Beer, Bait, and Ammo

by Harper, Chap

  The wine and salad arrived at the same time. Both had ordered dressing on the side, which they poured on their salad to fill the silence. Debi took a gulp of wine and looked in Lester’s eyes.

  “Lester, first you need to know that both Einstein and Steve Jobs had dyslexia. Having dyslexia is in no way a measure of intelligence. You’re an amazing and brilliant man. However, I’ve never seen or heard of a case as severe as yours. I think I know why. Here’s a copy of your MRI.” She slid a multi-colored electronic picture from her envelope.

  “This should be reviewed by your doctor, and you need to discuss it with Sydney, but I thought we could at least see the issue and then you can go into detail with a neurologist.” Debi pointed to a spot on the colored picture. Another large swig from her wine glass was in order.

  “What is that spot?” Lester asked.

  “My dad couldn’t be sure, but believes that the car wreck that killed your mom injured your brain, and caused either a blood clot or scar tissue right on top of the area of your brain that controls certain speech and word functions. The cerebral cortex processes language and symbolic representations. Two sections within this region that are vital for human communication are the Wernick’s area and the Broca’s area. Some recent studies showed the less dominant right hemisphere participates in comprehension of words either written or heard. Your anomaly sits right on top of this area.” Debi looked up to see what his reaction would be. He put his finger on the spot and rubbed it as though he hoped it would go away.

  “Einstein? Steve Jobs? Cool!” He looked Debi in her eyes and said, “You’re a very smart lady. I’m impressed that you got your dad to read the MRI so you could explain the findings to me rather than dumping me off to a neurologist who might not care about me as a person.” Lester reached over and squeezed her hand. He noticed she had tears in her eyes.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  “Yes. I’m sorry, but that was a sweet thing to say.” Debi blotted her eyes with a white cloth napkin.

  Lester laughed and said, “I suggest we eat our salads and drink wine until this place closes.”

  “Lester, I don’t think there has ever been anyone who had surgery to correct dyslexia. Your case may be an exception. If you did have that scar tissue or blood clot removed, there’s the possibility that you would have to re-learn everything you know. Of course, it would be a hell of lot easier, but still…”

  “Does your dad know the best neurosurgeon in the state?” Lester asked.

  “I’ll ask, but little is known about specific areas of the brain. Much has been learned by accident. A man gets shot during a war, and while he is operated on to remove a bullet on the brain, the doctors notice that a certain part of his speech is affected, and that is noted. A woman has a stroke and they remove the clot on her brain, and they notice she can speak but no longer can read. They put that in their notes. This has gone on for centuries to where we have collected a pretty extensive body of work,” Debi explained.

  “The hearing specialist said a hearing aid for my left side would help me some.”

  “Yes, I’m sorry I didn’t bring that up. My guess is that you read lips at times from conversation coming from your left. The device will help you, but I don’t think your dyslexia was affected much by your hearing loss. You can ask your new speech therapist her opinion.”

  “Is she as pretty as you are?”

  “She’s about sixty-six-years-old, very attractive, and very married.”

  They finished their salads and had another glass of wine before they left. Lester gave her an envelope with his $40 co-pay and insisted on paying for her meal. He explained that he was paid more than even the officers at the sheriff’s office since the sheriff paid him as a special investigator. He earned bonuses for his work with all the other police departments.

  When he dropped her off at her office, he said he would wait to hear from her dad on a recommendation for a neurosurgeon. Lester went around the SUV and held her hand as she exited the truck. Some sort of electrical energy ran through their hands and it took them a while to disconnect. Lester stood by as she unlocked the office. An awkward moment followed.

  “Uh…are you going to set up my first appointment with Mrs. Carter?”

  “I’d be glad to do that for you, Lester.”

  “Debi –would you—uh—have dinner with me Friday night since I guess we are legal now?”

  “I would love to, but I wonder if there is a residual patient-client thingy—what do we do about that?”

  “You only date past patients who’re police officers and also have scar tissue on their brain—no other former patients?”

  “Got it—call me later and we’ll also discuss my dad’s advice on brain doctors.”

  Lester drove off, wondering if she had accepted or put him off.

  Chapter Four

  Monday—Mt. Ida

  A black Hummer blew past the guard office at S.G. Crystals and slid to a stop in front of a door marked “Employees only.” A striking blond woman with radiant green eyes moved quickly from the vehicle to the door without looking around. Her skintight leather pants exposed a shapely young body enhanced by boots with three-inch heels and a gun holster under her left armpit. The door barely slammed shut when she started shouting angrily.

  A tall young man with long brown hair tied in a ponytail was pressed up against the wall. His face was only inches from the pretty blond-haired woman. Spit peppered his face during her tirade.

  “Stick—you idiot! Why in the fuck didn’t you go to Quince’s house and pick up those guns?”

  “I didn’t hear about him getting shot until two days later, and the cop had already been out there,” Stick said.

  “Where were you that you didn’t hear the news on TV or your goddamn radio?” More spit blasted his face.

  “Deer stand…we went to deer camp to build stands. No TV there, and nobody called me. Sorry, didn’t know all this was going to happen. I talked to Quince and invited him to go with us. Said…had things to do. Didn’t know that meant—killing his wife and her boyfriend.” He stared her straight in the eyes.

  She moved away from where she had him pinned to the wall and looked at the group of about ten people in the room.

  “All of you better be prepared to have this place searched. Go underground with the operation and seal and perfume it from drug dogs. Make this place look legit if it means you buy ten tons of crystals from everybody in town. Get a crew working the old Waggner Mine we bought and get several truckloads dumped in the back of the warehouse. I can fucking assure you they will be around. Lester McFarlin is as good as they get simply because he don’t miss a trick. Most cops would have scratched this up as a domestic case and went for coffee and donuts. Not this guy. In a couple of days he’ll be here and maybe also in New Orleans. Prepare your ass to be investigated.”

  She left, slamming the door again, and jumped into her Hummer, fishtailed down the gravel driveway and out the guard gate. Angel Gambini’s thoughts mostly centered on her decision to move her operations from New Orleans to the Arkansas sticks. Damn deer hunters—so goddamn important here. Katrina wiped out her production facilities that were located in the ninth ward in Orleans Parish. She had little hope of starting back up anytime soon even though she had tried for a long time.

  For years her family came to Hot Springs for summer vacation and in the springtime to bet on the horses. They had a houseboat at Mountain Harbor Resort and loved to go dock it on an island for swimming and fishing. Compared to the swampland in southern Louisiana where most trees had water beneath them, this was paradise. Lakes in Arkansas had gravel bottoms surrounded by rock cliffs. Angel had never seen a rock in Louisiana. Parking lots, roads and driveways were paved with oyster shells. Without oyster shells, cars in New Orleans would sink below the surface, and only boats would be left to take folks around town. Angel had been told this, but wasn’t sure how true it was.

  She came from families who might not be trusted to tell
the truth. Among her distant Italian relatives were names like Marcello, Carollo, Gagliano, and Giacona. Her parents were Matrangas, and she was pretty sure she was connected to most crime families in New Orleans and New York City. Her husband, Richie Gambini, had died in a car accident that ended in a deep dive off the causeway into a swamp full of alligators. The police first said he was driving too fast for conditions, but later reported his hands were tied behind him and a bullet was lodged in his brain. Angel insisted she had not taken part in the killing and acted genuinely distraught at the funeral. Later, people learned he had sampled too many of the amenities at the Royal Street Asian Massage Parlor he owned, now managed by Angel. The only thing she would admit was she moved out when she discovered her husband Richie had a thing going with a certain Asian hooker.

  Crime families generate nicknames, and this family had such characters as Fat Frank Gagliano and Spider Gambini, for Angel Gambini. Since black widow spiders kill their mates, why not apply “Spider” to the only female underboss in an American crime family? Although Angel did not choose the Spider designation and denied any part in her husband’s death, her cohorts stuck her with the name just the same.

  She and Richie had a son, Frank Marcello Gambini, fifteen-years-old and attending a boarding school in New York. Plenty of family in the area to keep an eye on him, and if he gave his full name to anyone who had a sense of history they would surely give him a wide berth.

  Spider was thirty-seven and every bit as beautiful as when she was a nineteen-year-old contestant in the Miss Louisiana beauty contest. As second runner up, she had some animosity toward her parents for not paying the right people to get her the title. Her talent on the stage was tap dancing, but her real talent was using guns, a skill the judges didn’t get to witness. She didn’t see many men on a social basis, as most were a little put off by the array of guns she took to bed with her. However, she had casually met Lester McFarlin at a Hot Springs charity event and talked to him about crime fighting and some of the cases he had solved. She told him she was a writer and might want to interview him further. She really liked what she saw. Spider said she would call to set up an interview but never did. In the back of her mind she had some fear that if he found her out and then she would have to kill him.

  On this Tuesday morning, Becca saw Lester sitting at his desk and came by, walked completely around him, and moved some papers for a landing place for her shapely rear.

  “Doll, got your report. Except for the RPGs, assault rifles, and grenades, they all came from New Orleans—same guy. Reports say he’s a gun runner for the mob there. Little Richard interviewed the sister and she reported that Quince’s wife had stolen the Glock from her estranged husband since he had plenty. Automatic weapons most likely were ripped off from a reserve unit near Shreveport—rest from overseas—most likely Pakistan—can buy a tank there, so I’m told.”

  “Do people whisper those things in your ear during intimate moments?” Lester asked.

  “Come over tonight and I’ll whisper something in your ear.”

  “Get back to you on that.”

  Little Richard was sitting at a desk behind Lester and was a little put off that Becca had given part of his report.

  “Rich, can you get me the New Orleans police department on the phone? See if they have an organized crime department—if not, the people who work that crap,” Lester said.

  A few minutes later, Lester was talking to a captain by the name of Hank Campanella who headed a vice unit. “Captain, this is Lester McFarlin with the Garland County Sheriff’s office in Hot Springs, Arkansas. How are you today? Great. Would you be so kind as to check up on a Tony Evola for me? Seems to run guns and a few of them floated into Arkansas after Katrina.”

  “Don’t have to check—know him well,” Captain Campanella said. “He buys guns for most of the mob here. Has his own sporting goods store and participates in every gun show known to man. For the most part he keeps his nose clean, but we all know he’s dealing arms under the table—just can’t catch his ass.”

  “Found a closet full of automatic weapons, RPGs, and grenades. All the legal guns were registered to your man Evola. Tell me about your crime families there. Got a feeling some of them are on permanent vacation in my lovely city,” Lester said.

  “The old families—the Marcellos, Carollos, Giaconas, and the Gaglianos all died out—but their kids, grandkids, cousins and uncles still operate quietly. Many in legitimate businesses. I did hear that one may have moved to Arkansas.”

  “Who is he?”

  “Not a he. It’s a she, and a damn good looking one at that. Mean as a snake, and please don’t send her back here.”

  “Give me her name. I think I may have dated her,” Lester said, laughing.

  “If you did, you’re lucky to be alive. Angel Gambini—a.k.a., Spider Gambini. Kin to every gangster that ever lived. Big time drug dealer. Keep her. And we’ve heard of you, Lester—started to hire you for a big murder investigation, but the department didn’t have the money to spare. Good luck on your investigation.”

  “Thanks. If I come to New Orleans for this case maybe I can help you with something—no charge. If you’ve a picture of Angel, that’d be helpful. Rich’ll give you the fax number.”

  Lester handed the phone to Little Richard and got up and walked to the sheriff’s office. Lester had made the freebie offer to the New Orleans police department without consulting Mike Adams, which Lester knew would not go quietly into the night. Sheriff Adams was on the phone to the quorum court concerning completion of a new jail that had been funded by a tax increase. Remarkably, there were $2 million in reserves that had not been anticipated since the tax generated an excess in revenues. Lester was aware of the giant slush fund and was not shy about dipping into it.

  When the sheriff hung up, Lester said, “Mike, I’m just warning you that I may need to go to New Orleans for this investigation.” Lester loved dropping these bombs, and then he would sit back and watch the sheriff self-destruct. Mike Adams did not disappoint him.

  “Why in hell do you think because you’re Lester McFarlin you can go anywhere…investigate anywhere…spend my whole fucking budget in a day or two—can’t do me that way!” Sheriff Adams stopped for a minute to get his breath and let his blood pressure drop back below stroke level.

  “I had to take one of my clerical staff down to part time the other day because of my budget, but because you want to be a hero you can spend thousands of dollars chasing pussy in New Orleans.” Mike was now just grabbing airtime.

  “Mike, I know you can put your clerical staff under the jail budget and take that person back to full time if you want to. Two million will pay for a secretary that will type a hundred words a minute and blow you at the same time. I’ll get back to you on the ‘chasing pussy’ trip to New Orleans, and believe me when I tell you this case will make you famous.”

  Lester didn’t wait for a reply and excused himself, stopped by his desk to pick up a faxed picture of a very attractive gangster lady, and walked out the door to his patrol car. As he cranked up the engine he glanced at the black and white picture. He knew this lady from somewhere. While driving toward his church, he tried to place the woman. Ah, now he had it! She was at the Levi hospital fund raiser, and she said she was a writer or reporter. He had looked forward to an interview, but she never called. He was beginning to understand why. He looked at the picture again. God, she was beautiful. A one-on-one interview with her would have been trouble.

  Chapter Five

  Church and Gunfire

  Lester’s church wasn’t really a church, but rather a cafe in the tiny town of Kirby in Pike County. It was Arkansas. It was America. It was the soul of the universe. Near a table by the front window, the molten core of the earth surfaced and wrapped itself around Lester. This was his religious pilgrimage. If his funeral were to take place in that small room, joy and peace would surround him. He rarely ate with anyone since this was his prayer time—not in the conventional bowing of
one’s head and muttering words—but more esoteric—in a way only Lester understood. Usually he drank black coffee and listened to the real world preach to him. Deer hunters talked of their cameras picking up a huge buck crossing to a feeder. Farmers exclaimed their excitement about the rise in beef prices. More than likely, a couple worried over paying bills or lamented friends getting a divorce. Men talked about the coming football season, while women discussed weddings and parties. It was all so damn real. It was life on Earth. The cafe was the world compressed into one room. After church, he peacefully drove his cruiser back to Hot Springs refreshed, cleansed—his spirit renewed. The air he breathed seemed sweeter, and the things that bothered him had now drifted off somewhere.

  Sitting at his desk in the office, he didn’t really want to talk to anyone. Sheriff Adams walked by with the mayor at his side and gave Lester the finger behind his back so the mayor wouldn’t notice. Lester smiled and resisted returning the gesture. He was still in his religious frame of mind. It was afternoon and he was also in a Debi Green frame of mind. He decided to call her. He was a little nervous but was really comfortable around women, and they sensed it.