by Stuart Woods
“What am I going to do with her in New York, lock her in a hotel suite? I’m going to be very busy for the next week or so, and I’d have little time to spend with her. And from what she tells me, I think she’d be afraid to go out shopping or anywhere else on her own.”
“You have a point,” Stone said.
“I’d feel much better if she were here with you and Callie and Dino.”
“For how long?” Stone asked.
“For as long as you’ll stay, or until you reach some sort of accommodation with Manning.”
“Thad, I can’t stay forever, but I’ll give it another week or two. Maybe we’ll hear from this Frederick James again. If he really is Manning, I can’t think why he wouldn’t want to talk to me. After all, he’s already called my office three or four times.”
“Does James know where you are?”
“No. At least, I don’t think so.”
“You want me to hire some private security to back you up?”
“No, not at the moment. If it gets bad we can always do that.”
“If you want help, just tell Callie. She’ll know who to call.”
“All right.”
The two men shook hands, and Thad left the yacht.
Dino, who had been having breakfast during this conversation, now spoke up. “Listen, Stone, I’m beginning to think you’re taking this too seriously. I mean, all that’s happened is the lady’s house has been messed up a little. That’s kid stuff; it’s hardly a threat on her life. And if James is really Manning, then he can’t be completely a fruitcake. He’s made a life for himself, he’s writing again, and if his book is on the bestseller list, he must be doing okay at it.”
“Dino, you only met this guy when you arrested him. I got to know him a little in St. Marks, and he made this very angry scene in New York right before you picked him up. He wanted his money, and he wanted it bad. I’ve got a feeling he still does.”
“A feeling? What’s that? Your hunches were never all that good, you know.”
“Liz feels the same way, and she knows him better than anybody.”
“So now we’re operating on Liz’s hunches? Don’t get me wrong, I’m getting used to living on a big yacht and having my every wish catered to; I always knew I could. I’ll stay here until the chief of detectives sends somebody down here for me with an extradition warrant.”
“She’s not a stupid woman. She and Paul pulled off quite an insurance fraud, you know.”
“Pulled off? You think nearly getting herself hanged is pulling it off? The whole thing completely backfired on them. They’re stupid, both of them.”
“Okay, so it didn’t work out. She’s still pretty smart,” Stone said stubbornly.
“Anyway, she may not be your only problem.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I haven’t mentioned this, but yesterday we got followed around town by a car.”
“What?”
“You heard me. Somebody is tailing us.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“It didn’t seem related to Liz and her problems.”
“And what do you think it’s related to?”
“I think it could be the former Mrs. Barrington.”
“Oh, shit,” Stone said. He had nearly forgotten about Dolce. “What kind of a car?”
“Sort of an anonymous-looking sedan, probably Japanese. The windows were tinted dark. I couldn’t see who was inside.”
“Everybody’s windows are tinted dark down here; keeps out the heat.”
“I think you should take Dolce seriously.”
“You think I don’t?”
“I think you don’t take her seriously enough.”
“And how do I do that? Carry an automatic weapon at all times?”
“You could do worse. And I’m worried about Callie.”
“What about Callie?”
“If Dolce sees you with her, she could be in trouble.”
“Oh, God,” Stone moaned. “When is this going to be over?”
“As far as Dolce is concerned, it’ll be over when one of you is dead, and she might want that sooner than later.”
“You think she’s suicidal?”
“Homicidal, more likely.”
“Thanks, I needed that.”
“Anytime.”
The cell phone on Stone’s belt vibrated. “Hello?”
“Mr. Barrington?”
“Yes.”
“This is Frederick James.”
“Good morning, Mr. James,” Stone said loudly, so that Dino would get it. “I didn’t think I’d hear from you again.”
“I changed my mind. I want you to answer a question.”
“Go ahead.”
“How did you know that I know Paul Manning?”
“Let’s not be cute, Mr. James. I think you are Paul Manning.”
“Well, I’m not, but I’ve been in touch with him.”
“When?”
“Recently.”
“How recently?”
“Recently enough. I know about his past with Allison, and the business with the insurance company. Quite frankly, I know more about him than I want to know.”
“Don’t we all?”
“I got to thinking about what you said in your e-mail. Does Allison really want to buy him off?”
“Yes, she does.”
“For how much?”
“I don’t know that I can discuss that with you, since you claim not to be Paul Manning.”
“Tell me this, then. Why do you think I’ve been trying to get in touch with you?”
“You really don’t know?”
“No, I don’t, or I wouldn’t have asked you.”
“A man called my office several times and wouldn’t leave his name. I suspected it was Paul Manning. I managed to trace the call back to a Manhattan hotel, and you were the only guest whose name I recognized.”
“That’s pretty tenuous, isn’t it?”
“Is it? Wasn’t I right?”
“Actually, you may well be. Paul Manning was in my hotel suite a couple of times, and he made some phone calls.”
“Well, I’m glad you admit, at least, to being in the same room with Manning.”
“Have you ever met Manning, Mr. Barrington?”
“I got to know him rather well, but he was using another name at the time.”
“Listen to my voice. Does it sound like the voice of Paul Manning?”
Stone admitted to himself that it did not. “Manning’s is deeper,” he said.
“Exactly. I have rather a light voice, wouldn’t you say?”
“I suppose.”
“And Manning’s is a sort of bass-baritone.”
“Yes.”
“Does that do nothing to convince you that Manning and I are not the same person?”
“It helps. Of course, we can resolve the question of identity very easily.”
“How?”
“We can meet, face-to-face.”
“Where are you, at the moment, Mr. Barrington?”
“I’d rather not say.”
“I’d rather not say, too.”
“Then we might as well be on different continents.”
“We may very well be.”
“How are we going to resolve this?”
“I may be able to help you deal with Manning.”
“Deal, how?”
“You’re trying to buy him off, aren’t you?”
“Let’s just say that I’m trying to bring a difficult situation to an amicable close.”
“Then I’ll take him your offer.”
“You know how to get in touch with him?”
“How could I take him your offer, otherwise?”
“All right. Tell him that Allison wants to come to an arrangement with him to get out of her life. If he agrees in principle, then we can discuss it in more detail. Or just get him to call me.”
“I don’t think he’ll do that.”
“Why
not?”
“He’s very shy these days, and he’s not fond of you.”
“Tell him I can arrange for him to live his life more openly, without fear of legal difficulties.”
“Now that might appeal to him. Can I reach you at this number?”
“Yes. How can I reach you?”
But Frederick James had hung up.
Stone turned to Dino. “You heard that?”
“I heard it.”
“What do you think?”
“I think this is getting very weird,” Dino said.
41
CALLIE CAME ON DECK. “AND WHAT HAVE YOU TWO planned for the day?” she asked Stone and Dino.
“Zip,” Dino said. “But I wouldn’t mind some golf.”
“I’ll book you a tee time at the Breakers,” she said.
“I don’t want to leave you and Liz alone,” Stone replied. “We’d better stick close.”
“Liz and I will be just fine,” Callie said. “I have your gun, and Juanito and a couple of crew members will be around. Besides, if you have to spend all your time here, you might get tired of me.”
Stone snaked an arm around her and kissed her on the neck. “Not much chance of that,” he said.
“I know,” she replied, “but unless you and Dino get out of here and allow Liz and me some girl time, I’m going to start getting sick of you both.”
Stone threw his hands up. “Golf, it is. Come on, Dino.”
The starter cleared them from the first tee. Stone drove his usual slice into the next fairway, and Dino hooked his into yet another fairway.
“How’re we going to handle the cart on this?” Dino asked, getting in.
“Well, I’m not giving it to you. You’re away, so we’ll go to your ball first.”
Dino addressed the ball with a fairway wood, took a practice swing and sent the ball two hundred yards over a stand of palm trees, back into the fairway. “Take that!” he said.
Stone drove to his own ball, took a long iron and hit it to within five yards of Dino’s ball.
“Looks like we’re back in the game,” Dino said.
“Back in the fairway, anyway.”
They both parred the hole. A bit later, as they were crossing South County Road, Dino spoke up. “You are the most unobservant person I know.”
“What brought that on?” Stone asked. “And how does being observant help my golf game?”
“Nothing can help your golf game,” Dino replied, “but if somebody had told me that my former wife and lover was hunting me down to kill me, I’d take a look around me once in a while.”
Stone tensed. “Where?”
“Over your left shoulder, parked at the curb, about two hundred yards down. Don’t look yet!”
Stone tried to keep his eyes ahead. They stopped to tee off, and he took his driver out of the bag and tried a couple of practice swings, which allowed him to look at the car. “I can’t see who’s inside,” he said.
“That’s kind of the point, isn’t it?” Dino asked. “If she’d wanted you to see her, she could have parked twenty yards from us.”
“We’ve already made the local papers this week, as a result of the scene in the restaurant,” Stone said. “I don’t think I want to read a story that says I was shot dead on the golf course at the Breakers.”
“Don’t worry,” Dino said. “You won’t. I may, but not you.”
“How do you know she doesn’t want to kill you, too?”
“Because I never married her, then dumped her when an old girlfriend called,” Dino said. “I’ve always been nice to Dolce.”
Stone teed up and swung at the ball, hitting it straight, for a change. “I remember your telling me once that Eduardo was the devil, and that Dolce was his handmaiden. Is that what you call being nice?”
“I didn’t say it to her,” Dino pointed out. “You think I have a death wish?”
“But she must know what you think of her.”
“I don’t know how she could. I’ve certainly never told her.”
“What about Mary Ann?”
“Mary Ann and I have not yet come to the point in our marriage where she wants me dead. Someday, maybe, but not yet.” Dino drove the ball, and they got back into the cart.
“What is it with Sicilians, anyway?” Stone asked.
“Well, speaking as a scion of the more elegant north of Italy, it has always been my opinion that all Sicilians are totally batshit crazy. I mean, the vendetta thing would be counterproductive anywhere else but Sicily, but they’ve made an art of it. Do you have any idea how many more Sicilians there would be in the world, not to mention in this country, if there were no vendetta? If you took all of them who’ve been knifed, shotgunned, garroted, blown up, and poisoned, married them off and had them produce, say, four point five children each? Millions.”
“And you’re saying that’s not counterproductive?”
“Nah. It just concentrates more ill-gotten wealth in fewer hands, and it prevents a Sicilian population explosion. And that can’t be a bad thing.”
“But you married a Sicilian.”
“How do you think I know all this? It’s been an education, I can tell you.” Dino curled a thirty-foot, breaking, downhill putt into the cup.
“How’d you do that?” Stone asked, astonished.
“I just thought about how a Sicilian would do it, if the ball would kill somebody.”
Stone laughed. “How can I make it up with Dolce, without getting killed?” he asked, serious again.
“Make it up? You mean marry her again?”
“No, no, no,” Stone sputtered. “I mean just make peace with her.”
“You don’t make peace with Sicilians, unless there is a threat of death on both sides. You know, like the nuclear thing: mutually assured destruction. Where do you think the Pentagon and the Kremlin got the idea?”
“There has to be another way.”
“Eduardo could call her off.”
“Yeah? He could do that?”
“If she wasn’t crazy. Nobody can call off a crazy person, not even with a threat of death.”
“You’re such a pleasure to be around, sometimes, Dino.”
“I’m just telling you the way things are. No use kidding yourself.”
“I guess not,” Stone said glumly. They were on a tee that faced the road, now, some four hundred and fifty yards away. Stone hit his first true drive, now, two hundred and sixty yards straight down the fairway.
“Everybody gets lucky sometime,” Dino said.
“That’s the thing about this game,” Stone said, getting into the cart. “Even the worst duffer can go out and, maybe two or three times in a round, he can hit a shot that’s the equal of anything a pro could do under the circumstances. And it gives you the entirely irrational hope that, if you worked at it, you might get pretty good at this game.”
“That’s what keeps us coming back,” Dino said. He hit a good drive, too, but short of Stone’s.
“I like you keeping a respectful twenty yards back,” Stone said. “Shows a certain deference.”
Stone chunked his second shot, hitting the ground before striking the ball. It fell short, some forty yards from the green.
Dino hit the green. “Sorry about the lack of deference,” he said.
Stone got out of the cart and looked toward the green, lining up his shot. Then he saw the car, sitting and idling at the side of the road, a hundred yards away.
“What club do you want?” Dino asked, standing at the rear of the cart beside the bags.
“Give me the two-iron,” Stone said.
“Yeah, sure,” Dino laughed. “You mean a wedge, don’t you?”
“Give me the two-iron,” Stone said again.
“Even you will hit the two-iron a hundred and eighty yards,” Dino said. “I’d use a lob wedge, myself, to clear the bunker.”
“Give me the two-iron,” Stone said, an edge in his voice.
Dino gave him the two-iron.
Stone took the club and lined up on his target.
“You’re aiming twenty yards to the left of the pin,” Dino said, standing behind him.
Stone took a practice swing.
“Stone, if you take a full swing, you’re going to hit the ball onto a neighboring golf course.”
“No, I’m not,” Stone said.
“Then you can kiss that ball goodbye.”
Stone lined up with the ball. He took a short back-swing and abbreviated his follow-through to keep the shot low. He connected solidly, and the ball flew straight and true, twenty yards to the left of the pin, across the road, narrowly missing a passing Rolls-Royce, and straight at the idling car with the blacked-out windows. The ball struck the driver’s window with a thwack, but it did not shatter. Instead, it cracked into a hundred pieces, held together by the safety glass and the tinting film applied to the window.
Stone hoped somebody would get out, but instead, the car sped away, its tires squealing on the pavement, leaving a puff of black smoke.
“Nice shot!” Dino yelled.
42
DINO WATCHED THE CAR SPEED AWAY AND LAUGHED aloud. “That ought to make the guy keep his distance!”
“Guy? What guy? You said it was Dolce.”
“I said I thought it was Dolce. For all I know, it may be one of your groupies.”
“I don’t have groupies,” Stone said.
“Okay, maybe it’s one of your many enemies.”
“Come on, let’s finish the round,” Stone said. “I assume you’re going to let me take a mulligan on that one.”
“Yeah, I guess.”
Stone took his sand wedge, choked down on it, opened the face and flopped the ball onto the green, within three feet of the pin.
“You should have taken my advice in the first place,” Dino said.
They were driving back to the Shames estate, with Dino at the wheel, when Stone’s cell phone vibrated. “Hello?”
“This is Frederick James.”
“Good day, Mr. James.”
“I’ve spoken with Paul, and he’s willing to deal, through me.”
“Not through you,” Stone said.
“Why not? He’s chosen me as his representative.”
“How can I trust you?” Stone asked. “You’ve already lied to me at least once.”
“When did I ever lie to you?” James asked, sounding offended.
