63

AT LEAST WHEN HE chauffeured Mrs. Hall, Stan got to drive a good car, a black Daimler like a sofa converted to a tank. Also, while she was in the hospital and while she was at her lawyer’s office, instead of trailing after her as with Mrs. Parsons, he got to stay at the wheel and read his newspaper, his wrong-size hat on the seat beside him. And driving between the hospital and the lawyer’s office, he got to hear at least parts of her several telephone conversations, which didn’t sound at all good.

She told more than one person that “poor Monroe” had lost his memory forever, and it wasn’t ever coming back, and that meant there was permanently no way to get at “you know,” which he guessed would be money in banks where she didn’t know the secret word. She also talked about “liquidating” this and that, which from a mob guy would have meant somebody was gonna die but which from a respectable married lady meant something along the lines of a visit to the hock-shop. She also told a few people she’d be “coming home,” which after a while he realized didn’t mean the compound but somewhere else.

But the main thing she kept saying, in conversation after conversation, was that she wanted this or that “taken care of today. I mean today. I know it’s Saturday, but I don’t want to have to still be in that compound tomorrow. Or any other day. So I want it taken care of today.”

She said that several times, and though she never raised her voice or sounded angry, Stan somehow had the feeling she was going to get her way. Whatever it was she wanted done today, it would get itself done today.

What it added up to, when he put it all together, there was no Monroe Hall any more. Everything that had been fixed tight around him, his wife, his compound, his employees, the people there to steal his cars, everything was now untied, off and away, as though Hall’s gravity had been turned off.

So far as Stan could see, this was bad news for the heist. He supposed they could still do it, still collect the cars, deal with the insurance company, but somehow it felt different now. How would the other guys feel about it? How would Chester feel about it? It was Chester’s need for revenge against Hall that had got them into this thing in the first place.

On the other hand, did they want to go through all this for nothing?

It was just after twelve-thirty when they got back to the compound, sailing past the guardshack where the brown-uniformed plug-ugly on duty saluted, not very well, when he saw Mrs. Hall in the backseat. Stan drove her up to the house, got out, opened her door, and when she climbed out she looked very sad, “I believe this is good-bye, Warren,” she said.

On a sudden impulse, he said, “My friend’s call me Stan.”

She liked that. Smiling, she said, “Then I hope we’ve become friends, in this very short time.” She stuck her hand out. “Good-bye, Stan.”

She had a strong handclasp, but he treated it gently anyway. “Good-bye, Mrs. Hall,” he said, and walked down the road, heading for the green house and lunch, when ahead of him, out of the side road, came a flatbed truck with a yellow convertible Triumph Stag on it, its black hardtop in place. Stan had studied the list of Hall’s cars, and remembered that one; it was from 1976.

But where was it going? Toward the gate. As he walked on, Stan watched the truck go through the gate, out to the county road, and turn left.

Stan turned left, too, onto the side road toward the green house, and here came another flatbed, this one bearing a 1958 Studebaker Golden Hawk, creamy white with black trim on its roof, hood, and tail fins. The truck driver, a skinny guy in a straw cowboy hat, gave Stan a casual wave on the way by. Automatically, but not really meaning it, Stan waved back.

What was going on here? Where were they taking those cars? Come on here, Stan thought, those are our cars.

He walked faster, hoping Kelp or Tiny would be at the house to tell him what was going on. Or maybe Dortmunder would be back by now. Ahead of him he saw the house, and then saw, on its tiny porch, Kelp and Tiny standing against the rail, like people watching a parade.

Well, they were watching a parade. Another flatbed truck, this one bearing a 1967 Lamborghini Miura, all gleaming white, a flat-nosed front like a predator fish, was next in line. This truck, like the ones before it, had Pennsylvania license plates, so they’d been hired locally. But where were they going?

Stan was practically running by the time he reached the house. The bitter expressions on Kelp’s and Tiny’s faces were not encouraging. As a black Lincoln Continental Club Coupe from 1940 sailed by, the vehicle Frank Lloyd Wright once described as “the most beautiful car in the world,” and that the Museum of Modern Art chose as one of the top eight automobile designs in history, Stan said, “What’s going on?”

“Our heist,” Kelp said, “Out the window.”

“Off the property,” Tiny said. He looked as if he wanted to eat that Lincoln, flatbed truck and all.

Stan said, “But where to?”

“Florida,” Kelp said. “A car museum in Florida.”

Tiny growled, and the red 1955 Morgan Plus 4 was trucked by. Stan said, “All of them?”

“Every last one,” Kelp said. “Except the Pierce-Arrow. The missus is taking that with her to Maryland.”

“They’re closin shop,” Tiny said.

Stan found it hard to look at the cars going past, but then it was even harder not to look. Frowning at the house instead, he said, “John not back?”

“Nobody knows where he is,” Kelp said.

“Dortmunder always shows up,” Tiny said. Clearly, he didn’t want anything to deflect from his irritation.

“Well, wherever he is, he’s better off than here,” Stan said. 1950 Healey Silverstone, white, the car Mrs. Hall most often drove, was next. Stan shook his head. “John wouldn’t like to see this,” he said.

64

ONE GOOD THING ABOUT Hal Mellon: his cell phone didn’t ring. When Chester drove him on his rounds, Mellon kept his cell phone in his shirt pocket, over his heart, set to vibrate rather than ring when he got a call. “Getting me ready for the pacemaker,” he said, which might have been another joke. But there was a different joke coming at Chester this sunny Saturday afternoon in June, though he didn’t know it yet. He knew Monroe Hall had been kidnapped from his compound yesterday, because the world knew Monroe Hall had been kidnapped from his compound yesterday. He also knew they had grabbed the butler as well, but wouldn’t that be Dortmunder? He hoped Dortmunder would get himself away from those people, whoever they were, and he sure hoped the police presence at Hall’s compound wouldn’t screw up the grand theft auto planned for tonight. He didn’t want to be stuck in this car with Hal Mellon forever, Tuesdays through Saturdays, because, in Hal’s world, the managers he needed to schmooze with were likelier to be in the office on Saturday than Monday.

“Young couple walking in a graveyard,” Mellon said. “Oops, hold on.” And he dove into his shirt pocket for his phone.

Another couple, Chester thought, in another graveyard. Why don’t they spend their time at horror movies, like all the other young couples in the world?

Mellon murmured briefly into his phone, then broke the connection, pocketed the phone, and said, “Canceled the appointment, the son of a bitch. Who cares if he’s got pneumonia? I’ve got product to move. Ah, well.”

Mellon looked at the dashboard clock, so Chester did, too: 3:24.

Mellon sighed. “Let’s call it a day,” he said. “That was my last real appointment anyway, I was just gonna do drop-ins after that.”

“Sure thing,” Chester said, and U-turned in front of two trucks, an ambulance, and a cement mixer.