Clint Faraday Mysteries collection A Muddled Murders Collector's Edition

by Moulton, CD

  She grinned and took the twenty he gave her and went out to the shop across the Via Espania while the rest of them went up to their rooms.

  “Did you get any pictures?” Sandi asked. Clint shook his head and said, “I left the damned camera here! Real bright!”

  Clint reached into his maleta and took out a CD in an envelope. “I got a phone card. I also got this great Cd! It’s beach and stream sounds to make you sleep. Trouble is, it makes you have to piss all the time. Water sounds.” He slid it into the CD slot on the TV and a whispery sound came out.

  “White sound. If they’ve got any bugs in here they can’t hear a thing.”

  “Okay. Got the picture and recorded the ‘chance’ conversation in the elevator,” Candi reported. “Wanted to know how long I’d known the famous detective and friends and why they were all in Panamá City, seeing Clint had so often said he hates cities.

  “I told him ... here. Listen. I sent the pics to Marko.” She took a little digital mini-recorder from her purse and turned it on.

  “Hola! Que tal?”

  (Hello. How are you?)

  “Oh, hello! Do you speak English? My Spanish stinks!”

  “Some. I saw you with the detective from Bocas. How long have you known him and his friends?”

  “Oh, we met in David. I’m on vacation with ... a man who just left me there with no money or anything. His wife ... uh, a friend took him to San Jose. In Costa Rica, you know.”

  “He hates cities, so I’m surprised he’s here.”

  “Oh? You know him?”

  “We’ve met in Bocas. Chiriqui Grande.”

  “Well,” she sounded confidential. “I think there’s some big trouble in Bocaterenyo or something and he said he wants to lay low for awhile and they’d never look for him here. I think maybe he’s got in big trouble with some big gangsters about gambling or something. It’s exciting and a little bit scary, but I don’t have enough money to go back to Florida!”

  “Don’t you have the return ticket? It’s required if you stay here.”

  “But HOWARD has it and he’s GONE!”

  “Oh. I see.”

  “Oh, here’s my floor! Have a good night!”

  The phone rang. It was Jim and he had a package. William told him to bring it up and explained that it was a throw-away phone they could use to talk with Marko. They would be able to trace the ones they’d been using by now. Clint nodded and took the throw-away he’d bought while in David but not activated from his maleta. William grinned. He called Marko, who conferenced the call to William, Candi and Sandi, all of whom had throw-aways from the package.

  “Okay. The woman’s someone we can use if we have to so long as she don’t know we know about her,” Marko said. “The one in the elevator is a bit hard to find anything about, but he’s still in the lobby. Jim said he watched him get into the elevator with the package and he was close when he said it was for us. Maybe he can learn something. Several people have asked Judi Sylvia and me about you. We tell them you’ve got some kind of job or something and are in Santiago or David or somewhere. We don’t meddle in your business.

  “I’ve got a few suspicions. I think maybe Juan is the boss. He’s got a lot of hidden little deals that could lead to a very big deal. He’s using Fiona-bitch the way we’re using Candi. Difference is Candi knows it and she’s not an idiot like Fiona-bitch. She knows she’s not running things and has better sense than to want to. I’ll find out what there is to know about your ... just a minute. Jim’s on another line.”

  There was about a two minute wait, then,”Okay. Name’s Bert Golander from Florida – to Jim. I can trace that back. I’ll call in the morning.”

  They talked a bit about the job, then went to bed.

  “Bert Golander is Bert Golander from Orlando, Florida,“ Marko reported. “He’s a big developer of commercial real estate and tourist traps. He’s out of his league here. He’s another one who thinks he has all the answers and is untouchable because he can’t be connected to anything short of his name on titles and such. He’s made a big goof by contacting Candi because we used that to trace him. He’s probably the actual boss. He got directly involved because he happened to be there in the Hotel California when you checked in. Stupid move to not act like he didn’t know what was going on.

  “Juan and Fiona-bitch had a terrible accident on the InterAmerican Carretera. Car went off the road into the river and they drowned. He wasn’t the boss. Golander is. I’ll get him out of there if I can find a way. So far he hasn’t offed anybody who didn’t deserve it in spades.”

  “I’ll get rid of him,” Clint promised. “I can pull a bluff that will guarantee he never comes back here. He can run his little tourist trap deal on the Pacific on the land he has or can sell it or something. There’s not much to ruin there anymore.

  “I think I’ll really miss your friends here. They’re my friends now, too. I think Candi should go to Hollywood and become a star! She’s GREAT with the bimbo act.”

  “She’s got better sense than that, too! You can all come to Bocas for a vacation. No one can connect them to me so we’ll happen to meet.”

  They chatted awhile, then Clint went down to sit in the lobby until Golander got off the elevator. He called him over.

  “And you are?” he asked.

  “You know perfectly well who I am. You chatted with my girlfriend in the elevator. She’s a great lay and a lot of fun, but has about half a brain. Not everyone I associate with knows what I’m doing. I do have a private life.”

  Golander smirked. “She certainly has what it takes physically!

  “So! What can I do for you, Clint Faraday?”

  “You can get the hell out of Panamá and never return and you can take your bunch of amateur hoods with you. I can’t believe you were so stupid you tried to use the Colombians and Mexicans! You can’t get back out of that kind of thing. Be damned glad you didn’t get in with the Ruskies or you’d be ... you’d be dead for about six months now.”

  “Oh? You think you can just order me to leave and I will?” he said with a sneer. “This Marko character doesn’t scare me. I deal with the mafia daily in the states.”

  “You deal with a bunch of amateurs down in your own league. Consider how fast I was able to find you and learn where you stand in the deal.”

  “Marko Boccini did that!”

  “Exactly. Doesn’t that tell you something – or are you as stupid as deceased Juan and Fiona-bitch were?”

  “Er, deceased?” he asked. Looking a bit scared now.

  “Uh-huh. Had a tragic accident this morning very early on their way back here. It’s why they’re not here now.” It occurred to Clint that Golander was too actually shocked at that news to be faking it. They were probably partners in the deal, not agents being used. “People who think they know people who they don’t know here seem to have a very high incidence of accidents. That – and the fact there are cameras in places I would expect and that you wouldn’t can put you right smack in the middle of corruption and conspiracy charges that will get you twenty years in the pen here in Panamá City.

  “Ask anyone. See how long people live on average in the pen here. With this president you ain’t buying or bluffing out of it. Particularly the corruption bit. They have a president who actually will prosecute the hell out of corruption and corrupters. This one means it.

  “Also, not knowing who and what Vincente is means you don’t have anymore chance of surviving than Juan and Fiona-bitch did. By now the only place in the world you’re reasonably safe is the US – and probably just in Florida there. I don’t want to have to waste a lot of time on this anymore. Git! Stay and die. I don’t have to do anything, I have to NOT do anything and you’ll probably have an accident before the day is out. I can call off Vincente for long enough for you to get out. I can’t call off the charges the government will bring if you’re here when they get the tapes of your involvement in this crap. Marko is royally pissed at you for causing his friends so much sh
it. He has those tapes.

  “Do you go, now, today, or do I decide not to call Vincente off?”

  “You can call him off?” he asked. He was sweating since the tapes part.

  “I have some things that could cause him all kinds of trouble with the government here. He could end up in the pen for those twenty years. It’s not true that you can buy anything you want if you have the money here. It’s only mostly true. You have to stop it from ever coming to the direct attention of the president. He won’t back off.

  “Today. Call the airlines and use your ticket. Now.”

  “I have my own plane. I don’t have much choice. You know, two people told me to use you here, but I wouldn’t listen. I couldn’t anyhow, could I?”

  “Not a chance! Check your plane out thoroughly before you go.”

  “I have two guards on it at all times.”

  “Are they flying with you?”

  “No. Why ... I see. I’ll make it plain they go with me to Florida. Thanks. I think you’re the first one here I can trust to do exactly what he says he’ll do.”

  He took out his phone and called to say to have the plane ready to leave in one hour – and Jose and Liam were going with them. Clint went to their rooms to call Marko. Marko would make it plain to Vincente that anything that happened to Golander from this point onward would result in some catastrophic things happening to him.

  They spent that night in Panamá City, then went back to Bocas Town where they spent another week just lazing around and relaxing. Clint and Candi were getting a bit too serious for his tastes (when viewed afterward) when they had to go back to the states.

  Yeah. Fishing today.

  He went inside to get a few things together, put the “Gone Fishin’” sign on the front door, got in his boat and headed east, then south.

  It was going to be another perfect day for lazing around and doing some fishing. He would get back in time to find something to do tonight, hopefully without finding anymore bodies on his deck.

  Rain Forest Tour

  Clint Faraday looked over the sea from his deck over Saigon Bay. The sunrise was going to be spectacular, but it often was. There were clouds just above the horizon and another level much higher.

  He sipped the second cup of coffee and reached for the phone. It was Ariel Guerra, an Indio friend from the coast southeast of Bocas Town. He said he had to talk with him. Clint said to come on over.

  When the Indios had to talk with you about something very important they almost always wanted to borrow money. Lending money to a Panamanian is the same as giving them the money. They don’t pay it back, but will lend you whatever they have if you need it with no expectation of repayment.

  Judi Lum from the next house came out on her deck to wave and call, “Buenos dias!” He returned the greeting.

  That’s another thing about Panamá. Anywhere else Clint had ever been saying “Good morning!” or its equivalent was rhetoric. Words. Nothing more. In Panamá you mean it. You hope they have a great day. That’s the only way he knew to explain what the difference in Panamá and almost anywhere else is. It’s a feeling.

  “Doing anything today?” Judi asked. He put his hand palm up. He hadn’t decided.

  “We’re going to Changuinola to shop. Come along if you like – like a man wants to tag along when a gaggle of women are shopping.

  “Someone’s coming to your front door.”

  He waved and went to let Ariel in and to offer him coffee. He took a cup and asked if Clint had ever been to Cusapin. He hadn’t. It was in the comarco (Indian land) past Chiriqui Grande. He understood it was mile after mile of beautiful beaches and lush rain forest.

  “Mr. Clint, hay un problema seriosa,” he said.

  (I have a very serious problem.)

  “Que es?”

  (What is it?)

  *I’ll translate the rest – CD

  “There is a problem with some gringos and my family land. I think it is possible they will do what they did to Miguel to get his land. There is only my mother and brother in the family and they are doing the same thing.”

  Miguel had been contacted, phony papers made, then was almost killed. They would have the phony papers and no one to contest it if the family was dead. It happened a lot in the past.

  “Gringos can’t own land in the comarco,” Clint replied.

  “It is only part in the comarco and part beside it on the other side of the river. I would sell it to people who wouldn’t ruin the area, but these are just a bunch of exploiters and want to build another tourist place.

  “Mr. Clint, I can’t do anything to make them leave me alone!”

  “Have you told anyone you would sell it? Anyone at all?”

  “No, only my mother, but she might have said something about it to someone else.”

  “Did you quote a price?”

  “No, only that I might sell it. Do I have to sell it?”

  “No, but they can cause trouble if someone will testify that you said you would sell it. You can say you said you MIGHT sell it, not that you would, but they would tie it up in court and break you. The law is weird here.

  “Tell you what. Sign over exclusive selling rights to me. I’ll go to Cusapin and get rid of them for you – one way or another.”

  “Okay! I’ll do that. I can trust you, Mr. Clint.”

  “And please stop calling me ‘Mr. Clint.’ It’s just‘Clint.’ Okay?”

  “Okay, Mr. Clint.” He grinned his infectious grin. Clint gave him the finger.

  The place was a lush and beautiful as described. There was a large if spread-out puebla where he could rent a room, but Ariel insisted he stay at his house. The gringos were staying in Chirqui Grande where Ariel pointed them out from a distance when they went through to the boat, which is how one gets to Cusapin. Clint said he’d seen them a couple of times at Bohmfalk’s and The Plank in Bocas. He’d been unimpressed with the type.

  Clint settled in, then went to walk along the beach back toward the river. Ariel pointed to the 65 hectare spot he owned. It was very certainly a place where a tourist town would make a bundle for unscrupulous developers.

  “Tomorrow we will go there and you can walk around it. It is Friday tomorrow so they will come in the afternoon with their engineer to draw a plano,” Ariel said.

  “They don’t make a plano, you do. It’s your land,” Clint replied. “I’ll be there to tell them to get the hell out and stay the hell out. They’re trespassing onto private land. Even if it was for sale they couldn’t go on it without permission.

  “You didn’t tell them they could go on it, did you?”

  “No, but mother told them they could look around one time a month ago.”

  “Okay. It’s in your name only. Your mother can’t give valid permission for anyone to be on it. I’ll handle them and their engineer.”

  “They have a lawyer with them,” Ariel warned.

  “A lawyer?” Clint laughed. “I suppose he’s typical? All bluster and promises, then delays and you need to pay this and that expense because it’s taking so much time with these delays – that I’m the cause of.”

  “He isn’t very ... whatever you call it. Honesto. I think.”

  Clint smirked and they went back to the house. Clint spent a very pleasant night with the cool breeze off the Caribbean and the smells of the flowers in the rain forest.

  Clint, Ariel and a man named Justo Juarez spent the morning strolling on the beach and walking around the property. Clint had filled one card with digital pictures and was about halfway through the second when a boat came into the river from the Caribbean and beached where the river met the sea. Clint told them not to come above the high tide line. It was private property.

  “We have permission from the owner!” a fat man in his late thirties – in a suit – stated firmly, as though THAT settled THAT.

  “Oh? Is that so? Ariel, you didn’t say you’d given anyone permission to come here,” Clint said.

  “I did not give them or
anyone else permission.”

  “Here’s the owner. I have the escritura. It’s in his name and with his cedula number. There are no minor owners listed. You don’t have permission,” Clint said sharply. “What do you want here?”

  “We’re going to buy the place,” a younger slick type Clint had met in Bocas said. “We’ve met. On the isla. I’m Bill Gooden and he’s Jack Norton. We just call the lawyer ‘licenciado’ for some reason. His names Donaldo Something-or-other. The surveyor is Batiste Batiste.

  “His mother gave us permission to come survey the place.”

  “His mother can’t give you permission,” Clint fired back sharply. “I take it El Gordo is your lawyer. He should have warned you about that. If you come onto this land after warning I’ll have all your asses in the pen, capich?”

  “Let’s not get off on an adversarial foot,” Jack pleaded. “I want to buy the land so want a plano drawn.”

  “There’s already a plano with the registration from nineteen eighty four when Ariel’s father died and left him the place. The ROP was assigned originally in nineteen thirty nine so is as solid as a titulo. In addition, the owner supplies the plano, not the buyer – which you aren’t, at this point.”

  “We’ll deal with Sr. Guerra, not you!” the lawyer spat. “Who do you think you are?!”

  “Me? I’m just the poor ignorant gringo who has exclusive rights to sell the place. So just who in hell do you think YOU are, Fatso?”

  “You can’t sell land here!” the lawyer spat a bit more acidly. “You have to be licensed! This is an outrage!”

  “Funny thing about that is that Ariel, my very close friend, is an indigenous person whose residence is on the comarco, so anyone he chooses can sell it legally. The law here is comarco law, not national law. The council approved me. Ask the jefe, Basilio Cona.”