One Endless Hour

out the door.

I was halfway through the hundred-and-eighty-degree swing of the door to the parking lot when Dahl charged in on the other side, heading back into the bank. I froze. I couldn't imagine what he was up to. From my position with my back to the exit I could see the bank guard coming across the floor of the bank at a dead run. He shoved his foot into the protruding edge of the section of revolving door inside the lobby, and Dahl and I couldn't go anywhere. We were locked inside the revolving door.

I raised the riot gun, but before I could draw a bead Dahl fired three times from his compartment inside the door. Shattering glass crashed in massive quantities. The guard ducked to one side, unhurt but shaken. The sudden acceleration of the door as his foot was removed thrust me out into the alley. In a second Dahl came winging out as the door completed the circuit. 'What the hell were you doing?' I panted as we ran for the car.

'Thought you might need help.'

'When I need help I'll ask for it!'

Harris was under the wheel of the Olds with the motor running. Dahl and I piled into the back seat. We were moving down the alley by the time I got the door closed. Dahl jerked off his loose-fitting red-and-blue-sleeved jacket and threw it on the floor. 'Masks off!' I rasped as Preacher made the turn at the end of the alley onto Piney Branch. The fresh air felt cold against the perspiration on my face when I pulled mine off.

Dahl reached over the back of the front seat and lifted the pillowcase into the back seat. I half turned on the seat so I could watch him and still keep an eye out the back window for possible pursuit. We were headed south in a traffic flow that seemed ordinary. Dahl dumped the contents of the pillowcase onto the floor and began sorting it into three piles. 'Damn, damn, damn!' he swore softly. 'Small stuff.'

'I know,' Harris said without turning around. There were no red fights behind us and no sirens. 'What's the take look like?' His voice sounded husky.

'Less'n twenty thousand,' Dahl grumbled. Harris's grunt was eloquent of disgust. I refrained from saying that a properly planned job would have guaranteed that the amount of cash available made the risk worthwhile. 'Check it,' Dahl said to me, pointing to the piles of money at his feet.

'Watch the rear,' I said. I went through the cash quickly. I checked by packages of banded bills, not by counting. 'It looks all right.' Dahl reached down to the stack nearest him and began stuffing packages of bills into various pockets.

I did the same. We had reached Military Road by the time I looked around. Still no sign of police pursuit. Dahl picked up the third pile of money in both hands and dropped it on the front seat beside Preacher. 'This'll hardly keep me goin' three weeks,' he said gloomily.

'That's right,' Harris chimed in. 'Unless my system takes hold real quick this time.' He looked belligerently at Dahl. 'That was the most stupid thing I ever saw done on a job!'

Dahl started to laugh. 'You're jealous, cousin. I-'

'What was this stupid thing?' I asked Harris, interrupting Dahl.

'This mongoloid had the women tellers bare-assed on the floor, taking movies of them.'

'All but one who wouldn't pull her pants down even when my gun was an inch and a half from her twitch,' Dahl affirmed in high good humor. 'Must've had the rag on. You never know when you can use a little good pussy footage, cousins.'

I wondered how much of the bank area the camera had covered. 'If I ever hear that you've used that film commercially, I'll find you and nail your ears to the nearest telephone pole,' I threatened Dahl.

Harris pulled the Olds onto the shoulder of the road before Dahl could reply. 'What do we want to take?' he asked.

'Nothin' but the gun,' Dahl said sullenly. 'Leave the masks.'

Harris was scooping money into his pockets… 'Let's keep moving,' he urged. His voice was husky. He sounded as though the strain was beginning to catch up to him. We walked across the wide highway to my car and I slid into the driver's seat. Harris got in with me, Dahl in back.

I handed the blanketed gun to Dahl. 'Wipe it clean.'

He was already working on it when I swung the VW around in a U-turn and headed toward Brightwood and Dahl's parked car. The final look I took in the rearview mirror showed the white Olds glistening on the shoulder of the road. Harris broke the silence. 'This touch wasn't much of a stake,' he said.

'It's enough to get us together again for proper planning on the Schemer's job,' I said. 'And that time I think we should remember that we do just as long a bit for ten thousand as we'd do for Fort Knox. Let's make sure the cash is there.'

Dahl spoke right up. 'Suits me,' he said. 'When?'

'How about next week?'

'Make it two weeks,' he said. 'I've still got a movie to shoot. You in, Preacher?'

'I guess so,' Harris said unenthusiastically.

'I'll drive to Philadelphia and get set up,' I said. 'I've let the Schemer know where I am, and when we're ready to go you can call him to find out where to meet me.'

'Let's make the meeting two weeks from today,' Dahl said.

'Fine.'

'All right,' Preacher Harris said a tick later.

We were approaching Brightwood. 'Where are you parked?' I asked Dahl.

'In the middle of the first block, across from the post office,' he replied. 'Pull in anywhere.' He was carefully rewrapping the riot gun in the blanket. 'So long, cousins,' he said when I double-parked momentarily alongside a line of cars parked at the metered curb. 'Don't spend it all in one place.' He stepped out, slammed the door, waved, and jogged across the street.

'I don't ever want to work on a job with him again!' Harris burst forth as I pulled away.

I knew what he meant. I wasn't happy about the botched aspects of the job myself, but I didn't want Harris too unhappy with it. I knew how long it would take to recruit new partners. 'Now that we know he's a kook, we'll keep our fingers closer to the button next time,' I said soothingly. 'And you have to admit that nothing fazes him.'

'No brains, no feeling,' Harris snorted, but he subsided. 'Let me out at the next cab stand,' he said a minute later. 'I'll take a cab to the airport.'

'Take one to Fourteenth Street and then another to the airport,' I advised him. 'The police are sure to check cab sheets from this area for riders to Union Station and National Airport.'

'Yeah, good idea,' he admitted.

'Here we are,' I said, easing in behind a two-cab stand. We weren't more than five blocks from the bank we'd taken. 'The next one will be a piece of cake too, and we'll all get well on the proceeds. Don't forget to call the Schemer.'

Harris's smile was wan as he got out of my car. As I drove off I had the feeling that whether he called the Schemer or not depended very much upon how his luck ran at Vegas's dice and card tables for the next two weeks.

I headed over to Bladensburg Road in northeast Washington and had lunch. Then I went to a neighborhood movie where I watched the Redskins lose again. When I came out of the theater, the 4:30 P.M. homeward traffic was just starting to thicken up. I joined it, moved along to New York Avenue, and-eventually-to the Washington- Baltimore Expressway.

There were no roadblocks or car inspections barring exit from the District of Columbia.

If there had been earlier, the police had decided that the hit-and-run bank robbers were long gone.

I settled down for the drive to Philadelphia.

9

When I had a chance to count it, my end of the District bank job came to sixty-four hundred dollars.

It wasn't worth the risk, but it had been a long time since I needed sixty-four hundred so badly. I felt