The Knowland Retribution

by Richard Greener

  “No, not safe, not the way you mean it. People we know are already dead, for Christ’s sake! We’re in the crosshairs alright, but Leonard Martin has something up his sleeve.”

  “Great. When do we find out?”

  “If Sherman doesn’t find him first, and soon, we’ll find out when he wants us to. In the meantime there’s nothing we can do, Nathan. Nothing.”

  Louise and Wesley went home, kept their blinds closed, and stayed away from the windows. She drank and he paced, talking to himself, cursing. They didn’t hurt for any creature comforts. The very rich can have anything delivered. They were used to having things brought to them. Each passed off the new, higher cost of such luxury to market conditions. Their stocks were tumbling, and in the end they knew the servants would just as soon pick their bones as wish them good morning. For both of them, bitterness and anger grew in direct proportion to personal jeopardy. After a couple of days of this, Tom called to say Nathan wanted them to “take off,” to go somewhere they won’t be found and try to relax.

  Under different conditions Wesley Pitts might have flown off to Cabo San Lucas or Palm Springs. Not now. Instead, he bought a first-class ticket with a private cabin on the Amtrak train that ran from Washington, D.C. to New Orleans. Lawrence made the long drive from Manhattan to Union Station in the nation’s capitol. From there, Wes was on his own. Although his ticket was to the end of the line, he got off the train when it stopped for a few minutes in Meridian, Mississippi. From there he rented a car and drove the hundred miles or so to the tiny town of Hintonville. His grandmother welcomed him with open arms and a warm smile.

  “Are you hungry, honeychild?” she said. “Oh, Wesley, I’m so happy to see you.” She squeezed her grandson, although she barely came up to the middle of his chest. “I love you so, boy.” She was not surprised to see him. Even in the backwaters of the Deep South people read the newspaper, even the New York Times.

  Like Wes, Louise would have preferred La Costa or Vail. Unlike him, she had no grandmother who would take her in, no family who had been proud of her since childhood, eager to protect their loved one. There were many men she slept with, but none of them were of any use to her now. What she did have was an enormous amount of money. She called a real estate agent she found on the Internet in Brattleboro, Vermont. The same day she bought a house nearby, just north of the Massachusetts state line. She was adamant. She wanted privacy, off the beaten path, no neighbors. The agent suggested three properties. Louise chose the second one, a six-year-old cabin with all the amenities, three bedrooms and three and a half baths on two and three-quarters acres at the foot of what passed for a small mountain. The agent offered to fax Louise pictures of the property and directed her to a website where she could take a 360-degree virtual tour of

  the house. “Not necessary,” Louise said. She wired power of attorney and approved a wire transfer from her bank to the realtor’s escrow account in Vermont. “Close on it immediately,” she instructed the agent. “Today, if possible. Tomorrow at the latest.” She packed and began driving. She thought of Nathan’s house in Wevertown and prayed the one she just bought would be as nice. It had to be, she figured. She paid almost six hundred thousand dollars for it.

  Tom Maloney believed the best place to hide was in plain sight. He moved into a suite at the Waldorf, arranged for private security, and settled in for the duration. He was quite happy to get away from his current wife for a while, and she was so pleased with his decision she immediately left for Switzerland, telling friends she’d be gone until the spring.

  Nathan Stein stayed home in the city for two days, then took off for the country, upstate. A day after arriving in Wevertown he was already going stir crazy. He called Maloney.

  “Get a bigger suite,” Nathan said. “Hell, get the whole fucking penthouse.” By dinner he had moved into the Waldorf with Tom.

  St. John

  The phone woke him at six o’clock the next morning. It was noon in Holland and van de Steen had other business to attend to that day.

  “Hoe gaat het, Walter.”

  “Hoe gaat het yourself. What time is it?”

  “It’s nice to see you haven’t lost all your Dutch.”

  “No, I still know how to say ‘hello’ and how to find the toilet.”

  “And the polar bear.” Van de Steen laughed, recalling an old joke between the two men.

  “Waar is de ijsbeer?” said Walter with a smile. “I don’t remember much, but I remember that.”

  “Listen Walter, some of your man’s arsenal is too common, too available to trace to any one individual. You knew that, of course, but not all of it. The Holland & Holland, a fine and excellent piece of equipment—truly a work of art—that one I am sure came from California. How do you say S-a-n J-o-s-e?”

  “San Jose,” said Walter. “How did he get it and where?”

  “I cannot say for sure it was the man you are looking for, but the rifle itself was sold through a dealer, on the Internet, paid for in money orders.”

  “Money orders? I thought that gun sold for more than twenty-five thousand dollars. That’s a helluva way to pay that kind of money.”

  “Yes. Quite normal, actually. And it was twenty-seven thousand, plus a dealer’s fee and shipping.”

  “That’s great, Aat. I think I can find the trail of a money order that size. Is there a name?”

  “Not so quickly, my friend. These dealers never sell to people who use their real name. In your country there are many named Smith or Jones. It will be a name like that. Dealers know the name is untrue. They don’t care. The name—whatever it is—will do you no good. And, you will not be able to track down a money order.”

  “Why not?”

  “Most individual clients pay in this manner, and they do so with a group of money orders, none for more than nine hundred dollars, all of them purchased separately. It’s an inconvenience, but it serves its purpose. Again, the dealers have no interest in the procedure, only the result.”

  “Where did they ship to?”

  “Ah ha, now you are talking—what is it—turkey? Do you know where is Fargo, North Dakota?”

  Walter listened as van de Steen told him how the Holland & Holland double rifle was shipped from an anonymous owner in San Jose, California to a PO Box at a private mail and packaging store in Fargo, North Dakota. The transaction was completed under the auspices of a dealer Walter’s Dutch friend saw no need to name. He wasn’t asked. The owner of the PO Box was listed as Evangelical Missions Inc. Van de Steen said the commercial mail store, following instructions, forwarded the package, knowing nothing about its contents, to a private address in Raleigh, North Carolina.

  “Jackpot!” said Walter.

  “The Israeli gun,” van de Steen said, “I believe it too went to this address. Of that one I cannot be totally certain, but I think it is so. There are many of them—it too is a wonderful piece—and I believe at least one went to this place in North Dakota.”

  “That’s great,” Walter said. “The Holand & Holland is enough. That two of them were sent to the same place makes it a hundred percent.”

  “A word of caution, my friend. It was not on your list, but I can trace a Walther WA2000 to the same destination.”

  “What is that?”

  “That, as you call it, is the finest rifle ever built in the sniper class. It is a NATO 7.62mm semiautomatic regarded by most people who are familiar with things of this nature, such as myself, as the most accurate long-range weapon in the world. And there lies the trick, Walter. The Germans—a people so good at making things like this—built only seventy-two of them. If you asked me to get one for you today—and you would be a rich man, a very rich man to do so—I could not.”

  “You’re serious? You couldn’t find one? How could a rank amateur?”

  “He did not. It was no amateur. A Walther WA2000
is a transaction to be proud of. I think it could be sold for a hundred thousand euros, maybe more. A dealer I know in Hong Kong made just such a sale at the same time as these others, all bought within a few months of each other. I remembered hearing about it. We brag, as you Americans say, even in my profession. I called him last evening. He was bursting with pride still, and told me he arranged for it to be delivered to the same place—North Dakota. Be aware, Walter. With that gun you can kill anyone, anywhere.”

  “No need for the concern. My man doesn’t want to kill me. He doesn’t even know me.”

  “He will kill someone with it. When you do what you do you can never know what can transpire. If he does not know you, make sure it stays that way.”

  “Don’t worry, Aat. But thanks.”

  Aat van de Steen said, “No man spends that much money for such a thing and doesn’t use it. Besides, having played with it, practiced with it, held it in his hands and against his cheek and shoulder, taken it apart, cleaned and reassembled it, I am certain he will be unable to resist shooting it at someone. It must be so.”

  “Thank you, Aat,” said Walter, acutely aware of the intensity in his friend’s voice. It struck him as almost religious—sexual. Every business has its Holy Grail. “As always,” Walter said, “I am in your debt.”

  “Quite the contrary, Walter. It is I who owe you. It is my pleasure to assist. Do not forget. I am planning on it. In the spring, the Yab Yum.”

  St. John

  When the address in Raleigh turned out to be an empty lot, Walter was not surprised. No delivery service—not UPS, not Fed Ex, not anyone—would simply drop a package in an empty lot and drive away. Someone had to be there when it arrived, and Walter was sure it wasn’t Leonard.

  He was certain, as certain as he could be absent real proof, that Isobel’s Kermit was Carter Lawrence. He was convinced, although less certain, that Carter had been present at the empty lot in Raleigh. It must have been he who took delivery as the packages of weapons and ammunition arrived there. What did he do with them? Probably, Walter conjectured, he shipped them on to wherever Leonard was. Most likely Carter loaded the packages into his car and drove south on interstate 85 back to Atlanta. If he had sent them out again it would have been from there, from somewhere in Atlanta. And if the two men had seen each other, Walter was sure it was Leonard who had come to Carter, not the other way around.

  For the last twenty years, at least, no contacts had been more valuable than those that enabled Walter to see credit card records. With friends in the right places, vital information could be gathered instantly. Walter knew the authorities could accomplish the same thing, but it would take them weeks, even months. There would be search warrants, court orders, and, of course, the inevitable screw-ups caused by multiple and overlapping jurisdictions. The cops would have to deal with their own internal politics. Somebody might have the idea to check out credit card records, and somebody else, often times the next guy up the line, would kill the idea, simply because it wasn’t his. Walter’s years in the business also taught him that even when the cops, the FBI, or any of a slew of government agencies got it right—when they knew what to look for and where it was—they still missed it at least as often as they didn’t. Just as he once told Isobel the best way to follow someone can sometimes be to walk in front of them, he knew the best way to look for a clue was to know what you were looking for before searching for it. Easier said than done, but Walter trusted his instincts. For three decades they led him in the right direction.

  Carter Lawrence’s credit card receipts gave Walter the confirmation he expected. Gasoline purchases tracked him from Atlanta to Raleigh and back again, more than once. Walter could even see where Carter stopped for lunch along the way. And, best of all, UPS records showed shipments from Carter Lawrence to a PO Box in Las Vegas, New Mexico—no doubt a private mail and package store just like the one in Fargo. The shipments were in Carter Lawrence’s name, paid for with his Visa card. The recipient was EM Inc.

  After his ex-wife and two sons died, Carter hunkered down in Atlanta. Except for the trips to Raleigh, he went nowhere for more than two years. Some of his gasoline charges in Atlanta were separated by many weeks. He wasn’t even moving around in town. The only vendor that showed up on Carter’s records in any regular fashion was a Kroger supermarket. From the amount of the charges—never more than forty dollars—Carter was obviously eating alone. Then, only a month ago, charges appeared for gas and food in Birmingham, Alabama. “What was he doing there?” Walter wondered. This month there was another out-of-town charge. This time for a Hampton Inn in Clarksville, Tennessee—plus a restaurant bill of $130.46 at the Clarksville Holiday Inn. He wasn’t eating alone that night. Another gasoline charge showed up the following day in Springfield. Walter opened the travel atlas he kept handy on top of the refrigerator and turned to the map of Tennessee. Atlanta to Clarksville was about three hundred miles. He traced out a route, simple and direct, going north on I-75 and picking up I-24 just past Chattanooga, going west right into Clarksville. The round trip was too long to make on a single tank of gas, and the refueling stop fit the trip perfectly. Springfield was just down the road on the way to Nashville. It was clear to Walter that Carter Lawrence had driven from Atlanta to Clarksville, eaten dinner with someone, spent the night at a nearby Hampton Inn, and drove home the next day. Walter had seen his share of Holiday Inns, from Maine to Montana and too many places in between. There was no way anybody could spend $130.46 in any of their restaurants—not alone. Carter had more than one dinner guest—at least two, more probably three, Walter figured. There were no more surprises after Clarksville. Carter wasn’t hiding from anyone. He never thought to cover his tracks by paying cash. By now Walter expected to see the airline charge for Carter’s ticket to New York. Yes indeed, he was Kermit. No hotel for New York. Walter made a mental note to check the addresses for Carter’s brother and sisters. He was sure he’d find one of them living in New York City on the Upper West Side.

  New Mexico

  Walter’s plane didn’t land in New Mexico until late afternoon, and he had also lost two more hours by the clock. The trip had been grueling, but he felt momentum and didn’t want to break it, didn’t want to stop. Up at six, he had taken the ferry to St. Thomas and boarded a flight to Miami. From there he flew to Dallas, changed planes, and he was airborne again on his way to Albuquerque—his first time ever in New Mexico. Santa Fe was another couple of hours by car from Albuquerque. Walter had booked a room at Santa Fe’s most famous hotel, Inn of the Anastasia. At the suggestion of the reservations agent, he got one with a fireplace. “Isn’t Santa Fe in the desert?” Walter had asked her, mistakenly believing he was headed for a warm climate. “Yes it is,” she told him, “but it’s the high desert. It gets real cold here, Mr. Sherman. You’ll see. There’s snow on the ground right now. If you’re coming from the Virgin Islands you need to bring a coat.” She laughed a friendly laugh. Walter had a lopsided idea of what Santa Fe was all about, and he figured she labored under a similar

  misconception of the Virgin Islands, and most likely had never heard of St. John. “She probably thinks we’re all walking around in shorts and T-shirts, with floppy hats and sunglasses,” he thought. Then he realized if she did think that she wouldn’t be too far from right. “Take the fireplace. You won’t be sorry,” she said. After landing, he rented a car and drove first to Sure Shot Shooting Supplies and Accessories at 5400 Holly NE. It took him less than half an hour to purchase a Glock, with bullets and holster, for $576.42.

  The interstate is straight as an arrow, uphill heading north. Walter found it barren and sad. Occasional Indian casinos, their satellite motels and restaurants, were clustered along the sides. He noticed with wry surprise that the sun was setting, suddenly, behind ragged mountains. The Caribbean sun takes forever to disappear out past Puerto Rico. Here it drops like a rolling stone; daylight one minute, dark the next. “Not my cup of tea,�
� Walter thought.

  He didn’t like the landscape, either. It was mostly scruffy sand, much of it overrun by alarmingly hearty, ugly weeds. It wasn’t graceful desert like Arizona, Nevada, or even Aruba. Whatever it was, he’d not seen it before and would not miss it when he left. An hour later he stopped at a roadside restaurant, felt the chill stepping out of the car, and understood how cold it would be when he’d driven another few thousand feet up. The restaurant was not even much of a diner. Walter ordered a grilled cheese sandwich. It came on the thickest bread he’d ever seen.

  He reached Santa Fe at eight, followed directions to the Plaza, and found his hotel. The whole town looked like a theme park. From what he’d heard, it wasn’t. The city restricted construction to adobe old-west designs, but people did live in the houses. The Inn sat smack on the well-lit Plaza, a wide space filled with people moving swiftly

  in the cold. It was, Walter reminded himself, the Christmas season, which probably explained the seven hundred dollars he paid for the room. A bellhop led the way and started the fire. Walter found a Diet Coke in the mini-bar, set it next to the telephone, and fell asleep with the light on.

  In the morning, after an early breakfast, he drove north for about an hour and a half to Las Vegas, New Mexico. The journey to Las Vegas led to a shopping center mail and package store. Walter expected as much. He already knew the address and PO Box number. The packages had been sent to Evangelical Missions Inc. Carter left a trail a mile wide. When Walter first encountered that name, he wondered whether he would again, or whether Leonard would use it just once. Walter was relieved to discover that Leonard was not quite that wise. Why should he be? This was his maiden serial rampage.

  Had he been the kind of guy to offer advice to others in his field—if indeed there were others in his field—Walter would have told them first and foremost: respect the obvious. The easiest thing to discover