Stealing Through Time: On the Writings of Jack Finney Read Online Free PDF

always be traced back to one's origins. Al realizes that Jerry is serious about planning the heist, and the foursome split up to think about how to arrive in Reno seemingly out of thin air.
    Al takes Tina out to dinner and proposes marriage, but she hesitates, telling him that she wants a man with money and prospects for the future, not just a college student. Al tells her he'll have money soon, and this may be the first time that Al is serious about the robbery himself. His motives are thus suspect: the idea is hatched out of boredom but becomes more appealing when it may lead to Tina's taking his marriage proposal more seriously.
    Al's ethics are questionable as he explains the plan to Tina: "'I think gambling is wrong. I always have; this isn't a new idea with me. I think it's vicious. As evil socially as narcotics'" (180).
    For a nineteen-year-old junior in college, Al has strong feelings. He continues with this bit of ethical gymnastics: '"So I say [casinos are] fair prey. Harold's Club has only a technical legal right to that money, no more real right to it than I do.'" He continues: '"But this isn't stealing to me; by any standard I respect, that money doesn't belong to Harold's Club; and I'll take it if I can, and it will never bother my conscience for a moment'" (180).
    This curious rationalization by Al Mercer hurts the story, especially because he never wrestles with his conscience again. Jack Finney would use a similar excuse in Assault on a Queen, and it is problematic there as well. To enjoy "5 Against the House," the reader is required to accept Al's argument, and (fortunately) the story is good enough that one soon forgets about the ethical dilemma and gets wrapped up in the events.
    Tina concocts a method of arriving in Reno unnoticed and tells Al, but Finney keeps the reader in suspense by not telling us at this point in the story. Tina thus becomes the fifth member of the title group.
    Her plan is revealed a few pages later, and she explains that they can cross the country hidden in a trailer, emerging only at night for supplies. They plan to abandon the trailer in Reno and then rob Harold's Club disguised as cowboys during the Rodeo Week celebration on the Fourth of July. The group decides to go through with the planned robbery, and part one of the serialized novel ends with Al and Tina struggling with the idea of marriage.
    Part two appeared in the next issue of Good Housekeeping, published in August 1953. This section begins as Al and his friends collect supplies and work out the details of the trip to Reno and the robbery. Jerry flies to Reno and takes photographs at Harold's Club; when he returns, he explains his plan to his friends but again the details are withheld from the reader. Eventually, the gang begins driving crosscountry, with Jerry behind the wheel and everyone else hiding in the trailer.
    During the trip, Al gets to know Tina better and falls deeply in love with her. They decide that the robbery is too risky and Al tries to back out, but Brick refuses to allow this and threatens to harm Tina if Al does not cooperate. Al stays with the group against his better judgment as the trailer crosses the state line into Nevada.
    After reaching Reno and Harold's Club, the men don their cowboy suits and Tina heads for a boarding house. Jerry waits with the car as Al enters the club and surveys it, followed by Guy. Al watches a man pushing a cart and sees him go in and out of the cash room. The cart contains silver dollars that are used to replenish supplies at the gambling tables. Al approaches the man with the cart and tells him that Guy will kill him if he does not smile and cooperate. The man walks out of the casino with Al into an alley, where Brick threatens him.
    At this point, the details of the plan start to become clear to the reader. There is a duplicate cart waiting in the alley, and Jerry is allegedly hiding inside the cart. However, the reader learns that it's actually a tape recorder