Bud
Copyright© 2015 by Bill Offutt
Chapter 23
Bud was ten when the robbers entered his father's store one summer afternoon and threw the bolt on the front door behind them. There were three of them, two young men and an older fellow with white stubble on his cheeks and very bloodshot eyes. He was the one with the gun, a double-barreled shotgun, 12-gauge Bud guessed when he saw it. All three wore heavy work shoes with high, rounded toes.
"Don' do nothin' stupid," the older man said, waving the gun toward Bud. "Jus' step away from there and go on into the back room an' set." He wore a striped hat with the B & O logo on it.
That was when Sammy appeared with a cardboard box of canned tomatoes in his hands. "Do what he said, boy," his father said, waving him toward the back of the store after he put the box on the floor and raised his hands.
"Smart man," said the fellow with the gun as the younger men began stuffing cartons of cigarettes into big gunny sacks. "You got a safe?" he asked.
"No, sir," Sammy said, feeling both anger and fear. He was well aware that robbery was one of those things a storekeeper had to expect. He hadn't been robbed since his pocket was picked in Cleveland and his kitbag was lost or stolen in France. He was due, he thought, maybe overdue.
"Got a bank deposit ready?" the man asked, spitting tobacco juice on the floor as the hams and smoked salamis hanging above the meat counter began going into paper bags.
"Not today?" Bud's father said as he heard the side door close in the storeroom. The man with the gun did not seem to notice.
"Well then jus' dump your cash drawer into a poke, and we'll be going."
Sammy went behind the counter, cranked the cash register and pulled the drawer open. He put the paper money up on the counter. "You want the silver?" he asked, hoping the man would not pull the drawer all the way out and see the bigger bills in the back, the tens and one twenty.
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