Martin Billings Caribbean Crime Thrillers

by Ed Teja

  I called for the bill.

  She smiled at me. “Say, you don’t really need to take off right now do you?”

  “Well…”

  “I know the way I've talked about Clyde probably has sounded cavalier, but it really has unsettled me. I won't pretend I'm sad, but I am upset."

  "You hide it well."

  She grinned. "I really would prefer not to be alone right now...at a time like this. If you'd take me to dinner, I promise to be light and carefree. I can be good company."

  And here I had thought she didn't even like me. "You want to have dinner with me?"

  "You are here with me. Why not stay and play?” Like a chameleon, Evelyn shifted smoothly into serious flirtation mode, shedding her previous personae. Under the table, her hand landed on my knee.

  I'm sure she wanted to make her intentions clearly understood and I obviously came across as rather a dunce, although apparently not an unattractive one. She needed to make certain, in case I hadn’t figured it out, that she didn't give a rat's ass about dinner.

  “It's a nice night for dinner and dancing and whatever that leads to. I’ve got a car and I know some great restaurants up in the hills, overlooking the bay. There are some nice guesthouses too. It would be really peaceful up there. We could forget about all this shit for a few days.”

  “I have to meet the Guardia tomorrow,” I lied. “Finding the boat, being on the scene, made me officially a suspicious character. The Comandante wants to see me in his office in Cumaná early in the morning. Seeing as he has my passport, I need to show up. So, unfortunately, I better make an early night of it. Maybe some other time.”

  She looked displeased with me, but perhaps not quite as disappointed as my ego would have liked. As I left her with her drink, I noticed her eyes scanning the room.

  # # #

  One thing I hadn't known about Clyde Walker, something no one had bothered to mention to me, was that he had horrible teeth. I don't mean ugly teeth, like Simon's, but really bad teeth.

  Apparently, his bad teeth bothered him enough that he had taken action. Whether it was out of tooth pain or vanity, the man made a lot of trips to his dentist.

  Fortunately, Consuela made his appointments for him, arranged his transportation and even paid the bills. Because Consuela watched television, she knew that a person could be identified by their dental work.

  When the Guardia had called her, moaning over the difficulty of identifying incredibly well-charred hunks of people, she had taken the initiative of contacting the dentist.

  She had him send Walker's dental records to the coroner in Cumaná where that noble professional ultimately confirmed that one of the two piles of burned people found on the boat was probably all that remained of Clyde Walker.

  If nothing else, whoever it was had been wearing his bridge and that was enough for him.

  The other pile would sadly never find recognition beyond whatever the Venezuelan equivalent of Jane Doe is.

  When the Guardia called with the news about confirming his identity, I called James.

  "Are they positive?" he asked.

  "No James, they aren't. We are in Venezuela. We can't be positive that the dentist didn't screw up and send the wrong records. We can't be positive that the coroner was sober or looked at the records he was sent. He could have decided that since we were looking for Walker, it was easier just to say that was who it was. Everyone is made happy. We don't even know that the coroner was in his office recently or if he looked at the body. All we know positively is that the authorities have decided that, eventually, we are going to have a death certificate, official and everything, with Clyde Walker's name on it. For our own purposes, we have strong, but circumstantial, evidence that the remains are actually his. That is about the most I can do for you, unless you want me to get his remains and ship them to you for your own evaluation."

  James was not amused. "Do you think it was him?"

  "I do. It was his boat. His girl. His suspicious circumstances. If he staged his own death, he had to have killed someone else to leave in his place. I don't figure him for a killer or even clever enough to stage this. I go back to the idea that if he was going to do anything drastic, he would have settled up with you first. So, my money says it was him. What I am not sure of is who killed him and why."

  "Do those things matter to you?"

  The question surprised me. I knew James would never be flip about something like that, so I thought about it carefully before answering.

  "Yes, I think so. I don't like loose ends, especially with dead bodies lying around and money missing. I don't want someone thinking I have their money."

  "Oh yes. That was the story you heard from the Brit, Simon Riche, right?"

  "Yes indeed."

  "Is there any other evidence that Clyde had this money?"

  That question seemed even odder. "Why would he make something like that up?"

  "I don't know. It just seemed to me that the only reason we think Clyde might have had any money in the boat is that Simon said so. We have no independent evidence. You are letting him influence your view of what happened to Clyde. Even if you think the circumstances are weird, there is a lot of bandido activity in that area... more all the time. These days they aren't just stealing dinghies. They've stepped up to more rape and murder. The locals might be getting bolder or just stranger, but it seems with the absence of consistent law enforcement they've gotten drunk with their ability to get away with things."

  "James..."

  "Are you going to tell me you know that isn't the case, that it couldn't be bandidos?"

  I couldn't, of course. "It just seems unlikely."

  "Bill asked me to dig up information on him."

  "Him?"

  "Simon Riche. The font of all information about the missing money."

  Our conversation seemed to be skipping about.

  "And did you?"

  "Of course."

  "And do you intend to share that information with me?"

  "Sure. It seems that the part about being a spy was true. He was formerly employed by Her Majesty's government, in fact. After a few years of moderately adequate service, Her Majesty's representatives discovered he was profiting from some commercial sideline activities."

  "He worked for two sides?"

  "I don't think so. The record shows that he was unceremoniously retired, without a pension. So it probably wasn't a matter of compromising national security. It was more likely that he was simply engaging in sleazy businesses on his own time that the government found unsuitable."

  "In other words, he worked more or less what he seems to do now," I said, just thinking out loud.

  "Something of that nature. So, maybe this money is part of some scam he cooked up."

  "Maybe so. This should be a chance to find out. If it is really the money from some crook, Walker's death might make things difficult for him. The pressure will be on him to determine if the money burned up with the boat or if someone made off with it."

  "Which means determining if it was on the boat in the first place," James said. "Remember that even if he is telling the truth, he only assumed that part. Walker could have hidden it somewhere."

  "You are right," I agreed. "And now his employer will expect him to find out for sure where it went, even if it went up in smoke. So, Simon will be taking a close look at all interested parties. It makes me glad I didn't get here until after Walker set sail."

  "Interested parties like the woman you saw taking pictures?"

  "If she is the same one that the guard at the marina saw getting on the boat, then she will be a likely suspect."

  "She must've known about the money," James said.

  "Why?"

  "Why else would she kill Walker? It's very confusing. Is there something else I don't know about Walker that made him a target? Could his wife be in danger?"

  James was getting frustrated, and understandably so. "I don't
really know," I said. "I've spent my time finding the boat and trying to wrap up this business. What we've learned from Simon and the circumstances surrounding Walker's death just complicate things. All I can say is that I have no idea why anyone would kill Clyde Walker, unless it was an irate husband, and that scenario doesn't really fit the circumstances. It would also make the disappearing money a coincidence, and they are much like unicorns in their rarity."

  James was silent for a time. "We might never know the answer."

  "That's possible," I agreed.

  "I'll contact the insurance company. Tell Consuela to see how quickly she can get her hands on the death certificate and fax me a copy. Then tell Evelyn Walker that her husband is dead. There will be an insurance payment to settle her claims on the business and all she has to do to get it is to sign the damn paper."

  "I'll do that."

  "Once you've gotten her signature, we can start to wrap things up there. When we close the office and you are gone, we can forget about the other complications. They don't have anything to do with us."

  "I hope we can," I said.

  "I am thinking about how I can help Consuela find another job before we actually shut things down there."

  "Why?" I asked. "You have enough on your plate without worrying about a big girl like her."

  "I feel guilty," he said. "Walker promised her that she'd be helping us build a thriving business and now it is going away.”

  I hung up feeling down. This wasn't the ending I'd envisioned for my investigation. In my vision, I found out what happened, but it didn't look like we'd even have an ending. I still thought the money existed.

  I saw no reason Simon would make that up unless he had some other reason to keep an eye on Walker and didn't want to say what it was. If the money existed, then it had to play a role in Clyde Walker's death. My gut went strongly against the bandido idea and my curiosity was running a bit wild.

  # # #

  Ugly Bill had no truck at all with the idea that an irate husband had hired a killer.

  "Walker mostly went after local girls, country girls, who were easily impressed by him. He wanted girls that would believe he would take them to Europe or America with him. The girls were runaways or girls that came to the city for work. If they have husbands or boyfriends, they are safely back home, and anyway they don't have the kind of money it would take to hire a gringa hitwoman."

  "How do you know all this about Walker's girlfriends?"

  He smiled. "Consuela pays attention to the world around her. She isn't a gossip but she enjoys dropping hints. If a person is patient, the story comes out."

  "Well, I wish you weren't so quick to demolish my theories. I don't have many."

  "It isn't my fault they have no staying power."

  "Do you have any theories?"

  Bill scowled. Although he is quick to comment on human behavior, whether to celebrate it or belittle it, he isn't fond of speculating.

  "If I think about the people Walker was involved with, it boils down to a few options. If this mystery woman killed him, then she was the same one seen getting on the boat. That was definitely planned so it probably was a hit. The question then is who hired her and why? The only candidates we know of are your pal Simon, Walker's wife, this mob boss, if he really exists, and our friend Jimmy."

  "James? Why would he have Walker killed?"

  Bill cocked his head. "Walker's death means the key man insurance pays for the buyout that Jimmy was going to have to spend cash on. That is a serious motive, even if we know that Jimmy doesn't do that kind of thing. We heroic types have to be ruthless in our analysis."

  "Go on."

  "If someone had Walker holding money for them and Simon Riche knew about it, that makes him a suspect."

  "Explain."

  "With the boat burning, the fate of the missing cash is unclear. So if Riche knew he took it on the boat, he hires an assassin to kill Walker and take the money and then burn the boat to cover his tracks. Their tracks."

  "And the wife?"

  "That'd be your standard knocking off the cheating husband and collect his insurance game, with the unexpected added bonus of the buyout money."

  "And your pick?"

  "You won't like it."

  "I never do."

  "My pick is your drinking buddy, Simon Riche. Seems to me he'd be the most likely to have a clue of how to find an assassin. The wife doesn't even speak the local language."

  "The woman we think did the killing is a gringa," I pointed out. "She probably speaks English."

  "But the wife would have to make contact somehow. That would be local. She can't go through expat circles without someone figuring out what she's up to, and she doesn't seem to be connected anywhere. She kept to herself for the most part."

  "What if it wasn't the mystery woman?"

  Bill thought for a time. "If we have any other suspects for that role, I haven't heard about them. We know Walker walked to the marina at least somewhat alive. He had two people on the boat with him when he left, and one of those is dead. That makes the one who didn't die the killer, unless it was bandidos, in which case, where the hell is the third person."

  A thought struck me. "What if the local girl was working with the bandidos?" She incapacitates the other two, then leaves with the bandidos."

  "You don’t think the bandido theory makes sense," Bill said. "Besides that is pretty elaborate planning for a robbery. Hardly worth the return on investment."

  It was an option.

  "If your pal Simon is plugged in like he says he is, he should be able to find the mystery lady for you," Bill said. "If he can't, maybe it's because he doesn't want her found."

  That was something I could pursue, at least.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Buyout arrangements are smart

  The clever thing about businesspeople is the way they figure things out in advance. In this case, James and his old pal Walker had insurance policies on each other in case one of them croaked.

  It was a special policy, designed for the purpose of keeping the business alive with a partner dead. The death benefit went to the family of the deceased, effectively buying them out of the business.

  And the terms of the contract James had signed with Walker made the specifics clear. Once the bereaved widow, Evelyn, accepted the money, she had no other claim on the business.

  This, James assured me, was the standard way of doing things. It was good business practice. Hell, I know nothing about good business, and I doubt I practice it very often.

  That is probably why I had to borrow money from James in the first place, which is what got me working for James as a detective—outside of my expertise and my chosen profession. I could be a businessperson, and I should be better at it than I am, but I get caught up in being a sailor, and my fancy can shift with the winds and tides. Bill is the same, which is how we keep from killing each other.

  Still, seeing the effectiveness of this bit of planning impressed me. I didn't intend to try it. The image of me waltzing into the insurance company with Ugly Bill and trying to get a policy was good for a laugh.

  Sure, we'd fill out the forms. I could name my little brother as beneficiary, and Bill would probably list some poet's anonymous society or some equally esoteric beneficiary. I'm sure they'd be thrilled to have us pop in and give them money for a policy.

  But a boat, even one operated for commercial purposes, is a different animal than a regular business. For one thing, if it sinks, getting it going again is a nasty and expensive business and not for the faint of heart, as Bill likes to say.

  But planning always serves James well. He knows what he is doing; he understands his risks and takes some with no regrets and hedges others. In this case, the goal had been to keep his life simple when things went sour. He knew that Evelyn had no personal interest in the business of import and export, no experience in it, and no desire to keep a hand on the tiller.

  "Sh
e'll be delighted to learn that her late husband provided a secondary cash bonus," he told me.

  And he was right. Evelyn was delighted at the prospect of being paid a substantial amount for her share of a business that I was pretty sure she considered close to worthless. I would have thought so too.

  "Who would've known?" she asked when she saw the papers. "That ass is treating me better now than he ever did."

  Apparently, the impression that their marriage was strictly one of inconvenience did not require any adjustment.

  "He provided for you." It seemed a politic thing to say at the moment.

  "I'm sure it wasn't his idea," she said. "And he didn't pay the premiums. Still, I get it because of him, so he gets a few merit points. Too bad he wasn't Buddhist."

  "If you sign the paper that waives any claims to the business," I said.

  "That is not a problem," she said, laughing. "For that much money, I'll sign away almost everything."

  "And then?"

  She grinned at me. "I'd always wanted to see Europe. So my obliging husband dragged me to South America."

  "Not everyone is good at geography," I said.

  "Not everyone is the consummate asshole that Clyde was," she said. "He played everyone, not just me. He thought I was jealous of his affairs, but most of the time I felt sorry for the girls he picked up. He ran through them so quickly that they couldn't have gotten much out of it. If you were to tell me that some irate boyfriend or husband was the one that killed him and then torched the boat, I wouldn't be surprised."

  "Would he kill the girl too?"

  She shrugged. "Clearly I don't understand men well, or I wouldn't have gone this long thinking that one day Clyde would wake up and appreciate me."

  "Change his life?"

  Her smile was grim. "Something like that. When things are going down the tubes, somehow it is awfully easy to convince yourself they will turn around. You think that sooner or later someone you loved will see what is wrong and decide to change. All you have to do is be a little patient. I think that is the secret of lotteries. People remember the small wins and forget the steady losses."