by Rex Burns
Bunch snorted a laugh. “Yeah. They know. Here’s what’ll happen: You go to Canon City, they go on probation. The cops want you, Scotty, not them. They’re just mules. The cops are willing to trade for testimony against you.”
“You’re all on your lonesome,” agreed Devlin. “Unless you’ve got something to trade, too.”
His eyes, a kind of muddy green, narrowed. “Like what?”
“Information.”
“Screw that.”
Bunch said, “We don’t work for the cops. We work for Advantage Corporation. But the cops will listen to us on the charges. Maybe, with Mr. Reznick’s help, the charges can be reduced.”
“Who the hell is Reznick?”
“Your boss. The plant manager.”
The eyes studied Bunch and Devlin. Finally Martin said, “Reduced to what? It’s only possession.”
“No. It’s possession with intent to sell. No jury’ll believe you brought in twenty kilos of ninety percent pure for your own recreational use, Scotty. You’re under the Kingpin Statute, and Miller’s hungry for your ass.” Bunch smiled. “How’s it feel to be a genuine kingpin?”
“And maybe,” said Devlin, “the charges will be increased. Remember the kid who was murdered? What’s your alibi for that night, Martin?”
“No you don’t—”
“Yes, you son of a bitch, I do. Visser threatened us, and you and Tony carried out that threat. You two killed that boy, Scotty. Just like you said you would. Remember Visser? He swore out a deposition that you brought in Tony and you both went over there and killed the kid. Premeditated murder one, with aggravating circumstances. That’s a death charge, Scotty. That’s the big one.”
“Hey, I didn’t do that. I don’t know nothing about that!”
“Cut the bullshit, Martin.”
“I didn’t—”
Bunch’s large hands grabbed Martin’s ears and lifted him to the end of the short chain and thudded the back of his head against the white concrete wall. He leaned over the grunting man. “You shit-for-brains, you’re getting a deal! You’re getting a fucking deal and you better take it!”
“You can’t hurt me like this—I got rights! Guard!”
Bunch picked him up again. “We’re not cops. You got no rights with us.” He bounced the man again.
“Ow!”
“Everything all right in here?” A uniformed officer leaned through the door to look suspiciously at the three men.
“Tell the man, Martin. Tell him it’s not all right. Tell him you want to talk to somebody in homicide.”
Martin stared at the black policeman, his eyes wide and mouth open. But no sound came. Instead, he took a deep breath and chewed his lower lip and nodded. “It’s fine. Fine.”
Bunch smiled at the officer. “We’re from down the hall in Vice and Narcotics.”
The policeman grunted. “Getting pretty noisy out here.”
“Thanks,” Devlin said. “It’ll be quiet now.”
The heavy door with its rivets and tiny Plexiglas window closed again. Kirk gazed down at Martin, and he seemed to be a long distance away, as if bracketed in the sights of a rifle. “I don’t want to give you a deal, Martin. I want you to fry. I want to hear your goddamn skin crackle like bacon.” The man’s eyes gazed hollowly back at Kirk. “A premeditated torture murder. There’s no way you’ll beat the death sentence on that, Scotty.”
“It wasn’t me!”
“We’ve got the deposition. As an accessory, you’ll be just as dead.”
Martin’s Adam’s apple bobbed. “What kind of deal?”
“We want Tony and the names of the people in the Pensacola plant. You give them to us and maybe—just maybe—I’ll talk to Reznick about lowering the charges.”
A long minute. “What about—ah … the other. You know.” He swallowed again. “I’m telling you the truth—it wasn’t me!”
“Then you by God tell us who it was.”
CHAPTER 21
EVENTUALLY, HE DID; in his eyes, justice was a series of deals, and what helped Martin was what was just. He repeated several times that he had not been the one to kill Newman, that he didn’t know that’s what Tony was going to do. “He said he was going to thump the guy a little. Nothing heavy, just a few thumps to find out what he knew. Me, I was lookout. Outside the door. We went over, the guy sees me through the peephole and opens the door, then Tony steps in. Next thing I hear is the music go loud.”
“You didn’t hear any screams?”
Martin shook his head, and his eyes moved away from Kirk’s stare. “Later, Tony opened the door and told me to come in and help clean up. He’d taped the guy’s mouth so he couldn’t scream too loud. And there was all this fucking music real loud … .”
Neither Kirk nor Bunch believed the man, but there was no evidence otherwise. When they got Tony, that scumbag might tell a different version and it would be up to the prosecutors to decide which was the best story to bring into court.
“Why’d he kill the kid? He didn’t have to do that.”
One of Martin’s shoulders bobbed. “I don’t know. Maybe he flipped. Tony’s got this thing about hurting people, I don’t know. He did hard time in Joliet and some other place.”
Tony was one of the Pensacola people, and Martin thought he was the one who put the organization together. He was also the one Martin telephoned after Chris came in with the story about selling cocaine in the factory. “An emergency number, you know? Something comes up, I call this number, somebody calls back, finds out what’s the hang-up. Tony maybe takes care of it. Anyway, I told him about this guy wants to sell cocaine in the plant. Tony didn’t believe it, but he says he’ll come and scope it out because it was bad news anyway. Set up a meet, he told me, use a front, and he’d go along to look things over. So I told Eddie to meet with you people. Eddie and Tony. I never met the guy in person before. I don’t know if that’s his real name, even. Anyway, he goes along as driver. After the meet, we went over to talk to the guy. Newman. Find out what kind of scam is really going down.”
“And you found out.”
“Tony came out of the room and said you was company dicks and there wasn’t nothing to worry about. We’d just lay low for a while. Keep our eyes open.”
“And he said Chris was dead.”
Martin looked down at his dusty work boots. “No. Not exactly. He just told me to come in and help clean up.” He looked up. “I was along but I didn’t know what was going down.”
Bunch snorted. “And if you did, you’d have stopped it, right?”
Martin thought about that, then shook his head. “I don’t think so. I don’t think I could’ve.” A deep breath. “You people going after him? You two?”
“Yeah.”
The man shook his head. “Company dicks. You ain’t got a chance.”
The trick would be to grab Tony before he slid away. Martin would help them do that, though he didn’t know it yet.
The Pensacola team was made up of three people. One was a man Martin did time with in Menard, Illinois—the one who had brought him in on the deal, Stan Schuler. The second was somebody who worked with Schuler in the Pensacola plant, but Martin didn’t know his name. The third was Tony, who had the contacts in Colombia or Panama and who ran the organization. “He’s got three falls, so he stays behind things. But it’s his scam, you know? His contacts and all.”
“What about the dope on this end? Where do you send it?” Devlin asked.
Martin chewed at his lip. “You people haven’t given me the Miranda, you know? You can’t use none of this.”
“I told you, we’re not cops. But you help us, we help you. You don’t help us, only God can help you.” Bunch let a drop of spit fall to the concrete between his large shoes. “And He don’t really give a shit, does He?”
“What do you do with the dope?” Devlin asked again.
“Take our cut and ship the rest on. We get ten percent of everything we sell, split it with Johnny and Vinny. Johnny gets thre
e, Vinny gets two because he’s the new guy. I keep five. We send the rest of the money back to Tony, and the rest of the dope we ship out to other Advantage docks. You know, the distribution points.”
“You put it in canisters and send it that way?”
“Yeah.”
“To who?”
“I don’t know.”
“Come on!”
“I don’t. The only one who knows the whole layout is Tony. He set it up that way for security. He don’t want nobody asking questions about the operation. I don’t know who gets it. They don’t know who sends it. All they know is a barrel comes in with the mark, they got a shipment in the bracing.”
“What mark?”
“A number code. An extra line of numbers we stencil on the canister. They block it out when they get it and the canister goes back to Pensacola or wherever.”
“How many points do you ship to?”
“Five docks. The number code I get tells me how to divide it up. Each dock has a number too, and however many times the number shows up, that’s how many kilos I send.”
Bunch looked at his notebook. “Dock eight gets four kilos from this load?”
Martin looked too. “Eight. A double number means double the kilos.”
“Where’s dock eight?”
“San Jose.”
Devlin asked, “Are you the only people doing this?”
“Working for Tony, you mean? Yeah. There’s only one shipping crew in the warehouse. Nobody else handles the canisters.”
Bunch propped a foot on the metal bench. “The vice dicks’ll want to have the names of the people you sell to around here. We don’t give a damn, but they’ll want them. You’ll help your case by telling Miller all about them. Hear me?”
“I hear.”
He heard something else, too: what would happen to him if he in any way tried to warn the people in Pensacola about Devlin and Bunch. Then they turned him over to Dave Miller for the paperwork and stopped at the Brewery Bar for dinner and a couple beers. And to talk over who would make the trip to Pensacola.
It was Devlin. Bunch’s job was to sit on Martin and make certain he did his part. Besides, he had Humphries and Mitsuko to watch over, too. Dave Miller gave Kirk a contact in the Pensacola Police Department’s vice and narcotics section if he needed it, and Devlin telephoned Reznick at home to bring him up to date. The manager was happy to hear that Martin had been taken out. But he wanted to be certain the company name didn’t get splashed in the press. “You’ll be working undercover in Pensacola, too?”
“No. We don’t have time for that.” Even if Martin kept quiet, the word on his bust would get there in a few days at most.
“Well, listen, Kirk. Stewart’s adamant that none of this reflect ill on the company—”
“I understand. I’ll try to pick them up off company property. Just as we did with Martin.”
Reznick told Devlin the name of the plant director—Malcolm Colby—and offered to call first thing in the morning to tell him that Kirk was on his way.
Bunch explained to Miller what he wanted Martin to do. The cop wasn’t all that eager to let Bunch violate procedures with his prize catch, but finally agreed on condition that Martin wasn’t to go anywhere without a guard. “I can fix it with the chief,” Miller said. “But you got to give me a couple hours’ lead.”
“I won’t be able to, Dave. Kirk’s on the other end and he’ll set up the call for whenever he can. It’s not like he’ll be calling the shots. You know that.”
Miller leaned back and looked at Bunch across the glass top of his gray metal desk. Its surface hadn’t been wiped in a long time, and circles of old coffee stains and shreds of eraser and cigarette ash showed up against the family photographs, lists of telephone numbers, and emergency procedures pressed flat by the glass. “You want to keep him the full seventy-two, that it?”
“Hey, it’ll save the county money.” Bunch added, “And this is a big operation. You saw that. Twenty kilos of pure every shipment, maybe more. You know and I know the chief’ll want to break something like that.”
Miller stared at his desk and then nodded. The pink scalp on top of his head showed through his lank blond hair. He’d already asked Bunch if his hair looked thinner since the last time they talked. Bunch lied and said no and asked him who wanted fat hair anyway. “We still have to use an escort. I know Chief Pozner’s going to insist on that.”
“No problem. That way, I can take care of my other chores.”
The result was that Martin was moved into his own apartment under guard, sleeping on a couch shoved against one wall of the tiny living room where they could keep an eye on him. Any of the small rooms he went into, he went accompanied. And when he went to the bathroom, the door was always open to the sound of his stream or to his pink, bony knees. He ate things that came out of cardboard boxes.
If Scotty wasn’t happy, neither were the cops who rotated every eight hours to guard the prisoner while they waited for Devlin’s telephone call from Florida. At least everyone was equally unhappy, and what was more democratic than that? Bunch was reminded of when he had worn a uniform and guarded prisoners and had wondered what the difference really was between the restraint the criminals were under and that of the cop. The answer once again reinforced his decision to leave the department.
The “other chores” Bunch had mentioned to Miller included sporadic surveillance on Truman and protection for Humphries. The Truman case had to wait—along with the cramped Subaru—because there were only so many slices of himself to go around. Besides, it might be better to let that foxy lady think they’d dropped the case. Humphries, on the other hand, wouldn’t wait. Miss Watanabe called the next morning.
“I don’t know how he got so close to the house, Mr. Bunchcroft. It came through the front room window. I called Roland and he told me to lock myself in the bathroom and call you right away. He wants you to please come right now.”
“Do you have your revolver?”
“Yes.” She added in a small voice, “I’m afraid, Mr. Bunchcroft.”
“Call 911 and tell the police what happened. I’m on my way out.”
He gave the officer guarding Martin his mobile phone number in case he needed it. Scotty asked if Bunch would bring back a TV Guide so he could keep up with what was happening on the tube. “I mean, at least in jail they got a dayroom with a newspaper and maybe People magazine. Here it’s just the goddamn TV, and all I can find is reruns.”
“You want a woman, too?”
“Hey, I’m trying to help you people out. A lousy magazine ain’t too much to ask, you know!”
“You’re trying to help yourself out, Martin. I’ll see if I remember.”
The day officer, leather belts creaking with boredom, added, “Try hard.”
When Bunch sidled cautiously through the front door of Humphries’ house, he listened for any sounds. There was the faint warble of a meadowlark beyond the tree line and the sigh of wind through the screened windows. He called out Mitsuko’s name but got no answer. With weapon drawn, he inspected the rooms until he came to the master bedroom. He knocked on the closed bathroom door. “Mitsuko? It’s me—Bunch.”
The door clicked and, clutching the pistol in the white fingers of both hands, she came out. “Is he here?”
“Nobody’s here, Mitsi. The sheriffs officers haven’t come yet?”
“No.”
Bunch carefully set the pistol aside and called in to cancel the 911 alert. “Show me what happened.”
She took him to the living room. A trail of glass led from the broken window and glistened across the long white couch and onto the carpet with its raised geometrical border and Chinese characters carved in the center. A smooth rock about the size of a fist lay near the characters. It had scratched the leg of the low coffee table when it hit. Aiming back through the window, Bunch could see the thicket of pine where the man could have stood to throw it.
“The sensor field wasn’t on?”
“No. Roland only turns it on at night.”
“And you didn’t see anyone?”
“No. I was in the kitchen and heard the noise. I came out here and saw the broken window and the rock. I ran to the bedroom and got the pistol and locked myself in the bathroom.”
“Did you hear any noises? Prowler?”
“No. Only when you came.” She held out a wrinkled piece of paper. “This was with the rock.”
Bunch opened it up. “It’s Japanese. I can’t read it.”
“It says, ‘Do what is right before it is too late for you.’ “
He looked at the small woman, whose eyes were still on the slightly grimy slip of paper. “What’s it mean?”
She shrugged. “I am to go back to Japan. Or be killed.”
“It’s from the yojimbo?”
“Oh yes.”
“Your father wants you to come back or he’s going to have you killed, that it?”
“Yes. My father.”
“And despite that, you don’t want to go back.”
“No.”
“What happens when Humphries gets tired of all this?”
Her head shook once, almost a spasmodic twitch, and she took a deep breath and straightened up. “He’s not tired of me yet.”
“I wish I knew what your game was.”
“As I told you before—to stay alive.”
CHAPTER 22
AS THE PLANE’S ventilation system started pumping local air and the passengers crowded the aisle to disembark, an unfamiliar humidity wrapped around Kirk like flannel. Outside the aircraft, too, the air felt sticky under a sun that had nothing of autumn or high altitude in it. But Kirk’s strongest impression was of the flat earth paralleling the horizons, a lush, gently rolling green to the north, and on the south the line of the Gulf against a sky burned pale with glare. While the plane circled for its landing Devlin had made out strips of barrier islands off the Gulf shore and a stubby freighter riding at anchor in the brown water of Pensacola Bay. But now there was little chance to rubberneck. The traffic surrounding the airport was heavy, and the roads he’d marked on the Triple A map turned out to be a lot easier to follow on paper than they were in fact. Twelfth Avenue to Fairfield to Pace. Then south a few miles to the industrial area near the shipyards. When he finally turned the rental car into the grid of short streets serving the factories and chemical tanks, his shirt was damp with sweat despite the car’s air conditioning, and the industrial fumes that stung his sinuses seemed to leave an oily film on his skin.
