by Moulton, CD
“What did he say to that?”
“That you were never concerned. It was an accident that you and I got involved at all.”
“And?”
“I said that Pablo was murdered in cold blood on the property of a friend of yours, you were shot, I was abducted – and we aren’t involved? How droll!”
“That sounds like you. What next?”
“He said he doesn’t know about any of that. He wasn’t told. He was simply getting in touch with us because a person involved discovered you were with the Campbells.”
“Yeah. Right.”
“He’ll call you. He said for me to arrange something and I gave him your number and said to call you.”
“Thanks. Take care. This is as weird as what else has happened.”
They chatted a moment, then Clint hung up. He could figure about how long it would take for whoever to call him. If he really wasn’t involved on that end he would have to check it out.
Clint was up all night. It would be very soon if this turkey was involved. It would take several hours if he wasn’t. If he wasn’t Clint could get some information from him.
It was three and a half hours later when the call came. Chances were this guy wasn’t too deeply involved. He was trying to deliver a message and to defuse the situation as he claimed. Clint would meet him at the Alcalá restaurant at six. He would see what was up then. He might be up all night again so he got another three hours of sleep, then went to the Alcalá and into the restaurant. He got a table and was there about ten minutes when a dark bullish man came to sit across the table from him. He introduced himself as Oscar Mittermann. Major Oscar Mittermann, if it made a difference.
“Not to me. What do you want?”
“I’ve checked on you. I know more about you right now than you do, probably. I think we can work together.
“What is going on, quite frankly, is that a bunch of people from various countries are planning some kind of weird mutual action to consolidate military forces to challenge the US about some operations. We can’t let that happen and we can’t let the people know we have anything on them or their plot.”
“You can’t make a dent in the drug trade with the methods you’re using. Everyone here knows how false your wolf cries are. Ever since Ollie North your programs are a joke.”
“Don’t I know it! It has nothing to do with drugs. I’ve got better ways to waste my time. These people are planning to take control of the canal and shipping to and from most of the South and Central American countries.”
“Can’t happen. The canal isn’t defendable and the US is their major market. Try again.”
Mittermann studied him a minute. Clint called the waiter over and ordered a pork steak with all the trimmings, then sat back. Mittermann ordered the same and grinned at Clint.
“It’s about ... this is going to sound stupid ... voodoo. A group from Haiti and Jamaica are scaring the hell out of the pols in several of these countries. They want to run things.
“Okay. That’s true, but they’re backed, sponsored, by ... this sounds like crap.”
“It is crap. Why are you doing this? Insulting my intelligence isn’t going to get any cooperation from me.”
Mittermann sat back and got more and more nervous. “You know all the conspiracy theories going around, of course. They’re more and more popular as people get more and more frustrated with big government and big money running it. Is it any easier to believe the truth? It’s a scheme by a bunch of bankers to destroy the Federal Reserve and impose a currency on all the South and Central American countries – that they control.
“Maybe there’s a conspiracy in the states and Europe, maybe not. I tend to think there is, frankly. I just don’t have a clue about how to fight it. They have the power.”
“I could agree with dumping the Fed,” Clint agreed. “That’s where one hell of a lot of the world’s problems are coming from. I could agree with a currency among all the countries in the Americas if the Fed wasn’t in control. If they set something up like you suggest it’s the same thing here. If it’s true I wouldn’t blink to learn that the US Fed’s behind it. We need a universal exchange. We don’t need that bunch in control of it. It’s the end of economic freedom for anyone.
“I listen to a lot of the stuff. I agree with some of it and disagree with some of it. I’m not sure the cure isn’t worse than the disease, though.
“I don’t give a shit about it. I can be with the Indios and won’t be affected. When you or anyone else brings it to them, you have me to fight.”
“I swear to you on whatever oath you care to impose that we didn’t know about Armand Gault and that bunch. We knew that Claire Auber has her thumb in it up to the elbow so we could have figured it would get out of hand. Hope she doesn’t decide to come here. She has all the witch doctors in this hemisphere scared shitless of her. Voodoo is involved to that extent. Too many of the bigshits believe in that garbage.”
“I’ve seen a few things. Some of it works, but I don’t believe magic is involved.”
“They’re very able with untraceable poisons and such.”
“Among other things. Maybe some few of them have some minor psy power or something. The bruja on the comarca can sense the follower spell Auber put on one of the women. That works.”
Mittermann stared at Clint a moment. He didn’t know if he was serious so he said he was. He didn’t have a clue to how it worked.
“She knows who has the spell or that one of them does?” Mittermann asked.
“That one or more of them have it and that it’s the women because all the men were with me when we talked with her and she knew it wasn’t them.”
“She senses electrical emanations somehow. We have a few in the department who can do that. They’re sensitive. There will be some kind of device involved. Those people can get their hands on almost any of the crap.”
“Then we can find it,” Clint said.
“Yeah. We can get a wideband scanner and find it.”
“Do that and I’ll help – if just to get the type who brought this to the Indios out of here.”
Mittermann didn’t say anything. He made a call on a somewhat large cell phone, then said a man would meet them in one hour in the parque. He would have the bugchaser, as they called it.
Clint and Mittermann had the delicious meal and chatted, then went to the parque where a bum came to sell them contraband CDs and DVDs. Mittermann looked through his cooler of CDs and bought three. The bum put them in a bolsa and slipped a package in, took the five dollars and latched onto a passing gringo, saying he had all the latest CDs and DVDs from the states at just a dollar apiece.
Clint and Mittermann went to Peter’s place and had a Balboa, then went out to take a cab that happened to be passing. The CD salesman was the driver. They went to Quiteño and used the bugchaser. There was one transponder in Ann’s purse, made into the clasp. She said she bought it in Haiti from a stand on the street. She didn’t know how they could know it was her who would buy it.
“They didn’t,” Judi said. “They saw which one it was and substituted when you were out or something.”
Cori also had one. It was in a necklace she bought in Haiti.
“Okay. I’m convinced I can work with you, but I don’t believe one word of the crap explanation,” Clint said.
“Fair enough,” Mittermann replied. “I’ll take you back to the Costa Rica and meet with you tomorrow. We can figure some angle. I’m with you about getting those kinds out of here.”
He dropped Clint off and the taxi took him on to his hotel, the Alcalá. Clint went inside the Costa Rica, talked with the owner, Lee, and Bob for awhile, then went to his room..
That was successful! Now to find out who Armand Gault was and what was really going on.
He called Judi and warned her Mittermann had probably put some kind of fancy spy device there so be careful. She said Cori was watching him in the mirror from the bathroom when he slipped a cute little thing beh
ind the toilet. They checked and found one behind the refrigerator and another in the master bedroom.
“And one under the server shelf to the kitchen from the sala,” Clint said. “I saw that one. He wasn’t too subtle. I was probably expected to be watching and wouldn’t know he planted others. Pick them all up, say goodnight into them and go to bed. There’re probably more of different kinds. I suppose they’re listening to this.
“You people need new methods. TV’s already exposed all of this. If we knew anything we’d be damned sure you wouldn’t learn about it unless we decide there’s a reason you should know. This just means we won’t trust any of you an inch.
“See you tomorrow, Jude. Tell everybody good night for me.”
They hung up. Clint went to bed.
“Good morning, Clint!” Clint heard when he answered the phone. He was sitting in the little open-air restaurant across from the taxi stand by Romero’s. It was ten to six and not much else was open in David.
“Good morning,” he replied. “Mike?”
“Uh-huh. We caught some crud sneaking around by the bodega. Obilio decided that, seeing he’s so interested in it, we would lock him in until you come to ask him a number of polite questions.”
“What does he say?”
“Nothing, except he’s with the US government and is here to protect us. He said to call you and to have you talk to somebody called Oscar.”
“He’s from the CIA and isn’t there to protect anybody. You shouldn’t need any protection, but ... you might. Tell him to let you know what he’s looking for and maybe you’ll help him find it. I’ll call Oscar and let him know how much we appreciate all this crap.
“I think the most dangerous one where we’re concerned is the witch woman, Claire. I haven’t a clue as to what they’re doing. The explanations don’t make sense. All I know is that they’re doing something that will ... I’ll be damned!”
“What?”
“You know something? I think we’re just a distraction. Cori happened to be at a place at a time that ... That makes no sense, either. It’s too complicated to have a hope it will work. Antoin wouldn’t be dead if that was it.
“Christ! I can’t make anything make sense! I suppose you can let your guest go. There will be someone from the other side lurking around. Be careful. If there’s any kind of attack shoot to kill.”
“We already decided that. Call after you talk to that Oscar character. We’ll keep this one on ice until we hear from you.”
Clint agreed and hung up. The phone buzzed almost immediately. “We don’t have anybody out there! Don’t let him go!” Mittermann almost screamed.
“Good morning. You can get a car that can get us there fairly fast?”
“Is there a place a chopper can land?”
“A small one.”
“Airport. Fifteen minutes.” He hung up.
What in HELL is going on? Clint thought as he dropped some money on the counter and flagged a taxi from across the street. He was at the airport eight minutes and twenty dollars later. He told the cabbie there was twenty in it if he was there in less than ten minutes. He was. Mittermann came about five minutes later and they went to the private chopper sitting near the terminal. They were landing on Obilio’s mountaintop nine and a half minutes later. On the way, Clint told Mittermann one more lie and the cooperation was gone for good. He had no authority in Panamá. This turkey was Obilio’s capture, on the comarca, and Obilio would decide who and when anyone else spoke to him. Mittermann said the sad fact was that they were trained to never tell the truth about anything.
“That’s your reputation. This guy said to talk to you.”
“So connect the dots, but it’s from the wrong direction. Mike said he wanted you to talk to Oscar. Nobody in the outfit or out calls me Oscar. It’s always Mittermann.”
Clint nodded and said that was what make him suspicious from the first. What was the object?
“You almost did it. You almost said to let him go. By the time you found out he wasn’t from the agency he’d be in Paris or somewhere.”
“Port au Prince.”
“I don’t think he’s with them. I really don’t. We’ve identified all of them who are here. That scares me.”
Clint was surprised. He said they would find out who he was with. Mittermann said he would be trained against telling them anything true. He wouldn’t react to pain.
“We have an expert on making people talk,” Clint said.
“I think it won’t work. We have everything and we have counters for everything. Built in.”
“You just think you do. You badly underestimate the resources on the comarca. You underestimate these people – again.”
Mittermann grinned. “You know something? I think maybe you can get answers.”
Mike and Obilio came out to the chopper. Mark and Matt were inside and had rifles pointed at anyone who got off the chopper they didn’t know already. Obilio pointed to the bodega and said someone tried to come to it from in back. A couple of shots that missed less than an inch seemed to have convinced him that wasn’t a good idea. It was too dark to see much of anything about him.
Obilio took the heavy board holding the door shut off and opened the door.
“Armand?! In person!?” Mittermann cried, almost screeched.
“Hello, Mittermann. It would seem these people are better at this kind of thing than either of us.”
“Shall we go to the house and have a cup of hot coffee?” Obilio suggested.
Clint laughed, then Mittermann, then Armand.
“Might as well be civilized about it,” Armand said. “Armand Gault. You’re Faraday. I know who the Campbells are.”
“Obilio, comarca councilman and boss,” Mike introduced. “This gets weirder and weirder!”
“You can say that again,” Mittermann said.
“This gets weirder and weirder.” Mike shot back, looking innocent. Mittermann giggled and waved at the house.
There was a shot from above them in the forest. Gault staggered and dropped.
Matt stepped out of the house and scanned the area with binoculars, then carefully shot at a spot in the forest.
“Probably didn’t hit, but it will be close. There was a spot of smoke from that shot.”
Gault had crawled a few feet to a large rock Lila had planted terstrial orchids around. He sat up and swore steadily. There was blood coming from his right shoulder.
“Come on!” Mittermann said. “You’ve been shot before!”
“Asshole!” Gault said and stood unsteadily.
Matt was watching the spot where he’d shot through the binoculars. He grunted and said someone was running through the meadow toward the path they had followed already two times. He waited another few seconds, then said, “Damn! It’s Maria!”
That really got Gault to swearing.
“You were working for her, huh?” Clint asked.
“WITH her, I thought. Bitch!”
They went into the house. Mittermann made a bandage for Gault’s arm. He said they would have to get him to a hospital.
“After while,” Clint said.
“It could be critical. I can’t stop the bleeding.”
“Then it would be wise for Mr. Gault to answer Clint’s questions quickly,” Obilio said. “You may not leave the comarca until I say you may leave the comarca.”
“I think Armand has a strong incentive to answer the questions,” Mittermann said.
“Ask away,” Gault said.
“Who and what?” Clint asked.
“A group. To establish a control of banking in Central and South America, including all the islands in the gulf and Caribbean.”
“You’re part of the group?”
“Apparently not. I thought I was.”
“Maria is. That’s obvious.”
“No. She is a sociopath who’s being used by a woman known as Claire Auber. Claire Auber is one of the twelve people who are running things. Eleven. I’m obviously going to do
what I can to end them. Dr. Freud would make a big case study of someone like her!”
“Maria’s a sociopath who may have been acting on her own,” Mittermann pointed out.
“Or not,” he replied. “I’ll cooperate. I don’t know if you can do anything if Auber is behind it.”
“Oh, I can,” Clint said. “Obilio, I think we can allow Mr. Gault leave to go to a hospital.”
Obilio nodded. Mittermann took Gault to the chopper and they took off. Clint would have to stay. The chopper was a two-seater.
The Missing Clue
“Why did you not ask him what he came here to find?” Obilio asked.
“I caught that,” Mike said. “Good question!”
“Because I want to find it.” Clint went to the bodega. They took everything out. Obilio said it was a good time to clean the place so he cleaned everything and they put most of it back. They didn’t find anything.
“Gault and Maria think it’s here. Maria was here. Whatever it is has to be here,” Clint said stubbornly. “It wouldn’t make sense that she would go to that trouble to find something she ... so we locked Gault up in this bodega. Damn! How stupid!”
“I think he did not take anything away with him,” Obilio said. “I assure you I would have found it when we made the bandages. I know how to find anything on a person.”
“Then it’s still right here. It’s why he was so unconcerned when everything happened,” Mike said. “He seemed a little bit smug to me the whole time.”
“There wasn’t any time since we let him out that he could have hidden anything,” Mark argued. “He hid it somewhere in the bodega. It’ll be a paper or something very small. He slipped it under a floor ... there aren’t any. It’s a stone floor. It’s under a stone.”
“No stone was moved. I would know,” Obilio said positively.
Clint laughed. “I wonder, why did he crawl around after he was shot when none of us were concentrating on him? Hmm? Want to bet?”