Plunder Squad Read Online Free PDF Page B

Parker remembered having driven it two or three times in the past, a curving two-lane road between the ocean and the mountains of the Santa Lucia Range, twenty-eight miles of rugged scenery, cliffs and boulders and mountains and no cities or towns. There were campsites and forest ranger stations off in the mountains, but that was all.
    “All right,” Beaghler said. “They’re coming up that road. We ambush the armored car on one of the curves there, I’ve got one all picked out, a beautiful hairpin where they’re gonna have to come to practically a full stop anyway.”
    Ducasse said, “How do you ambush it?”
    “With grenades,” Beaghler said. “Smoke, and then percussion. We hit them with a smoke grenade so they can’t see and they have to stop. Then we roll a percussion grenade under the car to keep them stopped. Then we come down and George opens the rear door and we take the statues out and go on our merry way, safe and sound.”
    Parker said, “On our way where? In the first place, armored cars keep in radio contact with their headquarters, and in the second place, there’s no way off that road. All they have to do is block both ends and wait for us.”
    Beaghler’s broad grin showed he’d been waiting for that objection. “Not so,” he said. “I’ve got an ATV.”
    “A what?”
    “An all-terrain vehicle,” Beaghler said. “They make them for people who want to camp out. They’re like a jeep, only they’ll go places even a jeep won’t go. I’ve got one that’ll go places you’d think twice about going with a horse. It’s fantastic.”
    Walheim said, “Where do you figure to go with it, Bob?”
    “Over the mountains,” Beaghler said. “Over to King City. We’ll have another car stashed there, and we can just take the main road back up through Salinas.”
    Walheim shook his head. “Not a chance.”
    “Why not?”
    “You can’t get through there. You’ll never make it to King City.”
    “That’s where you’re wrong,” Beaghler said. “Because I’ve done it. Artie Danforth and me, we did it together about a month ago.”
    Walheim squinted at Beaghler as though he was hard to see. “Are you putting me on? You really went through that country?”
    “Man, we averaged six miles an hour. But we got through.”
    Parker said, “How many miles?”
    “Just under sixty.”
    “You’re talking about ten hours.”
    “Probably longer than that. We’ll probably have to camp out overnight. See, the timing is, we’ll probably hit the armored car around noon. Say one o’clock. Then we’ve got only five or six hours before—”
    “Somebody outside,” Sharon said. She was standing by the living-room window looking out. “Looking at the cars,” she said.
    All four got to their feet and went over to look out the window. Out there, giving the three rental cars a once-over, was a stocky compact guy with a flattened nose, thinning curly hair, and a heavy slightly-blued jaw. He was glancing in the windows of each car, strolling along past them, taking his time but not making a major production out of it.
    Parker frowned, trying to see the guy’s face more clearly. There was something vaguely familiar about him, but he couldn’t really be sure.
    Beaghler, sounding very worried, said, “Fuzz, do you think?”
    “No,” Ducasse said. “Private maybe, but not law.”
    Beaghler said, “Sharon?”
    “I never saw him before.” The sudden frightened defensiveness told Parker just how tight a rein Beaghler kept on his wife, and suggested also how necessary it was. Which was confirmed when she added, “If I knew the guy, would I have said anything?”
    Parker said, “Nobody knows him?”
    Outside, the guy had turned toward the house, was coming up through the bedraggled lawn.
    Ducasse said, “Not me.”
    Frowning, Parker said, “There’s something—Let me take it.”
    “Sure,” said Beaghler. “I don’t want him.”
    Parker kept watching as the guy came up on the porch. Was it a