by Rick Boyer
"Yeah? Good. Freddie's a good kid. Kid? Hell, he's pushing forty by now. He speaks good Spanish, you know."
"So?"
"Just crossed my mind. I remember him talking to Ken and Jesus in Spanish a lot of the time. I guess a lot of people in Texas speak Spanish."
"On the way back from Texas, I've got a two-hour layover in Chicago between flights. I've talked Summers into taking the train out to the airport and meeting me there for an hour."
Roantis smiled up at me, remarking that it was nice I'd decided to accept his offer. I replied that I had not accepted the offer. I was merely gathering a little preliminary information for him. No way had I accepted the offer.
But he kept smiling at me. Why was he smiling?
"Where's Bill Royce gone?" I asked, changing the subject. He shrugged his shoulders in thought.
"He's from North Carolina someplace. A little town up in the mountains near Tennessee. Show me a map, I could remember the name. A lot of the recon men were from the Smokies. Good in the wilderness, you know? Anyway, maybe he's gone home. I don't know. And maybe he's fine now. He was a nice guy when he was with us. Then he cracked. He was real unstable then, and dangerous."
"How did he get along with Vilarde?"
"Fine. I tell you, Doc, I don't think he had anything to do with Ken's disappearance or with shooting me. A lot of people don't like me, you know."
"I can understand that. But Bill Royce should be checked out. How many days and nights did it take you to get back after you took the statue?"
"Two days and two nights."
"And during that time, could any of the other Ducks have discovered the Siva in your pack while you slept?"
"Uh-huh. Sure."
"And what would they have thought if word got out that you had it?"
"Hard to say. Anything could happen. But it would be unlike them to go through my stuff."
"Yeah. But were the packs private? I mean, didn't each of you carry stuff for the whole team? What if they were just looking for something and didn't want to wake you up?"
"Could happen. Could happen easy."
"Is Suzanne picking you up this afternoon?"
"She was. But the car's busted again. Guess I'll take the bus."
"No you won't. I'll drive you home. I'll come back at three when they discharge you."
I was out the door before I remembered the beautiful woman I had seen on the stairs.
"Hey Liatis, you don't happen to know a gorgeous Asian girl about six feet tall, do you? Wears a white ski parka and her hair up in a bun?"
"No, why?"
I explained the chance meeting, and he cussed me out, saying I should have sent her to his room. I left him lying in bed, watching All My Children.
6
I PICKED ROANTIS up at the hospital at three, as promised. But I had decided not to take him back to his apartment in Jamaica Plain. How could I be sure that whoever took a shot at him wasn't going to try again? Brian Hannon's detectives could find no trace of the lone gunman around Concord. Was he still in the vicinity? It seemed he was only interested in the key, and that he'd gotten what he was after. But who knew? Maybe he wanted Roantis dead.
So I'd called Suzanne and convinced her to pack clothes for both of them. She didn't need much persuading, and one quick look at her small apartment told me why. Suzanne Murzicki Roantis was a pretty, petite, brown-haired woman ten years younger than her husband. She had a nice pair of big blue eyes. But years of living with a professional soldier-karate champ had taken their toll: the eyes were dulled, the face around them lined with worry wrinkles. Poor kid; she needed a break—probably even more than Roantis. Suzanne was with me when I waited at the desk for them to wheel out the ex-mercenary. He was momentarily taken aback and confused when he saw us together, then gave his wife a dutiful hug and kiss from his wheelchair and stared blankly ahead while I wheeled him out into the parking lot. We got him settled comfortably in the Audi's front seat and headed for the Adams household.
"What's going on?" he asked finally as I helped him into an overstuffed chair in the living room. "And how about a drink, Doc?"
"Nix on the booze. You remember what the doctors told you. If you can stay off the stuff for another month or so, you'll be in good shape. Now, later tonight Mary and I are going to drive you and Suzanne down to Cape Cod. We're going to put you up at our cottage, where you can recover in peace and safety. Nobody else knows where you're going. In six or eight weeks, you should be almost as good as new."
Surprisingly, he didn't fight it. The bullet had apparently sapped a bit of his cussedness. I wheeled him into the kitchen to help prepare dinner. I knew that a lot of protein would help him heal, so Mary and I had put a huge standing rib in the oven. Roantis made the mashed potatoes while Suzanne helped me make dressing for the salad. When Mary and I make blue cheese dressing we add onions, capers, seasoned black pepper, and a dash of white vinegar to the cheese and oil, and blend these in the food processor before adding the mayonnaise and additional crumbled blue cheese. It gives the dressing more bite, makes it less heavy and cloying. We poured this liberally over big lettuce wedges. With the meat, potatoes, and buttered broccoli, it was quite a feed. We ate in the kitchen nook, and when Roantis sat down, he stared at the sprig of prickly ash that Mary had set in a vase in the middle of the table.
"Where'd you get that?" he asked, not taking his eyes off it.
"At Lexington Gardens, especially for you, Liatis," said Mary.
Roantis broke off a sprig and sniffed it. He placed it in his breast pocket so he could smell the aromatic oil. The prickly ash is a member of the rue family. To all Lithuanians, the rue plants are special, almost sacred. No Lithuanian household, either in the old country or America, is complete without them. Rue plants are to the Balts what the shamrock is to the Irish, the thistle is to the Scots. "Thank you, Mary," was all he said. But his eyes said it all. Then he dug into the grub like there was no tomorrow.
After dinner, we returned to the living room with coffee. Roantis was quieter and more subdued than I had ever seen him. He looked positively elderly.
"We're not going to start until around midnight," I told him. "Mary's brother, Joe, advised this. He says that any tails will be easy to spot then. As additional insurance, we'll have Joe with us in an unmarked state car. Liatis, we've notified the BYMCU that you'll be on leave for at least six weeks. All we want you to do is lie low, relax, and eat well. If you behave, nature will do the rest."
He nodded, placid as a sheep. Roantis was a changed man. At ten minutes after midnight we swept out of the driveway, followed by Joe in his unmarked car. We arrived at the Adams cottage, the Breakers, at two-thirty. The cottage sits on a bluff off Sunken Meadow Road in the town of North Eastham. It overlooks Cape Cod Bay. We trundled down the sandy footpath in the dark to the gray, cedar-shingled house, painted with white and navy blue trim. All was dark and quiet. There had been no sign of a tail along the way. After a mug of coffee, Joe climbed back into his cruiser and left. He'd just given up five hours of his off-duty time to see Roantis safely stowed. Typical.
Next morning after breakfast, Mary and I went into Wellfleet and bought several weeks' worth of groceries for Liatis and Suzanne. We didn't skimp on the grub, laying in lots of steaks and lamb chops. We stocked the freezer and refrigerator, and I left Suzanne with $200, despite her protests, to tide them over until our next visit. Roantis sat in front of the stone fireplace, soaking up the heat and looking out over Cape Cod Bay. In midafternoon, he discovered the stereo system and the collection of classical tapes. He played them continually and scarcely moved until suppertime. Suzanne told me she'd never seen him so relaxed.
"It's not relaxation, Suzanne," said Mary, who was throwing leaves of romaine into a huge teak bowl, "it's resignation. It's his sense of survival talking to him. Finally, after years of self-destructive behavior, common sense is getting the floor. Charlie, do you think it's a good idea for Liatis to see Moe a few times?"
"A
very good idea, if Moe's willing."
"But Moe loves helping people. I'm sure he wouldn't even charge anything."
"I know. But I don't know how keen Moe would be on trying to reform a professional soldier. The fire on the grill is almost ready. Where's that meat?"
Mary handed me a fat beef tenderloin, which I rubbed with peanut oil, took outside to the deck, and placed in the covered smoker-grill. Soon delicious aromas emerged from the contraption's top in the form of light blue smoke, which swarmed around the cottage walls in the sea breeze. I threw on a down vest and sat on a beach chair to watch the sun go down over the bay. It was warm for midwinter and, if you managed to avoid the direct breeze and sit in the sun, almost balmy. Roantis came out and joined me.
Suzanne appeared at his side and handed him a mug of hot chocolate, which he sipped. I heard a faint whine and growl off to my left and turned to see a coastal trawler inching along the horizon toward Wellfleet. Ahead of it was a low, dusky patch of darkness on the water. Billingsgate Shoal. I thought back to the close calls I'd had in connection with that sunken island and felt a big adrenaline rush. There was fear there, too—but the surge of excitement muted it and won out. I remembered my adventure, how I'd prevailed against substantial odds, and the rush grew. Sad to say, we live in a world in which risk is minimized or nonexistent. Most things are taken care of for us. And life, while comfortable and safe, has lost its challenge. We slip through our days in tired, pathetic routines, as if smeared with petroleum jelly. And then comes old age and death and we look back and ask ourselves, what have we done with our lives except follow the dots and mark time? Adventure is absent from twentieth-century life, and it's a damn shame. I had to admit that Roantis's predicament sounded more and more attractive to me. I couldn't help it. I turned back to the scarred and gnarled man who sat next to me, sipping from the steaming mug.
"Tell me a little bit about professional soldiering, Liatis. Who are these guys, and where do they hang out? And why were you so sure about the kind of rifle that was used to shoot you?"
"Hmmmmn," he said. "Mercking is dying out, I think. The world won't stand for it much longer. Not that it's not needed sometimes. Sometimes it's the only way out. But I guess in twenty years or so there won't be any more mercs. Where do they hang out? The big European cities, especially Paris, Marseilles, and the ones in Switzerland. Then there are the better cities of the Far East, like Kyoto, Hong Kong, and Bangkok. A lot of 'em can be found in Manila and Sydney, too. South America's full of them: Rio, Buenos Aires, Caracas . . ."
"How about here?"
"In America, the best single city is probably Miami. Why? Because it's a wide-open town, for one thing. Shit—with all the drug dealing and Mob hits going down, a merc doesn't stand out, you know? Good place to lie low and look for action. Also, Miami's close to Mexico, the Caribbean, and South America. They're all just a short hop away. DC's another place. You'd be surprised how many contacts you can make there. More than half the American mercs I know have worked for the Agency at one time or another. There's always some dirty little job they want done. And they pay like crazy, too."
"C'mon Liatis, I have trouble believing that."
"Suit yourself."
"How many mercs are there in Boston?"
"Ha! Boston? Probably none except me. But there're some in rural New England . . . You can bet on it. See Doc, there are basically two kinds of men who go into this line of work, this life. First, there's your sicko killer types. These guys are a little off in the head, you know? They like to kill people. Period. If they can do it legally and get paid too, so much the better. These guys usually have military or law enforcement backgrounds, but they're not really soldiers. They're misfits. They'll take any job that comes their way, any excuse to pull that trigger. They'll work for any government, even a ruthless dictatorship. These guys you'll generally find in the big cities, bumming around in bars and cathouses. They're scum. I've never worked with them and never will."
"And the second type?" said Mary, who had come out on the deck with Suzanne. She snuggled down into her parka, drawing the collar tight around her neck. "How is the second type any better?"
"Well, the other type is a true professional soldier. Generally he's spent ten to twenty years in a major military service and has a good track record in elite forces. He doesn't like to kill people, but is good at it when he must. This man is guided by strong opinions and political ideals. He will take on only those contracts which he feels will benefit the world as well as his wallet. He's a professional soldier because it's what he knows and does well. Almost always, this man has another source of income besides soldiering, since he's picky about his merc contracts."
"And what's this other source of income?" I asked.
"Could be just about anything. With me, it's teaching martial arts. I know several mercs who are couriers and bodyguards. Two guys I know own bars. One is a heavy hauler. A lot of them are ranchers or construction workers. Quite a few are in the security equipment or firearms business. Some are bush pilots. It all depends. But this second-type guy, chances are he won't hang around the big cities trying to make a contact. He's good enough so people find him. Also, he's a loner. You won't find him working for somebody else, certainly not at a desk job. Chances are, he'll be out in the country where he can hunt, fish, screw off, and do what he damn well pleases."
"And that's why you said there are mercs in rural New England?"
"Yeah. Especially upcountry in Vermont, New Hampshire, and Maine. But even more down in the southern mountains . . . around the Smokies and the Blue Ridge. I can't think how many great trackers and recon men came from there. Been doin' it since they were toddlers, practically. So don't look for these guys in the city dives. You'll find them out in the boonies, but only if they want to be found. Otherwise, forget it."
"And you're the second type, of course," said Mary.
"Of course. See Mary, I was forced into soldiering by the Germans. I killed a man when I was a teenager. I shot the soldier who killed my best friend. Then I had to leave Lithuania with some of my buddies because the Nazis were hunting us. We wound up in England, where we joined the Polish Resistance under Sossobowski. I fought in Operation Market Garden as a paratrooper at sixteen. I guess I don't know anything but soldiering."
We took the meat off the grill and hustled it inside, where I sliced it into juicy fillets. Roantis tucked into the steak like a lion on the Serengeti. Afterward, when Mary and Suzanne were talking over coffee in the kitchen, he and I sat in the study corner of the living room and talked about military small arms.
"How come you're so sure about the appearance of the rifle that shot you?" I asked.
"Because I know the kinds of rifles mercs use, that's why. The modern military small arm is called the assault rifle. It's an automatic rifle that can be fired as a semi-auto single-shot."
"I know."
"Right. Now the U.S. military has adopted the Colt M-Sixteen as our standard military arm. Too bad. That two-twenty-three cartridge just can't hack it. Although it's a good rifle for women and Asians, who are small. They like the li'l two-twenty-three Armalite because it's lightweight and doesn't kick. Now, on the wrong side of the iron curtain is the Kalishnikov, the AK-Forty-seven. Nice rifle. Practically foolproof . . . and fires a hefty round, too. Remember Doc, we used the Kalishnikovs in the Daisy Ducks. We carried very little spare ammo with us—we dint need it."
"And the others?"
"Well, Germany, Switzerland, and Italy all make very nice combat rifles. Israel and Finland both make nice ones too, based on the Russian design. But the best is the Fusile Automatique Légére, the FAL, made by Fabrique Nationale in Belgium. It's used by most of the NATO forces and has been the standard British rifle for a long time. It's top of the line. Accurate, dependable, and fires a hefty three-o-eight round. They sell for two grand—and that's military issue, with no fancy custom work."
I whistled. "And so that's what was used on you?"
"I'm w
illing to stake heavy bucks on it. What I keep saying is: the guy was a pro. Don't you go after him, Doc. I know you're good and smart, but leave this guy alone. You're in enough trouble with him already, shooting him in the leg. He's probably still pissed at you. And these guys, they don't go to court. They go for your throat."
"So you don't want me to help?"
"I do want you to help. I want you to find Vilarde. Just lay off the other trails. Don't try to find the marksman. Hell, he's out of the country now anyway. Let him be. I'll go for him later. How long am I supposed to stay here?"
"About a month. Maybe longer."
"And how much will I owe you?"
"Nothing. It's all been taken care o£"
"Bullshit. How much?"
"Nothing. Anyway, your being here sure isn't costing me anything except a couple of bucks for food. just relax and rest up. If I get a solid lead on Vilarde, I'll want you healthy enough to go looking for him—because I'm not going."
"Look Doc, we both know I can't pay you back now. But remember, we get the Siva, you get your part of the cut and all the expenses too, okay?"
"Yeah. Don't worry about it. Don't worry about a thing except healing. See how little you can drink and how much you can eat and sleep."
Mary and I pulled out of there the next morning after coffee. We turned out of the drive and headed into Wellfleet to our market, instructing the owner to put every and all purchases made by Mrs. Roantis on our tab—no arguments.
An hour from home, Mary asked me if Roantis and I had discussed the cost of his little respite on the Cape.
"No. In fact, I told him it wasn't costing me anything. I said that so he wouldn't feel bad."
"Jeez Charlie, it's cost us over five grand already. You didn't tell him you'd paid Bill Nesbit's fee, plus a portion—a hefty portion—of the hospital charges?"
"No. Not yet anyway."
"And what are the odds, do you think, of Roantis's ever paying you back?"
"Slim. As slim as spider's silk. But the odds of my being here now in one piece would be nonexistent if he hadn't saved my skin in the parking lot."
