by Lee Child
I was back in the coffee shop and almost at the end of my second cup when Elizabeth Beck appeared. She had nothing to show for her shopping. No purchases, no gaudy bags. I guessed she hadn’t actually been inside any stores. She had hung around for four long hours to let the government guy do whatever he needed to. I raised my hand. She ignored me and headed straight for the counter. Bought herself a tall white coffee and carried it over to my table. I had decided what I was going to tell her.
“I don’t work for the government,” I said.
“Then I’m disappointed,” she said, for the third time.
“How could I?” I said. “I killed a cop, remember.”
“Yes,” she said.
“Government people don’t do stuff like that.”
“They might,” she said. “By accident.”
“But they wouldn’t run away afterward,” I said. “They would stick around and face the music.”
She went quiet and stayed quiet for a long time. Sipped her coffee slowly.
“I’ve been there maybe eight or ten times,” she said. “Where the college is, I mean. They run events for the students’ families, now and then. And I try to be there at the start and finish of every semester. One summer I even rented a little U-Haul and helped him move his stuff home.”
“So?”
“It’s a small school,” she said. “But even so, on the first day of the semester it gets very busy. Lots of parents, lots of students, SUVs, cars, vans, traffic everywhere. The family days are even worse. And you know what?”
“What?”
“I’ve never seen a town policeman there. Not once. Certainly not a detective in plain clothes.”
I looked out the window to the internal mall sidewalk.
“Just a coincidence, I suppose,” she said. “A random Tuesday morning in April, early in the day, nothing much going on, and there’s a detective waiting right by the gate, for no very obvious reason.”
“What’s your point?” I asked.
“That you were terribly unlucky,” she said. “I mean, what were the odds?”
“I don’t work for the government,” I said.
“You took a shower,” she said. “Washed your hair.”
“Did I?”
“I can see it and smell it. Cheap soap, cheap shampoo.”
“I went to a sauna.”
“You didn’t have any money. I gave you twenty dollars. You bought at least two cups of coffee. That would leave maybe fourteen dollars.”
“It was a cheap sauna.”
“It must have been,” she said.
“I’m just a guy,” I said.
“And I’m disappointed about it.”
“You sound like you want your husband to get busted.”
“I do.”
“He’d go to prison.”
“He already lives in a prison. And he deserves to. But he’d be freer in a real prison than where he is now. And he wouldn’t be there forever.”
“You could call somebody,” I said. “You don’t need to wait for them to come to you.”
She shook her head. “That would be suicide. For me and Richard.”
“Just like it would be if you talked about me like this in front of anybody else. Remember, I wouldn’t go quietly. People would get hurt. You and Richard, maybe.”
She smiled. “Bargaining with me again?”
“Warning you again,” I said. “Full disclosure.”
She nodded.
“I know how to keep my mouth shut,” she said, and then she proved it by not saying another word. We finished our coffee in silence and walked back to the car. We didn’t talk. I drove her home, north and east, completely unsure whether I was carrying a ticking time bomb with me or turning my back on the only inside help I would ever get.
Paulie was waiting behind the gate. He must have been watching from his window and then taken up position as soon as he saw the car in the distance. I slowed and stopped and he stared out at me. Then he stared at Elizabeth Beck.
“Give me the pager,” I said.
“I can’t,” she said.
“Just do it,” I said.
Paulie unlatched the chain and pushed the gate. Elizabeth unzipped her bag and handed me the pager. I let the car roll forward and buzzed my window down. Stopped level with where Paulie was waiting to shut the gate again.
“Check this out,” I called.
I tossed the pager overarm out in front of the car. It was a left-handed throw. It was weak and lacked finesse. But it got the job done. The little black plastic rectangle looped up in the air and landed dead-center on the driveway maybe twenty feet in front of the car. Paulie watched its trajectory and then froze when he realized what it was.
“Hey,” he said.
He went after it. I went after him. I stamped on the gas and the tires howled and the car jumped forward. I aimed the right-hand corner of the front bumper at the side of his left knee. I got very close. But he was incredibly quick. He scooped the pager off the blacktop and skipped back and I missed him by a foot. The car shot straight past him. I didn’t slow down. Just accelerated away and watched him in the mirror, standing in my wake, staring after me, blue tire smoke drifting all around him. I was severely disappointed. If I had to fight a guy who outweighed me by two hundred pounds I’d have been much happier if he was crippled first. Or at least if he wasn’t so damn fast.
I stopped on the carriage circle and let Elizabeth Beck out at the front door. Then I put the car away and was heading for the kitchen when Zachary Beck and John Chapman Duke came out looking for me. They were agitated and walking quickly. They were tense and upset. I thought they were going to give me a hard time about Paulie. But they weren’t.
“Angel Doll is missing,” Beck said.
I stood still. The wind was blowing in off the ocean. The lazy swell was gone and the waves were as big and noisy as they had been on the first evening. There was spray in the air.
“He spoke with you last thing,” Beck said. “Then he locked up and left and he hasn’t been seen since.”
“What did he want with you?” Duke asked.
“I don’t know,” I said.
“You don’t know? You were in there five minutes.”
I nodded. “He took me back to the warehouse office.”
“And?”
“And nothing. He was all set to say something but his cell phone rang.”
“Who was it?”
I shrugged. “How would I know? Some kind of an urgent thing. He talked on the phone the whole five minutes. He was wasting my time and yours so I just gave it up and walked back out.”
“What was he saying on the phone?”
“I didn’t listen,” I said. “Didn’t seem polite.”
“Hear any names?” Beck asked.
I turned to him. Shook my head.
“No names,” I said. “But they knew each other. That was clear. Doll did a lot of listening, I guess. I think he was taking instructions about something.”
“About what?”
“No idea,” I said.
“Something urgent?”
“I guess so. He seemed to forget all about me. Certainly he didn’t try to stop me when I walked away.”
“That’s all you know?”
“I assumed it was some kind of a plan,” I said. “Instructions for the following day, maybe.”
“Today?”
I shrugged again. “I’m just guessing. It was a very one-sided conversation.”
“Terrific,” Duke said. “You’re a real big help, you know that?”
Beck looked out at the ocean. “So he took an urgent call on his cell and then he locked up and left. That’s all you can tell us?”
“I didn’t see him lock up,” I said. “And I didn’t see him leave. He was still on the phone when I came out.”
“Obviously he locked up,” Beck said. “And obviously he left. Everything was perfectly normal this morning.”
I said nothing. Beck t
urned through ninety degrees and faced east. The wind came off the sea and flattened his clothes against him. His trouser legs flapped like flags. He moved his feet, scuffing the soles of his shoes against the grit, like he was trying to get warm.
“We don’t need this now,” he said. “We really don’t need this. We’ve got a big weekend coming up.”
I said nothing. They turned around together and headed back to the house and left me there, alone.
I was tired, but I wasn’t going to get any rest. That was clear. There was bustle in the air and the routine I had seen on the previous two nights was all shot to hell. There was no food in the kitchen. No dinner. The cook wasn’t there. I heard people moving in the hallway. Duke came into the kitchen and walked straight past me and went out the back door. He was carrying a blue Nike sports bag. I followed him out and stood and watched from the corner of the house and saw him go into the second garage. Five minutes later he backed the black Lincoln out and drove off in it. He had changed the plates. When I had seen it in the middle of the night it had six-digit Maine plates on it. Now it was showing a seven-digit New York number. I went back inside and looked for coffee. I found the machine, but I couldn’t find any filter papers. I settled for a glass of water instead. I was halfway through drinking it when Beck came in. He was carrying a sports bag, too. The way it hung from its handles and the noise it made when it bumped against his leg told me it was full of heavy metal. Guns, probably, maybe two of them.
“Get the Cadillac,” he said. “Right now. Pick me up at the front.”
He took the keys out of his pocket and dropped them on the table in front of me. Then he crouched down and unzipped his bag and came out with two New York license plates and a screwdriver. Handed them to me.
“Put these on it first,” he said.
I saw guns in the bag. Two Heckler & Koch MP5Ks, short and fat and black with big bulbous molded handles. Futuristic, like movie props.
“Where are we going?” I said.
“We’re following Duke down to Hartford, Connecticut,” he said. “We’ve got some business there, remember?”
He zipped the bag and stood up and carried it back out into the hallway. I sat still for a second. Then I raised my glass of water and toasted the blank wall in front of me.
“Here’s to bloody wars and dread diseases,” I said to myself.
CHAPTER 7
I left the rest of the water in the kitchen and headed out toward the garage block. Dusk was gathering on the ocean horizon, a hundred miles away in the east. The wind was blowing hard and the waves were pounding. I stopped walking and turned a casual circle. Saw nobody else out and about. So I ducked out of sight down the side of the courtyard wall. Found my hidden bundle and laid the phony plates and the screwdriver on the rocks and unwrapped both guns. Duffy’s Glock went into my right-hand coat pocket. Doll’s PSM went into my left. I put the spare Glock mags in my socks. Stowed the rag and picked up the plates and the screwdriver and backtracked to the courtyard entrance.
The mechanic was busy in the third garage. The empty one. He had the doors wide open and was oiling the hinges. The space behind him was even cleaner than when I had seen it in the night. It was immaculate. The floor had been hosed. I could see it drying in patches. I nodded to the guy and he nodded back. I opened up the left-hand garage. Squatted down and unscrewed the Maine plate off the Cadillac’s trunk lid and replaced it with the New York number. Did the same at the front. Left the old plates and the screwdriver on the floor and got in and fired it up. Backed it out and headed around to the carriage circle. The mechanic watched me go.
Beck was waiting there for me. He opened the rear door himself and dropped his sports bag on the back seat. I heard the guns shifting inside. Then he closed the rear door again and slid in the front beside me.
“Go,” he said. “Use I-95 south as far as Boston.”
“We need gas,” I said.
“OK, first place you see,” he said.
Paulie was waiting at the gate. His face was all twisted up with anger. He was a problem that wouldn’t keep much longer. He glared in at me. Turned his head left and right and kept his eyes on me the whole time he was opening the gate. I ignored him and drove on through. I didn’t look back at him. Out of sight, out of mind was the way I wanted to play it, as far as he was concerned.
The coast road west was empty. We were on the highway twelve minutes after we left the house. I was getting used to the way the Cadillac drove. It was a nice car. Smooth, and quiet. But it was heavy on gas. That was for sure. The needle was getting seriously low. I could almost see it moving. The way I recalled it the first gas stop was the one south of Kennebunk. The place where I had met with Duffy and Eliot on the way down to New London. We reached it within fifteen minutes. It felt very familiar to me. I drove past the parking lot where we had broken into the van and headed down to the pumps. Beck said nothing. I got out and filled the tank. It took a long time. Eighteen gallons. I screwed the cap back on and Beck buzzed his window down and gave me a wad of cash.
“Always buy gas with cash,” he said. “Safer that way.”
I kept the change, which was a little over fifteen bucks. I figured I was entitled. I hadn’t been paid yet. I got back on the road and settled in for the trip. I was tired. Nothing worse than mile after mile of lonely highway when you’re tired. Beck was quiet beside me. At first I thought he was just morose. Or shy, or inhibited. Then I realized he was nervous. I guessed he wasn’t entirely comfortable heading into battle. I was. Especially because I knew for sure we weren’t going to find anybody to fight.
“How’s Richard?” I asked him.
“He’s fine,” he said. “He’s got inner strength. He’s a good son.”
“Is he?” I said, because I needed to say something. I needed him to talk to keep me awake.
“He’s very loyal. A father can’t ask for more.”
Then he went quiet again, and I fought to stay awake. Five miles, ten.
“Have you ever dealt with small-time dope dealers?” he asked me.
“No,” I said.
“There’s something unique about them,” he said.
He didn’t say anything more for twenty miles. Then he picked it up again like he had spent the entire time chasing an elusive thought.
“They’re completely dominated by fashion,” he said.
“Are they?” I said, like I was interested. I wasn’t, but I still needed him to talk.
“Of course lab drugs are fashion items anyway,” he said. “Really their customers are just as bad as they are. I can’t even keep track of the stuff they sell. Some different weird name every week.”
“What’s a lab drug?” I asked.
“A drug made in a lab,” he said. “You know, something manufactured, something chemical. Not the same as something that grows naturally in the ground.”
“Like marijuana.”
“Or heroin. Or cocaine. Those are natural products. Organic. They’re refined, obviously, but they aren’t created in a beaker.”
I said nothing. Just fought to keep my eyes open. The car was way too warm. You need cold air when you’re tired. I bit my bottom lip to stay awake.
“The fashion thing infects everything they do,” he said. “Every single thing. Shoes, for instance. These guys we’re looking for tonight, every time I’ve seen them they’ve had different shoes.”
“What, like sneakers?”
“Sure, like they play basketball for a living. One time they’ve got two-hundred-dollar Reeboks, brand new out of the box. Next time I see them, Reeboks are completely unacceptable and it’s got to be Nikes or something. Air-this, air-that. Or it’s suddenly Caterpillar boots, or Timberlands. Leather, then Gore-Tex, then leather again. Black, then that yellow color like a work boot. Always with the laces undone. Then it’s back to the running shoes again, only this time it’s Adidas, with the little stripes. Two, three hundred dollars a pop. For no reason. It’s insane.”
I said noth
ing. Just drove, with my eyelids locked open and my eyeballs stinging.
“You know why it is?” he said. “Because of the money. They’ve got so much money they don’t know what to do with it. Like jackets. Have you seen the jackets they wear? One week it’s got to be North Face, all shiny and puffy, full of goose feathers, doesn’t matter whether it’s winter or summer because these guys are only out at night. The next week, shiny is yesterday’s news. Maybe North Face is still OK, but now it’s got to be microfiber. Then it’s letter jackets, wool with leather sleeves. Two, three hundred dollars a pop. Each style lasts about a week.”
“Crazy,” I said, because I had to say something.
“It’s the money,” he said again. “They don’t know what to do with it, so they get into change for change’s sake. It infects everything. Guns, too, of course. Like these particular guys, they liked Heckler and Koch MP5Ks. Now they have Uzis, according to you. You see what I mean? With these guys, even their weapons are fashion items, the same as their sneakers, or their jackets. Or their actual product, which brings everything full circle. Their demands change all the time, in every arena. Cars, even. They like Japanese mostly, which is about fashions coming in from the West Coast, I guess. But one week it’s Toyotas, next week it’s Hondas. Then it’s Nissans. The Nissan Maxima was a big favorite, two, three years ago. Like the one you stole. Then it’s Lexuses. It’s a mania. Watches, too. They’re wearing Swatches, then they’re wearing Rolexes. They don’t see a difference. Complete madness. Of course, being in the market, speaking as a supplier, I’m not complaining. Market obsolescence is what we aim for, but it gets a little rapid at times. Gets hard to keep up.”
“So you’re in the market?”
“What’s your guess?” he said. “You thought I was an accountant?”
“I thought you were a rug importer.”
“I am,” he said. “I import a lot of rugs.”
“OK.”
“But that’s fundamentally a cover,” he said. Then he laughed. “You think you don’t have to take precautions these days, selling athletic shoes to people like that?”
