by Stuart Woods
“All right, Stone. Whenever this—whatever it is—is over, let’s have a drink and you can tell me what the hell was going on.”
“Deal, but you’re buying.” Stone hung up and called Mike Freeman.
“Welcome home, Stone. You are home, aren’t you?”
“I’ve been home, now I’m on the way to Connecticut.”
“Okay.”
“Mike, I need the services of Strategic Services.”
“What can I do?”
“Tomorrow morning, you’ll get a call from my broker, telling you that the money is ready. Please send some people over to my bank. Ask for Mr. Crockwell. Your men will show Strategic Services ID, and Crockwell will give them five million dollars in tens and twenties, in a leaf bag.”
“All right, Stone, I’m baffled. What’s going on?”
“I may have to pay a ransom to someone.”
“In tens and twenties?”
“It may be to my advantage, if he has to count it.”
“Do you want me to pay it to somebody?”
“Just hang on to it until I call you back and give you instructions on where to deliver it.”
“You want me to send an armored car?”
“Do it any way you like.”
“Stone, do you need some backup?”
“I don’t think so, but I may reconsider. I’ll let you know when I call back.”
“Is Dino in on this?”
“I’m in his car right now.”
“Good, that makes me feel better.”
“There’ll also be a SWAT team from the Connecticut State Police.”
“I feel even better.”
“Bye.”
“Bye.”
“Am I beginning to sense the outlines of a plan?” Dino asked.
“If you are, then you’re a gifted seer, because I don’t have one.”
38
New Fairfield was an actual wide place in the road, not a metaphor. A large, unmarked black truck and an unmarked black sedan were parked next to each other outside a small market. Men in black uniforms were leaning on the truck and sitting on the car, as if waiting for something terrible to happen. Dino’s driver parked next to the unmarked car, and a man in a dark suit came over. Dino got out, and Stone followed.
“Hello, Dan,” Dino said, offering his hand. “Thanks for turning out. This is my friend and former partner, Stone Barrington. Stone, Dan Sparks.”
Stone shook his hand, too; his paw was large, his grip iron. “Hi, Dan.”
“We’ve got a little problem,” Sparks said.
“I would be surprised if you didn’t,” Dino replied.
“I can’t find the owner of the land and the lake, and there are ten cabins.”
“Uh-oh.”
“I don’t think we can go knocking on doors.”
“No, you can’t.”
Stone spoke up. “He can.” He was pointing at a Federal Express delivery truck. The driver was taking a package into the market. “Dan?”
“Right.” Sparks walked over to the truck in time to intercept the driver on his way out of the market. A badge was flashed, a conversation conducted. The driver produced an envelope and filled out a waybill according to Sparks’s instructions.
“Stone?” Sparks called.
“Yes, Dan?”
“Any message?”
“Tell him I’m not going to give him any money.”
“Right.” Sparks wrote that on a sheet of paper, stuffed it into the envelope, sealed it, and handed it to the driver. More conversation, then he returned to the group. “All right, everybody, saddle up. We’re going to follow the truck to where the entry road joins a loop around the lake. We’ll wait there until the driver returns, then I’ll have further orders. Dino, Stone, you’re with me.”
The men got into their body armor and helmets, then into the truck. Dino and Stone piled into the backseat of Sparks’s car, while Dino’s driver followed in his car.
“Just follow the truck,” Sparks said to his driver.
The little caravan followed the truck half a mile down the highway, then turned off onto a gravel road. They entered the woods, and another half a mile down the road they stopped, while the delivery truck turned right. They could see water fifty yards ahead, through the trees.
“Now we wait,” Sparks said. “He’ll go house to house, asking for Buono. If this works, he’ll deliver the envelope, then come back here. If it doesn’t work, he’ll still come back here.”
They sat quietly for a minute. “How’s the new job going, Dino?” Sparks asked.
“Better than I expected,” Dino replied. “I’m actually enjoying it.”
“Next, you’ll be the commissioner.”
“God forbid.”
They went quiet again. Half an hour passed. The truck reappeared and pulled up next to Sparks’s car.
“Turn left, first house on your right,” the driver said.
“Did Buono sign for it?”
“I didn’t see a man. A woman signed.” He handed over a receipt.
“H. Cromwell,” Sparks read aloud.
“There was no car there, either,” the truck driver said.
Sparks got out of the car and rapped on the rear door of the police truck; it opened. “Okay, we’re going on foot from here,” he said to the men, and they began to file out, shouldering weapons.
Stone got out of the car and walked over to Sparks. Dino followed. “Dan, let me drive down there in Dino’s car.”
“What’s your point?” Sparks asked.
“She knows me.”
“What about Buono? Does he know you?”
“Yes, we’ve met.”
“Are you armed?”
“Yes, but Buono won’t shoot me—he wants the money.”
“You okay with this, Dino?”
“Why not? It’s Stone’s ass.”
“I’ll give you five minutes, Stone, then we’re going in.”
“Five minutes it is.”
Dino’s driver got out of the SUV, and Stone got in. He started the car and glanced at his watch. He turned left and drove slowly down the road until he came to a mailbox emblazoned with a large B. He turned into the drive and continued downhill another thirty yards, until it opened into a clearing, with the lake behind. It was dusk, and there was a porch light on. No car in sight.
Stone got out of the car and walked slowly to the house, looking carefully around. He climbed a few steps onto the porch and walked to the door. Closed. He opened the screen, took a deep breath, and knocked. Not hammered, like the cops, just a polite knock. Nothing happened. He knocked again.
The door opened, and Hank stood there, wearing a bathrobe. Her eyes widened, then she rushed into his arms. “Oh, Jesus,” she said. “I knew you’d come, but not this fast.”
“Are you alone?”
“Yes, Onofrio went to the grocery store.”
“In New Fairfield?”
“I don’t know, he said it was nearby.”
“Get some clothes on. We’re getting out of here, and there’s a SWAT team three minutes behind me, so hurry!”
She ran into another room, and Stone had a look around. There was a bedroom to his right with twin beds, bare of linens.
He walked farther into the small living room; a woodstove was on his right. On his left he could see into another bedroom, where Hank was getting dressed. She was too far along for him to know whether she had been naked under the robe. There was a double bed in the room, neatly made up.
Hank came back. “Let’s go,” she said.
Stone put her into the SUV, turned around, and started up the road. A cop stepped into the road and put a hand up. Sparks and Dino came out of the woods.
“I’ve got her,” Stone said. “Buono is at
the grocery store we just left.”
“Shit,” Sparks said. “Everybody back in the vehicles!”
Dino got into the rear seat of the SUV. “You know this guy by sight, don’t you, Stone?”
“Yes, but I didn’t see him.” He turned to Hank. “What’s he driving?”
“A silver Mercedes, the big sedan,” she said.
“Do you know the plate number?”
“No.”
Stone shouted to Sparks: “Silver Mercedes S Class!” He followed the police car and truck back to New Fairfield, and everybody spilled out of the vehicles again. He looked around the parking lot. No Mercedes. He couldn’t remember if there had been one before. “Dino, do you remember seeing a Mercedes when we got here?”
“No,” Dino replied, “but I didn’t not see one, either.”
“All right, Hank,” Stone said. “Start from the beginning.”
39
Stone watched Hank take a deep breath.
“You put me into that car, and they drove away. Before I could say anything I was on the floor with somebody’s foot on my neck. We drove for, I don’t know, twenty minutes, half an hour. I was disoriented, I don’t know where we went.
“Then we were in a garage, and Onofrio was there. I was blindfolded, my hands tied behind my back, and stuffed into the trunk of a car. We drove for a long time, first stop and start, then obviously on the open road, probably an interstate. I made myself as comfortable as I could and dozed for a while.
“The trunk opened, and I was hustled into the house, untied, and the blindfold came off. There were groceries brought from the car, and I was told to cook.”
“What were the sleeping arrangements?” Stone asked.
“I know you saw the double bed—that’s where we slept. I know the guy well, I knew what he wanted, and I decided to give it to him. It made life more bearable, if it wasn’t hostile all the time. If I hadn’t give in to him, I would have been tied up and blindfolded again, and I didn’t want that.”
“Did anyone else visit the house?”
“No, there were just the two of us. He got some phone calls, and I talked to you twice.”
“What did you do with your time?”
“There was a TV, with a satellite dish, and some magazines. We fucked a lot.”
Stone winced. “Were you ever left alone there?”
“Not until today. I thought about running, but I had no idea where we were. I don’t know now, come to that. I never saw a soul, not even on the lake. It was starting to get late in the day, and I didn’t want to try the woods or the road in the dark. I thought he’d be back any minute.”
“You’re in the lower left-hand corner of Connecticut,” Dino said.
At the store in New Fairfield, Stone and Dino got out of the car and went to Sparks. “Buono is gone,” he said. “He probably saw your vehicles before we got here, then took off.”
“What do you want me to do?”
“You could issue an APB on the silver Mercedes,” Dino said. “But Buono is either halfway to New York by now, or to someplace else.”
“Okay,” Sparks said. “You got the girl?”
“We’ll take her back with us,” Stone said.
“I wouldn’t let her go home without a police detail on her.”
“We’ll go to my place,” Stone said.
Everyone was quiet on the drive back to the city. Dino sat up front, and Stone and Hank were in the backseat. She put her head on his shoulder and seemed to sleep, so he didn’t question her further.
As they approached Stone’s house, Dino asked, “Do you want some cops here?”
“I don’t think so,” Stone replied. “He’ll probably think we have them anyway, and he can’t get into the house.”
Hank stirred. “Where are we?”
“Almost to my house,” Stone said. “You’re staying with me.”
“I need some clothes,” Hank said. “All I’ve got is what I’m wearing. He had bathrobes in the house, so I was able to wash things.”
“You’re about Joan’s size,” Stone said. “Taller, but she’ll have something you can wear.”
“All right.”
“Dino, you want to come in? Helene can fix us some dinner.”
“Nah, I’d better get home to Viv.”
Dino’s driver had a look around before Stone and Hank got out of the car. Stone opened the door to a darkened house and closed the door behind them. Then he tripped over something soft and fell. Hank found a light switch, and Stone was sitting on the floor in the foyer, next to two fat leaf bags.
“What’s that?” Hank asked.
“Five million dollars,” Stone replied.
“Onofrio seemed to be expecting seven or eight.”
“Five million was all I was willing to pay for you.”
Then they began to laugh.
40
John Fratelli was dressing for dinner when his cell phone rang.
“Yeah?”
“It’s Stone Barrington.”
“How’d it go?”
“We got the girl back. Buono got lucky—he went to the grocery store and saw the police there and took off.”
“Did he hurt her?”
“No, not so’s you’d notice.”
“I’m glad of that.”
“I appreciate the tip-off about the cabin. It made all the difference.”
“You’re welcome.”
“You sound different since you got to wherever you are,” Stone said.
“I am different: new name, new house, new girl.”
“What more could any man ask for?”
“You’re right about that. Call me if Bats acts up again. I’ll help if I can.”
“Thanks.” They hung up.
Fratelli met Hillary downstairs, and the Bentley was waiting for them. They drove to Café L’Europe for dinner, and the valet drove the car away. Fratelli thought to himself: You’d better not scratch it.
They were seated immediately, and Fratelli ordered them martinis. After looking at the menus and chatting quietly, they ordered, and Fratelli cleared his throat.
Hillary looked at him askance.
“There are some things I have to tell you about me.”
“I had a feeling something like that was coming,” she said. “Shoot.”
“I told you some lies about my background—in fact, everything I told you was a lie.”
“You didn’t tell me much, and I had the feeling I shouldn’t ask.”
“I grew up in Brooklyn. My father worked as a shoemaker for a place that made custom shoes. He paid the rent, put food on the table, gave me an allowance. My last year in high school I . . . fell among thieves.”
“Did they steal from you?”
“No, together we stole from others—financial institutions. We made some money, I bought some clothes and a car. We did about two jobs a year. Nobody ever got hurt. I was the driver, I never went inside, never carried a weapon. Then, when I was in my mid-twenties, something went wrong inside. I heard shooting. I wanted to drive away, but I was a standup guy, and I didn’t. I sat there and waited until my three partners stumbled out of the bank. Two of them had been shot by a guard.
“I drove them to a doctor we knew, then left the car on the street and went home. That night, the police came. The partner who didn’t get shot told the police everything. The two wounded partners died in the doctor’s office. I went to prison. My tattletale partner walked, as we say.
“I served twenty-five years. Inside, I met a man named Eduardo Buono, who was from Brooklyn, too, but he was smarter than I, better educated, better read. We made a bargain: I protected him from . . . assaults by other prisoners, he gave me what amounted to a university education. We both got jobs in the library, and I spent most of my time reading.”
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“What did you read?”
“Everything. I started with the Harvard Classics—that’s supposed to give you a liberal education. I read the Durants’ Civilization. I read other histories, especially American history, and biographies. Pretty soon I was educating myself.
“I never applied for parole because of Eddie, who needed me to survive in there. Then he died, and I completed my sentence and went free.”
“So you have no . . . what is it they say—debt to society?”
“None.”
“So where did the money come from?”
“From Eddie. He was inside because he had masterminded the robbery of a cash transfer business at JFK airport. They stole fifteen million dollars. Half went to Eddie, half to his crew. All the crew spent money and got noticed. When they started getting arrested, Eddie knew he was next. He hid his money and went to prison. He thought he could buy a pardon, but that didn’t work. Before he died he told me where the money was, and the statute of limitations on the robbery had expired. When I got out, I collected it and left New York. Came here, changed my name, invested the money offshore, bought an apartment, and met you.” Fratelli shrugged. “I think that brings us up to date.”
“Well,” she said, “that was a much more interesting story than I had anticipated.”
“I’m sorry I deceived you.”
“I’m glad you did,” she said. “I would have been put off. But now I’ve gotten to know you, and I’m glad you told me.”
“I would understand if you didn’t want to see me again.”
She took his big hand in hers. “That, my dear, is not the case.”
“I would be grateful if you would keep this in confidence. I wouldn’t want Winston and Elizabeth to know.”
“Of course. You’re a good man, Jack, and I’m terribly, terribly fond of you. You’re an honest man, too. Do you know how I know?”
“How?”
“You don’t cheat at golf. Almost everyone else I know does, but not you.”
Fratelli laughed.
“May I know your real name?”
“Jack Coulter is my real name. I have a birth certificate, a passport, and a driver’s license to prove it. I was born John Fratelli.”
