by Ralph Zeta
But it wasn’t silly at all. That was very specific and incredibly helpful information. “He had trouble with ‘r’s,’ is that it?”
“Sort of,” she hesitated. “But not all the time. Sometimes he seemed to stammer a bit before he said anything else you know what I mean?”
I did. It meant that the man had probably undergone speech therapy to help him deal with the condition. Like a neighbor I grew up with, he sometimes had to think before speaking, to compensate for the lisp. But if it was the same man I had just met, why wasn’t he trying to conceal his lisp? I looked in on him again. He was being served yet another drink. Under the influence of alcohol, he may not even care enough to mask the lisp.
“Jason? You still there?”
“That’s very helpful, Elizabeth,” I replied. “Thank you. I’ll call you back.”
I entered the club and headed for the bathroom. On my way there, I gave Sammy a slight nod to follow me.
The restroom was deserted. Sammy entered a minute later. I explained my conversation with Elizabeth and the man in the wheelchair. We had to make sure it was him. Sammy would find whatever car he was driving and check out the registration, most likely kept inside the glove compartment. It shouldn’t be too difficult to locate his vehicle to accommodate his large motorized wheelchair, he most likely drove a van or minivan with a “handicapped” plate or a dangling interior tag. If this man was indeed Lowell Pinkus of Plantation, the documents inside would affirm it. But that would work only if he drove himself. What if he was driven here say, by some sort of a service for disabled pervs? I dismissed the thought. This man seemed to like his independence. And if he had been involved with Baumann, he was likely capable of performing more than just basic tasks.
The plan was simple. I would return to my table while Sammy examined the guy’s vehicle. If it was indeed our man, Sammy would arrange for us to talk privately later. I would take care of the rest.
I went back to my table. Nothing much had changed during my brief absence. The same girls were still gyrating on stage, the same patrons were in various stages of subservient adoration. The guy in the wheelchair, as expected, was parked at his table. A friendly waitress with ample boobs and a not-so-young face wandered by to see if I needed to freshen up my drink, handsome. I said no thanks, and she scooted off with a practiced smile. Less than ten minutes later, my phone buzzed, and I glanced at the screen. Sammy, with a one-word message: “Bingo.”
Nineteen
We left the Pink Heel just before closing time. It had taken another four drinks and well over two hours for Lowell Pinkus to have enough. I paid for the drinks. I had to entertain him, gain his trust. Besides, having him under the influence would make my job easier.
Sammy had gone to bat one more time and, as always, delivered. He had called one of his local sources and secured several items that would be required to carry out my plan. It was imperative that our man survive the interview and that when finished, we leave him in pretty much the same condition we found him in. Yes, he would remember some of it, but he wouldn’t be able to prove that it ever took place.
I followed Pinkus out of the club. The night was cool and damp after yet more rain, and the clouds overhead heralded more to come. That reminded me that I was supposed to be on vacation. I shook off the images of Nora’s hasty exit from the boat, our last phone call, regrets over how things had turned out. I needed to focus. After all, I was about to commit several serious felonies that, if ever proven in court, called for a significant amount of alone time.
Pinkus hummed away in his chair, and I strolled casually behind him. He was headed toward a large van. I saw the Virginia “disabled” license plate. That explained why we couldn’t find a Florida driving record. Pinkus and I chatted about any old thing as we crossed the wet pavement. When we reached the van he pulled a small gizmo resembling a remote control from a side pocket of the wheelchair and pointed it at the van. The cargo door clicked open, and with a whir, a ramp extended to the pavement. He turned around and faced me.
“Thanks for the drinks,” he said, rubbing his eyes.
“Don’t mention it,” I replied. “You okay to drive?”
“Oh, sure. Trust me, my friend, I’ve been much worse and still managed to find my way home.”
I smiled and shook my head in the way men do when they recognize a good boast. He smiled, too, and we both laughed.
“I never introduced myself,” he said, rolling toward me. He put out his hand. “Lowell Pinkus.”
I shook his hand. “Jason.” Not letting go of his hand, I said, “Tell me something, Mr. Pinkus...”
“Lowell, please,” he interrupted while I kept pumping his arm.
“Lowell, then...” I leaned in closer and could smell the bouquet of scotch, aftershave, and old sweat. “You ever heard of a Jacksonville woman by the name of Elizabeth Gage before?”
His eyes widened before he caught himself and went back to his old self. I felt the muscles in his arm tighten. He tried to retrieve his hand but couldn’t.
“I’m sorry who did you say?”
So this was how he was going to play it. “How about the name Stefan Baumann you familiar with that one, Lowell?”
His face froze for a beat, and his small eyes darted around me as if he half expected company. Finally, he seemed to regain some measure of composure. He regarded me with a skeptical glare.
“I’m sorry Jason, is it?” He pulled his hand hard and broke free of my handshake. No matter. He was exactly where I wanted him: alone, in a dark corner of an all but deserted parking lot, with Sammy watching my back. I obviously knew quite a bit about him, and he knew nothing about me other than that I was twenty years younger than he, fit, and not handicapped. I had all the advantage.
“But I’m sure I have no idea what you’ah talking about. Good night.” He turned to leave.
I grabbed his wheelchair with one hand and yanked the power cord from the large battery pack with the other. “I need some information, Lowell,” I said, “and I know you have it. This can go one of two ways. You cooperate, and we both go away feeling better for it, or you don’t, and I force you to give me the information anyway and in the process, you suffer needlessly. It’s your call, Lowell.”
He swallowed hard, his eyes searching mine as he tried to assess the seriousness of my threat.
I leaned on the wheelchair’s armrest and said, “So what’s it going to be, Lowell?”
“Who awe you?” he asked.
“A friend of friend.”
“Do you have any idea what you’ah messing with hewe?”
“Enlighten me.”
He smirked. “All I can tell you is that if you don’t stop this befowe it’s too late, you’ah going to wegwet it.”
“Understand this, Lowell: I’m not interested in you,” I said. “It’s really very simple. Your friend Stefan Baumann stole from my clients substantial amounts of money and property that did not belong to him. My clients want it back. Tell me where to find Baumann, and I go away. No one needs to know of your involvement.”
A smirk. Even sitting there in his wheelchair, he thought himself somehow immune.
“What are you afraid of?” I asked. “No one has to know a thing.”
“Me afwaid?” he asked, seeming puzzled.
“Is it Baumann that’s scaring you?”
He smiled and shook his head. He studied my face for a moment, then said, “Do you-ahself a favor, pal. Get lost befowe it’s too late. That’s my best advice.”
“Lowell, please tell me you aren’t that stupid,” I said, giving him a look of disappointment. He responded with a deadpan stare. “Is that’s the way you’re going to play it?”
The cocky smile again. “That’s the way it’s got to be, pal.”
I raised my hands up in an expression of giving up and took a step back.
He smiled. “Now, that’s a smawt man.”
Reaching back on his chair, he reconnected the power line, did a U-turn, and rolled toward the van’s
elevator ramp. As he steered the chair into position, I stepped beside him and hit him with the edge of my hand just below the second cervical vertebra. His head snapped forward, and he sank unconscious in his chair. The act of knocking out a harmless guy, especially one confined to a wheelchair, a man who could not defend himself, stirred a pang of remorse, but I reminded myself of what he had been a part of, the harm done to Elizabeth and her family, and the feeling soon passed.
I looked at him listing sideways in the chair. All his frustrations, shortcomings and anxieties all locked up inside his body. His combative attitude a clear indication that before befalling to whatever bound him to this chair, Lowell lead a different life. Maybe, like countless others, he grew up in some idyllic part of America, had loving parents, maybe a sibling or two, went to school, graduated, perhaps even married and had a family, worked and paid taxes. One day his life too, will come to an end. He will be buried or cremated and his heirs, if any, would squabble meagerly over property and insurance proceeds. Such is life. We spend a lifetime gathering things only to leave them behind as futile mementos of our brief stay in an ungrateful world, failing to realize that in the end, we are not remembered for what we leave behind, but by the emptiness felt by those that remain. I wondered if anyone would miss this broken man.
Out of range of security cameras or prying eyes, I pushed the buttons on the lift, and we rose off the pavement and were soon inside the van’s cargo area. The door closed automatically behind us with a reassuring click. There was no driver’s seat, since the van was retrofitted to run by hand controls accessible from Pinkus’s wheelchair, which locked in place behind the steering wheel. I lifted Pinkus from the wheelchair and laid his limp frame out on the floor. His dead weight felt heavier than I expected. After placing some towels just below him to protect him from the skid proof metal floor of the van, I took the battery out of his cell phone, gagged him and tied his hands in front of him, and called Sammy. We were ready to roll.
In the rearview mirror, the Denali’s intense, bluish xenon lights pierced the darkness. After locking the wheelchair behind the wheel, I sat in it and took a few moments to figure out the gas and brake hand controls. Then I started the big van, pulled out of the parking space, and glided out of the lot to follow Sammy south on the interstate. A few minutes later, we were headed west on Interstate 595. I followed the SUV’s bright taillights down a wide two-lane road into one of the light-industrial areas west of the highway. The Denali turned left into a dark driveway and came to a stop before a big hangarlike structure. Stark and ominous, the semi-round structure stood tall in the moist night air.
Sammy got out and unlocked a large roll-up door, raised it enough for the van to clear, and waved me in. Sammy drove in behind me. Once the heavy metal door clattered back down behind us the cavelike space was revealed. It was a dark and quiet as a catacomb. In this anonymous building, we were completely isolated from the outside world.
Sammy soon joined me and donned a Balaklava mask and plastic gloves. In the unlikely event Pinkus could remember where he had been held, he would not be able to identify anyone but me. What I had in mind some would construe as excessive and heavy-handed, a few may even call it torture. I would disagree; it didn’t even fall under the rubric of “enhanced interrogation tactics.” The methods I would employ insured Lowell would not endure any pain or suffer any injuries. I preferred to think of this process as “assisted recall,” it was a way to soften his natural defenses and make him more cooperative.
Sammy and I put on headbands fitted with high-intensity LED headlamps like those used by cavers. Then we laid Pinkus’s inert form on a sturdy industrial table near the far wall of the hangar. From the faded stenciling above some of the doors, this place had once housed a jet engine maintenance facility, and it still had the scent of heavy industrial solvents and grease. We untied Pinkus’s hands and took off his clothes, then secured him to the table using a restraint technique that would leave no obvious marks yet would make the subject feel completely powerless and vulnerable.
After making sure he was safely secured, I blindfolded Pinkus and poured some cold water on his face, and he started coming around. Sammy produced two small white pills and a paper cup half-filled with water. One of the pills in Sammy’s hand, I knew, was a “roofie” Rohypnol, the so-called date rape drug. The second pill was a hallucinogen obtained from a street drug vendor recently arrived from São Paulo, Brazil. Scopolamine, better known on the streets of South Florida by its third-world name, “burundanga,” is another memory-blocking drug, used by some intelligence agencies and criminal elements in subduing and interrogating subjects. The drug makes its victims incapable of resisting an order or asserting themselves. This makes for a very passive and willing subject, one who has some volition but will have no clear recollection afterward. With specific memory of the events that transpired while under the influence of the drug hazy at best, the victim generally is unaware of having been raped or, in this case, interrogated, and makes for rather poor witnesses in a court of law.
Pinkus began to stir. In my experience, the mind of a defenseless man, especially one who is physically impaired or injured, one who cannot move, talk, tell whether it’s night or day, and doesn’t know who took him or where he is or the fate that awaits him, quickly descends into a netherworld of chaos and despair. Survival instincts fueled by adrenaline soon take over and override normal behavior. Some sob inconsolably. Others tremble and pray. Only the strongest, most hardened men last any amount of time under such conditions.
Before Pinkus could come around fully, I lifted his head enough for him to swallow the pills, which I had crushed and dissolved in a couple of ounces of watered-down scotch. I poured the mixture into his mouth, and Sammy poured water down his throat and held his mouth shut till he swallowed. I saw his Adam’s apple shift several times, and his breathing soon became easier. The drug cocktail was in his system. Sammy let go of his jaw, and before he could say anything I stuffed a hand towel in his mouth. Now all we had to do was wait for the drugs to take effect.
After a moment, Pinkus began to thrash again. He pulled hard against the restraints pinning him down, but it was pointless. Anticipating this, we had secured him using a cocoon restraint setup, where we first placed him inside a thick sleeping bag and then duct-taped him tightly from head to toe, thus avoiding injuries or marks. We then tied the silvery bundle to the steel table with a thick orange net of trucking-grade nylon webbing designed to secure heavy cargo. This “cocoon” was then secured to the table’s metal legs with braided nylon rope cinched down as tight as possible without crushing his rib cage. The setup, though benign, rendered him utterly incapable of moving, no doubt flooding his mind with a claustrophobic feeling of impotence.
It wasn’t long before the unmistakable smell of feces and urine permeated the still air of the warehouse. Pinkus began to sob, a clear signal that he fully understood the seriousness of his predicament.
After several minutes of fruitless thrashing, his movements began to slow down and his breathing became less frantic and more rhythmic, and soon he was completely still. I checked his breathing: deep and relaxed. His pulse was low and steady. Lowell had reached the promised land.
Sammy took off his mask, and I took the towel out of Pinkus’s mouth called his name. He sounded drowsy but responded right away. I asked him about his relationship with Baumann, and with a little prompting, he began to deliver the goods. He disclosed details about his employment with the State Department. Although not entirely unexpected, I was still surprised to learn that Lowell’s prior life had been a well-crafted cover; he actually worked for the CIA’s Directorate of Operations. Clandestine work. The Spook Realm. He had worked many years under the guise of a diplomat, in several overseas embassies, until a car bomb in Chechnya left him a cripple. After a few years spent undergoing a long string of surgeries, he had been officially retired and, like most retirees, moved to Florida. He still remained secretly in the employ of the CIA as an ou
tside contractor. He was “a patriot who loved his country and the agency,” he blurted at one point.
In this new job as an outside contractor for the Agency, Lowell Pinkus was serving as a liaison officer with several ex-CIA assets now residing secretly in the States as transplanted expats. He was charged with facilitating the relocation and absorption of these retired foreign assets who, for various reasons, could no longer safely remain in their home countries. Now, with their covers blown and further service in America’s national interest no longer feasible, these assets had been furnished with new identities and a new life in the States on Uncle Sam’s dime.
According to Pinkus, Stefan Baumann, whose real name was Kaja Slavik, had been one of some twenty such retired assets assigned to him. Slavik arrived in the U.S. in June 1994, his cover blown in the old totalitarian regime that had ruled Czechoslovakia since the Soviet invasion. Slavik had served in the upper echelons of the Czech Secret Service First and Second Directorate of the STB, the much feared Czech intelligence apparatus. Kaja Slavik had informed on Communist and Soviet activities in his country and later provided valuable intelligence on Soviet forces during and after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. His service had proved valuable enough that he was granted relocation assistance to his city of choice in America, a modest monthly stipend, and a new identity complete with a U.S. passport and social security number.
Pinkus did not know much else about his charges, he said. He was not routinely briefed on specifics. Their stay in the United States was mostly unsupervised, rather like being placed in the Federal Witness Protection Program. He was not a babysitter, he pointed out. Once the asset had settled into his new life, Pinkus merely acted as a conduit between the transplant and Langley. The newly retired assets were free to join the ranks of retirees who called Florida home, free to make their own way as they saw fit. Of course, nothing illegal was tolerated; indeed, criminal activities were grounds for deportation. But did that mean they all lived honest lives? Not necessarily, and in Baumann’s case, Lowell already knew that was not the case. As it turns out, Lowell admitted, among other things, to being instrumental when it came to preventing any such evidence ever reaching the higher-ups back at CIA. For this valuable service, he had been handsomely rewarded by Baumann.
