Sea Change

by Dave Balcom

  Jan asked, “What was the lawyer’s name?”

  “He said it was Wallace Crocker, but his ID said his name was Willard Crocker.”

  “Have you found him in the Bar Association?”

  “Oh, yeah, I had forgotten about your long-lost lawyer. I’ll have it checked,” he was opening his phone as he spoke, then he walked away, talking as he went.

  When he came back, I asked, “Were there any girls in the complex?”

  He checked a note, “Twelve, none of them were Wright girls.”

  “Do you have a last known address for Georgia Wright?”

  “I’ll ask Sylva when he calls me later. Right now I think he’s been in bed for about an hour, so I’m not going to bother him.”

  “Not to sound impatient, but maybe somebody else at Vice could help with that? She might still be alive...” I let my voice trail off, and he hopped up with his phone open and walked away.

  He came back with his self-deprecating frown firmly in place. “I can be a real twit. They’re checking and will call me ASAP.”

  I sipped my coffee and stole a glance at Jan. She was studying me as if I were a new species. “You okay?”

  “Thanks to you.” She glanced at Jensen and decided not to say anything just as his phone rang. “I’m sorry. That’s all.”

  I shook my head and smiled. “Don’t be, okay? Just be there when you can.”

  He came back with his notebook open. “We can meet a Vice officer named Willie Reed at this address. Come on!”

  The address was less than a mile from the hotel, and an unmarked PPD car was parked two houses down. Jensen pulled past the undercover car. We walked back and a tall, raw-boned ginger of a man unfolded from behind the wheel and approached us with a wide grin. “I’m Reed; you must be Jensen,” he said as they shook hands. “And these are?”

  I extended my hand, “Jim Stanton. This is Jan.”

  He smiled at Jan and touched his finger to his forehead in an old-world gesture, “Jerry said you were pretty, and he didn’t exaggerate. Nice to meet you both.”

  “Our last known address of Georgia Wright is just down here at twelve oh six. Looks like somebody’s home.”

  Jensen asked, “How do we want to handle this?”

  Reed flipped open his phone, and dialed a number from his notebook. “Thought I’d first call her and see if she’s home and okay. We got no probable cause, right?”

  He listened and we heard him say, “Georgia?”

  “Yes, ma’am. This is Sgt. Reed of the Portland Police, and we got a call from some folks who met you a couple nights ago and they were afraid something might have happened to you. Would it be all right if I came to your house, I’m nearby, and spoke with you a moment?

  “No, no, you’re not in any trouble with the police that I know of, but these nice folks became worried about you last night, and they’d like to know that you’re doing okay.”

  He listened for a few minutes, nodding. “Yes, ma’am, and to be honest we’re all standing on your block. Can we come knock on your door?

  “Thank you. We’ll give you a few minutes.” He closed his phone, looked at the house, and then turned to us. “You stick right here, see if she comes to the door in a minute or two.”

  “Where are you going?” Jensen asked.

  “Just around back, see if she’s taking flight, that’s all.” And with that he started trotting through the side yards toward an alley visible from the street.

  Jensen and I walked down toward the house we figured was Georgia’s. As we arrived at her walk, she opened the door. She was wearing jeans and a t-shirt. She had little makeup on, and seemed overly aware of it. She looked at us, and then at Jan who she waved at.

  “Where’s Sgt. Reed?” She asked.

  “In the alley,” Jensen said. “He wasn’t sure...”

  “Come on in, and I’ll call him from the back door.”

  We entered the house and found ourselves in a small living room. A hallway ran from where we stood to the back door which was in the kitchen. We could see cars parked just beyond that door. She beckoned us to follow, and as we walked down the hallway, we saw a bathroom on the left and a stairway to the right.

  “There are two bedrooms and a whole bath up there,” she said as we all entered the kitchen. “If you want to go up there, my room is still a mess, but the rest of the place shouldn’t offend you.”

  She opened the door, and called, “Sgt. Reed? Sgt. Reed? Come on in!”

  Reed stepped into view behind the cars and made his way to the steps.

  “Come on in, Sergeant,” she said.

  When he came into the kitchen, Jensen said, “Miss Wright, did you want one of us to look upstairs?”

  “Not really, but I also don’t want you going around worrying about me.”

  “I’ll go up,” Reed said.

  “The stairs are on the left,” she said pointing down the hall.

  Reed was back in minutes. “Clean.”

  “Now, you can see I’m not having a problem, so tell me why you think I might?”

  Jensen shot me a sideways glance so I answered, “Ma’am, we’re really interested in finding Angelina Wright. Actually, we’re really interested in finding Pedro Martini...” I faltered, trying to find the right words...

  “Out with it, Mr. Coldwell. I’m a big girl and I’ve been lied to by the best and the worst of them.”

  “Have you ever heard of The Outfit?”

  She paled. She went from lovely and pink to ashen gray in a heartbeat.

  I pushed ahead, “We... er... at least I believe that Pedro Martini used to work for this Outfit, and last spring he and four co-workers disappeared, not because they were eliminated for some reason, but because they were launching a plan to kidnap a wealthy business man and his wife.

  “In any event, that kidnapping was successful and he and his co-workers took claim to twenty-five million dollars. When I heard Angelina had disappeared at about the same time, I became convinced that if I could find her, I’d find Martini, and I really want to have a word with him.”

  We could hear her kitchen clock ticking. The room was cool and comfortable, and if she’d offered milk and cookies it wouldn’t have surprised me. I thought, “Every kitchen should have a ticking clock, like mom used to have...”

  “I thought she was lying,” Georgia finally said.

  “What do you mean?” Jan asked.

  “She told me last April that she was buying a boat, and giggled. She was tipsy at the time, and had been talking about her boyfriend – Pedro – and I had asked if he’d given her a ring. She laughed and said, ‘no,’ she said he had bought her a boat. She said, ‘It’s in my name, too,’ and then she giggled some more.”

  “Is Martini his real name?”

  “I don’t know. This is a big company, folks. I don’t know more than a half dozen co-workers. Not every hooker in Portland is part of this, but then again, I have no knowledge if that’s true, either.

  “We don’t have employee meetings, or employee of the month awards, either,” and at that she had to giggle a bit.

  “We do have one rule, however, and it’s painfully apparent that I broke it.”

  “What’s that?” Jensen asked.

  “It’s like Fight Club,” she answered. “You never talk about The Outfit. I’m going to need some protection.”

  “Do you have family?” I asked.

  She shook her head. “No. If I do, I don’t know about them. Why?”

  “From what we’re hearing, the punishment for breaking that rule is usually death, only after watching everyone they care about die.”

  She nodded. “That’s been promised. I don’t have anyone, but I don’t really want to die at age twenty-five.” She turned to Jensen, “Can you help me?”

  “Why don’t you pack up what you need, and what you can’t leave behind, and we’ll find a secure place for you ... you’ll be expected to tell us everything you know. You may even know things you don’t kn
ow you know, but we’ll want to hear it all.”

  I asked her, “What about Monique and Shannon?”

  There was a tear trickling down her cheek. “I guess that’s why neither one of them called me back last night. I had told them about you folks, how nice you were and the hundred dollars for a quick chat. Monique asked me if I’d lost my mind and Shannon told me she couldn’t make it last night, but she’d call me later... She never did.”

  Jensen said, “Jan, can you give her a hand? We need to get a move on.”

  Reed said, “Jim, you and I can hang out down here. When Georgia and Jan get something packed, we can carry, okay?

  When the two women went upstairs, Jensen took his phone to the front room. Reed and I sat in the kitchen which was shadowy from the bright noon sun. The only sound in the kitchen was the ticking of the clock; outside was the hum of insects up in the trees.

  A black suburban pulled into the alley and stopped behind Georgia’s car. Two men, wearing sun glasses and Hawaiian shirts loose over their belts, climbed out of the vehicle, and walked confidently up to the back door.

  One knocked, the other called out, “Hey, Georgia!”

  The other guy laughed, and tested the door to see if it was locked. I looked at Reed and he had his service weapon in both hands; I pulled my Taurus revolver from its holster on my hip, just as the first guy came through the door.

  With his shades on we had to be invisible to him. He walked confidently into the room; his automatic in his right hand along side the seam in his jeans. His partner followed him in, and he too had an automatic in his right hand.

  Reed was sighted on the first guy. I was at a more oblique angle, and would have to turn to find a target. I switched my gun to my left hand just as Reed barked, “Police! Stop where you are!”

  Both men were blinking trying to make out the scene, but the second guy moved his gun towards Reed’s voice, and the officer fired without hesitation. I had my gun pointed at the first guy as he was raising his weapon to fire, and Reed shot him high in the left shoulder, spinning him off the sink behind him. He caromed back with his gun turning toward us. I fired just as he did. My three-fifty-seven magnum took him in the sternum, killing him instantly.

  I looked back at Reed and he was slumping in his chair, blood streaming out of his neck.

  I quickly checked to see if either of the bad guys was alive, and when I returned to the table, Jensen was there pressing his sports coat to the wound in Reed’s neck. “It’s not that serious if we can stop the bleeding,” he said in a hiss.

  His phone was on the table where he’d dropped it when he ran into the room. I picked it up and dialed nine-one-one just as Georgia and Jan hit the room. “Hi, my name is Jim Stanton. I’m at twelve oh six Winston...” I looked at Georgia and she said southwest... “Southwest. We have a police-involved shooting and we have one officer down. We need help, and we need it right now. We’re in the kitchen at the back of the house. We’ll be waiting to direct the EMTs. Yes, I’ll stay on the phone.”

  Jan was obviously in shock but she looked composed compared to Georgia. Georgia looked at the two dead men, absorbed the meaning of their guns, looked back at the parked Suburban, put two and two together and silently walked into her bathroom and threw up. Jan went to see if she could help.

  The clock continued its steady ticking, a bizarre metronome of life.

  35

  By the time Reed was in the ambulance and headed for the trauma center, the E.M.T.s had the bleeding under control and were already pumping blood back into him.

  Portland Police were swarming around the house, but Jensen had taken Jan and Georgia with him to FBI headquarters. “We’ll secure her there. You can tell the police everything, and they can call me, but she’s going to be safe with us.”

  I remembered Lawton’s advice years before: Don’t talk to the first guys on the scene, wait until the detective who’s in charge of the investigation arrives, and then talk to him.

  Twenty minutes after the ambulance had left the scene, a short, round plain clothes detective introduced himself to me. “I’m Lieutenant Pauli,” he said in a tired tone of voice. “You’re Jim Stanton, and you made the call to nine-one-one. Right?”

  “Lt. Pauli, are you in charge of this investigation?”

  He looked around as if he couldn’t believe he had heard me. “Sure, so why do you ask?”

  “I just want to start telling what happened when the guy who really needs to know is on hand.”

  He nodded and I realized he was chewing on something. He had a notebook in one hand and a pencil in another. I looked at the pencil and noted that the eraser was half gone and I knew what he was chewing on.

  “So what happened?”

  I started from the top. “Sgt. Reed of Portland Vice and Special Agent Ron Jensen of the FBI, and my wife, Jan Stanton, and I paid a visit to Georgia Wright, the owner of this home. While we were here, she decided that she wanted police protection from a criminal organization. Agent Jensen was on the front porch, talking with his office and arranging for her. My wife and Miss Wright were upstairs packing, and Reed and I were sitting at the kitchen table, waiting to carry Miss Wright’s bags to a car.

  “Those two pulled up in the back, got out and came to the door. They were wearing sunglasses, but the difference between the bright sunlight and gloom in the kitchen must have made them unaware of our presence. The door was unlocked, and they both came in with automatics in their right hands.

  “Sgt. Reed had his service weapon out and trained on them. I am licensed to carry, and I had my Taurus out, but as I was sitting with my back mostly to the door, I had my gun in my left hand, and it wasn’t trained on anyone.

  “When Reed told the men to stop and drop their weapons, the trailing man made a move to shoot at the sound of Reed’s voice, but Reed shot him first; then the lead guy was raising his gun, he had held it down along his right pant leg, and Reed shot him, but he hit him high in the left shoulder, spinning him around and off the sink. The guy then got his gun back up and he and I shot at the same moment. I hit him in the chest, he nicked Reed in the throat, just left of his wind pipe. Reed was bleeding quite badly.

  “Jensen raced into the kitchen, saw what had happened, and immediately started to help Reed. I used Jensen’s phone to call nine-one-one, and help was here in minutes.”

  They left me sitting in the living room for about three hours. Then Pauli and two uniforms came and got me. One of the uniforms patted me down, relieved me of my wallet and pocket knife, and they marched me to a cruiser and took me to the Hall.

  Three hours later, after I had told the story two more times, and then signed the hard copy transcripton of the recorded statement, they turned me over to Jensen.

  “They kept my Taurus,” I whined to the FBI agent.

  “They do that with weapons involved in their investigations. You’ll get it back, someday.”

  “I have to have a weapon. Look, there was already someone willing to pay a million bucks to kill me, now I’ve got this Outfit pissed off. I have to have a weapon.”

  “Buy another one. But you’ll probably have to go to Pendleton to find a sheriff who’ll issue you a permit.”

  “I have my permit, I just need a gun.”

  “You’ll still have to wait twelve days.”

  “You’re the bloody FBI, Jensen. You have to be able to grease this for me.”

  He laughed. “Let’s get you some dinner and a night’s sleep. We’ll keep an eye on you and Jan tonight. I hear room service at the Monaco is outstanding.”

  36

  Jan was waiting for me when in the room, and it was a far different reunion from the previous night. We ordered room service and I told her the details of my day after she’d been taken away.

  “Are you facing charges?”

  “I don’t think so. Reed is out of surgery, and is expected back on restricted duty within two months and full recovery inside a year. The two dead guys were obviously there with evil
intent. I don’t think I’m facing a charge.”

  After we’d eaten, and I had a shower, she wondered if we should go home.

  I hadn’t thought about it, but she obviously was concerned.

  “Why?”

  “I talked to Shirlee today. She called to tell me that there was going to be a service for Stan in La Grande this weekend. She wondered if I knew, and when I told her we didn’t, I felt something tug at my heart. I want to go.”

  I called Jensen and asked him if he knew about the service. He hadn’t known. When I told him I wanted to go home, he told me to check with Sylva. I called the detective, and he said he’d call back in the morning.

  The next morning Sylva called and said we could go home, but he wanted me to stop by the Hall before we left town, so we did.

  “Why?” Jan asked.

  “I didn’t ask. I bet they want me to sign something from yesterday or go over something one more time. Sylva’s voice didn’t give me any clues, but it didn’t occur to me to ask.”

  When we arrived at the hall, it was mid morning, and Sylva came down immediately when the desk officer paged him. We went up to his squad’s office on the third floor.

  He introduced me to several plain clothes officers, and each shook my hand with a purpose. “Great job yesterday, Jim,” one of the older officers said.

  I raised an eyebrow at Sylva as we sat down at a desk. “They all wanted to meet you and shake your hand,” he explained. “Those two you helped take out were known as ruthless, dangerous men. Everyone in this squad is grateful to you and Reed for doing it right.”

  “Was that the reason you asked us to stop by?” Jan asked.

  He reached into his desk and pulled my Taurus out and handed it to me. “No, this is the reason. The technicians are finished with it, and the prosecutor’s already announced that you were justified in your actions, so take that and be careful with it.”

  I thanked him, and we made our exit to a chorus of “come back and visit us any time!”

  “That was very strange,” Jan said to me as we walked down the stairs. “They’re celebrating you.”