Psycho Save Us (12 page)
Authors: Chad Huskins
Jovita felt her
knees buckle. It was time to wake up. Yes, that was a good plan. Once she
woke up, she could score another jab perhaps, maybe find some H, who knows?
That would do away with these dirty, icky dreams for good.
4
The robberies he
committed were fairly nonviolent, and they were the kind of stuff that would
have him called “Brainiac” for a time by some FBI fellows who needed to give everyone
they were after a nickname, the “Master Mimic” by those in the press with the
same inclination, and “a master of deception” by the host of
America’s Most
Wanted
. But those names would only come
after
he’d escaped
Leavenworth Federal Penitentiary.
The crimes were
fairly simple, and Spencer would always feel that it had nothing at all to do
with his intelligence, but rather everything to do with the fact that most
people were stupid. Just stupid. They just didn’t think. And they were eager
to go along with the rest of the herd.
This would be a
common argument of his: his sincere belief that he wasn’t anything special. In
Leavenworth, Spencer had been tested for his IQ, and when Dr. McCulloch told
him that it was superior to most others, that Spencer was quite the perceptive
intellectual, and had asked him what he thought about that, Spencer had merely
replied, “Then you need to raise the standards for IQ testing, because I’m no
Al Einstein, doc.”
The first bank
he hit was a Bank of America in a small town called Marble Falls, in Burnet
County, Texas. It had been a sunny October afternoon during an autumnal
cavalcade like no other. High winds were blowing dead leaves off of trees,
creating miniature, swirling funnels of multicolored leaves dancing up and down
the streets, a few of which danced across the parking lot as Spencer had
approached the Bank of America wearing overalls, large rubber gloves, a
reflective orange vest like a road worker might wear, and carrying a bullhorn.
The radio clipped to his side was for effect, as was the hardhat, gas mask and
the Geiger counter.
Spencer had
opened the door and hustled with purpose right over to the manager’s office.
Two female employees were within earshot, which was good. There were four
customers in line waiting, one of which had spotted him, which was also good.
They all saw his urgency. The unease was already palpable, and soon would
spread. “I need to speak to the manager,” he told one employee. “What’s his
name? Mr. Ottey?”
Mr. Ottey had
heard and seen Spencer’s hasty entrance, and had hopped up from his desk to run
to the doorway. “Yes? What is it? What’s going on?”
“Gas main leak,
sir,” Spencer said in an officious tone. He pointed out the nearest window,
where the van had been parked. One week prior, Spencer had rented it and had a
friend of a friend of Pat’s over in Alabama put on letters and stenciling that
made it appear legit. It read
MARBLE FALLS GAS & LIGHT
on the side. Like
the hardhat and the radio clipped at his side, it was only for effect.
“Gas main—?”
“We need to move
everyone into a secure location.
Not
outside! A chemical truck wrecked
outside and may have caused the rupture while the road work was going on,
hitting the exposed main line.” Spencer said it all so quickly that Mr. Joseph
Ottey never had any time to register it, or to recall that there was no road
work going on outside, and no one digging up a gas main. “The chemicals
spilled may mix with the gas leaking and become
highly
combustible! We
need to move everyone to a secure location inside the bank.”
“B-but…well,
okay, but where?”
“I don’t care,
um…” Spencer touched the button on his radio, pretending to be in a hurry to
ask the question of someone else. “I…just…just put them in the vault. Do you
have a vault or a back room or
someplace
you can put them?”
Mr. Ottey nodded
and said that he did. He pulled out a set of keys and described a back room
where counting was done. By now, others had started looking. Customers were
unnerved at the frenetic exchange. Spencer made sure to speak in tones just
barely audible, increasing the trepidation and fear of those around him.
Then, once he
had the full support of the bank manager, the alpha male, it had been easy to
get them all to fall into line. “Folks!” he’d hollered. “This is an
emergency! Listen up! Listen
up
! We’ve got a leak outside that’s
emitting highly volatile chemicals! There’s a chance that it may rupture and
explode! I’m going to have to ask all of you to move to safety immediately!
Do
not
go outside to your cars! The risk of combustion is too great! The
fumes are also highly noxious! The bank manager here, Mr. Ottey, is going to
escort you all to the back counting room! Now—” Here, he paused suddenly to
pretend he was getting something in from his radio, when all he’d really done
was touch the button which made the staticky sound. To others, it would sound
like a transmission coming in. Spencer touched his ear, which had no earpiece,
and checked the Geiger counter before saying, “Yeah. Yeah, that’s what I’m
reading, too. Some of it’s seeped in through the front door. I’m getting everyone
to safety now.”
Most people were
too stupid to know that a Geiger counter didn’t detect gaseous emissions leaks.
Most people wouldn’t even know a Geiger counter if they saw one. But Mr.
Joseph Ottey was already standing behind Spencer, lending him his support.
With the bank manager at his side, his story now had verisimilitude. He was
valid. He was in control of them.
They had
gathered in the back room, and were left there for God knows how long after he
left. Spencer had locked the front door at once. He then took the crowbar out
from inside his overalls and pried open all of the tellers, robbing all six of
them. He’d also come across a bagful of deposits not yet entered into the
system. He went outside, got inside the van, and drove two miles before he
came to his other rental car, hopped in, and drove off with his money. He’d
come away with a mere $37,893.
It wasn’t
genius. His schemes never were. It was the fear and gullibility of people
that allowed him to get away with it all.
Two months later
and three days after Christmas, Agent Gary S. Chalke of the Secret Service walked
into a SunTrust bank in Brandon, Mississippi. He stepped right inside, dressed
all nice in a black suit and red tie with a tie clasp in the shape of
handcuffs, his expensive shoes clicking on the marble floor as he approached the
manager’s desk and pulled out a badge identifying himself as a member of the
Secret Service. He’d pulled out a series of hundred-dollar bills he claimed
were all counterfeit and said that every single one of them had come from this
bank.
“Oh, dear,” said
the Mississippi bank manager, a man named Mr. Tanner, who bristled a bit at the
insinuation his bank was somehow involved in a nefarious scheme.
Agent Chalke talked
fast, making it clear that he meant no such implication. In the next few
months, Mr. Tanner would try and convey to law enforcement officials just how
fast Agent Chalke talked, and how utterly confusing some of the things he’d
said were, yet how he had spoken with such confidence and authority that it was
difficult not to believe every word he said.
At one point,
Mr. Tanner asked, “Is this all, you know, for
real
?”
“We’re a part of
the Department of Homeland Security, sir. And our role with the Treasury
mandates we monitor laundered or counterfeited money like this if we’re to stay
a step ahead. We take this very seriously.” Mr. Tanner had protested very
little after that.
Over the next
thirty minutes, Agent Chalke convinced Mr. Tanner to bring him samplings of
other hundred-dollar bills. He produced a kit that could chemically test the
bills. Chalke had dipped a small brush in liquid and fanned it delicately
across the paper, turning all of the bills yellow. “We’ve got a serious
problem here,” Chalke had said. Mr. Tanner almost phoned someone, probably the
regional manager, but each time Agent Chalke had assured him that it wasn’t
necessary. “All the essential people are being informed as we speak,” he told
Mr. Tanner.
Agent Chalke
convinced Mr. Tanner to bring him more and more samplings of bills, tested only
a few and they all turned yellow when tested with the liquid. Chalke had
nodded knowingly, broodingly, and asked for more. Eventually, he had Mr.
Tanner bring him a few dozen stacks of hundred-dollar bills. It was around
this time that Mr. Tanner had started getting suspicious, and just as he’d
asked to see Agent Chalke’s badge and identification again, he’d been hit over
the head with a hammer. Agent Chalke had made sure the manager’s door was
suitably closed just before that happened.
Of course, there
was no such person as Agent Gary S. Chalke, and the liquid he’d used to test
the money had been an ammonia mixture that turned all money yellow. Spencer
had made off with $54,300, and Mr. Tanner had been hospitalized with brain injuries
for six months.
The story made a
few headlines, but was mostly just told as a side story to other more important
things in the world—the withdrawal of U.S. troops from the Middle East, the
latest development in the scandal involving that senator from Idaho, and a
sexting story involving a bunch of high school cheerleaders that had the media
ostensibly in an uproar while at the same time daring to give away the most
titillating details.
“The last time I
saw ya was around that time,” Pat said presently. “That’s when you came around
an’ needed that spruced up black sedan, right?”
Spencer took a
sip of his Bud, and nodded. “Yeah, but I ended up not needing it. But if
anybody saw me driving up in a van an’ then hopping out an’ saying I’m a Secret
Service agent, it wouldn’t have been convincing. But nobody saw me hop in the
sedan when I arrived or when I left. Still, it was a precaution. It was
clean, so I brought it back to you, if you recall.”
“I do. So, what
happened next? If ya got away clean, how’d they bring ya in?”
“Random fucking
traffic stop. Can you believe it?” Spencer laughed mirthlessly and rapped his
knuckles on the desk beside him. He downed the last of the Bud, belched, and
tossed the bottle into an overflowing trash bin beside Pat’s desk. Outside,
some pneumatic drills were getting to work on the jacked up Lincoln. “Cop
pulled me over for a roll-and-go at a stop sign in, uh, let’s see…I think it
was some fuckin’ town called Foley?” He scratched at the back of his head.
“Yeah, yeah, Foley, Alabama. Goddam tenacious motherfucker, this cop was.”
“S’what
happened?”
“I gave him my
ID. Fake, o’ course. I got it from Basil—which, by the way, I need the Yeti’s
new address from you later, get some more fakes he’s supposed to have waiting
on me—but anyway, the cop knew my face. By that time an enhanced image of the
banks’ security cameras started circulating, courtesy of the FBI.”
“Yeah, I
remember that shit. I was tellin’ e’rybody around here, like, ‘Spence done
fucked up now.’ I was still pullin’ fuh ya, yo,” he said, toasting the memory
of the Spencer That Was and downing the last of his beer before grabbing
another one from the fridge. “I heard ya beat a fuckin’ cop nearly to death
before they pulled ya in. Didn’t go out like no punk, eh? Was it the cop that
pulled you over?”
Spencer nodded.
“Yep. He asked me to step outta the car. Now, I knew what the score was. He
was gonna check me out, pat me down, but his back-up was probably already on
the way. He didn’t wanna just ask me to stay inside my vehicle because he was
actually pretty smart. He figured if I lingered much longer, I’d know that he
recognized me and I’d speed away. So he asked me to get outta the car. I got
maybe two steps out before I head-butted him an’ then he an’ I went at it. He
went right to the ground but snatched the collar of my jacket and pulled me
down with him. They’re not supposed to do that, they’re supposed to roll so
that they can get to their gun or Taser and make space to shoot, but I guess
it’s the animal in fighters like us. An’
fuck
, was he a fighter.”
“His back-up
show up an’ fuck you up?”
“Yep. But not
before I fucked him up good.”
“How so?”
Spencer looked
up at him. “You sure you wanna know?”
“Uncle Spence,
please tell me the story o’ the little piggy ya fucked up.” Pat had on a
childish grin. The folks in the Bluff had ever despised the police, and it
would surely always be so.
“I bit off his
nose,” Spencer started. “I swallowed it. They tried to give me syrup of
ipecac—you know, the automatic vomit stuff?—and tried to see if I could puke it
up so that they could reattach it to his face. I held it down as long as I
could, but it finally came up. I hear they reattached it, but it doesn’t look
too good. Had to take some flesh off his ass and grow it on his forehead to
make it look better, but still…” He shrugged. “I bit off a finger when he
pushed at my face, but I didn’t get a chance to swallow that one. He pulled
out his Taser with his free hand, screamin’ the whole time, but he couldn’t
make it work and I just kept head-butting him. He was goin’ unconscious by the
time the other two patrol cars pulled up.”