Clint Faraday Mysteries collection A Muddled Murders Collector's Edition

by Moulton, CD

  “I’m finding out a lot about Avenidas and Blakley,” he said, deciding it would have to come out sooner or later. Might as well make it now. “Seems they both knew your father for years.”

  “Raul did. A little. I mentioned that when I told you why I was coming here,” she answered. “I don’t know much about his dealings. Blakley might have known him. She looked just slightly familiar. I might have seen her with Father years ago.

  “Father was into some pretty shady things. I think he did some work for the drug people. He was scared of something for a couple of months before he and Mother died. He said that it was business and that Mother and I were better off not knowing. It was something that had put him into notice – he called it that – of a big drug lord named Ochoa. He died and left everything to my Mother, who died at the same time, leaving everything to him in her will. I got everything as surviving heir, but we haven’t been able to find anything except the house and a bank account that was just more than twenty thousand dollars, US. I’ve managed to go through that and had to get a job or get married, which is the Colombian girl’s only way to security.

  “I don’t want to get married yet. I was offered a job by Raul at a time I needed it, so here I am.”

  “How did your parents die?” Judy asked.

  “They were on their way to Bogotá and ran off the mountain when a truck was coming down the road on the wrong side. Its brakes had failed and the driver was in the hospital for four months because of being hurt when the truck went into the side of the mountain farther down.

  “It was real. It wasn’t a setup or murder. I had that checked out very thoroughly. It happened in September of ninety eight and was investigated completely.

  “I thought then, and still do, that Father had a lot of money tied up somewhere. I know I saw him with big sacks of money several times. I was in the garden one time when a man gave him a sack of money so heavy he could hardly carry it. He put it in the bodega and I snuck in to see when he and Mother went to shop. It was hundred dollar bills. I couldn’t guess at how much, but it had to be a million dollars. The next day another man came and collected the sack and left.

  “I was eleven years old. I didn’t think much about it because Father always said Mother and I were not to concern ourselves about business things. Ever. It was the father’s job to provide for the family and the mother’s job to care for the house and family. They were separate parts of why a marriage worked. We got lectures on our proper roles. He was very good to us. Mother said a thousand times that he was a better provider and more caring than any other man in Colombia. I never once questioned anything he did. Looking back, I can see where maybe I should have.

  “You can see why I’m so ... confused and worried about what’s happened here. Raul and Blakley, then that money in a chest full of jewels. Avenidas once showed me a sword with fifteen jewels he said was very old and worth probably a million dollars. He was mixed up with Father in business. I saw millions of dollars in cash kept in sacks. Money ended up in the pirate chest, which seemed to throw Raul into a rage. Blakley was wearing some jewelry when she was killed that could have come from that chest.

  “I don’t know how any of it’s connected. I wonder if ... I don’t even know what to wonder about.

  “That’s my true story. I can’t believe how naive I was. I never added two and two because I guess I didn’t want to rock the boat.”

  “I’ll jump to a few conclusions myself!” Judy cried. “If you weren’t so naive you’d probably be dead. Maybe Raul has you here where he can watch you because that money and chest might belong to you!”

  “Yeah,” Dave added. “Have the good sense not to wonder about it until Clint finds out a few things.”

  “This gets weirder and weirder,” Clint said.

  “You keep saying that,” Judy said. “Let’s drop it for tonight, Okay?”

  Dave and Ben went to The Plank a little later. Judy, Clint and Gina went to The Toro Loco. Judy met a good friend and stayed there when Clint and Gina went to The Rip Tide to talk with Neil and Cathi. The rest of the night was very pleasant. Gina stayed at the hotel, which was the only sour note to Clint. He stopped at some little bar for a beer on his way home where he talked to some people, but didn’t even finish the beer. It wasn’t going to be as pleasant a night as the last couple had been. He was a little fuzzy about the later part. He didn’t think he’d had that much to drink.

  Dark Day

  Okay. That was possibly a very important fact. Gina’s parents had died in September of ‘98, definitely not murdered, then Blakley died in October, as definitely murdered. Avenidas started selling antique pirate treasure in ... exactly when? He had to know that date. It was either vastly important or incidental. Nothing between.

  When he got up to a dark drizzle he checked the comp to find Manolo had sent some information. Much of it was covered by Manny’s information. Blakley had been laundering for two major cartels and was trusted by them. He was knocked over, but NOT by them. They lost a few million because of that and had tried to find who and why. They weren’t good at investigation. They always ordered people to talk and they talked. It wasn’t always accurate information, though it was too often acted upon as though it was.

  Halverson was a sort of placement man. He took the money from one place and put it in another from which he arranged for it to go to a third place, minus commissions and fees, before returning to the original sparkling clean. His fees were reputed to have made him something over ten million dollars a year for some years. There was talk that some of it was missing at his death, that he had been ripped off for a lot more and that Blakley and some stockbroker were the ones ripping him off.

  He had once put a lot of money in a treasure hunt a lot like those things in Florida. There was a hint that something was found – because a few pieces showed up. It seemed to stop when he died, except for three pieces that showed up five years ago. There might be hundreds of millions still hidden somewhere.

  Avenidas, the information was mostly what he had. He had sold the artifacts in late ‘97 and early ‘98 that they could say definitely came from him.

  Clint sat back and thought. He was building a scenario that may be a mile away from the facts for every dollar in that chest.

  Blakley and Halverson had a semi-partnership deal in money laundering. They became rich with it. Halverson had financed a treasure hunt that had paid off. He wanted a way to keep the find safe until he could dispose of it. He had let Blakley in on it and Blakley had gone with him to see what there was to see. Fifty years ago there was nothing and very few people on Isla Colón. They decided to keep a bit of the cash they had with the treasure as insurance against bad times. Everything was according to plan for quite a while. They both had plenty of money and didn’t need the treasure or the cash they had hidden. They let it lay.

  Then the Halversons died. Now where did it go? That part was probably fairly close.

  Okay. Halversons are dead, so ... Gina would inherit everything. There were maps or something left for her to find, so Blakley found it first. That was why there were no notes or registrations or such for the offshore accounts. Blakley stole them from Gina.

  How?

  Gina was about 15 years old – and was in the states going to school! Blakley simply went into the house and took what he wanted.

  How was Avenidas involved? How did he know about the treasure? How did he get the items?

  Halverson had financed a treasure hunt and Avenidas was the stockbroker who reputedly ripped him off. That would fit. Avenidas didn’t know where the treasure was, he simply had some items Blakley gave him, probably as a pay-off to keep quiet. Avenidas did NOT kill Blakley. He would lose his final chance at the treasure that way. He didn’t know how to find it.

  So – who did kill him? It would be whoever ended up with the treasure, which was Betina.

  Another supposition. Blakley got those maps and papers and took them home. Betina found them. She knocked her old man of
f herself. That would fit very nicely, thank you very much!

  Now Avenidas was really in a fix. The money from the sale of the artifacts wouldn’t last forever and he had no clue as to where the stuff was. He didn’t have access to those offshore accounts. He was about to end up with an empty basket. What could he do?

  He could see that Betina was throwing money she couldn’t have around like she had a never-ending supply. Watch her! Sooner or later she would go after the treasure.

  She came to Bocas. He’d had an office there for years. He came to Bocas. He brought Gina over because ... he had something that gave her rights to that treasure. She could collect fifty percent of its value by turning it over to Panamá. He was the stockbroker who had arranged financing, so could charge her twenty percent. Twenty percent of millions was a lot of money.

  He wouldn’t have killed Betina, then. She had to lead him ... but the treasure was already gone! Someone had made an anonymous call about a body buried where the chest was.

  Betina was going to claim rights and get half? What happened ... except that there was ... no. The chest was already found when she was killed. What had happened that made it necessary to get rid of her?

  The cash in the chest! It was added to that chest before Betina was ten years old. She couldn’t claim the treasure without explaining the cash. She couldn’t explain the cash, which wasn’t too difficult to get around – but she couldn’t hope to explain why she knew about the chest. She had come here before Avenidas and was already acting suspiciously, so a claim of not knowing about it would fail.

  It looked like a rage killing. It was!

  Now. How to get Avenidas?

  He had to learn a lot more about Avenidas and Blakley. He had what was needed for Halverson. Halverson was the type who accepted the total responsibility for his family. The family very obviously almost worshiped him. He was a very good father, if not much else.

  What about Blakley? Was he a good father?

  Clint could assume he was not. She wouldn’t have killed him if he was. He called Manolo and asked if he could find details on Blakley as a family man. Manolo said he had that, but didn’t include it because he didn’t think it was the kind of information Clint could use to any purpose.

  “You don’t know!” Clint replied. “This is a weird mess. That might be behind a good part of it.”

  “His wife left him shortly after Betina was born. She ran away with a guy she claimed was at least a man, not a cheating snake in the grass. She wasn’t any prize. She left Betina with him when the kid was less than a year old. She was raised by nannies, several of whom said he was a real monster. When he died she actually said she would give whoever planted him a million dollars reward. She spent her life hating men. She said she was going to use all that money he got to make more. She had learned that from him.

  “In other words, he would never make husband and father of the year.”

  “You know she killed him?” Clint asked.

  “I suspect she paid someone to do it.”

  “I think she did it.”

  “I damned well wouldn’t be surprised.”

  “Thanks, Manolo. I owe you one.”

  They chatted a few minutes, then Clint sat back, shook his head, sighed and went to his computer. He had to find a way to connect it to Avenidas if only because, that way, Gina might get something out of it. Regardless of what happened later, her father found the treasure. She didn’t have a clue as to what was going on. She was only nine or ten years old, so couldn’t be held responsible in any way. She obviously didn’t know anything about any treasure chest and she as obviously had no least idea concerning the cash in that chest.

  Betina had all the secrets, but she was now out of the equation. For the future. She was most of the equation until she ended up cut to ribbons.

  Nice scenario. Too bad it only fit in pieces. Something was missing. Something big. Clint was sure Raul Avenidas killed Betina Blakley. Everything else almost fit. Like a .357 shell in a .38. It worked, but there was a slight misfit. It would throw a lot of residue. The aim would be off just a bit.

  Why that comparison in his mind? He just couldn’t focus and seemed to be making up silly fantasies. What was damned certain was that SOMETHING was missing. There was someone else involved. Someone who was very good at being invisible. They left footprints, even if you didn’t see them go by.

  If this stupid mood didn’t break he wouldn’t solve anything. His mind seemed locked onto a circular track. There was too much he didn’t know. He was letting his own emotions get in the way of strict rationality.

  The phone rang. He picked it up. Judi asked him what the hell was wrong with him after one minute of conversation. He told her he couldn’t get his mind into gear and laid out what he was thinking, in brief.

  “Clint? I know you don’t use drugs, but you’re acting like you’re on methamphet or crack!” She sounded strange. “What have you.... Clint, what’s wrong? Really?”

  “Judi, I don’t know! I have a headache – which I never do – and can’t focus.” He stretched and looked at the comp. The clock said 10:14.

  “My god! What time do you have?”

  “Time? Around a quarter after ten. Why?”

  “I haven’t been up for a half hour! I never sleep past five thirty! It was dark and raining. I ... Judi, something IS wrong!”

  “What time did you get home? What did you have to eat or drink?”

  Clint tried to think. He remembered coming home, in a displaced sort of way. He had stopped at ... he couldn’t remember the bar. He had talked with ... someone. He was confused as to who or what they had talked about.

  “Judi, this is weirder than ever. I think I was drugged! Why? Who? I only had a beer. Nothing else.”

  “You usually have a tequila at Neil’s. Why a beer?”

  “It wasn’t at Neil’s. I stopped at a bar on the way home. Gina went back to the hotel and I was down because of that. Someone was there and waved for me to come in, so I ... no. There was someone or something in the road and I was waved down ... it would have to be someone I recognized or I would have waved and gone on. I can’t remember who it was! I can’t remember which bar.”

  “Stop trying and it may come to you. You’ll see or hear something that’ll remind you. Association works a lot of the time with that kind of thing. You might have been told to forget.”

  “I think I was. I remember someone saying it would not be a good idea to ... something.”

  “Get Sergio to have you tested for scopolamine. It sounds like you were given a hypnotic, for some reason.”

  Clint agreed. He would go get tested. He headed for the hospital. In a taxi.

  “Serg, Clint was given scopolamine last night on his way home,” Judi explained. “We want to find which bar it was and who it was he saw there. They’ll answer you where they would look blank and say he wasn’t there and didn’t talk to anyone if we asked.”

  He grimaced and agreed. He took the police truck and Clint and Judi to stop at all the bars between The Rip Tide and his house. It was the fourth one, a little local place. The old man who ran the place said Clint came in with a man and woman. She was about forty, may have been a Tica. He was a gringo. He said Clint had stopped to help him start his car and he wanted to buy him a drink. Clint ordered a Balboa and they talked for about half an hour at the little table in front.

  Clint cried, “I remember stopping to help someone with a stalled truck! His name was ... George? Something like... I don’t remember any woman.

  “Someone came by in ... on a bike. A Ho Fai. I remember that. I was sitting at the table and he went by. I can’t ... there was a woman who came from around back. She sat and was drinking a rum and coke. It was already there, so she was ... now it’s gone again.

  “I’d recognize George. She’s a blur. It was Carlos Ramirez on the bike. He saw me and will remember the woman.”

  Sergio thanked the prop and they headed out toward the Bluffs. Carlos had a few hecta
res out there. Carlos said he didn’t know who the man and woman were, but he’d seen them around. He drove a Toyota truck. Green and black with a yellow band on the doors.

  “John Brandon. The woman is his wife, Sylvia. She’s a Tica,” Sergio said.

  They thanked Carlos and headed out toward Drago to John and Sylvia’s place. No one was around. A neighbor said they went to Costa Rica early in the morning. They’d be back in four days. It was for the passport visa renewal. That left everything up in the air for the moment. Clint was thinking a lot better now, so would try to find who was connected with the Brandons – and if it had anything to do with the chest and murder. Sergio drove them back and said he was working on an angle he’d uncovered where Avenidas was concerned. It seemed he had tried to buy a lot of land on the coast on the other side of the Bluffs.

  “So. He knew it was in that general area, but not where,” Clint said. “No one had any real information except Blakley. Now she’s dead and all of these people are in big trouble with someone – but who?”

  “This mean this crap doesn’t stop when we tag Avenidas, doesn’t it?” Sergio asked.

  “It looks that way,” Clint agreed.

  Clint called Manny and asked if he could find out anything about John and Sylvia Brandon. He said he’d check them out. He called Manolo to see if he could find a connection. He called Judi and asked if she could check out Sylvia any way.

  “I already asked some people about her,” Judi replied. “It seems she was from Colombia, not Costa Rica. She just goes with John when he gets his visa updated. She has a two year visa on some kind of work card. That would mean she works for John. She’s not his wife. They let people think she is. They have that place – or John does – for the past two years, but almost never come here.