A Hard Ticket Home (25 page)

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Authors: David Housewright

Tags: #Fiction, #Mystery & Detective, #Hard-Boiled, #Private Investigators

BOOK: A Hard Ticket Home
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“Oh, I believe it.”
“The Russians, unfortunately, didn’t like the idea,” Harry said. “Working directly with a black street gang? They couldn’t think of anything more absurd. Except possibly losing their lucrative North American market, and that’s what Casselman convinced them would happen if they didn’t take the meeting. So, they agreed. Stalin is practically having an orgasm over it.”
“If he’s so happy, why did he kill Katherine?”
“He didn’t.”
“We thought he did,” said Alec. “We thought Katherine’s cover had
been blown and Stalin had her tortured for what she could tell him. But listening to our wiretaps—Stalin was as shocked about Katherine’s murder as the Entrepreneurs. What’s more, both parties were determined not to allow it to compromise their business arrangements. If they had killed Katherine because she was an informant, would they talk like that?”
“Then Jamie was killed,” I added.
“And the conversations between the Entrepreneurs and the Boyz increased in volume. Does that make sense?”
“If Stalin didn’t kill Katherine and Jamie, who did?”
“We thought it was Bruder,” Harry said. “According to our taps, so did both Stalin and the Entrepreneurs. The way that clown Thompson talked to the media, Bruder was all but convicted.”
“But Bruder didn’t do it.”
“We know that now.”
“Who did?”
“We don’t know,” answered Alec. “And as callous as it might sound, we don’t care. That’s your pal Detective Sergeant Robert J. Dunston’s job.”
“He’s pretty good,” said Harry. “What he lacks in imagination he makes up for in tenacity. He’ll figure it out.”
“I don’t understand,” I admitted. “If Stalin and the Entrepreneurs weren’t concerned that Jamie was informing on them, why did they try to kill me?”
“You were right about Cook. He did some checking after finding your business card. According to our intercepts, he told the Family Boyz that you were ‘some kind of cop.’ That was enough for Stalin. You have to appreciate that after Katherine’s murder, they all became paranoid.”
“Why was Cook killed?”
“You tell us,” said Harry.
“Same reason, I guess. Cook was a weak sister. He fingered me for Stalin but Stalin couldn’t put me down. When I showed up unexpectedly to hassle him, Cook panicked and Stalin became afraid he’d turn.”
“Okay,” Harry told Alec. “You can keep the ten bucks.”
“But why tell me that Bruder was right-handed, that he didn’t kill his wife? Why did you want me to keep pushing?”
“We knew the meeting with the Russians had been scheduled,” Harry admitted. “But we didn’t know when or where. Katherine was killed before she could tell us. Your involvement—your insistence on connecting the Boyz to the murders—kept the parties talking. Each time you survived an assassination attempt the phones would ring off the hook. We hoped that sooner or later one of those conversations would provide us with the intel we needed. And it did.”
“You used me.”
“Your government is grateful for your assistance in this matter.”
“Ahh, stick it.”
“You did a good job,” Alec told me.
“Sure. So what happens now?”
Harry studied the illuminated dial of his watch. “Thirty-five minutes?” he asked a shadow near him.
The shadow replied, “They entered U.S. airspace forty-six minutes ago. ETA thirty-seven minutes.”
“What happens now is that in thirty-seven minutes we are going to scoop up the Entrepreneurs and the Family Boyz and the Russians and approximately two dozen cases of automatic weapons and ammunition left over from the Cold War and put them in our pocket.”
I shut my eyes and shook my head against it all. “Gentlemen, you should have told me, you really should have told me.”
“It was strictly need-to-know,” Alec said. “You didn’t.”
“Maybe so. But if you had told me all this yesterday, I wouldn’t have tried to trap Casselman tonight and he and his pals wouldn’t have taken a woman prisoner. She’s with them now.”
“My God, that’s why you’re here,” Alec realized.
“I changed my mind,” Harry said. “I want my ten bucks back after all.”
“Dammit, McKenzie.”
“I told you he bluffs too much,” Harry reminded his partner.
Alec didn’t disagree. “Fuller?” he called.
“Sir?”
“Deploy your men.”
Quickly, silently, the agents dispersed and disappeared into the night, Alec with them.
I pivoted toward Harry. “I want my gun.”
“Get serious. All we need is for a civilian to shoot up the place.”
“I’m not staying here.”
Harry handed me a windbreaker with FBI in large, white letters both front and back. I wore it over my tuxedo, zipped to my throat.
“We’ll try to look out for your girl,” Harry said. “But we can’t change our plans now. When the plane lands, we go.”
Harry squatted next to me at the edge of the clearing. I couldn’t see his face but I could hear his breathing. It was deep and regular. Mine was shallow and coming fast and I wondered if this was what it had been like in ’Nam, sitting in the jungle, waiting for heavy rain.
The forest was quiet and still. The moon disappeared behind a slow-moving cloud bank and I could see nothing except what was happening below the lamp. I soon convinced myself that Alec’s people had gotten lost, had surrounded the wrong shed and Harry and I were going to jump out of the woods and shout “Don’t move, you’re under arrest” and Stalin would laugh at us. I had participated in several raids in my time, only none like this, none where I couldn’t see my backup.
We waited for what seemed like an eternity after moving into position, yet it was only about ten minutes. Where was the damn plane? Finally, I could hear the soft drone of engines. The noise grew louder but I couldn’t see the aircraft that created it. A moment later two ribbons of
landing lights rolled out from the metal shed like dominos, the ribbons about thirty yards apart and two hundred and fifty yards long. Maybe longer. It was hard to tell from where I squatted next to a fir tree. The plane dropped down from the sky, flying without lights, and followed the ribbons at tree top level ’til it reached the end of the runway, where it banked sharply and once again disappeared into the night. I could still hear it and then I saw it again, coming in low and steady from the opposite direction, its landing gear engaged. The plane was a single-prop job with a huge cargo bay—it looked like a truck with wings. It was silver and maroon—its ID numbers had been masked. Beyond that I can tell you nothing about it. I don’t know planes. The fact they can even get off the ground never ceases to amaze me.
The plane touched down at the far end of the runway without so much as a bounce and rolled toward the shed even as it decreased in speed. When it reached the near end of the runway it stopped and pivoted to face the direction from which it came. The ribbons were extinguished, plunging the runway back into darkness. The lamp that hung from the pole now seemed like a candle compared to the light that had been shining. Harry reached over and took my arm. He squeezed it tight. “Easy, easy,” he whispered, only I don’t think he was talking to me.
The plane engine was feathered. The propeller stopped twirling. A dozen men emerged from the hangar and moved quickly toward the plane. Casselman stood under the lamp. The plane’s portside door opened and a stepladder was extended. Geno Belloti stepped out and waved.
“Now!” Harry barked into a hand-held radio. A half dozen shots rang out in unison and the airplane’s tires exploded. Before the echoes died away, two dozen agents emerged from the woods, brandishing their weapons like they were just itching to squeeze off a few hundred rounds. They soon got the chance. The two black men I had met in Stalin’s apartment, Mr. Mustache and Mr. Non-Mustache, pulled their heavy machine gun from the back of one of the Chevy vans. They
trained it on the attacking agents but before they could squeeze off a single round, they were cut down by a prolonged fusillade from M-16s.
I followed the agents, sprinting hard in a straight line past the dead bodies of the gangsters toward the entrance of the shed. There were a half dozen men in the shed. Most of the men were dressed in tuxedos and holding long-stem champagne glasses. They seemed frozen in shock.
“Where is she?” I screamed at them.
Mellgren was the first to come to his senses—sort of. He threw his glass to the concrete floor and rushed me.
“You sonuvabitch,” he screamed, trying to throw a punch at my face.
I used his momentum against him, blocking his punch with my left forearm, bringing my right arm up under his left armpit, sweeping his legs out from under him and throwing him over my hip on top of the limousine’s hood. I locked my fingers over his windpipe and squeezed.
“Where is she?”
When he didn’t answer I squeezed tighter. Mellgren gasped for air.
“Where is she?”
“Here.”
I angled my head toward the voice that had called out. Merci Cole was sitting in the back of the limousine and looking out of the window. I left Mellgren gasping on the hood and went to her.
“Are you all right?”
“I am now,” she said and smiled. “You want a drink?”
I opened the door and sat next to her. She handed me a square crystal decanter filled with scotch that she had found in the back of the limousine. I gladly took a long pull.
“The FBI and those other guys, were they part of the plan?” she asked.
“Yes, they were.” ’Course, I didn’t explain that it was their plan and not mine.
“How come you didn’t mention ’em before?”
“Must have slipped my mind.”
I took another sip of scotch. As I drank, Harry and Alec and their band of happy warriors led Warren Casselman, Stalin, the airplane pilot, three disgruntled Russians, and Geno Belloti into the hangar. Not a shot had been fired since the two gangsters went down.
“Congratulations,” I said, raising the decanter in salute.
“Your girl okay?” Harry asked.
“Safe and sound.”
If looks could kill, Casselman’s expression would have put me six feet under.
“Is this yours?” I asked, displaying the scotch. I made a production out of taking another sip. “Smooth.”
An excited agent spoke to Harry. “The trucks are on their way. ETA fifteen minutes.”
I turned back to Merci. “Are you sure you’re all right?”
She shook her head. I gathered her up in my arms. She rested her head against my chest. I held her tight.
“I kept thinking of Jamie. I kept thinking …”
“You’re safe now. It’s all over.”
“Is it?”
“You’re safe,” I repeated.
I held Merci for a while longer. I thought she might cry, but she never did. Instead, she asked for more scotch. While she nipped at it, some of the agents busied themselves reading Miranda-Escobedo to the suspects and chaining them together for the drive into Minneapolis. Another group isolated the three Russians.
“Welcome to America, comrades,” Alec told them. “I know you’ll enjoy your stay. We have the best prisons in the world.”
“Look what we found,” an agent said, walking toward Harry. He was carrying a briefcase. He set the briefcase on the hood of the limousine and opened it. It was filled with American currency.
“At least half a million dollars,” he said. “Maybe more.”
“We’ll count it later.”
Harry was smiling brightly. In fact, everyone wearing a windbreaker was smiling, including me. Only the prisoners looked like they were in mourning. It would have made a great picture, except you never have a camera when you need one. Casselman’s mood had already swung from anger to despair. He was standing next to Stalin near the limousine, a single agent training his weapon on them. Stalin glared at the agent and muttered, “Fucking F, fucking B, fucking I …”
Merci took another sip of scotch and handed the decanter back to me. I raised it toward Casselman.
“Why?” I asked him. “You’re a wealthy, respected man. All of you are wealthy, respected men. So, tell me why. Why did you do it?”
“The supply of product had decreased sharply following the collapse of the Soviet bloc, yet the demand had remained consistently high, not only here but throughout other markets in North America that we were able to identify. We determined that a comparatively low-risk investment would reap significant rewards, especially if a streamlined distribution system could deliver the product to our customer base in an efficient, secure manner.”
I chuckled at Casselman’s response. Even now, with his world collapsing around him, Casselman was unable to appreciate the moral or legal implications of what he had done. To him it was simply a business decision.
“Be sure to tell that to the jury,” I told him. “I’m sure it’ll appreciate your logic.” I shook my head. “You’re never gonna see the sun again, you moron.”
“Kiss my ass,” Stalin snarled contemptuously.
“Whatever you say,
Raymond.
”
Oh, he didn’t like that at all.
After securing the others, two FBI agents moved toward Casselman and Stalin, chains in their hands. The rattling of the chains sounded
like small bells and when one of them fell to the floor, everyone glanced down at it. Except Stalin. He grabbed the barrel of the M-16 held by the guard, spun the agent around, and kneed him hard in the groin. The agent released the gun and Stalin started running, weapon in hand. He ran about fifteen yards, whirled, and fired the M-16, the shots pounding high into the ceiling of the hangar. He sprinted for the woods as we picked ourselves off the floor. Several agents fired wildly at him, missed, and began pursuit.
“No, no, stop. Call your people back,” I told Harry. “Keep them out of the woods.”
Harry was confused by my request.
“Trust me. Please.”
Harry recalled his men.
“This had better be good.”
I held up my hand and gazed into the woods in the direction Stalin had escaped.
“Wait for it,” I said.
The agents, the prisoners, Merci—we all silently watched the dark trees, although only I knew what we were watching for. Suddenly a dim light flicked on. “There,” I said, pointing. It was the Jag’s interior light. It came to life when Stalin opened the car door, when he jerked the string that pulled the pinless grenade out of the tomato can, releasing the trigger and igniting the fuse. I started counting, “One football, two football, three football …”
I could see the woman in my mind’s eye, the Rosie Riveter who raced to the factory to do her bit during World War II, the last good war—who bent to the task of cutting fuses, a thankless task as tedious as any assembly line job, as tedious as putting bolt A into nut B ten thousand times a day. She was young and she was pretty and her mind would wander and she would think about what she was going to have for dinner on Meatless Tuesday and if her friend who had a friend who
had a friend would come through with the nylons in time for the Friday night dance at the USO and what she should do about the 4-F down the street who made her feel like a woman, who made her almost forget her fiancé who was fighting in North Africa. And during those brief reveries she would sometimes cut the fuses short.
“Four football, five football …”
I felt no guilt, no remorse when the grenade exploded, lifting the Jag three feet into the air, twisting and dropping it lengthwise across the road. My hands did not shake and my stomach did not churn as I watched the fire slowly burn itself out. This was four, I told myself. Four dead men. Yet the revulsion and nausea and dizziness that had accompanied the others was not present this time. I tried to make it come, repeated silently to myself, “You’re sick to your stomach.” Only I didn’t feel sick. I felt indifferent.
Harry stared at me, not quite sure what to do or say.
Alec stepped between us and sighed.
“Suspect killed while resisting arrest. I hate it when that happens.”

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