by Moulton, CD
“Dave and I talked a lot in the field. We met so many different people among the Indios. They’re a very diverse group.”
He nodded and sat back to sip coffee and think.
“You state he is honest in his dealings with everyone to the extent he alienates some of them. In what way?”
“He deliberately challenges people who go around spouting bullshit, particularly about other people and always when it’s about the Indios. He faces down bigots, though he admits that a certain situation made a bigot of him in a limited way. He despises snobs with attitude. That kind of thing. He says he answers to one person in the universe. He has to meet the eyes of that person directly when he shaves in the morning. If he can’t meet those eyes he’s a piece of shit.
“I agree. I use the definition myself.”
He sat back for a moment to think again. “I’ll give you a check for a hundred thousand dollars right now, then more as needed, determined by Dave. If what I’ve heard is true that will finance him for years.”
“No. It’ll finance things for a couple of months, but Dave’ll have another dozen students in the universities with everything he doesn’t need – and he needs next to nothing for himself – in days.”
He laughed. “That, I’ll finance! If he holds to the rules as you’ve stated them. He apparently chooses those to help well.”
“That, he does. He’s a bit stupid about personal things. He trusts all the wrong people, then he digs in and becomes hardnosed with the ones he considers worth his time. It’s how he is.”
“It is true that he owns a hotel and several parcels of land that are in another’s name? That it was stolen from him because he trusted a charismatic scam artist?”
“Yes. He’s never going to let that go, for which I don’t blame him. He’ll see those crooks in jail or dead. He says that they prey on retirees who can’t afford it.”
They chatted for a few minutes, then Clint said he had to go. He would probably be in town another day, then back to the field. Napoli asked if he needed anything. He said he got by and was comfortable enough. He didn’t need much.
Clint felt as though he had met a truly good person. Manny had been wrong about him. That didn’t mean he made all that money through legitimate channels. He probably did that just like Manny suggested, but it wasn’t him who got into the crooked parts and it wasn’t him who was doing that bit in Panamá and Bastimentos. Clint wanted a way to get rid of Napoli’s albatross without it affecting him, personally.
Pragmatic Solution
Clint got off the plane, went to the hotel in Santiago, cleaned up and became Clint Faraday again, then went to have a good dinner in the place across the street. He missed the local fare in only two days!
He decided to spend the night in Santiago so went to the popular local bar nearby to swap stories about anything that came up. It was a very pleasant night. He was up early for the bus to David, stayed there a day, then went to Bocas. He hadn’t let anyone know he was back yet so went to Judi’s place to find she was with some friends who wanted to see the real Panamá. She was at Las Tablas and places farther out the peninsula and was coming back via Chitre the day after tomorrow.
He saw Dave and told about the conversation and handed him the check. He was surprised and told Clint he was elected to make all the speeches he was supposed to make and wouldn’t. He would put another couple dozen people through university with the money! He would also accept as much as Napoli wanted to send. He agreed with Clint about getting Gino out of the picture.
“Your good friends – to hear them tell it – on Bastimentos are worried that they might not be allowed to leave. Ever.”
“I think I can make them ... I think maybe one of them, at least, can be made to turn on the boss! That may be a solution! I’ll let them all know the killer’s head’s in the noose and I can drop the trap the minute I get confirmation from him. The boss is Gino. I’ll have to arrange for them to get out of Panamá, but I want to know who first. I want the others tagged and watched. I don’t like blackmailers, regardless of who or why they do it.”
“You use blackmail yourself so don’t get holy on me,” Dave said, grinning.
“I use threatened blackmail on them.”
“There’s a difference?”
Clint gave him the bird.
He called Manny and told him the story. He accepted that it could well be true, that Napoli was Italian – and they were his people. He knew what he would put up with and would always try to protect his family from getting caught in most things.
“Clint, that’s duty. If someone else gets them, that’s the way of life. If they had reason you say it was fated to happen and move on. If they don’t have reason they get stepped on.”
“There’s reason to go around with this one, I’d say. I want to find who’s the killer in the bunch. I’ll probably arrange for them to go home just before I get the information for a deal with the FBI with him to take his brother down to protect certain people. He’ll have to squeal on whoever’s his hit here to get the deal.”
“Oh. He’ll put all his crooked shit on Arno. That happens among the type. He would know they can put him away for life for his pedophilia so will make any deal he can.
“Arno wouldn’t turn on his brother for any reason. Gino will turn on him or anyone else in a flash and they all know it.”
“So they have to prevent that. Gino was blackmailing them so they have reason.”
“You can make it work.”
They talked about new information. There was damned little of it.
Clint went into town to talk with Sergio, then found Franconi and chatted with him. He said his boss was about to go down very hard so get whatever’s owed right away. Franconi thanked him and laughed.
“I don’t know what it’s about, but my boss, who you found out is not Arno, is a pervert if I ever saw one. He got caught with the wrong person in a perverted situation, as they say?”
“Uh-huh. That bunch out there found him in the wrong place at the wrong time with the wrong person. People, considering all of them.”
“Now I have to wonder if he’ll turn on me.”
“A risk of the business.”
He nodded. They talked a few more minutes, then Clint went home, got his boat and headed for Bastimentos. He was just in time to find Catherine and Lucerne in one of the gazebos. They were below eye level and he didn’t see them until he was passing four feet away. They didn’t see him.
He started thinking about things. Some things began to click. At the house Dickerson was watching wrestling on the TV. He said he didn’t know where any of the others were. This time of day his wife was locked in her room for her beauty nap, Lucerne went fishing, probably Frieda was with him.
“I mainly dropped in to tell you to stop telling people we’re friends. You’re just someone I’m investigating – and to tell you your meal ticket’s about to expire. Gino’s ass is in a crack and the only way to save it will probably be to claim the bunch of you were blackmailing him and that he paid one of you to start knocking off the others. You should all check your proof because Danny lost his and died, then Julia let the wrong person know how to find her proof and she died.
“Gino’s gonna tell us who to save his own hide. It will take a week or so to wear him down, then at least one of you goes down the hard way.
“We don’t want you here. I’ll try to arrange for you to get out in a way that lets the police off the hook for letting you escape. It’ll have to be very damned fast so let me know within the hour if you’re willing to take the chance.”
He said he’d take any chance he could find to get out of Panamá. He didn’t doubt that Gino would crack. He was a total wimp!
Clint went back home. It was now up to them. Dickerson would call him as soon as they were ready to leave. If anyone wanted to stay he didn’t have any say in that. He and Catherine would get out as fast as they could!
The phone buzzed half an hour after Clint got home. D
ickerson said they were ready to leave. It wouldn’t take them ten minutes to get their stuff because they had it packed since the first time they wanted to get out.
“Go load the stuff on your boat. I’ll have the cop there instructed to let you go because you’re going to Bocas and the police boat’ll watch your every least move. The police boat’s gonna receive a sudden emergency message to help locate a drug runner and will go toward Zapatillias. Go north to Costa Rica, pay someone fifty bucks to stamp your passports, then go to the states or wherever. You shouldn’t have any trouble disappearing for a month or so there. It’ll be over by then. Nobody’s going to try to catch a child molester’s blackmailers too hard. They’ll say he deserved it and worse and be glad he’s caught and is going to be put away for life.
“He’ll throw you to the dogs in a blink. They won’t act on that. It’s the only way to make a deal for fifteen to twenty instead of life without. He’ll try to throw his brother to them too. The one part of this deal you have to make with me is that you’ll tell the truth. Arno had nothing to do with it.”
They agreed to that in a flash. Clint said to wait five minutes, then get to the dock and get on that boat as fast as they can. He’ll give them a call the second the police boat’s been dispatched to the Zapatillas.
“One of you is going to have to be able to disappear completely. He’s going to have to give whichever one of you who’s acting as a hired killer here up. That’s the only deal they’ll make to give him anything to hang onto.
“That’s fine with me! They’re going to start the pressure right away and figure he’ll crack in a week or less. I want you out of here. You fend for yourself after you’re in international waters.”
He waited four minutes then told them to go. It would take the police boat six minutes to get to the Zapatillas and about six to get back when they found the drug runner had been caught just as they arrived. That made just twelve minutes for them to get out of sight toward the north. They should have enough of a head start to be in Costa Rican waters before the police boat could intercept them. Then they were on their own.
He waited. Sergio called to say he didn’t believe that bunch could move so damned fast. They were running like their asses were on fire. Clint said he would come to town later to get the reports on where they went. Their boat had a transponder on it that gave the GPS readings on it every ten minutes. They went to northern Costa Rica, stayed less than an hour, then went on to Yucatan and then to Galveston. Manny had them watched. Dickerson went directly to Ohio, Lucerne went to Louisiana, Herman went to Colorado. Catherine went to LA. Just what Clint thought she’d do.
“See, everybody else had air-tights for Bianco’s murder. Hers was Dickerson, his was her. He sleeps like a log, as they say where he came from. He drinks six or eight beers, then sacks out. He’s really out!
“She’s screwing anybody with the time and energy, I’d say. She’s very used to sneaking away at night, but she was doing it during the day, too. She was locked in her room for her beauty nap so far as Dickerson knew, but was in that gazebo with Lucerne. You can bet it was a long number from the first time.”
“That one, you pegged,” Manny agreed. “She’s a type. You find three of her in every redneck bar in the world! Anyhow, let’s see what transpires.”
They talked for a few more minutes, then Clint decided he could use a beauty nap. Trouble was, he couldn’t sleep during the day anytime.
So he went fishing.
Finally Home
“Hi! I’m finally home!” Judi greeted. “Did you learn anything in California?”
“I learned that Arno Napoli had nothing to do with it past financing the moving of those scum on Bastimentos. I didn’t figure who killed them until I was back.”
“It was that Frank character, right?”
“No. Catherine.”
“Really?”
“Dead certain.”
“You let them go? Sergio said you and he made a plan to get them out of here for good. Panamá doesn’t need the headaches and expense of prosecuting them.”
“Uh-huh. It’s better to have them back in the states with their redneck friends than here in jail.”
“I’m beginning to see your point about that with some of these ... people who come here.”
“It’s about being pragmatic.”
“I guess. Want to come to the Nine Degrees for dinner? I don’t want to cook tonight. I’m tired.
“Oh! Serg said to tell you Franconi left within minutes of that bunch sailing into the sun ... rise. We’re east.”
“I figured he would. Let’s go get some of Rick’s cooking!”
“... reported that he was the brother of the very esteemed personage in Fallendale, Arno Napoli. The police report says it appeared to be an attempted robbery that went wrong. He was stabbed seven times.
“Services will be held at the Fallendale Mother of Mercy Hospital chapel tomorrow. It is to be a closed private ceremony as Mr. Arno Napoli states that the circumstances and the wishes of the family are for such arrangements. In other news, there were two more drive-by....”
Clint turned off the cable TV tuned to LA CBS, shook his head and wondered. Did Franconi get him and make it look like the MO of Catherine? Did Catherine get him? Did Manny have it done?
He might never know the real story. He wasn’t sure he wanted to. Now, today. Fishing?
No. Maybe to Tierra Oscura where Dave was doing his research. He liked that.
Or ..........
Clint Faraday Mysteries #13
The Body In the Bay
© 2011 by C. D. Moulton
This is a work of fiction. Any resemblances to persons, living or dead, or events is purely incidental unless otherwise indicated.
A woman’s body is found in the bay near Tierra Oscura. The first theory is that she drowned when she got tangled in the mangrove roots while snorkeling.
Why would anyone be in that bay snorkeling – plus the fact that no one could get tangled in those roots at that spot.
Who were the men with her when she went out?
Contents
A Body
Small Clues
Follow That Cab!
Veraguas
Treasure Located
Identifying the Treasure
Sheik Schmuck
Too Far!
Very Small Deal
So! That’s What It’s About!
Not Our Problem
The Body In the Bay
A Body
Clint Faraday, retired PI from Florida, brought his boat into his bay deck. He and Judi Lum, the attractive Taiwanese nextdoor neighbor, climbed out and tied the boat. Clint handed her the gear and smaller items, then he put the chest of fish on the deck, followed by the other paraphernalia they took on their fishing jaunts.
“It was nice all day today,” Judi said. “We got enough for both our freezers and a few for Ben. It was too bad he couldn’t come.”
Ben was Ben Longstreet, a neighbor. He was gay, which was a big “So what?” in Bocas del Toro, Panamá.
Silvio Lopez, an Indio friend, came by in his cayuca and greeted them, “Coin dere!” They returned the greeting. Both of them spoke some of the Ngobe Bugle language (Ngoberé). Clint was becoming fluent. Most of his closer friends were Indios.
Judi brought a deep pan from the kitchen and sorted the fish. She left two large ones in the chest and told Clint she’d borrowed the chest from Ben so he could carry it back with the fish.
Clint grinned and helped her take her gear and fish home, then returned and cleaned the fish. He put Ben’s in the ice and carried the chest to Ben’s house. Earl, Ben’s newest love, took the fish inside and said Ben would be home from work in half an hour. He’d cook up one of the fish for dinner. He was a gourmet chef so the meal would be between great and fantastic.
“They’re big so I’ll expect you and Jude around six thirty. No excuses. I have a good almondine sauce I make, old-fashioned hush-puppies, garden salad
and mustard greens from Volcan. We were in Cerro Punta last week and I brought a lot of them back. They’re a weed up there and nobody eats them. I cooked up enough for a month or two and froze them for your freezer. I know you like them as much as we do. There’s nothing better with fish.”
Clint said he’d be there. He called Judi and she said that would be perfect. She was planning to cook some fish herself, but she couldn’t hope to compete with Earl in the cooking area.
Clint went back home to check out his comp and calls, answered a few e-mails and deleted twenty some-odd spam messages, then cleaned up and laid around until a few minutes after six. He took a bottle of good Chianti, called Judi to say, “Let’s go!” and went to meet her at his gate and to walk the two blocks (if they’d had blocks there) to Ben’s. They spent a pleasant evening there and went home at about eleven. Judi decided to go to a friend’s house, but Clint was tired. He sacked out.
In the morning Clint went into town and talked with the regulars at the Golden Grill, then to the market for a few things, then back to his house. He got a call from a friend at Punta Robalo and took his boat around to his place, about an hour and a half by boat. They solved the problem, a non-issue type of thing about who owned what. The Indios have no ownership in that sense in their culture. It was a simple misunderstanding that could have grown into something more, but probably wouldn’t have.
Clint went back home at three o’clock and was tying the boat to the dock when his celular buzzed. He answered to find it was Sergio, head of the police in Bocas Town. Some snorkelers had found a body in the bay. It looked like a woman had been snorkeling near the mangroves and had gotten entangled in the roots and had drowned.
“Why tell me?” Clint asked.
“It doesn’t feel right. No one has been reported missing. She was a tourist, I think, so wouldn’t have been there alone.”
