. He hadn’t drawn his pistol yet, and honestly didn’t want to, but would if this fancy dressed runt decided to get stubborn. He knew Jake didn’t like Peterson very much. Never had, really. Ever since they’d had that run in with Peterson last summer in Ling’s Supermarket over a simple parking space, the bitterness between Jake and Mr. Peterson had only deepened, manifesting itself into a mutated form of “mutual but respectful” hate. But Jake robbing the man’s bank? Hate would be too kind of a word, at least from Peterson’s standpoint.
     Peterson rose to his feet as ordered. A fussy little man with a funny moustache who’d never been told he resembled a young Adolf Hitler back in the dictator’s glory years of the Third Reich. Lowering his hands, he straightened the knot of his tie, glaring in distaste at Rod. Rod, in Peterson’s aristocratic opinion, was clearly inferior in both social values and overall moral aptitude. A man-child born dumber than a stump; a species of man --including his insufferable companion Jake Clemmons-- who deserved nothing less than to be wiped off the bottom of humanity’s shoe like dog-shit and then tossed in the trashcan of depravity.
    “If that’s the way you want it, Mr. Gumbler,” Peterson said, circling his tidy desk. He couldn’t bear to use the lug’s first name. Too close. Too personal. “But let me remind you, sir, that you and your…cohort…will never get away with this. I’ll see to it personally.”
     Rod took a step backward, allowing Peterson to pass. Peterson smiling smugly, almost sauntering passed Rod as if to say You-Know-It’s-True-Dummy, and crossed the foyer to join his tellers and Jake.
     Rod fell in half-a-step behind Peterson, wondering why Peterson hated him so much. The man had never actually stated it, but Rod could sense it. A man could sense things (most men that is), and Rod was certain that for some unfathomable reason Peterson couldn’t stand the sight of him. What had he ever done to the man (barring today’s robbery, which had been Jake’s idea to begin with)? He’d always been personable to Mr. Peterson and his large wife when they crossed paths in town. Hadn’t Rod just a week ago complimented Mrs. Peterson on a new dress she’d bought at JCPenney’s? Hadn’t he offered to change the sparkplugs and oil in Mr. Peterson’s car when he overheard Peterson talking to old man Stillings about how it needed to be done and that he didn’t trust mechanics? ‘Devils!’ Peterson had called them. ‘Men no better than apes swinging from jungle vines who happened to know the difference between a wrench and a screwdriver.’
     Rod had chuckled at that one, but he wasn’t chuckling now. Mr. Peterson flat out didn’t like him, and it was troubling him.
     “Over here, Rod,” Jake said, pointing to a spot by his side. He was looking at the trio of bank employees before him, two of them with their hands still in the air, the other --Peterson of course-- standing there like an insolent child who’s been denied his dessert. Jake would have gladly taken three steps forward and slapped that shit-smug I’m-Better-Than-You look right off the man’s pinched face, and resisted the urge to do just that.
     “Welcome to the party, folks!” Jake announced. Rod was on his right, his large hands stuffed deep in his pockets. “Pay attention, do what I say, and you’ll live to see another day. Sound good?”
     “Can we put our arms down? I’m getting tired over here.”

     It was the younger of the two tellers, the Miss Spokatski wannabe. Jake could see she was telling the truth, her arms trembling over head as if she were lifting a terrible weight. Jake motioned for both of the tellers to put their hands down, when Peterson spoke up in his nasally, not quite feminine voice:
     “Just what is it that you want, Mr. Clemmons?” he asked, the tone in his voice clearly implying that he already knew. “Because if this is about money, there’s a couple of thousand over there in the tills. Take it and get out, before the police arrive and haul you and your…your pet off to jail.
     Leaning over, Rod whispered, “He told me we’d never get away with it, Jake. I promise. Told me that he’d see to it personally. What’s that supposed to mean?”
     “Nothing,” Jake said, and turned back to Peterson, who was standing there with his arms folded across his chest looking thoroughly put out. As if Rod and him were roaches he’d discovered in the kitchen sink, and that needed to be exterminated before they were given a chance to breed and multiply; the big man on campus who had threatened to call Sheriff Parker because Jake had “robbed” him of a fine parking place up near the front of Ling’s Supermarket.
     ‘Ass-hole!’ Peterson had screamed from the window of his blue 2001 Volvo on that hot and sunny afternoon. ‘They don’t accept food-stamps here, you moron! Try the Salvation Army if you want a hot bowl of soup!’
     Jake, with Rod riding shotgun, had given the petite banker the bird, honked the horn of his Chevy truck, and then answered back, ‘Thanks for the advice, dip-shit! Just tell your wife not to get there before me, or there won’t be anything left to eat!’
     And with that, Jake and Rod had leaped out of his truck laughing and patting each other on the back, leaving Peterson still in his Volvo shouting threats of contacting Sheriff Parker and the Deeroak police department about the many unpaid parking tickets he was sure Jake had acquired. Jake often thought about that moment when he was ever feeling lonely or down, a sure cure for the blues that never failed to put a smile on his boyish features. Good times.
     “Rod here tells me that you’re trying to scare him, Peters,” Jake said. He loved calling the irritable little shit “Peters,” because it did just that, irritated him. “Is that so? Are you trying to scare my friend here by telling him that we’ll ‘never get away with it?’ That you’ll see to it personally? Is that what you’re saying, Peters?”
     Peterson sniffed, rubbing his stubby index finger beneath his nose. He was a stick of a man with wide staring eyes, black --like owl’s eyes-- and little feet that reminded Jake of a child’s.
     “I’m not trying to scare anyone, Mr. Clemmons, for your information. Your friend, for want of a better word, seems to be sadly misinformed. If you take the money available in the tills, and only the money in the tills, I can assure you safe passage out of here assuming none of us are harmed.”
     Jake grinned, the hard steel of the .357 tucked in the small of his back a gentle reminder of exactly why he and Rod were here today—the vault.
     Sunshine, hazy and dreary, was flooding through the bay windows of Oldfield National Trust. It lit the main foyer in weak beams of feeble light, offering its warmth, but ultimately casting nothing but long, fingery shadows; specters creeping along the walls and floor, angles and edges of black light finding purchase in corners and deserted vestibules. The grandfather clock read: 9:16.
     “Open the vault,” Jake said, when a sudden chill passed through him as if in answer to his demand. A chill that felt unwarranted --out-of-place-- an alien passenger through the pores of his naked flesh. Jake shook it off, attributing it to the antiquated heating system stored inside the walls of the bank. But still--
     Peterson stiffened noticeably. “The vault is off limits. I told you only the tills, Mr. Clemmons. Was I not clear on that point? Do you need clarification? Just take the tills and leave. After that, I could really care less what happens. That’s up to you.”
     Jake considered this a moment then nodded. “You’re right, Peters,” he said. “It is up to me. Which means, it isn’t up to you. So me and Rod here are going to take half of your advice and take the till money, but were not leaving until that vault is open. Understand?”
     Reaching behind him, Jake drew the Magnum from the waistband of his trousers, pulled back its heavy hammer, and settled its black hole of a barrel directly between Peterson’s jittering eyes. “One way or another,” he said, his voice soft and even, “you’re going to open that vault or we’re going to start wasting people, starting with…her.”
     Jake swung the barrel of the Magnum, pointing it at the stocky lady’s chest. She was wearing a flowery print dress, a choker of fake pearls draped around her thick neck. Her expression was one of disbelief, but not of fear or shock, as Jake had expected. The lady stood there, just staring into that single eye of the Magnum, seemingly unconcerned that her chest would open up like a rotten cantaloupe if Jake decided to give the trigger a little pressure.
     “C’mon, Jake,” Rod whispered in a hoarse voice. To Jake’s ears his friend was beginning to sound scared and unsure of himself-- untrustworthy. Not at all like Rod, and something Jake --along with a list of other things-- had not expected. “I thought we agreed there’d be no shooting. I ain’t never killed a soul in my whole life, Jake. Let’s just take the money over there and get the hell out of here. We’ll have plenty to get out of the state and down to Mexico with a couple of thousand dollars. C’mon, man.”
     But Jake was only half listening to the pleas of his partner, thinking. He had thought Rod had a clear perception of why they were here today; had known what the stakes would be, and what might be required of him to accomplish this task. Apparently, he’d overestimated Ron’s mental ability to grasp such large concepts, concepts that could mean the difference between them drinking margaritas on the sun-drenched beaches of Acapulco, or serving 30 years in a maximum security facility where extortion, sodomy and murder were a normal everyday occurrence.
     How could he explain such concepts to Rod? Better yet, how could he explain such concepts now? Both of their fates spinning on that giant wheel of life, clickety-clack-clickety-clack-clickety-clack, until it would finally stop based on Jake’s next decision. What to do.
      But instead of addressing Rod’s concerns, Jake focused his attention back on Peterson, the .357 still trained on the older lady with the bad nest of curly hair. “We came for the vault, Peters,” he said. “And if we don’t get what’s inside it, Big Mama here is gonna’ get a hole the size of my fist blown in her pretty dress, and she’ll have you to thank for it. Have I made myself clear? Do you need clarification, Peters?”
     “Jake,” Rod groaned, “listen, we can—“
     “Shut-up, Rod. If you wanna’ leave, then leave. If you didn’t have the stomach for this then you should have never came. But I’m taking what’s in that vault, that’s final. And when you walk out, you’d better keep on walking, because I’m not going to be there anymore for ya’. Understand?”
     “Ah, Jake…” Rod was whining now, a little boy told to go to bed early on a Saturday night. “I just meant that me and you ought to—“
     “I’d take your friend’s advice, Mr. Gumbler,” Peterson interjected. He was staring at Rod impassively, the waning light of the bank’s foyer giving his drawn features a ghastly, yellowish appearance.
     The wind had risen to a shrill around the gutters and eaves outside the bank, whistling in its throaty voice the promise of an approaching storm. The streets of Deeroak Vale were vacant; shops down Broadway closing, their employees happy for the early day off, but more concerned with the trip back home where the safety and comfort of their fireplaces awaited. The weatherman had been wrong (no surprise), for the winter snow was fast approaching and had no mercy on the weak or slow. Still ticking in its infinite corner, the grandfather clock said: 9:40.
     “Take his advice and get out of here while you can,” Peterson continued. “Save yourself. Show the world that you’re not as stupid as you look or that everybody in town thinks you are, including myself.” Pointing at Jake with the end of one manicured fingernail, Peterson bore on, “Because Jake Clemmons is about to get you killed, and you don’t even know it.”
     “Don’t listen to’em,” Jake growled. “You go on and leave if you want, Rod, but I’m staying here. This monkey spunk piece of shit is going to open that vault. Trust me.”
     Rod was looking back and forth between Jake and Mr. Peterson. The verbal parlay between the two men was making him dizzy and confused, unable to concentrate on one thing --and one thing only-- only making his current condition of indecision an insurmountable roadblock. His mind had four flat tires and was up on cinder blocks, like the 1985 Bronco in his front yard he’d been meaning to “fix-up” for the past three years, and Rod knew it. Knew it in the way a man past forty years of age knows that his days of pussy-chasing are over. You could give it your best effort, consider it from various angles, but were ultimately bound for failure.

 

 

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Copyright © 2009 Matthew Lett
Published on the World Wide Web by "www.storymania.com"