The Traffickers

by W. E. B Griffin

  The first person Sergeant Matthew M. Payne saw at the bar as he entered was First Deputy Police Commissioner Dennis V. Coughlin.

  Coughlin had his head back so that he could drain the last drop of his double Bushmills Malt 21. He caught Payne—and The Hat—out of the corner of his eye.

  After lowering his head and putting the glass on the bar, Coughlin turned toward them. He looked a little guilty, as if he’d be caught. But only a little guilty.

  “Waste not, want not,” he then said with a twinkle in his Irish eyes. “Glad you gentlemen made it.”

  “Commissioner Coughlin,” Payne said formally, “I’d like to introduce Sergeant Jim Byrth of the Texas Rangers. Jim, Commissioner Coughlin.”

  “Pleased to meet you, sir,” Byrth said, offering his hand.

  “My pleasure, Jim,” Coughlin replied, meeting his firm grip. “Liz Justice speaks highly of you. That goes a long way in my book.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  Payne waved for the bartender to come over.

  “Uncle Denny,” Payne said, “do you want another double Bushmills 21?”

  Byrth caught the “uncle” and looked to see how the commissioner of police was going to respond.

  “No, thank you, Matty. I don’t need to start slurring in there.”

  Byrth then decided that Payne and Coughlin had to be uncle and nephew.

  “Jim,” Coughlin said, “I’m going to put you on the spot here.”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “I’m speaking tonight about what’s been going on recently, particularly today. I know you’ll find this hard to believe, but today’s murders weren’t our fair city’s first. But it might be a first for them to happen at almost the same time. I plan to go over that and the illegal drugs behind it. I’m hoping you might speak to the crowd about your perspective of it.”

  Byrth nodded once. “Absolutely. It would be my honor.”

  Payne passed out the bourbons to Byrth and Harris, then held up his glass. “To our health—and to our catching that bastard who killed that poor girl. And all the other bastards.”

  The four of them touched glasses and drank to that. Denny Coughlin wound up chewing on an ice cube.

  “What happened at the morgue?” Coughlin then said. “What’d you find out?”

  Payne told him.

  Coughlin shook his head slowly in disgust. Then he checked his watch and said, “These things never start on time. But we need to get the show going. Bring those drinks with you.”

  Then First Deputy Police Commissioner Dennis V. Coughin marched out of the bar and through the doorway.

  When Matt Payne, Jim Byrth, and Tony Harris entered the Grant Room, Commissioner Coughlin was already standing beside the dark wood lectern at the front of the room. He was talking to Captain Frank Hollaran, who stood in front of a flag of the United States of America. The flag was on a wooden staff that was held upright on the floor by a round golden stand.

  All the tables were full except the one at the back of the room. Payne, Byrth, and Harris got to three of its five empty seats just as Hollaran stepped up to the lectern.

  Exactly at the time that they sat down, Hollaran used his left hand to pull the microphone from the lectern.

  He said, “Good evening, all. As most of you know, I’m Captain Frank Hollaran of the Philadelphia Police Department. Thank you for being here tonight. Now, if you’ll please stand and join me, we’ll get the formalities of tonight’s meeting out of the way.”

  The room rose to its feet en masse. Everyone faced the American flag and placed their right hands over their hearts.

  Hollaran, microphone to his lips, then surprised the hell out of Byrth by belting out in a rich baritone voice “The Star-Spangled Banner.”

  Everyone near Byrth, including Matt Payne and Tony Harris, sang along with gusto. But none in harmony. Nor in tune. And all seemed oblivious to that fact.

  As they all sang, “. . . the land of the free and the home of the brave!” Byrth couldn’t help but glance and grin at Payne.

  Matt must be tone-fucking-deaf.

  Everyone took their seats.

  Still, I liked that.

  Byrth looked around at the people. They were as Payne had described in the car, upper-middle-class types who were clearly of comfortable means.

  And it’s good to be among people who actually know all the words to our national anthem.

  And are respectful of it.

  Hand over heart. No talking during its singing. No yelling “play ball!” at its end.

  A real class act.

  Hollaran now said, “If you’ll please join me in welcoming First Deputy Police Commissioner Denny Coughlin. . . .”

  The room filled with polite applause as Hollaran handed the microphone to Coughlin.

  “Hear, hear, Denny!” a dashing gentleman seated at a table closer to the lectern called out as he pounded the tablecloth with an open hand.

  Byrth saw Payne make eye contact with the gentleman. He looked to be about fifty. He wore a crisp seersucker suit and red bow tie. He was enjoying a cigar the size of a small baseball bat. He nodded politely at Payne.

  Payne saw that Byrth was watching and leaned over.

  “D. H. Rendolok,” Payne whispered as he nodded in Rendolok’s direction. “Can usually be found at the bar lost in his thoughts and an enormous cloud of Honduran cigar smoke. His father-in-law was one of our finest police commissioners, under a previous mayor. His wife gave up a lucrative law practice to become one of the most respected judges in Eastern Pennsylvania, if not the entire Eastern Seaboard. D.H. won’t tell you himself, but he volunteers time as a consultant in building structure analysis in a highly classified homeland security project. Good people.”

  Byrth nodded. He then looked at Coughlin.

  The big Irishman smiled warmly. He held up his hand to get them to stop. “Thank you. That’s quite kind of you.”

  The crowd became quiet.

  Coughlin said: “As usual, I must begin by saying that this session is off the record. What’s said here in the Grant Room stays in the Grant Room.” He grinned. “My old pal Ulysses would want it that way.”

  He got the expected chuckles.

  “That said, I want to repeat Frank’s sincere thanks for all of you taking time to be here. It tells me that not only do we have fine citizens who care about our great city, we also have people who care about what their police department is doing.”

  Byrth saw more than a few heads nodding. But he also heard behind him what sounded like a derisive grunt. And some mumbling.

  He turned and saw two men right behind him, at the next table.

  Byrth did not hear exactly what had been said. But the tone and body language—and knowing smirks—clearly suggested that it had been derogatory.

  The two men were murmuring between themselves. They looked to be between thirty-five and forty—and terribly smug. One had what could be described as a three-day growth of beard. It was what in some circles passed for a fashion statement and in certain other circles qualified for insubordination. The other was skinny and frail, appearing almost sickly.

  “Inbred” comes to mind, Byrth thought.

  Or “professorial.”

  Well, at least the bearded one looks like he could be a college teacher.

  One tenured or someone still living on Daddy’s Money—same difference.

  When the bearded one noticed Byrth looking at him, he made a face that was at once condescending and disdainful. Then the bearded one looked at Payne in his undersized loaner blazer and at Harris in his wrinkled well-worn blazer. He made a similar look of condescending disdain.

  He’s clearly decided that we’re all interlopers.

  I’m surprised he hasn’t called for security to have us booted out.

  Byrth turned his attention back to Coughlin. But out of the corner of his eye, he saw that Payne had not missed any of that exchange.

  Byrth looked at Payne, who shook his head just perceptibly in
a gesture of mild disgust.

  “It’s been another challenging day in our fair city,” Coughlin was saying. “You very likely have seen part of it on tonight’s newscasts. We had two deaths at the motel on Frankford that blew up around two o’clock this morning. We believe the explosion was caused by a lab manufacturing illegal drugs. Two other people were injured in the blast and taken to Temple University Hospital’s Burn Unit ICU. Then, later in the morning, there was a shooting at the Reading Terminal Market. It was a multiple murder, including that of innocent bystanders. Our detectives and investigators found evidence that that shooting was also drug-related. Then, just before noon, an assassin disguised as a hospital orderly snuck into the Burn Unit’s ICU and murdered one of the victims from the motel explosion. The assassin—”

  He pulled the microphone away and cleared his throat.

  “Excuse me.”

  Hollaran brought him a glass of water from their table.

  “Thank you, Frank. As I was saying, that assassin was pursued through the streets of Philly on foot by one of our Homicide sergeants. The assassin shot at the sergeant. Just before he unfortunately got away, the sergeant, we believe, wounded him. The shot was made to his leg in an effort to stop him, not cause fatal injury.”

  My ass, Payne thought. I wanted that sonofabitch dead.

  I was aiming for a chest shot, hoping it might turn into a head shot.

  Breathing so hard, it knocked my aim off—that’s why I only winged the sonofabitch!

  Byrth looked at him and smiled conspiratorially.

  Payne thought, He just read my mind!

  He grinned back.

  “Finally,” Coughlin went on, “about the time of that foot chase, the Marine Unit of the Philly PD recovered from the Schuylkill River the body of a young Hispanic woman.”

  One of the few females in the audience gasped audibly.

  “Yes,” Coughlin said softly. “And I’m saddened to say that that story gets worse. Before this poor young woman was put in a black trash bag and weighted and tossed in the river, she had been beheaded.”

  “My God!” the woman now said loudly and forcefully.

  “And within the last hour, we have additional information that gives us reason to believe beyond any doubt that we know who her killer is. We are applying our full resources in apprehending him. As well as the others.”

  There was a wave of appreciative murmuring though the audience.

  Then Byrth heard the bearded one’s voice say in a stage whisper: “These Keystone Kops couldn’t catch a cold barefoot in a December snowstorm.”

  His inbred pal chuckled.

  “And with that information,” Coughlin went on at the front of the Grant Room, “we now have a common thread between all these crimes I’ve mentioned: illicit drugs.”

  Another audible wave went through the audience.

  Coughin nodded. “Now, tonight I’m going to depart from the usual focus on Philly. I’ve given you just now an idea of what problems our city faces today. And I mean today.” He looked to the table in the back of the room with Payne, Harris, and Byrth. He gestured. “I am privileged to introduce some of our finest members of law enforcement who are with us tonight. The first is a guest, Sergeant James Byrth of the Texas Rangers.”

  Byrth half-stood, waved once, then glanced at the two men behind him as he backed down. The audience applauded politely.

  Their body language is saying, “Oh, so you’re cops. That’s how the riffraff gets in the Union League.”

  Coughlin went on: “Just like those Texas Rangers of fame and legend who have proceeded him, Sergeant Byrth is on the trail of the fellow who we now believe killed this girl and, last week, two others in Texas. Beside him is Homicide Detective Anthony Harris”—a somewhat shy Harris half-stood and gestured to the crowd, then sat down—“who this morning was among the first on the scene of the motel explosion. Tony has had a very long day.”

  There was another smattering of polite applause.

  “And finally, Sergeant Matthew Payne, also of our Homicide Unit. Many of you, I’m sure, are familiar with the Payne name, if not with Matthew personally. Sergeant Payne is a legacy member of this fine society, his great-grandfather having been among the founders of the Union League.”

  Payne smiled nicely at the bearded one and his inbred pal. The manner in which he held his glass in his palm, with his right hand’s middle finger and thumb extended, was not lost on them.

  “Sergeant Byrth, would you please come forward?”

  [FOUR]

  140 South Broad Street, Philadelphia Wednesday, September 9, 9:45 P.M.

  “Good evening,” Byrth said as he held the microphone and began addressing the audience. “It’s an honor to be in your city and here at the Union League. I hesitate to use the word ‘pleasure.’ If you had been with Sergeant Payne and Detective Harris and me an hour ago, I know you would understand my reluctance.

  “So I will start with that. I came here hunting an evil man. We do know that he’s a drug trafficker. And that he’s Hispanic, preying mostly on illegal immigrants. He knows they fear the police and other authority due to their being in America illegally. And, among his other heinous acts, he has the horrific habit of cutting off the heads of family members of those who in some way have crossed him.”

  He gestured to the table at the back of the room. “Sergeant Payne, Detective Harris, and I just came from the Medical Examiner’s Office. The autopsy had just been performed on the young Hispanic woman who had been beheaded. As horrible as the description sounds, I am here to tell you that witnessing such horrific abuse of a human being is manifoldly worse. It affects one in ways unimaginable. Even Dr. Mitchell, who in the course of his duties I’m sure has witnessed more than most of us can begin to consider, said he was deeply affected by the young woman’s murder.

  “The animal—” Byrth caught himself. “Excuse me. The suspect who we believe committed this atrocity is up to something else in your city. We have evidence that this particular drug trafficker has also begun bringing to Philly what he started in Dallas. That is to say, the sale of a drug that combines a cold medicine with heroin. Its street name is ‘cheese’—and this guy markets his variety with a snappy blue logo under the catchy brand name ‘Queso Azul,’ or Blue Cheese. It’s particularly heinous because he targets kids as young as middle-school age. Two dollars a hit—and then they’re hooked on heroin.”

  This news triggered more murmurs in the crowd.

  An attractive young woman in a striped pantsuit was seated just to Byrth’s right. She raised her left hand. Byrth could not help but notice the giant gleaming diamond wedding ring. She held a pen and small piece of paper in her right hand.

  “Sergeant, how do you spell that?”

  Byrth spelled Queso Azul, and the young woman thanked him as she wrote it down.

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  Byrth then saw a hand go up at one of the back tables.

  I guess we’re already into the Q & A.

  But Matt did say this was a loosely structured meeting.

  The hand belonged to the friend of the inbred one, the bearded one.

  “Yes, ma’am?” Byrth said. “I mean, sir?”

  The bearded one stood. He had a look that was antagonistic.

  Small wonder.

  We hardly became buddies earlier.

  “Yes, I’m Dr. Stanton Hargrove—”

  “You’re a medical doctor, sir? Pardon the interruption. Everyone here is new to me.”

  “I have a double Ph.D.,” he said with obvious pride. “I chair Marsupialia Studies in the Biology Department at Bryn Mawr.”

  “ ‘Ph.D.’?” Byrth repeated. “Of course. And the order Marsupialia? Aren’t those the pouched mammals. Right? Kangaroos, bandicoots—”

  “Yes, they are,” Hargrove interrupted, clearly pleased someone recognized his chosen field of work.

  “—opossums?” Byrth finished. “We have opossums in Texas.”

  “Yes,” he repl
ied, a bit bewildered. “And opossums.”

  There were muffled chuckles in the crowd.

  This pompous ass wants to be called “doctor.”

  He doesn’t have a clue what it’s like to be a real doctor, one like Mitchell.

  I’m damn sure not going to give him the satisfaction.

  “Thank you, sir, for clarifying that for me,” Byrth said. “And your question?”

  “It is this: As horrible as these acts today were, how do they possibly affect someone, hypothetically speaking, of course, enjoying, oh, shall we call it some recreational marijuana?”

  As he sat back down, Byrth immediately said, “Well, for beginners, it’s an unlawful act—”

  “I’ll take that one,” Denny Coughlin interrupted, his hand extended for the microphone.

  Byrth passed him the microphone, and Coughlin went on: “As Sergeant Byrth was I think about to say, possession or consumption of an illicit drug is illegal in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and will find your hypothetical example duly arrested and quite possibly incarcerated.”

  He paused for a sip of water.

  “But there is a bigger point to your query that I want to make. While I am not able to give further details, I can tell you that the two injured in the explosion at that motel this morning come from two very fine families. Were it not for illegal drugs, those two young people from the Main Line would not have been at the back of some seedy motel at two o’clock in the morning. And they would not have jeopardized what otherwise would have been wonderful, productive futures.”

  He started to hand back the microphone to Byrth, then stopped.

  “I might add one other thing,” Coughlin said, “and Sergeant Byrth here can put it in better perspective than I. There are those who devoutly believe, and I count myself among them, that those who take so-called recreational drugs are funding not only these criminal gangs and their street wars, but also funding terrorism around the world.”

  He then handed the microphone to Byrth.

  Byrth saw that Professor Hargrove—the bearded one now had a name—called from his seat, “You can’t be serious!”

  Coughlin’s Irish face looked to be reddening. But he simply nodded his answer, taking the high road by choosing not to get into a verbal battle.