Fake Currency

(Part 1)

Mister Jackal and Mister Hyena decided to rob a bank.

“I think we can rob Piggy’s Bank. It is small bank. Only three employees; very few customers; and most of them are senior citizens.  It would be easy to take care of three bored employees and a couple of aged customers,” suggested Mister Jackal.

“But we won’t find large amount of cash. After all the trouble, we may hardly get a few thousand rupees,” said Mister Hyena.

“No, that’s not true. Every bank has a few millions in the safe; even a small bank like Piggy’s Bank would have five or six million,” countered Mister Jackal.

“But I think we should dream big; let’s rob a big a bank,” insisted Mister Hyena.

“Let us not tempt the fate; we have never been caught and I don’t want to get caught robbing a big bank,” said Mister Jackal.

That settled the argument. They decided to rob Piggy’s Bank. In the garb of beggars they went around the bank to choose the escape route.

“Everything should be well planned, even a safe route to escape in case anything goes wrong,” Mister Jackal said to his friend. “Tomorrow you go to the bank as a customer and open an account. Just deposit five hundred rupees.”

“But why do we need an account in the bank?” asked Mister Hyena.

“We don’t need an account. You will go there to observe; I will also come with you. We will observe everything that happens in the bank and everything that is there in the bank,” said Mister Jackal.      

Next day they went to the bank. Mister Hyena filled up a form for opening an account. He went to Mister Clerk, one of the bank employees. Mister Clerk was attending to a customer who had to deposit money.

“Sir, five of these currency notes are fake,” Mister Clerk said to that customer and returned him a few currency notes.

“How can that be? These were given to me by my office and I work in a government office,” the customer argued.

Mister Hyena was attentively listening to this argument. He stretched his neck and looked at the fake currency notes. These were one thousand rupees notes. “How do you know that these notes are fake?” he asked Mister Clerk just out of curiosity.

But Mister Clerk did not reply. He always attended to one customer at a time.

Mister Hyena was not doing what he was supposed to do but Mister Jackal had not been wasting his time. He had been carefully observing everything. He called Mister Hyena and they both left the bank.

“I could not open the account,” Hyena said in irritation.

“You were to observe the layout of the bank and the routine of bank employees and of security guard. What did you observe?” barked Mister Jackal.

“Well, actually I thought I would observe everything after opening the account,” Mister Hyena said timidly.

“Just forget it; I know what we need to know.  Tomorrow we would reach the bank few minutes before one. They close the bank for lunch at sharp one. The security guard is a careless person. He leaves his gun near the washroom to wash his hands. We will take away his gun and lock him in the washroom. Then we will rob the bank.”

“Is it that simple?” asked Hyena, he was a bit astonished.

“Yes,” said Mister Jackal. He was full of confidence.

Next day, as planned, they reached the bank few minutes before 1 PM.  They were not wearing masks on the faces. But they were using false beards and moustaches to disguise their identity.   

(to be continued)

©i b arora

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