Pardners

by Roy F. Chandler

  Jocko asked, "What can I tell him about the guy in the ID?"

  Alpha said, "We ought to charge for this, Jocko, but we are not in business. Tell your caller that this man is no longer in the picture."

  Visibly astonished, Jocko said, "That is one hard and experienced, warrior! You claiming he's dead?"

  Alpha turned toward the door before adding, "Now that would cost you a lot of money, Jocko."

  With Bravo behind the wheel, the pickup with the camper in tow rumbled east on US 80.

  Bravo said, "Well, all we've got to do now is get Charlie to tell us who paid the big money for our hides. We'll go visit whoever that is and reason with them. Then we will be done."

  Byrne answered, "Done? We may never get this all the way done, Bravo. In all honesty, I do not see a way that we can end this thing. Kill all the Santos men? There may be a hundred of them. Hell a new generation has grown since we saw them last.

  "We will have to feel our way along. If anything looks beyond managing, we run for the hills—or better put, we cross oceans and maybe never come back.

  Bravo swore. "I like it here."

  They drove in silence until Alpha said, "Washington D.C. is next. If we run most of the night, we can be waiting at Charlie's place of business. We can be there early enough to decide when it will be best to re-introduce ourselves to our old pal."

  Bravo sounded serious. "Then what will we do with him, Byrne? Dropping a federal agent in the Potomac River or burying him in a landfill doesn't sound like a smart move to me."

  Byrne was long in answering. "Right now, I'd say that what we do with Charlie will depend on what we find out from him, and maybe later on—what we find out from whoever put up the money to kill us."

  Alpha thought about it some more before adding, "I doubt Charlie will want to tell us much, Tommy."

  Bravo's voice was cold. "He'll answer every question, Don. I've never done anything like this, but I know how, and in this case I am more than willing.

  "In a way, it's him or us, Donny, and if it turns out that we have to abandon everything and move to some distant hideout because of him, I won't want to picture Dewey Lavender living fat and comfortable back here in our country."

  Byrne sighed. "If that's the way it has to be, pardner, I'm with you. Lavender will tell us what we wish to know, and we will do what we must to keep on living free.

  "To hell with Charlie. He is a traitorous bastard, and we shouldn't waste thought on whether he will like what is going to happen."

  Bravo asked, "How do we get to D.C., Donny? I've never driven these highways."

  "We keep on Interstate 80, then onto 76, which is the Pennsylvania turnpike. We get off 76 and onto 70 until just outside D.C. where we switch to 270. It's long, but it's easy, pal."

  Alpha leaned across to examine the speedometer.

  "Damn it, Bravo, slow down. We don't need a state cop checking us out."

  "We're going slow enough, Byrne. I'm just anxious to get my fingers around Lavender's neck."

  Alpha was only half kidding when he said, "You squeeze his head loose, and I'll kick it across the room. I've had it with Dewey Lavender."

  There was silence for a long moment before Shepard said, "I wonder if, somewhere down the road, we can peddle what happened to these losers like the mercenary and his sniper crew and maybe Lavender to Jocko? He sells info, so he might buy the yarn."

  "Good thought. We may need money if we have to assume new identities in some faraway place."

  "We've got enough money, Byrne, and what good would a hundred bucks more do anyway?"

  "There's never enough money, Bravo."

  "There won't be if we have to run for our lives. Let's find 'em all and settle this mess."

  Chapter 17

  Dewey Lavender's condo was in North East, as far as he could get from his old home. Even after two years, he suspected his ex-wife of driving past and spying on him. The woman stayed crazy-mad, and he doubted he would ever get through the last of the lawyering she was laying on him.

  When his ex-discovered his other woman, she had gone for his pistol. Fortunately, he had left it in his office. So she chose a kitchen knife, but by then, he was out the door and moving fast. The goofy broad who had called his home to describe how the husband was about to leave his wife and kids to take up with a new love was herself long gone.

  Lavender wondered vaguely what he had ever seen in her? Unattached good-looking women always had something important wrong with them—which is why they were unattached.

  His ex-wife had been a pliant and comfortable woman without strong positions on most things. Lavender had never suspected a spine of white-hot steel that appeared intent on ruining him no matter the cost. Attorneys began calling and papers came in piles. A private detective had been hired, and Lavender found his every secret exposed for his ex-wife's picking over. Always there lurked the threat to take his betrayal upstairs, and in Lavender's company, personal problems were never supposed to surface.

  A decent government salary had supported the Lavenders for all of their marriage. With the kids still in college, money had become tighter, but that pinching would soon have passed.

  Split more or less down the middle, with his half deeply invested in lawyer fees, the salary proved small, and Lavender had searched for a way to make extra money.

  He had lived then in a cheap room above a noisy club in a less than desirable part of town, and his beat up old car was monotonously and ritually savaged where it parked along the street.

  With his ex-wife's efforts to impoverish him never ending, Lavender's mind had turned desperate, and somewhere in the sweat of an August night memories of lying scared half to death among the bugs and pickers of jungley Mexico had passed through his mind.

  Charlie had always suspected there had been more to the firefight than his partners had admitted. He had smelled gun smoke on them. Both had sat in blood, and Byrne had it in his hair. The simplicity of Alpha and Bravo's story had fueled unvoiced suspicions. Lavender had detected eye glances exchanged by the two military men that hinted something unspoken had occurred, but at that time, all he had cared about was getting far from all of it.

  Lavender's mission report made the team sound solidly responsible, fast thinking, and clever in their escape from the guerillas' unexpected appearance. Still, Charlie believed there might have been more, and he had kept an eye on intelligence coming from that part of Mexico and from the south of the border drug business in general.

  Surviving Santos relatives raged, but there were astonishingly few of them left. The family patriarchs and their sons, the made-men, the men of influence and respect, had been slaughtered in the guerilla attack. Surviving Santos bodyguards had been rounded up and jailed by Mexican authorities. Within the year, Santos power was gone, and other drug lords were in place.

  Over the years, many of the guerilla band had been killed or had disappeared. Whether those rarely identified departed had succumbed to Santos vengeance, and whether they had told what they knew before their demises, Charlie could not discover.

  His plan to use the almost forgotten incident involving Byrne and Shepard formed slowly. There were discomforts in betraying long ago companions, of course, but more important to Charlie's interests, was whether he could manage to gain a large fistful of dollars while remaining completely out of the picture.

  Badgered almost into poverty, Lavender had tested the waters. Contacting the Santos family had proven difficult, but a California branch had listened. If the Santos relatives wished to know who was really responsible for the massacre of the men of the family only he knew. It would cost them, of course. There were no free lunches, but he could, for the right money, provide details including names and addresses.

  Charlie was clever and cautious in his probing. He identified himself as The Information Man. He implied that highly classified material was his specialty. He used pay phones from various cities on the east coast. He had purchased a simple modulator that would disguis
e his voice, and he kept his calls short.

  Lavender's pitch was simple and clear. He described how a two-man team of American agents had been sent into Mexico to lead guerillas to an ambush with the intent to kill off the Santos men in one powerful sweep. The agents themselves had opened the battle by personally marking the unsuspecting Santos men with automatic weapons fire. Before the firefight ended, the Americans had seized the Santos Mercedes automobile and were gone leaving few traces of their presence.

  The Santos bit, and they would pay for names and addresses. To them, Charlie judged, the huge payment demanded would be nothing. The Santos had millions—enough to dump a million in cash onto a table in a Mexican jungle just for laughing over.

  Lavender sucked in his guts, smothered a nagging conscience and buried sour feelings. He had to have money and a lot of it. Agreement was reached. The Santos side required only a single area of assistance. They needed a stone killer, an assassin who could not be connected to them. Lavender agreed to look into that minor aspect—for a few dollars more.

  Dewey Lavender was not versed in secret agenting skills. Anything he had learned in training had become ancient memory. Except for his single venture in Mexico, he had been a deskman, a paper chaser for nearly thirty years. He knew little about hiding money—although he had attempted small, easily explainable stashes, now withdrawn and spent that, so far, his wife's lawyers had not discovered. He definitely knew nothing about hiring criminal expertise.

  Lavender began to read. He discovered that banks throughout the world were now wary of large cash deposits, and many, even those mysterious banks based on exotic tropical islands, had international agreements of mutual disclosure. There were still highly confidential repositories here and there, but it was not the open market of twenty years earlier, and just the cost of establishing truly secure accounts—accounts that would accept large unexplained dollar deposits—would cost serious money.

  First, he would have to establish an account, in another name, of course, in an appropriate offshore bank. He would have the Santos money wired to that account. That wire service from bank to bank would wash the money to a marked degree. He would allow a few weeks for the transfers to cool and become old news—just in case. Then he would again transfer most of the money to another secretive bank and later close the original account. Even later, he would divide up the money and deposit innocuous amounts in other accounts in other names in the most secure depositories he could discover.

  But how did one find a hitman? Were there actually such killers for hire out there? Lavender knew no more about the subject than readers of popular fiction.

  He claimed to be writing a book and brought up the subject with other deskmen at various lunches. No one knew much, but a clerk from the Midwest mentioned Jocko's in Cicero, Illinois where, it was said, professional Soldiers of Fortune left their names and specialties in expectation of hire. It was worth a try, and with a little trepidation, Lavender called Jocko's.

  Bingo! It was that easy. Jocko had such men on call. Of course, they did not list themselves as hitmen, but enough explanation passed for mutual understanding that extreme measures might be involved in any hire agreed upon.

  Dewey Lavender paid for two names. Which murderous bastard the Santos chose, he did not wish to know. Dewey forwarded the names and closed the deal. His money was deposited. Lavender had not feared for that end of the bargain. He knew the Santoses; they did not know him. To them, the caller was only an untouchable voice. If they welshed, they believed they would receive visits from nasty people. The Santos paid on schedule, and Dewey Lavender's life turned around.

  Lavender had sweat in his poverty until his former wife's lawyers decided there was no more to wring from his beaten-down carcass. Of course, Mister Lavender would remain responsible for his children's education, and the former Mrs. Lavender now owned everything they had accumulated over the decades.

  Dewey could not have cared less. He now had money. Money enough to enjoy luxuries previously beyond dreaming about—secret, tax free, unencumbered money.

  His new condominium was handsome and would increase in value. His vehicle was expensive, and he believed himself impressive behind its leather-clad wheel. He had unwisely flaunted his new opulence a time or two in his wife's presence but had belatedly realized the stupidity of such a demonstration of improved circumstances. Now, he stayed well away and tried to put her from his mind.

  He also fought to ignore what was surely going to fall on the unsuspecting heads of Don Byrne and Tom Shepard, but in the last few months, Charlie's heartburn had become serious. Rodents gnawed at his innards. He was now on Prilosec with a lot of Pepcid AC on the side.

  Lavender blamed his wife for all of it. If she hadn't tried to destroy him, Byrne and Shepard would not have been . . .

  Rationalizing failed. Dewey Lavender knew betrayal when he caused it, and the many pieces of silver he had received were failing to ease the soul-devouring ache in his gut. He often wished to hear that the Santos had struck, and it was all over. Maybe then some of his regularly-surfacing self-disdain would depart, and he could genuinely enjoy his improved financial position.

  Then Alpha had called reporting Bravo dead and himself on the run. Since that call, Charlie's gut ache had never eased.

  Alpha's second call, days later, was almost beyond belief. Where was the Santos executioner? Why wasn't Doctor Don Byrne just as dead as Shepard? Was the throat slasher following Byrne, lying low, just waiting for things to quiet down— Lavender's stomach griped? Or, had Byrne gotten away and was now planning his own bloody revenge? Lavender's guts cramped painfully.

  Dewey wheeled the Mercedes into his building's parking area. As usual, he chose a spot where other cars would be unlikely to crowd him. He suspected that more than one envious fellow employee would have willingly dragged a key across the car's gleaming bodywork.

  He had three years to go before full retirement. Until then, Lavender explained his fancy car as money left by a distant relative. He had long ago dropped former family acquaintances and avoided making new commitments. On occasion he picked up handsome women, but none became serious or remained long.

  Three years to outwardly remain the familiar old Dewey Lavender. Then, he would move far away—probably to Europe, at least to Southern California—to begin a new, more glittery and faster moving life.

  Alpha and Bravo? Charlie vowed to put them from his mind. He raised the convertible's top and locked the car. He wished that his office had a window that looked onto the parking lot so that he could admire the handsome machine from a distance. Instead, he shared a third floor cubicle that had no window looking out on anything.

  With their trailer safely anchored in a small RV park almost down to Quantico and their big truck curb-parked on a nearby side street, Byrne and Bravo waited in a small delicatessen across the street from Charlie's building. They chose a window seat and watched the entrance to the building's parking area. They were early and few cars entered. Those that did, swept a card key and a bar rose to allow vehicle entrance.

  Bravo examined their surroundings. "Where do we go if Lavender just comes walking in here to get a morning coffee?"

  "We step into the men's room, of course."

  Bravo raised an eyebrow. "Together? That looks like a one-man john to me."

  Byrne chuckled. "This is the big city, pardner. No one will pay attention. Here, they've seen everything."

  Bravo was disdainful. "And how would a hick like you from the hills of Idaho know anything about that, Alpha? I am the man with city experience. The cities are mine. They open their doors to me. I thrive there. You? Hah."

  Byrne swilled his Diet Mountain Dew. "Do not forget that I am a doctor. By merely hanging my stethoscope around my neck I become everyone's friend, relative, and probably confessor. City people love doctors, Shepard." Byrne craned to look further down the street. "They also hate real estate salesmen. Leave local contacts to me."

  Bravo scraped his chair across t
he cement floor. "Do you want another doughnut or something, Doctor Byrne? I'm having a crème-filled."

  "I'll take another chocolate covered, but you buying this snack does not mean that it is not your turn to pay for a real meal."

  They ate slowly, enjoying the moments, their minds weighing approaching actions.

  Then Bravo said, "There aren't any guards on that parking lot. We can walk right in."

  Alpha said, "Charlie probably arrives about the same time each day. We can judge whether or not we can just jump into the car with him, or maybe it will be better to get him leaving."

  "It will probably be best to follow him home and see what we can do there. Grabbing a guy in a parking . . ."

  Byrne interrupted. "This is probably him."

  A low and long silver convertible Mercedes with the top down was approaching. As it came closer, both men recognized the driver. They spoke in unison. "That's him."

  As the handsome car slid through the parking entrance, Bravo added, "He's gotten fat, and he's damned near bald."

  Byrne said, "Yeah, he isn't training, but we won't be wrestling him to the ground anyway—I hope."

  They judged the care Charlie used in parking his vehicle, and Bravo hazarded, "He picks the same spot every day." Alpha agreed.

  The men watched as Charlie raised his convertible top and gave his car a last lingering look.

  Bravo judged. "The bastard loves that car. Let's bury him in it."

  Bravo always suggested shooting and burying, so Alpha paid no attention.

  Shepard said, "Hell, Alpha, he's so fat he waddles. Look at him. He's a walking butterball. Let's pound him into mush right there in the lot. We'll take his car and sell it to the first ratbag with money."

  Byrne was more serious. "Quit making dumb suggestions and look at the tree limbs overhanging the lot, Bravo. We could wait right there and be into his car before he sensed a thing."