Run For It! First Three Chapters

                            ONE

                (Forest Oaks, Illinois, June 23, 1939)

   “Off!”

   Robert moved an arm, another arm, his legs. I’m alive.

   “Off!”

   He rolled off of Merwyn and felt soft, cool grass under his

stomach. A robbery, he thought. A Brinks job. They didn’t

look like Brinks guys. “I must have fainted.”

   The possibility that he’d passed out was so astonishing that

the idea came out aloud.

   “I pulled you down, jerk!”

   Hearing this, both the assertion and the tone, Robert felt a

little better about himself. Okay, okay. I didn’t faint.

   The air stank. A line of black smoke went straight up from

the burning tires of the armored car.

   Things were coming back: the careening armored car just

missing them, knocking the mower away; the Packard at the

curb; the ball of fire exploding with a whoosh under the

armored car; the neighbor lady jumping screaming from her

maroon LaSalle.

   Looking now, he saw her lying on his front stoop. Is she dead?

   He knew from his father that her husband ran some labor union.

   Robert saw Merwyn get up and run toward the driveway.

   He got himself up and followed. The man lay still, with open,

unmoving eyes, the back of his head flat on the concrete, blood

and streaks of gray oozing out of his nose and ears.

   Robert turned away and puked. He remembered seeing the

guy running with the other two, hauling the big green bag, and

then like he was dancing. That was it, dancing.

   Turning again to look, Robert saw Merwyn reach down into

the grass, pick up a tan leather wallet and put it in his pocket.

   Robert tasted bile, spit. “What’re you doing, Merwyn?”

   “Those guys tried to kill us, Bob.”

   “So? Leave it.” He remembered the guy jumping out of the

Packard, grabbing the bag from the guy on the driveway,

pulling him up. The plop as his head hit the driveway.

   Merwyn’s eyes said, You are so naive. He beckoned Robert to

follow him back to the tree, felt around the chipped bark and

scraped at a hole. “Feel it.”

   Robert reached up and put his finger in the hole. Buried in

the wood was a slick, warm substance. With his fingers he traced

four more lead-filled holes.

   The big memory of impending death came to Robert: the

Packard backing up, the red-faced guy bringing up the tommy

gun. The burst of noise. The tree had saved them.

   “Why’d they shoot at us?” Robert said, amazed.

   “We seen ‘em, that’s why.”

   Robert tasted bile, spit. He felt a chill, felt the intense heat

from the armored car. “Why’d you take it?” He spit.

   “Now we got leverage.”

   “What are you talking about?”

   Merwyn sighed. “It’s like insurance, Bob. We got something

they don’t know we got. We got control.”

   “Control?” Robert was losing what control he had. “Who

says?”

   “My dad, that’s who. ‘Find the leverage.’ One of his little say-

ings.”

   “We should give it to the cops.”

   Merwyn shook his head. “Oh, no. Then they got the control.

And we do get knocked off.”

   “They who?”

   Merwyn shrugged. He took off running, heading toward the

back of Robert’s house.

   Robert followed, right into the outstretched arms of his mother.

   She pulled him to the back porch.

   She looked to Robert as pale as a catfish belly.

   “There’s a dead guy on your neighbor’s driveway,” Merwyn

said to her.

   “Dead? Did you say dead?” She led the boys into the living

room and peeked out the window. “Oh!” She put her hand to her

mouth in horror.

   “Mrs. Friend’s on the porch,” Robert said.

   “Dead? She’s dead too?”

   Robert eased the front door open. Mrs. Friend’s head, which

had been propped up by the door, slipped across the threshold.

   Red lights flashed and a fire bell clanged. Stinking black

smoke hazed the neighborhood. Robert could see people sneak-

ing up on the scene like so many deer coming out of the woods.

He scanned the wreck to see if he could make out what might

be left of his lawn mower.

   Snapping out of her trance, his mother said, “Are you hurt,

Mona? I’m so sorry.”

   The woman on the doorstep looked up. “You heard me bang-

ing on your door but you didn’t let me in?”

   A man in a tan suit stepped up onto the stoop, looked down at

Mrs. Friend and said, “Can you get up? You sure?” He gave her a

hand up. He looked at Robert, his mother, Merwyn. “Detective

Lieutenant Quinlan, FOPD,” he said, displaying a wallet with a

badge.

   He was squat and square, bald with a ring of white hair. Rob-

ert figured the bulge under his coat was a shoulder holster.

Mrs. Friend said, “My car! Where’s my car?”

   Ignoring her the detective said, “Anybody see this happen?”

   “We saw the whole thing,” Robert said. “We were under that

tree. They–” He felt Merwyn’s eyes boring into him.

   “May I sit down?” Mrs. Friend said.

   “Yeah, go sit down,” the detective said. “I want to talk to you

– and you” – he pointed at Robert’s mother. “Stay here. You two

come with me.”

   The boys pointed at themselves. “Me?”

   “Yeah, you.”

   “Where are you taking them?”

   The detective picked Robert’s mother’s hand off his sleeve.

   “Down to the squad car. Ask ‘em a few questions. Then we’ll

have a few for you.”

   At this point Robert got back to Mrs. Friend’s question. “They

took it,” he said.

   “They took it?”

   He nodded.

   “Come on you two,” the detective said.

   As Robert and Merwyn walked with him to the squad car,

men hauled a stretcher to an ambulance.

   Robert’s stomach hurt. Why’d they have to kill the guy? He was

reading Merwyn’s signals: keep your mouth shut!

                            TWO

   Looking into the police car, Robert saw a colored man in uni-

form. A colored guy? he thought.

   The detective bent down and spoke to the cop. “Williams, talk

to this kid,” he said. He whispered another thing, which Rob-

ert overheard anyway: “His father plays poker with the chief. So

you’re on a tight leash here. Got it?” Then he led Merwyn a dis-

tance away.

   The policeman unfolded himself out of the squad car. “What’s

your name, young man?”

   “Robert Bell.”

   “So. Let me ask you a few questions, Robert. You saw this

happen?”

   Robert nodded. As the questions came at him, his mind was

somewhere else. He was thinking about getting killed. “I didn’t

see much,” he said. “It happened so fast.” In fact, the whole scene

was playing in his head like a movie. This brought back the nau-

sea.

    “You okay?” the policeman asked. “Here. Sit down.” He closed

his notebook and squatted down beside Robert. “Put your head

between your legs. This happens, you see something like this.

You’ll be okay. Just take it easy.”

   As Robert sat in the grass the policeman handed him a card:

Officer Henry Williams, Forest Oaks Police Department.

“You feeling better? Good. Call me if you think of anything

else.” He smiled. “I’ll be in touch.”

   Robert got to his feet and shoved the card into his pocket.

A burly man with a flash camera came through the police

barrier. “Where’s the stiff?” he said to no one in particular.

“You’re too late for blood and guts, Joe,” the balding detective

said. “And stay back of the tape.”

   The photographer looked at Robert. “Hey, kid. You live around

here?”

   “That’s my house.” Robert pointed.

   “Com’ere. Let’s get a shot of you looking at the truck.” The

photographer positioned Robert so his house would be in the

background of the picture. “Just look at the truck,” he said.

“That’s it.” The flash popped. “What’s your name?”

   “Robert.” His head was still spinning, his stomach still churn-

ing. He felt compelled to get things straight. “It’s an armored

car.”

   “Robert what?”

   Robert was thinking about the two men who escaped the

gunmen. “What? Robert Bell.”

   Merwyn came running up. “Are you nuts?” He grabbed Rob-

ert’s arm and pulled him away.

   The photographer glared at Merwyn, then headed for the

bloody driveway.

   Walking toward his house with Merwyn, Robert looked down

the street and saw his father’s new car stopping at the corner

and being waved through. Pulling into the driveway, his father,

inscrutable in his aviator’s glasses, looked toward the mess.

The car’s startling color was “canary yellow,” his father had

told him. It featured lots of chrome, headlights hidden in the

fenders, tire sidewalls white as milk. No running boards.

   “Bob,” his father said.

   Merwyn walked up with Robert, looking the car over. The

dashboard was polished cherry, the seats leather, the color of

cream.

   “What the heck’s going on?” Robert’s father took off his fedo-

ra, his eyes still hidden, his gold wristwatch glinting in the light.

“The cop said a guy got shot.”

   “Yeah.”

   His father looked at the steaming vehicle, firemen still hosing

it down. “You see it happen?”

   Robert nodded.

   “You okay?”

   “Yeah.”

   “Good. I better go see your mother.” With that, the car shot

down the driveway toward the garage in back of the house.

   “It’s a Cord,” Robert said, eyeing Merwyn.

   “I know.”

   “We just got it Monday.”

   “Yeah. Well, I seen it in your garage.” Merwyn popped his

eyes at Robert. “Let’s see what’s in the wallet.”

   Robert looked around at the fire and police officials. “Here?”

They ran behind the garage, where Merwyn slipped the wal-

let out of his pocket, unfolded it, and pulled out paper money.

“Sixty bucks.”

   They looked at the driver’s license: James L. McGinnis, 11

Creek Road, Blue Lake.

   Merwyn pulled out a business card. “Acme Electrical Con-

tractors, Thos. O’Bannion, Prop.” The card listed several towns,

including Blue Lake.

   “Give it to the cops,” Robert said.

   Merwyn looked at him. “Not a good idea.”

   “Then just drop it back in the grass.”

   “You kidding?” Merwyn said. “They been looking all over

around there.” He tucked the wallet into his pocket.

   As the boys came out from behind the garage Robert’s father

came out the back door of the house, his eyeglasses in his hand.

   “Nice car, Mr. Bell,” Merwyn said.

   “1938 Cord 812 Supercharger,” Robert’s father said.

   “What’ll it do?”

   Robert’s father smiled, showing even teeth, two capped with gold. “Over a hundred.” He scrutinized their faces.

   “And don’t get any ideas.”

   Eyes wide, Merwyn held up his hands.

   Robert’s father answered this look of innocence with a know-

ing look of his own. “Look, Bob,” he said. “I was just coming

home to get some papers. I have to talk at Rotary.” He looked

bemused. “But I’ll come right back after that.” He glanced at his

watch.

   “They killed the guy, dad.”

   “Look, I’d stay with your mother but I can’t. Go in and stay

with her, okay? I’ll be back as soon as I can. Maybe an hour.” He

paused, taking in the scene again. “Oh, yeah. You two are coming

in to work tomorrow with the clean-up crew, right?”

   Robert looked at Merwyn, who nodded assent. “Yeah, Dad.”

   “Wear old clothes. Eight o’clock. Be on time. Pack a lunch.”

   “Okay, Dad.”

   “Gotta go. Go in and talk to your mother.”

   The police moved a barricade to let his father through. Steam

was still rising from the armored car. The firemen were wetting

down the grass. Everything stank.

   Most of the first wave of gawkers had gone, but other people,

including a mother with a baby in her arms, kept showing up at

the barricades.

   Robert headed in to see his mother.

   She was crying. “I didn’t let her in,” she confessed to Robert.

“I thought it was a union killing.”

   “It’s okay mom. Dad’ll be home in a few minutes.”

                            THREE

   At six o’clock the next morning, Saturday, Robert went out

on the front stoop to get the milk. The sun was coming up. The

air was hazy. The armored car had been hauled away, but Robert

could still smell burning rubber. The yard looked like the leftover

battlefield it was.

   He picked up the quart bottle in one hand and the newspa-

per in the other. Then he set the milk back down to look more

closely at the paper.

   A banner headline across the top of the front page said,

“Gangs at War!” A smaller headline underneath said, “Mobster

Slain in Ambush on Armored Car.”

   The story said:

   “A gangster was killed in broad daylight Friday in the tree-lined

suburb of Forest Oaks in front of three witnesses.

   “The dead man, Joseph Pisciatti, was believed to have once been a

member of the notorious Al Capone mob.

    “An armored car in which Pisciatti had been riding went out of

control in the incident, cut across two yards, hit a tree, and caught

fire.

   “A detective at the scene, Lt. Adrian Quinlan, Forest Oaks PD,

said two gangsters ran from the wreck and escaped in a comman-

deered maroon LaSalle sedan. The sedan had been abandoned only

moments before by a Hill Street resident, Mrs. Aaron Friend.

   “Pisciatti, the third man who ran from the wreck, was gunned

down as he tried to get into the LaSalle by a man firing a tommygun

from a black Packard sedan.

   “Robert Bell and Merwyn Peterson, both 16, also witnessed the

slaying.

   “Sources speculated that the attack on the armored car was either

a ‘hit’ aimed at members of an opposing gang, or a ‘heist,’ aimed at

stealing money or other valuables. Police had the vehicle hauled to an impoundment garage.

   “If the incident was connected to Capone’s gang, it may mean that

his influence still prevails, although he remains in prison. After a

murderous career as a Chicago gang leader he was sent up in 1932

for income tax evasion, having failed to pay taxes on ill-gotten gains

from bootlegging and other criminal pursuits.

   “Since then, a number of his associates have met their ends through

gang violence or at the hands of G-men. But some are believed to be

still active. The incident on Hill Street may have involved these ele-

ments.

   “But no one, sources believe, has yet emerged to take the role of the

notorious Scarface.”

 “Rob  ert Allen Bell, 1400 Hill Street, Forest Oaks, looks at the

smoking armored car. The caption said:

“Robert Allen Bell, 1400 Hill Street, Forest Oaks, looks at the

armored car he and a friend saw destroyed just before they witnessed

what appeared to be a gangland slaying.”

   Robert looked up from the newspaper. They know who we are,

he thought. Joseph Pisciatti? That’s not the name in the wallet.

   Picking up the milk bottle, he went back into the house. He’d

show the front page to his parents and tell them what he knew.

   But his father had already left for the plant, his mother was

upstairs getting dressed, and the cleaning lady was in the front

hall waiting for instructions.

   After moping around the hall for a minute Robert went

upstairs to put on his clothes. He and Merwyn had to get to the

dairy.

   They coasted on their bikes down Hill to First, turned right,

pedaled the three blocks to Locust, crossed the street, and leaned

the bikes against the wall at the side of a one-story cement-block

building with a red-brick façade. Gilt letters high on the wall

said Bell & Koenig Creamery Co.

   “This is weird,” Robert said. “The paper said the guy’s name is

Pisciatti. So who’s James McGinnis?”

   Merwyn shrugged. “Maybe the guy that grabbed the bag

dropped his wallet.”

   “Dropped it there?” Robert said. “I’m scared, Merwyn.”

   “You oughtta be, with your picture in the paper like that.”

   “Your name too,” Robert said. He led Merwyn into the build-

ing. Passing through an office into the dairy manufacturing area,

they were enveloped in sweet smells of flavoring, cheese, milk,

and ice cream.

   The handful of other workers eyed them. These were the kids

that saw the armored-car job.

   The boys went to the locker room, pulled on rubber gloves

and boots and paper caps, then scuffed out into the plant to help

with the tear-down-and-clean operation.

   Merwyn discovered he could bend the nozzle of a pressure

hose and squirt a powerful stream of water thirty feet. The other

workers rolled their eyes and kept their distance.

   At lunchtime Robert and Merwyn went outside into the

warm sunshine.

   “Let’s say this guy dropped it,” Merwyn said. “Would he

know it, or would he think maybe he lost it someplace else?”

   “What are you getting at?”

   “If we get rid of it, we oughta put it where the guy might

think he lost it. That way he wouldn’t be thinking of us when he

found it.”

   Robert considered Merwyn’s shifting position. “Like where?”

“I don’t know.”

   Robert did a double take as they passed a black Packard

parked next to the building. “You think there’s a lot of cars like

this?”

   Merwyn stared at the car. “You remember the license?”

   Robert shook his head.

   They walked around the Packard, studying it. Nothing

resolved, they went back into the plant and helped the crew put

the newly cleaned pipes back up.

   At quitting time, Robert led Merwyn to the back of the plant

and opened a steel door. As they entered the room they could see

their breath. Pints and quart boxes of ice cream were stacked up

in pyramids. Five-gallon ice-cream drums were lined up along

the walls.

“Ali Baba’s cave,” Merwyn said. He helped himself to a pint of

vanilla. “Okay?”

   Robert reached into a box on a shelf for a wooden spoon and

handed it to him, then helped himself to a pint of strawberry.

   “We shoulda had this for lunch,” Merwyn said.

   Robert led him to a door with a big handle at the back of the

room. “We can go out this way. Goes to the shipping dock.” The

space where the Packard had been stood empty. The boys were

busy with the ice cream and weren’t paying attention anyway.

Before supper, Robert listened on the radio to Jack Arm-

strong, the All-American Boy. But his mind wandered. He thought

about the man’s head hitting the driveway.

   When his program ended he went into the living room. His

parents were having a cocktail, talking about the killing. Rob-

ert ducked out. He’d worked all day at trying to keep it out of

his mind. He’d also decided he didn’t want to rat on Merwyn.

Maybe they’d find a way to ditch the wallet. He had the cop’s

card, too. Maybe they could talk to him.

   After dinner his parents went out to play bridge, and Robert

walked across the street to Merwyn’s house and showed him the

card. “You think we should call him?”

   “They’re all on the take,” Merwyn said.

   “How do you know that?”

   Merwyn cocked an eye. “My dad says.”

   “Your dad? You told your dad?”

   “No. But he deals with ‘em, Bob. He knows. Besides, we got

time to figure this out. They’re not gonna just shoot us down in

the street, a couple a’ kids.”

   “They already tried to do that.”

   Merwyn squinted at Robert. “They were jumpy. Now they’re

reading the papers, thinking it over.”

   “That makes me feel just great,” Robert said. “Let’s give it to

the cop.”

   “You read the paper every day,” Merwyn said. “You ever see a

story where ratting on the mob was helpful to some guy?”

   The mob. Robert thought about pictures he’d seen in the Tri-

bune of dead hoods, their bodies riddled with bullets, lying in

the dirt and weeds along various rural roads around Chicago.

   “Who else would it be? You got guys in an armored car, right?

Guys in a Packard. A guy packin’ a tommygun. The mob.”

   Robert despaired. “I have to tell my mom and dad.”

   “Don’t do it,” Merwyn said between his teeth. “First your mom

will go nuts and then your dad’ll drive us down to the police sta-

tion. The mob will get wind of that, don’t kid yourself.” Merwyn

made a throat-slitting motion with his index finger. “We gotta

figure this out, Bob. You and me.”