Final Payment pc-14

by Steven F Havill

  Estelle turned to one of the chairs, pulled it forward, and sat down beside Hector Ocate. “It’s hard to believe anything you say, señor.” She emphasized the salutation, and its obvious contrast with joven, the generic greeting for a teenager.

  “You landed, got out of the plane, and popped those three. Is that what happened?” Torrez asked. “There ain’t no goddamned fifth passenger.”

  “That is not what happened,” Hector said, a trace of panic creeping into his voice. Despite the circumstances, it was still hard to look at the young man’s round face, his expressive brown eyes, and think him a killer.

  “What did?” As he asked the question, Eddie Mitchell leafed through the remainder of the wallet’s contents, finally tossing the scant documents back on the table.

  “I landed the plane as you say,” Hector pleaded. “That is all. Manolo ordered everyone out, and he followed.”

  “You had to get out of the airplane as well,” Estelle said. “There’s no passenger side door on the right side of the cockpit. For Manolo to exit the plane, you had to get out first-to get out of his way.”

  “Yes. That is so. Then I climbed back in.”

  “And waited.”

  “And waited, yes.”

  “You knew what he was going to do?”

  “Yes.” The single word was nearly inaudible.

  “You saw what happened, then?”

  “No, I did not,” Hector said quickly. “I was inside the airplane. What happened was…was behind me. I could not see.”

  “But you knew,” Estelle said, and Hector nodded.

  “Who are these folks?” Mitchell asked. He held up a photograph that had been framed in one of the wallet’s plastic inner pockets. The photo had been folded, a crease running through the picture between the boy in the middle and the man on his right. “This is you in the middle.” He held out the photo to Hector.

  “Yes,” the boy said. He took a deep breath.

  “The others?”

  “That is my father, just so.” He touched the photo, indicating the man standing to his right, isolated by the crease where the photo had been folded. “Rudolfo Villanueva. But he is not my father. He is padrastro. I do not remember the word in English.”

  “Stepfather,” Estelle prompted.

  “Yes, I think so.”

  “And this?” Mitchell tapped the photo. The third figure, a heavy-set man with black curly hair, stood with one arm draped around Hector’s shoulders. The man, perhaps fifty years old, wore only a pair of bright yellow shorts-and a lot of muscle. His left foot rested on a cooler, and his calf muscle looked like a football. Estelle examined the photo. The family resemblance was striking.

  Once again, Hector hesitated. “He is…a friend of my father.”

  “His name?”

  “I…I do not know.”

  “Shit, you don’t remember,” Mitchell snapped. “You two are standing there like old buddies.”

  “Really. He is just a man we met that day. We were fishing, and when we posed on the boat, my mother, she took the photo.”

  Estelle fingered the crease.

  “He’s a lyin’ little shit,” Torrez said affably.

  “He is just a friend. Mira,” he added. “My father knows nothing of this. Please…”

  “You’re lying, Hector,” Estelle said abruptly.

  “No,” he said.

  She held up the photo again so Hector could see it. “This is the man who flew north with you, isn’t it?”

  “I…I…he was just there that day. We were fishing,” he said lamely.

  “He’s the one, isn’t he?” When Hector refused to answer, she grimaced with impatience and turned to Eddie Mitchell. “We need to bring the Uriostes in. Both of them. I don’t believe that all this went down without them knowing something. While you’re doing that, I’ll see if I can reach el capitán Naranjo. He may have contacts that will be useful. We’re going to need to talk with this alleged padrastro.” She picked up the photo. “And we have this. This other face.” She leaned close, examining the photo. The man wore a heavy watch, perhaps a Rolex. All three men were relaxed in the photo, not a moment among strangers.

  “I…” Hector said, and put his head in his hands.

  “I’ll do it,” Sheriff Torrez said. “You want ’em both? Mom and Pop?”

  “Yes.”

  “No, please,” Hector said from behind his hands. “They know nothing of this. And…”

  “And what?”

  “Please…”

  Estelle nodded at Torrez. “Go ahead. Give me a minute with him.” When the door had closed, she leaned closer to Hector. “So tell me, señor. You waited for this Manolo to finish his business?” When the boy looked up at her, confused, she added, “You waited in the airplane, and after a little while, Manolo returned to the airplane? You got out so he could climb back inside?”

  “He entered through the big door. The cargo door in the back.”

  Estelle pictured the tight confines of Jerry Turner’s Cessna. “There’s no easy way from there to the front seats,” she said, and looked at the photo again. “And he’s a big man, Hector.”

  “No, no. He remained in the back.”

  “And the two of you flew where?”

  “Here,” Hector said. “We flew to the airport. I parked in front of the hangar, and got out to open the doors. When I returned to the airplane, he was gone.”

  “Sure thing,” Mitchell scoffed.

  “He was gone,” Hector insisted. “I do not know where.”

  “You just locked up and went home?”

  “Yes.”

  “What time was it by then?”

  “Perhaps two or three in the morning.”

  “Your host family-the Uriostes-they knew nothing of any of this?”

  “Nothing.”

  “What time did you leave the house that night?” Estelle asked, as if “that night” was a time in the distant past and not just days before.

  “Eight in the evening,” Hector said promptly. “Maybe a little earlier. The Señor Bergin had a meeting. I know that. The…I don’t know what it is called, but the businessmen of the town all meet.”

  “The Chamber of Commerce?” Estelle prompted.

  “Yes. That is it.”

  Tuesday evening’s dinner meeting of the Chamber had been an important one, by all accounts-and well-publicized. “How did you know that?”

  “He told me,” Hector said.

  “Ah.” Estelle looked across at the others. “Jim Bergin told you?”

  “Yes.”

  “You’ve talked to him?”

  “Yes. Several times. He came to school once, and I have visited the airport.”

  Estelle turned to Mitchell. “See if you can reach Jim, will you?”

  “You got it,” Mitchell said, but he paused before turning to the door. “What did you tell the Uriostes when you left the house?” he asked Hector.

  The boy ducked his head, as if loath to reveal the subterfuge. “I go to study with one of my friends,” he said. “He lives just a short distance.”

  “But instead, you went next door and took the old man’s truck,” Estelle said. “You park in the rest stop along the highway, just east of the airport.” She relaxed back in the chair, regarding Hector Ocate. His story included some grains of truth, no doubt. Her flight with Jim Bergin, over rough country at night, had surprised her. What to the uninitiated might seem suicidal or at best foolhardy was hardly that; they had managed the flight with comfort and ease.

  “What time did you return home?”

  “It was nearly four in the morning,” Hector said.

  “Your host family doesn’t mind that you’re gone all night?”

  “They are sure that I’m with the Grahams.”

  “Your study partner.”

  “Yes.”

  Captain Mitchell reappeared at the door, cell phone in hand. “Jim’s on his way in.” He beckoned to Estelle, who joined him outside the conference ro
om.

  “What do you think?” he asked.

  “Bizarre, is what I think,” Estelle said.

  “He’s a real piece of work,” Mitchell said. “Woulda been nice to run an NAA on his hands. But it’s been too long now.”

  “I don’t think he fired the gun, Eddie.”

  “I don’t either, but it was a thought. At the same time, I’m not sure I buy all this Manolo shit, either. But it’s a fact-we’ve got somebody who is as cold-blooded as they come. Like some shootin’ gallery. Pop, pop, pop. And in the dark, even with a laser sight, it ain’t easy. It ain’t something that a kid does. And that’s what bothers me. Here’s a kid who’s a hot-dog pilot. All right, I can buy that. Motorcycle, four-wheeler, airplane, it doesn’t make any difference. Kids are immortal and know it.”

  “The flying is one thing,” Estelle said.

  “That’s where I’m going,” Mitchell agreed. “He knows what went down out there in the desert, and he still flies back, calm as shit, makes a perfect landing, puts the plane away, remembers to fuel it…Shit.” He shook his head. “Don’t jibe. That’s cold.”

  “The money troubles me,” Estelle said. “Three money belts, and maybe five thousand in each. That’s petty cash, Eddie. You don’t run those kinds of risks for fifteen thousand dollars. Not in this day and age.”

  “Well, now, I don’t know. We have people walking across the desert every day and every night without a peso between ’em.”

  “This is different. Someone from El Salvador makes complicated, risky arrangements to flee north, carrying enough money for the trip without being weighted down? I have to wonder…Where’s the rest?”

  “Transferred to some bank stateside,” Mitchell said. “Or a million other places. Caymans, Switzerland, wherever money is going these days.” He nodded as the possibilities opened. “Odds are good it isn’t their money,” he said. “That’s an obvious motive.” He frowned. “But why not just pop ’em in Mexico, when he caught up with ’em? What’s the point of takin’ the risk?”

  “That’s the part that doesn’t make sense to me,” Estelle said.

  Mitchell grinned. “Just that part, eh? That puts you way out ahead of me.” He looked across the small lobby toward the clock. “We’re going to keep after this little shit until he gives us some answers,” he said. “The Uriostes will be here in a minute. They have some explaining to do. Are you going to talk with Naranjo?”

  “Yes. If the Judiciales can help in some way, he’ll be the best contact that we have. If this is all out of El Salvador or some such, there’s not much they can do.” She held up the picture of the boy and his two guardians. “Maybe this will help as well. I’ll e-mail it to Naranjo’s office right now so he can have a look. That and the name of the boy’s stepfather might ring a bell with someone.” She shook her head slowly. “Hector makes things up as easily as breathing.” She tapped the photo. “Who knows. This guy in the bathing suit might be an innocent shrimp fisherman, just minding his own business.”

  “Maybe.”

  “But I’ll bet a lot that he isn’t. He looks more like Hector than his stepfather does.”

  “If there is a Manolo who needs a return flight, he might be coming back this way. Be nice to be at the plane to meet him.”

  Chapter Twenty

  Estelle Reyes-Guzman’s pulse clicked up several notches at what she heard. Jim Bergin was contrite that he hadn’t remembered his conversations with Hector Ocate from days earlier. Perhaps in the dim light of dawn, in the excitement of the moment as he watched the speeding patrol car chasing the airplane, and then later standing well back from the scene as the boy was placed under arrest, he simply hadn’t recognized Hector.

  Estelle ushered him into the privacy of her office, and she could smell the sweet tang of aviation fuel and motor oil on his clothes. “His name is Hector Ocate, Jim.”

  “Yep. When Eddie got me on the phone, he told me. I feel kind of stupid.”

  “Apparently he knew that you had a Chamber of Commerce meeting this past Tuesday night,” she said.

  Bergin grunted in disgust, and it was obvious by the expression on his weather-beaten face that it was directed at himself. “You know, out there, I thought he looked kind of familiar. But you know how that came up?” he said. “That chamber thing? He was out at the airport one day last week, wondering if it was staying light enough now for him to take flyin’ lessons in the evening. One thing led to another, and I guess I told him that Tuesdays and Wednesdays were out. Got Chamber on the one, bowling the other. He said maybe weekends, then. Or maybe he’d wait until summer, when school was out.”

  “It could have been just talk,” Estelle said.

  “Obviously was,” Bergin replied. “I’ve been thinkin’ on it all the way in here from the airport. I know how he come to pick Jerry Turner’s plane. He was there last week, all right. But a few times before that. I know that he hung around in early March, when I was puttin’ a new ADF in Turner’s plane. I had taxied her down there to the main hangar, and I remember that one day, Hector spent most of the afternoon there. Helped me clean up some.”

  “You’re sure it was March?”

  “Yep. I can look in the repair logs to get the exact date. But early March sometime. Just a kid hangin’ out, as far as I was concerned,” he said. “I didn’t pay him too much mind, anyways.”

  “Did he talk about his father’s business? The charter flying service?”

  “Nope. He wondered with all this Homeland Security stuff if he was going to have a hard time taking flying lessons in this country. I remember that.”

  “He didn’t tell you that he already had a license issued in Mexico?”

  “Nope. I didn’t know that. He really does?”

  “He really does.”

  “Then the little bastard was just scopin’ me out. That’s the way it seems to me.”

  “So it seems,” Estelle said. “It would be helpful if you could figure out when he first came out to the airport.”

  “I’d just be guessing. This year, though. Sometime after Christmas. The first time he talked to me, that is. He coulda snuck in anytime, far as that goes. But that don’t mean he was planning to take an airplane back then. What’s he say?”

  “He doesn’t yet. But we’ll get there.” She moved to her office door and opened it. “If you think of anything else, give me a buzz.”

  “You bet.” He rose, hat crumpled in his hand like a little kid leaving the principal’s office.

  “Thanks for coming down, Jim.”

  “I’ll get the locks changed today,” he said, and grinned a brown smile. “Horse is long gone from the barn, but what the hell.”

  She could hear voices out in the hall, and stepped out after Bergin. She saw Bob Torrez escorting Gordon Urioste, with Tom Mears following, one hand on Pam Urioste’s elbow. Deputy Jackie Taber followed, looking as if she needed a long nap.

  “Take a few minutes with Gordon, all right?” Torrez said to Estelle. “Jackie will give you a hand. Me and Sarge will talk with Pam for a minute.”

  Mears steered Pam Urioste toward the sheriff’s impossibly uncomfortable office.

  “We can all…” Gordon started to say, but the sheriff cut him off.

  “No, we can’t all,” he said ungraciously. “In there, please.”

  Estelle held her office door open. “This shouldn’t take long, Mr. Urioste,” she said. As Jackie passed, she added, “Have you been up on the mountain yet?”

  “No, ma’am,” the deputy said. She glanced at her watch. “The first riders were off at a little after nine. They’ll all be on the course in about an hour.”

  “That’ll keep everyone occupied,” Estelle said. “Give us some peace and quiet.” She indicated a chair, and Gordon Urioste sat down, hands clasped nervously over his gut as he leaned forward in the chair. Two doors down the hall, his wife would be sitting on a steel folding chair in the sheriff’s office, comforted by the blank walls, government-gray office furnishings, and the
unsmiling sheriff. Across the hall in the spacious conference room, Hector Ocate would not know that his host family was in the building. It would be interesting, Estelle thought, to see how the three stories puzzled together.

  Her phone rang before she could close the door, and Gordon Urioste nodded as she excused herself. “We’re in Grand Central Station at the moment,” she said.

  Out in the hall, she walked toward the rear exit of the building, out of earshot of any other room.

  “Guzman.”

  “Ah, I am so glad I reached you, señora,” Captain Tomás Naranjo said. “Is this a good moment? It is terribly early.”

  “It’s a fine moment,” Estelle replied. “It’s good to hear from you.”

  “We have a name,” Captain Tomás Naranjo’s quiet voice said. Estelle had not been expecting to hear from the Judiciales so quickly, and she was stunned into silence. “A colleague of mine in Acapulco knows Rudolfo Villanueva-and his stepson, for that matter. Señor Villanueva is in, how do we say, the transportation business. People who need to travel discreetly from here to there-all entirely legal, I should think.”

  Or with the right people’s palms greased, Estelle thought. “A charter business, then.”

  “Exactly. Nothing like what I’m hearing from you, however. That would be a new thing. But his relationship with the boy-Hector, is it? His relationship with this boy is obscure. It appears that stepfather is courtesy. He and the boy’s mother are not married, you see.”

  “Really.”

  “But that aside, until now, at least, Señor Villanueva has been careful that his business is entirely legitimate and documented. But I must say, the friend standing beside the boy in the photograph…that would be a different matter. That was most interesting to receive that. I took the liberty of forwarding it to my colleagues, and they are most intrigued. His name is Manolo Tapia-and his relationship to the boy’s mother is somewhat in question. Perhaps he is a brother…”

  “That would make him Hector’s uncle, then.”

  “Yes. It appears that Señor Tapia goes by several names, you see, depending on the circumstances. But we have reason to believe that is his name at the moment.”

  “And his significance?”