My father decided, the year I
turned fifteen, that a summer job would provide just the catalyst through which
to redirect me from a life of idle languor to one of resolute achievement and
ultimate success. He was, he assured me, there to help. Little did he know that
his efforts would nearly veer me into a life of crime.
It happened this way. Daddy
procured for me a job at a “filling station” in downtown Pine Bluff, Arkansas.
It was during the late 1950s and life was slow and predictable, particularly in
the summer months. The station employed two full-time attendants, me, and a
college student, the son of a multi-millionaire cotton farmer, a father who
also saw work as a cure for most ills. The college kid arrived at work each
morning in a brand new Corvette Stingray that probably cost more than the
annual salary of one of the regular workers. My sister dropped me off on her
way to work at a bank in the family car, an old purple Pontiac my classmates
dubbed “The Purple People-eater.” Life can be sorrowful for a high school kid with
a color-blind father.
Social disparity aside, we were a
happy crew. When we weren’t serving customers, we washed cars, the college kid
and I. When there were no cars to wash, we greased vehicles that were hoisted
on racks like kings on their thrones. When there were no cars to grease, we
learned things that would, the older guys assured us, stand us in good stead in
later life—like shooting craps, doing card tricks, and learning how to spot
girls who lived “on the spicy side of life.”
What, one might ask, could go
wrong? It had to do with the FBI.
Two Special Agents, both bachelors
(I think maybe all the agents were then) roomed in a boarding house two blocks
from the station. It was our privilege to maintain their vehicle, a powerful
Ford affair, in peak condition from which to fight crime, ferret out the Communists
lurking in Pine Bluff, and make the city safe for all citizens.
They left that car in one of our
vehicle bays at night and that is where the trouble started.
During the day, the car sat on the
street, ready for action in the event of a Communist uprising or a chase after
known criminals. It came to pass that it was my lot one hot summer afternoon to
move the vehicle from the daytime spot to the vehicle bay. Like a good scout, I
drove the car into the bay, left the key in the ignition as I had been taught
to do and, having been told not to forget to close the bay door, followed that
instruction. Then I was careful to lock the bay from the inside.
At such a high level of
professionalism, I could already see myself being accepted as a Special Agent
with all the glory that such a life promised. Certainly I would achieve a
grander post than a boarding house in a sleepy southern town. Maybe even New
York. Just wait.
What no one had told me was that,
due to a lack of criminal activity, and a failure to dig up a single Communist
in our city, the station owner had agreed with the agents that the vehicle bay
door wouldn’t be locked at night, just closed. This presupposed that nobody
would be stupid enough to prowl around where an FBI vehicle was parked.
Wouldn’t you know it? That night,
the only bank robbery that I remember occurring during my entire time of
growing up in that area occurred. It was in a little farming town with a branch
bank some thirty or so miles away.
I knew nothing about this until I
slammed the door on “Old Purple” next morning, ending some argument with my
sister, and walked into the station.
Somber can’t describe it. All three
of my comrades were leaning against a counter looking at me as if I were
carrying a copy of Das Kapital. I
nodded but not a single one of them nodded back. They just stared. Finally the
one we called Boss spoke.
“Where were you last night?”
“Me? At home.”
“Can anyone prove that?”
I knitted my brow. What business
was that of his? “Sure, the family. Why?”
“What time did they go to bed?”
He knew what time my parents went
to bed. “With the chickens,” as they say down south.
“Your sister there?”
“No, she was on a date.”
“Hmm,” he said. “You better get
your story straight.”
“My story?”
“Your story.”
“What,” I said, “on earth are you
talking about?”
“Somebody robbed the bank at
Sherrill last night, just as they were closing.”
“Really?”
“Really. Guess what else happened?”
“What?”
“Somebody locked the FBI car in the
bay here and the FBI guys had to walk all the way back home and get the key or
they might have gotten over there in time to catch the thieves.”
The weight of the world began to
lower on me like one of our fully loaded vehicle hoists. I said nothing.
“Don’t leave,” Boss said.
“What do you mean, don’t leave?”
“The agents want to question you
when they get back.”
“Question me? Why?”
He looked at me like I had just
asked where sunlight came from. “Because you are the one who locked the FBI car
in the bay.”
I couldn’t speak. I tried but my
vocal chords just made a little squeaking sound like a screen door being opened
on a hot summer day.
“They are pretty sure,” Boss said,
“that you were in on it.”
Robinson Crusoe, on first reaching
shore, could not have felt more abandoned and alone than I did at that moment.
“Don’t worry,” the college kid
said. “We won’t hear them.”
I finally found my voice. “Hear
them what?” I said, a half tone below “High-C.”
“Interrogate you,” he said in a
grave voice honed by years of hazing fraternity pledges. “They are going to
take you to the Police Station. That way they can just go ahead and lock you up
if they need to.”
“Lock me up for what?”
Boss said, “Aiding in a bank job is
a pretty serious offense.” He told me that he had assured the agents that all
his employees knew not to lock the bay at night. Mine was clearly a renegade
action. With that, they all found something to do that didn’t include me. I moseyed
around, bumping into things, until I finally found a quiet place to sit and
await my doom.
Maybe prison wasn’t so bad, I
thought. Maybe I could learn to sing there. Elvis did in some movie. Or maybe I
could escape. As the minutes evaporated, so did my options, until only dark
despair remained. Then I heard the sound.
It was the dark rumble of the
souped up engine of the FBI car. It came into view, lumbered alongside a gas
pump, and stopped. It didn’t occur to me to attend it until I looked around and
saw nobody in sight. I was alone. The agent driving honked and the sound evoked
the signal for a large door to close on my life. I wandered out.
The driver rolled down the window
and smiled. “Hey sport,” he said. “We drove this old gal a piece today so fill
her up.”
“Fill her up?”
“Fill her up, and check the oil.”
“Yes sir,” I said. “Anything else?”
I would get this thing over once and for all.
“Windshield’s dusty,” he said.
“Oh…” Here it came. I froze in fear. “They forgot to tell you but you don’t
lock that bay door at night. Saves us some time and trouble.” With that, he
turned to the other agent and began to compare notes. I moved to the gas pump.
As the pump hummed to life, my life
hummed afresh. Then I saw three heads peer around from the back of the station,
each laughing like the act would soon warrant censure. I squeezed the handle as
if it were a lover, took in the smell of gasoline as if were the scent of roses,
smiled at the three guys, and nodded. That was a good one, all right.
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| Maybe they would have taught me a trade in prison. I'll never know. |
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