The armoured car was red, and so short it looked stubby. It jounced into the diner lot at seventeen minutes to eleven, and stopped where Skimm had said it would. A Pontiac convertible was already there, in the spot between the armoured car and the road.
Parker lit a fresh cigarette and watched. The driver got out, on the near side, and carefully closed the door behind him. He walked back the length of the truck and unlocked the rear door. The guard climbed out and waited while the driver locked the rear door again. Then the two of them walked into the diner.
Two minutes gone; fifteen minutes to eleven exactly.
They came back out at three minutes to eleven, and they both went to the rear of the truck. The driver unlocked the door, the guard climbed back in, the driver shut and locked the door again. Then he went to the cab. The other guard opened the door for him from the inside, stepped down to the gravel, and the driver climbed up behind the wheel. The guard pushed the door closed and went into the diner.
He didn’t take so long, probably because he didn’t have anybody to talk to. At eight minutes after eleven, he came back out and went around to the far side of the armoured car. The driver reached over and opened the door for him. He climbed in and the driver backed out of the space and bumped across the gravel to the concrete and headed south again on 9.
Parker got rolling right after him, coming out of the furniture store lot and heading north a quarter mile to the next place where he could make a U-turn. He hit sixty-five for a couple of minutes, coming back southward, and when he saw the red of the armoured car far ahead of him he slowed down to fifty, matching the armoured car’s speed.
The road was four lanes wide for a while, and then it narrowed down to two. There was very little traffic, only one Chevvy station wagon between Parker and the armoured car. The wagon turned off on 520, and Parker hung back farther. He was watching the sides of the road and the road itself, but he didn’t see anything that looked good. No blind turns, no hills, no valleys. The road was flat and straight, the curves wide and looping.
Parker quit before they reached Freehold, and turned the Ford around. He drove north a couple of miles and pulled on to the shoulder of the road. He shut the engine and got out of the car and opened the hood. Then he went back and sat behind the wheel again and lit a cigarette. He made himself comfortable in the seat and watched the rear-view mirror.
A little after noon, a state patrol car pulled on to the shoulder just ahead of him, and a trooper got out looking like a modernized cowboy, only better fed. Parker rolled the window down and the trooper looked at him through his sunglasses and said, “Any trouble here?”
“She heated up,” Parker answered. “My brother took a walk up to the Esso station for some water.”
The trooper nodded. “That’s all right, then.”
“Thanks for stopping,” Parker said.
The trooper hesitated, and then took one glove off. “May I see your licence and registration, please?”
“I don’t drive,” Parker told him. “My brother drives. I’m just sitting over here till he comes back.”
This was beginning to irritate him, but he didn’t show it. The hood being up was supposed to answer all the questions, was supposed to keep cops from stopping to ask what he was parked on the shoulder for. But it was a dull day and a quiet road and not much traffic, so they’d stopped anyway — for the hell of it, to break the monotony.
“What about the registration?” the trooper asked.
“He’s got that, too,” Parker answered. “He keeps them both in his wallet.”
“It’s supposed to be in the car.” The trooper wasn’t suspicious or angry, just breaking the monotony. “He should have left it with you.”
“I guess he didn’t think,” Parker said. He hoped the armoured car wouldn’t go by now, while he was bottled up with this idiot cop. “He was sore about the heating up and everything.”
The trooper hesitated again, glancing through his sunglasses at the back seat. “How come he went for the water, instead of you? Seeing you don’t drive.”
Parker said, “I’ve got a game leg. That’s why I can’t get a driver’s licence.”
The trooper was suddenly embarrassed. He pulled his glove back on and said, “You tell your brother about the registration.”
“I will,” Parker promised.
The trooper walked back to his own car, still looking like an overfed cowboy. He even had a rolling, slightly bow-legged walk. His black boots glistened in the sun. He got into the car and after a minute it pulled away and dwindled out of sight on the concrete road.
Parker watched it till it disappeared, and then lit a new cigarette and frowned at the rear-view mirror.
That shouldn’t have happened. To have a cop working the area of a job notice you, that was bad. The hood being up should have taken care of things; if the damn cop hadn’t been bored, it would have. From now on, he’d have to watch two things at once, the job and that state trooper car. It wouldn’t do for that trooper to see him driving.
He touched his fingers to his face, over his upper lip. His beard had been coming in spotty since the plastic surgery — the doctor had said that would straighten out after a while — but the hair on the upper lip grew the same as always. It might not be a bad idea to grow a moustache. If the same cop stopped him again, he could be his own brother. Amazing family resemblance. Parker grinned sourly at the thought, still watching the rear-view mirror.
He saw the red in the mirror at twenty after one, coming like a bat out of hell. He got out of the Ford and closed the hood and was getting back behind the wheel when the armoured car went by. He started the engine and took off after it. The armoured car was staying between fifty-five and sixty now; these guys were probably quitting work as soon as they reported in. Watching for the trooper’s car, Parker stayed with the red tin box, without getting too close.
They went by the Shore Points Diner and over the Raritan River and straight on up 9 — four lanes all the way now — to Elizabeth. When the armoured car turned off, in town, Parker kept going straight, on up to Newark. He’d seen all he wanted to see. The diner was where it would have to be done. There wasn’t any place at all along the road where they could flag it for the toby, so that meant they’d have to use Alma.
Parker didn’t like it. First Alma, and then the bored cop. It was beginning to smell sour. There were too many things to watch, all at once. But he needed the stake, so he’d go to the Green Rose tonight, but if the job got any more sour anywhere along the line he’d drop it. He was figuring on splitting half, plus the bankroller’s cut, and that made it a boodle worth going after.
In Newark, he parked on a side street. He had time to kill, so he went to a movie. It was the fourth double feature he’d seen since Saturday.
Chapter 6
THE GREEN ROSE was oblong, and very dim. A trough high around the wall contained indirect lighting, alternate red and green lengths of fluorescent tubes. Some of the mechanical beer and whisky display ads on the bar back were lighted, and there was a light over the cash register, but the rest of the place was like a tomb.
Coming in the door, the dark mahogany bar was to the left, extending back to the wall projection for the rest rooms. Booths with dark red leather seats and black formica on the tables were on the right. Parker walked down the line between the bar and the booths to the back, where there was a bigger booth across from the rest rooms. They were there, all three of them.
Skimm and Alma sat facing the front of the bar, with Alma on the outside, so she’d been to the head already. They both had beer in front of them, a glass and a thin bottle and a glass and a thin bottle, and Alma’s glass and bottle were almost empty. Handy McKay was sitting on the other side, half-turned, with his back against the wall.