Nonetheless, he was unquestionably Hidden Valley’s wealthiest and most respected citizen. In addition to owning the Mercantile, which he had inherited from an uncle ten years before, and in addition to having served two successive terms as mayor, he owned a thousand acres of mountain land lucratively leased to a private hunting club, a portfolio of blue-chip stocks, and a high five-figure bank account. He was married to a woman considered by most everyone both intelligent and enviably attractive: an equally substantial form of wealth. If he had been an ambitious man, he might have left Hidden Valley for less secluded surroundings-might have entered successfully into the larger business world or perhaps even into politics. But he was not ambitious, and he derived a great deal of contentment from his position of importance in the valley. To enhance it, he offered unlimited credit to regular customers, maintained a “banking” service for the cashing of personal and business checks, could be counted upon for a loan in any emergency, and regularly contributed money to the All Faiths Church and to civic betterment projects. It was, he sometimes thought, a little like being the benevolent young monarch of a very small, very scenic, and very agreeable kingdom.
Behind him, now, the telephone began ringing distantly in his private office. Without turning from the window, he called, “Maude, would you get that, please?”
“I’m on my way, Matt,” she answered. Her footsteps sounded on the wooden flooring, and after a moment the ringing ceased. The loudspeakers began to give out with “Deck the Halls.” Maude’s voice called above the music, “It’s your wife.”
Hughes sighed. “Okay, thanks.”
He crossed the store and stepped behind the counter again. Small and neat, his office was nestled in the far right-hand corner adjoining the storeroom; it contained a pair of file cabinets, a glass-topped oak desk, and an old- fashioned, black-painted Wells-Fargo safe, bolted to the floor and wall, in which he kept his cash on hand. Entering, closing the door behind him, he cocked a hip against the edge of the desk and picked up the phone receiver and said, “Yes, Rebecca?”
“I just called to tell you we’re out of coffee,” his wife’s voice said. “Would you bring a pound of drip grind home with you tonight?”
“I think you’d better come down and pick it up, dear. I won’t be home after closing.”
There was a brief silence; then Rebecca said, “Oh?”
“I have to go over to Coldville,” he told her. “I was going to call you a little later to let you know.”
“Why do you have to go to Coldville?”
“Neal Walker called and asked me to come. He wants to discuss some civic problem or other he’s having.”
“Mayor to mayor, is that it?”
“Yes.”
“I see. And wives aren’t allowed?”
“You’d be bored, dear, you know that.”
“I suppose I would.”
“I’ll probably be late. Don’t wait up.”
“No, I won’t,” she said, and broke the connection.
Hughes replaced the receiver, sighed again, and then went around the desk and sat down in his leather armchair. He pyramided his fingers under his chin and sat that way for several minutes, lost in thought. Then, abruptly, he straightened, picked up the telephone again, and dialed a Soda Grove number.
A woman’s soft young voice said, “Grange Electric, good afternoon.”
“Hello, Peggy. Can you talk?”
“Yes. Is something the matter?”
“No, not a thing. I just wanted to talk to you.”
“Well, you’ll be seeing me in another three hours.”
“I know that. I’ve been thinking about it all day.”
She laughed softly. “What were you thinking?”
“You know what I was thinking.”
“Yes, but tell me anyway.”
“I’ll tell you when I see you. I’ll show you.”
“Oh, yes, I can imagine you will.”
Hughes moistened his lips, and his breathing was thick and rapid. “You know something?” he said. “This conversation is giving me an erection. I never thought a man could get an erection talking to a woman over the telephone.”
The girl named Peggy laughed again. “Well, don’t lose it, okay? I’ll see both of you at six or a little after.”
“At six,” Hughes said. He waited until she had rung off and then reached out almost reluctantly to recradle the receiver for the second time. Using a handkerchief from the pocket of his gray wool slacks, he wiped away a thin sheen of perspiration which had formed on his forehead; then he stood up and went out again into the front of the store.
Over the loudspeakers, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir was singing about love and faith and the spirit of Christmas.
Sacramento
When they were two blocks from Greenfront and he was certain they had no immediate pursuit, Brodie slowed the armored car to the legal speed limit. Time was a precious commodity, but they couldn’t buy any of it if they drew attention to themselves getting the dummy back to the rented garage.
The alley off which the garage was located had both its entrances on parallel industrial streets crowded with trucks and vans. Brodie made the turn onto the nearest of them without seeing any sign of a police car and drove a block and a half to where the alley mouth bisected the block to the left. Kubion, watching the street in a flatly unblinking stare, said, “It looks okay; nobody paying any attention”-and Brodie nodded and made the swing into the narrow opening between two high, blank warehouse walls.
Midway through the block, the alley widened to the right to form a small parking area; it fronted a weathered brick structure which had been independently erected between the rear walls of two warehouses. One-half of the building had a sign on it that said BENSON SOLENOID, MANUFACTURER’ S REP. The other half was the garage.
They had left the doors open, and the area was deserted; Brodie drove the armored car inside without slowing. Kubion was out of the passenger side before the car had come to a full stop, closing the two wooden halves of the doors, barring them with a two-by-four set into iron brackets. Turning, he began to strip off his guard uniform, the false mustache and sideburns and bulbous putty nose he had been wearing. Brodie and Loxner, out of the car now, were also shedding their uniforms and disguises-Loxner one-handed, his left arm hanging useless at his side and ribboned with blood. His eyes still had a glazed look, etched with pain, and they wouldn’t meet either Kubion’s or Brodie’s; but he’d kept his mouth shut, and he was functioning all right.
Their regular clothing was in a locked storage box at the upper end of the garage, along with the suitcases in which they had planned to carry the money. Kubion unlocked the box and took out one of the cases. Into it they put the disguises, because they didn’t want the cops discovering they had worn them, and the. 38 automatic Kubion had had tucked into his belt under the uniform jacket; the uniforms, which were untraceable, were allowed to remain discarded on the oil-splattered floor.
Brodie and Kubion got immediately into slacks, shirts, winter coats; then they transferred the New Police Colts into their coat pockets. Loxner took off his undershirt and tore it into strips with his teeth and his right hand and bound the wound in his arm. He had difficulty getting into his own clothing, but neither Kubion nor Brodie went to help him. With Kubion carrying the suitcase, the two of them moved past the dummy car-it, too, was untraceable, and they had worn gloves from the moment it was delivered to make sure it stayed clean of prints-and crossed to the double doors.
Loxner joined them, struggling into his coat, as Brodie took the bar away and cracked one of the halves. The area was still deserted. Hands resting on their pocketed guns, Kubion and Brodie led the way out and over to where they could look both ways along the alley. Clear. In the distance there was the fluctuating wail of sirens, but the sounds were muted, growing fainter, moving elsewhere.
