The cold chill of a February morning greeted Spratt as he walked outside. He turned to his right and started walking down the sidewalk with his sights set on the parking lot exit. Noticing that it was quite desolate at this time of the morning, he wondered if he would draw suspicion and also wondered where he would go; the immediate destination didn’t matter at the moment…he just had to get far away from this hotel. As Spratt reached the end of the sidewalk, he heard the distinctive sound of a diesel engine and noticed a person inside the shuttle bus filling out some paperwork. Spratt walked over and asked what time was the first run to the airport. The bus driver stated, “We can go right now if you want”. Spratt couldn’t believe his luck! “Please, let’s go” he replied and got on the bus.
The driver finished filling out his log book and put the bus in gear. Spratt kept expecting to see the two cops run out of the hotel but never did. The bus left the parking lot and got on the main road putting much needed distance between Spratt and the hotel with each second. Spratt pulled Hector’s wallet out and opened it up to inspect the contents: driver’s license, credit cards, and, what Spratt was most interested in, cash! Spratt grabbed the bills and held them up to the window so that he could see their denominations with the help of the streetlights. Three one dollar bills and a five! “What! That’s it?!? Eight fucking dollars!” Spratt was pissed and searched the wallet again. “Surely this motherfucker carries more than eight fucking dollars!” Spratt couldn’t find any more money in the wallet and kicked himself mentally for not taking the Sergeant’s wallet too…”What the FUCK can I do with eight FUCKING dollars!” “Nothing!” Of course, there were credit cards in the wallet…maybe Spratt could do something with those.
Upon arrival at Hartsfield International Airport, Spratt got off the bus and tipped the driver with a one dollar bill while thanking him for the ride and apologizing that he couldn’t leave a better tip, “I don’t have much cash on me” Spratt said. In his mind, he already felt superior to the Sergeant since that cheapskate didn’t tip anybody during the entire trip.
Spratt may as well have told the driver to take him to the police station as the airport at that time of the day is empty except for janitors and cops…lots of cops. Spratt had never seen an airport so completely devoid of passengers. Spratt was the only one in sight not wearing an official uniform. Well, technically, he did have a uniform on but not like everybody else’s. He saw armed security guards, Atlanta city police, TSA officers, a K-9 officer and his dog walking around sniffing things, and a couple of Customs agents. He could only imagine how many were in back rooms that he couldn’t see but, with all of the cameras, could certainly see him. “So much for trying to blend in” thought Spratt, “Holy Fuck! So many goddamned cops!”
Spratt nervously walked up to a janitor and asked where the closest bathroom was. He headed there immediately as he wanted to take the name tags off of his clothing and inspect the rest of Hector’s belongings in good light. He entered the bathroom and quickly noticed there was somebody at the urinals…a cop! “Son of a bitch!” Spratt made his way to the stalls and chose the spacious handicap stall. He heard the cop flush and walk away so he knew he was alone for the moment. Spratt used Hector’s keys to cut into the thread holding the name tag to his jeans and then worked on the shirt’s tag. Keys aren’t very sharp but he finally got them off and flushed them down the toilet.
Opening the shoulder bag, Spratt found exactly what he expected; a portable DVD player and two DVD’s (‘The Incredible Hulk’ and some kind of porn). No money hidden in there anywhere. He put the bag down and went through the Badge/ID holder…nothing in there but the badge, Hector’s official ID, and the handcuff key. (Spratt thought it was kind of funny to be in the midst of all these cops; an escaped inmate sitting on the shitter with a badge and a set of handcuffs!) Spratt went through the wallet once more and found several credit cards but no money. Ironically, being an ‘expert’ on credit card fraud, they were of absolutely no use to him at the moment. All of the stores and restaurants in this part of the airport were closed…certainly he could use them at a 24 hour store like Wal-Mart to get some civilian clothes but how would he get to one? He didn’t even have enough money to take a cab to a store. If he had all of his equipment with him, he could have sent himself some money through Western Union but, even if he could get that through, he only had an inmate ID and doubted that he would be able to pick the money up anyway. Spratt gathered up his things and walked out of the bathroom towards the subway wondering if the trains were running at this hour.
The schedule showed the first train leaving towards downtown Atlanta at 5:00am so he bought a ticket for two dollars. He boarded the waiting train and hoped he didn’t draw attention from the cops due to being the sole passenger. Each moment that passed, he kept expecting a S.W.A.T. team or something to come rushing on board and take him into custody. At the very least, his description may have already been broadcast and even a lone policeman could recognize him and his brief moment of freedom would be over. Finally, the train doors closed and he was whisked out of the station without incident.
On the way downtown, Spratt got nervous at each stop expecting, still, police to come aboard at each station but nothing happened and he felt more comfortable as the train filled up with unsuspecting commuters. Spratt opened up the wallet again and studied everything in it. He memorized all of Hector’s personal information: date of birth, social security number, address, etc. He knew that he couldn’t present the ID to anybody and have them believe that he looked even remotely like the man in the picture but maybe he could bluff his way out of a potential confrontation if he could rattle off personal stats without showing ID. Nothing else in the wallet was of use to him at the moment except, possibly, a ‘Banco Popular’ ATM card but he doubted he could use that because he didn’t know the P.I.N. and it wasn’t a ‘branded’ debit card…just one that could be used to withdraw money from a machine.
Spratt got off at the Peachtree Center Station in downtown and rode the escalator to street level passing a sign proclaiming this particular escalator to be the steepest escalator in the country. Or was it the steepest in the world? Spratt thought that was interesting…they were pretty steep. Leaving the station, Spratt noticed that it was still dark outside. There was a newsstand open next to a convenience store and, though he was hungry, he didn’t want to spend all of the money at one time so he purchased a cup of coffee and a cheap brand of ‘generic’ cigarettes. That left him with about two dollars and a little change. He kept walking down the street and, with nothing better to do, he decided to try Hector’s ATM card but couldn’t find any machines.
Spratt walked inside the lobby of a luxury hotel and asked the front desk clerk if they had an ATM machine. The clerk pointed him to an area off to the side of the front desk and Spratt walked over to give it a try. Spratt stuck the card in, pressed the button indicating withdrawal and hesitated when the screen asked for the P.I.N. Spratt punched in the last four digits of Hector’s social security card and the transaction was declined. Spratt walked back out into the darkness.
Spratt’s mind began wandering. Were the cops awake yet or were they still sleeping soundly? Was there a manhunt for him right now or did he still have a little more time to try to get further away? Spratt walked into another hotel lobby and found the ATM on his own. Spratt inserted the card and entered the last four digits of Hector’s phone number as the P.I.N. The transaction was declined. Spratt didn’t really expect to get any money anyway since Hector had been a fraud investigator. His P.I.N. wouldn’t be an easily accessible number. He walked back into the street and saw that the sky was just a tad brighter meaning that the sun was trying to come up and the street was a bit more lively with pedestrians.
Spratt started walking towards the Greyhound station and noticed an ATM machine jutting out from the wall of one of the buildings. Spratt knew that three failed attempts at a P.I.N. usually meant that the machine would confiscate the card but thought, “Fuck it. I might as well give it another shot.” He stuck the card in the machine and entered Hector’s birth year as the P.I.N. Not surprisingly, the transaction was, again, declined but the machine didn’t keep the card (Spratt guessed that it might have to be three attempts at the same machine…good, now he would be able to try again later). Spratt took the card once more and continued to the bus station knowing that he was running out of time since the cops had asked for a 7:30am wake up call. If they weren’t awake yet, they would be soon. Once they woke up, Spratt was sure that all of the cards in the wallet would be cancelled and they would be of no use to him; he wouldn’t even be able to buy any civilian clothes because the wake-up call was set to go off before ANY downtown stores opened.
Spratt walked inside the bus station knowing that it was not the best idea since this is the first place that cops go when they are hunting a fugitive but he needed to warm up a little bit. He bought another cup of coffee (leaving him with exactly two dollars) and sat down in an area specifically reserved for ticketed passengers only; he hoped that his clean-cut appearance would prevent the security guard from asking to see a ticket. Spratt decided to call his wife in Puerto Rico and pulled out Hector’s cell phone; he hoped it wasn’t too early and that he didn’t wake up her grandmother because she could be pretty feisty at times and he didn’t want any arguments. He dialed the number and the phone was answered by the grandmother on the fourth ring. She spoke something unintelligible in groggy Spanish and hung up. He called back several times but there was no answer. On the fourth, and every subsequent, attempt he got a busy signal and guessed that the grandmother had taken the phone off the hook.
Spratt didn’t know what to do now. He hardly had any money and couldn’t get in touch with anybody that he knew. His options were extremely limited at the moment but he knew that he would get caught if he stayed in Atlanta. He couldn’t leave though because he didn’t have enough money for a ticket. Wandering around the city would surely lead to somebody asking for some ID at some point and he didn’t have any that would be acceptable. Plus, he felt that his picture would probably be in every police car soon so it was just a matter of time before he would be arrested again. Spratt gave serious consideration to using his last two dollars to take the train back to the airport and returning to the hotel on the shuttle bus. He thought it might be funny to be sitting in the lobby enjoying a continental breakfast when the two cops came running around the corner after discovering that he wasn’t in the room. He had proven his point already! He DID escape! He just didn’t have anywhere to go now that he had accomplished this. If they found him in the hotel lobby, they might not be able to charge him with escape. Spratt wondered if he could make it back before they woke up or if it was already too late.
Now warmed and feeling nervous about being in the bus station, Spratt left to decide his next move and was immediately accosted by homeless people and drug addicts that hang around the station asking for money. They didn’t believe he didn’t have any and he felt that he may be close to being robbed. He needed to avoid any confrontation at all costs so as not to draw the attention of the police so he showed one guy his Idaho Inmate ID and told him that he had just gotten out of prison and didn’t have any money. The guy finally relented and left. Spratt continued down the street relieved that he hadn’t been assaulted.
Spratt entered yet another hotel and went directly to their ATM machine. Going through the preliminaries again, the machine asked the amount of the withdrawal prior to asking for the P.I.N. and Spratt arbitrarily punched the button indicating twenty dollars. When asked for the P.I.N., Spratt entered the month and day of Hector’s birthdate and the machine spat out a twenty dollar bill. “Holy Shit!” thought Spratt. He wasn’t expecting this and hurriedly grabbed the money and the receipt leaving the hotel immediately.
Spratt was more paranoid than a crackhead now! His mind began racing with all of the possibilities of why the machine had given him some money. He knew that some of those machines go off-line for accounting reasons at certain times of the day and they will sometimes complete a transaction in that state if the amount of money is small even if they can’t communicate with the bank while reconciling the transactions. However, the P.I.N. is encoded in the magnetic strip on the back of the card and even a machine that is off-line would know that the correct P.I.N. wasn’t entered! Why did it give out the money? Could it be that the cops were now awake and looking for him? Could they have informed the bank to allow transactions so that they could trace where he was? He had to get out of the area now!
Still perplexed, Spratt went to another ATM machine at the Bank of America to see if the twenty dollars was just a fluke or if he could actually get some more money. He entered the same P.I.N. and selected the button for ‘Balance Inquiry’. The machine printed a receipt indicating the balance to be $609.32! “Wow, Hector” thought Spratt, “is that all the money you have?” Spratt tried again and found out the balance in the savings account was zero. “Man! This fucker’s poor!” Spratt decided that if they were using the card to track him then they already knew his location so he decided to just get any amount of money that he could and asked the machine to give him six hundred dollars. The machine didn’t respond immediately which made Spratt nervous and he was about to turn around and leave when the damn thing spit out a stack of twenty dollar bills and a receipt! Spratt now had $622.00!! He was richer than Hector at the moment!
Spratt couldn’t help but grin as he was walking down the street! Hector, the fraud security ‘expert’ had used his birthdate as P.I.N.! That was the most basic admonition that all banks tell their customers! The first thing you are told when you open an account is NOT to use your birthdate! What a dumbass!! Spratt didn’t really know what to do next but he knew one thing: “I’m not going back to the fucking hotel now!”
Spratt purchased another subway ticket and took the train to the furthest station from downtown. He looked in the phone book and found another small Greyhound station in that suburb and took a taxi to it. He purchased a ticket to Greenville, SC and sat down to wait for the bus which was supposed to leave at 9:00am. A few minutes after eight o’clock, Spratt tried to call his wife again but the phone wouldn’t process the call. He tried to dial random numbers but none of them went through…the phone had been cut off. “Well, I guess those fuckers are awake now!” Spratt said to himself. He turned the phone off and took the battery out of it so they couldn’t use it to track him. He figured that if the phone was off then the credit cards had also been deactivated and he wouldn’t even bother trying to use them…doing so would only leave a trail to trace him with.
The bus left on time and without incident but Spratt didn’t relax until it crossed the State line into South Carolina. As soon as he got to Greenville, he bought some food from Burger King and thought that he should get even further away so he immediately bought a ticket for the next bus to Charlotte, NC. Charlotte is a good sized city and he figured, with it being two States away from where he escaped, he had a good chance at not being recognized.
On the bus to Charlotte, Spratt couldn’t help but to amuse himself with what might have happened in the hotel that morning when the cops woke up. He could imagine the phone ringing with the wake-up call and one of the cops sleepily answering it then hanging it up and looking in the direction where Spratt was supposed to be but not finding anything. He imagined the Sergeant would be the one answering the phone since it was closest to his bed. Then he imagined him JUMPING out of the bed and shaking Hector awake, “Where the hell is Spratt!” He imagined Hector jumping up looking confused and then suddenly realizing that their prisoner was missing and rushing to the bathroom praying to himself, “Please be in the bathroom! Please be in the bathroom! Please be in the bathroom!” and bursting through the door only to find a toilet, sink, and shower…no prisoner! Oh, how he wished he could have been a fly on that wall at that moment!
Have been waiting with baited breath for each day's installment! This is a cliffhanger! For anyone who ever needed anyone to root for them, this is your story! Enjoy!
ReplyDeleteLoving it!!
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