Yellow Dog Contract

by Thomas Ross

  Slick came in smoothly. He looked at his watch and said, “Now that we all understand each other I think Harvey and I had best be on our way.” He rose and looked at me, as though waiting for me to join him.

  “I think I’ll pass,” I said.

  “Shit,” Gallops said.

  Roger Vullo stared at me, an expression of curiosity and interest on his face. “May I ask why?”

  “Sure,” I said. “I think somebody should call the cops or the FBI. Let them handle it.”

  “You heard Arch,” Gallops said. “Call in the cops and he gets killed.”

  “Kidnappers always say that,” I said.

  “And a lot of people get killed, too,” Slick said.

  “Mr. Longmire,” Vullo said. “We had an agreement that you would spend two weeks on the Mix thing and then give me your report. It would seem to me that the conclusion of your report now depends on whether Mr. Mix is released by his kidnapper. You’re not being asked to rescue Mr. Mix. You’re simply being asked to help deliver the ransom safely. In exchange for that service I’m prepared to pay you the rest of your fee.” He reached over and tapped the check with his pencil.

  I looked at the check. I looked at it for several moments. Then I picked it up and put it in my pocket. “I still think somebody should call the cops,” I said.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  I DIDN’T COUNT the money. I didn’t even look at it. I simply picked up one of the suitcases and put it in the trunk of the black Ford that was parked in the basement garage of Vullo’s building. The suitcase was heavy. About forty pounds. Slick put the other one in the trunk and then slammed the lid shut.

  “Will you drive?” he said.

  “Sure.”

  There was a long red light at the corner of M and Connecticut. I used the time to roll a cigarette. I was just pushing the lighter in when the signal changed. I turned the corner, the lighter popped out, I lit my cigarette, and said, “I thought he was dead.”

  “Mix?”

  “Yes.”

  “So did I, dear boy, until just a few hours ago.”

  “You told me there was a chance he might be alive. A tiny chance, I think you said. What happened, did you get a tip?”

  “It was a little more than a tip,” he said.

  “Are you going to tell me about it or do you want me to beg?”

  “It was a phone call. It was from a black woman—or a woman who was trying to sound black.”

  “What’d she say?”

  “She wanted to know how much the union would pay to find out what had happened to Arch Mix. Well, there’s the one-hundred-thousand reward that the union’s offering, but when I told her about it she said it wasn’t enough.”

  “How much did she want?”

  “She said she wanted two hundred thousand. I told her that was a great deal of money and that I would have to check with the union first. She asked how long that would take. I said at least four or five hours. She said she wasn’t talking about that. She was talking about how long it would take before she could get the money. I said at least twenty-four hours, possibly forty-eight. She said, and I’ll try to quote her exactly now, ‘He’d be dead by then.’ Then she said she’d call me back and hung up. She never called back.”

  “When was all this?”

  Slick thought about it for a moment as though trying to pinpoint it exactly. “It was mid-morning of the day that we had the picnic in Dupont Circle. About ten thirty.”

  “The same day that Sally Raines got killed.”

  “Yes.”

  “And this was the tiny chance you told me about that Mix might still be alive.”

  “That’s right.”

  “You ever tell the cops about it?”

  “Yesterday,” Slick said. “I told them yesterday.”

  “What’d they say?”

  “That it was probably a crank call. There’ve been a lot of them.”

  “It’s funny,” I said.

  “What?”

  “That they’d mention the same amount of money.”

  “Who?”

  “The woman who called you and Max Quane. Max told his wife that he was about to pull off some deal that would net him two hundred thousand. Max was shacked up with Sally Raines. Just before he got killed Max called me, half petrified, and said he thought he knew what had happened to Mix. A woman called you and told you the same thing, except that she implied that Mix was still alive. She also talked about two hundred thousand dollars. But the woman never called back—possibly because she was Sally who got shot to death that same afternoon, but not before leaving half a word that everybody seems to think is a vital clue.”

  “A what?” Slick said.

  “A vital clue. It’s what the police are always finding except that Ward Murfin found this one. It supported what I call Longmire’s Yellow-Dog Contract Theory, which isn’t much of a theory anymore.”

  “Perhaps you’d better tell me about your vital clue first, dear boy.”

  “It was on a wadded-up piece of paper that was found in Sally’s room just before she got killed. It was one word. Chad. I thought it meant Chaddi Jugo.”

  “Ah!” Slick said.

  “You remember Chaddi.”

  “Indeed.”

  “That was your show, wasn’t it, Slick, dumping Chaddi?”

  “I was merely on the periphery.”

  “I thought you thought it up.”

  “I was only in on the initial planning.”

  “Which was why you got me to go work for Hundermark.”

  “It was the start of a brand new career for you.”

  “Sure. Well, anyway Arch Mix once mentioned to Audrey that he wasn’t going to let them do what they did to Chaddi Jugo—or something like that. Audrey remembers telling Sally that so she probably told Max Quane. I thought Max—and possibly Sally—had figured out who killed Arch Mix and why.”

  “That was the basis of your Yellow-Dog Theory?” Slick said.

  “Yellow-Dog Contract Theory.”

  “I thought those contracts were against the law.”

  “If my theory proved correct, they’d rewrite the law. My theory was that Arch Mix had been killed so that the PEU could strike ten or twelve of the biggest cities in the nation and create such a voter backlash that the Republicans would be guaranteed another four-year lease on the White House.”

  Slick thought it over. “I can’t say that I object to the outcome, but the means seem a bit gamey.”

  “They might even take the House of Representatives.”

  “Another decided improvement.”

  “You always did have funny politics, Slick.”

  “Just soundly conservative. A few of us are, dear boy.”

  “Of course there’s still a certain amount of validity to my theory.”

  “In what way?”

  “If whoever kidnapped Arch Mix doesn’t let him go, then those strikes are going to take place.”

  “Unless—” Slick seemed to lapse into thought without finishing his sentence.

  “Unless what?” I said.

  “Unless, dear boy, the strikes were all Arch Mix’s idea in the first place.”

  We drove into the Safeway parking lot at five minutes until four and parked the Ford about halfway toward the rear of the building. I handed Slick the keys and he opened the glove compartment and took out a plain sheet of 8½ x 11-inch paper. He gave me back the keys and I put them underneath the accelerator.

  We got out of the car and Slick put the white sheet of paper underneath the windshield wiper. He looked at me. “Well, shall we take a cab?”

  “Let’s wait a few minutes,” I said.

  “I don’t think that would be wise, Harvey.”

  “Mix didn’t say not to watch who picked up the car. He just said that we shouldn’t waste our time because whoever picks it up won’t know anything. I’m curious.”

  Slick looked around. “I still don’t think it’s wise, but if you insist, let’s at least
make ourselves a little less obvious.”

  “What do you suggest?” I said. “After all, you used to do this for a living.”

  “You have some curious ideas about my former calling.”

  “Romantic notions, really.”

  “I suggest that we go stand with those other people over there by the entrance.”

  Some housewives were standing with their loaded shopping carts near the entrance of the store waiting for their husbands to drive up and put the groceries into their cars. Slick and I moved over and joined them.

  At one minute past four a Yellow Cab pulled up in the driveway to the parking lot and discharged its passenger. He paid off the driver and started walking down a row of cars, turning his head from side to side. A few moments later he spotted the black Ford. He opened the door and felt underneath the accelerator for the keys. Then he removed the sheet of white paper from underneath the windshield wiper. He didn’t bother to unlock the trunk and open the suitcase and count the money. Instead, he got into the car, started the engine, backed it out, and drove right past us as he headed for the Connecticut Avenue exit.

  When he had got out of the cab I had got a good look at him. He was dark brown, slimly built, about six feet tall, and all of eighteen years old.

  “They picked him up off the street,” Slick said.

  “You think so?”

  “They probably paid him his cab fare and twenty dollars to pick up the car. They’ve probably got somebody on him to see if he’s being followed.”

  “Then what?”

  “He’ll probably stop and make a phone call—to another pay phone. They’ll tell him where to go next. It could go on like that for quite a while until they’re sure that there’s no one on his tail.”

  “Clever,” I said.

  “Crude, really, but effective.”

  “I wonder what their next move will be?”

  Slick shook his head. “I have the feeling that we’ve heard the last of them. They’ll probably wait until late tonight before they release Mix.”

  “Unless they kill him first.”

  “That’s right,” Slick said. “Unless they kill him first.”

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  THEY FOUND ARCH MIX at 8:05 the next morning floating face down in the Anacostia River just south of the Frederick Douglass bridge. He had been shot in the back of the head three times. His body was identified by his wife.

  I got some of this from a news bulletin that came over the radio at 9:15. The details I got from Slick who called at 9:35.

  “Have you told Audrey?” he said.

  “She heard it when it came over the radio.”

  “How did she take it?”

  “Not too badly. She didn’t say anything for a while and then she said she was going for a walk. She’s still gone. Where are you?”

  “I’m down at police headquarters with Vullo and Gallops. That’s one of the reasons I’m calling. We’ve told the police of your minimal involvement in the delivery of the ransom and they’d like a statement from you.”

  “Today?”

  “I don’t think that’ll be necessary. You can come in tomorrow just as well.”

  “Okay. I’ll do it tomorrow.”

  “The other reason I called, dear boy, is that I’ve been thinking about your remarkable theory. Mix’s death gives it a certain amount of validity, doesn’t it?”

  “I don’t know,” I said. “I haven’t really thought about it.”

  “Well, there are a few bits and pieces that I’ve gathered over the past few weeks that, when put together with your own information, result in a rather startling picture.”

  “What’re you getting at, Slick?”

  “What I’m saying, Harvey, is that if we put our heads together, we may be able to prove not only your theory, but also prove who engineered the kidnapping of Arch Mix.”

  I was silent for a moment. Then I said, “You want to come out here?”

  “I think that would be best, don’t you?”

  “Probably.”

  “What time is lunch?”

  “When you get here.”

  “I’ll bring some wine.”

  “Do that,” I said.

  After I hung up I called the Vullo Foundation and asked for Ward Murfin. I reached Ginger, his secretary, who said that Murfin hadn’t come in yet and that she wasn’t sure when to expect him.

  I found his home number in our address book and called that. It rang three times before Marjorie answered it. Marjorie wanted to talk about the death of Arch Mix, which she had just heard about. She had some interesting theories about it, most of them involving the Palestine Liberation Organization. After we ran through those, I asked if I could speak to Ward.

  “He’s not here,” she said.

  “Do you know where he is?”

  “He drove in from Baltimore late last night. He didn’t get here till around two. We didn’t get to bed until around three and then he rushed out of here this morning after he got the call.”

  “What call?”

  “I don’t know what call. All I know is that it woke us up about seven and he was gone by seven fifteen. He rushed out of here without even shaving although I told him he’d better shave before we go to Max’s funeral.”

  “What time’s that?”

  “Aren’t you going?”

  “No, I’m still too broken up.”

  “Bullshit.”

  “What time’s the funeral, Marjorie?”

  “At two.”

  “If Ward comes in, ask him to call me.”

  “You ought to go to Max’s funeral.”

  “I’ll think about it,” I said and then said good-bye.

  I found Ruth in her studio which was a big-windowed room on the north side of the house. Honest Tuan was serving as a model. My nephew and niece were at Ruth’s side watching her with fascination. I went over to see what she was doing. She was vising watercolors and it seemed that the beavers who lived upstream were going to Honest Tuan’s birthday party. Ruth had the beavers all dressed up.

  She put her brush in a jar of water and looked up at me. She had a smudge of blue paint on the side of her nose, but then she usually did although it wasn’t always blue.

  “Slick’s coming for lunch.”

  “That’s nice,” she said. “I hope he likes peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.”

  “He’s bringing some wine.”

  “A good claret would go nicely with peanut butter and jelly.”

  “So would Mogen David.”

  “Since it’s Slick, perhaps I should make him an omelette.”

  “I like your beavers,” I said.

  She looked at the watercolor critically. “They are rather precious, aren’t they?” She turned to Nelson and Elizabeth. “Why don’t you tell your Uncle Harvey what we’ve decided. En Français.”

  “You do it,” Nelson said and nudged his sister.

  Elizabeth smiled her silky smile. “We will be very good and not bother our dear mother for the rest of the day,” she said in her rapid French. “And if we are good, our dear uncle will let us swing on the swing and later he will take us to visit the beavers.”

  “Oh, what fun,” I said.

  “I think Audrey could use some solitude today,” Ruth said.

  “Probably.”

  “What’re your plans?”

  “Well, I think I’ll go out on the porch and put my feet up and watch the Christmas trees grow.”

  “When I’m through with this I might come out and help you.”

  I sat on the porch watching the Christmas trees grow and going over it all in my mind, everything from Murfin and Quane’s first approach until the news bulletin about Arch Mix’s death, and by the time that Slick arrived at 11:30 I had decided that there indeed had been a conspiracy and that I was fairly sure that I knew who had both designed and executed it.

  Slick looked hot and worried when he climbed the steps to the porch and handed me the bottle of wine. He lo
oked around as if expecting to see someone.

  “Where’s Audrey?” he said.

  “She hasn’t come back yet.”

  “Are Ruth and the children here?”

  “Over there,” I said and pointed to where they were feeding the ducks.

  “I think I was followed,” Slick said.

  “From where?”

  “From Washington.”

  “All the way?”

  “I’m not sure, but I think so.”

  “Let’s go see,” I said.

  Slick loosened his tie, but didn’t take off his coat. The loosened tie was ample evidence that he was concerned. He followed me down the stairs and around the house. A quarter of a mile away, where the dirt lane turned in from the wood, a car had stopped. It was pulled over to the edge of the lane. A man was on top of the car, reaching up with something shiny.

  “I think, dear boy, that he’s cutting your telephone wires.”

  “I think you’re right.”

  We turned and hurried around to the other side of the house. I called to Ruth. She must have heard the note of alarm in my voice because she took the children by the hand and almost ran over to us.

  “What’s wrong?” she said.

  “I’m not sure yet, but I want you to take the kids and go over to Pasjk’s. Go to the other side of the pond and up through the trees and down. If Pasjk’s phone is working, call the sheriff. If it’s not, have him run you into town and tell the sheriff to get out here right away.”

  “Can’t you come?”

  “I’m going to see if I can find Audrey first.”

  “Where’re we going?” Nelson asked.

  Ruth made herself smile at him. “En Français. You promised.”

  “Okay,” Nelson said and then he said, “Where are we going?” in French.

  “We’re going to see Mr. Pasjk for some cookies and lemonade and maybe a ride into town.”

  “You’d better go now,” I said.

  Ruth nodded and started off around the pond. She stopped, looked back, and said, “Harvey.”

  “Yes.”

  She shook her head and smiled nervously. “Nothing.”

  Slick and I watched them until they disappeared into the pines. Then Slick said, “I hate to be an alarmist, but do you keep a weapon in the house?”