The Moneychangers Read Online Free Page A

ambush" signal. The signal was where it should be a small yellow card, placed inconspicuously in a window. The card would have been put there, minutes earlier, by a porter whose job was to be first in the big branch each day. If all was in order inside, he placed the signal where arriving staff would see it. But if robbers had broken in during the night and wer e waiting to seize hostages, no signal would be placed, so its absence became a warning. Then, later arriving staff not only would not enter, but instantly would summon aid.
    Because of increasing robberies of all types, most banks used a "no ambush" signal nowadays, its type and location changing frequently.
    On entering, Edwina went immediately to a hinged panel in the wall and swung it open. In sight was a bell push which she pressed in code two long, three short, one long. The Central Security operations room over in Headquarters Tower now knew that the door alarm, which Edwina's entry had triggered a moment ago, wou ld be ignored and that an authorized officer was in the bank. The porter, also on entering, would have tapped out his own code.
    The ops room, receiving similar signals from other FMA branch banks, would s witch the building's alarm sys tem from "alert" to "stand by."
    Had either Edwina, as duty officer, or the porter failed to t ap out their correct code, the o ps room would have alerted police. Minutes later the branch bank would have been surrounded. As with other systems, codes were changed often.
    Banks everywhere were finding security in positive signals when all was well, an absence of signals if trouble erupted. That way, a bank employee held hostage could convey a warning by merely doing nothing.
    By now other officers and staff were comi ng in, checked by the uniformed porter who had taken command at the side door.
    "Good morning, Mrs. D'Orsey." A white-haired bank veteran named Tottenhoe joined Edwina. He was operations officer, in charge of staff and routine running of the branch, and his long, lugubrious face made him seem like an ancient kangaroo. His normal moodiness and pessimism had increased as compulsory retirement neared; he resented his age and seemed to blame others for it. Edwina and Tottenhoe walked together across the bank's main floor, then down a wide, carpeted stairway to the vault. Supervising the vault's opening and closing was the duty officer's responsibility.
    While they waited by the vault door for the time lock to switch off, Tottenhoe said gloomily, "There's a rumor that Mr. Rosselli's dying. Is it true?"
    "I'm afraid it is." She told him briefly of the meeting yesterday.
    Last night at home Edwina had thought of little else, but this morning she was determined to concentrate on bank business. Ben would expect it.
    Tottenhoe mumbled something dismal which she didn't catch.
    Edwina checked her watch. 8:40. Seconds later, a faint click within the massive chrome steel door announced that the overnight time lock, set before the bank closed the night before, had switched itself off. Now the vault combination locks could be actuated. Until this moment they could not.
    Using another concealed pushbutton, Edwina signaled Central Security ops room that the vault was about to be opened a normal opening, not under duress.
    Standing side by side at the door, Edwina and Tottenhoe spun separate combinations. Neither knew the combination setting of the Other; thus neither could open the vault alone.
    An assistant operations officer, Miles Eastin, had now arrived. A young, handsome, well-groomed man, he was invariably cheerful in pleasant contrast to Tottenhoe's dependable glumness. Edwina liked Eastin. With him was a senior vault teller who would supervise transference of money in and out of the vault through the remainder of the day. In cash alone, nearly a million dollars in currency and coinage would be under his control through the next six operating hours.
    Checks passing through the big branch bank during the same period would