The Roy Stories Read Online Free PDF Page A

did the mechanical work and tire patching. All Marty the T had to do was wait on the Two Dollar Bills and Bettys, as Poznanski called those motorists who stopped only for gas. T was sixteen when he began working there, right after he dropped out of high school. The first time Roy met him, Marty the T told Roy he had decided that he was going to be a jazz trumpet player. Poznanski didn’t mind that T practiced the trumpet all day because he was half deaf and spent most of his time under cars on the garage side of the station. As long as Marty the T’s playing didn’t interfere with his taking care of the customers, the old man left him alone. T was a medium-tall, skinny guy with green eyes, crewcut red hair, a nose that would have been a comma but for a scar below the bridge that made it resemble a semi-colon, and a prominent chin with a few wispy, straw colored hairs sticking out from it. “All the jazz cats got chin hair,” he said.
    It was a drizzly, chilly March afternoon in 1962 when the station was robbed by two men wearing bandanna masks, one red, one black. Marty the T was working on Dizzy Gillespie’s tune “Con Alma” when a gray and blue 1959 Chevrolet Impala pulled up to one of the pumps. T noticed the car out of the corner of his left eye, played a few more notes and put down his trumpet. By the time he’d stood up and begun to head out the office door, the two men were walking quickly toward him. Both of the men were of average height and weight and carried guns in their right hands, which they held at their sides, not pointed at T. They wore dark brown Fedoras and black car coats and were inside the office before Marty the T could do anything. As soon as T saw the guns, he put up his hands.
    â€œOpen the register,” ordered one of the men.
    Marty the T hit the No Sale key on the 1920 National and the cash drawer slid out. The man who had not yet spoken elbowed T out of the way, removed all of the bills and stuffed them into a pocket of his coat, then took out the drawer and dropped it. Coins scattered all over the room even before the drawer hit the floor. The man scooped out the larger bills, tens and twenties, that had been hidden underneath and crammed them into the same pocket.
    The other man said, “Show us the safe.”
    â€œThere isn’t one,” said T.
    â€œWhere’s the old man?” asked the bandit who had cleaned out the register.
    â€œIn the garage.”
    That man left the office; the other one stood still and kept his eyes on Marty the T. T noticed that they were blue; the other man’s eyes were brown but T didn’t really look at them until the man returned to the office marching old man Poznanski in front of him.
    â€œThe boy’s tellin’ the truth,” Poznanski said, “there’s no safe.”
    â€œGet on the floor, both of you,” said the man who’d herded Poznanski. “Face down.”
    â€œClose your eyes and stay put,” said the other man.
    Poznanski and Marty the T did what they were told. The robbers took a fast look around the office, one of them kicked over a waste basket that was next to the desk, then they left. Marty the T and old man Poznanski stayed down until they’d heard the men open and close the doors of their car, the engine start and the car pull away.
    Poznanski stood up first, looked out the door and said, “It’s okay, Marty, they’re gone.”
    T got up and looked out.
    â€œWe’re pretty lucky, I guess,” said the old man. “They didn’t shoot us, they only took the cash.”
    â€œNo,” said T, “they took my trumpet, too.”
    Poznanski looked at the top of the desk, which was where Marty the T always put the trumpet down when he left the office to pump gas.
    â€œThey’ll pawn it for two bucks,” he said.
    When Roy and his friends found out that thieves had stolen Marty the T’s instrument they