SUGARLOAF TOWNSHIP -- A convenience store clerk in Luzerne County faced down a knife-wielding woman who demanded cash from the register.
But instead of giving her the money, he pulled out a baseball bat and stopped the robbery attempt in its tracks.
Hiren Patel hides a bat near the register to be prepared for trouble just like he faced Tuesday night.
A woman showed a knife and said, "open the cash register." Patel had an answer.
Low gas prices may mean less money in convenience store cash registers, but that didn't stop a woman from going into the Gulf station on Route 93 near Conyngham and trying to rob the place.
"She showed me a knife and said, 'open your register,'" Hiren Patel recalled. "I said, 'what?' and she said, 'open your register.' Then I pulled my bat out, and she ran away."
Patel doesn't think the woman expected him to pull out the bat. He says she ran out of the store, got into her car, then sped off on Route 93.
"Little bit (scared)," said Patel. "But that's my job, so I just pulled out my bat."
Patel locked the door to the store and called state police. Troopers were able to get surveillance pictures of the woman wearing a parka. Patel says he chased her out of the store and believes she sped off to I-81 just two miles away.
The store reopened about a half hour after the attempted holdup.
As for the would-be robber who drove off empty handed, Hiren Patel has one message for her: get a job.
"It's not hard to make money for that. It's a little bit of hard work for the money, that's it," he said.
State police are still looking for the would-be robber.
Hiren Patel returned to work at the convenience store Wednesday afternoon.