“Maybe not,” Dortmunder said.
The red Toyota, still unnoticed, was a block behind the Cadillac when it made the turn onto Oak Street and pulled up onto the gravel driveway beside the house. Stopping just shy of the chain-link fence, Kelp said, “Looks like we’re first.”
“Yeah?” Dortmunder looked interested. “What do we win?”
“Just the glory,” Kelp told him.
Ken Warren steered the red Toyota past 46 Oak Street, watching the trio from the Cadillac unload luggage from the trunk. He drove on by, made the next right, took the next left onto Myrtle Street and parked near the far corner there. Leaving the tow bar behind—it would be easier to tow the Toyota with the Cadillac than the other way around—he locked up and retraced his route on foot, shambling along round-shouldered and thrust-jawed like a bad-tempered bear.
The Cadillac had been left unlocked, and he was seated behind its wheel, door open, looking through his keys for the one to fit this ignition, when a bread company van pulled in behind him, filling the rearview mirrors and blocking his exit.
Now, Ken was the big silent type, not because he had nothing to say but because of his deep nasal twang and severe glottal stop. He preferred to be thought of as a silent tough guy rather than a geek who couldn’t talk right. But there were moments when speech was necessary, and this looked like one of them. “Hey,” Ken said, and leaned out to look back at the van’s driver, who he assumed was just making a delivery. “Moo fit!” he called.
Stan Murch, who was not exactly making a delivery, and who knew from the MD plates that (1) Andy Kelp had driven this car here, and (2) that ugly mug at the wheel wasn’t Andy Kelp, switched off the van’s engine, pulled on the emergency brake, and stepped out to the driveway, calling toward the house, “Andy! Mayday!”
Wally, climbing over the driver’s seat to get out on the same side as Stan, said, “Who is he, Stan?”
“No idea.”
“What’s going to happen?”
“No idea.”
There is one rule in Ken Warren’s profession: If you’re in the car, it’s yours. Therefore, he slammed the driver’s door of the Cadillac, hit the button that locked all four doors, and went back to his methodical run-through of his keys. Once he got this vehicle started, he’d use it to push the van out of his way.
People erupted from the house; first Andy Kelp, then Dortmunder, May, Tiny, and Tom. While May and Tom stayed on the porch, observing, Kelp and Dortmunder and Tiny went over to join Stan and Wally in looking at the beefy man inside the Cadillac.
“What’s going on?” Kelp asked.
“No idea,” Stan said.
“That man was in the car,” Wally said in great excitement, “when we got here.”
“He’s still in the car,” Kelp pointed out, and rapped on the glass in the driver’s door. “Hey! What’s the story?”
Got it! The Cadillac engine caught, and Ken looked over at the right-door mirror just in time to see a heavy-laden pickup pull into the driveway behind the van, filling the driveway and blocking the sidewalk as well. A handsome blond guy in cut-off jeans and a T-shirt that said WORK IS FOR PEOPLE WHO DON’T SURF got out and strolled curiously forward.
“What’s the story here?” Doug asked.
“No idea,” Stan said.
Hell! Could he push both the van and the pickup? Deciding he had no choice, he could but try, Ken shifted into reverse and watched a green-and-white taxi pull up to the curb, parking crossways just behind the pickup.
Murch’s Mom got out of her cab and joined the crowd beside the Cadillac, saying, “What’s happening?”
“No idea,” said her son.
Ken considered the chain-link fence. Drive through it? Unlikely; the metal pipe supports were embedded in concrete. It wouldn’t be any good to make the Cadillac inoperable.
Murch’s Mom went into the house for a potato. Kelp leaned close to the glass separating him from the stranger. “We’re gonna put a potato in the exhaust!” he yelled. “We’re gonna monoxide you!”
Ken was feeling very put-upon. And also, come to think of it, a little confused. This mob around the Cadillac just didn’t look right. Could he have made a mistake?
No. The car was right: make, model, and color. The license plate was right. There was a tambourine on the backseat.
Still, something was wrong. As the woman cabdriver came out of the house carrying a big baking potato in her hand, Ken cracked the window beside him just far enough to make conversation possible, and announced through the crack, “Ngyou’re gno gnipthy!”
Kelp reared back: “What?”
“Gnone of ngyou are gnipthyth!”
“He’s a foreigner,” Stan decided. “He doesn’t talk English.”
Ken glared at him. “Ngyou makin funna me?”
“What is that he talks?” Murch’s Mom asked, holding the potato. “Polish?”
“Could be Lithuanian,” Tiny said doubtfully.
Dortmunder turned to stare at him. “Lithuanian!”
“I had a Lithuanian cellmate once,” Tiny explained. “He talked like—”
Ken had had enough. Pounding the steering wheel, “Ah’m sthpeakin Englisth!” he cried, through the open slit in the window.
Which did no good. Dortmunder said to Tiny, “Tell him it’s our car, then. Talk to him in Lithuanian.”
Tiny said, “I don’t speak Lith—”
“Ikn’s gnot your car!” Ken yelled. “Ikth’s the bankth’s car!”
“Wait a minute, wait a minute,” Kelp said. “I understood that.”
Dortmunder turned his frown toward Kelp: “You did?”
“He said, ‘It’s the bank’s car.’ ”
“He did?”
“Fuckin right!” Ken yelled.
Murch’s Mom pointed the potato at him. “That was English,” she said.
“He’s a repo,” Stan said.
“Ah’m a hawk!” Ken boasted.
“Yeah, a car hawk,” Stan said.
Wally said, “Stan? What’s going on?”
Stan explained, “He’s a guy repossesses your car if you don’t keep up the payments.” Turning to Kelp, he said, “Andy, you stole a stolen car. This guy wants it for the bank.”
Ken nodded fiercely enough to whack his forehead against the window. “Yeah! The bank!”
“Oh!” Kelp spread his hands, grinning at the repo man. “Why didn’t you say so?”
Ken peered mistrustfully at him.
“No, really, fella,” Kelp said, leaning close to the window, “no problem. Take it. We’re done with it anyway.”
Handing Doug the potato, Murch’s Mom said, “I’ll move my cab.”
Handing Stan the potato, Doug said, “I’ll move my pickup.”
Handing Wally the potato, Stan said, “I’ll move the van.”
Wally pocketed the potato and smiled at the man in the Cadillac. He’d never seen a repo man before.
Ken, with deep suspicion, watched all the other vehicles get moved out of his way. Everybody smiled and nodded at him. The other woman and the mean-looking old guy came down off the porch to hang out with everybody else. The woman seemed okay, but the old guy suddenly said, “Kill him.” His voice was thin and reedy, and his lips barely moved, but everybody heard him, all right. Including Ken.
The others all turned toward the old guy, and several of them said, “Huh?”
“Drag him out through the crack in the window,” the old guy suggested. “Bury him in the back yard in a manila envelope. He knows about us.”
Everybody blinked at that, but then Dortmunder said, “He knows what about us?”