“Well, they did. And the law says ignorance is no excuse. You’re just as guilty as they are. Now, take me to what they brought here that night.”
They took the long way around to the Buick and drove directly over to the warehouse. There was no one yet there, it still being early. The big double doors were locked, but Archer found a window on the side that succumbed to his knife. He pushed Amy through and followed her in. He turned on his flashlight and aimed the beam around the huge interior of the place. It was piled high with merchandise ready to be shipped out.
“Where?” he demanded.
She led him to the very back corner where a number of boxes were piled high. Right behind this stack was the large metal four-wheeled trolley cart the men had used to bring the boxes in that Archer had loaded on Sid Duckett’s truck. And behind that was something covered with a blanket. Archer slipped off the blanket and a wooden crate was revealed. He aimed his light beam at the shipping label on top and read off what was written there.
He looked at the quivering Amy. “I…I don’t even know where that is,” she said, eyeing the crate’s final destination.
Archer said, “Well, I do. And it makes a lot of sense, actually.”
He found a crowbar, popped open the top of the crate, and peered inside. He found the contents of Lucas Tuttle’s safe underneath a great deal of folded-up women’s clothes and shoes and blankets and sheets, probably for additional padding and also to fool anyone chancing to look inside that it was just full of such items and no hint to a king’s ransom lurking there. He thought that some of the clothing might have come from Jackie and Ernestine. In fact, he believed that he recognized a few items from Ernestine’s closet. And they would want their personal things to also be delivered to where they were headed.
Then Archer found something stuck inside a pillow case that he had not been expecting. It was a sheaf of papers stapled together. He read down the first page and then flicked back to the last, eyeing the signatures at the bottom.
“Son of a bitch,” he hissed.
“What’s that?” Amy said in a trembling voice.
“Nothing.” He put the papers in his jacket pocket, put the crate top back on, and pounded the nails back in using one end of the crowbar.
Next, he eyed the trolley, and his plan came together. Squatting down and using all his strength he heaved one end of the crate up on the trolley, and then squatted down once more and lifted the other end up. He rolled the trolley to the front doors, unlocked them, and managed to get the crate from the trolley into the enormous trunk of the Buick. He closed the warehouse door and pointed the .38 at Amy.
“You say one word to anyone about this, you’re going to hang, do you understand me?”
Teary-eyed, and her hands gripping her white apron, she nodded. “But I don’t understand one thing.”
“What?”
“I was nice to you. I was even…flirty with you. So why’d you ever think I was involved in all this?”
“You just answered your own question, lady.”
“What?”
“I’ve discovered some gals like to play me for a sucker because I lose my good sense around them. Well, not this time.”
He left her to walk back while he drove off down the road and hit the main strip. He had to find some place safe to hide the contents of the crate. Two miles down the road, the perfect place came to him.
He floored the Buick and shot down the road to where he needed to go.
Chapter 47
LATER THAT DAY ARCHER went back to his room at the Derby to do some serious thinking. He had taken the shipping label off the crate and stuck it between two pages of the Gideon Bible in his bureau drawer. He had just finished two cigarettes and a fifth of the bottle of Rebel when someone knocked on his door.
He muttered, “Who is it?”
“Front desk sir, you got a message.”
“What? Who from?”
“She wouldn’t say.”
“She?”
Archer jumped up from the bed and hurried over to the door. As soon as he opened it, it flew inward, and Bart and Jeb plowed through the opening. They slammed him up against the wall.
“Well, good day to you, too,” Archer said breathlessly.