The elevator arrived, and Parker boarded. Already in there were two white men in suits and a large black wheeled suitcase. The 9 button was lit; Parker pushed 11.
As they rode up, he watched the numbers light above the door. When 7 came on, he took out the Sentinel and shot the nearer man in the arm, then pushed him into the other. ‘It isn’t your money,’ he said, holding the gun high for them to see, and they stared at him, shocked, too startled to know what to do, both of them still in the process of realizing that one of them had been shot.
Parker waited for the door to slide open at 9. If they had a third guy up here, in the hall, he’d have no choice but to kill them, but he’d prefer not to. Death draws more police heat than wounding.
The ninth-floor hall was empty. Parker pushed DOOR CLOSE, and the unwounded man said, ‘Do you know who owns this money?’
‘Me,’ Parker said.
The man said, ‘They’ll stuff your nuts in your mouth, and they’ll make you watch your children die.’
‘I can hardly wait,’ Parker said, and the door opened at 11. ‘Bring that,’ he said, gesturing with the Sentinel at the wheeled suitcase.
They came out into the hall, the wounded one holding his arm and watching Parker with a wary look, the other one pulling the suitcase and watching for his chance to make a move.
The hall was empty. A sign said the stairs were to the left. Parker said, ‘You know I don’t want to kill you, or you’d be dead already, but you know I will if I have to. You both have pieces under your coats, and you’ll leave them there. Let’s walk to the stairs.’
They walked to the stairs. A sign on the door there said ‘No Reentry.’ In checking the building this morning, Parker had noticed that security arrangement. In case of fire, people could get to the staircase on every floor of the building, but only the door at the lobby level would open from the staircase side.
He’d also looked at the company names on the building directory in the lobby, and Vestro Financial Services on 9 was one of the three outfits that had seemed likely. ‘You’ll get back to Vestro in a little while,’ he told them, ‘with a story to tell. Leave the case in the doorway.’
They did, propping the door partly open, and the three of them stood close on the concrete landing. The stairwell was bright yellow and had an echoing quality.
Parker took a pair of shoelaces from his pocket, still in their paper band, and gave them to the unwounded one, saying, ‘Use one to tie your pal’s thumbs together. Behind him.’
The wounded one said, ‘Man, don’t do that. I can’t move this thing.’
‘He’ll help you,’ Parker said.
The other one hefted the shoelaces on his palm. ‘You can still walk away from this,’ he said.
‘I’m in a hurry,’ Parker told him. ‘Do I have to do this the very fast way?’
The guy shrugged and said, ‘Sorry about this, Artie.’
‘Oh, shit,’ Artie said, and hissed through his teeth when the other one moved his arm.
Parker watched, and the unwounded one tied the knot well enough. Then he turned to Parker and said, ‘I suppose you want this one back.’ He extended the shoelace, but it dropped through his fingers.
He’d been expecting Parker to be distracted by that, as his hand darted in under his jacket, but Parker was not; he stepped forward and shot him in the gut, just above the belt buckle.
The man grunted, folding in on himself, the revolver coming in slow motion out from inside the jacket. Parker plucked it from his hand and pushed his chest; as the man toppled backward down the stairs, he turned to Artie and said, ‘That makes it easier.’
‘Ididn’t do anything! I’mno trouble!’
Parker put his new revolver on top of the suitcase, reached under Artie’s jacket, and found its twin. He tucked both guns under his belt, beneath his shirt, and put the Sentinel back into its holster.
Artie watched him, fearful but not pleading. Parker turned away from him, wheeled the suitcase back out to the hall, and the No Reentry door snicked shut behind him.
8
When he rented the post office box in Pasadena, an industrial suburb southeast of Houston near NASA’s manned space center at Clear Lake, Parker used the name Charles O. St. Ignatius. He paid for the first six months and pocketed the small flat key. Then he drove into Houston, where he bought the black suit and the clerical collar he wore when he went to the banks.
‘We’ve started a fund drive at our church,’ he told the first banker. ‘We are in desperate need of a new roof.’
The banker didn’t yet know if he was about to be hit up for the fund drive, so his expression was agreeable but noncommittal. ‘That’s too bad, Father,’ he said.
‘The Lord has seen fit to give us three near-misses the last several years,’ Parker told him. ‘Two hurricanes and a tornado, all just passed us by.’
‘Lucky.’
‘God’s will. But the effect has been to loosen the roof and make it unstable.’
‘Too bad.’
‘Our fund drive is doing very well,’ Parker told him, and the banker smiled, knowing he was off the hook. ‘Well enough,’ Parker went on, ‘so we’ll need to open a bank account, just temporarily, until we raise enough money for the repairs.’
‘Of course.’
