Kwik Krimes (16 page)

A spoonful of yogurt was en route to his mouth, just one minute before noon, when a red, mud-splattered Chevy pickup truck with oversize tires roared up from a side street and skidded to a halt behind the armored van. Two men burst out, wearing ski masks and carrying shotguns. The first one got out quickly and shot the no-longer-bored-looking guard at the rear.

BOOM!
The hollow sound echoed up the narrow street, and people started screaming and running away, as if that annual Spanish bull run had suddenly dropped by. The second guy fired his shotgun and a window shattered. More screams. A guard tumbled out of the van’s rear, firing off several rounds from his pistol, and a street lamp a few yards away broke to pieces. Another shotgun blast, the guard dropped, and the two robbers ducked inside the open van.

Olsen carefully put his spoon inside his yogurt container. Aloud he said, “You have
got
to be kidding me.”

The two men came out of the van, screaming at each other, each holding bags in one hand, shotguns in the other. The bags were tossed into the rear of the truck. Another shotgun blast.
BOOM!
A male pedestrian across the way fell. More screams. More shouts between the robbers. Two more canvas bags tossed into the truck bed. They got back in. Smoke rose from scorched rubber as the driver punched the accelerator. The truck slewed as it roared up Main Street, clipping two parked cars.

Olsen wiped his lips with a napkin, started up his Crown Victoria, and began his pursuit.

From downtown Spencer there were at least three ways of getting onto state roads and from there, the nearest Interstate, in about ten minutes. The knuckleheads up ahead chose none of those routes.
They kept on going straight on the local Route 12, the truck easy to follow. Olsen kept his distance, ignoring the panicked chatter over his police radio. There. A quick turn up a narrow paved road, going up into the hills. Olsen slowed and made the turn as well.

It didn’t take long. About a half mile up the narrow country road there was a dirt cutoff to the left. A cloud of dust was eddying in the air, and fresh tire tracks were cut into the dirt. Olsen braked, pondered his options, and decided a direct approach was best. He turned left and sped down the dirt road. It widened into a dead end. The pickup truck was next to a light-blue Ford Escort. Two men were at the rear of the truck, their faces red and sweaty, hair matted down, no doubt from having worn those ski masks.

Olsen braked again, put the Crown Vic in park, and stepped out.

The nearest guy said crossly, “The hell do you want?” as his companion reached into the open truck bed for a shotgun.

“Not much,” Olsen said, as he took out a Sig Sauer 9 mm and shot the first one dead, and then from his ankle holster, quickly removed a .357 stainless steel Ruger, and did the same to the second.

A quick glance into the canvas bags revealed bundles of single dollar bills, a whole lot of bank deposits with local checks, and lots of rolled coins.

That was it.

Olsen shook his head, went back to work, and after a while, strolled back to his Crown Victoria.

“Amateurs,” he said.

A month later, Olsen was back in his Crown Victoria, once again eating lunch, once again enjoying the sights of downtown Spencer. The people were out, the sun was shining, and once
again, the van from
IRON VAULT PROTECTION SERVICES
—with two new guards—was in the handicapped spot.

He took another swallow from the yogurt. The news from last month had been shocking, but the Spencer police had quickly solved the case. Two brothers had wanted to make a quick score, but had bungled the entire thing. An argument ensued as they tried to divvy up the meager loot, ending up in a shoot-out that killed them both.

It was almost noon. Olsen put the yogurt container down, removed his new 9 mm Beretta, and started up the Crown Victoria. Earlier on, the dispatcher had once again reported the town’s sole police cruiser was back in the garage. Can you believe that?

He pulled into traffic and eased up to the armored van, whose doors were now open.

Olsen stopped the car, stepped out, and went to work. In a land of amateurs, the professional was always king.

Brendan DuBois is the award-winning author of more than 115 short stories and twelve novels, including
Deadly Cove
(2011, St. Martin’s Press). His stories have appeared in
Playboy, Ellery Queen Mystery Magazine, Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine,
numerous anthologies including
The Best American Mystery Stories of the Century,
and have twice won Shamus Awards and three Edgar Allan Poe Award nominations. Visit his website at
BrendanDuBois.com
.

Warren C. Easley

M
omma always said I slept like a nervous bird. When I heard the front door click open that night, I got up and peeked down the hall. It was Momma’s new boyfriend, Duane, and he was just closing the door behind him.

He looked real surprised to see me. “Oh, hi, Sprout. Just havin’ a smoke outside.”

I hated it when he called me Sprout. My name’s Kat. “You must have smoked a pack, ’cause I heard you go out a long time ago.”

He laughed, but his eyes got kind of small and hard. “One cigarette. You were dreaming.”

Early the next morning, I heard Momma’s cell ring. Momma rushed into my room. “Kat, get up. Something’s happened to Pop Pop.” We drove over to my grandfather’s house. There were lots of police cars and flashing lights. Momma told me to stay in the car. I knew something awful had happened, and my heart sort of shriveled up in my chest.

I started thinking about the day before. I was at Pop Pop’s house, teaching him how to use his new cell phone:

“Punch the number in first, then press the little green light. That sends the call.”

He chuckled the way he always does, ’specially when he’s laughing at himself. “I’m an old dog, Kat. It’s hard to teach me new tricks.”

He was gray and bent with big hands rough as tree bark, but his eyes had a kindness in them that shined like a light. “You’re not old,” I told him, “least not to me.”

Before I left he hugged me and gave me a serious look. “How are things at home?”

I dropped my eyes. “All right.”

“That new fella, Duane, he’s treating you okay?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“You guess?”

My face got a little hot. I didn’t like Duane, but couldn’t say why. “He’s okay.”

“Are they using?”

“I don’t know, Pop Pop. I keep to my room, mostly.”

He hugged me again. “Listen, now that you’ve taught me to use this phone, you can call me anytime, Kat. I promise I’ll ans—”

I jumped when Momma opened the car door. She was all in tears. “Pop Pop got robbed last night,” she said.

“Is he okay?”

“No, Kat. He’s not. Pop Pop’s dead. The burglar killed him.”

Momma held me for a long time. When I stopped crying, she said, “Kat, the police want to talk to you. Listen, honey, they don’t like Duane ’cause he’s got a record. Don’t say nothin’ bad about him, okay?”

“Momma, he went out last night. I heard him.”

She gripped my shoulders so hard it hurt. “No, he didn’t, Kat. He was with me. Don’t say that to the police. Please, honey. Duane’s a good man.”

I talked to a nice police lady and didn’t say anything bad about Duane or Momma. Another policeman came in, and the nice lady excused herself and joined him across the room. I looked
down at the hole in the toe of my sneaker like I wasn’t listening, but I was. “The murder weapon’s missing,” he said in a low tone. “Something heavy, like a hammer.” She told the man about Pop Pop’s cell phone. The man nodded and said, “That’s missing, too, along with his wallet and cash.”

When everything in the apartment got quiet that night, I snuck out of my room. Duane kept his tools on a shelf next to the washer. I pulled a chair up and looked for his hammer. I’d used it just the other day and knew it had red paint on the handle. The hammer was gone.

“Whatcha lookin’ for, Sprout?” I jerked around and there was Duane. A cigarette dangled from the side of his mouth, and his eyes were hard again, like little stones.

A pack of spiders crawled down my back. “Uh, a screwdriver,” I answered, pulling one out of the toolbox and adding real fast, “You’re not supposed to smoke in the apartment.”

He blew smoke from his nose and smiled like a snake. “Things are gonna change around here, Sprout. We’re gonna move out of this dump into your granddad’s house.”

I lay in bed with my door locked, trying to think what to do. When I finally dozed off, I dreamed about Pop Pop. He smiled down at me, held up his cell phone, and said,
“You can call me anytime, Kat. I promise I’ll answer.”

I woke up and snuck Momma’s cell phone from the hall table. When I tapped in Pop Pop’s number, it rang several times before going to voice mail—“Hi, this is Claude. Leave a message.” He did answer me! When I heard his voice, I knew what I needed to do.

I slipped out the front door and ran down Fourth Avenue till I got to the alley that cut through to Pop Pop’s street. There were a few lights, but it was mostly dark and scary in there.

I started down the alley, dialing Pop Pop’s number again and again. My legs were shaking, but the sound of his voice kept me
going. Halfway in I heard it—the ringtone I’d put on his phone. It came from a humongous trash can. I took the lid off and pulled hard on the lip of the can, tipping it over with a crash. Dogs started barking up and down the alley. I didn’t care.

I sifted through the garbage till I found a plastic bag that buzzed with Pop Pop’s ringtone. The bag was tied shut, but a wooden handle with red paint on it had punched through the side. I put the lighted face of my phone up to the handle and saw a clear fingerprint in blood.

I dialed 911 and sat down to wait.

T
HIS STORY WAS FIRST PUBLISHED IN
E
VERY
D
AY
F
ICTION
.

Warren C. Easley lives on a ridge overlooking the Willamette Valley near Portland, Oregon. A chemist and former R & D executive, he is the recipient of a Willamette Writers Kay Snow Award for fiction, and his short stories have won several awards. Easley is author of the Cal Claxton Oregon mysteries (
WarrenEasley.com
), which will be published by Poisoned Pen Press beginning in the summer of 2013.

Gerald Elias

P
atient? Of course I’m patient. I’m patient as a saint, so I’ve been told. I can watch a glacier melt, though maybe that was a better analogy back in the day. Patience is one of the great virtues. If the creationists understood that for three billion years—more or less—evolution has been the miracle that demonstrates God’s patience, maybe they wouldn’t be so impatient to throw it under the bus. But patience has its limits, doesn’t it? After all, we let Hitler invade half of Europe trying to be patient. Get him to listen to reason. Who was it—Neville Chamberlain—that said “peace in our time”? There’s a fine line between patience and appeasement. As a student of history, sometimes you have to draw a line in the sand, don’t you? So you’re not taken advantage of.

Then there’s mercy. That’s the other great virtue. I love that speech Portia gives in
The Merchant of Venice
, the quality of mercy. It’s one of my favorites. Give me a sec while I put on my best Laurence-Olivier-in-drag accent: “The quality of mercy is not strain’d. It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven, Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest; It blesseth him that gives and him that…” Am I boring you? All right then, I’ll cut to the chase, since you seem to be in a hurry. Blah blah blah blah blah “it is enthroned in the hearts of kings, it is an attribute to God himself and earthly power
doth then show likest God’s when mercy seasons justice.” Etcetera. I believe that to be some of Shakespeare’s best writing. She really did screw Shylock, though. Took away everything that was important to him and forced him to be a Christian. I think there’s a bit of hypocrisy going on there, but still she makes a good point, even if there’s no black and white. Like when we dropped the bomb. Most of the people in Hiroshima probably didn’t think we were being merciful, but then when you look at the big picture—all the others who would’ve died had we not done it; and don’t forget Russia was on Japan’s doorstep. What would the world be like now if we had been thinking of mercy in the narrow sense? I’m talking about religion and war a lot, aren’t I? They seem to go hand in hand in a way. I think people have a right to believe what they want, though I’m not particularly observant. I don’t approve of fanaticism of any kind. Believe me, I’ve seen more than enough of that for your lifetime and mine. It really is good to be home. Why did I kill her? I believe that’s what you asked me. If she hadn’t been a stranger, I probably wouldn’t have. Let me amend that to be perfectly honest: I
might
not have. But she put her hand on me for no good reason. None that I could think of at that moment, anyway. There really was no choice. It’s easy to be a Monday-morning quarterback, isn’t it? At that moment I had to draw a line in the sand. Didn’t I?