Pete were outside looking for me.
“Look under the fucking trucks,” Bruner shouted. I could hear the two of them working their way slowly through the warehouse in my direction. Bruner was being careful. More careful than he'd advised the expendable strong-arms to be.
He and Mrs. Brussels met up directly below me, between the truck and the airplane door. “That's the window,” Mrs. Brussels said, looking up. The shoe had taken out almost all of the glass. “He’s gone.”
“Not if Jackie and Pete get him,” Bruner said. “Marty?” he yelled. “Got the kids?”
“All except the one upstairs,” Marty shouted back.
Upstairs had to be the foreman's office.
I debated dropping down on Bruner and Mrs. Brussels and smashing their heads together before either of them could shoot me. It didn't seem promising. Besides, Marty had the kids.
The two of them moved back toward the other end of the warehouse. Bruner put a reassuring arm around her waist. They were talking in low voices.
”. . have to move them after all,” I heard Bruner saying.
“You're so fucking smart,” Mrs. Brussels said bitterly, knocking away the reassuring arm. ” ‘We'll get him,’ you said. ‘No problem,’ you said. Now, look: he's gone and we haven't even been to the bank.” She reached up and tucked in a flyaway wisp of hair.
“There are still Pete and Jackie,” Bruner said. “And there's cash upstairs.”
Since they were both walking and talking, I guessed they wouldn't be listening too. Without any idea why I was doing what I was doing, I climbed down from the truck and stood on the running board. The springs of the truck groaned. I was still reluctant to put my feet on the floor, where someone might see them beneath the trucks.
As the babble of voices receded, I found myself looking into the cab of the truck. It was about what you'd expect: two cracked and worn leather seats, an oversize steering wheel, and a stick shift half the size of the pole used for an Olympic pole vault with a big transparent plastic knob on top. Something bright caught my eye. Lodged between the seats was a yellow plastic bucket with the word butts stenciled on it.
Whoever usually drove the truck wasn't a smoker, but he caught a lot of colds. The bucket was full of used tissues. I reached in, picked it up, and upended it, scattering wadded Kleenex across the driver's seat. What I had was too crude to be called an idea. All I knew was that they were going to move the children, and I couldn't let it happen.
In my urgency, I knocked the bottom of the bucket against the steering wheel with a hollow-sounding
“Fucking hell,” Bruner fumed. “What are you fruitcakes good for, anyway?”
“He had a head start,” either Pete or Jackie said plaintively.
“He had a head is what he had,” Bruner said. “You assholes haven't had a new idea since you learned to jerk off.”
“The children,” Mrs. Brussels said. For an insane moment I thought she was reprimanding him for swearing in front of them, but then she added, “We've got to get them out of here.”
“Keep your pants on,” Bruner snapped. “We'll be gone in ten minutes.”
Ten minutes. Clutching my newly empty bucket, I stepped lightly onto the floor and slid on my back underneath the truck. The concrete floor was cold.
“Marty,” Bruner said, “get your ass outside and circle the block. Maybe these cretins missed him.” The cretins murmured dissent in injured tones. “Look for a low-rider's Chevy,” Bruner continued. “If you see it, slash the tires.”
“I haven't got a knife,” Marty said as I stared up at the underside of the truck. It hadn't been maintained, and rust was rampant. Also, there was blood in my eyes from the cuts on my forehead. I wiped it away with my sleeve.
“Take Marco's,” Bruner said acidly. “I don't think he'll need it.”
“You should kill him,” Mrs. Brussels said. “Poor baby.”
Somebody, and it had to be Marco, let out a gabble of pain and protest. It was cut short by the spanging sound of Bruner's gun, echoing between the warehouse's bare walls. End of Marco. “Now,” Bruner said, “now will you get the fucking knife and get out of here?”
The door closed behind Marty. I stared up at an expanse of rust.
“Children,” Mrs. Brussels said. She clapped her hands. “We're not going to hurt Marie if you behave. You all like Marie, don't you?” There was something that might have been assent. “For right now, you stay close to Pete and Jackie. They're going to take care of you. Marie, you're group captain. I've saved your life, and I'm depending on you to make sure that everybody's good.”
I'd worked my belt partway off, arching my back so I could tug it through the loops in my pants. The tongue of the belt was sharp between my fingers, but not sharp enough.
“We're all going for a nice drive,” Mrs. Brussels continued in the same implacably insane voice. “If we're all good, no one will get cut. If we're not good, Marie will get cut first, and then we'll cut whoever was bad.” Now I had the belt all the way off. I sharpened the cheap metal tongue on the concrete floor.
“I'm going upstairs,” Bruner announced.
“Not by yourself, you're not,” Mrs. Brussels said curtly. “You just wait. Pete, Jackie, keep them together.” Feet shuffled as Pete and Jackie pushed the children into a tight group. At the far end of the warehouse I could see fat black shoes and small bare feet. “What do you say, Marie?” Mrs. Brussels asked, Miss Manners gone berserk.
“Thank you,” said a tiny voice.
“And what else?”
“We'll be good.”
“I only hear one voice,” Mrs. Brussels said threateningly.
“We'll be good,” the children chorused raggedly.
“Let's go, Max,” Mrs. Brussels said. A moment later I heard the two of them climbing the circular iron stairway to the foreman's office.
That left Pete and Jackie, and they had their hands full with the kids. They mumbled resentfully at each other and herded the children toward a corner, and I found what I was looking for.
It had to be right. Nothing else could be that big. Trucks the size of this one took lots and lots of whatever the hell they ran on.
After I'd rubbed the tongue of the belt against the concrete a few more times, I tested the point. It was sharp enough to puncture my left index finger, which it promptly did. I sucked on the finger, swallowed yet more blood, and shoved the new point at the end of the tongue against the bottom of the fuel tank. This was my week for petroleum products. I was sweating and bleeding at the same time, and my eyes kept clouding over.
Rust or no rust, it wasn't easy. While I was working the spike back and forth, trying to make a hole, the door swung open and closed. Marty had come back in.
“I found the car,” he announced proudly. “It was right in front.” Then he paused. “Where are they?” he asked.
“Upstairs,” either Pete or Jackie said. “Scamming the loot, probably.”
“We'll see about that,” Marty said quietly. “Anyway, I slashed his tires. He's not going noplace.”
“I thought he was already gone,” either Pete or Jackie said.
“Ummm,” said Marty, sounding less certain, and at that point I punctured the bottom of the tank, and diesel fuel poured out onto my face.
“You saw the car?” Bruner boomed at Marty from the top of the stairs.
“Right where he left it,” Marty said. “But it's totaled.”
“Then he's still around,” Bruner said. “Jackie, you dipshit, get out there and find him.” I heard Bruner's shoes click as he came down the circular stairway.
I positioned the yellow plastic bucket beneath the stream. The gasoline hitting the bottom of the bucket made a sound I hadn't anticipated, a rattling noise like someone pissing on a tin roof.
“What's that?” Mrs. Brussels asked.
