Trader of secrets pm-12

by Steve Martini

  The guard opened it just enough to let him out.

  Raji tried to see who was out there, but the broad back of the guard was in the way. The guy closed the door and Fareed just sat. He was wishing he could take a shower. For the last two nights he had been sleeping in the same clothes, harassed repeatedly by the blinding beams of flashlights. He was exhausted. Without coffee he wouldn’t be able to keep his eyes open much longer.

  Another knock on the door. The guard opened it. This time it was Bruno.

  Raji put his glasses back on.

  Bruno approached from across the room. He was breathing heavily, sweating as usual. The man needed to lose weight and get some exercise. “It appears we’re having some problems. It seems there is some difficulty with the Internet. They tell me it is down throughout the hotel. And the desk informs me that they are unable to find a restaurant to provide coffee or food because of the hour.”

  “So what do we do?” said Raji.

  “I guess we are going to have to wait until morning. Hopefully by then the Internet will be up and running, and at least we can get some breakfast. So for now it’s back to your room.”

  Raji shook his head. “You wake me up for this?”

  “I am sorry, but it cannot be helped,” said Bruno. “We will take care of it all in the morning.”

  Bruno and the guard led Raji back down the hallway. There was no sign of Joaquin. The suggestion of food had set Raji’s stomach to growling. It would be at least four or five hours until breakfast. He was hungry, but at least he could shower, change his underwear, and sleep.

  When they got to the room, the guard opened the door and gestured a head nod for Raji to get back in his cell. The second he did, the door closed behind him and the key turned in the lock.

  “Bastards!” Fareed didn’t linger on the thought. He turned immediately and saw that the computer was still where he left it, on the desk against the far wall. He took two steps toward the armoire, opened the door, and checked for his coat. It was still there in the same place where Joaquin hung it. Raji pressed with his fingers under the lapel until he felt the small hard prominence of the flash drive. He took a deep breath and relaxed.

  Raji closed the armoire and walked across the room to his suitcase that lay open on the unfolded luggage rack near the desk. He got out a clean set of underwear and his toothbrush. He was about to take off his glasses when he felt a cool breeze from behind.

  He suddenly realized that the air in the room was fresh. He turned quickly and looked toward the window. The drapes were drawn back and the window was closed. Raji turned toward the set of French doors. The drapes were closed. He couldn’t remember whether they were open when he left or not. He laid the underwear and the toothbrush on top of his shirts in the open suitcase. He moved slowly toward the French doors.

  Before he got there, one of the curtains moved. Raji felt the light breeze as the fresh air from outside ruffled the heavy velour. He stopped in his tracks and stood there for a second. Something told him not to look. Instead he turned as if nothing had happened and walked back toward the suitcase.

  His heart pounded in his chest like a sledgehammer. With his head down as if looking for something in the suitcase, Raji glanced toward the curtains. He knew that death was waiting for him out on that balcony. He fiddled in the suitcase, trying to figure out what to do. His mind raced. The window was bolted. The door to the hallway was locked. There was nowhere to go except the bathroom, and once there, there was no way out. Still, the door had a lock, and the key was inside. But to get there Raji would have to pass between the bed and the curtained-off French doors, a narrow gauntlet of less than three feet. He glanced once more at the curtains. If Joaquin was waiting for him there, that’s when he would make his move, before Raji could get to the bathroom and slam the door.

  Raji needed a weapon, anything to ward him off, to beat him back. He had nothing. He thought about his shoes, but they were rubber-soled. They weren’t hard enough to do any damage, and if it came down to a fight for leverage, without shoes on his feet he would be lost. What if somehow he got out of the room and had to run? Without shoes, what would he do then?

  Fareed left the shoes on his feet and instead grabbed one of the long white cotton athletic socks from his suitcase. He looked for something heavy and hard to drop inside of it. He kept an eye on the curtains. All he could find was his can of Barbasol shaving cream. It had been put in his checked luggage. The label on the can read eleven ounces. It was almost full. It wasn’t as good as a lead sap, but if Raji had enough room to swing it and get velocity, the hard pressurized can could do some damage, enough to keep Joaquin at a distance. And unless he had a silencer, neither Joaquin nor the goon outside could use a gun, not in the hotel. Anyone on the floors above or below would hear it.

  Raji edged his back toward the French doors so that Joaquin couldn’t see what he was doing until the last minute. He pushed the can into the sock. The heavy cotton fabric stretched around it like a snake swallowing a full meal. He pushed until the can seated in the toe. He gripped the open end of the sock as tightly as he could with his right hand. There were a good six to eight inches of empty stocking between his hand and the can, enough to whip the weight and get it going.

  Raji took a deep breath. If Joaquin wanted to come at him now, Fareed would take his chances. He turned and squared his body, facing the curtains, his feet spread about shoulder width.

  He took two tentative steps toward the curtains and started swinging the can over his head. Within seconds the length of the whip doubled as the centrifugal force stretched the cotton.

  Raji could feel the pulse pounding in his head as he moved toward the bathroom. The canned bolo whistled through the air above his head like a propeller. Fareed hugged the side of the bed, staying as far from the curtains as he could, inching his way toward the bathroom. He knew that if he got too close to the French doors, the weighted sock would tangle in the heavy velour and he would be dead. Joaquin, who probably had a blade, would be on him before he could think.

  The curtains moved. Fareed felt the cool air. It was now or never. He was three feet from the open bathroom door. He would have to pull down the singing bolo to make it through.

  One more step sideways with his back to the bed and Raji lunged for it. He threw the sock and can into the bathroom, grabbed the door with both hands, and slammed it closed. With his shoulder to the door he felt for the key, found and turned it until it locked.

  Raji stood there in the darkness leaning against the door and breathing heavily, waiting for the adrenaline to flush from his heart. His hand felt for the light switch on the wall as his upper back absorbed the punch. An electrical shock passed through his body. Fareed thought he must have been wet when he touched the light. Numbness gripped his fingers, and his knees buckled.

  Raji looked on in wonder as the light came on. His eyes beheld the needle-sharp point of the stiletto protruding from his throat. He wondered how this could be since the pain never registered in his brain.

  Liquida’s blade had severed the spinal column just below the base of the brain. The body was dead, though the eyes might blink and see for a few more minutes. Liquida had no intention of wrestling with anybody. As far as he was concerned, he was following doctor’s orders. He was still on light duty until the wound under his arm healed completely.

  He pulled Fareed over backward into the shower-tub so he wouldn’t bleed all over the floor. Liquida had already lined the tub, everything but the drain, with a blue plastic tarp.

  The second Leffort told him that the stuff on the flash drive looked real, Liquida started packing his bags.

  As he labored over Raji’s body, closing his eyes, retrieving his blade, and draining the blood from the tarp, the little hairs on the back of Liquida’s neck were standing up. He could smell the FBI bearing down on him.

  He told Bruno to call Marseilles and have them rev up the jet, and to be ready to leave the hotel in less than an hour. A rocket hadn’t
been designed yet that could get Liquida out of Paris fast enough.

  Chapter Forty

  It was Harry’s watch, though he could barely keep his eyes open. He sat behind the wheel of the small Renault, struggling to stay awake. Harry looked at his watch. It was just after four in the morning. Paul would spell him in two more hours.

  The entire exercise was a catch-22. The only way they could search the hotel to find out if Liquida was there was to bring in the French police, and the only way they could do that was to see him and identify him first. At least they now had the benefit of the FBI sketch. A computer printout of Liquida’s poster off the FBI website lay on the passenger seat next to Harry. Joselyn was able to produce it using a printer in an Internet cafe.

  For two days they camped in the cold car and saw nothing. Once each day they would drive around the block and search for a new parking space to keep from being ticketed.

  Harry’s stomach was beginning to growl. He would have killed for a cup of coffee. The sidewalks were dead. There was no one on the street except for an occasional car and driver passing down the rue des Ecoles on their way to work or going home from a night shift somewhere.

  Harry decided to get a change of scenery. Perhaps it would wake him up. He turned the key in the ignition, started the car, and turned on his headlights. He checked the side-view mirror for oncoming traffic, then pulled out of the parking space and did a U-turn directly in front of the canvas canopy over the entrance to the Hotel Saint-Jacques. He drove to the end of the block and turned right. This area of the Latin Quarter was a maze of one-way streets. The only way to drive around the block was to backtrack. By now they were used to it.

  Two more right turns and Harry found himself on the rue Valette, the side street that bounded the Hotel Saint-Jacques on the right-hand corner up ahead. He planned to cross through the intersection of the rue des Ecoles and try to park on the other side, where he could lean back in the driver’s seat and watch the hotel entrance through his rearview mirror.

  Before he got to the intersection, something caught his eye. Harry saw the lights on inside a small cafe at the corner of the alley just behind the Hotel Saint-Jacques. He had but one thought. Coffee!

  He slowed to a crawl and looked for a parking space. There were none. Every spot was taken. The street was dark except for a few lamps that hung from the sides of the buildings. He could cross over the intersection, but then he’d have to walk back and cross the street directly in front of the Saint-Jacques and along the side of the hotel. Paul had given strict instructions that none of them were to go near the place. He had seen what happened to Herman.

  Harry stopped the car in the middle of the street. He looked in his mirror to make sure no one was behind him; then he turned the wheel to the right and pulled into the brick-paved alley directly in front of the cafe. The two front wheels bounced as they crossed the swale into the alley. The car’s headlights flashed against the masonry wall of a six-story building perhaps a hundred feet away. The alley looked like a dead end.

  The sudden bright lights scared two itinerants leaning over a blue bundle on the ground at the foot of the distant building. Bending over, they both looked back, white faces and stark eyes; they stared for a second into the blinding headlights. Suddenly they both turned and took off. They disappeared into an opening on the left side of the alley at the far end. It looked as if it might be a garage, but the opening was too small for a car. The two men had left their bundle behind.

  Harry sat there for a moment looking, wondering what it was that he was seeing. The second he hit the bright beams he realized; there was a shoe with a foot in it sticking out of the end of the blue bundle.

  Bruno’s two men scrambled down the steps of the passage du Clos Bruneau and clambered into the white van parked at the curb. The second they were inside, one of them slid the door closed.

  “Where’s the body?” said Liquida.

  Bruno translated. One of them answered in Russian as he pointed back toward the steps and the alley that ran behind several of the small hotels, including the Saint-Jacques. Then he pointed and said, “Politsiya!” something for which Liquida did not need a translation.

  Bruno said something to the driver, and the man stepped on the gas. The van pulled away from the curb and down the rue des Ecoles headed for the A6, which would take them south through Lyon and on to Marseilles, where the private jet was waiting.

  Harry had no cell phone. He considered whether to back out and take the car back to his hotel to get Paul and Joselyn or simply go into the cafe and have them call the police from there. He did neither. Instead he got out, locked the car, and began hoofing it back to the Hotel Claude Bernard. It was only a short block away. Harry was afraid if he took the car, he would have trouble finding a parking space once he got there.

  Running part of the way and walking, he took less than three minutes to get to the room. By the time he knocked on the door he was breathless.

  When Joselyn opened the door, she was already dressed and had her shoes on. She took one look at Harry and said, “What’s wrong?”

  Harry had his hands on his knees, bent over, trying to catch his breath. He lifted one hand to point, but he couldn’t speak. Finally he said, “Body in the alley!”

  “What? Where?”

  “Hotel,” said Harry.

  “Paul!” Joselyn turned and yelled toward the bathroom.

  Chapter Forty-One

  By the time we reach the car parked in the alley, it is still dark. Harry asks me if I want him to turn on the headlights, but I tell him no, not until we get up close and see what is there.

  “Why don’t you take the keys and stay in the car,” I tell Joselyn.

  “Why don’t you?”

  “I’ll do it,” says Harry. “There’s an opening down there to the left. Do you see it?”

  I can barely make it out in the dim light.

  “That’s where they went,” says Harry. “I don’t know where it goes, but if they come back out, try to stay clear. I’ll use the headlights to blind them. Cream ’em against the wall with the car if I have to.”

  “OK.” Joselyn and I step slowly toward the end of the alley as Harry gets back in the car. We can see the long rolled bundle lying on the ground. It is sort of crumpled against the foot of the building. As we draw closer, I can tell, whatever it is, it is wrapped in one of those blue plastic tarps that you can buy in any hardware store in the world.

  I can’t see the foot until we get closer. Harry was right. As we get within a few feet, I can tell that the running shoe sticking out of the bundle has to belong to a man. It is too big for a woman.

  “Maybe we should call the police,” says Joselyn.

  “In a minute,” I tell her.

  The bundle is tied with twine. Neither of us has a knife or anything sharp enough to cut it. I am left to find the end and try and untie the knot. I pull my hands inside the long sleeves of my sweater and roll the bundle toward me looking for the end of the twine. Each time I try to roll it, the bundle seems to want to roll back the other way. Lividity has taken over the body, and the blood has settled to the lowest point and solidified, creating a counterweight.

  “What are you doing?” says Joselyn.

  “I’m trying to untie the knot.”

  “Leave it alone. Let’s get out of here.”

  “Go and sit in the car with Harry,” I tell her.

  “Not unless you’re coming.”

  “Watch the alley. Make sure nobody comes in behind us,” I tell her.

  It takes me a good two minutes to find the knot and to push the heavy cotton twine backward, using my thumb and my fingernails to untie it. Once the knot is undone, it becomes easy to unwind the string from around the outside of the bundled tarp.

  As I am doing this I am looking overhead to see if there are any surveillance cameras in or near the alley. It doesn’t look like it, but I can’t be sure. Using the inside of my sleeves, I pull the edge of the tarp and roll the body ou
t.

  The inside of the tarp is covered in blood, some of it clotted, some dried.

  Joselyn looks away and covers her mouth with her hand. “Let’s get out of here. Why are we doing this?”

  “Because I need to know what’s going on. Why don’t you go back to the car,” I tell her.

  “No. I’m OK.”

  The victim looks to be maybe forty years old with dark hair. The body is matted with blood. His flesh is the color of a bleached cotton sheet, pure white. There is a puncture wound in his throat, traces of blood still seeping from it.

  He’s wearing a buttoned dress shirt and light-colored cotton jeans of some kind. I can see that there is nothing in the breast pocket of his shirt. I feel the pockets of his pants, front and back. They are empty.

  “Who do you think he is?” says Joselyn.

  “I don’t know. There’s no identification. No wallet, no watch, no rings. Whoever dumped him stripped the body.” I lean over and carefully turn down the collar on the back of his shirt. I don’t like touching the body any more than I have to. But it is the only chance I have to find out who he is. There is not a doubt in my mind that Liquida killed him. His shirt collar is covered with blood and there is a hole just under the label, but it is readable: “Kenneth Cole.”

  “What are you doing?” she asks.

  “Can’t be sure, but I’m guessing his clothes were bought in the States.”

  “You think he’s American?”

  “I don’t know.” Then something catches my eye. “Do you have a handkerchief?”

  Joselyn feels around the pockets of her pants and her jacket. “No, but I have some Kleenex.”

  “That’ll do.”

  She takes out a small pocket pack of tissues and hands it to me. I take five or six and create a thick pad. “Don’t look,” I tell her.

  I lift his shoulder with my left hand and reach down under the body toward the bottom of the plastic tarp underneath him.