by Moulton, CD
Clint figured. “Two kilo bars?”
“Yes.”
“Two to three hundred million.”
“We don’t sell that cheap. Five. The emeralds are historic artifacts or whatever they call them. The shipment was made to that figure.”
“How will you handle it if I tell you where it is?”
“Will it stay there for a time?”
“I think definitely so. They don’t want to dump any of it on the regular market while you’re still watching so close. They’ll spend some of the cash. Can you trace that?”
“Of cou... Okay. No. You’re up-front with me, I am with you. We have no way to follow that cash. It wasn’t enough to worry about. That was stupid! It won’t happen again!
“You see, now I understand that it is something to worry about – not for itself, but for where it can lead you. I will not give you an answer you want to hear. I am not the only person involved – another stupidity!
“I will consult with my partners, such as they are, and try to convince them it would be better to bide our time than to rush into something that will only cause later grief. None of us are, as you gringos say, hurting for money.”
“This is just a game? A diversion?”
He laughed. “More or less. I do it for reasons such a person as you would probably not understand.”
“You have no friends. You are bored with life and try to find something to cause at least a temporary pause in that boredom.”
“You are amazing! I fear you are also correct. Perhaps I can find that friend in you?
“You see, I know not another person I can trust without very serious reservations. I feel I can trust you.”
“Unless I’m also playing a game?”
“No. You are not. That is a thing you would not have stated were it so. It is not to your personality.”
“You know something? I think we could be friends. Vasily is a lot like you. Is he a partner?”
“Not in this. He seeks adventure in various other places.”
Clint nodded. “Well, I’ll be in touch.” He handed Nikolo a card with his e-mail and celular number. Nikolo wrote a number on a piece of paper and said it would reach him anytime. Don’t allow anyone to know it.
Clint glanced at it and crumpled the paper. Nikolo raised an eyebrow.
“It’s memorized. If it’s not around on a piece of paper it won’t go anywhere else.” He told him the number.
“A good talent to have. I can do it a little. Come by anytime, my friend. You will always be a most welcomed guest in my home.
“I have never before said that to anyone!”
“Could I ask how Shannon O’Brien got the, er, information?”
“Another very stupid thing. She was a whore on the make. I brought her here. That is a diversion I can enjoy and she was very expert. She found a paper that was in a book (he pointed to a large cabinet with hundreds of books) because my safe can be entered with little trouble by a person trained in such things. I read extensively in six languages. I didn’t know anyone who ever came here would know Aramaic. She did, and was looking through a book while I was at the pool, apparently, and found the papers. There is no safe place to hide anything, I fear.”
“They were maps?”
“And a list of the contents.”
“That wasn’t smart! I have to say it before you do.”
“Partly true. They were not in the same book or books in the same language. The other set was Chinese. I doubt she found those because she read the language. Even I don’t read it. She found the list in the Aramaic book. I think there was a reference of some kind about the location maps so she searched and found it. I don’t see when she had the time because it was in a different section of the case.”
“She could eliminate Spanish, English, French, Russian languages ... it didn’t take long.”
“How could she ... I see! It would be obvious that it would not be in any book anyone coming here might look at! It would occur to her that Aramaic wasn’t a language anyone might understand here.”
“The first thing a detective would think,” Clint agreed.
“And a lesson to be learned. Where would you recommend?”
“The religious works. Nobody who comes here would waste their time looking through those!”
He laughed again. “I really do like you, Clint Faraday. It is refreshing beyond belief to find someone who isn’t a phony-ass.”
Clint laughed and said he thought they really could be friends. He went back to the hotel and checked out, then headed for the airport.
Of course, he knew full-well that Nikolo was playing a game – but maybe they could still be friends. It had happened with several unexpected people already.
That was from being pragmatic about life. It’s not like you want it to be, it’s like it is.
Identifying the Treasure
Clint got off the plane in David and got his car, then drove to Dave’s apartment to put things together without a lot of distraction. He knew there was a lot missing.
Where did the stuff come from? Laundering was out for this. That bunch laundered money by the millions per day.
Was the other content stolen? From whom?
Clint thought a bit, then called Manolo, an undercover special agent for Interpol and various other organizations. He would put out feelers to find if some bigshot drug lord or whatever was looking for something or someone. Stolen jewels and gold would very definitely be looked-for by Interpol if they were even partly legitimate. Nikolo said there was jewelry with historic importance so that would definitely be investigated by Interpol.
He called Manny Mathews, who said he hadn’t heard anything. He’d put out feelers.
Clint could make a short run-down of events:
Nikolo and partners got the stuff (?) and put it in safe boxes to hide under a small coral reef off of Dolfin Point to wait until they could safely dispose of it. He – and they, according to him – didn’t need money. It was a lark to try to get some excitement into their dull lives. That more than likely meant it was taken from a big drug lord or someone in an illegitimate business of some type. Shannon O’Brien found the maps and descriptions when she shacked up with him for a week or so. O’Brien had run into two men she had met in Canada who were running with the scumbag crowd. She met them again in San Jose’ among the scumbag crowd there and made a deal where they would all end up with millions. She came to Panamá and found a shady all-around scumbag in Veraguas. She made a deal. She contacted Besford and Dennis and said to meet her in Changuinola. She took the taxi there. They rented a boat in Almirante, went to the place her maps showed, got the treasure – and something went wrong. He could figure she tried to put the screws to her partners. She had the reputation of using people and turning on them.
How did they manage to get that weight into the boat? Two boxes that would have weighed nearly three hundred pounds apiece if he calculated right.
They were big enough. They did take them onto the taxi in Almirante.
Okay. She picked the wrong place to try to put the screws to them. The problem was solved right there.
The problem with her was solved right there. There’s still a problem. Nikolo and partners.
Clint could surmise that was what O’Brien had tried. “I get half and you split the other half or I tell the Russian mafia who and where you are.” Exit the lovely Shannon O’Brien downstage left. Her continuing part was now written out of the play.
So. He could work with that and could probably prove it, definitely could prove it with that steel lockbox in Gordo’s house. That would tell Nikolo who and where. It could get too damned hairy with that bunch. He wished he could trust Nikolo enough to make a deal with him to keep it out of Panamá, but knew the deal would be they would keep it out of Panamá only so long as it didn’t inconvenience them. Nikolo had hinted that he would go along, but that his partners may not. That was why the wait now.
Clint sighed. There wasn’t much he could d
o until he had a call from Nikolo. He headed for Bocas.
“Nothing much is happening here,” Sergio said when Clint went to the police station to report what he’d found. “It seems everything was from somewhere else.
“Should I have an arrest warrant ready when you’re ready to present the case? I can keep it quiet, I suppose.”
“You can if you can be certain Nikolo or they can’t know anything about it.”
“I’ll see. Maybe yes, maybe no.”
They chatted awhile, then Clint went home. Judi was just coming into town and saw him. She waved and said she would be home about five thirty. He saluted and went on in to check his e-mail, then cooked a good meal of corvina with hush-puppies and mustard greens.
He cleaned off his deck and lazed around for a little while until Judi came in to say she was really getting a workout with the committees she was on. She liked that. It kept her busy. She didn’t have any other gossip. It was sort of dead in Bocas except for the surfers and party crowd.
They went to the Rip Tide for a meal and to talk with the regulars and a few tourists, then Clint went home and sacked out. Tomorrow would be busy – or not.
In the morning he had his hojaldres and coffee on the deck and puttered around his boat. He got in the water with scuba gear and cleaned the hull, then the engine, then the interior. It was spotless when he was through and it was three twenty. His phone buzzed and he answered. Manny said there wasn’t a hint of anything as big as this so it wasn’t connected with any mob anywhere unless Nikolo’s bunch brought their own mob into it. No one was looking for them for anything beyond the ordinary.
Manolo called to say there wasn’t anything nearly like what Clint described Interpol was interested in. There was a slight hint that someone on some island had lost something big, but there wasn’t anything much known about it. It wasn’t in Panamá or the waters nearby so far as he could tell. It was some private agents who had asked that he keep a lookout for emeralds. They didn’t really believe that Panamá was involved, but were just covering all the bases.
Judi came over to say that there was some dignitary coming in tonight or tomorrow on his private plane. Sergio was pissed because he was supposed to protect such people. This was one he didn’t want any dealings with in any way. He thought the fact he had more money than god would let him buy his way out of anything.
“One of those gringo developers who leave it up to everyone else to live down to what they are?”
“No, not a gringo. I think he’s a sheik or prince or something. He owns a whole country or whatever in the Mediterranean.”
“Why the hell would he come here?”
“You got me! There’s nothing anyone like that could want here!”
Clint shook his head. Too many like that came to Bocas and it almost never bode good for the gringos. Maybe this one was an Arab or something and the gringos wouldn’t be in the same stereotype. He could always hope.
Manolo said an island? One not near Panamá? I wonder!
Sheik Schmuck
The private jet was just able to land on the runway in Bocas Town. The pilot and co-pilot and two men in very expensive suits got off. The one, somewhat fat and definitely Arabic, seemed to expect everyone to bow to him or something. Clint managed to be walking toward the gate when they reached it and the bigshit’s companion said, “Stand back!”
“Fuck you,” Clint returned pleasantly. “Who you may be somewhere else doesn’t mean pigshit here.”
“You don’t know with whom you trifle!” he spat.
“Neither do you, apparently. Difference is, I don’t give a shit. Don’t give me another order or I’ll dump your ass right here!”
He didn’t know what to say. “If you were in another place you would be down on your knees pleading for your life now!”
“We ain’t in another place. You’ll follow our rules here and maybe we’ll follow your rules there. All you cruds are here is another bunch of obnoxious egocentric arrogant tourists who were raised in a barn and bleat like farm animals.”
The bigshot was pretending to be amused. “I think I like your courage. If you ever are in need of a very well-paying job in another place call on me. Yusef will give you my number. I am Ali el Mika’h Mikim.”
Clint stepped back and waved him through the gate, but made the others wait there until he went through, which amused Mikim even more.
Mikim and Yusef went toward a waiting car. Clint recognized the Japanese thug, Itumi, as the waiting passenger in the car. He got out and bowed slightly to Mikim, who said something that made him laugh. He looked over to Clint and smirked. Clint could figure what that was about. He’d be ready for them.
It also tied another few odd things together. He thought about it and wondered again about some things.
He called Nikolo and asked if he knew Mikim was in Bocas.
There was a long pause. “You amaze me. How did you find out about King Ali the Less Than Magnificent so quickly?”
“Easy. He has four men here looking for the stuff. He just flew in on that overdone jet and pulled the visiting royalty act. Two and two is still somewhere in the neighborhood of four.
“Does this mean what I think it means?”
“That the bitch knew who we meant? Probably. She read Aramaic, which should have warned me immediately. She was always double-dealing everyone. He probably came there to collect his, as you call it, stuff, in a deal with her.
“Clint, it is only a very small part of what he has stolen from his people. You can’t know the depth of horror of living in constant fear such a person visits upon his socalled subjects. Now I must wonder if she told him about me.”
“I really do doubt that,” Clint mused. “She would be the type to hold that power over him to guarantee her own safety. She could say he would learn that after she had her cut and was gone.
“You know something? I think I know why she’s dead!”
“She tried to hold King Ali over her partners’ heads. She was stupid enough to let them know she was playing that side of the street, too. They would know she hadn’t told about them. That meant they could get away with the whole thing by getting rid of her. All they would need was a day or two to disappear. He wouldn’t have any way to find them without her.”
“So they played her game on her. I think she let something slip to Gordo and he’s made a deal or two on the side. Lovely bunch!”
“I can’t be flippant about this quite yet. He has enough money to buy almost anything.”
“He just thinks he does.”
“Yes. There is not enough money ever printed to buy you. For this one fact alone you have my deepest respect. I will ask that you, under no circumstances, tell him about me.”
“And vice versa. I’ll see what I can do. I think he’s already ordered that I be killed or seriously injured or something. I refused to step aside to let him through the airport gate and called him an obnoxious fat pig or something such. He acted amused and offered me a job if I ever needed one – but his eyes weren’t in the least amused and he wanted to have a way to reach me.”
“Be most careful, my friend. Do not underestimate him as he will undoubtably do about you.”
“I’ll certainly remember that!”
They chatted a minute more, then Clint headed for his house. The car that Itumi was using was sitting at the gate. That was unexpected. Clint thought they’d wait until he was alone after dark or something. He strolled unconcernedly to his gate and looked into the car. They had Judi.
“So? What’s the horseshit deal supposed to be, pukeface?” he asked. “Holding Judi is about as stupid as I thought you were from the first.”
“I want to know a few little things about a woman named Shannon Elizabeth O’Brien,” Mikim said from the back seat. “Your Miss Lum will not be harmed in any way, should you wisely choose to cooperate.”
Judi grinned. “Isn’t it exciting? I get kidnapped again! I’m going to have to start charging you piecemeal if this cr
ap doesn’t stop. It could get boring.”
“Well, I suppose they have to try something,” Clint replied. “If they’d checked around they could see how far this will get them.
“Oh! Did Marko return my call? I’ve been so busy I forgot to turn the phone on.”
“Marko? No.” She looked at him quizzically. “Why would he call?”
“Oh, he’s living not too far from Ali Baba, here. I think he’ll be amused by the abject stupidity of messing with his friends.”
“Who is this Marko?” Mikim demanded. “Itumi said you were friends with such a person and that might cause serious problems for us.”
“Marko Bocinni? He’s a friend from the states,” Judi said. “He’s living in the Mediterranean on an island somewhere ... Oh! You’re from that part of the world, right?”
The three chattered wildly at each other in Aramaic or something. Yusef trying to explain something to Mikim, who was trying to get some answers from Itumi, who was arguing with Yusef. It was almost – well, it was comical.
“Oh, well. Come on inside, Judi. I’ve got some lobster chowder in the ‘fridge and we can throw a salad together. I’d invite the rest of you, but you aren’t the kind of people who would ever be welcomed into my home.”
Judi grinned and opened the door. She got out and said, “Thank you for your hospitality. I hope I can return it in kind some day – if I ever decide to frequent the gutter.”
Mikim looked like he could bite through a steel bar. Yusef didn’t know what to do. Itumi threw his arms up and said something nasty. The driver started the car and it drove off. Judi and Clint had a giggling fit. They went inside and had lobster chowder and a lettuce, pineapple and pear salad.
Too Far!
It was still not quite coming together. Clint had a large collection of facts that seemed to follow a pattern and time-line, but something was missing. It didn’t seem logical Nikolo and company would choose this kind of situation to pull this kind of deal on. There had to be more. A lot more. There must be something in the stuff in Gordo’s house that would cause Mikim problems serious enough that he was here in person. He wasn’t the type to handle anything himself. He would hire anything he wanted less seriously. His attitude was, like Sergio suggested, that he could buy his way into or out of anything. He’d already had a shock or two about how far that would go with some of the people here!
