Caravan of Thieves

by David Rich

  When people in the military romanticized military service, I thought they were full of crap but I gave them some leeway, figuring it was just something they needed to do to cope with it all. When people out of the military romanticized military service, they were just full of crap.

  Scott jumped right in on the downbeat like a soloist in a jazz quartet. “People who don’t work are living off the government, while people like you come back and have to struggle to make ends meet on your own. We can’t change things the way we’d like to, but we try to do what we can,” he said, and he leaned forward with excitement and looked at Kate, who was caught off guard by the pause, still draining her wineglass. A Big Boy arrived with my beer. Scott got up.

  “Excuse me a moment.” He hustled into the salon, followed by Big Boy. Prostate or cocaine? Dan’s rule: assume both.

  Kate took up the sword. “It’s about respecting the laws. If you come here and the first thing you do is break the law, how’re you gonna have any respect for any other laws? I mean, c’mon, that’s common sense. You’re dodging bullets and they’re lining up with their hands out.” She paused to pour herself more wine and sip it. That seemed to bring her back to her sales pitch. “This is your lucky day. We can help you find the house you want and hook you up with a mortgage.… Are you working yet?”

  “Not yet.”

  “Doesn’t matter. The VA has one-hundred-percent mortgages and we can get you one where you come out of it with extra cash to tide you over the first few months. This is what we do. This is how we help.”

  By committing fraud. “One mortgage at a time,” I said, smiling. She looked at me with her mouth open as if she just remembered that she forgot to flush the toilet. “Are you okay?” I said.

  “Oh, yes, I just thought of something. You reminded me of someone.”

  “Kate, I want to talk to you alone.”

  “We have to take this country back. We have to reward hard work again. We have to protect our liberty.” She said it by rote, still lost in the moment. She hadn’t heard me. Somewhere along the line, Kate had stopped by the Kool-Aid stand and bought a few pitchers full of the stuff. It practically came gurgling from her mouth. Yet as each moment passed, I became more and more convinced I was sitting next to the right woman, the one Dan sent me searching for. Maybe she was the one lucky person in the world who had completely blocked the Dan experience from her memory, and when the picture was erased, my image went with it.

  Dan popped up: “I never had anything I didn’t steal. Even you.”

  I was not impressed. “I’m not impressed. You only stole to win the game, not to get things you wanted.”

  “Take a close look. That game was too easy to win. It was not about winning. I had to leave her and I had to take you. Can you blame me?”

  Blame would blow back at me, as useless as pity, and Dan was beyond punishment. I concentrated on Kate. Maybe she trained herself to only look forward. Neither she nor Scott wore a wedding ring, so she was a hot young thing for him and he was a catch for her. I did not want to ruin her gig, but she was making things difficult.

  “Make up an excuse to get off the boat. I have to speak to you alone,” I said. She giggled nervously. “Where can we meet?” I was hoping that open-jawed moment had cast a shadow on her brain, hoping she sensed who I was.

  She said, “We’re leaving tomorrow for Mexico. Maybe when we come back.”

  Scott reappeared, with lots of new energy, before we could pursue the subject. “Hey, so have you two been talking about the future? Where to live in Oxnard? Let me give you a tour of the boat before the guests arrive. There are only five in the world like this one. I had to get on a waiting list for three years. Paid in full in advance. C’mon, let me show you.” I followed him inside, passing close by one of the Big Boys, who just swiveled his head to watch me pass.

  “It’s designed and made by a Spaniard named Astendoa. Fifty-eight feet. Three state rooms. Three heads…” He droned on: Raymarine electronics, Kohler cooling, two 750-horsepower diesels. I kept thinking about Kate and how to get her alone. I wanted information and I wanted to know a little about who she was and I did not have much time. Close up, Scott looked seventy: tired and hopped up at the same time. He showed me the head, which was air-conditioned. In the elaborate galley, a female servant, also Asian, worked efficiently at putting sushi and other hors d’oeuvres on platters. The Mercedes key hung on a labeled hook next to the stove. The other hook said “Aston.”

  “You have an Aston Martin, too?”

  “Another waiting list, but worth it.”

  Maybe Kate had been smart enough to put him on a waiting list. We moved on: the lower helm, the flybridge, the engine room, with all specs at the tip of his tongue. He had memorized them; Dan would have made them up. I took a deep breath when I made that comparison and he asked if something was wrong.

  “Just envious,” I said. I knocked Dan off my shoulder so I could concentrate on this moment. “This is truly beautiful. But I don’t want to take up too much of your time.”

  He smiled as if he were waiting for me to say that. “Never say that to anyone. If you are getting what you want from them, then take the time. It’s your time, not theirs. If they want to stop, they will. It’s something I learned in business, and as you can tell, it’s paid off handsomely.”

  “Thanks. I’ll keep it in mind. And when I buy my yacht, I’ll send you a bottle of champagne. First, though, I have to buy a house around here.”

  “How strange that you happened to come by this boat. What a coincidence.”

  A Big Boy had come in behind us. Behind me.

  “Yes.”

  “It is a coincidence, isn’t it, Robert?”

  “Isn’t it? What’s going on?”

  “I mean, you’re not stalking Kate, are you? Or me?”

  “Look, sorry to disappoint you. Kate’s an attractive woman but a little old for me and you’re not my type. Neither is he.” I nodded toward the looming hulk blocking the door. “I just got out of the Marines. I’ve been home from Afghanistan for six weeks, so the last thing I’m looking for is a fight. I’ll leave. Nice to meet you. Thanks for the tour.”

  Scott held my arm. His smile made him look like a mad doctor trying to convince me to just try one treatment, but behind his eyes raged the battle between skulking paranoia and his desire to be grandly magnanimous: uptight versus cool. “Don’t be angry, Robert. I’m an attorney. I have lots of enemies. I had to ask. Let’s go have a drink. Maybe we can help you.”

  Big Boy was gone when I turned for the door.

  22.

  Kate greeted the guests as they came aboard, two couples in their fifties. I was introduced. A Big Boy brought around drinks. More couples arrived and I drifted toward the bow, trying to figure out the best way to get Kate away from there. Two women in their fifties came forward and we all said hi and wasn’t it a great boat. The harbor was quiet and calm, a scene waiting to happen. A sailboat motored out. One man at the tiller, another working on the sails. A Big Boy appeared and gestured with his finger for me to come along with him. I excused myself to the women and followed him upstairs to the top deck. Scott was holding court with Kate by his side. When he saw me he waved me over to him and when I was facing him he raised his voice and said, “Everyone, everyone…I want to introduce you to Robert Kent, a true American hero. Robert is just back from serving two tours in Afghanistan as an Army captain, where he led his battalion on raids into Taliban strongholds, capturing hundreds. Thank you, Captain Kent, from all of us. To Captain Kent.”

  Kate sure knew how to pick them. Maybe she preferred the really big liars, maybe she couldn’t tell. She gave no indication that she knew that he had made it all up. Everyone took a sip and then tried some polite applause, which was made difficult because they were holding their wineglasses. A few of the men stuck their hands out and I shook them. Oxnard is a military town, so they all had to have met lots of vets, but they acted like me being there was a big deal. Maybe
I was Scott’s first veteran. Maybe they just wanted him happy so he would be in the mood to pull out the free cocaine later.

  Someone tapped me on the shoulder and I turned to a short, attractive blond woman wearing a low halter top. “When are you going back? I mean, you must like it by now, right? It’s a thrill, right? I’d like to hear about it.” And more of that. But the same itch that bothered me on the bus made me raise my eyes past her toward the bridge where I had stood. Two men occupied the same spot.

  “I’m down here,” the woman said.

  I did not know the men, and had no time to understand how they could have tracked me. When they saw me they straightened up and one started to point, and they left immediately. They were coming to the boat.

  “Thank you,” I said to the woman. “That’s very kind.”

  Scott had begun rambling on to a man next to him. I leaned close and whispered in his ear, “I have to speak to you alone.”

  “In a minute.”

  I whispered again: “I’m DEA. In the galley. Now. Bring Kate.” I made sure to smile and hold his shoulder so he would stay steady. He looked at me, mouth open. I walked below.

  In the galley, I shooed away the servant. Scott and Kate arrived promptly. A Big Boy guarded the entrance. Scott thought he would try a little lawyer talk: “You lied to me, Robert. You—”

  I cut him off. “Here’s what I want you to do: get everyone off the boat immediately. Tell them anything you want to, there’s a tidal wave coming, the wine is poisoned, anything, but make it happen fast. There are two very, very bad guys coming and you don’t want them on board and you don’t want them hurting your guests, but they will if you give them the chance.”

  “Why should I do anything you say? I don’t care about the DEA and I don’t trust you.”

  “Because I won’t come after you for the cocaine import business you’re running and the money laundering and the taxes and the funny-money mortgages you help Kate peddle.”

  His brain was coated in coke and booze, but he could figure his position pretty well. It took five seconds for him to turn to Kate and say, “C’mon.”

  I held her arm. “She stays with me. I have to talk to her.”

  He thought she was an informer and it shocked him. “You?”

  “No! Fuck this guy.”

  “Go. Make it happen fast.”

  He went and Big Boy went with him. I held on to Kate. “When the others are streaming off the boat, you join in. Go to Scott’s car and wait there for me.”

  “No. Leave me alone. Let go of my arm.”

  I took off her sunglasses. “Look at me, Kate. Look at me. I’m not DEA. My name is Rollie Waters. Does that mean anything to you?” It was clear that the name meant nothing, which was an improvement over the last try. “I’m Dan’s son. Your son.”

  “I have no children.” She said it the way people say it’s a beautiful day or they’re doing fine. So much for the mystical mother-son connection.

  “Kate, these men are going to hurt you if they find out who you are. You have to get off the boat and meet me. You can’t let them get hold of you.” Behind her, I could see the stream of guests leaving the boat and the two thugs looking them over to make sure I wasn’t sneaking away. “I’m Dan’s son. I’m your son. I’ll meet you at the car.” She put her hand to her throat and tried to regulate her breathing. I thought she was going to vomit. Her world had revealed itself to be a nightmare, the one she always suspected was waiting for her. I put the sunglasses on her and turned her around and she went out.

  I grabbed the keys to Scott’s Mercedes from the hook. The two Big Boys stood on guard at the stern as the last of the passengers left. Out the window I could see Kate among them. The two thugs pushed through them on their way to the boat, but they had not identified Kate. I waited in the galley for the fight to start. The Big Boys just told the thugs to go away and that was it. A shot went off. I caught a glimpse of a thug being thrown to the deck. The sounds were reduced to grunting and swearing. I moved forward. The space on the stern was tight, so the two fights kept bumping into each other. A thug and a Big Boy were wrestling and the other Big Boy recoiled from a punch and toppled them overboard into the water. As I came out, I grabbed the railing below the fly deck and, swinging up, kicked the remaining thug in the jaw. He fell backward and I jumped down, landing on his knee. The crunch was awful. I smiled at Big Boy and ran down the pier.

  Scott had abandoned ship, too. “I’m taking your car,” I said. “Don’t tell anyone I have it.”

  “It’s a crime to impersonate a federal agent.”

  “Do you want to trade threats, Scott?” He didn’t. “If they ask about Kate, say she was there but left with the other guests. You don’t know where she went. I need your car for a few days. I won’t hurt it. Kate, get in.”

  She looked to him for instructions. “The full wrath of the law, Scott. That’s what you’re facing,” I said, in case he was starting to forget.

  “Go with him. If he hurts you, I’ll have him killed. I’ll do it myself.” He was as gallant as he was honest. She could not hide the disgust from her face.

  “I’ll fill it up,” I lied.

  23.

  She remembered Dan with bitterness and anger. He had promised her the moon, but she ended up waiting tables and bagging groceries and drinking. No fond acknowledgment of his enveloping charm or wistful regret at not being able to reform him. I waited for the watchword of Dan’s victims, I’d do it again; it was fun while it lasted, but she had never reached that stage. Dan was an evil genie who had tricked her and stolen her golden locks, and she had spent the rest of her life dreaming of getting them back.

  I drove north toward Ventura for no reason other than she had started talking and I wanted her to keep going. I was foolish to fear that she would clam up, though. Once the self-pity faucet turns on, you need a power tool to turn it off. She was crying recycled tears while I thanked Dan for sparing me this act. I would have had to run away.

  “I was beautiful. That bastard, that bastard told me to have the baby and he’d take care of everything. I was eighteen. What did I know? I couldn’t take care of myself, how could I take care of a little kid and he stuck me out in the middle of nowhere and brought around his business associates and then he disappeared for weeks at a time and what was I supposed to do?”

  I was the wrong person to ask. “Where was that house in the middle of nowhere?”

  “He told me he owned it,” she said. I made an effort not to tense up. “Ha! I found out it belonged to the damn monks and he didn’t even pay rent. They let him use it. That did it for me. I was out of there.”

  “Monks,” I said.

  “Monks,” whispered Dan. “They’re honest.”

  At that moment, I knew the money was there. “Where is it? That house…”

  “What’re you writing a book?”

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t think I could find it if I wanted to, and believe me, I don’t. Near Ojai. Somewhere above Ojai. The monks own a big place and that house.”

  “Big, sprawling place? Hacienda style? Front porch swing?”

  “Yeah.”

  “I remember it a little. You don’t have a photo of those days, all of us together, hanging outside the house?”

  It was as if I had reminded her of a task left undone, a burner left on, a debt uncollected. Panic gathered behind her eyes. Her bad dream was accelerating. Dragged away from hope and pleasure, she felt the past squeezing her in a dreaded embrace: she could not remember her locker combination, she had to make a speech that she knew she should have prepared for.

  “What else do you want to know? I gotta get back.”

  At a red light, I asked for her cell phone. She did not want to hand it over.

  “You can’t go back for a little while,” I said. “I have to take the battery out of your phone so no one can find us.” The light turned green. I went through and pulled off to the side of the highway and waited until she handed ov
er the phone.

  I asked a few more questions to make it seem like I gave a damn about her life after Dan left and up to today and so she wouldn’t suspect my only interest was in the location of that house. The parts she told me went like this: community college, dropped out; modeling, burned out; men, still trying. I was pretty sure those were the highlights. As we entered Ventura, she relaxed a bit. She asked about Dan, sheepishly. “What’s he doing now?”

  “He died,” I said.

  “I’m sure someone killed him.” Her one moment of insight.

  “It was in New York. A woman dropped her bag on the subway tracks. Dan jumped down to get it for her. He threw the bag back but slipped climbing up and the train crushed him.”

  “Are you really writing a book?”

  “Yes. About Dan.”

  “You’ll probably be good at it.” She said it with a pout and meant it as an insult. She was the same young girl Dan fell for, clueless and skeptical at once. I could understand why he married her; he thought the cluelessness would go away, that he would have a partner who saw through him but still loved him and still craved his charm. Somehow it made me want to lean over and kiss her on the forehead and hug her. “I suppose you look a little bit like him. He was handsome, I’ll give him that,” she said. I had planned to park her at a motel somewhere up the coast, but she would be back at the boat in a flash no matter what warnings I gave. I realized I would have to take her along.

  I used the computer at the public library in Ventura. The only place near Ojai with monks was a Buddhist monastery on the northwest side of Ojai, bordering the Los Padres National Forest.

  Kate’s lament that Dan did not pay rent might have been true and it might have been a fantasy she had and it might have been a Dan story. My favorite was the no-rent version because it meant Dan had charmed them and a proper coating of Dan charm could last a lifetime. My least-favorite version involved rent. I struggled to concoct a solid lie for the monks, one that would get me access to the house and time to search it alone.