by Rex Burns
“Nestor was taken back there alive?”
“If it was Nestor.” He added, “There was some talk of an increase in the bonus if the donor was alive.”
“I see … .” And that explained more of the numbers and cryptic entries in the file. “What happened to Nestor, Jerry?”
“I don’t know.”
“How can we find out?”
Another meditative silence. “Let me make some calls; maybe somebody knows somebody on the team. I’ll get back to you.”
But it wasn’t Kagan who got to me next; it was a voice I didn’t recognize right away. “Mr. Kirk? I’m glad I found you in. This is Mark Gilbert of Antibodies Research. I’d appreciate talking with you very soon.”
“About what, Mr. Gilbert?”
He was in no mood for fencing. “I’ve heard you’re making some wild and unfounded accusations about our company. Perhaps I can explain things and set your mind at ease.”
I glanced at my watch. “You’re at your company office?”
“Yes.”
Overhead, the casters rumbled again. “I can be there in half an hour if that’s all right.”
“I look forward to it.”
The industrial area was almost clear of workers’ cars and trucks by the time I drove up through the twilight, and it seemed a bit odd to walk to the front entry as an honored guest. The door was locked, but a night bell offered itself. I pushed the button. A minute or so later, I heard the jingle of keys and a vague tune being whistled. The guard—a young man with cropped blond hair—unlocked the door.
“Yes?”
“I’m Devlin Kirk. Mr. Gilbert’s expecting me.”
“Oh, sure. He’s in the office. This way, please.”
His crepe-soled shoes made a familiar squeak on the waxed tiles as he led me through the entry and into the hall where, the night before, Bunch and I had crouched tensely to let him pass. The outer office was empty; the guard knocked softly at Mr. Gilbert’s closed door and stuck his head in. Then he stepped back and nodded me through before squeaking away.
In the light, Gilbert’s office seemed larger, and the animal heads mounted on the walls receded to a stiffly polite distance. Gilbert, his florid face set in a taut smile, shook my hand and gestured toward the leather chair, which wheezed softly as I sat. “You do a little hunting?” I asked.
He glanced up at the lion’s glass eyes staring down at us. “Looks impressive, doesn’t it? Actually, I bagged him in Texas. Haven’t had time yet to go to Africa for the real thing. But I intend to. And I’ll be ready when I go.”
“They have lions in Texas?”
“A big game ranch.” He wagged a finger at the heavy-maned trophy. “The animals are familiar with humans and have no fear of them. That means they’re more dangerous than the wild animals. I find great pleasure in a challenge like that. Do you hunt?”
“Only information, Mr. Gilbert.”
“ ‘Only information.’ I see. Well, let’s get to the point then, shall we? I’d like to know exactly what it is you think our company’s engaged in, and what—if any—’information’ you have to support your allegations.”
“Obviously, Mrs. Chiquichano’s talked to you. She must have told you what I showed her.”
“Not in any clear detail; she was quite distraught. Apparently you frightened the poor woman.”
The poor woman hadn’t been afraid of me and Bunch together. “I think she—and you—know what happened to Nestor Calamaro.”
Gilbert’s sandy eyebrows lifted. “I have never heard that name, Mr. Kirk.”
“The donor with Rh null blood. The guy with the million-dollar kidney.”
Instead of answering, Gilbert gazed up at the lion, his own pale blue eyes as void of expression as the glass ones that looked back. “I’m not going to waste my breath pointing out the need for organ transplants, Mr. Kirk. Nor the benefits that such transplants bring to hundreds of otherwise crippled human beings every year—”
“Organs that come from willing donors.”
Gilbert rustled in the desk drawer and pulled out a slip of paper, pinning it on the polished wood with his forefinger. It was a receipt for fifteen thousand dollars, and it had not been in his desk last night. “I knew that donor as Mr. Martinez. It’s what he called himself when he made arrangements to donate one of his kidneys. As Mrs. Chiquichano perhaps told you, he was in this country illegally—a fact which I discovered only recently. However, we did make certain arrangements—financial arrangements—that could be construed as violating the law against the purchase of human organs. Mr. Martinez said he was willing to donate a kidney, but we would have to send money to his family in El Salvador.”
“That’s what this receipt is?”
“Yes.” He held it a moment more to let me see the payee line before folding it into his vest pocket. It was made out to Raimundo Calamaro. Then he leaned back against the wide wings of the chair. “It was not a purchase, not directly, but it could cause us embarrassment. That I fully admit. However, Mr. Kirk, that kidney—that very rare kidney—saved the recipient’s life and sent Mr. Martinez back home a relatively wealthy man.”
“He went home?”
“As far as I know.” Gilbert smiled. “The only reason he was working in America was to make enough money to buy a farm. I understand he flew directly home from New York once he recuperated.”
“What about Serafina Frentanes and Felicidad de Silva? Did they fly home too?”
Gilbert’s smile disappeared. “I don’t know who you’re talking about.”
“The two women you paid Mrs. Chiquichano to provide. Two pregnant women whose babies were almost at term.”
“I do not know them, and there is no evidence we ever paid Mrs. Chiquichano a single penny for anything.”
There would be no evidence in the now-purged files, that was certain. And I strongly suspected that the farm Nestor bought wasn’t the one Gilbert told me about. But the story was plausible enough to want checking out.
“The very nature of this kind of endeavor borders on the sensational, Mr. Kirk. That’s one of the many reasons we prefer to keep a low profile. More important, of course, is the possibility that sensationalism might cause suffering to the families and loved ones of the donors.” He cleared his throat. “I’m sure you can understand that. Now, I don’t know who has employed you to investigate this matter”—he paused to let me fill in the blank, but I remained silent—“but you may tell them, very confidentially, that Mr. Martinez willingly donated his kidney. You may even mention the—ah—remuneration. In a sensitive way, of course, one which won’t cause discomfort for your client.”
“Don’t you pay finders’ fees to hospital employees who notify you of suitable corpses?”
“There’s nothing illegal about that!”
“Perhaps not. But it does raise questions about those sensitivities you keep mentioning.”
“And what about sensitivities to those whose lives can be dramatically enhanced by organ transplant? What about sensitivities to the living recipients?”
“And what about profits on this trade? Your profits?”
“All money received in excess of overhead are reinvested in the operations, Kirk! Organ transplantation is an extremely expensive endeavor. Where do you think the funds come from for those ‘finders’ fees’ you sneer at? And—I assure you—the recipients would be willing to pay far more than we ask for the chance to lead normal lives.” He stood and held out a broad hand sprinkled with red hairs. “I suspect I haven’t changed your mind, have I? No? That’s too bad—too bad indeed.” The hand gripped mine with a tightness that wasn’t friendly. “But let me assure you and whoever hired you of one more thing: any slander you bring against us will be answered in court. Too many lives depend on what we do, Kirk, to let somebody destroy us through insinuation and innuendo. I assure you, we will fight back.”
In addition to trying to pump information from me and warning me, Gilbert’s purpose had been to convince me that
Nestor was alive and well and living in El Salvador. He hadn’t. His only evidence was a piece of paper he waved around, and his word—which was equally flimsy. But if there was no evidence that Nestor or the women were alive, there was none they were dead, either. And unless I could come up with something as definite as that, Sergeant Kiefer had little or no ammunition for his probe.
From the office, where I went to wait for Bunch, I telephoned Percy, hoping that the two-hour time difference between Denver and New York meant he would be at home. He wasn’t. The answering machine asked for any message I cared to entrust. Then I tried his office and got another answering machine. So I left the same message: Very important, please call as soon as possible. But it wasn’t until later in the evening that I finally talked to him about what Jerry had told me and what I needed now.
“So you want me to find out if the donor was alive, in fact?”
“If he was alive after the operation. And what happened to him—where he went.”
“There should be a paper trail on something like that—there should, indeed, and old Perce will pierce through to the truth of the matter, never fear.”
“I hate to tell you this, Perce, but time’s important.”
“When isn’t it, lad? The little black mouse, the little white mouse, nibbling nibbling at the thread that holds us suspended over the void. And then one fine day … .” Percy delighted in what he called his front-row seat at the comedie humaine, and if, at times, his constant laughter tended to irritate, that irritation was smoothed by the knowledge that he was genuinely interested in snooping because the more he discovered, the greater the laughter. Consequently, the jobs he did were thorough ones—even the freebies.
“As soon as you can?”
He promised an expeditious effort or double my money back. Which—given what I was paying—was a safe gamble.
It was well after ten before I heard the familiar heavy step on the iron stairs outside the office and Bunch came in.
“Don’t tell me, let me guess,” I said. “She didn’t do anything different.”
He groaned and stretched, his wide hands brushing the ceiling, “I’d rather run twenty miles than sit on surveillance. How in hell can you get so tired just sitting there?”
I knew the feeling. “What she did do was call Gilbert, and he told her to stay cool, that he could handle it.”
“You know something I don’t know,” said Bunch.
I described my visit to Gilbert’s office.
“That receipt wasn’t in his desk last night, Dev.”
“And he held his thumb over the date when he showed it to me. My guess is he sent the money this afternoon when he finished talking to Chiquichano.”
“If he sent it.”
“No, I think he did. He got Nestor’s father’s name and address from Chiquichano and sent it. It indicates Nestor’s willingness to donate a kidney and explains his disappearance—it’s central to Gilbert’s alibi, so he wouldn’t fake sending it. He wants me to know it’s authentic.”
“What about the two women?”
“Swears he never heard of them. And he’s cleaned his files of any reference to them, you can count on that.”
“Yeah. I figured we’d risk that. Well, you’re right about Chiquichano. She didn’t do anything out of the ordinary. Stayed at her office, made a few telephone calls, went home for supper, and then made a quick inspection of the cleaning crew. Now she’s safely tucked away dreaming about getting richer.” He yawned widely. “And I’m going home to dream too—about making that woman sit in a car for forty-eight hours without moving.”
I locked the office and we went down to the parking lot behind the building. Bunch had just settled into his Bronco and I was unlocking the door of the Subaru when four hefty shapes materialized in the driveway and a voice said quietly, “Hello, assholes. We been waiting for you.”
They were bearded, wore jeans and motorcycle boots and sleeveless vests with the gang colors. In their hands they carried things that glinted and clinked.
I moved to keep the car at my back. Behind me, I heard the Bronco’s springs creak as Bunch got out whistling “How Much Is That Doggie in the Window?”
“You people want to party?” I asked. “Or are you just going to stand there?”
“Goddamn! You’re asking for it—you really are asking for it, ain’t you?”
That was the last coherent sentence. The next sounds were the grunts and gasps of bodies lunging at each other as the four of them closed against Bunch and me. I saw Bunch’s arm reach out to spear the throat of one of the shadows, and then I was tangled with the greasy smell of sweaty flesh and a thudding shock as a pair of brass knuckles bounced off my hunched shoulder. Swinging back, I pulled the leather vest forward over my outstretched leg and chopped down hard at the back of the man’s neck, and heard him grunt as he tumbled into darkness. Then I aimed an elbow beneath the upraised arm of the other one. A short, thick pipe hovered in the street glow and came whistling down to scrape along my forearm. The blow numbed my hand and sent prickles all the way up to my neck. My knee came up solidly into the figure’s crotch, and an explosion of hot breath dampened my ear as I grabbed a wrist and twisted it up behind the man’s back in a hammerlock. His cap flew off, leaving a balding patch of scalp surrounded by a fringe of long hair that offered a handy—if greasy—hold. Twisting the locks in my fingers, I thudded the man’s face against the roof of the car and wrenched high on the arm to try and pop it from its socket. He was strong, and tough, and he bore down against me to keep his shoulder in place. I bounced him again, feeling something spew from his open mouth, and he tried with his free hand to whip the pipe back against my skull. It worked, cracking solidly across my scalp and sending yellow and red lights shooting through my vision.
It was enough to loosen my grip and he twisted, swinging again, and pulled away. The pipe came down on my crossed wrists this time and I shoved his arm high and stepped in with a solid, cutting thrust of knuckles under his ribs and heard the man’s breath drive from his body. Something was clawing at my back, and fingernails dug into my shoulders and neck, and I swung a high elbow back to thud solidly into something and then came forward again with the blade of my hand across the bridge of the first man’s nose. Before I could drive the splinter of bone up into his brain with the heel of my hand, he dropped out of sight, rolling and kicking, and scrambled somewhere.
I couldn’t tell where because the one behind me wrapped an arm across my neck and began to squeeze, hammering at my face with his other fist. It was reflexive, the response good training instills: I reached behind his back and grabbed the flailing elbow and, with my right hand, yanked on the man’s pants at knee height to pivot him across my hip. Stepping forward through his body, I lifted his leg and threw him over in a head-dive onto the graveled earth. A quick kick to his temple and he lay making uh-uh noises and scratching one foot in the dirt.
I looked around for Bunch in time to see his large shadow leap into the air with a flying front kick that caught his target in the chest and drove him, arms flailing a length of chain, back against the building’s wall. He bounced, falling forward into a side kick from Bunch that dropped him. A skitter of flying gravel whirled me around in time to see three figures running for the street.
Bunch, breathing heavily, said with satisfaction, “God, I needed that. I hate surveillance!”
We dragged the fallen warrior up to the office. While I dabbed Merthiolate along the already swelling fingernail scratches on my neck and shoulder, Bunch closed the blinds and sat the groggy man down in a wooden chair tipped back against the wall. Like the rest, he was fully bearded and wore jeans and steel-toed motorcycle boots and a sleeveless vest—the familiar uniform that expressed his freedom from stifling convention and a dedication to colorful individuality. He also wore a swollen right eye and fresh blood and snot that glistened in the gummy hairs under his nose.
“Dev, I told you and I told you: get away from those throws and holds. Us
e the punching techniques.”
I winced as the medicine burned into raw flesh. “I like my way, Bunch.”
“Yeah—and look what it gets you. Cut. Me, I come out clean.”
“Looks like a mouse under your eye.”
He touched the purpling flesh. “Well, almost clean. But you look like you tangled with a tom cat—maybe you better get some rabies shots.”
The owners were dirtier than their dogs, that was certain. I buttoned my torn shirt and turned to the man in the chair, whose open eye had begun to show he was awake. “What’s your name?”
“Fuck you.”
Bunch smiled. “The name does fit the face. But before we have a major misunderstanding, dickhead, let me explain something.” He picked up the length of chain the biker had used, and twisted it into a knot. His broad fists turned first red, then white. “It’s really easy to understand. We ask you questions, you answer them.” The chain snapped and Bunch dangled the broken link in front of the man’s wide eye. “Or I’ll unbutton your goddamn spine like this. Now what’s your name?”
He ran his tongue across his lower lip and stared at the chain. “Benny.”
“Benny. A fine name—I like that name, don’t you, Dev? Benny. Now, Benny, who was it tried to kill my partner here in the tunnel?”
“What?”
Bunch wagged a finger close under the man’s soggy nose. “I said we’d ask—you answer. One of you people tried to kill my partner up in Clear Creek Canyon, and we want to know who it was.”
“I don’t know. Nobody tried to kill the son of a bitch up there. When you came out sneaking around the ranch, sure. What the hell you expect, sneaking around like that?”
“Then, who was it broke into our office, Benny?”
He shook his head. “I don’t know. It wasn’t none of us—this is the first time we been here.”
“Benny, Benny, Benny—you’re not being helpful. We like you, Benny. We want to save you some hurt.” The big man leaned close to Benny, who pressed back in his chair. “But I will twist your fucking arms off at the elbows if you don’t start telling me the truth!”