by Ben Rehder
Vinnie went on to say that Slaton and T.J. had been enemies ever since. Anytime they saw each other, they would exchange harsh words.
Garza asked when and where the incidents had taken place, and he took notes as Vinnie answered. Most of them, Vinnie said, had happened outside of various businesses in Johnson City. Apparently, T.J. and Vinnie had nothing better to do than park along Main Street and “just hang out.”
“Did anyone else ever see these arguments?” Garza asked.
Vinnie glanced at the lawyer, who nodded. Vinnie continued:
“Well, they wasn’t really arguments, more like the two of them just cussing each other. T.J. would make engine sounds, you know, like four-wheeling noises, when Slaton would walk by. Slaton would glare at us and tell us to stay the hell off his land.”
“You didn’t answer my question,” Garza said quietly. “Were there any other witnesses to these exchanges?”
Vinnie scratched his head. “None that I can remember.”
The room was silent as Garza wrote something on the pad. “So,” the sheriff said, “if you think T.J. killed Slaton because of this bad blood, do you have any idea how T.J. ended up dead himself?”
Vinnie lowered his eyes to the table. “Yeah, I heard about that this afternoon. I got no idea how that happened. Musta drowned somehow. He was always out on the lake, just fuckin’ around.”
Garza nodded abruptly, and it was obvious to Marlin that the sheriff thought everything Vinnie had just told him was worthless. “Anything else?”
The lawyer glanced at Sal, who finally spoke up. “Yeah, dere is one other thing. I think the kid was stealing from us.”
“T.J.?”
“Yeah, T.J. We had a coupla things go missing after the kid had been at our house. My wristwatch, some cash on the kitchen counter, some of my wife’s diamond earrings.” Marlin could tell from Sal’s facial expression that he hoped Garza would find that information very interesting.
Garza didn’t. “Did you report it?” he asked.
“Naw. Didn’t figger it was wort’ the hassle.” Sal laughed. “Figgered youse guys was busy enough already.”
Garza slid his chair back. “All right, then. Thanks for coming in.”
The deputies filed into the interview room, Marlin bringing up the rear. Garza had sat back down again, drumming his pencil on the table.
“What do you think?” Tatum asked.
“Total bullshit,” Garza said.
Out in the parking lot, Sal rested on his crutches and shook hands with Eugene Kramer. He gave Vinnie a big smile. These small-town cops were so much easier than the Feds. And he had played them just right. Now they had a good reason to look at T.J. for the death of Slaton. And if they ever managed to trace Sal’s.35-caliber back to him, he could simply say that T.J. must have stolen it. Why didn’t you mention the handgun in the interview? they would ask. I hadn’t noticed it was missing yet, Sal would say. It was perfect. He felt much better now, not so angry at Vinnie. “Well, dat went pretty well,” Sal said.
Smedley liked the big guy, Billy Don, much more than Red. Billy Don was nicer, doing things like turning down the headphones and cutting Smedley loose to go to the bathroom when he needed to. But now, if Smedley could have freed himself from the chair, he would have jumped up and kissed Billy Don. Because he had just said the magical words: They found Emmett Slaton!
It was all over now. Red would have no reason to hold him anymore.
He listened as Billy Don told Red a story about being at a convenience store. Billy Don had overheard a cop talking to a reporter about Slaton’s body. Oh, thank God there were still a few loose-lipped officers around!
Red turned off the DVD and switched the TV over to KHIL. Sure enough, there was Kitty Katz, giving a live report. She was saying that a reliable source had confirmed that the body found in the car pulled from Pedernales Reservoir was Emmett Slaton, as rumored. She went on to say that the police had also found two handguns in the car-a.45-caliber and a.35-caliber.
Smedley wondered: Did she just say.35-caliber? Smedley was putting it all together, thinking that Sal Mameli was the only person he knew who owned a.35, when-
WOOOOM!
The trailer was rocked by the most enormous explosion Smedley had ever felt. It was followed by another. And another. And another-until Smedley thought the assault would never end. Finally, the explosions did stop, and now all three men were lying on the floor of the trailer, in a stupor, like G.I.s after a mortar attack. The interior of the trailer was bathed in an eerie orange glow.
“What in the fuck was that?” Red said, as he struggled to his feet.
Smedley began to grunt urgently, the tape still over his mouth, trying to capture the men’s attention. Surely they would have the good sense to turn him loose before something worse happened.
Red swung the front door open and Smedley could feel the heat from the fires burning outside.
“Oh, Jesus,” Red said, staring out the door as if aliens had just landed. “Billy Don, come take a look at this.”
But Billy Don wasn’t listening. Smedley was elated and grateful and relieved to see Billy Don coming toward him with a pair of scissors.
Red simply could not believe what he was seeing. The BrushBusters were on fire. All of them. With flames shooting thirty feet high, big goddamn clouds of black smoke rolling into the sky.
Then he saw that he was mistaken. There was one solitary BrushBuster that wasn’t on fire. And there was a man sitting in the driver’s seat. Red couldn’t be sure, because the fires were roaring pretty loud-but he thought he heard the BrushBuster’s engine running.
Just then, their prisoner, Smedley, went pushing past Red into the night. Red didn’t even try to stop him. He had much larger problems on his hands now.
Billy Don came up behind him and they stepped out onto the front porch. They watched as the man tried to operate the BrushBuster, first going forward, then putting it into reverse, backing away from the flames.
“Grab my forty-five,” Red said. “On the kitchen counter.”
“But Red-”
“Do it!”
Billy Don turned and went into the trailer. The BrushBuster made a left turn and seemed to be heading away from the trailer. He’s stealing my last goddamn machine, Red thought. That lousy sumbitch. Then the man slowly swung around and came to a halt, eighty yards away.
Billy Don returned and handed the gun to Red.
“What the hell’s he doing?” Billy Don asked.
Red shook his head, thoroughly confused.
The man seemed to be staring right at them, just watching them.
“You know, there’s that mental hospital right up the road,” Billy Don said. “Maybe he-”
Red held up his hand for silence.
Then there was a gnashing of gears as the man put the tree-cutter into DRIVE. He started slowly, then picked up speed. He was heading straight for the trailer.
“What’s wrong with that crazy fucker?” Red said.
The BrushBuster was forty yards away now, and closing fast.
Red and Billy Don began to yell, waving their arms as if they could somehow ward him off.
The machine kept coming.
Red lowered his gun and fired a round at the machine.
Twenty yards.
Red fired again.
Ten yards.
And then they both dove for the inside of the trailer as the BrushBuster came smashing through the front door.
The chaos was incredible. Tremendous wrenching sounds as metal was twisted and torn. The sound of the tree-cutter’s engine whining as it tried to plow forward. Red felt himself being tossed and jostled, like he was riding an inner tube down the rapids of a flooded river. He was aware of a tremendous pain in his leg.
Finally, the noise came to an end as the BrushBuster’s engine sputtered and died. The tree-cutter was now sitting inside of the trailer, the floor sagging beneath it, the ceiling above crumpled.
Red looked down
and saw that his left leg had been gashed by a ragged sheet of metal. He heard Billy Don moaning on the other side of the machine.
Billy Don knew his arm was seriously damaged, pinned under the BrushBuster’s front wheel. But for some reason-maybe he was going into shock-he found himself mesmerized by the metal plate that was right in front of him, riveted to the machine’s frame. He had never noticed it before. The plate was well lit by the fires burning outside.
“Billy Don, you okay?” Red called.
“I think I’ll be all right.” Billy Don said, still staring at the plate. On it, he could see all kinds of information about this particular model of BrushBuster. There was a serial number. Net vehicle weight. The size of tires you were supposed to use. Even the amount of gas the tank held. And at the bottom, there it was: the pounds-per-square-inch that the pincers applied.
“Hey, Red,” Billy Don called.
“Yeah?” Red answered, grunting as he extracted himself from the wreckage.
“I know what the ‘3000’ stands for now.”
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
Bobby Garza, the two deputies, and Marlin were sitting around the table now, drinking coffee, brainstorming about the Mameli case. They had stopped calling it “the Slaton case”; they were that certain one of the Mamelis was involved.
Ten minutes earlier, a lab tech from Austin had called with disappointing news. Both of the handguns in the Porsche had been dusted for prints. Both were clean. Likewise, Bobby Garza had thrown out the name Roberto Ragusa, but none of the deputies recognized it. They had run the name through the computers, and it was like the man had fallen off the face of the Earth. His last known address was in New Jersey, but that had been more than three years ago. Since then, there was nothing in the public records for Ragusa. He hadn’t voted, renewed his driver’s license, or even filed a tax return. The man was a ghost. Garza planned to make some calls to New Jersey in the morning, to see what he could find out. In the meantime, the deputies were rapidly running out of ideas.
“What about a warrant to search Mameli’s house?” Marlin asked. Marlin was surprised nobody had suggested it yet.
“We don’t have enough,” Garza said. “You have to specify exactly what you’re searching for and why you think you’ll find it there. We don’t even know what we’d be looking for.”
The search-and-seizure laws were obviously more complex than the ones that allowed Marlin to search a poacher’s vehicle.
“The question is,” Bill Tatum said, “why would Vinnie make up all that crap? And why would Sal throw in that stuff about T.J. stealing from their home?”
“Misdirection?” Rachel Cowan suggested.
Garza stretched and yawned in his chair. “I think if we figure that out, we’ll blow the case wide open,” he said.
After another ten minutes and no forward progress, Garza pushed back his chair and said, “It’s nearly eleven now. I say we call it a night. We’re gonna have to keep digging on this, and I want you all fresh in the morning. Let’s regroup at six A.M.”
The deputies murmured agreement and began to stand.
“Of course, Marlin, I don’t expect-”
“I’ll be here,” Marlin said, surprising himself.
Garza smiled. “Okay, then.”
The deputies left the interview room, walked through the main room of the department, and stepped out the front door.
Bill Tatum started to say something, but Garza signaled for him to be quiet. A large engine could be heard in the distance. Tires squealed as the vehicle turned the corner onto Main Street, one block down from the sheriff’s office. A few seconds later, headlights appeared and swung into the parking lot. Marlin recognized Red O’Brien’s old Ford truck racing their way, more banged up than before.
The vehicle screeched to a stop directly in front of them. The driver’s door swung open and an overweight, unkempt man emerged. His clothes were soiled, he needed a shave, and he had duct tape dangling from his wrists and face.
Breathing heavily, his eyes wild, the man said, “Sal Mameli killed Emmett Slaton. And I can prove it.”
Red jostled and pulled and tugged-and finally managed to get Billy Don’s arm loose. He felt plenty bad for his friend, because his arm was obviously broken. Red needed medical attention, too, probably some stitches on his leg. But they were both doing better than the lunatic who had driven the tree-cutter into the trailer. The man was slumped over the steering wheel, unmoving.
Red reached up and shook the man’s shoulder. The man responded by sliding sideways out of the seat and falling to the floor.
“Oh, shit,” Red said. He bent down and jostled the man’s arm, but there was no response. “Aw, damn. Billy Don, I think I kilt him! Call nine-one-one!”
“I’d say it’s too late for that, Red.”
“How did you hear about the thirty-five caliber we found?” Garza asked. They were back in the interview room once again-the deputies, the sheriff, Marlin, and the man Garza had introduced as U.S. Deputy Marshal Smedley Poindexter. If Garza hadn’t vouched for Poindexter, Marlin never would have believed he was a federal agent. Marlin always imagined a Fed would look like the cool characters in the movies: mirror shades, expensive suit, and an attitude the size of a Buick.
“It was on the news just thirty minutes ago,” Poindexter replied, gently removing the last of the duct tape.
Garza let out a sigh, and Marlin knew that meant there had been a leak.
“And what is the evidence you have, if you don’t mind me asking?”
Poindexter told them that Sal Mameli owned a.35-caliber handgun, a family antique, and that he had recently seen a shell from the gun hanging from the Mameli housekeeper’s necklace.
Garza gave him a puzzled expression.
“See, she makes jewelry out of little odds and ends. She must have found the shell in Sal’s house and decided to put it in her necklace.”
Garza shook his head in confusion. “Look, you’re losing me here. Start from the beginning. How do you know Sal Mameli?” The marshal took a deep breath. “I’m afraid I can’t comment on that. At least, not yet.”
Everyone was fidgety and frustrated now, including Marlin.
“But you’re saying the gun we found is Sal Mameli’s?” Garza asked.
Poindexter said, “It has to be. How many of you have ever seen a Smith and Wesson thirty-five caliber?”
Rachel Cowan spoke up: “I think I did once, at a pawn shop.”
“My point is, they’re pretty damn rare,” the marshal replied. “And what are the odds of one showing up in a murder case where the Mamelis are material witnesses, and then it turning out that the gun isn’t Sal’s?”
“But when I ran a check on that serial number,” Garza said, “it came back as-”
He stopped in midsentence and everybody looked his way. Marlin had never seen Garza look as astonished as he did now. “Oh, crap,” the sheriff said softly. “Roberto Ragusa. The mafia informant.”
Someone gasped.
Everyone turned to Poindexter now. He shrugged and held his palms up, a What can I say? gesture. “I’m afraid I can’t comment on that.”
“Does this become a federal case now?” Garza asked.
“I’d say that’s kind of a gray area,” Poindexter replied. “He’s a dangerous man, Sheriff, and I would feel obligated to participate in whatever action you might take. But if you feel the need to proceed…”
Garza glanced at Bill Tatum. “Get Judge Hilton on the phone.”
“Uh, Bobby,” Tatum said, “it’s kind of late to-”
“Wake him up if you have to! Tell him we need a warrant. Immediately.”
Tatum grabbed the nearest phone and began to dial. Poindexter spoke up in a sheepish voice: “Uh, I don’t suppose one of you has a gun I can borrow?”
They went in two cruisers: Garza, Cowan, and Marlin in one, Poindexter and Tatum in another. When they were a quarter-mile from Mameli’s driveway, they drove slowly with the headlights off.
<
br /> It was now almost one in the morning. Judge Hilton had been grumpy as hell about being awakened, but when he heard the wild tale Garza and Poindexter laid before him, he issued the warrant and wished them luck.
Marlin had been on countless middle-of-the-night maneuvers, but nothing compared to this. His heart was thundering in his chest and his breathing was rapid.
The plan was for Garza, Marlin, and the deputies to serve the warrant at the front door while Poindexter covered the back. Poindexter had told them about Maria’s cottage behind the house, and they wanted to make sure they contained Sal and Vinnie within the house. If they were forced to invade the home, Marlin and Poindexter were to guard the perimeter of the home until Garza, Cowan, and Tatum had the situation in hand. Poindexter had warned the team that Sal Mameli was capable of just about anything. He might welcome us into his home with open arms, or he might start shooting as soon as he sees us. Those comments hadn’t raised the team’s spirits any, but Marlin could tell that everyone was glad the marshal was being frank.
Garza pulled the lead car into the driveway, and the crunching of the gravel under the tires seemed as loud as firecrackers. As soon as the home came into view, Garza stopped the car. The team gathered between the cars to exchange a few last words, and Smedley gave them a general layout of the house.
Garza said, “We’re just serving a warrant here; it’s not a bust. I want you to be careful, but no guns drawn, understood?”
Nods all around, and then the group made their way up the driveway. When they were twenty yards in front of the porch, which ran the length of the house, Poindexter quietly split off and went around the side.
Garza waited a full minute, then motioned toward the front door. A weak porch bulb-yellow, to discourage insects-illuminated the way.