Evil Machines Read online

  As soon as the police had gone from the back of the lodging house, Juan Gonzales shinned down a drainpipe and ran as fast as his legs would carry him away from the scene.

  Just as they were beginning to run out of ammunition, Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez, who was known as The Kid, turned to Fernando Salvador, the second-in-command, and said, ‘Just a minute! What kind of “help” can Juan Gonzales be getting us? We’re desperate bandits! Nobody comes to the aid of desperate bandits!’

  Fernando Salvador, the second-in-command, stopped firing for a moment, and turned to stare at Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez.

  ‘You’re right!’ he exclaimed, banging his fist on the table and at the same time accidentally firing his handgun, because he was holding it in his fist. ‘We’ve been tricked!’ He was not the brightest of bandits.

  And so it was, the three remaining members of the Dos Hombres Gang ran to the window at the rear of the lodging house to look for Juan Gonzales, but he was long gone.

  ‘That no-good Juan Gonzales has run away and left us!’ said Fernando Salvador.

  ‘He is a bad man!’ cried Pedro Del Camino, the third of the Dos Hombres Gang, who had not spoken up till then.

  ‘Of course he is a bad man,’ said Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez, the Kid. ‘He is a desperate bandit – the boldest and most desperate bandit in the whole of New Mexico! Of course he is a bad man!’

  At that moment this interesting conversation came to an abrupt end, because ten police officers suddenly burst into the room and the chief said, ‘You’re under arrest!’

  And one of the policemen shot Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez, who was known as the Kid, in the arm because he saw he was about to fire at the chief police officer.

  ‘Thank you, Rolf,’ said the chief police officer. ‘These are desperate and dangerous men!’

  ‘You’re right!’ said the other policeman.

  ***

  And that was the end of the Dos Hombres Gang. Fernando Salvador and Pedro Del Camino were thrown into prison in Albuquerque for twenty years, and Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez, the Kid, was given an extra five years because he had been about to fire at the chief police officer.

  Juan Gonzales, however, managed to get to New York, where he landed a job as a cook on a ship bound for England. He changed his name to Montague Du Cann, and became a department store executive. He had all the money from the bank robbery still strapped to his person, and so was able to buy a share in one of the largest and most prestigious department stores in Swindon. That is how he came to be the head of the particular department store in which the malevolent elevator had been installed.

  And so it was that one day, shortly after his Aunt Leanora had been arrested yet again for shoplifting shoes, he got into the evil lift, pressed the button for the Ground Floor, went down six floors and, when the doors opened, Montague Du Cann stepped out not into the Cosmetics and Food Hall but into a small town in New Mexico!

  ***

  Montague Du Cann found himself standing in Española – the very town where he and his gang had robbed the bank all those years ago.

  ‘There he is!’ yelled an elderly man, who was sitting in a rocking chair on the stoop of a timber shack. ‘I recognize that guy! He was the one that robbed the bank twenty years ago!’

  Now you might think it surprising that Montague Du

  Cann should have been recognized so instantaneously from an event that had happened so long ago. But there is a perfectly good explanation. You see, the elderly gentleman sitting in the rocking chair had been the chief cashier of the bank that Montague Du Cann (then known as Juan Gonzales) and his gang had robbed, and ever since then he had been sitting in that rocking chair on the stoop of his shack thinking about the only interesting thing that had happened to him in his life. As a result he remembered every little detail of that important occasion as clear as daylight.

  ‘That’s Juan Gonzales! The leader of the Dos Hombres Gang!’ exclaimed the elderly man. ‘Quick! Call the sheriff! Arrest him! The others got twenty years and twenty five years apiece, but Juan Gonzales got away scot-free! Now he can pay for his crime!’

  Well, Montague Du Cann, or Juan Gonzales as he used to be, turned and banged on the doors of the elevator, which had brought him to the last place on earth he wanted to revisit. But the lift doors were firmly closed and the elevator wouldn’t open them again no matter how many times Montague Du Cann pressed the ‘Call Lift’ button.

  Eventually a small crowd gathered around Montague Du Cann and stood there gaping at him. They were, of course, equally curious about the elevator that had suddenly appeared on the outside wall of the only department store in Española – despite the fact that the building had only one storey. Montague Du Cann gave up pushing the elevator button, and started to push his way through the crowd, as he did back in his department store in Swindon during the Winter Sales, shouting, ‘Make way, there! Come along!

  There’s plenty of room! Let me through I am the Head of this Department Store!’ And the crowd simply fell back and allowed him to walk through.

  ‘Arrest him! Stop that man!’ yelled the chief cashier, who had leapt out of his rocking chair, and was now jumping up and down on the stoop of his shack. ‘He’s a notorious bank robber!’ But none of the people in the crowd had lived in Española long enough to remember the great day of the bank robbery, and in any case none of them knew what the old man was screaming about because he was yelling in Welsh, and the inhabitants of Española all spoke mostly Spanish with a little bit of English but not a single word of Welsh.

  The elderly man, you see, came originally from Dolgellau just north of Machynlleth, right in the middle of Wales, and always relapsed into his native tongue whenever he got excited.

  Meanwhile, Montague Du Cann, formerly known as the desperate bandit Juan Gonzales, strolled round the corner and walked into the saloon.

  Now it was, to be precise, exactly twenty years, three months and seven days ago that Juan Gonzales had escaped from the police and abandoned the Dos Hombres Gang to their fate. Fernando Salvador, the second-in-command, and Pedro Del Camino, had been released from jail earlier in the year, having served their sentences. Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez, otherwise known as The Kid, had also been released around the same time, having had his sentence reduced for being polite to the prison guards.

  The three of them, having no other friends or relatives

  still living, had met up again, and Fernando Salvador, the second-in-command, had proposed that they carry on robbing banks as they had done in the past.

  ‘But it got us twenty years in jail!’ exclaimed Pedro Del Camino. ‘I don’t want to risk the same thing happening again.

  ‘I was known as The Kid, when I went into jail,’ said Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez. ‘Now I’m a middle-aged gentleman and I’ve got a beer belly.’

  ‘Listen,’ said Fernando Salvador, the second-in-command, who – you will remember – was not very bright. ‘We only got caught the last time because Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez got drunk, and started boasting about how we’d robbed the bank. All we have to do this time is avoid getting drunk and we’ll be OK.’

  The other two, who were also, by the way, not very bright, thought about this for some time, and then Pedro Del Camino said, ‘But which bank shall we rob this time?’

  ‘Ah!’ exclaimed Fernando Salvador, the second-in-command. ‘I’ve given this a lot of thought over the last twenty years, and I have hit on the perfect bank for us to rob! It will be as easy as taking pennies from a blind beggar’s hat!’ (Fernando Salvador, the second-in-command, was not only not very bright, he was also not very pleasant.)

  ‘What bank would that be?’ asked Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez.

  ‘The bank in Española, of course!’ exclaimed Fernando Salvador.

  ‘But that’s the one we got jailed for robbing last time!’ exclaimed Pedro Del Camino.

  ‘Exactly!’ said Fernando Salv
ador. ‘We’ve done it successfully once before – the second time will be even easier! We know where it is, which is a plus, because it means we won’t have to spend money on a street map. We know what it looks like, so we won’t go into the wrong building, and we can remember where the safe was!’

  ‘Can we?’ asked Pedro Del Camino, who couldn’t.

  ‘It’ll be a cinch!’ said Fernando Salvador.

  Well, after several hours of argument, Fernando Salvador finally persuaded the other two that it was a good plan, and they agreed to rob the same bank that they had robbed twenty years before.

  So they took the Greyhound bus from Albuquerque to Española, but had to get out at Pojoaque, because they didn’t have enough money for the whole trip, and they had to walk the remaining twenty miles from Pojoaque to Española. They arrived covered in dust and thirsty, and went straight to the nearest bar, where they downed three beers on the trot, before they remembered they didn’t have any money.

  They were just arguing about whether to run out of the bar all together, or do it quietly one at a time . . . when who should walk in through the door but Juan Gonzales – the very man they blamed for all their misfortunes! The very man who tricked them into letting him escape, while they all got arrested and spent twenty years in jail!

  Montague Du Cann, as Juan Gonzales now thought of himself, did not notice the three desperate-looking men, covered in dust, sitting at the shadiest table in the saloon. He walked straight up to the counter, ordered a beer, and took out a large wad of money from his pocket.

  Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez nudged Pedro Del Camino. ‘He’s done all right for himself,’ he whispered darkly.

  The bar tender, however, looked at the bank note that Montague Du Cann had taken from the wad.

  ‘What’s this?’ growled the bar tender.

  ‘It’s an English £50 note. It’s worth $90. You can keep the change.’

  ‘We don’t do foreign currency,’ growled the bar tender. ‘Go and see if the bank sells beer!’ And he took the glass away from Montague Du Cann.

  ‘Now wait a minute!’ exclaimed Montague Du Cann, who had grown used to being obeyed. ‘I am offering you perfectly good legal tender that . . .’

  ‘Get lost,’ growled the bar tender.

  ‘No! Stay where you are, Juan Gonzales!’ growled another voice, this time in his ear. Montague Du Cann span round to find himself face with a grizzled desperado. ‘You and I have an old score to settle!’ said Fernando Salvador, and before Montague Du Cann knew what was happening he found himself lifted off his feet by six hefty hands, and he was propelled out of the bar and into the blistering New Mexico sunshine.

  For a moment Montague Du Cann had no idea who these three desperate-looking men were.

  ‘Forgotten your old mates, have you?’ snarled Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez.

  ‘The Kid!’ exclaimed Montague Du Cann, for he instantly recognized Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez’s voice. ‘And Pedro Del Camino!’ he exclaimed. ‘And you

  must be my second-in-command, Fernando Salvador! How good to see you! I’ve been looking for you all over!’

  ‘We weren’t hard to find!’ growled Fernando Salvador. ‘We was stuck in the Albuquerque Penitentiary for the last twenty years. You just had to look there!’

  ‘No, I mean – I’ve just arrived to look for you!’ Montague Du Cann was very good at both thinking on his feet and at saying things that were not strictly true. It was an ability that had kept him in good stead as both a bandit and as head of a department store in Swindon. ‘I’ve been lying low all this time, trying to think of a plan to get you out of jail!’

  ‘Really, boss?’ asked Pedro Del Camino, who was the most gullible of the three.

  ‘Yes! It’s the honest truth!’ lied Montague Du Cann. ‘And I finally formulated a foolproof plan, and have come all this way from England to try to spring you from jail!’

  ‘Well, you’re too late!’ snarled Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez. ‘We’re already out!’

  ‘Then so much the better!’ said Montague Du Cann. ‘For now you can join me in my next bank raid!’

  ‘We’re already doing our own bank raid!’ snapped Fernando Salvador, the second-in-command. ‘We don’t need you! You double-crossed us!’

  ‘Yeah! That’s right!’ exclaimed Pedro Del Camino. ‘You got us to keep the police occupied while you ran away . . .’

  ‘You ain’t fit to live!’ spat out The Kid, and grabbed Montague Du Cann by the cravat and started to punch him . . .

  But at that moment, the doors of the saloon burst open and the bar tender appeared, holding a gun.

  ‘Hey! You three! You ain’t paid for your beers!’

  ‘Run for it!’ cried Fernando Salvador, the second-in-command.

  ‘Rats!’ exclaimed Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez, dropping Montague Du Cann on the ground. And all three of them turned and ran off, while the bar tender sprayed bullets in their wake.

  Now the bar tender, as it happened, was not a good man. He had been born out of wedlock, and had suffered since childhood from a chronic disease of the ocular nerve, which gave him a pronounced squint. As a result, his character had been so deformed that he thought nothing of deliberately keeping the clock in the bar of the saloon ten minutes fast – so he could close early.

  He was genuinely a swivel-eyed, two-timing bastard.

  This was, however, good news for Fernando Salvador, Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez and Pedro Del Camino as they sprinted across the High Street of the town of Española, for the bar tender was a poor shot, and the bullets went flying over their heads without hitting any of them.

  All this time, Montague Du Cann, formerly known as Juan Gonzales, had been lying stretched on the ground, where The Kid had dropped him. He didn’t dare move until the bar tender ran out of bullets.

  When he did, and shuffled back into the saloon, Montague Du Cann got cautiously to his feet and then started marching smartly down the road in the opposite direction. He had not gone more than a couple of hundred yards, when he froze in his tracks. There it was! A building

  whose image was burnt on his mind: the bank that they had robbed twenty years ago!

  It looked almost exactly the same as it had all that time ago. A strange urge came over him. He wanted to walk in there, pull out his gun and order everyone to lie on the floor, while he took the keys to the safe from the bank clerk. Oh! That feeling of power . . . of other people obeying you implicitly . . . It was almost as good as being the head of a department store.

  He shook the fantasy out of his head. He wasn’t going to rob a bank again as long as he lived. Besides, he didn’t have a gun.

  But at that moment, one was pushed into his hands.

  ‘What’s this?’ exclaimed Montague Du Cann, dropping the gun like a hot brick.

  ‘You’re robbing the bank with us!’ said Fernando Salvador.

  ‘Just like we did twenty years ago,’ said The Kid. ‘Only this time you’re gonna take the fall for us three. Not the other way round!’

  ‘Yeah!’ said Pedro Del Camino. ‘Get it?’

  ‘You’re crazy!’ exclaimed Montague Du Cann. ‘You’ll all get caught! You haven’t got a plan!’

  ‘We haven’t got no money! That’s what we ain’t got!’ said Fernando Salvador. ‘We ain’t got no choice!’

  ‘You dummies!’ hissed Montague Du Cann. ‘You don’t even have a getaway car!’

  There was a silence. Fernando Salvador looked at Antonio Gabriel Bernardino Martinez and The Kid looked at Pedro Del Camino. Juan Gonzales was right. That’s why

  he had been leader of the Dos Hombres Gang. He had the brains.

  And then a smile came over The Kid’s face. ‘Wait a minute!’ he said. ‘Seems to me you had a pretty hefty bank roll, there in the saloon. Seems to me you could hand that over and we’d be quits.’

  ‘It’s no good to you,’ replied Montague Du Cann, quick as a flash. ‘It’s only English money.
It’s not worth anything here in New Mexico.’

  The three desperate bandits looked at each other a little crestfallen, and their shoulders slumped.

  ‘Then we’ll have to rob the bank after all,’ moaned Fernando Salvador.

  But then Pedro Gonzales suddenly perked up. ‘Hey!’ he said to Montague Du Cann. ‘You can change English money into US dollars at the bank, can’t you?’

  ‘Yeah! That’s right!’ said The Kid.

  ‘So what are we waiting for?’ cried Fernando Salvador, and he grabbed Montague Du Cann’s coat and tried to dig out the wad of notes.

  But Montague Du Cann had been about to pay off some blackmailers who had discovered his previous life as a bandit. For this reason he was carrying more cash than he would ever normally carry – to the tune of several thousand pounds. He was not going to let his former accomplices steal that money if he could help it. So he punched Fernando Salvador on the nose, hit The Kid in the stomach and kicked Pedro Del Camino in the crotch.

  Then he turned and ran back down the road, forgetting for the moment about the bar tender, who had just

  reappeared outside the saloon. As soon as he saw the three non-paying customers running towards him he opened fire again.

  The bullets sprayed all over the High Street, scattering the few people who were about.

  But Montague Du Cann didn’t give two hoots. He wasn’t going to allow those crispy £50 notes to fall into the hands of his erstwhile colleagues. He ran straight past the saloon, and round the corner. The three former bandits didn’t stop either. They reckoned that the bankroll in Juan Gonzales’ hand was the only real chance they had of getting any money that day.

  They rounded the corner in time to see something odd happen. Juan Gonzales had stopped outside a building that appeared to have an elevator that opened straight on to the street. None of them had ever seen such a thing before. What’s more the elevator doors were opening, and Juan Gonzales, the former leader of the Dos Hombres Gang – the man who had betrayed them and who now refused to help them in their hour of need, was stepping into the lift.