"Half?"
Stone faces stared at him. "A quarter?"
"Aww, Dirk, why don't we just strangle him and get it over with?" Gus drawled.
"We need every hand. Provided we get cooperation."
"Ten percent!" Shane called out. "Ten percent works for me."
"You get five-if you pull your weight."
And Shane Billiken found his hands being untied and an M-16 placed into his trembling fingers. This was his last chance and he knew it. He promised to pull his weight from now on. He used his most convincing voice. Anything to avoid the sharks. Shane knew everything there was to know about sharks. He had seen every jaws film. Talk about unevolved.
Chapter 36
Michael P. Brunt's voice was jaunty over the long-distance line.
"Brunt the Grunt," he said. "You point and I do."
"This is Brown," Harold Smith said. "Have you completed your assignment?"
"Mission accomplished."
"You have recovered the tea service?" Smith asked blankly.
"What if I said yes?" Brunt asked. Smith could hear a raspy scratching noise. It sounded like Brunt was scratching his beard stubble.
"Please stop talking in circles. What did you find?"
"Nothing. No tea service. No furniture, unless you count a TV and a bunch of boxes. If you want my opinion, the guy took it on the lam, as we detectives like to say."
"Boxes? What kind of boxes?"
"What do you care?"
"What was in them?"
"Got me. They were padlocked. For all I know, they were booby-trapped too.
"Could you describe them?"
"Oh, about four or five feet long. Kind of like footlockers. Some of them had brass handles and fittings. They came in an assortment of colors. Gaudy, too. Designer luggage they definitely weren't."
"And you did not open them?"
"My job was to go in and recover the tea service without disturbing the domestic environment, correct?"
"Yes," Smith admitted glumly.
"Those babies were secured with monster brass padlocks. Not the combination kind, which I could have cracked, but the kind you open with a key. A big brass key. Get it?"
"Clearly," Smith sighed. "You dared not open them."
"Not without the big brass key, which I did not find, or a hammer and cold chisel, which I must have left in my other suit. Did I do right?"
"Yes, of course," Brunt suggested, "for more bucks, I could take another whack at it. Maybe you want your tea service so much you don't mind if I make a mess."
"I do mind. The occupant must never know his dwelling was penetrated."
"Burglarized, you mean. Only CIA types say 'penetrated.'"
"Yes. Burglarized."
"So now what?"
Smith considered. The scratching came over the line again.
"If I need you, I will call you again," he said at last.
"Sounds like a kiss-off to me."
"You have your check."
"Cashed and spent already. I could use more. My secretary keeps asking for a raise."
"Good-bye, Mr. Brunt," said Smith, hanging up. He swiveled in his cracked leather chair, his gray eyes regarding Long Island Sound through the office picture window.
"Boxes," he muttered. What could these boxes contain? Armaments, perhaps. Brunt had described them as footlockers. Assault weapons were often shipped in similar boxes. Or weapons components. Stinger missiles, for example. Or in the case of a more complex device, such as a portable rocket launcher, the components were often transported in several boxes of the type Brunt described.
Was the house being used as a weapons-storage site? Was Smith the target of terrorists'? If so, why hadn't they made their move? If not, who was their target?
This was too critical now for a broken-down private investigator. Smith would have to get into the house himself, despite the risk. He must learn the contents of those boxes.
The time for waiting was over. Smith went to his file cabinet and from a folder deep in back extracted an Army-issue .45 automatic and two clips. He inserted a clip and sent a round into the chamber to check the action. Then he placed them in his briefcase, where they nestled in a false compartment under the telephone hookup.
Dr. Harold W. Smith left his office, a gray man with a cold white face and a purposeful stride that made the guards in the lobby dispense with their usual tipped-hat acknowledgments. They had seen that look on Smith's face before. It usually foreshadowed someone getting fired.
Chapter 37
Shane Billiken felt positively transformational. He really did.
Under cover of darkness, they had heaved to outside the lagoon. Dirk "Ed the Eradicator" Edwards and his men donned their jungle fatigues and greased their faces with green and black camouflage paint. They slid survival knives into ankle sheaths and taped magazine clips together to make reloading easier. Then they went over the side in rubber rafts, which they scuttled in shallow water. From there, they waded.
Shane Billiken carried an M-16 assault rifle over his head and clutched a marlin spike between his teeth. His shirt pockets were stuffed with spare clips and extra rounds and Gouda cheese. He hadn't any camouflage clothes, so he settled for rubbing his white ducks with borrowed jungle paint, not forgetting to anoint the triangle of hairy chest exposed by his buttonless shirt. At the last moment, he kept his mood amulet because, happily, the bull had turned green. It blended in perfectly.
He felt truly in touch with his animal side. There was just one nagging doubt to be resolved.