And I can hear the devil whisper,
“Things are only getting worse.”
Walter didn’t stop in Santa Fe this time. He had no desire to walk among the Indian women sitting around the Plaza, fat women, younger than they looked in their layers of warm clothing bundled against the cold, selling their jewelry, keeping their spirits up with hot tea and little flasks filled with whiskey. No gifts today. No pendants changing shape in the wind and sun. He made it straight through, all the way to Albuquerque, took a room at an airport motel and booked an early flight to Atlanta. He didn’t sleep. How could he? He took a couple of Mylanta he carried in his travel bag. Tylenol too. Didn’t help much. He must have dozed off for a few minutes here and there because somehow the morning came. He slept on the plane.
When he landed in Atlanta, Walter rented a car and made the drive to Roswell. Sadie Fagan was not expecting him, and when she saw the pain written on his troubled face, the misery in his eyes, she knew something terrible had happened. She didn’t hear a thing he said. It only took a few minutes. She did not invite him in for a cold drink. Harry was dead. He told her, then it was plain he had to leave. All the Levines were gone now. David, Elana and Harry. Long ago Sadie became a Fagan. She cried for her father. Walter had no part in Sadie’s grief. No part except that her torment was his fault. They both knew it. When he got back in his car he was feeling no better. He hadn’t eaten since-he couldn’t recall. Perhaps something in his stomach would make a difference.
Walter was alone, in a booth at a Waffle House restaurant in Roswell, Georgia, just at the entrance to the GA 400 highway, when he collapsed. He felt the bottom fall out, the air in his lungs desert him, his strength disappear, draining from his head to his feet like water in a flushed toilet. That’s where it all was headed. Into the toilet. At the same time fatigue swamped him, the pain in his chest took a gargantuan leap from a bothersome ache to a brutal squeezing pressure, gripping his upper body in a vice-like nutcracker, pushing out from within and in from without, threatening to crack his body like the fragile shell of a walnut, while simultaneously an unseen hand pulled the pin on a grenade buried deep inside his chest. His left arm hurt so bad he couldn’t lift it. A lump the size of a softball crawled up his throat. Perspiration, warm and chilly at the same time, swept over him. He could feel his balls shrivel up, his knees weaken, his hips give way, his head spinning. Even fear could not save him. He passed out leaning forward, his last conscious act a desperate effort to get up. He fell with his face in his eggs, knocking a glass of Diet Coke to the floor.
First there were the lights, zooming swiftly by. One at a time. One after the other, straight above his head. Bright dots, headlights in the window, reflections in a darkened sky. Then there were the hills across the river. The hills that never changed. Frozen in winter, lush in summer, always the same. When he was a boy, Walter saw them for the first time. The hills across the Hudson. They never moved. They were always there just as they had been before. Today, yesterday, forever. They rolled north from Kingston, beyond the bridge, surely all the way to Albany and then to who knows where, past the known world, to other mysterious places. No matter what, he knew he could go to the river, look to the other side and find comfort. And now, his father came to see him. How could that be? Snow was everywhere. There was nothing but snow. No trees. No shoes. He had no shoes, yet his feet were not cold. How could that be? Maybe it was he who went to visit his father. Which was it? Who cared. He didn’t. But he couldn’t visit his father. His father died when he was six. For a while his mother used to go to the cemetery. For a while. Sometimes she took him with her. He remembered the long rows of gray stones, the place where she finally stopped and cried. She always said they were going to visit his father. But Walter never saw him. Was that a visit? Not like this one. How old was he the last time? Nine? Ten? Who cared? He didn’t. The pain and the warmth swam together, one overlapping the other, then separating, then joining again in wave after wave. The pain. The warmth. The pain. Where was the warmth? Where was it? Come back!
Johnny Sherman, Walter’s father, was right there waiting for him, sitting in an old wooden chair, open on the left with a wide, desk-like area sticking out by the right armrest. It was a place big enough for a tray of sandwiches and hot chocolate or maybe beer and sausages, a newspaper or magazine, even big enough for a child to sit on. It was empty now, only his father’s arm resting there. Those chairs had a name. What was it? The chair was in the snow, encircled and surrounded by snow as if set down in the middle of a great open field. The sky was bright, white and cloudless. Johnny Sherman wore a green t-shirt, like Army green except he was never in the Army. He had on jeans, the sort that used to be called blue jeans, heavy, dark blue, coarse denim with the cuffs rolled up two or three times showing the material’s lighter underside. Walter was sure nobody had worn jeans like these for fifty years. His father had no shoes. They both had no shoes. How could that be? Snow was everywhere. His father’s legs were crossed, right over left, at the knee. Was he smiling? Was he? He said nothing. He didn’t move in any way. His eyes looked at Walter, into Walter, through Walter, but they never blinked. He made no motion with his head. He was silent. Yet Walter heard him, understood him, knew perfectly well what his father was telling him. There was no mistaking him.
“Sit,” his father said without a word, without a gesture. “Sit here, on this chair by my right arm. Sit down with me and all your pain will go away. Be with me, my son. I love you.”
The struggle between what is and what will be, between darkness and the light, between the flashing lights and the clear sky. “Sit down,” his father beckoned. “I’ve been waiting.” The struggle between life and death. Goodbye Gloria. Goodbye. Goodbye. Goodbye. No! Walter would not sit.
Dr. William Byron, Dr. Willie to anyone who knew him and every patient who had seen him more than once, looked down into Walter’s face. Dr. Willie’s was a friendly presence made up of smiles and good cheer. The joke among the Cardiac staff at Crawford Long Hospital in Atlanta was that Dr. Willie could tell someone they had six months to live and they would be happy to hear it. From him, that is. The first time Walter saw him was when he opened his eyes.
“Must be my magic touch again,” said Dr. Willie. Two residents and a nurse, standing just behind him, politely laughed and nodded to one another. Walter failed to comprehend. “You’ve come about, Mr. Sherman. Opened your eyes to the world. And you’ve done it with me right here, standing in your room, next to your bed. My magic touch, I tell you.”
“Where… am I?”
Dr. Byron told him. Further, he told him, pay no attention at all to the nameplate on his white coat. “Call me Willie,” he said. “Everyone does.” As for Walter, Dr. Willie said he’d had a heart attack. Paramedics saved him. The emergency doctors and nurses at North Fulton Regional Hospital, up in Alpharetta, stabilized him-somewhat, that is, since he never really regained consciousness while with those folks-then transferred him by ambulance to the Coronary Intensive Care Unit at Emory University’s downtown hospital.
“What day…?”
“It’s Friday, Mr. Sherman. You had your MI on Wednesday and you’ve been out of it pretty much until now. But I think you’re gonna be fine. We did an angiogram, a cardiac cath procedure, yesterday.”
“What’s that?”
“We inserted a long, thin tube in your groin-you might feel a pressure bandage there-and slid it up into your heart. Shot a little dye into your coronary arteries, took some pictures and got a pretty good idea of why you had so much trouble the other day.”
“What happened?”
“You had an infarct-that’s a heart attack-because a branch of your right coronary artery closed off.”
“Big heart attack?”
“Well,” chuckled Dr. Willie, “the only minor heart attacks are those that happen to someone else, if you know what I mean.”
“I think so,” said Walter.
“You need a bypass operation, Mr. Sherman. We’ve been waiting for you to come out of this, regain consciousness, get strong enough to undergo surgery. You have widespread artery disease. You’ll have another heart attack-and the next one you might not be so lucky with-if you don’t get some plumbing work done. I’ll schedule you for tomorrow with Dr. Ortega-great surgeon, the best. It’ll be four or five days…”
“No,” Walter said. “No surgery. Not tomorrow anyway. How soon will I be well enough to leave?”
“Without a bypass operation…”
“How soon, doctor? Please.”
“Monday. We’ll keep you the weekend. It’s a big mistake, Mr. Sherman. How old was your father when he died?”
“How do you know my father is dead?”
“Forty? Maybe younger? You talked about him, the day they brought you in. You’re nearly sixty, Mr. Sherman. You’re on borrowed time and your loan could be called any day. You understand?”
“How long will it take me to recover from bypass surgery?”
“Well, we can get you home-wherever that is-in four or five days, end of next week if everything goes well. Follow up and recovery, rest-four to six weeks. A man your age and weight, in the sort of physical shape you’re in, a couple of months. You may think you can’t spend a couple of months this way, but there’s a big upside to this.”
“What’s that?”
“Staying alive. You do want to stay alive? You don’t have to answer that. I know you do. I’ve been watching you. You do want to live, Mr. Sherman. You want badly to live. You need a bypass and you need it now.”
“I…”
“By the way, who is Gloria?”
“My wife.”
“Oh, well then,” said Dr. Willie, turning to look at the nurse holding Walter’s chart, “That’s good. We don’t have any contact individual for you. Nothing in your personal belongings to tell us where your family can be reached. We should call Mrs. Sherman immediately.”
“My ex-wife, doctor. No need to call.”
“As you wish.”
Saturday morning, Walter underwent quintuple bypass surgery. The following Thursday, a week after arriving at Crawford Long Hospital and eight days after his heart attack, he flew home to St. John. Dr. Willie gave him the name of a cardiologist on St. Thomas.
He didn’t call Conchita Crystal. Instead, he sent her a check returning her money, all except expenses, including the twenty thousand for the Isuzu Rodeo sitting in long-term parking at the Albuquerque airport. Although he wished he was, he wasn’t wealthy enough to forget the expenses. In addition to the car, travel alone had been more than thirty thousand dollars. He sent the check with a note explaining his refund and the embarrassing necessity for keeping the expense money. He really didn’t want any of it. She never cashed the check and she never called either.
Nothing was ever said between Billy and Walter about Tucker Poesy. Just a look, eye contact the first day Walter returned. He knew well enough if there had been any trouble Billy would have mentioned it. The trip home had taken its toll. The flight from Atlanta, the taxi to the ferry, the boat ride over to St. John, all of it was more than he counted on. Walter was tired and weak when he walked into Billy’s. Ike was shocked at Walter’s appearance, sunken eyes, thinner, older. He never expected to see his friend look like that. Billy was worried. God only knows what happened to Walter. He was a week late coming back and he looked like shit. What kind of a beating had he taken? Helen, however, could smell a hospital a mile away. She knew right off the bat. Heart attack. Had to be. He told his friends she was right and that he would be all right soon, that he was going to rest awhile at home and he would see them soon. “Maybe a few days,” he said. “Maybe longer.” They said they would check on him, if he didn’t mind. Of course he didn’t. St. John is a small island. Everyone knows everyone else. They were all family. “I’ll see you guys,” Walter said and then sat down to wait for Sonny to bring a car around, to drive him up into the hills, to take him home.
The bushwhackers thin out a little bit in March and a little bit more when April arrives. Rental prices go down-owners are more willing to take short-term guests, even for long weekends, instead of the two-week minimum at high season-and the room rates at the Westin and Caneel Bay are no longer scary. After February, Billy’s isn’t usually crowded before lunch. Walter recuperated quickly, as quickly as a man his age could. Dr. Willie knew what he was talking about. Walking was good for Walter. It was too hilly where he lived, so he drove down to the beaches and would trek across the sand from one end to the other, and back again. Sand walking was like water walking. Good for the stamina. Good for building up strength. As time went on, he took to doing it twice a day, in the morning before breakfast and again late in the afternoon. For her part, Denise showed a lot of her aunt in her. Even though she was more than thirty years his junior, she took command, asserted herself as she had not done before and assumed the mantle long worn by Clara before her. She cooked-she cared-she was there. And Walter was happy with it. He needed her. Dr. Willie had been right again. Six weeks. And all that time to think-think about what happened-think about who-think about the Cowboy.
As he saw it, there were three players-Devereaux, the Kennedys and the Georgians. Sure, he realized it wasn’t really the Kennedy family, probably none of them except Abby O’Malley, and yes, the Georgians were not really Georgians, strictly speaking. But that’s how he thought of them-Kennedys and Georgians. Devereaux was the easy one. He was out there all by himself, a guilty-looking sonofabitch.
He started with the Kennedys. Was he wrong about Amsterdam? Had the Kennedys simply made a mistake by sending the Irishman? Must they have been the ones who killed Sir Anthony and the American Ambassador in order to have killed Harry? Or, could they have killed Harry and not the others? Who wanted Lacey’s confession more than they did? Their motives were the most obvious, their need already demonstrated by Sean Dooley and by Abby O’Malley’s visit. If it was them, if the Kennedys killed Harry and took the document, how did they know about Leonard Martin? Whoever it was who intimidated Isobel already knew Harry had been taken to Leonard’s hiding place. And, they should have known, all along, that Harry had the document. If that was so, why did they have to kill Sir Anthony and Ambassador Brown? If they didn’t learn about Harry until later, how did they find out? Walter was confident he had been right in Amsterdam. Sean Dooley was no killer. Why send him if you had someone else, someone who had already shown he could kill a helpless old man and two naked homosexuals. Dooley didn’t do that, so why send him to Amsterdam? More to the point, how did Abby O’Malley discover them in Amsterdam in the first place? Tucker Poesy knew. Devereaux obviously told her and she was waiting. But, Abby O’Malley-who told her? The questions did overwhelm him. As he had been doing for decades, Walter lined them up, pieces in the puzzle waiting to be fitted properly.
Walter could not forget, it was him they found, not Harry Levine. He couldn’t bring himself to forgive his own stupidity. He led them to Harry, in Holland and in New Mexico as well. Christ! If Harry had just stayed on his own, who knows, maybe he’d still be out there hiding somewhere, still alive. Walter covered himself with a blanket of doubt. If he had not fallen for Conchita Crystal’s act-it was an act, wasn’t it? If he had just said no to her. If he never found Harry.. . Shit! What an asshole. Aat was right. He was an old fool. Devereaux made him in Atlanta. The girl had him down in Holland. Was it all gone, into the crapper? Did he have anything at all left? Ike was right. The old man had it cold. He should have stayed retired.
Leonard Martin had changed everything. Lost more than a hundred pounds. Cut his hair short. Grew a beard. Stopped wearing suits and ties and switched to jeans and down jackets, boots and a floppy, wide-brimmed hat. Yes, Walter thought, he made himself a better man, a different man. He became the Cowboy. Somehow Walter felt a need to do the same. He’d already hardened his body some and was in even better shape now, after his heart attack, after his bypass surgery. Sixty? Shit, he was feeling more like forty. He didn’t have a new heart, but he had the closest thing to it. Revascularization, they called it. Revitalization, as far as Walter was concerned. In much the same way as Leonard Martin, he thought of himself as a better man. Like Billy said, Walter was every bit as better as Tommy John. Transformed. Could he be the Cowboy? Why not?
Harry Levine wasn’t family, blood, kin. He didn’t really know Harry that well, although you can get quite close to another person traveling around the world with killers on your trail. No, he was not family. But Harry Levine was his responsibility, his charge. He had been hired to keep him safe, not get him killed. Things had turned out bad before. Not every client was satisfied, not every conclusion the right one. Still, he’d never had anyone killed-murdered-while in his care. And he’d never been played the fool at the cost of another’s life. He had a duty, an obligation. Walter took it upon himself to find whoever killed Harry Levine, and then… he would know, wouldn’t he. Could he be the Cowboy?
“You look great,” said Ike. “A couple of months here, do that for anyone.” St. John is what he meant and they both knew it. From his barstool to Ike’s table, Walter sent his friend a nod of thanks. Territory had been firmly established years ago. Ike already had his table when Walter arrived. Billy’s former management-Frogman’s, it was called back then-either didn’t notice or didn’t care. The owner, a man named Jorge Castillo, lived on St. Thomas where he’d come from Kansas City or Milwaukee or some place like that. The Virgin Islands were filled with people, Americans who came from somewhere, none of them-for reasons nobody ever talked about-too eager to go back. When Billy bought the place, he did not change the way it looked, the placement of tables or any of the fixtures, including the barstools. He did allow for a more or less official recognition of Walter’s and Ike’s already settled presence. The hostess and wait staff knew to keep customers away from their spots without certain knowledge that either of them would not show up. Billy never minded. In fact, Billy liked it that way from the beginning. Ike was thinking about that, watching his friend at the end of the bar, near the kitchen, getting healthier and healthier every day.
“You look great,” he said again.
“This surgery you had, Walter,” chimed in Billy, “I think it made you even better than before. You think I could be right?”
“Yes,” Walter said. “Yes I do. But I think Ike’s right too. Don’t I look great?” His smile quickly turned to full blown laughter. “Seriously though,” said Walter, “I think he’s right about being here, on St. John. If I lived in Cleveland, or someplace, I don’t believe I’d feel as good as I do or look as good either, thank you very much.”
“Damn right, Walter. Shit, that’s true for us all, isn’t it?” laughed Billy proudly, extremely satisfied with his own observation.
“Wise man,” said Ike. “Billy, you definitely a wise man.” For his part, Billy was as happy as he could be with Walter’s recovery.
Billy Smith-previously William Mantkowski in another life altogether-knew a little something about recovery. He had seen men, including himself, injured in a way no one ever thought they would come back, come back all the way that is, come back to their old selves. He knew there was a lot more to it than drugs and doctors. Billy was certain as the day was long that among other things, the grace of God, the loving hand of Jesus, as well as his own good food had done wonders for his friend’s robust improvement. If Walter wasn’t praying, Billy was sure his own would suffice.
“They took something from your leg-is that right?” Billy asked.
“And they used it for my heart,” said Walter.
“Bypass,” Ike said, at the same time he was sucking into his lungs a volume of cigarette smoke that might have killed a first-time smoker. “Bypassing. Gotta go around something. Gotta use something to do it.”
“True, true,” said Walter.
“Like they did with Tommy John.”
“Tommy John-again, Billy?”
“Let me tell you something, Ike,” Billy said, dropping his bar rag on the counter and leaning over, with both hands on the bar, in the direction of the old man. “There’s been other players in baseball besides Negroes. Players like Tommy John.”
“White boy, huh? The one you always talking about? Must be your favorite player, or something.”
“White boy, huh?” mocked Billy. “Tommy John threw out his arm. You know, that’s what they called it back then-throwing out your arm. When a pitcher did that, it was all over. But, with Tommy John, they operated on him-took something out of his leg, I think, and used it somehow to fix his bad arm, you know his elbow or shoulder or whatever it was he threw out. Anyway, he recovered and he was better than before. Better.”
“Tommy John,” laughed Ike. “Must be a Negro, with two first names, you know.” He laughed again. “Walter?” asked Ike. “You better than before? Now, before you say anything, I want you to know I think you look better. You know what I mean?”
“I think so, Ike. And again I thank you.”
“You know,” the old man said, with a sad shake of his head, “You walked in here, after you came back, and you looked like-” once more he shook his head the same way. “You looked like shit, you know what I mean?”
“I feel a lot better now,” said Walter with a generous smile. “Living here. The sand. The water. The weather. Billy’s food, of course, and…” He held up his bottle of Diet Coke. “Couldn’t have done it without this.”
“Denise too,” added Helen from her spot over by the wine cooler, the newest addition to Billy’s behind-the-bar equipment.
“Yes indeed,” said Ike. “Denise. Good girl.” And again Walter lifted his bottle. It was not necessary to say more. Good girl.
“So,” said Billy unwilling to give up on Tommy John just yet. “Tommy John was a good pitcher. Maybe even a great one. That’s not for me to say. But he’s better known for the surgery than for his pitching.” He glared at Ike. “That is among people who know who he is at all.”
“There’s others,” Ike interjected, coughing and spitting up phlegm into a bar napkin. one he then rolled up and left on the table in front of him. Still, despite his obvious discomfort, he dragged a huge inhale, exhaling from his mouth and nose simultaneously, once more, for the millionth time, appearing as if he was on fire himself. “There’s others more famous for what they did than what they did.”
Helen looked at the old man with a stare that had hopelessness written all over it. No one was going to change this man, not now, not ever. He was, she was sure, going to kill himself with those cigarettes.
“Damn!” Billy said, looking over at Ike.
“Ike,” said Walter. “You ever hear of those Buddhist priests who lit themselves on fire in Vietnam?”
“I have,” the old man answered. “Fine people, every one of them.”
The conversation turned back again to Tommy John and the surgical procedure that came to bear his name. Billy felt that alone was proof of his argument. “The man’s name is on it,” he said. “Like Lou Gehrig’s disease.”
“Jim Brown,” said Ike, with a period, like that was all that was necessary. More was required, however.
“Jim Brown? What about him?”
“I tell you, Walter, Jim Brown’s more famous for what he’s done after football than for when he was playing.”
“What’s that for?” Helen chided. “Throwing women-small women at that-off hotel balconies?”
“That too.”
“That too? Geez, Ike!” said Helen obviously too upset to say anything further about Mr. Brown.
“I don’t agree with that either, Ike,” said Walter. “Jim Brown-for all his difficulties, Helen-was the greatest player ever to suit up in the National Football League. Number thirty-two for the Cleveland Browns. Nothing he’s done since-movies, or anything else, good and bad-outshines that. I think we’re talking more about somebody like.. .”
“Mike Tyson,” shouted Billy. “Mike Tyson. I’d say Michael Jackson, but he’s even crazier than Mike Tyson, too crazy to talk about.”
“Well, how about Ronald Reagan?” the old man offered for consideration.
“Now you’re talking, Ike,” said Helen. “More famous for being President of the United States than for his time as a second- or third-rate actor. Good one, Ike.” The old man flashed her one of his patented, yellow-toothed smiles complete with a tip of his cap, which today was a John Deere hat. It had to be one of Ike’s jokes. There couldn’t have been a half-dozen pieces of John Deere equipment on the island of St. John, all of them probably lawn mowers.
“Or Kennedy,” said Billy.
“Kennedy? For what? Which one?”
“Either one of them, Helen. They’re both more famous for being dead than for anything they did when they were alive.”
“Now Billy, John F. Kennedy was the President of the United States. How much more famous are you going to get than that?”
“Yeah, and when you think about him, what do you think of? Come on, don’t sit there with that silly look on your face. What do you think of? That’s right, you know it. The same with his brother Bobby too.”
“Billy, do you know who Roosevelt Grier is?”
“Sure, I do, Walter.”
“Well, since you bring up the Kennedys, I’ll go with him-Rosey Grier. All pro, famous as you can get as an athlete. Yet, better known as the man who caught Robert Kennedy’s assassin, Sirhan Sirhan.”
“He did too,” said Ike. “Jumped on the man, right there in the kitchen where he shot him. That’s a good one, Walter.”
Billy broke the pause, the momentary silence among them, with a question. “You want me to write it up?”
“Put me down for Roosevelt Grier,” said Ike. “Thank you. Walter, if you don’t mind.”
“I’ll take Tommy John,” said Billy, showing loyalty to himself and his unwillingness to be moved off his original conviction. “Walter, what about you?”
“No,” said Walter. “Don’t write it, not yet. You say the Kennedys are more famous for being dead. Okay, I say the same for Wild Bill Hickok.”
“Wild Bill Hickok?”
“That’s right, Billy. Aces and eights.”
“Well now, boys,” cautioned Ike. “This is getting out of hand, if you know what I mean. Billy, you say the Kennedys, either one. Walter, you have Wild Bill Hickok-which I think is a good one-but I’m taking John Lennon.”
“That’s a stretch, don’t you think? Christ, he was a Beatle.”
“You don’t like it, Walter, don’t vote for it. Go on now, Billy,” said Ike, “Now you write it up.”
On the chalkboard, near the old register, Billy scrawled, KENNEDYS/WILD BILL/THE BEATLES.
“Beatles? Not what I said, but that’ll do,” said the old man with the silly cap. “They ain’t all dead yet, but that’ll do.”
“And just what does this prove?” asked Helen pointing toward Billy’s handiwork. “I don’t get it, and I’m not sure you fellas do either.”
“It shows,” Ike pronounced, “you never can tell what you’ll be remembered for. Isn’t that right, Walter?”
“As rain, my old friend. Right as rain,” said Walter. Helen seemed unconvinced.
Walter went to Boston. He spent two days there, talking to people, some at Harvard, others in the financial trade. He also had former clients in Boston. One in particular, a mature woman from a legitimate old New England family-not one like the more popular, Johnny-come-lately Kennedys-was eager to help Walter. So many of the pre-Revolutionary Protestant families hated the upstart Irish, thought of them as twentieth-century fakes. Plus, Walter had helped this woman in a way she could never have hoped for, at a time when she thought she might lose everything. Now she could do him a service and she was truly thankful for the opportunity. He wanted to know as much as he could about Abby O’Malley. He wanted to know who her friends were, where she spent money and how much, and especially who she talked to on the phone, both hard-wired and cell phone. Such information could be had. He had done it before, more than once. All you needed was the right contacts and sometimes enough money.
“Would you like me to hire an investigator?” she asked Walter.
“I don’t want anyone to do anything that might alert Miss O’Malley.”
“Of course not. And the last thing I would ever do is something that displeased you, Walter. You know how grateful I am.”
She said she would retain an investigator of the highest respectability, someone who would act with great discretion. The investigator’s work would never be shown to anyone but her. When he was finished, his work product would disappear just as he would. That was important, Walter said. No records. She said she would call Walter when she had something. He thanked her, said he would be in Boston for a few days and would wait for her call. He never asked about her daughter. That’s not the way he worked.
Sean Dooley was more than a little surprised to hear from Walter. A man doesn’t hold a gun to your head, strip you naked on the floor and threaten to crush your balls beneath his foot, then call you up on a Sunday afternoon.
“You remember me, don’t you Sean?”
“That I do.”
“Good. I need a favor from you.”
“A what? A favor… from me?”
“Tell me about Abby O’Malley.”
“Tell you what?”
“Tell me everything. I’ll listen.”
It wasn’t much. Dooley told Walter he’d never seen her. Spoken to her a few times, but never in person, always by phone.
“How’d she find you?” asked Walter.
“I don’t know,” answered Dooley.
“You don’t know? You get a call from a stranger and you never ask how?”
“Not with the kind of money she was offering.”
“To do what exactly?”
“Mostly to watch this old man. Englishman, a Lord or something. You never know with them. Follow him around. See where he went, write down how long he was there. Things like that.”
“How many times did you break in?”
“A few-broke into a few places…”
“Places where the old man had been?”
“Yes, that’s right. But I never found nothing.”
Louis Devereaux didn’t call for very much research. His background information was easy to get, some of it public record-Yale, University of Chicago, CIA. Of course, there came a time in Devereaux’s public resume when he began taking on titles at the CIA Walter knew to be pretense. The truth behind those things was harder to get at, perhaps impossible. But it hardly mattered. Walter was certain Devereaux had told him the truth about himself when they were in Atlanta. Men like that don’t tell small lies, he told himself. Devereaux was eager to get Lacey’s confession. But why? Walter was sure he was working on his own. It made no sense to think the CIA was behind such a thing. No, it was Devereaux. The question of motive, however, remained open. What could Devereaux want with Lacey’s confession and why would he kill for it?
Walter considered the situation, the series of events that led him to this point. What Devereaux had going for him was the President of the United States. If the President wanted Lacey’s document, if the President knew Harry Levine had it, why didn’t he just ask for it? And wouldn’t Harry have delivered it to the President? Walter was sure he would have. Why didn’t he then? Perhaps he did, or perhaps he thought he was. Perhaps the President did ask for the document and put Devereaux in charge of getting it. Walter considered that as a possibility. Harry had never told him about details like that. He never said what the President specifically told him to do.
Of course, Walter thought, it was Devereaux. It had to be. He figured Devereaux for a killer, a big-time killer. Walter couldn’t be exactly sure what Louis Devereaux did for the CIA, but he knew Tucker Poesy worked for him, and Tucker Poesy was definitely a hitter and probably not much else since she proved inept at what she tried to do in Walter’s house. She paid a high price for that misstep. A busted jaw maybe, and a week, naked, tied to a chair, hand fed and watered, never knowing what might happen next, shitting and pissing all over herself. That’s a high price, he thought. But in the end he let her go. She didn’t kill Harry. She pulled a gun on him, in his own house. Ten years ago he would have killed her without a second thought, without a moment’s hesitation. Ah, fuck her! he thought, with some degree of frustration.
Abby O’Malley and Louis Devereaux had some unknowns hanging out there. Still, Walter had every reason to believe all their unanswered questions would be resolved, soon. It was the Georgians who presented a more pressing problem. Walter had no idea who they were. Aminette Messadou was all he had. He’d never heard of her great-uncle or the story of his retreat from Georgia. He didn’t know very much about the Russian Revolution except that was how the communists got their foot in the door. He didn’t know the Czar’s name. Never saw the movie. Never heard of the transwhatever federation.
After a few hours looking up these and other things on the Internet, Walter placed a call to Dr. E. Bard Leon, a professor at Marlboro College in Vermont. One of the skills Walter had perfected over the years was his ability to call a perfect stranger, tell the stranger he needed their help, and get it. Despite whatever decline he was in, if he’d kept anything he’d kept that. Like so many had done before him, professor Leon agreed to see Walter. It was an easy drive from Boston to Marlboro, Vermont, just a few miles west of Brattleboro. Before getting to the campus, he stopped at a small diner, on the side of the road, in an old wooden building, not a modern aluminum diner, and had a bowl of macaroni and cheese made with pure, white Vermont cheddar. It was the best he’d ever tasted.
Professor Leon turned out to be a walker, a nature lover, one of those fifty-year-old men who wore hiking boots and old chinos, sweatshirts and woolen hats. He had long hair, longer than Walter’s. Grayer too. They walked about the hilly, wooded campus as they talked. Walter thought of telling Dr. Leon he was recovering from bypass surgery, but decided against it. If the walk proved too much, he could always stop and explain.
“Djemmal-Eddin Messadou was quite a fellow,” said Professor Leon. “Remarkable man.” Dr. Leon was the author of six books on Russian history, including a two-volume edition on the last of the Czars and a seventh about the long-forgotten Transcaucasian Federation. He loved to talk about all of them and spoke, uninterrupted by Walter who had no reason to stop him, for at least an hour while they strolled leisurely across the small campus and down the single, picturesque road leading to it. They walked slowly enough not to tire Walter at all. Everything Aminette Messadou had said was pretty much the way Professor Leon told it. The arrival of the Georgian had caused quite a stir in Europe.
“What about the personal fortune Djemmal-Eddin had? Jewels, gold, whatever?” Walter asked. “How did he get it out of the country before the Bolsheviks overran him?”
Dr. E. Bard Leon, distinguished Professor of History at one of the country’s elite liberal arts colleges, looked at Walter as if he just realized he was talking to someone who knew nothing at all. “Djemmal-Eddin had no personal fortune, as you put it. That’s not what he came west with. That is not what caused all the excitement. Not at all. Oh, no, Mr. Sherman, that is not what Djemmal-Eddin Messadou brought with him to Europe. Let me tell you about Solly Joel.”
According to professor Leon, Djemmal-Eddin had amassed many tons of the Czar Nicholas II ten Ruble coins. “Tons,” he told Walter eagerly, with a wonderfully warm smile. “Can you imagine it!?” Gold paid the bills for an independent Georgia as well as the ill-fated, short-lived Transcaucasian Federation. Djemmal-Eddin’s son-in-law Frederick Lacey was a great help to the struggling new nation. He assisted in the negotiation of international trade arrangements supplying Georgia with needed materials of all kinds in exchange for some of the Czar’s gold. While the coin itself held no monetary value for a supplier in England or the Netherlands, Italy or anywhere in Europe, the gold in the coin was always worth the value of. 2489 ounces. No one turned it down as a form of payment.
With Dr. Bard Leon’s help, Walter was now familiar with the history of Djemmal-Eddin’s independent Georgia. In 1917, Georgia combined with its nearest neighbors to form the Transcaucasian Federation. By the spring of the following year, it was obvious the arrangement was not viable. In May 1918 Georgia declared its full and complete independence. The Federation of Georgia, Azerbaijan and Dagestan collapsed. Stability was never really established. The region was embroiled in chaos, overwhelmed by war. In early 1920, when both the British and the Americans pulled their expeditionary forces out of Russia-“How many people know they were even there?” Professor Leon had asked Walter-the fate of Georgia was sealed. The infant nation fell to the Russian Army on February 25, 1921. Professor Leon had described Djemmal-Eddin’s retreat through the Klukhori Pass and Lacey’s pivotal role in the operation. Lacey brought three ships to the port of Sukhum-Kale. Djemmal-Eddin used those vessels to evacuate many of his fighters, their families and whatever else they could load on board.
Here is where it got really interesting, Dr. Leon told Walter. Many historical gossips and more than a few academic historians as well believed Djemmal-Eddin escaped with as much as twelve tons of the Czar’s ten Ruble coins. Only someone as close as Lacey-someone who was family-could have moved such a fortune without thievery. In Europe, those with whom Djemmal-Eddin did business during the time of his exile received gold in return for goods and services. Still, stories had it that the Georgian had hidden away more than eight tons of the coins. Lacey had done it, of course. He was responsible, and all who knew him or knew of him knew the gold was safe. If Djemmal-Eddin was a man of substance, Frederick Lacey was a man who instilled fear in the hearts of bandits, equally among those on horseback and those wearing suits and ties. After hearing this, Walter understood the appeal of Lacey’s confession to those who could care less about John F. Kennedy. If the document contained the location of such an amount of gold, it held the secret to a treasure worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
There were three balls in the air. Walter was not about to play favorites, pick one over the others. Not yet. No matter what he learned, his information served only to make a case for one or the other, not one against the other. This was the process he followed for decades. The time for judgment would come later, a time when he had all the data, when he could lay everything out and reach a conclusion in which he had confidence. What he learned in Vermont was valuable. The Georgian ball was still in the air, more so now than before. If Solly Joel was right, Lacey may have hidden gold worth five-and-a-half million dollars- then! Today that same gold would bring almost three hundred million, nearly a third of a billion dollars. It made sense that people who thought it was theirs would want it. No doubt people who had no claim to it would too, and Walter was equally sure either or both would kill to get it. The Georgians were a real possibility. He needed to find out. There was something he had to do. It was not personal. It was just professional. He called Isobel Gitlin.
The first time he called Isobel was about Leonard Martin. At the time she was writing obituaries for The New York Times, taking a terrible beating for her insistence that Leonard’s first three killings were done by a single man. No one-not even her-had identified him then. A local man, in Tennessee, a man with a personal grudge had been arrested for the murder of the third of Leonard Martin’s victims. Isobel thought the Tennessee authorities had the wrong man. Walter, of course, knew she was right. By then he was already on the job, trying to find who Leonard Martin was and then determined to locate the man himself. “I know you’re right,” he told Isobel back then. He also said he was old enough to be her father, so she needn’t worry about him. He was right. How could he have known he needed to worry about her? The first time she agreed to meet, she said she was bringing a gun. She was real cute.
Five years can be forever. Their conversation now was brief. He felt the tension and knew she did too. Isobel was, of course, polite. Yes, certainly she would see him. Whenever he suggested. They agreed to meet in Atlanta the next day. When she hung up, Isobel sat at her desk remembering New York, her kidnap of sorts by and her interview with Leonard Martin. When that strange ordeal ended, when she was safely home, she called Walter. He listened. He told her to catch the morning flight to St. John. Time passes, yet somewhere not far below the surface, Isobel wished he’d said that now. Take the morning flight to St. John. Ike and Billy would be there too. How would she have answered? Would she have gone? Instead she said she would meet him at a place called Malone’s, a restaurant near the Atlanta airport. He told her to be there at three-thirty, too late for lunch and too soon even for the early-bird dinner crowd. The place was sure to be almost empty. They would have all the privacy they needed. He would be there when she arrived, he said. Look for him in a booth. “Find me.” That was it. A quick goodbye and then a day to wait, for both of them.
You always deal with what you know, not what you think. Walter didn’t have to, but couldn’t help reminding himself of that simple fact. Speculation was a flame, hot to the touch. Sometimes too hot. But fact was the fuel that fed the fires of discovery. He knew Harry Levine was dead. That was fact. He knew Harry had been found only after the intimidation of Isobel Gitlin. That too was fact. Whoever it was in Atlanta threatening to cut off her husband’s fingers, there was no doubt he was directly involved. Fact? Not yet, but more than likely. Walter was proceeding his way, as he had done for forty years. He could not afford any thoughts about Isobel. Not today, he hoped. No personal commitment-that was the special ingredient in the formula for his success. If he expected to find Harry’s murderer, he could ill afford to screw that up now. His past with Isobel was pushed deep into the dark hole beyond the heavy metal doors guarding his soul, his sanity. He’d opened those doors for her once, doors closed tightly when Gloria left, and he was burned for it.
Isobel knew about Leonard Martin’s secret all along and kept it from him. She betrayed him, then rejected him. Hard as it was to move those massive plates, once they began to part he lost control. It was years since he closed those doors behind him again. To keep her out. Just as he had done so long ago with Gloria. He was taken by surprise at Il Localino. Still, it was Louis Devereaux who unnerved him more that night. It wouldn’t happen again.
“Wow,” she said, approaching the table near the back of the restaurant where Walter was sitting. “You l-l-look great.”
“Nice to see you, Isobel. Please sit.” The formality caught her off guard. Walter looked stronger, younger, far more fit than the last time she saw him briefly at Il Localino and certainly he looked better than how she remembered him from years back. She wanted to say more about it. She wanted to ask what he had been doing to look so good. But clearly he was not about to make this a personal meeting. “Please sit,” he said. That meant business.
When the waitress came over, Walter looked to Isobel. She stumbled a little and finally ordered a glass of Merlot and a steak sandwich with French fries. Walter already had a Diet Coke in front of him and it was plain to see he’d already ordered whatever it was he intended to eat. She wanted to ask what happened-what happened with Harry Levine. But she was afraid. The look in his eyes said it all. It turned her stomach. She was ashamed, but strangely not regretful. She could never let them hurt Otto.
“They killed him,” Walter said, without her asking.
“I’m s-s-sorry.”
“I didn’t come here for an apology.”
“Why did you come here?”
His resolve was jolted, on its way to shaken. Could she do this to him with a simple question like that? Damn! He wanted to say- For you. I came for you! Asshole! he berated himself. “I need to know about the guy who threatened you and your husband. I have to put him somewhere, with someone. He leads me to them and right now I don’t know who they are.”
“Walter, what is this all about?”
“You mean, who is Harry Levine? Who was Harry Levine?”
“That would be a good place to start.”
He told Isobel about Harry, his position in London in the Foreign Service and the quirky circumstances that brought him to Sir Anthony Wells’ office. He told her about Lacey’s confession. He told her the mystery surrounding the assassination of President Kennedy was solved. He knew she would believe him, and he was right. He said it made sense that some people might kill to get it or to keep it from public view. He said he found Harry in Europe and told Isobel how he took him to New Mexico to keep him safe. That’s all. He never mentioned Conchita Crystal. After all, she hired him and thus deserved the anonymity he so scrupulously protected for all his clients. It made no difference that he sent the money back, even less that she never cashed his check. He related the story of Frederick Lacey and Joseph P. Kennedy. He repeated what Harry told him about the summer of 1940, about the suicide of Audrey Lacey. He left out nothing about Lacey’s wife and the continuing interest from her family. He told her about Devereaux, calling him by name. He said he was the one who took him to Il Localino. Isobel winced when Walter reminded her of that clumsy moment. Walter gave her the full story. Finally, he said, “So, we have the guy who showed up saying he was Christopher Hopman.”
Isobel’s steak sandwich came during Walter’s talk. So did his seafood salad. She picked at her plate. He didn’t touch his. He recalled how she practically attacked her burger that day in Billy’s when she got in from St. Thomas after her long flight from New York. He saw her again, in his mind’s eye, in that white top with the spaghetti straps. Back then she ate and talked with equal fervor. Not now.
“Walter, do you remember when we were in New York, at my apartment, going over everything we had, trying to figure out who killed Hopman and the others, trying to identify Leonard Martin?” It was a foolish question, one that came perilously close to offending him. All the more because she was not looking for an answer.
“There was a point, then,” she continued, “a point where you refused to tell me something-a feeling you had about Leonard’s son-in-law, Carter Lawrence-we called him Kermit -and I was hurt. My feelings were hurt because I trusted you and you held back. I know you remember.”
“Yes,” he said.
“You said to me, you said you told me everything you knew, just not everything you thought. I remember it clearly. That was the way you worked, you said. I think you were sorry-sorry that you hurt my feelings-but you couldn’t help yourself. Right?”
“Yes,” he said.
“After that, you changed. You did tell me everything. I know you did. It was thrilling to work together like that. But now, you’re not telling me half of what you know. Forget what you think. You’re telling me maybe a tenth of what you know. Basically, you’re telling me squat.”
“You didn’t tell me…” He could feel those iron doors struggling to break free, to swing wide. He’d have no part of that now. “Tell me about your visitor,” he said, fighting his stronger instincts. “You said he had a trace of an accent.”
“He did,” Isobel replied. “I’ve thought about him-I’ve thought about little else since… since.”
“His accent?”
“Eastern European maybe. Actually, I was thinking even farther, into Asia. There’s a section of Russia-or what used to be Russia-stretching from Central Asia to Europe. The republics at the western edge are very Western. The people are more European than Asian, genetically that is. They’re white people. In fact, they’re Caucasian, which is the name of a mountainous area…”
“Azerbaijan? Dagestan or Georgia? Which one do you think? The Transcaucasian Federation? Was he from there?”
“What?”
“I’ve heard of them. I can even point them out on a map. I’m not as dumb as you think I am, Isobel.”
“I never th-th-thought…”
“Yes you did!” Oh shit, it was all coming apart for him. He’d loved her. Christ, he really had. He would have changed so much for her. And worse, he planned to, never thinking she would turn him away. But turn him away she did. She had a life to lead and he was nothing more than an old man, a dumb shit, a way to pass the time. “You want to know more?” he challenged her. “Here’s more. You killed him. That’s right. No fucking around, you gave him up. You traded Harry Levine’s life for Otto’s precious fingers.”
“No, no,” Isobel sobbed. “I didn’t understand…”
“Bullshit, Isobel! You knew damn well. The sonofabitch who threatened you wanted Harry and you gave him up.”
“I’m sorry,” she cried. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
“Yeah. Fuck you!” Walter reached in his pocket, took out some bills, threw them on the table, and walked out on her. Oh, Christ! he was thinking. Am I only getting even?
Tucker Poesy’s life was an open book, to Walter anyway. He knew where she lived. Harry told him. He had her cell phone number he’d taken from her purse. She might ditch the phone, but she wasn’t going to move just because Harry Levine had seen her apartment. She had the nerve to pull a gun on him in his own home, but Walter saw himself as a forgiving man, especially now in the bloom of his reinvigorated good health. If he could get over her transgression, she ought to be able to deal with being stripped naked, tied to a chair, and held as a hostage for almost a week. He smiled thinking about it. He had no regret. She must have gotten over it by now. Had she sought revenge, he would have seen her already. Patience was not one of her strong points. Walter was certain Tucker Poesy had gone home to lick her wounds. He called her in London. Fortunately, she had not changed the phone.
“Hello Tucker, it’s Walter Sherman,” he said.
“You cocksucking sonofabitch! Who the fuck do you think you are? You prick! Fuck you, and the horse you rode in on, mutherfucker!”
“Got that out of your system?”
“Go fuck yourself!”
“We need to talk. You need this every bit as much as I do. You just don’t know it yet.”
“Fuck off!”
“Fine, but if you really meant that you would have hung up by now.” Then the phone went dead. Oh, shit, Walter laughed. Better be careful not to push her too far. He called the number again.
“Is that you again?” she asked.
“Yes.”
“Okay, what the fuck do you want?”
He told her enough to pique her interest-not all of it, but enough. Then he said they had to get together, meet face to face, talk it out, decide what they should do and how to do it.
“You want me to meet you?” she said with a purposeful note of incredulity.
“What am I going to do? Bust your jaw? Tie you up?”
“Don’t fuck with me, you fucking… old man.”
“Ouch!”
“I said, don’t…”
“Meet me somewhere safe,” he said, “somewhere you feel comfortable. I’ll go anywhere. My intentions are pure, honestly.” Tucker Poesy agreed to meet Walter in two days. She was quite specific in her instructions. When she was done, she said, “No exceptions, no deviations. Do not fuck with me.”
“See you day after tomorrow,” said Walter.
It was an easy trip for him, a short hop from St. Thomas. It was not necessary for Walter to stay overnight and he made no reservations. In fact, he booked an evening flight home. He figured to be back by nine, ten at the latest. Maybe a late dinner at Billy’s-that would be nice. She told him to be there at three, sharp. “A minute late, and I’m gone,” she said. She obviously didn’t know him, he thought. If there was one thing she could count on it was his punctuality. Short of a heart attack, he was always on time. He hoped it wouldn’t be too sunny. Her instructions said no hat, no sunglasses. He’d be standing unprotected, at the height of the afternoon sun. That’s what she wanted. Who could blame her, he thought. Standing a few minutes in the sun was nowhere near as bad as being tied up for almost a week.
All the beaches in Puerto Rico are public. The luxurious, beachfront hotels and resorts cannot reserve the sand to themselves and their paying guests. In the fashionable Isla Verde area of San Juan, a string of upscale hotels overlooks the ocean. Among them is the El San Juan Hotel. The El San Juan has been a landmark in Puerto Rico for many years. In the old days, tawny oak and deep mahogany set off the elegant atmosphere of the hotel’s lobby area. In those days, in its famed casino, men in dark suits, some wearing tuxedos, played high-stakes craps, accompanied by beautiful women in sequined gowns who stayed close by, hanging on every roll of the dice. Lately, like just about everywhere else, things were different. Renovations at the El San Juan, particularly after its purchase by the Wyndham Group, had replaced many of the older, finer touches with more modern, sleek furnishings. The crowds were also different. These days they wore shorts and golf shirts with the tails hanging loose, not even tucked in. The women looked older and fatter. Where had all the beauties gone? In winter, the hotel was filled with lobster-red New Yorkers, too many of whom brought their noisy kids with them. Walter had a preference for elegant, traditional, older hotels. He felt the same about casinos. Although gambling was not among his favorite pastimes, he enjoyed an occasional visit to a busy casino. He liked looking at the women and he always got a strange buzz around so many desperate people with so much money on the line. Not these days, however. No more big shots and beauties at the tables. The place crawled with children now-thirty-year-olds who made a quarter-mil a year. They wore Nikes and sweat pants from Hugo Boss and tossed money around like it meant nothing. Their mothers played the slots, carefully guarding their plastic pots filled with the bogus coins created for playing the machines. Not even real money anymore. Walter had no use for it. The romance was gone. He remembered when you might actually pay a hundred dollars to stay in a fancy room at a place like the El San Juan. He supposed now it would take five times that and you’d have to share a bathroom with your wife.
Tucker Poesy told him to be standing on the beach in the middle of the sand, halfway between the end of the hotel’s patio and the edge of the surf directly in front of the El San Juan. Three sharp. Empty handed. He was to wear only bathing trunks. No hat, no sunglasses, no towel, nothing but his bathing suit. All that he complied with. He was standing there when she came up beside him. She too wore only a bathing suit, this time a bright yellow string bikini that covered so little of her as to almost not be there. That tiny suit, however, gave her a look far more sexy than when he saw her completely naked. Of course, then she was bound up with duct tape and had a badly swollen jaw, broken or something close to it. Her face looked fine now. No damage.
“Jesus, what the hell happened to you?” she asked, pointing to the still very red scar on his chest and the puffy, jagged one running in a crooked line halfway down his right leg from the knee past his ankle.
“Bypass,” he said. “Scary, huh?”
“Yeah, you look like Frankenstein-like shit.”
“No, I don’t look like shit. Shit is brown and mushy. I’m neither. I’ll give you the Frankenstein. What I look like is someone who’s been sliced up pretty good.”
“You can say that again.”
“You, on the other hand, look spectacular.”
“We don’t have to go into that,” she said. “What’s on your mind?”
“Now that you see I’m harmless, can we go somewhere-more comfortable?”
“Sure,” she said. She had expected this. She knew if there was anything really to be said between them, they couldn’t do it on the beach. What little he already told her was enough to get her here. She wanted to know more. “Let’s walk over to the bar by the pool.”
“Here?” he asked. “At the El San Juan? You told me to come empty handed. I have no money or anything.”
“Don’t fret it. I’m staying here. I’ll sign for anything you drink, you sonofabitch.”
Seated comfortably under a brightly colored beach umbrella that rose up like a plastic tree from a hole in the middle of their table-and with Tucker Poesy’s complete attention-Walter began. He took the saltshaker, moved it to the edge of the table on his left and said, “This is where we begin. This is Schiphol.” She nodded and he knew she understood. Then he reached over, took the peppershaker, moved it to the opposite side of the table. He let it stand there for a moment, perched on the edge. He looked at Tucker Poesy. Neither one of them said a word. Then, gently and with a touch of grace, using the index finger of his right hand, he toppled the peppershaker from the table to the tile patio surface. It rattled about noisily before coming to rest somewhere, where neither of them could see it. “That,” he said referring to the missing condiment, “is where we end.”
“You’re telling me we don’t know where that is, is that it?”
“I’m saying we have been led to believe the end was here.” He pointed to the place the peppershaker had been, for a moment, until he knocked it over. “This is where it was supposed to end for us. Someone meant it to be that way.”
“But there’s more?” she said, not so much as a question but rather to finish his thought. He nodded, a trace of a smile crossing his sun-tanned, leathery face.
“I’m going to tell you what I know and some of what I believe has been going on here. When I’m done, if you think I’m a crazy old fool-well, you’ve bought me a drink and you made a trip to Puerto Rico for nothing. You could do worse. But, if what I say makes sense to you, if you see what I see, we have work to do. You and I need to be the ones who say where that peppershaker ends up.”
“And where is this ‘you and I,’ huh?” she asked.
“There is none,” replied Walter. “Not yet, that is. But there should be. You see, we’ve been had, Ms. Poesy.” Tucker Poesy looked at Walter in disbelief. He could see she was starting to question why she bothered to come all the way to Puerto Rico in the first place. “We’ve been played,” he continued, “like a cheap piano. Someone banged the keys and stomped on the pedals. We’re at each other’s throats, thinking that means something. It’s all bullshit-all of it! I know it now and you should know it too. When you do, then there will be a you and me.”
“Like a cheap piano, Mr. Sherman?”
“Call me Walter, will you?”
“Fine, fine. You call me Tucker if it makes you feel better. Tell me, who’s playing us and, for God’s sake, why?”
“From the day I got hired for this job, you were figured in. I think the plan was all there. All we did was play our roles. Walk on stage when we were told to. We did exactly as we were expected to do.”
“Well, what the fuck are we doing here, today? Looks to me like we’re sitting on the beach in Puerto Rico, with each other. What’s that all about?”
“That is my fault,” said Walter. “I screwed up. Instead of just coming on stage and saying my lines, I bumped into the furniture.”
“Oh, yeah. Just how did you do that?”
“I didn’t kill you.” He saw the chill sweep across her eyes and he only imagined the anger fomenting in her brain. Tucker Poesy was nobody’s fool. She was a stone killer, balls of steel and all that crap. Walter looked in her eyes-she hadn’t said a word-but he was certain she knew he was right. The rest would be easy, he thought.
Walter had never mentioned Tucker Poesy to Isobel. But now he told Tucker everything. He related the story of Isobel’s visitor, the threat to her husband and the fate of Harry Levine. The Lacey Confession was missing, once again, he told her. Whoever killed Harry took it, had it. Working backward, he told Tucker about Abby O’Malley, Sean Dooley-Fuck! she thought. She spotted Walter and Harry in that apartment in Amsterdam and then went off to her hotel thinking they would be there the next day. Dooley actually tried to do something-and also, Walter spoke of Devereaux. Walter’s sense of duty and honor meant he still said nothing about Conchita Crystal. Even though he tried to return the money, she would always be his client. He owed it to her to keep her name out of this.
When his narrative ended, bringing him back to the very table at which they sat, at the bar by the pool of the El San Juan hotel, he stopped. Drawing conclusions was uncalled for. This was no time for contemplation. The information was here. She had it now. A decision was called for. Making demands was unnecessary. He remained silent. He just looked at her.
“I’m ready,” she said, without a moment’s hesitation. Then Tucker Poesy bent down and picked up something from beneath the table. She stood up, reared back, and tossed a strike, flinging something that flew over the patio, past the thatched-roof poolside bar, and landed somewhere on the beach, in the sand. She noticed a slightly bewildered take from Walter. “Peppershaker,” she said.
Tucker Poesy couldn’t get an appointment with Abby O’Malley. She did everything Walter told her to do. But it didn’t work. She said everything he said she should. But she couldn’t get past O’Malley’s secretary’s assistant. Leave your number, she was told, Ms. O’Malley’s secretary would get back to her. Fuck! Ms. O’Malley’s secretary. Not even Ms. O’Malley herself. She decided to take matters into her own hands.
“Tell Ms. O’Malley I’m calling for Walter Sherman,” she said the next time she called. “Tell her also, if she doesn’t talk to me now-and I mean right now-I won’t call again.”
“I’m sorry, but Ms. O’Malley…”
“Did you fucking understand me? You have a second job to go to when you lose this one? I’ll wait twenty seconds.” In half that time, Abby O’Malley picked up the phone.
“Abby O’Malley,” she said.
“Look,” said Tucker Poesy, still pissed. “My name is Helen Valdecanas.” That was the name she and Walter decided she would use. Tucker was no stranger to phony names. She used them all the time in her line of work. She thought this one had a certain lilt to it-Helen Valdecanas. “I have a message from Walter Sherman.”
“Well, I…”
“Meet me at a place called the Chelsea Royal Diner. It’s an old wooden building, painted white with green trim and the name all over it, on Route 9W about two miles outside Brattleboro, Vermont, going west. You can’t miss it. I’ll be there at four. I’ll recognize you. Come alone. If you don’t, you’ll make the trip for nothing.”
“Miss…”
“Valdecanas.”
“Yes, Miss Valdecanas, please tell Mr. Sherman…”
“You better leave soon. It’s a long drive.” With that Tucker Poesy hung up. She was sitting in her room when she made the call, a very comfortable room at that, at Toomey’s Inn. As she spoke, she was eating the marvelous breakfast that had been delivered only moments before. Norman and Ethel Toomey ran a delightful place. The accommodations were a little pricey, she thought, but the best part of it was the location, just down the road not far from the Chelsea Royal Diner. Tucker planned to go back to sleep after breakfast. These must be 750-count sheets, she was happy to note. In six hours she would know exactly where the Kennedys fit in this whole thing. If Walter Sherman was right-and she was ninety-nine percent sure he was, especially after her conversation with Professor Leon yesterday, at Marlboro College only fifteen minutes farther along on Route 9W-then Walter was some kind of guy. She was beginning to get over what he did to her.
Abby O’Malley showed up right on time. She was alone. No one had driven up to the diner in a half-hour and everyone was there who had been there when Tucker Poesy arrived. When Abby walked in, Tucker stood up and signaled to her. The two women shook hands, exchanged smiles and sat across from each other at a table by the window, looking out on Route 9W.
“You’re younger than I thought you would be,” said Abby. “I suppose you sound older when you’re angry.”
“I couldn’t get through to you. I couldn’t even get to your secretary. How do you do business like that?”
“I don’t do business. I guess, if you stop to think about it, I don’t talk to anyone I don’t already know.” Tucker Poesy frowned and shook her head as if to say, what the fuck is wrong with you, lady?
But instead she asked Abby, “Are you hungry? I’ve already eaten-great cheeseburgers here, with white cheddar cheese-but I suggest the macaroni and cheese-same cheese. Must be Vermont cheddar, wouldn’t you think?”
“I would. But coffee will do just fine.” Tucker hailed the waitress, ordered coffee for her guest and another cup of tea for herself. When they had their coffee and tea, and the privacy they were looking for, Tucker spoke.
“How much are you prepared to pay for the document?”
“Do you speak for Walter Sherman?”
“I do.”
“Or, do you speak for Harry Levine?”
“Does it matter? Walter has an offer for you-the document for the right amount of money. What’s it worth to you?”
“Miss Valdecanas, I’ve met Mr. Sherman. Have you?”
“What is this, some kind of joke?”
“Walter doesn’t strike me as the kind of man who would sell the document, if he had it-which he most likely does not. And I am not an old lady with attention deficit disorder. I know Harry Levine is dead.”
“Then what the fuck are you doing here?” asked Tucker Poesy. “This is a long way to come if you think I’m full of shit.”
“I didn’t say that. I merely asked who you represent. It can’t be Walter Sherman, or the late Harry Levine, for reasons I’ve just made clear. I’m sure you can see that I am aware that this promises to be a costly transaction. You can’t expect me to deal with-you’ll pardon me-just you. If you have it to offer, you must make a good faith sign by telling me-in a way I can verify-for whom you work. At that point we can do business, as you say.”
“So,” said Tucker, in a much more relaxed tone of voice than she’d been using, “you came here, all the way from Boston, hoping to buy Lacey’s document, from me.”
“For no other reason, Miss Valdecanas.”
“I don’t have it,” said Tucker.
Before leaving Puerto Rico, Walter put Tucker Poesy through a short course in understanding people as you talked to them, especially people under pressure. He explained how he noticed the tiny acne mark still there, just above her lip on the right side of her face, and how he knew she would glance at it, even if just for a split second, and how he was certain he could coldcock her with a right cross when she did.
“It was that bullshit about Denise, wasn’t it? You said she was behind me and I, stupidly, looked. That was it, sonofabitch!” she said.
“That didn’t help you, but that wasn’t it.”
“What was it?”
“Your breasts. When I told you, you had lovely breasts-you looked. Your eyelids gave you away,” he told her. She shook her head slightly, looking at him with what he took to be admiration. He thought he saw the beginnings of a smile.
They didn’t have much time. Walter concentrated on changes in respiration, lines around the mouth and eyes, expansion of the pupils, sweat starting at the hairline. She was using that lesson talking to Abby O’Malley. She decided Abby was telling the truth. She decided Abby was a buyer, and therefore, not an owner and therefore, not a killer. Just as Walter said she should, Tucker moved forward.
“You knew Walter and Levine were in Amsterdam.”
“I did,” said Abby.
“Sean Dooley was your man.”
“He was. Has Walter told you everything?”
“Well,” laughed Tucker, “one never knows, does one? Walter is weird.” Abby smiled and reached out to touch Tucker’s hand. It was a friendly gesture, some kind of sign they had become friends.
“Where do we go from here?” she asked.
“I’m not done yet,” said Tucker. “Did you know when Walter’s plane got in to Schiphol?”
“You mean in Amsterdam? No. No, I didn’t.”
“You learned he was in that apartment later?”
“Later, yes. I was told he was there, with Harry Levine and that the document was with him, or them as the case may be.”
“I knew when he arrived,” said Tucker. “I was at the airport. I followed him to the train and I got on and rode all the way to a town called Bergen op Zoom. Ever hear of it?”
“No,” Abby said. “Nice name though.”
“I followed them back to Amsterdam, all the way to the apartment. And then guess what I did?” Abby sat there transfixed. And now Tucker’s session with Walter paid off, in spades. The lines around Abby O’Malley’s mouth tightened. Her breathing quickened. Tucker swore she could see the flush come over the other woman’s face. “Go ahead,” Tucker said. “Take a guess. What do you think I did?”
Abby O’Malley was nobody’s fool, still she was stunned. She sat back, her arms and shoulders gone limp, the blood nearly drained from her face. “My God!” she said, fighting for a clean breath of fresh air. “You work for Louis, don’t you?”
Rogers Messadou lived on 77th Street, just off Fifth Avenue. His home was a three-story brownstone building. In front it had a tiny plot of grass, no more than a yard wide, plus something very rare in New York City, even in the most upscale private residences-a garage. The man could actually drive a car into his house, or more likely, have one driven for him. Not bad for a kid, thought Walter, walking up to the entrance. Nice house, if you’ve got fifteen or twenty million dollars. New York City had been a part of Walter’s life for fifty years, since the first time his mother took him there by train, down the Hudson River from Rhinebeck, into Grand Central Station. He felt comfortable in New York, very much at home. He knew the restaurants, hotels, neighborhoods, Greenwich Village and Chinatown. Central Park too, since he had made it a forty-year habit to stay at the Mayflower Hotel on Central Park West at 61st Street. He was not a big fan of change and he knew he would always be angry they tore it down. But he’d been away, on St. John, for a long time. Time went by differently in New York than in the Caribbean. Fifteen to twenty million is what he pegged the young Messadou’s house for. Just as he might be losing something in other areas, he was well behind the times for the Big Apple. Had Rogers Messadou been willing to sell this place for fifteen or twenty million dollars, he would be selling cheap. And Rogers Messadou was not a man who sold anything cheap. He had agreed to meet Walter, and at his home, as Walter requested. Actually, he seemed quite friendly on the phone. He was the first person Walter called after Puerto Rico. That’s the way he and Tucker worked it out. He’d find Messadou. She would deal with Abby O’Malley. Afterward, they would talk and move on from there.
A male servant-not from around here-Walter said to himself, showed him inside. The man was tall and very thin, wore a black suit, white shirt and skinny black tie. He looked like a very well-dressed funeral director except for the cheerful smile and bright eyes. Walter wore his big-city, mainland clothes, his New York outfit-gray slacks, open collar light blue dress shirt, no tie of course, and a double-breasted navy blue, gold buttoned blazer. He knew he was underdressed, but it didn’t bother him. Mr. Messadou was upstairs and would come down immediately, the long, lean servant said to Walter as he took him to a study off the main hallway on the first floor. No chance to look around, Walter thought. Not here.
“Please make yourself comfortable, Mr. Sherman. May I get you anything?” Walter asked him if they had any Diet Coke. “Of course, sir,” the male servant said, and closed the door, leaving Walter alone. Seeing how people lived was a key to knowing what sort of person they were. Walter knew to look about carefully. Everything told a story, or part of one. Furniture, tables and chairs, lamps and light fixtures, rugs, paintings and sculptures, nicknacks and personal memorabilia, particularly books and magazines-all of it was important. But, most of all, he knew that when he was shown into a room, and left to wait alone, that room would give up no useful information. Only a fool lets a stranger into anyplace meaningful, unescorted. From his research, minimal though it may have been, and from the looks of the house itself, Walter did not make Rogers Messadou for a fool.
The young man arrived a few minutes later. He fairly bounded into the room, a glad hand extended and a big, white toothy smile lighting up his face from ear to ear. He wore a Nike running suit, complete with matching shoes, and it was clear he had just been exercising. Drops of sweat still rolled down his neck from under his long, deep brown hair. He could not have been more than thirty-two, if that.
“Rogers Messadou,” he introduced himself. “Call me Roy, everyone does.” He stopped, like an action figure caught in midstep, or in a freeze frame just after somebody hit the pause button on a DVD player. His smile was fixed in cement and his finger pointed stiffly toward Walter.
“I got it,” said Walter. “Roy-Rogers.”
“Hey, good for you, Walter. Sit down. Jake will be right in. You did ask for something, didn’t you?”
“A Diet Coke.”
“Great, great. Love that stuff, but I’m not crazy about the artificial sweetener. Now, what can I do for you? It isn’t everyone who calls me up and wants to talk about my great-uncle.”
“I’m here about the Czar’s gold coins,” said Walter, getting right to the point. In setting up this appointment, Walter told Rogers Messadou-Roy-he worked for important people and he thought Roy might be able to help him with something that came up regarding his great-uncle. Roy was friendly, even eager to talk about that. “Djemmal-Eddin Messadou,” he said on the phone. “Quite a man, Mr. Sherman.” Here, in the home of a Messadou, Walter felt it necessary to demonstrate some knowledge of Djemmal-Eddin before asking for information about him, especially this kind of information. So Walter began with a review of the man’s exploits and achievements. He saw Roy was impressed just with the mention of the Transcaucasian Federation. When was the last time he met anyone who’d ever heard of it? Of course, he did not think less of the Federation for its obscurity. To the contrary, he thought only that Americans were ignorant, and completely deficient in matters of history, their own and everyone else’s. At times like these Roy Messadou forgot he too was an American, second generation. Family loyalty is a deep vein in the mine that runs over and across any lines of nationality. Walter passed the test-he wasn’t going to come in here and make bad jokes, mispronounce exotic names and not know the Messadou family had not been Muslims for more than a hundred years-and when he saw he had won over Roy’s confidence, he started talking business.
“I want you to know, right off the bat, my employers have no personal interest in the coins. Frankly, they don’t even know of their existence. It’s only me-and I too have no interest in them. I’m not searching for gold, Roy. I need the information about the coins in order for me to complete my work. I am not asking you to tell me where they are or even if you know where they are. But, knowing what happened to the gold-or what people think happened to it-will bring me closer to finding the person I’m looking for. That’s it.”
“How so, Walter? Tell me.”
“I’m not sure who it is I’m going to find when I reach the end of my search,” he answered. “I have reason to be believe he or she or they may themselves be after the coins. Knowing that-if it’s so-will point me in their direction. Likewise, if I have others-let me call them suspects-on my list, and I discover they either don’t know or don’t care about Djemmal-Eddin’s gold, that information also gets me closer to where I have to be.”
“What makes you think I can help you?”
“Your last name,” said Walter.
“You know, Walter,” said Roy, sounding nothing like the exuberant youngster who met him a few minutes ago, “most powerful men, men of great influence, are rich. But not all rich men are powerful. Not all rich men have influence. I believe it’s fair to say I am rich. Look around you. You could say wealthy, without argument. But I have no power-don’t seek any-and I have even less influence. All of which pleases me immensely. Everything you see around you comes from money I’ve earned. There is no Czar’s gold here.” He continued his tale of the self-made man unaware that Walter knew most of it already. That’s the way Walter liked it. Getting information you already have is a good way to assess the veracity of the person giving it to you. This works particularly well when the source is certain you have nothing to start with.
Roy spoke of his grandfather, who came to the United States after World War II. Roy’s father was born here, in New Jersey, in 1948. His grandfather opened a restaurant, a small place that catered to the new population of Georgians in the New York area. Of course, it was a tiny population even at its postwar height. Still, the restaurant persisted. The family persevered. Roy’s father and his uncles and aunts grew up, went to school, on to college, and the family made ends meet because of that restaurant. “My father had ambition,” said Roy. “We imported many of the foodstuffs that went into the menu and Dad thought the market for those foods might be wider than just our little restaurant in Jersey City.” He laughed, the same friendly laugh Walter saw earlier. “He was right too.” Roy Messadou’s father eventually opened an import/export business specializing in Russian products coming in and American luxury items going out. It was nothing huge, but it was much bigger than the restaurant. For Roy’s generation, a home in the suburbs, new cars and the finest colleges were part of the deal. Roy Messadou’s father saw the upper middle class as the culmination of the American dream. America was a great country-the Messadou family, proof of it.
“I went to Princeton and then got my MBA at Harvard,” said Roy.
“I thought it was Columbia and the Wharton School,” said Walter.
“Good, good,” said Roy, once again the jovial host. “I wanted to see how much you knew. You’ll forgive me. You’re pretty good, Walter.”
“It wasn’t much. You flatter me.”
“Just want to know that we both know what we’re doing here.”
“Look, Roy. I’m chasing a killer and I’ve been running toward a certain revelation in Frederick Lacey’s personal journal-something that has absolutely nothing to do with you or your family. Then, all of a sudden, Lacey’s wife comes up, then her father-your great-uncle-and I begin hearing about the gold and thinking maybe who I’m looking for has no connection to what I’ve seen revealed in Lacey’s confession, and instead has everything to do with the gold. If that’s true, I may be after the wrong person. I was hoping you could help me.”
“A killer?”
“Yes.”
“As in murder?”
“As in murder.”
“You’re not the police.”
“I’m not. You really should stop asking questions. Let me ask them. The more you know, the more you know what you shouldn’t. It serves no purpose. Do you understand me?”
“I do,” answered Roy Messadou. “It amazes me when you say you are after a killer, when you tell me you are really talking about murder. I assume this murder has already taken place.”
“Correct.”
“You know, of course you do, that I am just a stocks-and-bonds man. A good one. Well, what the fuck-a great one. But one nonetheless. I am a Messadou, proud to be one too. But my family’s history is a subject for great misunderstanding. I assure you whatever murder you are involved in, it has nothing whatever to do with Djemmal-Eddin Messadou. Do you know why?”
“Your sister doesn’t feel that way,” said Walter. “She came to see me and she was quite interested. The family fortune-your family fortune-was put someplace by Frederick Lacey. He never told any of you, according to your sister. After his father-in-law died, he kept the secret himself. Lacey surely didn’t spend it. The last thing he needed was more money. So, it must still be there-wherever he put it. Your sister says your family has a claim on that gold. I make no judgment about that. As I said earlier, I don’t care about the gold. But, if someone you know is killing people to get to Lacey’s document, to find the Czar’s coins, I will find them. I will.”
There was an earnestness in Walter’s voice, a serious nature to his bearing, a level of agitation Roy Messadou could not miss.
“Walter,” he said. “You’ve been misinformed.”
“Yeah, about what?”
“There is no gold. So far as I know, there never was. My great-uncle was a great man, a man who has been slighted by history. But he was a simple man and so was my grandfather a simple man. There was no gold then and there is no gold now.”
“That is not what your sister has to say.”
“Which one?”
“Aminette. Aminette Messadou, who your father named after Lacey’s wife.”
“I have a younger sister, Piper, who lives here, in the New York area, in Far Rockaway, Queens. She is slow, if you know what I mean. Retarded they used to call it. She lives in a special home, a wonderful place really, directly on the beach out there. I pay for it. I visit every week. Sometimes she remembers who I am. Sometimes she doesn’t. I have another sister, Jean. She lives in Houston. She’s married to some sort of financial executive. He does all right. Nothing like this, but okay. Jean is proud. Will not take a penny from me. She doesn’t want anybody’s gold. My sister Aminette came to see you? I have no sister named Aminette.”
“What does your sister Jean look like?” Walter asked, a sickening feeling creeping up from his stomach, looking to shut his lungs down tight as a drum.
“She’s forty years old and forty pounds overweight.” For a moment, Walter stopped breathing.
It’s never cold on St. John. Rarely is it too hot. When the rains come, people like it. True, a hurricane in September or October can make things unpleasant for a while, but the storms are never as bad as the television news says they will be. Most days in February are the same-seventy-something degrees, bright sunshine, sea breezes. Light, wispy clouds float across St. John’s blue skies, most often in small bunches on their way in from St. Thomas to the west. The hotels are full. The houses are rented. The beaches are packed and so too are the restaurants and bars in Cruz Bay. Dinner reservations, in February, are a must.
Walter’s visit with Roy Messadou presented a continuing puzzle. The solution evaded him. He thought about it late into the night. Walter was a late riser at home. Often he liked to drop in a DVD and watch a movie at one or two in the morning. These days getting to sleep at three-thirty, even four, was not unusual. He wondered if his heart attack and bypass surgery had affected his sleep patterns. By nine or nine-thirty, ten at the latest, he was up. Denise knew to have a fresh pot of coffee ready. She also knew he would have his breakfast at Billy’s, even in February.
On Sunday he walked into Billy’s a little after ten. Billy was still in back checking the meat and fish. Ike was eating a bowl of something, sitting alone at his table out front near the sidewalk. He smiled at Walter and Walter smiled back at the old man. He was not in his seat five minutes when Helen brought him some scrambled eggs and buttered toast-lightly buttered-and a cold bottle of Diet Coke. The New York Times, Sunday edition, was within reach, sitting unopened on the bar at the far end near the kitchen where Walter always sat. Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons played on Billy’s superior sound system. “I love you, baby.” This Sunday began no differently than many others.
“Best oatmeal I had since…” Ike was searching for a time. A man as old as he was had a lot of time to sort through. He blew out an amazing amount of smoke from his mouth and nose, holding the cigarette, fast approaching butt size, up in front of him like it was some kind of pointer. “Since the Army,” he finally said.
“Thank you very much, Ike,” said Helen, truly pleased the old man had enjoyed her out-of-the-ordinary choice of a breakfast for him. Most mornings he ate a single hard-boiled egg and three or four pieces of bacon. Today, she brought him oatmeal saying, “You know, all that pork you eat doesn’t go well with that tobacco.”
“Huh?”
“What I mean Ike is, that stuff will kill you. Either one probably. The pork or the cigarettes.”
“Damn, Helen,” said Ike, a man whose dignity could absorb substantial assault without damage. Still, he said, “You married him, but it looks like you got a attitude transplant from him too. You and Billy, now one of a kind.”
“Why thank you Ike,” she said with a gracious smile and curtsy, certain there was more pride than truth, more humor than hurt feelings in his protest.
“When were you in the Army?” Walter asked from across the bar. He knew perfectly well Ike had never been in the Army.
“The Army? Did I say I was in the Army?”
“Yes you did,” Helen said.
Walter said, “The oatmeal, Ike. The best you had, you said, since the Army.”
“Oh, that. I didn’t mean I was in the Army. ’Cause I wasn’t. Nope. Tried to be, but I didn’t make it. Didn’t want any more Negroes, they said. Had enough. I believe I said since the Army. I was in the Navy, you see. Officers’ Cook, Second Class. And, let me tell you, that’s what we was back then-second class.”
“What about the Army and the oatmeal?” Helen asked.
“I was slaving on that ship, colored boy hidden away in the very bowels of that fine vessel. Until we made port in Ireland. I met up there with these Negro Army troops, 92nd Infantry. Brave young men. Wouldn’t let them fight, so they sat there, in Ireland, where there was no Nazis, drinking and messing with the local women. Serving their country, in their way. I hung around them as much as I could back then. Anything to stay off that ship. One morning I went over to where they had this mess hall. That’s where the oatmeal comes in. I ate that oatmeal, sitting there with maybe fifty Negroes. First good meal I had since I left St. John. This one,” he said pointing to his empty bowl, flashing one of his trademark grins, “second only to it.”
Billy came out of the back, into the bar. He carried a cup of coffee in one hand and a receipt in the other. “Sonofabitch,” he muttered. “He shorted me on the red snapper.” He handed the receipt to Helen. “You call him and tell him to get it over here-all of it-right now-or I’ll call him and he won’t like that one bit. This is not the first time, you know.”
Walter finished his breakfast in silence. Everybody’s mood seemed a little off this morning. By the time he was done, people were starting to filter in for lunch. It’s February, Walter reminded himself. Billy’s will be jammed all day and all night. No wonder he’s pissed about the red snapper. There’s nothing worse for him, once he runs out, than to have to tell customers the snapper is not available. Billy-and now Helen-took great pride in how well the place was managed. Running out of an item, a specialty of the house no less, would make him look bad. The embarrassment would gnaw at him.
“That fish man better come back with the fish,” said Ike. “Billy’s so upset he might just kill the man.”
“Nah,” said Billy. “I’m pissed all right, I might push the sonofabitch around, but nobody goes and kills somebody because they’re
…”
“Embarrassed?” Helen gave him the word. She’d been doing that more and more lately and it seemed he liked it.
“Yeah, embarrassed-and that’s what I’d be. Money, that’s what people kill for, Ike. And love. Money and love.”
“You think so?” said Walter.
“You still here, Walter?” joked Ike. “Haven’t heard a peep out of you.”
“Still here, old man. Money and love. Is that it, Billy?”
“Believe it,” said Billy. “I know what Ike’s saying-got a point-but it’s the wrong one. Some people look like they’ll kill somebody because they’ve been shamed, you know. But that ain’t it. I knew a man once, his wife took up with a guy. Big mistake on her part. Her husband, this was no man to fuck around on… if you know what I mean.”
“Was that New Jersey, hon?” Helen asked.
Billy looked at her, stared at her steely-eyed, quiet for a moment. Then he said, “Yeah, New Jersey.”
Walter caught Ike’s eye as Billy spoke. New Jersey? He knew Ike was asking himself the same question. Was this more of Billy’s mysterious past, more than they had ever heard coming from his mouth? “Anyway, this guy-the one whose wife was playing him-his wife gets taken out.”
“Taken out?”
“Just listen, Helen,” said Billy, irritated. “She gets shot. Real messy. In the face, and down…” He looked down and motioned clumsily to his groin.
“She got shot there?”
“Helen!”
“Sorry.”
“Well,” continued Billy. “We all figured he did it, you know, the guy, the husband-and we figured he did it himself. The cops figured it the same way. Christ, every phone his wife talked on was wired. Should’ve known better. The cops knew everything.”
“He was plenty embarrassed, this guy?” Ike asked, then answered his own question. “Had to be.”
“Yeah, sure he was embarrassed. You would be too if you were… you know… a kind of boss and everything, and your wife was fucking some guy on the side and the cops had it all on tape. But he didn’t kill her. We had it all wrong. Cops too.”
“Who killed her?” Walter asked, by now on the edge of his seat.
“You kill her, Billy?”
“Fuck you, Ike! What are you, crazy? I didn’t kill her. I ain’t talking about me. You’re missing the point here.”
“Okay,” said Ike inhaling as much smoke as he possibly could in a single breath. “Okay. I got you now.”
Billy was leaning on the bar with both hands. Walter could see his jaw was tense, his teeth clenched. Whatever this was, it was hard for him. He wanted to reach out and help his friend, but he had no idea how. Helen too. Walter could see she felt the strain, wanted to do something, but what? She stood there, respectfully silent.
“The other guy did it,” said Billy. “The guy she was fucking.”
“No!” said Helen, eyes as wide as saucers.
“The reason he shot her up so badly was to make it look like the husband did it. You can see that.”
“Oh yeah, make it look like the angry husband,” Ike said. “I can see that.”
Billy took in a big breath of fresh air. He needed it. “See, people think you’ll do anything if you’re embarrassed enough. Even kill somebody. But that’s not what it’s about. It’s about the money. It’s always about the money.”
“Where’s the money here?” asked Helen.
“The husband kept a lot of cash in the house. The kind of business he was in made that a smart move. I’m telling you, a lot of money, probably a couple hundred thousand. So, the guy who’s fucking his wife finds out where the money is, where the husband stashed it in the house. He kills the wife-like I told you-and steals the money. And, to cover his tracks, he sets up the husband.”
“How did the husband get off the hook?” asked Walter.
“What makes you think the husband got away, Walter?” Helen asked.
“Oh, he did. No doubt about that, right, Billy?”
“Well, I’ll tell you, Walter. The husband had some friends and when we… when these friends saw the cash this guy was laying out, not so broke anymore, going to Atlantic City and stuff, they sort of put two and two together. They sat him down and it didn’t take much. He confessed the whole thing. Once that little shit stepped up, told the cops everything, the husband, they let him go.”
“And the other guy, the one who did it, he went to jail?”
“No, Helen. He never went to jail. He didn’t make his trial. Something happened to him before his case got that far.”
“You mean, he…”
“That’s another story which we’re not interested in,” said Billy, the tone of his voice making it very clear he had reached the end of his tale.
Walter looked over at Ike. He motioned with his hands, a sort of unspoken question for the old man, like-what have you got?
“Not me,” said Ike. “Billy, you wear me out. I got nothing for that. You are most definitely in a class by yourself today. Unless Walter has something to say. Walter?”
“I’ll say only this, and then I’m getting the hell out of here, before the bushwhackers take over. I think we ought to vote on it.”
“Vote on it? Vote on what?”
“You said it, Billy. Love or money.”
Ike said, “That’s good. That’s very good, but I do believe we need to throw embarrassment in there with them. We do need three, do we agree?”
“Love, money and embarrassment,” said Billy scratching his recently clean-shaven chin. “Okay with me.”
“Write it up,” said Walter.
“Un huh,” echoed Ike.
“Can I do it?” Helen asked. Billy looked to his friends and seeing no resistance, he flipped the chalk to her. She grabbed it out of the air, with one hand and a big smile that said- I’m one of you! And she slid herself over to the rimless chalkboard next to the old cash register and wrote, in strong capital letters: LOVE/MONEY/EMBARRASSMENT.
Walter was already thinking about money.
When Tucker Poesy walked into Billy’s she looked very different from the last time. Of course, the last time she didn’t exactly walk in. She was carried in on a chair, a chair she was attached to in a most unfriendly manner. Billy’s wasn’t exactly open then-she was brought in at four in the morning. And Walter was not on the island. He was already gone, off to Washington, he thought, but really to New Mexico. Walter was here now and he heard her behind him. She was dressed for the climate. This was a woman who traveled well. She wore shorts, tight, white shorts showing off her dancer’s legs. A bare midriff was topped by a blue t-shirt with a picture of the Dixie Chicks on it. Underneath them was written, FUTK. Walter had no idea what that meant. She had no baggage-it must have been stowed somewhere already, he thought-and she was as cheerful as any first-time bushwhacker, fresh off the boat from St. Thomas. She could easily have been from Pittsburgh or Minneapolis, come to St. John looking to spend some money and drink a few of Billy’s more exotic beverages. This was a woman Billy had some experience with-under the worst of all possible conditions. He had personally hosed her down when she needed it most.
“Hello, Billy,” she beamed.
“Hello,” he replied, more than a little tentatively. Walter had clued him in, but it was still a little difficult for him. It didn’t make any sense to him. What would he do, he thought, if somebody from Jersey, someone from his past-when he was another person, with another name-what would he do if they just walked into his bar and said, “Hello, Billy.” Shit, Walter must know what he’s doing.
Walter turned in his seat, smiled broadly at her and said, “You look terrific, Tucker. I’m really glad to see you. Ike, Billy, Helen, I want you to meet my friend, Tucker Poesy.” She smiled to each, greeting Billy as if he was a perfect stranger. This girl’s got balls, he thought.
“Nice to meet you,” Helen said.
Ike’s warm, toothy smile, and a tip of his Cleveland Browns cap-Helen was sure he wore it to both honor Jim Brown and annoy her-did not obscure his immediate, first reaction. Boom! It just happened in his head. The old man couldn’t help it. He saw Isobel Gitlin, right there in front of him, clear as day on the water. Now, that girl had been nothing but trouble for his friend Walter. God only knew what damage this one had in store. Some people, Ike was sure, spent their whole lives waiting for something, for someone. Other people spent their lives running away from it-from somebody, most likely. He knew Walter was special-among the cursed, sad to say-and there was nothing he could do about it. He had one foot looking and the other running. Cursed, thought Ike, truly cursed. Still, his ancient, creaky bones and wrinkled face wished Gloria would hurry up and come.
“What’ll you have?” Billy asked Tucker. She leaned in on him, so only he could hear her. “I eat and drink for free,” she said. He nodded his acceptance. It was the least he could do.
“I’m starving,” she said, loud enough for all to hear. Then she ordered a steak-the biggest rib eye on Billy’s menu. “Is that prime beef?” she asked. Billy just looked at the floor. He made no effort to respond. “Fries and salad with that,” she said.
“What are you drinking?” he asked, practically unable to look her in the eye.
“How ’bout a big bottle of your best champagne. You know, the one that goes for a hundred and seventy-five bucks a pop.”
“I don’t carry that.”
“Well, order some. I may be here awhile. In the meantime, a Corona will do.” Billy walked away thinking he was getting off cheap.
Walter and Tucker Poesy sat in Billy’s all afternoon. She ate her steak and drank her beer. He nibbled at a fruit and veggie plate Helen prepared for him and sipped his usual. He had given up all pretense. He talked business, right there at the end of Billy’s bar. A couple of times he thought about it-uneasy thoughts-but what the hell. Ike really was right. He was retired. There were no rules anymore. He was no longer working for Conchita Crystal. This was all on him. He bore the load. They killed Harry and he had become the Cowboy.
He had it now. Almost the whole story, from beginning to end. Well, not quite. A few details still stumped him, especially the very beginning. Whatever he still didn’t know didn’t matter, at least for now. He wanted Tucker to get it the way he had. He didn’t want to tell her. He was afraid she might simply take his word for it. He wanted her to figure it out for herself. So, they talked about details, not the wider picture. He put his part in. He told her how someone had approached him with the job. He still did not mention Conchita Crystal. Walter had been protecting clients for forty years. Even if he wanted to, he wasn’t sure he could reveal one now. But it didn’t matter. It was what happened, the order of events, the puzzle and its pieces. No puzzle had to be perfect. Chita was a piece that could be left out. He told Tucker about Harry’s Aunt Sadie, and went over his discovery of Bergen op Zoom and how fortunate he was to have a contact in Holland-his old friend Aat. Finding Harry turned out to be the easiest part. He told her about Devereaux-about Il Localino. It rankled him still. Just the mention of it flushed his face. She had to notice. Devereaux knew he was on the job-knew even who hired him.
“Who?” she asked.
“No. I can’t, Tucker. But it’s not important.”
Once the narrative reached Amsterdam, Tucker filled in her side. Devereaux called her, in London, told her to meet Harry Levine and get the document from him. She never said, but Walter wondered if she would have killed Harry too. He meant nothing to her. Walter liked her. He liked her more the more he was with her. But she was a killer and she was the most dangerous of killers. She was what he had always thought of as a swatter. Like swatting flies, she could shoot anyone without asking why, without caring why-walk away without a second thought. Shooting people was what she did. The only question for Walter was, could she kill someone she knew, someone she had nothing against? Could she have killed Harry Levine? He’d never know. It turned out Harry showed up to meet her without the document. She didn’t do this well, and admitted as much to Walter. She scared Harry off and he lit out for Holland. Tucker said she got a call, from Devereaux, with Walter’s flight plans. She was there, waiting for him, when he landed in Holland. The rest was all her. She followed him to Bergen op Zoom and then all the way back to Amsterdam, spotted their little hideaway, and decided to make her move the next day. By then it was too late. Finally, Devereaux sent her to St. John.
“He knew you were coming back.”
“I came back to meet Abby O’Malley. Let me tell you something about her.”
Abby O’Malley’s phone records showed a million calls to Louis Devereaux. Walter saw the regularity with which she called him and asked his contact in the phone company to check back as far as he could. Sure enough, she had been calling Devereaux’s home phone for as long as they had records of her calls. It was easy after that. It didn’t take much to find out they both went to the University of Chicago Law School. A few phone calls to people there turned up plenty of information about a couple of distinguished graduates. Abby O’Malley and Louis Devereaux, together as a pair, went back decades. That explained Sean Dooley.
“You called Devereaux, didn’t you?” he asked Tucker.
“Sure,” she said.
“And you told him I was comfortably settled, with Harry Levine, in Amsterdam.”
“Right.”
“And you told him exactly where.”
“Of course, and that I wasn’t going to do anything about it until the next day. Oh, fuck!” shouted Tucker Poesy, still pissed at her own stupidity. Billy looked down the bar, in her direction. She waved him off. “Sorry,” she mouthed, since there was no way he could hear her from there unless she screamed again. Then she apologized to Walter too.
“Devereaux called O’Malley,” she said, having put two and two together and gotten four. “The sonofabitch. O’Malley gets her boy into action immediately. But he’s a fuck-up artist. You beat it out of him and then beat it out of there. All the while I’m sleeping in a hotel overlooking the canal around the corner.”
“I like that,” said Walter. “The canal around the corner. Sounds like a Dutch country and western song.”
He filled her in again on his travels with Harry. They had gone over this part in Puerto Rico, but Walter could never repeat things too much. Like an athlete, deep into an intense training regime, for Walter, it was the repetitions that were the key to success. The more a fact was scrutinized, the more certain he could be it was a fact. That brought them to St. John, and their first meeting. It seemed an uncomfortable moment for Tucker, but Walter was apparently undisturbed. She noticed that and it actually made her feel better. If he was cool with this, why shouldn’t she be?
“This is where Devereaux fucked up,” he said. “Can you tell me how?”
“Sure,” said Tucker Poesy, by now able to dissect this with the same detachment Walter had. “You were supposed to kill me. That fucking Devereaux-sonofabitch!”
“Exactly right, my dear girl. I was supposed to kill you. I’m sure you do your job very well, but messing around trying to fool me isn’t part of your job description. You were set up. Devereaux knew you were impulsive. He knew you’d make some kind of move on me-even though it made no sense. And he figured I’d kill you.”
“You didn’t have the document,” said Tucker. “He knew you didn’t have it. You would have been nuts to bring it with you. He sent me to get something he knew wasn’t there. But why did he want to get rid of me? Why did he want you to kill me?”
“He didn’t need you anymore. He either already knew where Lacey’s journal was, or was about to know. You had too much information. You were the man-or in this case, the woman-who knew too much. You may not have known precisely what Lacey had written, but you certainly had to know it was worth killing for.”
“He didn’t need me anymore? You mean he needed to get rid of me?” She sounded like she was shocked.
“Yeah. Cover his tracks. Loyalty,” said Walter, holding his hands out like the scales of justice, pretending to be Devereaux. “To you-or to me? Snap decision. Easy. You were an asset that had become a liability. But, like I said, that’s where he made his mistake. He had you figured pretty good, but not me. He was sure I’d kill you, but I didn’t. I let you go once I realized you didn’t kill Harry.”
“You took your sweet time about it.”
“Water under the bridge,” said Walter. “We’re in a tough business, you and me.”
“What now?”
“Devereaux killed Harry Levine-or had him killed. He tried to kill you, through me. And, no doubt, his plans eventually called for getting rid of me too. Everything in due time. It’s time now. It’s his time.”
“Let’s go get the little prick,” Tucker Poesy said.
The house on Kalorama Road was a four-sided, red brick Colonial, with double-hung windows and black shutters, dormers at the top and a beautiful, arched doorway. The neighborhood was as secure as any in the Washington area. So many important people, top officials and those with as much power as top officials, had chosen to live in the upscale Kalorama district of Georgetown. The enormous price tag on the property was no concern for Devereaux. In fact, he bought the house at a substantial discount because, as his real estate agent told him, “A lot of people think the place is haunted.” She had correctly pegged Louis Devereaux as a man who could not possibly believe such nonsense. With someone else, she might have left that out. Crazy as it seemed, selling a haunted house was every bit as difficult as selling one in which someone had been murdered or committed suicide. “These things must be disclosed,” Devereaux’s agent told him. “And when they are, buyers get a little skittish.” To his advantage, these ridiculous concerns served to bring the price down. Even his realtor could not have guessed, but Devereaux would have gladly shared his home with a ghost or two. For sure, it would have been their ordeal.
He arrived home about eight-his usual time. He went straight to his bedroom where he changed into a pair of more casual pants and a pullover top. He washed his face, brushed his teeth-for reasons he never came to understand, he had always brushed his teeth before eating as well as afterward-walked back into his kitchen to mix a drink. Drink in hand, he sat down in his favorite chair in the living room, grabbed the remote from the small table next to him and turned on the television.
“Turn the TV off,” said Walter emerging from the hall that led to the downstairs guest room and private office. He carried a gun, pointed at Devereaux. The television went dark.
“How did you get in here?” Devereaux was quite clearly baffled. It made Walter feel very good to see him as confused as he had been that night outside Il Localino.
“You mean, how did I get past your alarm system? Your wiring-probably installed by the folks you work for, or better said, the folks who work for you-and your backup alarm too? I could tell you, but it would only be new information you’d be unable to use. So, forget about it, Louie. I’m here.”
“What do you…” Devereaux caught himself before saying want. That would have been too melodramatic. It nearly caused a smile to crease his lips. Instead, he decided to wait on Walter. If Walter wanted him dead, he’d be dead already. So, he must want something more. Devereaux felt confident he had plenty of time. Keep his mouth shut, that’s what he decided. Let Walter show his hand.
“Did you think you could stay a step ahead of me forever?” asked Walter. “Did you think I was too old or something?”
“I thought I knew everything about you,” Devereaux answered. “Vietnam. All those special cases afterward. A lot of them weren’t quite as confidential as you thought they were. Hell, you were the perfect combination of skill, great skill, a skill never seen before and perhaps never to be seen again, and vulnerability. There was always something about you, bubbling just beneath the surface, something by which you could be had. You were a figure of literary magnitude. Walter Sherman. Phantom. The Locator. Almost too good to be true. I admired you. You’ve no idea.”
“At first,” said Walter, sounding as if he hadn’t heard a single word Devereaux said, “you figured it would be simple. Maneuver Harry into Tucker Poesy’s web, and she’d get the document for you. You thought that would work. I can understand that. I probably would have done the same. So, we’re on the right track, together, at the start. Right?”
“No argument here,” said Devereaux.
“But Harry doesn’t come, document in hand. And, on top of that, Tucker Poesy scares him off. Now, here’s where I come in. Harry’s gone. Someone close to him hires me to find him, and you-since you’ve obviously got me under your microscope-figure to piggyback on the deal. I’ll find Harry and you’ll have Tucker Poesy follow me. Simple?”
“Your point being?”
“My point? My point is this whole thing was a charade, a puppet show, and you were pulling all the strings.”
“You think too highly of me.”
“Too highly?” scoffed Walter. “Far from it. I think you’re a worthless excuse for a man.” There was contempt in his voice, and anger, a controlled anger. Walter was not about to lose it now-at the end.
“Worthless excuse,” Devereaux repeated slowly, emphasizing each word equally. “Worthless excuse. Let me tell you something. This worthless excuse makes the world safe for hypocritical assholes like you. You sit in your island paradise, hide out in a world you keep to yourself, a world you think you can keep to yourself. And just how does that happen? Tell me. Who makes that possible? Who? A worthless excuse like me. That’s who.”
“You’re the guy in charge?” Walter mocked him and Devereaux, failing totally to catch the sarcasm in Walter’s query, shouted, “You’re goddamn right I am!”
“Amazing. You think you know everything, don’t you Louie?”
“What I know, what I know-yes, Mr. Locator-it’s what I know that keeps you free. Keeps you from going to jail. Keeps the IRS in the dark. Keeps your clients confidential. Keeps your-your Gloria safe. There’s no doubt about it. No doubt at all.”
“Ubi dubium ibi libertas,” said Walter.
“Latin? From you? Quite a surprise. I’m a little rusty on mine.”
“Translation-Where there is doubt, there is freedom. Harry Levine gave it to me, right out of Lacey’s journal. Poor Harry said it reminded him of Roy Orbison. You know, do the ubi dubi. What kind of man are you, Devereaux? You think you can order the killing of Harry Levine? You think you’re so great? You think you’re running the world, don’t you? You have-a wasted fucking existence. No idea. No clue.”
“Me? A worthless excuse? I have a wasted fucking existence-very funny, coming from you. A little crack in your elaborate facade. I’ll have to remember that.”
“Years ago,” Walter continued, in a much calmer tone, his resolve and purpose once more front and center. “When I was sixteen, seventeen-when we all got our driver’s licenses-we used to drive into New York City, on a whim. That’s a couple of hours, each way from Rhinebeck. One night, we’re tooling around town-I’m driving and Bobby Hatton, a friend of mine sitting next to me, says ‘Are we ready?’ He could only mean one thing. Drive to New York City. So, I take off for the Taconic Parkway, pathway to the Big Apple. I’ve got the car. I’m the king of the road. Just like you-I’m in charge. But, my other friend, Joel Adler, in the back seat, he doesn’t want to go. He’s pissed. He’s shouting. He’s doing everything short of grabbing me, which would be stupid because I’m driving. Finally, he gives up, gives in, sits back. There’s nothing he can do. But Joel doesn’t say a word for about an hour. Then, out of nowhere, he said something-you know what he said?” Devereaux looked at Walter with the slightest hint of a smirk on his lips. He held back not wanting to antagonize a man holding a gun on him. “No, of course you don’t, Louie. How could you? Joel Adler said to me, ‘You’re a shmuk with an empty life.’ Think about it. Didn’t fit me, that’s what I thought. I thought it was very funny. Shmuck with an empty life. Someone like me-with the power? Someone like you-with the power? But my friend Joel-he meant someone with no power, no purpose. In the end, someone with nothing. And that’s exactly what you are and where you are. You’re a shmuk with an empty life and this is the end.” Devereaux had no reply.
Walter sat down in a chair directly across the room from where Devereaux sat. He kept his gun pointed at him. “When Tucker calls you from Amsterdam, you call Abby O’Malley. She sends that incompetent poor bastard, Sean Dooley, after me. Big mistake, or is it?”
“What are you saying?” Devereaux asked. “You think I had other motives?”
“We’ll get to that. You knew Abby O’Malley had been desperate to get Lacey’s journal. Her whole life revolved around it. But you also knew she couldn’t hurt a fly.” The reference made Walter chuckle. His laughter unsettled Devereaux because he had no idea what it was based in. “Abby would send in a fool. You were sure of that. And that’s exactly what she did. The last thing you wanted was for her to get the document. She’d burn it in a New York minute. You were sure I could handle anything she did. You could play with both of us and still come out on top.”
“Can I get a refill on this?” Devereaux asked.
“What are you, fucking crazy? Get a refill! Put the fucking glass down and see if you can’t concentrate all your attention over here!”
“I only…”
“Louie? Louie-listen to me. This is not a lesson in interrogation. This is it-the major moment. Don’t you get it? Let’s get back to Holland. When Harry and I take off, you’re lost. I’ll tell you where we went. I know you’re interested.” Walter detailed his trip from Holland to Belgium to Spain and Mexico. Finally, the bus ride to Juarez and across the boarder to El Paso. “I bought a car there and we drove to New Mexico, to the cabin.”
“Nice touch,” said Devereaux.
“Huh?”
“The car. The car. Buying the car. Beautiful.”
“Because you knew everything Abby O’Malley knew, that means you knew I was going back to St. John. She told you that. You knew I was going to meet her there. So, you dispatched Tucker Poesy once more. You told her to find me, get the document and get out. But there was something-something important-you didn’t tell Tucker.”
“What was that?”
“I didn’t have Lacey’s document. Of course I didn’t have it. I wouldn’t have brought it with me from New Mexico. You knew that too and you saw your chance. You had separated me from Harry-separated me from Lacey’s confession-that was the time for your best shot. In the meantime, you thought I’d get rid of an unnecessary part of your changing plan.”
“Really?” said Devereaux trying very hard to sound calm and doing a poor job of it. “And just what was that supposed to be?”
“Tucker Poesy.”
“Ah, The Bambino.”
“The what?” asked Walter, totally perplexed. Devereaux only smiled. “You were right about her,” Walter said. “It’s her nature to move on a target. Subtlety is not a weapon in her arsenal. When she struck, you were sure I would kill her. And that’s really what you wanted, at that stage of the game. You needed to be rid of her. She no longer served any purpose, and she knew too much.”
“Well,” Devereaux spoke up. “She did, didn’t she? Wouldn’t you have done likewise? Killed her too? Cleaned up after yourself? No, actually you wouldn’t, would you. You’re a loner, a cosmic loner. You never clean up, because you never get dirty. See, I told you, Walter. I’m not in your league.”
“So, you sent someone to see me, someone very beautiful, very mysterious, someone pretending to be Aminette Messadou. She was good. I don’t know where you found her. One of your actors, I suppose. I hope you didn’t tell her too much, because if you did, I’m sure she’s dead by now. She gave me quite a colorful story, a really good one. And, through her, you establish a straw man and send me chasing him down an empty road. You divert my attention from Harry. Then you send in another actor of yours, a guy who throws around the name Christopher Hopman. Wow, that’s a powerhouse for Isobel Gitlin. Right between the eyes. She has no idea what’s hit her. Okay, I can live with that. I can see where you had plenty of information about Leonard Martin, and about me. But you used Isobel in a real bad way. She gave Harry up. She didn’t even know him. She didn’t know anything.” Walter stopped, took in a deep breath and gazed straight into the eyes of the devil. “You sent someone to kill Harry Levine and take the document. You have the Lacey Confession.”
“Is that a question?”
“No. Not a question. You have it, and it’s right here, inside this house.”
“And you’re going to do what? Torture me until I tell you where it is? Are you going to slit my throat? No, I forgot, you only do that to teenagers with one leg. Go ahead, Walter. Have your way with me. Cut me, beat me, do anything.” He laughed. Whatever Devereaux was thinking, Walter knew a desperate, frightened laugh when he heard one.
“I’m not going to touch you, Louie. I may kill you, but I won’t touch you. I don’t torture people. I don’t need you to tell me where the document is. I’ll find it. Have you forgotten? I’m The Locator.”
“What do you want then?” Devereaux said it, asked it, but hated himself for it. Cheesy, melodramatic asshole! he thought. “You don’t have the whole story. No, you sure don’t. You’re missing the most important piece of the game, Mr. Sherman.”
“No, I’m not,” said Walter. “I’m not.” He took in another deep breath, the sort of inhale a man takes at a moment of terrible sadness. “I know about her. It must have been for her. Why else would you do this? The Czar’s gold? What do you need with the Czar’s gold?”
“You’re smarter than I thought,” Louis Devereaux said, then immediately caught himself in an error. “No, no. No, that’s not what I thought. I always knew no one was ever smarter than you. The Locator. But I thought you’d lost something by now. Not much. Just a little. Middle age. Retirement. But you haven’t, have you? Sonofabitch.” Devereaux was smiling again, this time with real delight. “I underestimated you and I didn’t even know I was doing it. My mistake. I apologize.”
“You haven’t told me why-why her? Why do all this?”
“You already know why, Walter. You simply haven’t put it together yet. You don’t need me to tell you. It’s the gold. It’s always been the gold. From the time I first told her abo ut Lacey and his father-in-law and the Czar’s gold, that’s all she talked about. She became obsessed with those people-the Georgians. I got some Russian cigarettes for her, just as a hoot, you know. She asked for more. She started smoking them. She wanted the gold. It’s all been about the gold.”
“There is no gold,” said Walter.
“Oh?”
“None.”
“None?”
“You won’t find the answer in Lacey’s confession. Because there is no answer, no hiding place. No tons of gold coins.”
“You…” Devereaux’s laughter brought him to a coughing fit. “I’m sorry,” he said, recovering. He wiped his nose and rubbed his eyes, a genuine smile still sitting wide across his face. “You bought Roy Rogers’ act. Imagine that. I’m just a stocks-and-bonds boy! And you bought that. You? Holy shit!” Then he laughed again. “There’s more gold than you ever dreamed of. It was for her. It was all for her, you
… idiot.”
Walter rose from his seat, crossed the room to where Louis Devereaux sat and placed his. 9mm pistol on the small table next to Devereaux. “You killed Harry. You’re responsible. You’ve got a choice to make, Louie. You can pick this gun up-there is a single round in the chamber-otherwise unloaded. Just one shot. You can take that one bullet and go out of here with at least a touch of dignity. Or I can shoot you. Your decision.” Devereaux looked at the pistol, then up at Walter, and again at the gun. “I know what you’re thinking,” said Walter. “I’d think it myself. But I need to tell you that if you pick up that gun and so much as point it in my direction, Tucker Poesy will put two in the back of your head, probably in the little soft spot just below the skull, and probably get both in the same hole. She’s that good.”
“You use this one all the time?” mocked Devereaux. “Tucker Poesy’s behind me? That’s a good one.” He didn’t exactly laugh out loud, but he smiled and the devil’s grin filled the room with a smell like acid on metal.
“Hi, Louie,” she said.
Louis Devereaux picked up the gun. He knew it was an untraceable weapon that would stay behind. For the first time he noticed that Walter Sherman was wearing gloves, thin white cotton gloves. Only Devereaux’s fingerprints would be on the handle. He didn’t look at Walter again. In fact, Walter saw him close his eyes. He put the gun up to his head, against his temple, by his right ear, and pulled the trigger.
The house belonged to Linda Morales. It was far enough outside Ponce to be called a retreat. That’s how she referred to it-my retreat, she would say. Few knew about it and fewer still knew where it was. There was nothing spectacular about the house itself. It was nice, but not unusual. Pushed into the side of a hill, nearly at the top-very much like Walter’s place on St. John-her view was a thing to behold. The whole of the Caribbean Sea lay at her footsteps. Walter Sherman had made his life’s work finding things others could not. Finding Conchita Crystal’s Puerto Rican retreat was no challenge for The Locator. He had resources everywhere. He used one to keep an eye on the place, to let him know when she arrived. Hours later, he was there. Unlike his own house, where the driveway snaked around and down the hill, this one had a drive straight up to the house. He parked his car at the bottom, off the road, behind some bushes, and walked. He rang the bell and waited.
“Walter,” she said, as if she was expecting him for cocktails and dinner. “Come in. You look wonderful. Have you done something… to yourself? You look great.”
“A little surgery,” he said.
“No. You’re not the kind.”
“Coronary bypass.”
“Oh,” her hand covered her open mouth, but he could see she was careful not to touch those delicious lips of hers. No smudges.
“It’ll do wonders for you. You should try one.”
“When? What happened?”
“It doesn’t matter,” he said. “I came to pay my respects, offer my condolences.”
“Oh, really,” now he saw the chest heave and the muscles around that marvelous mouth tighten. “What for? Who’s died?”
“Louis Devereaux. I’m sure you’ve heard by now. They say he killed himself. Shot himself with the only bullet in a Glock nine millimeter. They found the gun in his hand. Did you know, if you shoot yourself in the head, you die so quickly your fingers cannot release the weapon. That’s true.” Chita said nothing. She stood there, like she was waiting for her director’s instructions. Stage right-stage left-kick and move-smile, smile! “That was a nice Glock. I bought it, on the street in Washington, a few hours before he killed himself with it. You still can’t say anything, can you?”
“I… I…”
“I know all about it, Chita. I know about you and Devereaux. His phone records. Your cell phone. The two of you go back a long ways. How? How did that happen? You and Devereaux?”
Conchita smiled. It was that warm, wonderful smile she was so famous for, the one Walter had seen and taken some measure of pleasure in before. “He called me. Just like he called you. You couldn’t just call me, not Chita Crystal. Not in those days. I had people who had people. But that’s exactly what Louis did. ‘Hi,’ he said. ‘I’m Louis Devereaux. I’m a big fan. Let’s have dinner.’ That’s how. I needed help. He was there.”
“It never occurred to me,” said Walter. “The two of you. I see it now, but I don’t know why Harry. Harry was-what to you? Why him?”
“I don’t work as much as I used to,” she said. “Didn’t I tell you that? You should have listened.”
“The money? The Czar’s gold coins? The money was for you?”
“Of course. Look at me. This is my little bungalow, my most modest accommodations. Conchita Crystal is a business-no, she’s an industry. And, unfortunately, she ain’t what she used to be.” She saw Walter looking at her. She never doubted her appearance. She lived on it. Still did. That’s not what she was losing. It was the income. Simple and to the point. Conchita Crystal did not make as much money as she used to. Her lifestyle had not adjusted to her new economic conditions. Her motives were so simple. She needed the money.
“Devereaux had money,” he said, astonished that she should worry about her future in such a way-that she would kill for it-that she would kill family. “You had nothing to worry about.”
She laughed. “You don’t know a thing about real money, do you Walter? Louis told me about Lacey, years ago. He told me about Kennedy and he told me about the gold.”
“Still… I…,” he stammered.
“You cannot imagine what it costs to be me,” she said.
“So, it really was pure, dumb luck,” Walter said.
“You know about me and Louis. We were made for each other, truly we were. I love him. He loves me in a way he can’t love anything or anyone else. You’ll never know how good that feels.” Conchita Crystal was crying again. This time Walter didn’t give a flying fuck.
“He knew Lacey’s instructions were to open his will four days after he died,” Chita said. “It never mattered what day it was-when the old man died. The fourth day was a Saturday, but it could have been any day. Louis could have made it happen anytime. But we got lucky, with Harry.”
“But that was the American Embassy. What did that have to do with Lacey’s will?”
“Don’t you see? Come on, you’re the fucking Locator! And you still don’t see it.”
“See what?”
“Louis knew-all along. He not only knew Frederick Lacey was behind the assassination of President Kennedy. He knew about Lacey’s confession. His dear friend, Abby O’Malley, kept him up to speed on everything she did. You know, Walter, Louis had a way of finding things even you couldn’t match. What do you find? You find people. He found knowledge. He found out things no one else could. And he was always right. Always.”
“You’re kidding, aren’t you? That’s such crap.”
“No, no, my dear man. Louis knew things nobody else knew, and now never will. The assassination was just one, one among many. He knew about Lacey’s private journal and he guessed Lacey’s confession was in it. He was right, wasn’t he? See what I mean? You won’t see another like him. He figured that when the will was opened the confession would be there. And in it, the location of the gold. Everybody looking for it assumed the lawyer had it, probably in a safe somewhere. Louis went with his gut. The lawyer would see the document, he told me, discover that his old friend had murdered John Kennedy, and offer the whole thing, on a silver platter, to the Americans to do with as they wished.”
“How long have you…?”
“How long? Years. Years,” she laughed at him. “Fifteen years ago,” she said. “He told me about Lacey at least fifteen years ago.”
“And you?”
“Me? You were right. The pureist, dumbest of luck. I had this nephew, a kid I’d only met a few times, whose mother was my sister, but I never met her at all. Harry Levine. He worked at the London Embassy. He wanted to stay there. Louis made sure he did. Louis said it was a piece of cake. He could have arranged for anyone he wanted to be the senior official on duty, on any day. Louis could do things others couldn’t dream of. When the old man died on a Tuesday, Harry was a natural. Open the will Saturday-have Harry be the senior official on premises. Bingo! The lawyer gives him Lacey’s confession. An act of incredible coincidence.”
“And you’re only interested in the gold. You don’t give a shit about Kennedy.”
“Oh, no, Walter. You underestimate Louis Devereaux. He was a very loyal man. He would do anything for me. Abby O’Malley too. She was a great friend to him. Of course, he was going to destroy the confession. Once he got the location of the gold, that is. Once I had-once we had the gold, he would give Abby what she wanted-the entire document, up in smoke. I’m sure you didn’t find it, did you?” Again, she laughed. “No se puede.”
“Lo halle,” said Walter. “No problema. Facil.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“There’s a bar in his living room-a small wet bar-do you know it?” Walter asked. “I’m sure you do. Underneath, where the plumbing for the sink is, on the right-hand side, high up, anchored against the sink itself, is a button. Press it and you open the false front, the cabinet facing on the bar that appears to be solid. It isn’t. When it opens, it reveals a small safe, a sort of mini-vault. You don’t even need a key or a combination to get in. He never thought anyone could or would find it. Just open the front. Press the button. Took me less than thirty minutes to find it. That’s where it was.”
“You’re lying.”
“Roosevelt shit in his pants at Yalta. Did you know that? No, of course you didn’t. How could you. How could anyone. The smell made Churchill sick, but apparently, Stalin didn’t even notice it.”
“What?”
“It’s in the Lacey journal, his confession. There’s a lot more in it besides the Kennedy killings. But there’s no gold, Chita.”
“You have it!” she said. “Where is the gold?”
“Sir Anthony Wells?” said Walter ignoring her question. “The American Ambassador? What about them?”
“Overzealous associates.”
“Overzealous associates!” cried Walter. “That’s it? Just like that.” Conchita Crystal shrugged her shoulders.
“So, then you decided to hire me. Harry was hiding and wouldn’t even tell you where he was.”
“Not me, Walter. I never heard of you. Louis. Louis told me not to worry. He knew someone who could find Harry no matter where he had gone. Louis sent me to you. He said you weren’t working anymore, you had retired. But he was sure you would work for me.” The gleam in her eye, the smile on her lips, said it all-“Facil? You don’t know what easy is.”
Walter rubbed the back of his neck, shook his head and breathed slowly, deeply through his nose. He felt himself getting lightheaded. “I know,” he said. “You set me up real good. I found Harry for you and as soon as I did, you had someone on me. That we got away-me and Harry-was just a mistake. It didn’t matter, though. You figured out where I would hide him. ‘Someplace no one else could find him,’ isn’t that what you said? But you knew how to find that too. Devereaux found Harry through Isobel Gitlin. But it was you who went to New Mexico. It was you who killed him. It was you who took the document.”
“I had nothing to do with that,” she said. “And Louis never told me there would be any killing, not in London, not in New Mexico. Whoever he sent overdid it. There was no reason to kill Harry. It hurt me. I’m sorry. I’m deeply sorry-for Sadie Fagan too-but I can’t turn back the clock. I can’t make it unhappen.”
“You have anything to drink?” said Walter. “Something cold.”
“Sure. I’m sure I have some Coke.”
“Diet?”
“Walter, what other kind?” She patted her flat belly, inviting and secure within those skin-hugging jeans and a green silk blouse that also fit like it had been made just for her. She saw the look in his eyes. She smiled at him. One of those smiles again. A smile that never quit, equal parts magic and desire. Probably enough right there to melt the Czar’s gold, Walter thought. They walked into the kitchen. Walter was surprised to find it much smaller than he would have guessed.
“Why did you kill Harry?” he asked, as she poured the drink into a glass filled with crushed ice.
“I didn’t kill Harry. I told you. Things got out of hand. I don’t know how. I wasn’t there.”
“Sure you were, Chita. You were there. You were the only one there. You’re the one who shot him. You killed Harry.”
“Come on, Walter,” she said, throwing off his accusation as lightly as she might discard a sweater on a warm day. “What do you think I did? Go busting into his cabin, guns blazing, firing away? Shoot him down-grab Lacey’s papers and drive off? Is that how it happened?”
“No, that’s not how it happened.”
“Then what makes you think I had anything to do with it? How could I have been there?” Walter took the glass she offered, took a long sip and put it down on the kitchen counter.
“I knew it anyway,” Walter said. “But if there was any question, any doubt at all, you just told me you were there.” Chita looked at him, half a grin, half a rebuke written on her beautiful face. “Cabin?” Walter continued. “You said cabin. How would you know it was a cabin? And, Lacey’s papers. You called them papers. Not a journal, not a notebook, not a diary, not even a document-papers. How would you know that, if you hadn’t pushed them all together in a stack, packaged them and took them, leaving Harry dead on the floor.” Conchita Crystal had nothing to say. She’d run out of script. “And you weren’t even careful. The Russian cigarettes-‘papiroses,’ they call them. Just like the one you smoked the day you came to St. John, the one you lit up so dramatically at the bar. You probably have a pack in your purse right now-a couple of cartons in the pantry. Hard to find. Can’t get them at your neighborhood supermarket. Devereaux got them for you. You threw the butt on the floor and stepped on it, but the holder, the cardboard part, didn’t get squashed. If a man steps on one of those things, the whole thing gets flattened. A woman, however, a woman with high heels-she uses only the front of her shoe. You didn’t get the whole thing. You only stepped on the front of the butt.”
“My, what an imagination you have, Walter. You even know how I step on a cigarette.”
“The same way you did in Billy’s. The same exotic cigarette. The same crushed butt. What made you think you could mislead me?”
Chita Crystal said nothing.
“You know what made me sure it was you? You know how I knew it was you, how I knew from the minute I found Harry’s body? Do you?” Still she was silent. “Answer me, goddamnit!”
“No,” she said. “I don’t.”
“Harry was shot so close there were powder burns on his shirt and an indentation larger than the bullet itself. An indentation the size of the barrel. You hugged him. You brought him close to you, up tight. And you reached up, pushed a little single-shot pistol, no bigger than a cigarette lighter, against his heart and pulled the trigger.” Walter had to catch his breath now. He took another, longer, bigger swallow of his drink. Conchita Crystal, she did that which was most natural to her, that which she had been doing since she was fifteen.
“I know you want this,” she said, unbuttoning her blouse, leaving it tucked into her jeans, riding on her hips, low beneath her waist. With the slick ease of a poisonous snake, her hands slid the open blouse around behind her, showing him her breasts, the silky smooth curve of her belly, and as the open blouse fell from her shoulders, as she pulled each arm through the sleeves, she was bare from the waist up. “It’s all yours, Walter. Touch it. Go on, touch it. It’s all yours-today, tomorrow, forever. You and me.” She could see what she was doing to him. How many men have reacted the same way? How many over thirty years? Who could resist? Facil. She kept her eyes on his, smiled the smile that always got her what she wanted, and with a twist of her fingers, unsnapped the top of her jeans and began slowly pulling its zipper open. She no longer had to say it-not in English-not in Spanish. Walter Sherman had what she wanted and she had what he wanted. “Walter,” she said, walking up to him, right up to him, taking one hand and putting it on his neck, running it across his shoulders, up into his long hair, pulling him closer with the other arm, that hand touching his hips and moving over them, around behind, into the small of his back. “Walter.” She squeezed against him and he held her tight, his own hand moving down her back as she pushed hard against him. She knew when things were going her way. She felt it. To Walter, she felt so warm, smelled so wonderful. She never stopped looking him in the eye, and then she drew his lips to hers and kissed him. Her tongue fired into his mouth. Her eyes shut. His didn’t. But he held her close, as close as he could.
“Did Devereaux ever tell you,” he whispered, “about Leonard Martin? Did he ever mention the name?”
“No,” she answered.
“He should have.”
Walter shot Conchita Crystal in the heart. The tiny pistol he pushed against her smooth warm brown breast had only a single shot. The force of the small caliber shell was not enough to even produce an exit wound. If she knew what happened at all, it could only have been for a fraction of a second. He let go and she slumped to the floor, dead.