Deep Dive

by Chris Knopf

  “That’d be inconvenient.”

  “That’s all I can tell you. This is your hunch, not mine.”

  I thanked her and got another Guinness. When the barmaid came back around, I asked if the pub delivered food in the neighborhood.

  “Aye, for the discerning. Our shepherd’s pie in particular. Where you from, if you don’t mind me askin’?”

  “Southampton, New York. It’s on Long Island.”

  “Never been to New York. It’s on my list. Have a cousin there who works in banking. My mum tells me you need a gun if you go out at night. I tell her, don’t be ridiculous.”

  “Don’t need a gun,” I said, “but a credit card is essential. It’s actually the weapon of choice.”

  “Can’t be more expensive than this place. I don’t know how people afford to live here, though I live here, so there it is. You want another Guinness?”

  “I do,” I said. “And the bill, and a takeaway of your famous shepherd’s pie.”

  She brought it to me in a Styrofoam clamshell stuffed in a plastic bag. It smelled great and I was tempted to order another one on a plate, despite stuffing myself at the hotel’s buffet.

  “I have to graduate before thinkin’ of international travel,” she said, handing me the bag.

  “What are you studying?”

  “Psychiatric pharmacology,” she said.

  “There’s a route to campus popularity.”

  “Never heard that one before. You Yanks certainly are the clever ones.”

  I walked the shepherd’s pie over to Ruth’s place, which was a brick Georgian row house behind a wall, also brick. The gate had a call box and a security cam. I pulled my Oxford University baseball cap down over my face and pushed the button.

  “Who the fuck,” came out of the call box. A deep, grainy male voice.

  “Shepherd’s pie for the madam, sir,” I said, trying to sound like an Australian mate I used to have at the company, a guy I liked imitating, usually at the end of a long night in an evil bar most would consider an ill-advised choice, especially when inebriated, which we certainly were.

  After a few moments, he came back on.

  “Nobody orderin’ shepherd’s pie here. You got the wrong house. So fuck off.”

  “So that’s how it is,” I said. “Maybe if you come out here and fuck me proper, you wanker.”

  The mechanics of the exchange weren’t that easy, since we had to push a button to speak, then wait for the reply, and the fidelity wasn’t first rate, but the essence of the content was communicated.

  It’s easy to see at this historical remove that Muhammad Ali was the greatest psychological fighter in history. The fine boxers who went up against him, people like George Foreman and Joe Frazier, his match physically, fell for it every time. What Ali understood intuitively is a scientific fact. That anger makes you stupid. It transfers mental function from your higher-level prefrontal cortex to the bottom of the brain, the amygdala, which only knows rage, fear, hunger, and the nice smell of the cute hominid sitting next to you.

  The bloke on the intercom came out of the gate in the prehistoric way I expected—arms back, chest, head, and center of gravity thrust forward. All I had to do was grab him from the side by his shirtfront, stick out my foot, and propel his momentum into the street, where he landed face-first.

  He was pretty big, so not that quick to get back on his feet, giving me plenty of time to kick him in the head, the kind of kick that would impress a striker for Manchester United.

  I dragged his inert body up against the wall and went through the gate.

  The front door was at the top of a steep flight of masonry stairs. The door was closed but unlocked. I went through.

  “Trevor!” called out a female voice. I presumed Ruth’s. “What on earth are you going on about?”

  I followed the sound to a sitting room down the front hall. Ruth Bellingham was settled on a Victorian love seat wearing a silk robe, her feet up on a low stool, a digital tablet in her lap. I took off my Oxford University ball cap when she looked up at me, more confused than startled.

  “Where is Trevor?” she asked, in a level voice.

  “Taking a nap outside.”

  I took a few steps into the room and relieved her of the tablet and turned it off.

  “You might think I don’t remember you, but I do,” she said.

  “Good. Saves on introductions.”

  “I had my suspicions. That idiot Osterman.”

  “Not his fault. He was just trying to build an addition to the hacienda,” I said.

  “Then you can explain to me this horrid behavior,” she said.

  “More horrid than selling impoverished kids into sexual slavery?”

  She settled her hands in her lap, composed, back straight. I wondered for the first time if she might have a little revolver in the pocket of that silk gown. I found the balls of my feet and got ready to jump, one way or the other.

  “Well, that’s preposterous,” she said.

  “You scumbags really focused on the Puerto Rico campus, especially after Maria, with all the upheaval and distressed families. Even better, the kids are US citizens and easy to bring to the mainland. Which also means there’re no jurisidictional issues. And we have your files. It’s all there. In your handwriting, your DNA all over it. A first-year federal prosecutor with an inferiority complex could nail the case with one hand tied behind her back.”

  She wasn’t about to concede the point, though she didn’t put up an argument.

  “If you’re so sure, why the inappropriate visit?”

  “I want to know who in New York was involved. Art Reynolds, Milton Flowers, Elton Darby.” I paused for a breath. “Burton Lewis.”

  I could see her weighing the implications, doing the math.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” she said. “And even if I did, why would I share any information with you?”

  “The file is safe with me. For now.”

  She seemed to relax a bit.

  “Ah. An exchange? Is that what it is?”

  “Yeah,” I said, in the way only a tired, shopworn Yank could say. “I don’t care about you. I just want those bastards.”

  Her eyes drifted from my face to a corner of the room. I followed the gaze and saw a laptop sitting on an antique writing desk. She caught herself and flew her eyes back into mine, but it was too late. It was only a few steps for me over to the desk, where I snapped the laptop closed and stuck it under my arm with the tablet. Bellingham was on her feet, holding both fists in the air.

  “Too late,” I said. “Deal’s off.”

  “Do not dare,” she yelled.

  I put my hand over her face, stuck my heel behind hers, and pushed hard enough to drop her back on her ass. She rolled over on her side and put her hands to her ears, as if willing the sound of her destruction from reaching her mind.

  “You miserable spick,” she said into the carpet.

  “Miserable Canuck. Get your pejoratives straight.”

  Her whimpers were more in anger than pity. I wanted to kick her like I did her meatball bodyguard, but that would bring me too close to her level. Instead, I knelt down and said, softly, “I’m coming after you. I’m after those guys in the States as well, but you’re the source of the evil. I don’t know why you did it. I don’t care. You hurt a lot of innocent people, but you also tried to hurt the people I love. Fear and anger make you stupid. Rage makes you crazy.”

  And then I stood up, shook out my shoulders, and walked out of there. Trevor was back on his feet, reeling a bit, and wobbled up to me on the path to the house. I had the devices under my left arm, so I had my right available to give him a parting shot to the face. He fell backward, eyes open, but blank to the world. It was more than I should have delivered, maybe less than he deserved, though I still felt a little bad when my head cleared.

  But not all that bad.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  When I got off the plane, I called Jackie an
d gave her a brief update on my fun in London. She told me to go straight from the airport to the Pequot, bringing everything with me. The journey was brief enough to avoid jet lag, but I was still jangled by the time differences, so I had to concentrate on driving. The sun was up, the day approaching midafternoon, the traffic in my favor.

  My next call was to Amanda.

  “How can I miss you if you keep coming home?” she asked.

  “Sorry. Just couldn’t take all that jolly British cheer.”

  I asked if she could meet me at the Pequot, where I’d likely arrive just after quitting time.

  “Easily. They don’t care if I show up covered in sawdust.”

  “Everything okay?”

  “Joe Sullivan added a new member to my crew. First construction manager I’ve had with a pistol stuck in the back of his blue jeans. He never lets me out of his sight. Doesn’t talk a lot, but is very polite. I thought you’d like to know that.”

  She thought right.

  “Bring him along to the Pequot,” I said.

  “Unavoidable, I’m afraid. Door-to-door service.”

  “Call ahead and they’ll have the catch-of-the-day waiting.”

  “With or without chips?”

  I made one stop on the way to the East End—at a computer services company in Islip, where I invested an hour copying all the corrrespondence off Bellingham’s hard drive. So I got to the Pequot a little later than planned, and Amanda’s red pickup was already in the parking lot. Next to Jackie’s Volvo station wagon. No apparent threats, though I still felt uneasy leaving the Jeep, wearing my backpack, and heading into the restaurant. I tried to calm my nerves, but all the travel and altercations were catching up to me.

  They were at my regular booth, Jackie and Amanda and a sturdy young guy with short-cropped black hair and an aura of vigilance. I introduced myself.

  “Joel MacGregor. Nice to meet you, sir,” he said, standing and gripping my hand in a way that would allow him to toss me over his shoulder if he wanted to.

  Amanda stood as well so she could give me an enthusiastic bear hug.

  “Joel’s ex-military,” she said. “He calls me ma’am. I’ve grown accustomed.”

  He waited for us to sit before sitting down himself, his eyes scanning the Pequot’s dusky interior.

  “He calls me miss,” said Jackie. MacGregor looked concerned. “Don’t stop,” she said to him, grabbing his meaty bicep with both hands. “I like it.”

  After going through all the ordering and delivery rituals, including a brief visit by Dorothy Hodges, Jackie got down to business.

  “Where is it?” she asked.

  “In my backpack,” I said. “I got through customs free and clear, so I’m guessing she didn’t report the theft.”

  “I have her files from La Selva in here,” she said, holding up a tote bag. “I want to give everything to Hodges to hide somewhere. But you need to ask. He’s your friend.”

  I said that wouldn’t be a problem. But I asked her why.

  “Things are getting a little too hairy, and I don’t know enough to know if the sanctity of my office is sanctified enough to stop the FBI from paying a visit with a search warrant. We don’t know enough, period. It’s way too risky.”

  When Dorothy came back over, I asked if her father was around. She said he was in the kitchen bossing around the cooks, who were ignoring him, though it would be good to get him the hell out of there. We were happy to oblige.

  He had his chef’s apron on when he came over to the table. I asked him how things were cooking.

  “Kids today think they were born knowing everything,” he said.

  “When did you learn?” I asked.

  “When I was about five. Maybe four and a half.”

  We introduced him to MacGregor and listened to them describe their respective military units and experience in the field. Hodges made points by serving in a Swift Boat in Vietnam, though he wouldn’t let MacGregor call his time in Kandahar Province any less worthy. The rest of us just sat there and honored the two of them with a series of toasts.

  When they seemed spent of reminiscence, I brought up the business at hand.

  “So, Paul, if we gave you some stuff to hide, do you think you could hide it where it would be completely safe and guaranteed retrievable?”

  He thought about it.

  “Safe from who?” he asked.

  “Anyone. Including the FBI,” said Jackie.

  “Ah. That kind of safe.”

  He thought some more, then nodded.

  “I could. Any chance I’d have to lie to the FBI?”

  “Remote, but not zero,” said Jackie.

  He nodded again.

  “Of course, they’d have to find me first. Not easy when a man is hunting up in New Hampshire, is what I’m thinking. Been planning to do that for a while.”

  “Dorothy is going to miss you terribly,” said Amanda.

  He grinned at that. “I can almost hear the cryin’ and wailin’.”

  We were able to stuff Bellingham’s laptop, her tablet, my own tablet, and the hard drive from my PC in my backpack and slide it over to him under the table.

  He grunted when pulling the heavy bag into his lap.

  “Must be weighty information,” he said.

  “The weightiest,” said Jackie.

  ON THE way out the door, I slipped Jackie the copy of Ruth Bellingham’s correspondence that the computer people had stuck on a flash drive.

  “Insurance policy,” I said. “Plus you can give it a look over at your leisure.”

  “You think I’m leisuring?”

  “I think it’ll give us everything we need. Just keep it somewhere safe. Like your bra. Plenty of room in there.”

  She did just that when I handed her the hard drive. The significance not lost on either one of us.

  “It’s just till I get home,” she said.

  ONE OF my least favorite things to see in my driveway is a big white van with US government license plates. There were two guys sitting in the front seat, who got out when I pulled the Jeep in behind.

  About the same age and size as Joel MacGregor wearing nearly matching grey suits, just loose enough to conceal their weapons. I kept my own hands in clear view.

  “Sam Acquillo?” one of them asked.

  “That’s me. What’s up?”

  “I’m Special Agent Carson, this is Special Agent Darrow. We’re from the Federal Bureau of Investigation. We need to search your house.”

  I got up close enough to look at their IDs, as if I’d know if they were legit or not.

  “Not without my lawyer,” I said.

  Carson held up a piece of paper.

  “You can call her if you want, but we’re searching your home.”

  “How do you know she’s a she?”

  “You can let us in, or we can use kinetic methods.”

  “And get those nice suits all sweaty?”

  They looked inside the Jeep and saw my duffel bag, telling me I might as well bring it along since the warrant covered any of my vehicles. I did as asked and had them follow me to the cottage and through the side door. They snapped on surgical gloves.

  “Want to tell me what you’re looking for?” I asked, tossing the duffel on the kitchen table. “I might be able to just get it for you.”

  Darrow went right to my laptop, flipped it over, and used a tiny screwdriver to remove the cover from the hard drive.

  “Want to tell me where it is?” he asked.

  “Damn things keep disappearing on me,” I said. “Put that cover back on, if you would. Easy to lose track of those little screws.”

  Carson went through all the duffel’s contents and nooks and crannies, then took a photo of it with his smartphone. So I took photos of them with mine.

  “Fair’s fair,” I said.

  I called Jackie, who’d made a futile attempt to get to bed early, so I had the pleasure of waking her up again.

  “Shit, shit,” was about all she s
aid before hanging up.

  Before they got started, I told them about my registered automatic in a drawer next to my bed. I let them retrieve it, assuring them it was the only weapon in the house, unless they counted the three-quarter-sized Harmon Killebrew baseball bat I used to hit golf balls for my dog.

  While I waited for Jackie, I sat on the screened-in porch and read some Spinoza, in case I had a chance to discuss the wily Sephardic philosopher with Mikolaj Galecki.

  Carson and Darrow were only partway through the bedroom search when she showed up. They stood there while she studied their IDs and the search warrant, grilling them on probable cause and specified items they could seize, which included paper files and any computing devices, though not my phone.

  “Don’t let it disappear,” said Carson. “We’ll be back for that.”

  “You still haven’t provided adequate probable cause,” said Jackie. “Conspiracy to withhold evidence from a federal investigation? That’s it?”

  “Take it up with the judge,” said Darrow.

  She assured them she would, and before they had a chance to ask, told them I wouldn’t say another word.

  “Your choice. Won’t make things any easier,” said Carson.

  “For you, maybe.”

  Jackie looked ready to watch them go through a long and tedious process, so I went back to Spinoza. She eventually relented, though only after they stipulated my design drawings were not files and to leave them the hell alone.

  She sat on the daybed and said, “No talking.”

  I tossed her a copy of my favorite Immanuel Kant, but she opted to just sit and stew. It was after two in the morning when they finally wrapped up and Jackie had a chance to look over the haul, which mostly amounted to a pair of Bankers Boxes full of files I hadn’t gotten around to tossing out, and my hard-drive-free laptop.

  It wasn’t until they left and we felt completely secure that I said, “Good call on stowing all that stuff with Hodges.”

  “They’re only getting started. It’s going to get nasty.”

  “What are we going to do?”

  “Take a ride to New York. After we get some sleep and my brain has a chance to regain full function.”

  “What about mine?”

  “That’s up to you.”