Miguel's Gift

by Bruce Kading

  Marvin Johnson held the paper out as far as his arm would extend, his eyes straining to make it out. He read aloud in a plodding, deliberate manner, “I hereby give my cusin, Hernan Garza, all my properties when I die.” An unreadable signature was scratched at the bottom.

  “Well, you’re a pretty lucky guy, aren’t you?” said Johnson with a wry smile. As he looked down at Garza, he noticed something hard protruding above the belt at Garza’s waist, concealed under the blue jacket. This was the sort of guy you would expect to carry a gun, Johnson thought. He assumed the note Hernan Garza had presented was phony. But somehow the man knew Rico well enough to know about the tools in the garage. Or whatever was in there. When Johnson had parked his truck in the garage ten minutes earlier, he’d noticed cars with red lights flashing in front of Rico’s apartment building. Perhaps Rico had been killed. But then another thought came to him. What if the police found drugs in the trunk—his trunk and in his garage? Would he be a suspect, somebody who was cooperating with Salvador Rico to hide drugs or other contraband? He suddenly pictured reporters with TV cameras swarming over his garage, wanting to talk to him. And what would this small but dangerous-looking man do if he refused to let him recover whatever was in the trunk? Johnson’s most fervent wish was to rid himself of any connection to Salvador Rico, preferably before anything damning could be found on his property. He had heard of homes being seized if they were used for illegal purposes, and envisioned federal agents brusquely taking over his property.

  “He put a lock on my trunk. Do you have the key?” asked Johnson.

  The trunk! “No, no have key,” he said. “They take Salvador away. But I have tool to cut.”

  Johnson studied Garza, his eyes shifting between Garza’s face and hip. It now seemed clear what Garza was up to. He was probably Rico’s partner in crime. And Johnson had a sense that for all his attempts to appear congenial, this little gangster was determined to get whatever Rico had in the trunk, with or without his cooperation. He didn’t need to know what was there. If he could get rid of whatever was in the trunk and sever any connection to Salvador Rico, so much the better.

  “Let’s go take a look,” said Johnson cautiously.

  “I bring car in alley,” said Garza.

  By the time Garza pulled in front of the garage, Marvin Johnson had lifted up the garage door. But now something else was bothering the old man. What if Rico wasn’t dead, as Garza claimed? Rico would no doubt blame Johnson if the trunk had been emptied, and Rico was probably even more dangerous than this character. If he could only verify that part of Garza’s story, he would feel better.

  “Just wait here a minute,” said Johnson to Garza, who stood peering anxiously into the interior of the dark garage.

  Garza’s face fell into an angry scowl. “Why? What is wrong?”

  “I’ll be right back,” said Johnson, who trudged off in the direction of the rotating lights.

  For an instant Garza thought of pulling the .38 and forcing him back, but instead he froze. There might be nothing in the trunk. Things could get ugly, and there were cops nearby. There was no way to stop the old man. Garza looked nervously up and down the alley and back into the garage. Perhaps there was time to get it open before the man returned. Garza opened the passenger door of the Regal and pulled out the bolt cutters. He looked back across the alley, but there was no sign of the man. The filthy bastard was going to turn him in—perhaps tell them about the trunk!

  Garza walked over to the trunk, heaved the bolt cutters into place, and, leaning his full weight into it, cut through the padlock. Flinging the trunk’s cover open, he stared in disbelief at what he saw inside: an innocuous collection of tools strewn over a canvas lining.

  “Hey, I thought you were going to wait,” snapped Johnson, stepping into the garage and around his pickup truck. He saw Garza kneeling alongside the opened trunk, his head hanging over the edge as though he were ill.

  “Well, go ahead and empty it out,” said Johnson huffily, “but you can’t stay parked in the alley too long. There’s an agent out there who says you’ll need to move your car. I said you were picking something up and would be gone in a minute. You were right about Rico. They told me he was killed today. I guess he was involved in counterfeit documents or something like that.”

  Johnson walked out, leaving the crestfallen Garza alone in the garage. He’d been pinning his hopes on finding something useful in that trunk. Now what would he do? He suddenly didn’t care if INS came charging into the garage to arrest him. What difference did it make? Rico was dead. He might as well return to Peru. There, at least he didn’t have an unreasonable hope for riches, a sort of disease that infected everybody in this country.

  Garza decided to take the tools that appeared to have some value—a large crescent wrench and a power drill. As he removed them, he spotted something curious. The sharp corner of a piece of paper was barely visible along the edge of the canvas liner. Then he noticed that the liner appeared to be about four inches higher than the bottom of the trunk. He pulled back the corner of the liner for a better look and gasped. It was a crisp hundred-dollar bill. His hands shaking, Garza removed the few remaining tools and pulled the liner away. There in front of him was a thick layer of bills that nearly took his breath away. They were stacked carefully to create an even bed beneath the tools. Garza placed the tips of his fingers on the bills and pressed down to confirm they were real and not some illusion that flowed from booze and self-pity. He pushed them around and could see that they were all hundred-dollar bills, perhaps three or four thousand of them.

  His heart pulsing with glee, Hernan Garza shoveled the loose bills into a large, black garbage bag he found next to the newspapers, afraid that the old man would return at any moment. He had just put the last of the bills and the bolt cutters in the bag when a voice came from behind.

  “Hey, you there.” The deep baritone voice filled the garage and lifted Garza to his toes as he swung around toward the alley. There, just inside the garage was a huge figure, backlit by the sunshine. It was INS agent Tim Reynolds.

  “We’re federal agents. Is this your car parked out here?” asked Reynolds impatiently.

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Well, it’s blocking that parking lot and we need to get in there,” said Reynolds, stepping out from the garage and into the sunlight.

  Garza didn’t hesitate. He threw the heavy bag over his shoulder and walked boldly toward the officer, leaving the tools behind.

  The agent watched Garza, who brushed against him with the loaded bag as he marched quickly to his car. Reynolds could smell alcohol even before Garza spoke.

  “I move car, sir,” said Garza with a shaky smile.

  Reynolds peered curiously into the garage and back at Garza, who quickly threw the bag into the backseat and fired up the Regal. Something about the little fellow struck Reynolds as suspicious. He not only had a thick Spanish accent and had been drinking but also was a bit too eager to leave the area. Garza drove slowly forward toward Reynolds, who was standing in front of him in the middle of the alley. Reynolds held up a huge arm for Garza to stop.

  “Hold up a minute,” he called out, and Garza rolled to a stop.

  Reynolds walked to the car window and leaned over to look inside. His eyes shifted from Garza to the plastic bag on the backseat.

  “You’ve been drinking,” said Reynolds.

  Garza gave him a big smile that showed his stained and rotting teeth. “Just a little. I not drunk,” he said. Garza dropped his right hand from the wheel to his hip, feeling the gun with the inside of his wrist.

  A white evidence van had entered the parking lot. Reynolds looked toward the van and then back at Garza. He thought there was a good chance this guy was illegal. Though his English was better than most, he smelled of not only liquor but also fear. Still, Reynolds knew that if he questioned the man about his immigration status, he would be responsible for processing him for deportation. Reynolds guessed he wasn’t a Mexican, so the pro
cessing would take even longer. He was already busy collecting evidence on the Rico case. Who had time to deal with yet another illegal alien? To hell with it.

  “Well, drive safely and don’t stop for another drink, you hear?”

  “Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”

  Tim Reynolds looked on as the Regal drove slowly over dried leaves. Garza, watching Reynolds in the side-view mirror, stuck his hand out the window and offered a cheerful parting wave.

  * * *

  Nick’s shoulder was throbbing, though he also felt a lingering euphoria from whatever narcotic had been administered, and it infused everything with the hazy texture of a dream. Not yet fully awake, he peered out the window at stars shimmering in an ebony sky. Puffs of gray clouds passed through the sky like sheep moving in the night.

  He finally turned away and glanced around the room, lit only by a small nightlight next to his bed. The door out to the hallway was partly open, and he could hear the soft padding of feet and murmur of conversations among the nurses down the hall. Though warm, the room had a cool antiseptic feel and odor.

  A nurse stopped by and told him the surgery had gone well. The bullet had caught the outside of the shoulder and exited cleanly. No major arteries had been severed. He should feel lucky, she told him. His arm and shoulder would be placed in a soft cast and sling. Anxious to regain clarity of thought, he refused more pain medication.

  Tom Kane arrived at the hospital at about eleven thirty. He let out a grateful sigh as he let his weary body collapse in a chair next to Nick’s bed.

  “I had to badge my way in because it’s past visiting hours,” said Kane with a weak grin. There was an awkward silence as Kane stared gloomily at Hayden’s shoulder, swollen with bandages.

  “I wish we hadn’t been parked so far away,” said Kane. “We had to break down the front door of the bar. Somebody locked it after you and Miguel got inside.”

  Hayden was expecting Kane to be miffed. Nick was open to charges that his actions were rash—an emotional response that placed the other agents and Miguel at greater risk. No doubt Kane considered it a misguided and unprofessional concern for the safety of an informant who knew well enough the risks involved. Then there was the matter of Miguel having a gun. Nick recalled that Miguel never answered his question about having a gun. He should have swept the vehicle. Then again, if he had, he’d probably be dead now.

  “I think I’m awake enough,” said Hayden. “What happened after I got carted away?”

  Kane poured some water from a pitcher on the nightstand into a plastic cup, drank half of it, and paused to organize his thoughts.

  “Well, Pinal helped us out and that made things a lot easier.”

  Kane reported that Felix Pinal, just happy to be alive, had chosen to cooperate fully. Like many inexperienced criminals, he’d assumed the government knew a great deal more than it did and that he had no leverage.

  After the counterfeit documents earmarked for Miguel were found in a briefcase under the sofa, Pinal led agents to a removable ceiling panel, and behind it were over ten thousand more documents. He then opened Rico’s small safe, located behind a wood panel on the wall, where Rico kept his operating cash, and agents seized $81,000, most of it in hundred-dollar bills, along with two hundred bogus Puerto Rican birth certificates. Pinal said they sold the birth certificates for a thousand dollars apiece and that this part of the business was growing rapidly.

  Though minutes earlier Kane had appeared exhausted, he was now revived. “You’re not gonna believe what else he came up with,” he said.

  Pinal had produced a key to a storage locker Rico was renting under another phony name, and there they found dozens of packages of blank counterfeit green cards and social security cards. There hadn’t been time to do a complete count, but the initial estimate was staggering: 140,000 green cards and 100,000 social security cards. Street value: several million dollars.

  “We ended up arresting about twenty-two vendors around the city and seizing a bunch of manufacturing equipment. The arraignments will be tomorrow.”

  Stark was handling press inquiries at the office and had issued a brief press release. Two suspects were dead and one officer had been wounded. That was all. Once the dust settled and official identification of Rico was received, Stark would hold a press conference and get the word out that Salvador Rico was one and the same as Liriano Solis, wanted in Panama for murder. That revelation would help divert attention from the embarrassing fact that an informant carrying an unauthorized weapon had been the one to kill Rico.

  “I told Stark that what you did was justified. If Miguel had gone in there, gun or no gun, there was a good chance he wasn’t coming out alive, especially with the wire down. Pinal said they had decided to search Miguel again and that Rico would have killed him, destroyed the tape, and tried to make a run for it. It looked like some kind of rip-off when you came in alone—that maybe you were a dirty cop.”

  “And what did Stark say?”

  “Not much, but I could tell he wasn’t happy about what you did. You better watch out. I have a feeling he might come after you. He’s going to have to explain about Miguel having the gun. It’s not as clean as he’d like it to be.”

  Kane sat silently for a moment, reviewing a day crammed with innumerable details. Then his eyes lit up.

  “Oh, I almost forgot,” said Kane, leaning closer. “Pinal says Rico has a stash of several hundred grand in cash hidden somewhere—maybe more. He would always clear out the safe if there was a substantial amount in there. He says Rico was very careful about not letting anyone know where it was kept. He doesn’t think it’s in a bank because Rico didn’t want to draw attention with large cash deposits. But it’s out there somewhere. We searched his apartment and vehicle and came up with nothing except a few guns.”

  Neither of them said anything for a few moments, and then Hayden lifted his eyes toward Kane. “Sorry it all fell on you.”

  “Don’t worry about it. It worked out well except for what happened to you. This thing has turned out to be a lot bigger than we expected. We got lucky, first with Miguel and then with Pinal.”

  “Yeah, Miguel was the key. He should get a lot of the credit.”

  Kane finished the water and stood up to leave. “Well, I’m gonna grab a beer and get some sleep. Tomorrow will be busy with all the arraignments.” He patted Hayden’s outstretched leg.

  “Thanks for coming over, Tom.”

  “I’m just glad you seem to be doing OK. But I’m going to need your help finding Rico’s stash of money, so get out of here as soon as you can,” said Kane as he trudged wearily toward the door. “I’ll keep you posted.”

  As the narcotic effect wore off, Hayden began to review the day’s events. Tomorrow he would check on Miguel—make sure he was holding up OK after a bizarre and bloody day. He realized his own problems were minor compared to Miguel’s, whose fate now rested precariously in the hands of Richard Stark—hardly a comforting thought.

  Nick shifted his position, which shot a bolt of pain through his shoulder, and he rang for the nurse. Then he felt a powerful wave of fatigue and closed his eyes. There were ways to keep Miguel here, even if he could no longer be an informant. Maybe Stark could be reasoned with.

  By the time the nurse arrived he’d fallen into a deep sleep.

  18

  The sun, deceptively pale and white, blazed through a cloudless sky. The road curved west from the Everglades into a vast, desolate landscape of sand, wetland scrub grass, and gnarled cypress trees—no sign of anything man-made aside from the road and a line of telephone poles that looked like weathered crucifixes.

  After exiting the interstate, Nick had seen only one vehicle, a pickup truck heading in the opposite direction. The driver, an old man wearing a straw cowboy hat, had waved and seemed to be laughing, as though amused by what lay ahead for Hayden.

  The rental car was letting out an occasional gasp, as if it was running out of gas or the engine was misfiring. Nick checked the fue
l gauge and saw that he had well over half a tank. Thinking it might be the strain of the air conditioner, he turned it off, rolled down the windows, and was instantly engulfed in hot, steamy air—the heat magnified by the soft cast and sling wrapped around his shoulder. Within minutes, his T-shirt was soaked with sweat.

  Nick felt fortunate to find somebody at the only business in Hollins, a general store and gas station. The owner, a middle-aged man with a handlebar mustache and a Panama hat, confirmed that Tatum was still living in the area. “Nobody knows him. Keeps to himself,” he said. He gave Hayden directions to Tatum’s property and then added: “You wanna be careful if he’s not expecting you. Some folks around here don’t take kindly to strangers.”

  About four miles from the store, Hayden spotted what appeared to be the sandy road the man had described. There was a carved wooden sign off to the side that read, NO TRESPASSING! THIS MEANS YOU! He turned cautiously onto the road. On each side were pools of water covered with swirls of bright green algae. The terrain was flat, dotted with low-lying brush and an occasional willow or cypress tree. Off to the right an egret stood poised at the edge of a lagoon—its white plumage, long neck, and yellow bill etched sharply against a sea of green.

  After a few minutes of slow driving, Nick saw a cluster of trees on a rise, several feet above the surrounding grasses. An old white trailer home came into view beneath the trees—a faded red pickup parked off to the side. He’d reached the end of the road, and there were no other buildings in sight. About fifty feet beyond the trailer was a small lake of perhaps twelve acres, rimmed by an endless savanna of tall wetland grasses. There was a pungent though not unpleasant smell of moist vegetation. Everything was still, the silence accentuating the landscape’s desolate beauty.

  The trailer was short and squat, resting on cement blocks that lifted it about two feet off the ground. Two small windows were covered with old, yellowed newspaper. Moss-covered branches of a cypress tree hung over the roof, offering a bit of shade and holding moisture that had gradually dripped brown streaks down the metal siding.