“Wha what?”
“Twenty Questions. Do you know how to play it?”
She nodded, doubtfully.
“Good.” He looked around, saw the walkie-talkie. “I’m thinking of something mineral.”
All at once she started to cry. She ducked her head and whispered, “I’m, I’m sorry. It’s my nerves.”
“That’s all right, Mary. It’s just stage fright, don’t worry about it.”
4
Kerwin didn’t take any part in wrecking the radio station equipment. For himself, he didn’t even think it was necessary, but Parker and the others did, so let them do it.
He stood in the doorway, watching the street. The prowl car was parked there, at the curb, with the station wagon behind it. There was absolute silence from the street, but from inside there were the crashes of metallic breakage.
Kerwin liked metal. He liked machinery, liked to watch it work, liked to fiddle with it and learn about it and understand it. At home, he was a ham radio operator, and a do-it-yourselfer. He owned two prewar cars, and they both ran like watches. In one corner of his basement there was a model train layout, full of drawbridges and complex signal systems; he ran the model railroad with his neighbor, and two pipes under the driveway between their houses carried track which linked their systems.
He liked machinery and he hated to see it destroyed. When it came to safes, he liked to use drill and screwdriver and wrench and his own hands; men who relied on nitro were just bums and amateurs, not professional safemen at all. And when it came to the kind of wreckage Parker and Littlefield and Phillips were doing in the radio station now, Kerwin wanted no part of it. He didn’t approve.
The sounds stopped. A few seconds later, they came out, all wearing their hoods, and Parker said, “Clear?”
Kerwin nodded. “Clear.”
They went out and got into the two cars, Parker and Phillips in the prowl car, Kerwin and Littlefield in the wagon. They drove back up Whittier to Raymond, turned left, and drove down to the end, to the west gate of the plant.
This part had no effect on Kerwin at all. People were just fuses; they had to be deactivated before you could get to work. He and Littlefield waited while the prowl car nosed forward to the gate, and the guard came out of his booth, waving in a friendly way. Then the guard stopped, and raised his hands, and Kerwin saw Phillips get out of the car, walk around it, disarm the guard, and walk him back into his shack.
Littlefield cleared his throat, and said, “Think they need us?”
“If they do, they’ll motion to us.”
“I guess so.”
Parker had gotten out of the car now, too, and had gone into the shack. After a couple of minutes, Phillips came out wearing the guard’s uniform. He attached a metal sign to the already-closed gate, and got into the car just as Parker also came out of the shack.
Littlefield cleared his throat again. “It’s certainly running smooth,” he said.
Kerwin glanced at him and saw how tightly he was holding to the steering wheel. “Nothing to be nervous about,” he said.
“That’s right.” Littlefield coughed, and cleared his throat.
The prowl car had backed away from the gate, and swung to the right. Littlefield put the wagon in gear, and followed the prowl car down Copper Street toward the other gate. Closed luncheonettes and bars and barber shops and tailors were on their right, and the fence on their left. Beyond the fence were the dark bulks of the plant buildings, and beyond them, in total darkness, the sheer wall of the canyon.
Again, the station wagon hung back while the prowl car drove up to the gate. The same actions were repeated, and then Parker waved to them to come forward. Phillips had opened the gate, and was standing there looking natural and easy in the guard uniform. He gave them a mock salute as the wagon passed him, following Parker along the blacktop company street between the buildings.
By the time Littlefield stopped in front of the main building, Kerwin had his bag of tools ready in his lap. They got out of the car, joined Parker, and the three of them went into the building.
As far as Kerwin was concerned, defusing people was Parker’s job. Kerwin’s job was simply to stand there and add numerical strength. He entered the office with Parker and Littlefield, and belatedly drew the revolver from his shoulder holster. Guns were about the only machines he wasn’t interested in; he held this one absent-mindedly, waiting without listening while Parker talked to the frightened man a while, and then Parker and Littlefield tied and gagged him. Once they were done, he put the revolver away again the safety hadn’t been off yet tonight and said, “Where is it?”
“Through here.”
Littlefield was sitting at the desk now, clearing his throat and watching the telephone. Kerwin followed Parker through a doorway, across an office, down a hall, and through another office. He waited while Parker forced a locked door, then went into the room and looked at the safe.
It was dark green, with yellow designs. Approximate exterior dimensions, four feet high, two and a half feet wide, three feet deep. Simple combination lock. Parker had turned on the office lights, because the windows here faced the rear of the building. Kerwin walked over and set his bag on a desk and patted the top of the safe.
Parker said, “You all set?”
“Mmm? Yes, of course.”
5
