As the Governor is buying time on the capitol steps, the telephone rings at the ranch. Willie answers.
“Joe’s Bar and-... Oh, hi, Mister Nickels. How ar-... They’re coming up here?... In two hours? And make sure we’re ready to go?... Okay, okay. Sure, sure Mister Nick-... Uh. Your safe?... Behind th-... Okay, sure, consider it done. Bye.”
Willie looks concerned. Dewitt wheels into the living room.
“Who was that?” he asks.
“That was nothin’,” says Willie. “Just... ”
Willie takes a deep breath.
“Doc,” he continues, “that was Mister Nickels. I may’s well tell you what’s happening, Doc. I have a bad feelin’ after two hours you won’t be sharing it. The information, I mean.”
“You mean sharing it anytime soon?” Dewitt wonders, his eyes widening.
“I mean anytime ever,” replies Willie. “He’s sending two of his men up here.”
Dewitt purses his lips and lets out a whistle.
“I was afraid of that,” he says. “What about you and T. P.? – And Michael?”
“Michael’s okay. But me and T. P. You see, Mister Nickels once told someone to ‘be ready when they get there.’– And we never saw the guy again.”
“Yikes,” says Dewitt. “Anything else?”
“Uh, yeah. He wants us, uh, T. P. and me, to move the piano and pull the boards off the wall behind it. He mentioned some kind of safe.”
“That would mean it’s important, whatever’s in there,” notes Dewitt. “If only we could get to it. May be guns. Give us a fighting chance. – Hey, Willie, you ‘packin’?”
Willie slowly shakes his head.
“Doc, T. P.’s always thought I did but I never liked the attached penalties for, you know, packin’ a heater. We just get the job done without one, the professionals that we are.”
Dewitt nods and mumbles to himself.
“Just my luck: Instead of Stallones, I get Flintstones.”
Then he says to Willie, “Well, let’s see if that safe is really a safe safe!”
The two hustle off to fetch T. P. and begin the task of getting to the safe.
A little later the three men sit in the ranch house kitchen. Dewitt is at the table, a pad and pencil his only weapon for now. Willie sits with him. T. P. has been relegated to a corner.
“I’ve seen safes like that before, Doc,” says Willie. He puts up his hands as if trying a combination lock.
“I guess we need to start with ‘one, one, zero,’ then ‘one, two... ”
Willie quickly looks over at T. P. and points a finger. T. P. suppresses himself just in time to avoid Willie’s wrath.
“I’m afraid this isn’t going to get us anywhere,” notes Dewitt. “Are you sure there isn’t anything Nickels might have mentioned, any little thing.”
“I don’t think so, Doc,” says Willie, shaking his head. “I been wreckin’ my brain, but it’d take a rocket scientist, there’s so many choices. And even that guy Einstein wasn’t no rocket scientist.”
Dewitt smiles.
“Hmmm,” he says. “Never thought of it that way, but you’re right.”
T. P. raises a hand but Willie and Dewitt don’t see him. He puts his hand down.
“We’re history if we don’t crack that safe,” says Willie.
T. P. decides to speak up. He clears his throat.
“I got a clue,” he says.
Willie doesn’t even look around.
“You ain’t got no clue!” he says.
There is a pause. Dewitt considers quietly, then looks over at T. P.
“Go ahead, T. P. Tell us,” he says.
“Wellll,” T. P. replies shyly, “once Mister Nickels said the combo was his favorite platter.”
Willie just looks up at the ceiling and sighs. Dewitt has the tiniest of grins on his face. But, he nods and gestures “go on.”
“And once I heard him tell Running Fever it was his favorite day of the year,” T. P. continues.
“What, Chr-”, begins Willie.
Dewitt cuts Willie off abruptly.
“Yes, go on,” he tells T. P., who continues.
“The combination, I mean. He said it was his favorite day of the year.”
“So we’re down to three hundred and sixty-five,” Dewitt says. “That’s good. Really, T. P., I mean it.”
“Gotta be a holiday,” says Willie.
“Or a birthday,” adds T. P.
“I think he’d be too smart for that,” replies Dewitt.
They all ponder.
“Well,” says Willie, “you can mark out ‘Tax Day.’ Mister Nickels don’t pay no taxes.”
Everyone nods, still pondering. Then, Dewitt brightens.
“That’s it! Tax Day! ‘Mister Nickels don’t pay no taxes.’ – He loves it!”
Dewitt wheels around quickly and begins pushing himself toward living room.
“Willie, you may just be the next Einstein!” he yells back.
Willie looks at T. P. with a holier-than-thou look. From outside the room comes Dewitt’s voice.
“And you too, T. P.!” he adds.
T. P. sticks his tongue out at Willie.