Rumrunners

by Eric Beetner

  “Look closely. It’s a tiny skull with crossed bones. Somebody finds the rest of that map and they’ll find the treasure.”

  “Where’s the other half?”

  “I’d start by looking in Stonehaven, if I was a younger man.”

  His finger was still planted firmly on the map when Shayna finally looked up. She was surprised to see that Keely’s was filling up with a rowdy crowd. Georgia and Ida both looked like they were sleepwalking as they filled orders and drank themselves awake. Neither of them made eye contact with Shayna.

  She turned back to speak with Lafitte, but he was already across the room hanging the map back on the wall. The bouncer was sitting on his stool instead. He looked her up and down, practically licking his lips.

  “Hey, Shayna. I’ve got something for you.”

  She craned her neck to look for the old man, but he was nowhere to be seen.

  “Seat’s taken, Adam.”

  “Was Lafitte telling you his pirate stories?”

  “Be nice, asshole. He’s sweet.”

  “Hey, now. You’re sexy when you’re mean.”

  The bouncer reached into his leather jacket, producing an official-looking envelope. Part of Shayna wished it was another map, until she saw it was addressed to her. She reached for it, but he pulled it back at the last second.

  “I thought that might get your attention, but I’ve got something even better.”

  He reached into his other pocket, pulling out a tightly folded piece of paper. It was about the size of a matchbook and practically bursting with cocaine. She watched for a moment as he flipped it between his fingers like a magician would a coin—before fumbling it to the floor.

  The bouncer leapt from his chair to recover the coke. Shayna took the opportunity to snatch the envelope from his outstretched hand. She spun on her barstool and sliced it open with her fingernail. The life insurance check inside was made out to her in the amount of three hundred thousand dollars.

  She felt the bouncer’s hot breath on the back of her neck. He leaned in to put his arm around her shoulder.

  “Damn, girl! You hit the lottery. Let’s celebrate.”

  He waved the bindle under her nose. She tried to ignore him, but there was no doubt he’d gotten her attention.

  Shayna looked over to where Georgia and Ida were mixing up cocktails and flirting with the pathetic regulars. She could clearly picture them doing the same thing, night after night, for the next twenty years. Then she imagined herself right there beside them, weathered, wrinkled and washed out. The thought of it made her skin crawl.

  That’s when she made up her mind. It was definitely time to leave New Orleans, but not without a little going away party for two. Shayna grabbed the bouncer’s wrist and led him upstairs.

  ***

  Her dreams teemed with pirates that night. She imagined wooden boats filled with swashbuckling men who swung from ropes with swords in their teeth. Buried treasure chests dotted the white sandy beaches of a thousand tiny islands, where palm trees swayed in the violent tropical breezes. Powder flashed from the flared muzzle of a blunderbuss as she wandered through the bloody battle in her tattered wench’s dress. Cannons erupted all around her, spitting out fire and filling the air with acrid smoke.

  Smoke.

  Shayna’s eyes shot open. The bouncer was passed out cold in the bed beside her. Strange voices were screaming downstairs. It felt too late for the bar to be open, but she was too disoriented to know for sure. The familiar scent of burning wood filled her nostrils. She tiptoed over to the bedroom door, cracking it open an inch or two.

  A policeman was frantically waving his flashlight at the top of the stairs. The yellow beam danced across the tendrils of gray smoke that curled around his boots. He was yelling for everybody to get out of the building before it burned to the ground. She slammed the door shut, gathering her scattered clothes from the floor. It’s nearly impossible to put a thong on backwards, but Shayna almost managed to do so in her rush to get dressed.

  She tossed the rest of her possessions into a bag and went over to the bed. Two chalky white lines were still laid out on the nightstand. She grabbed a rolled up dollar bill and polished them off. The bouncer’s pistol was there too, along with his keys and wallet. She fished a couple of hundred-dollar bills out, tucking them into her bra. She definitely didn’t need the money now, but that didn’t stop her from taking it.

  She reached down, pinching his nostrils shut. It seemed like an eternity before he sprang up in a panic.

  “What the hell’s going on?”

  “There’s some kind of fire. Cops are all over place.”

  He rubbed his eyes and jumped out of bed.

  “This has Ida written all over it.”

  Shayna opened the door, heading downstairs without looking back. Shadows dashed through the orange glow in the barroom. She hung a right at the bottom, hugging the wall until she reached the men’s bathroom. The boxy frame was still hanging right where Lafitte had left it. She pulled it from the hook, shoving it into her bag.

  Fire trucks wailed down the street outside. Georgia and Ida were seated on the curb when Shayna finally emerged. Several policemen hovered around them, barking orders into their radios. The women’s faces twisted into horrible, forced smiles when they caught sight of her.

  Georgia waved her over. Ida leaned forward when Shayna walked up; her voice was a scratchy hiss.

  “See what you get when you sleep with my man?”

  It was all too familiar for Shayna. She needed to get out of there before the panic took over. There was no way she could be associated with another fire without somebody putting two and two together. Shayna might not have started this one with a match, but they could still trace the spark back to her.

  She slipped by, making a beeline for her red convertible. It was parked across the street and down the block—far enough away from the commotion that it wouldn’t be blocked in by any emergency vehicles. She climbed behind the wheel, started the engine and stomped on the gas. There was nowhere for her to go, no place she had to be. Her head spun with the lonely possibilities, but the tank was full enough to get her out of town.

  She looked down at her bag in the passenger seat. A corner of the frame was poking out like a tiny wooden arrow. She reached over and snatched it up, Lafitte’s final words running through her mind.

  I’d start by looking in Stonehaven…

  Shayna took the first on-ramp. She didn’t slow down until she crossed the North Carolina state line thirteen hours later. From there she only had to follow the road signs leading the way to “The Home of Captain Aurora.”

  Click here to learn more about Crossed Bones by S.W. Lauden.

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  Here is a preview from Polo’s Long Shot, a Nick Polo mystery by Jerry Kennealy…

  Chapter 1

  George Rigsdale hated me. Well, maybe hated is too strong a word, but despised might not be strong enough. Rigsdale was the in-house investigator for Feveral & Lenahan, one of the largest full-service law firms in San Francisco. They represented many of the major insurance carriers in the United States, Europe, and Asia, and handled everything from dog bite cases to litigation involving major airplane crashes, mergers, and acquisitions, as well as insurance and banking transactions for their clients. They also handled criminal matters, mostly of the type where the feds go after a bank or stock brokerage firm.

  I was called in when Rigsdale and his staff of seven computer geeks couldn’t get the job done.

  I did feel a little sympathy for the guy. He had to go strictly by the book in his investigations—F&L did not want him doing anything illegal that might get them sued—while I, an independent contractor, could commit the types of misdemeanors and occasional felonies needed to get results.

  Rigsdale was on the short side. He had a triangular-shaped face, wheat-colored hair, with a silver-dollar size bald spot at the back. He had a precisely trimmed mustache pasted under a ski-slope shaped nose. His ey
es were pale gray, and whenever I spoke to him I focused on his eyes for a second or two and then moved up to his eyebrows. Rigsdale would adjust, tilting his head back to maintain eye-to-eye contact, and then I’d raise my focus again, and he’d follow suit. My objective was to have him tilt so far back that he’d fall backwards and land on his butt.

  We were in his office, which was located on the seventeenth floor of the Steuart Tower Building. The floor-to-ceiling window had a view of the skyscraper across the street. The offices that overlooked the bay, Alcatraz, and the Golden Gate Bridge were occupied by the company attorneys.

  It was a good-sized room with a walnut-topped black metal desk, a black leather chair, a matching couch, and a table holding three computers, two printers, and several wireless routers, their monitors of red lights silently winking and blinking.

  One wall featured a watercolor landscape with angry, foam-tipped waves crashing into a peppermill shaped lighthouse. A brass-printed tag the size of a bar of motel soap at the bottom of the frame identified the artist as Laura Feveral.

  Rigsdale was usually a neat and trim dresser, but today his suit jacket was off, his shirt sleeves rolled up to his elbows, his tie at half-mast, and his collar undone. He reminded me of one of those TV weathermen, the ones who sit behind a desk in an air-conditioned office with makeup people at the ready. When there was a really big storm they liked to do the roll-up-the-sleeves bit and have their hair in slight disarray, while interviewing a reporter who was actually out in the storm, holding onto a streetlight for dear life.

  “I may have an assignment for you, Polo.”

  He liked to pronounce my name as PowwLoww.

  “That’s Italian isn’t it?” he’d asked at our first meeting.

  “Sicilian,” I’d told him, causing his frown to deepen. George claimed to be a direct descendent of one of the families that came to America on the Mayflower. He hadn’t liked it at all when I’d pointed out that an Italian by the name of Christopher Columbus had beat the Mayflower by a couple of hundred years.

  “Who’s the attorney that asked for me?” I said. The only assignment Rigsdale would hand me would be sweeping the parking lot.

  He sank down into his chair and leaned forward with his elbows on the desk. “Mr. James Feveral.”

  Jim Feveral was the senior member of the firm, and a fan of mine. I had helped him out in several cases. He seemed to get a vicarious pleasure in having me run down difficult witnesses or serve subpoenas on people who reacted violently to those kinds of things.

  Rigsdale leaned back in his chair, sighed, then leaned forward and opened a drawer slowly, as if afraid of what was inside.

  He withdrew a thick manila envelope and placed it carefully in the middle of the desk.

  “We want you to locate someone.” He slid a grainy black and white photograph from the file, rested his index finger on the corner and slowly pushed it toward me. “This someone.”

  The man in the photo was tall, with a full head of dark curly hair. He had a trench coat draped over his shoulders like a cape and was glaring in the direction of the camera, as if he didn’t appreciate having his picture taken.

  He was leaning against the wall of an outdoor café, holding a cup of coffee in one hand, a cigarette in the other. It was impossible to know from the photo where it was taken, but the cobblestone street and table umbrellas had a European flair.

  “Who is he, George?” I asked casually, knowing that it irritated him to be called by his first name by those he considered underlings.

  “Al Lamas is the name he’s using. It wouldn’t surprise me if there are others.”

  “What’s Jim Feveral’s interest in him?”

  Rigsdale coughed into his fist and gave me what he must have considered a hard look. “Mister Feveral merely wants you to find the man. I’ll handle the rest.”

  I picked up the photograph. The café Lamas was standing in front of had a canvas awning, but the name wasn’t visible.

  “When and where was this taken?”

  Rigsdale stirred in his chair, as if to relieve an aching muscle. “Rome, Italy. Approximately six months ago.”

  “Who took the photo?”

  “What difference does it make?” Rigsdale said, his voice hoarse with anger. “We think Lamas is here—in the Bay Area.”

  “The more I know about him, the easier it will be for me to find him, George.”

  He responded by shoving the envelope across his desk. “Take it. There are more photos in there, along with some of my reports.” His voice softened. “There is some urgency. If you cannot devote full time to the case—”

  “I know. You’ll get someone else. What’s your interest in this Mr. Lamas?”

  “We believe he’s…taken something that doesn’t belong to him. The owner wants it back.”

  “What did he take?”

  Rigsdale chewed that over—literally, his teeth riding over his lips. “An object of art. A chauri, a flywhisk, with a carved ivory handle and yak’s tail brush.”

  “You’re kidding me, George.”

  He made a waving motion with his right hand. “It was allegedly used to keep the flies off some prince in India in the fifteenth century. There are a few photos of it in the envelope.”

  “I know that you and your staff have worked hard on this, covered all the data bases, ran him through social media, civil filings and motor vehicle records, and haven’t come up with anything, which means Lamas is going to be difficult to find. Why is he so important to Feveral? I have to know the details.”

  Rigsdale raised an eyebrow as he considered the request. “All right, but this is a very confidential situation, understood?”

  “Understood.”

  “Lloyd’s of London is the insurance carrier. Mr. Paul Bernier, a highly valued client of ours, is the owner of the chauri. We do a great deal of legal work for him. He’s a former international banker and has a home in Nicasio, over in Marin County, a penthouse apartment here in San Francisco, and a villa in France. He has many business interests, including wine. He owns more than a thousand acres of vineyards in prime Napa Valley and Sonoma County locations, as well as throughout France. And he is a volunteer curator at the city’s Asian Art Museum.”

  Rigsdale glanced over to see if I was properly impressed.

  “Until right now, I’ve never heard of the gentleman. Do we know what Al Lamas does for a living?”

  “He described himself to Gloria, Mr. Bernier’s adopted daughter, as being a stress-relief consultant.”

  Ah, consultant—one of those delusive words. You don’t have to be licensed to be a consultant. You could describe yourself as a brain surgeon consultant, but have no real knowledge of medicine or surgery—you’re just a consultant. Stress relief could mean anything from yoga, to massage, to drugs.

  “Is Gloria Bernier dealing with some kind of stress?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  “Does she have an idea as to where he lives, or where his office is located?”

  “She told me that they had a social relationship, however, she never visited his residence or office.”

  “Where’d she meet him?”

  “At a nightclub called Noche on Townsend Street. I’ve been there. No one at the club knew of Lamas.”

  “You’ve told me about Gloria. Are there other children?”

  “A son, Andre, who was killed in Iraq in 2003.”

  “Army? Marine?”

  “No,” Rigsdale said wearily. “His death has nothing to do with the case, but if you must know, Andre Bernier was civilian, an art advisor for UNESCO, the United Nations Scientific and Cultural Organization, at their Paris office. He went to Iraq to help in finding their lost art treasures.”

  “What about a wife?”

  “Mr. Bernier is a widower. Twice. His first wife was born in India, where they lived for several years. She died many years ago. His second wife, Gloria’s mother, also passed away. If any word of this leaks out, Polo, you’ll never get an
other assignment from Feveral and Lenahan, I can promise you that.”

  “How does Lamas tie in with the missing flywhisk?”

  “He was…friendly with Gloria. She invited Lamas to the Nicasio residence while Mr. Bernier was away on a business trip. The chauri was kept in a buffet cabinet in the dining room. When Mr. Bernier returned, the chauri was gone. Now Lamas has disappeared.”

  “But there’s no proof that he actually took it, is there?”

  “No, but he’s the obvious suspect.”

  “How much was it insured for, George?”

  Rigsdale picked up a ballpoint pen and began popping the point in and out. “One million dollars.” He stabbed the pen into the manila envelope. “Don’t get any ideas of a finder’s fee, Polo. Your job is to locate Lamas. Nothing more.”

  Rigsdale was still smarting over a thirty-thousand-dollar finder’s fee I’d received for retrieving a stolen painting by renowned artist Cy Twombly. At a recent auction at Christie’s, one of his works went for sixty-nine-point-six million dollars. To the uneducated eye, mine included, some of his graffiti-like scribblings look like they could have been done by a child freewheeling with crayons.

  I had found the missing painting in a home belonging to a museum janitress, a hardworking Filipino lady who juggled three part-time jobs. She had taken it from a rack of artwork stored in the basement of the San Francisco Modern Museum of Modern Art.

  “I thought it was junk,” she’d told me. “That they were going to throw it away. I wanted to show it to my granddaughter. She could draw better that that.”

  I believed her, about why she took the Twombly, not her granddaughter’s drawing talents, so I’d simply returned the painting to the museum—with no questions asked.

  “There’s one more important item to discuss, Polo. The police have not been brought into this. Mr. Bernier wishes to have it handled discretely. Understood?”

  “So if Lamas has this flywhisk, you want to make a deal with him, right?”

  “That is not your concern. I’ve interviewed everyone who resides in the Bernier residence, and every worker and visitor that was there when the chauri went missing. The cook, Yves Dupree, took advantage of Mr. Bernier’s absence by taking a vacation, so he was gone when the theft took place. The property has a state of the art security system, so I do not believe a burglar could have gained entrance. Mr. Feveral insisted that I involve you, against my judgment.”