vapros
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Chapter 20
Chapter 20
Piper wasn't expecting the call until Wednesday, but it came on Tuesday afternoon, taking him by surprise. He had to go and turn down the volume on the television so he could talk to Villarubbia.
"Glad to find you in, man. I know I'm a day early, but things are not on schedule. Can you talk?"
"Yeah, I can talk, but I'd rather listen, John. What's happened to the schedule?"
"I'm on the run, man. One of you guys must have given it away. When I got to my hiding place for the money, they had a man waiting for me with a gun. You understand me? Thirty minutes after getting the money, I go to hide it, and this guy's already there and waiting for me. They knew, and I damn' sure didn't tell. I was lucky as hell to get away in one piece."
"Go ahead and tell me. You lost the money, and we're out of luck, and you're sorry, right? Do you know what that ****ing Lindsay kept saying to me, all the way back to town? He kept saying we'd never see you again, and we were a couple of assholes to leave Binghamton without our money, and he's called me about four times in the last two days, to say it again. We never gave anything away. I guess we really are a couple of assholes, to get mixed up in this. They must have known it was you, right from the beginning. This thing was born dead - it never had a chance."
"Cool down, Piper, 'cause you're all wrong. I've got the money, and you'll get yours, but the arrangements are going to change. I'm not going to New York, tomorrow, or next week or ever. I'm busted in that whole part of the country, man. When I got away in Binghamton, I was going to my uncle's in Elmira to spend the night, and there was a whole truckload of 'em there, and they started a shooting match, and blew the glasses out of my car and almost got me. They were parked in front of my uncle's, you hear me? They knew I was coming, but I don't know how they knew. Something went wrong. I guess it's too late to worry about it now."
"So where the hell are you?"
"I'm across the border in Canada," lied Villarubbia. "I don't know where I'll wind up, but I'm still traveling, and not ready to stop yet, either. I can't ever go home again, Piper. It's Canada from now on."
"Well, tell me where you are and sit tight. We'll catch a plane or a train, and come to you. You know we don't either of us have a car, but we'll get there, John. This whole thing is for shit, but we'll do what we have to."
"You can forget that. I'm not sitting tight until I get farther away than this. Those guys are in a network of people in the dope business, and I can't even guess how many people are watching for me, or how big an area is hot.
I'll leave your money in a safe place, and call you again, and you guys will have to come and pick it up. That's the best I can do, Piper. You keep that goddam Lindsay cool until I get this all figured out. If he does anything foolish, I'll have somebody kill him, I promise you. Not only that - before it's all over, these people will be asking around in the City, wanting to know who I knew there and who I might have lined up to help on this job. So the two of you are going to be hot, too. When you get your money, you both better go someplace besides New York, or you might not get to spend it."
"This is really going to make Lindsay's day, you know what I mean? He's about got himself convinced that you're going to screw us out of our money, and now I'm supposed to tell him to be patient, because his money's in Canada, but he'll get it someday if you can figure out a way. Don't be later than tomorrow, John, making your arrangements and calling me back. Me and him will be figuring out how to get there, and we won't be long."
"That's fine. I can get it done tomorrow, and get back on the road. You be at home in the evening, about eleven. That's when I'll call. And you can tell Lindsay what I said. I didn't have to stop and call at all, you know, but I did."
"We'll be waiting." The phone conversation was a relief to both parties. John had taken the first step toward solving a problem that was weighing heavily on his mind, and Piper had been contacted about his money by a man he had not been certain he would ever hear from again. After hanging up the receiver, he sat for half an hour, smoking and mulling over this development. Of the three men involved, none was really aware of a brutal fact that had been part of the scheme from the first day. There had never been any possibility of an equal three-way split of the ransom money. One of the things that might have happened was that Villarubbia would take off with the whole amount, and Piper and Lindsay had known that all along, but it was, after all, his plan, and their option in the beginning was to be in or be out, so they decided it was a good risk to take. The holding of his family as a sort of security had helped them make up their minds on that score.
Another eventuality was that John could have driven to New York, as was intended, and the three-man meet might have turned into a winner-take-all shooting match, especially if he had attended with the bag of ransom money unopened to show his good faith. Or, if John had called New York and spoken to Piper about arrangements for the meet, Piper might have either killed Lindsay or just neglected to contact him, and dealt with Villarubbia one on one, hoping to get out with the whole take. Of all the possible results, thirty-three percent for each of them was nothing more than a concept, but if any man had consciously recognized the fact, it had been Piper. He had been a thief longer than the others.
John Villarubbia had already taken more money from the bag, and had bought a slick year-old Buick for the pickup truck and nine thousand dollars, and he immediately felt a bit more at ease. He was now twice removed from the Cadillac, even if somebody had already found it and reported it, which didn't seem likely. After talking with Piper, he checked out of the little motel and headed south. He had told both his family and Piper that he would be in Canada, so he figured it was time to head for Mexico. He drove as far as Wheeling, West Virginia, and checked into another little motel, using another phony name.
He unpacked the ransom money and counted it again, and sorted it out into two portions. He put half a million dollars back into the plastic hanging bag, but when he picked it up, it all fell to the bottom in a wad, and it had to be done over. This time the packets of bills were put in a thick layer that extended over the length of the bag, much as clothes would fill it. Then it was folded in the middle and fastened with the rope and tape, and ended up in the form of a large suitcase. This was for Piper and Lindsay. The rest, just under three hundred thousand, he awarded to himself - because he figured he could get away with it. Like Romeo and Sonny and the rest of the Lepperts, he didn't intend to ever see either of them again. Mexico was a big place, especially after telling everybody Canada. He resisted the urge to break into the packet of cocaine. If the other two asked about it, he would say it had been talcum powder or something, and that they had been cheated on that part. If they wanted to make a complaint to the Leppert family, go to it. The coke would be sold, or maybe even taken to Mexico with him. He doubted the border guards were on the lookout for people smuggling dope out of the U.S. His share of the ransom, along with the cocaine, went into the second canvas bag he had bought on Monday. Tomorrow he would find a hiding place.
Wednesday was a day of frustration, as he put a hundred miles on the Buick, cruising Wheeling and the immediate area, looking for a safe place to stash half a million dollars in cash. It was a much tougher proposition than he had expected. Bus station lockers were ruled out as being too public. There were a couple of neighborhoods with abandoned buildings, but when he went to check one out he surprised half a dozen teenagers smoking pot, and had a hairy ten minutes talking them out of kicking his ass for him and taking his Buick. His irritation increased as the day wore on. He wanted to get on the road. Just before dark, in an industrial development near the Ohio River, he found the perfect spot. A small brick building was under construction, and there was no watchman in sight. He forced an outside door and went in, leaving the money in the trunk of the car a block away. In the rear of the building, on the second floor, the drywall work was about a third completed, and there were several walls in progress.
This was right up his alley. In Binghamton, every male Villarubbia could hang drywall by the age of thirteen. Even John could hang Sheetrock. One room in the building was padlocked, and he broke in with a crowbar, wrenching the screws out of the wood. Everything he needed was there, including half a bucket of mud. He hurried back to the car and retrieved the money and carried it into the building. The packet was a snug fit between two studs in a wall, and he covered it with a four by eight drywall panel and risked the noise of nailing it in place. Nobody appeared, and after having a good look around, he went back in and taped it and finished it with the mud and a wet rag, and the cache was invisible. His work was as good as the rest. The wall now had one more panel in place than it should have, but who would remember? And the mud would be dry in an hour. He put his tools and supplies away, and stole a Skill saw and a cordless drill to make it look like a burglary, and then left them hidden in brush when he went back to his car.
It was full dark, and his problem was solved, and he felt as good as a man can feel after abandoning more money than he had ever seen in his life. He checked out of his motel and turned the Buick west, taking Interstate 70 toward Cambridge, where he could go south on 77. At the appointed time he would stop and get some change and call Piper. He drove steadily, clearing Ohio before ten o'clock and going back into West Virginia at Parkersburg. Looking at his road map, he calculated that he could push on to Charleston and do his telephoning from there, and his last tie to the kidnapping would be snipped. He had already prepared Piper for what he had to tell him, so that wouldn't be so bad. He might carry on and bitch a little, but so what?
Lindsay was quite another matter, and he tried to imagine the scene when Piper broke the news to him, and a sudden revelation hit Villarubbia like a load of buckshot. He nearly slammed on the brakes right there on the interstate. How could he have been so stupid? Shit! Piper wasn't going to break any news to Lindsay! Piper was going to hit the road to Wheeling by the fastest means, snatch the half million and keep going, and Villarubbia was liable to run into him one day, down in Mexico. Piper didn't give a damn whether or not Lindsay went back to Binghamton and started setting fires. And it would only be one day - two at the most - before Lindsay figured it out. No word from John and Piper gone from New York. He would go berserk, for sure. Could he call them both? Bad idea; suppose he reached one and not the other? Lindsay had no home phone, anyway. This was a bonehead plan he had come up with. What the hell ever made him think he could make this work? Now he had to go all the way back to Wheeling and get the money out of that wall before morning and make another plan.
Or maybe he didn't, if he could figure a way to tie the two of them together. He began to make a plan that didn't include going back to Wheeling, and what he came up with was the very arrangement that kept the cache untouched for all these years. Initially, Villarubbia thought it was clever and foolproof. In fact, it was idiotic. The directions to the hiding place were already fixed in his mind - he had been about to call New York and explain the process to Piper. Instead of that he would cut the directions in half, and give each man half the solution, by mail. This would ensure that neither of them could rob the other, wouldn't it? He continued on to Charleston and bought a writing pad and envelopes and stamps in a supermarket, and got directions for finding the post office. Addresses were in a notebook he had recovered before abandoning the Cadillac.
Villarubbia stood at a table in the lobby of the post office and composed a short letter to Lindsay, telling him to make a trip to Wheeling, West Virginia, with Piper, and to go to the First Presbyterian Church, even giving the
street address. He assured him that Piper would know what to do from there, sincerely, JV. A similar communication was prepared for Piper, advising him to accompany Lindsay to a spot that only Lindsay knew, and telling him how to find a certain little brick office building from there, and then what to do when they got inside. No sweat, the building would not be finished for some time, just do it at night, best regards, JV. He sealed the envelopes and added the stamps, but hesitated before dropping them in the slot. What was he forgetting this time? He went outside and sat on the steps of the building, smoking and thinking. The second time a patrol car went by slowly, with two policemen inside looking at him through the window, he got up and mailed the letters, and returned to his car, trying to recall how to find 1-77 from downtown.
He became aware that the new plan was not a very good one, but had no idea just how bad it would prove to be. And it got him off the hook, which was the whole reason for it in the first place. He had left their money, and told them how to get it. What more could they want from him? His plan to drive to Mexico lasted only two more days. In Bossier City, Louisiana, he picked up an opportunistic blonde in a joint near Barksdale AFB and between a bottle of liquor and his supply of nose candy he fell into such a stupor that he began boasting foolishly and in great detail about his recent exploits, including the fact that there was nearly three hundred grand in his hotel room. It took Villarubbia less than fifteen minutes to live the rest of his life, and the blonde left town with his Buick and his cash and his cocaine and his secrets, none of which he needed any longer.
Likewise, his intention to avoid Binghamton forever quickly went by the boards. Eight days after the snatching of Sonny Boy Leppert, John Villarubbia was buried in the family plot there. On the way, the funeral procession passed within a block of the vacant lot that still bore the marks of John's now-defunct Cadillac, and Romeo's car, and a tow truck. There were four Lepperts in attendance at the service, but it was a wasted trip. They didn't find out anything about where their money had gone. Several of the Villarubbias remarked later on the unexpected appearance of a clan they hardly knew at all, and how sincerely mournful they all looked.
Chapter 20
Piper wasn't expecting the call until Wednesday, but it came on Tuesday afternoon, taking him by surprise. He had to go and turn down the volume on the television so he could talk to Villarubbia.
"Glad to find you in, man. I know I'm a day early, but things are not on schedule. Can you talk?"
"Yeah, I can talk, but I'd rather listen, John. What's happened to the schedule?"
"I'm on the run, man. One of you guys must have given it away. When I got to my hiding place for the money, they had a man waiting for me with a gun. You understand me? Thirty minutes after getting the money, I go to hide it, and this guy's already there and waiting for me. They knew, and I damn' sure didn't tell. I was lucky as hell to get away in one piece."
"Go ahead and tell me. You lost the money, and we're out of luck, and you're sorry, right? Do you know what that ****ing Lindsay kept saying to me, all the way back to town? He kept saying we'd never see you again, and we were a couple of assholes to leave Binghamton without our money, and he's called me about four times in the last two days, to say it again. We never gave anything away. I guess we really are a couple of assholes, to get mixed up in this. They must have known it was you, right from the beginning. This thing was born dead - it never had a chance."
"Cool down, Piper, 'cause you're all wrong. I've got the money, and you'll get yours, but the arrangements are going to change. I'm not going to New York, tomorrow, or next week or ever. I'm busted in that whole part of the country, man. When I got away in Binghamton, I was going to my uncle's in Elmira to spend the night, and there was a whole truckload of 'em there, and they started a shooting match, and blew the glasses out of my car and almost got me. They were parked in front of my uncle's, you hear me? They knew I was coming, but I don't know how they knew. Something went wrong. I guess it's too late to worry about it now."
"So where the hell are you?"
"I'm across the border in Canada," lied Villarubbia. "I don't know where I'll wind up, but I'm still traveling, and not ready to stop yet, either. I can't ever go home again, Piper. It's Canada from now on."
"Well, tell me where you are and sit tight. We'll catch a plane or a train, and come to you. You know we don't either of us have a car, but we'll get there, John. This whole thing is for shit, but we'll do what we have to."
"You can forget that. I'm not sitting tight until I get farther away than this. Those guys are in a network of people in the dope business, and I can't even guess how many people are watching for me, or how big an area is hot.
I'll leave your money in a safe place, and call you again, and you guys will have to come and pick it up. That's the best I can do, Piper. You keep that goddam Lindsay cool until I get this all figured out. If he does anything foolish, I'll have somebody kill him, I promise you. Not only that - before it's all over, these people will be asking around in the City, wanting to know who I knew there and who I might have lined up to help on this job. So the two of you are going to be hot, too. When you get your money, you both better go someplace besides New York, or you might not get to spend it."
"This is really going to make Lindsay's day, you know what I mean? He's about got himself convinced that you're going to screw us out of our money, and now I'm supposed to tell him to be patient, because his money's in Canada, but he'll get it someday if you can figure out a way. Don't be later than tomorrow, John, making your arrangements and calling me back. Me and him will be figuring out how to get there, and we won't be long."
"That's fine. I can get it done tomorrow, and get back on the road. You be at home in the evening, about eleven. That's when I'll call. And you can tell Lindsay what I said. I didn't have to stop and call at all, you know, but I did."
"We'll be waiting." The phone conversation was a relief to both parties. John had taken the first step toward solving a problem that was weighing heavily on his mind, and Piper had been contacted about his money by a man he had not been certain he would ever hear from again. After hanging up the receiver, he sat for half an hour, smoking and mulling over this development. Of the three men involved, none was really aware of a brutal fact that had been part of the scheme from the first day. There had never been any possibility of an equal three-way split of the ransom money. One of the things that might have happened was that Villarubbia would take off with the whole amount, and Piper and Lindsay had known that all along, but it was, after all, his plan, and their option in the beginning was to be in or be out, so they decided it was a good risk to take. The holding of his family as a sort of security had helped them make up their minds on that score.
Another eventuality was that John could have driven to New York, as was intended, and the three-man meet might have turned into a winner-take-all shooting match, especially if he had attended with the bag of ransom money unopened to show his good faith. Or, if John had called New York and spoken to Piper about arrangements for the meet, Piper might have either killed Lindsay or just neglected to contact him, and dealt with Villarubbia one on one, hoping to get out with the whole take. Of all the possible results, thirty-three percent for each of them was nothing more than a concept, but if any man had consciously recognized the fact, it had been Piper. He had been a thief longer than the others.
John Villarubbia had already taken more money from the bag, and had bought a slick year-old Buick for the pickup truck and nine thousand dollars, and he immediately felt a bit more at ease. He was now twice removed from the Cadillac, even if somebody had already found it and reported it, which didn't seem likely. After talking with Piper, he checked out of the little motel and headed south. He had told both his family and Piper that he would be in Canada, so he figured it was time to head for Mexico. He drove as far as Wheeling, West Virginia, and checked into another little motel, using another phony name.
He unpacked the ransom money and counted it again, and sorted it out into two portions. He put half a million dollars back into the plastic hanging bag, but when he picked it up, it all fell to the bottom in a wad, and it had to be done over. This time the packets of bills were put in a thick layer that extended over the length of the bag, much as clothes would fill it. Then it was folded in the middle and fastened with the rope and tape, and ended up in the form of a large suitcase. This was for Piper and Lindsay. The rest, just under three hundred thousand, he awarded to himself - because he figured he could get away with it. Like Romeo and Sonny and the rest of the Lepperts, he didn't intend to ever see either of them again. Mexico was a big place, especially after telling everybody Canada. He resisted the urge to break into the packet of cocaine. If the other two asked about it, he would say it had been talcum powder or something, and that they had been cheated on that part. If they wanted to make a complaint to the Leppert family, go to it. The coke would be sold, or maybe even taken to Mexico with him. He doubted the border guards were on the lookout for people smuggling dope out of the U.S. His share of the ransom, along with the cocaine, went into the second canvas bag he had bought on Monday. Tomorrow he would find a hiding place.
Wednesday was a day of frustration, as he put a hundred miles on the Buick, cruising Wheeling and the immediate area, looking for a safe place to stash half a million dollars in cash. It was a much tougher proposition than he had expected. Bus station lockers were ruled out as being too public. There were a couple of neighborhoods with abandoned buildings, but when he went to check one out he surprised half a dozen teenagers smoking pot, and had a hairy ten minutes talking them out of kicking his ass for him and taking his Buick. His irritation increased as the day wore on. He wanted to get on the road. Just before dark, in an industrial development near the Ohio River, he found the perfect spot. A small brick building was under construction, and there was no watchman in sight. He forced an outside door and went in, leaving the money in the trunk of the car a block away. In the rear of the building, on the second floor, the drywall work was about a third completed, and there were several walls in progress.
This was right up his alley. In Binghamton, every male Villarubbia could hang drywall by the age of thirteen. Even John could hang Sheetrock. One room in the building was padlocked, and he broke in with a crowbar, wrenching the screws out of the wood. Everything he needed was there, including half a bucket of mud. He hurried back to the car and retrieved the money and carried it into the building. The packet was a snug fit between two studs in a wall, and he covered it with a four by eight drywall panel and risked the noise of nailing it in place. Nobody appeared, and after having a good look around, he went back in and taped it and finished it with the mud and a wet rag, and the cache was invisible. His work was as good as the rest. The wall now had one more panel in place than it should have, but who would remember? And the mud would be dry in an hour. He put his tools and supplies away, and stole a Skill saw and a cordless drill to make it look like a burglary, and then left them hidden in brush when he went back to his car.
It was full dark, and his problem was solved, and he felt as good as a man can feel after abandoning more money than he had ever seen in his life. He checked out of his motel and turned the Buick west, taking Interstate 70 toward Cambridge, where he could go south on 77. At the appointed time he would stop and get some change and call Piper. He drove steadily, clearing Ohio before ten o'clock and going back into West Virginia at Parkersburg. Looking at his road map, he calculated that he could push on to Charleston and do his telephoning from there, and his last tie to the kidnapping would be snipped. He had already prepared Piper for what he had to tell him, so that wouldn't be so bad. He might carry on and bitch a little, but so what?
Lindsay was quite another matter, and he tried to imagine the scene when Piper broke the news to him, and a sudden revelation hit Villarubbia like a load of buckshot. He nearly slammed on the brakes right there on the interstate. How could he have been so stupid? Shit! Piper wasn't going to break any news to Lindsay! Piper was going to hit the road to Wheeling by the fastest means, snatch the half million and keep going, and Villarubbia was liable to run into him one day, down in Mexico. Piper didn't give a damn whether or not Lindsay went back to Binghamton and started setting fires. And it would only be one day - two at the most - before Lindsay figured it out. No word from John and Piper gone from New York. He would go berserk, for sure. Could he call them both? Bad idea; suppose he reached one and not the other? Lindsay had no home phone, anyway. This was a bonehead plan he had come up with. What the hell ever made him think he could make this work? Now he had to go all the way back to Wheeling and get the money out of that wall before morning and make another plan.
Or maybe he didn't, if he could figure a way to tie the two of them together. He began to make a plan that didn't include going back to Wheeling, and what he came up with was the very arrangement that kept the cache untouched for all these years. Initially, Villarubbia thought it was clever and foolproof. In fact, it was idiotic. The directions to the hiding place were already fixed in his mind - he had been about to call New York and explain the process to Piper. Instead of that he would cut the directions in half, and give each man half the solution, by mail. This would ensure that neither of them could rob the other, wouldn't it? He continued on to Charleston and bought a writing pad and envelopes and stamps in a supermarket, and got directions for finding the post office. Addresses were in a notebook he had recovered before abandoning the Cadillac.
Villarubbia stood at a table in the lobby of the post office and composed a short letter to Lindsay, telling him to make a trip to Wheeling, West Virginia, with Piper, and to go to the First Presbyterian Church, even giving the
street address. He assured him that Piper would know what to do from there, sincerely, JV. A similar communication was prepared for Piper, advising him to accompany Lindsay to a spot that only Lindsay knew, and telling him how to find a certain little brick office building from there, and then what to do when they got inside. No sweat, the building would not be finished for some time, just do it at night, best regards, JV. He sealed the envelopes and added the stamps, but hesitated before dropping them in the slot. What was he forgetting this time? He went outside and sat on the steps of the building, smoking and thinking. The second time a patrol car went by slowly, with two policemen inside looking at him through the window, he got up and mailed the letters, and returned to his car, trying to recall how to find 1-77 from downtown.
He became aware that the new plan was not a very good one, but had no idea just how bad it would prove to be. And it got him off the hook, which was the whole reason for it in the first place. He had left their money, and told them how to get it. What more could they want from him? His plan to drive to Mexico lasted only two more days. In Bossier City, Louisiana, he picked up an opportunistic blonde in a joint near Barksdale AFB and between a bottle of liquor and his supply of nose candy he fell into such a stupor that he began boasting foolishly and in great detail about his recent exploits, including the fact that there was nearly three hundred grand in his hotel room. It took Villarubbia less than fifteen minutes to live the rest of his life, and the blonde left town with his Buick and his cash and his cocaine and his secrets, none of which he needed any longer.
Likewise, his intention to avoid Binghamton forever quickly went by the boards. Eight days after the snatching of Sonny Boy Leppert, John Villarubbia was buried in the family plot there. On the way, the funeral procession passed within a block of the vacant lot that still bore the marks of John's now-defunct Cadillac, and Romeo's car, and a tow truck. There were four Lepperts in attendance at the service, but it was a wasted trip. They didn't find out anything about where their money had gone. Several of the Villarubbias remarked later on the unexpected appearance of a clan they hardly knew at all, and how sincerely mournful they all looked.