Jack only manages to slither halfway into the space above the closet. Then Jim has to climb the ladder and pull on both his feet as hard as he can, as if his son were a rat who had crawled into a soda bottle to drink the contents and had become too fat to squeeze out again. When Jack 1nally comes loose, the two of them fall to the Aoor, Jim with a crash and Jack with a thud. They lie there sprawled on the closet Aoor, surrounded by womenโs underwear from the last century and with the rabbitโs head rolling around, sending the dust balls Aeeing in fear of their lives. Jack embarks upon another verbal demonstration of his knowledge of farmyard anatomy, before getting to his feet and saying: โWell, thereโs a very narrow old ventilation duct up there, but itโs sealed at the far end. Cigarette smoke might blow out, but thereโs no way anyone could get through there. Not a chance.โ
Jim looks unhappy, mostly because Jack looks so unhappy. The father remains standing in the closet for a while after his son storms out, to give him time to walk a few circuits of the living room and get the swearing out of his system. When Jim eventually walks out he 1nds Jack standing in front of the open 1replace, thinking.
โDo you think the bank robber could have got out this way?โ Jim wonders. โDo you think heโs Santa Claus or something?โ Jack answers, with
unnecessary cruelty that he regrets at once. But thereโs ash at the bottom of the grate, and itโs still warmโthereโs been a 1re here fairly recently. When Jack carefully pokes about with his Aashlight, he 1shes out the remains of a ski mask. He holds it up to the light. Looks at the blood on the Aoor and the furniture around him, trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together.
In the meantime Jim wanders about apparently at random, and 1nds himself in the kitchen, where he opens the fridge (which perhaps indicates that it wasnโt entirely random after all). Thereโs leftover pizza in there, on a china plate, carefully covered with clingwrap. Who would do that, in the middle of a hostage drama? Jim shuts the fridge and returns to the living room. Jack is still standing by the 1replace holding the partially burned ski mask in his hand, his shoulders slumped in resignation.
โNo, I canโt see how he got out of the apartment, Dad. Iโve tried looking at it from every possible and impossible angle, but I still donโt understand how the hellโฆโ
Jack suddenly looks so sad that his dad immediately tries to cheer him up by asking questions.
โWhat about the blood? How can the bank robber have lost this much blood and stillโ?โ Jim begins, but is interrupted by a voice from the hall. Itโs the police officer whoโs been standing guard.
โEr, that isnโt the bank robberโs blood,โ he blurts out cheerfully, picking something from his teeth.
โWhat?โ Jack asks.
โSchusssschfnurschulle,โ the officer says, with almost his entire hand stuck in his mouth, as if the blood were nowhere near as important as the souvenir from his lunch that had gotten stuck in there. The hand reemerges with a piece of cashew nut, and the newly liberated mouth laughs and looks remarkably happy.
โSorry?โ Jim says, with rapidly dwindling patience.
The cheerful police officer points at the dried blood on the Aoor.
โI said: thatโs stage blood. Look at the way itโs drying, real blood doesnโt look like that,โ he says, holding the piece of cashew nut as if heโs unsure whether to throw it away or frame it as a memory of this great personal achievement.
โHow do you know that?โ Jim asks him.
โIโm a bit of a magician in my spare time. Well, to be more accurate, Iโm a bit of aย 9olicemanย in my spare time!โ
His expectation that Jim and Jack are going to laugh at that turns out to be an optimistic prognosis, so he coughs rather forlornly and adds: โI do a few shows, stuP like that. Old peopleโs homes and so on. Sometimes I pretend to cut
myself, and then I use stage blood. Iโm quite good, actually. If youโve got a pack of cards on you, I canโฆโ
Jack, who has never looked like he just happened to โhave a pack of cards on himโ at any time in his life, points at the blood.
โSo youโre quite sure this isnโt real blood?โ The police officer nods con1dently.
Jack and Jim look thoughtfully at each other. Then they each switch their Aashlights on, even though the ceiling lights are already on, and start to go through the apartment, inch by inch. Around and around and around. Staring at everything but still seeing nothing. Thereโs a bowl of limes next to the pizza boxes on the table. All the glasses are neatly placed on coasters. Thereโs a marker on the Aoor to indicate where the police found the bank robberโs pistol. Right beside it is a small table with a small lamp on it.
โDad? The phone we sent in for the perpetrator, where did we 1nd it when we came in?โ Jack suddenly asks.
โIt was there, on that little table,โ Jim says. โThat explains it,โ Jack sighs.
โExplains what?โ
โWeโve been thinking about this wrong all along.โ