by David Pierce
"Five thousand dollars, I believe, sir. That would be roughly . . . er, eleven million pesos."
"That should buy a few Ping-Pong balls, eh, Lieutenant," I said. "And perhaps new nets for the soccer field."
The lieutenant's dark eyes twinkled in merriment.
"It might even run to a table to bounce the balls on," he said, and we all smiled again conspiratorially.
"Did you mention that we can only suggest possible usages for such funds but that their ultimate disposition can only be decided by the appropriate prison authorities?" Benny asked.
"I was just about to, Keith," I said testily. "It seemed obvious to me that in a ticklish matter like this, our interests end when we hand the cash over to, say, the lieutenant. Did you think I was going to ask him for a receipt for some prying journalist to uncover some day? Perhaps you would like us to all have our photos taken at the handing-over ceremony. Perhaps you would like to have a plaque affixed to the Ping-Pong table reading Donated by the Organization."
Benny looked suitably chastened. I wondered if I wasn't overdoing it slightly; it was remotely possible. Joaquín hid his amusement by stroking his dapper lip adornment. I hid my satisfaction by glaring at Benny again. We had Joaquín, no doubt about that; we had one fascinated dandy sitting in front of us already spending his millions.
There remained little more to discuss. Could the lieutenant devise some dire emergency that would allow him (and Billy) to leave the jail briefly while the commandante was also away, because one would not like to risk the commandante's ire (or, possibly, his desire to be cut in) by trying to sneak off while he was there and getting caught. A dire emergency could and would be arranged; for that much dinero Joaquín could have probably arranged the return of the Great Plague. Could he arrange for Mr. Brown to appear clean and as smart as possible, in civilian clothes and without handcuffs, as we naturally wanted to maintain our Cultural Association cover as much as possible, which would be difficult to do if a manacled skeleton in prison rags showed up in a Black Maria surrounded by a half a dozen armed guards.
Easiest thing in the world, the lieutenant assured us. Clothes would be provided. A closed sedan-type vehicle was available—as I knew, I'd already seen it. And one guard plus himself and his driver would be more than enough.
"I hope so," I said worriedly. "I'd hate to be responsible for a dangerous criminal attempting to escape."
"Dangerous?" Joaquín laughed. "Mr. Brown couldn't run ten meters without stopping twice for a rest and once for an injection of anabolic steroids. And where would he go, anyway? He has no contacts, no money, no forewarning of his visit here, and thus no time to plan anything. I do not believe we have to worry overmuch about any attempted escape, señor."
I looked relieved. We set the meeting for the following afternoon, at three o'clock. We shook hands with great amiability. I pressed on him a pamphlet, one printed in both Spanish and English, describing the origins of our association. He kissed Doris's hand again with considerable style and strutted out, Benny accompanying him to the elevator and then down to the lobby and out to his Jeep just to prevent any encounters with Fred or lingering at the notice board.
As soon as I'd closed the door behind them and their footsteps had died away, I grabbed Doris.
"Doris," I said, "prepare to get those attractive glasses of yours fogged up, because I am going to give you a kiss Yankee style." I looked deep into her eyes, murmured, 'Ay, qué linda,' bent over, and gave her a good smack.
She made a big production of pretending to go weak at the knees. When she recovered, she said, "What does that mean, anyway?"
"Who knows?" I said airily. "I think it's got something to do with Linda Lovelace, but if it's good enough for ol' smoothie, it's good enough for V. Daniel."
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
When Benny returned a few minutes later, we celebrated all over again.
"Oh, did we hook him," he said, grabbing Doris and twirling her around. "Did we hook him, Sara, or did we hook him?"
"We hooked him," she said breathlessly, one hand holding on to her peruke. "At least I think we hooked him. From what I could see, we hooked him, but as Doris the dopey secretary, I was out here, wasn't I? while you guys were in there having all the fun."
"Darlin' doubtin' Doris," I said, "hooked isn't the word. Hooked, gaffed, netted, and then strung up by the feet having his picture taken isn't even the word. Look at it from his point of view. One. According to the pamphlet I gave him, the U.S. Cul. Ass. has been in business for fifteen years. Let him check if he wants. Who cares? It's true. Two. As far as he is concerned, we are the U.S. Cul. Ass. We have a plaque out front. We have one on the door. We look like a Cul. Ass."
"No thanks to you," said Doris.
"Doris, if I was in this merely for thanks, I'd be a pretty low type of individual," I said. "Three. We have an address and a phone number, which both check out, and how could they be faked?"
"That bloody Ethel and her awful serape," Doris said. "That's how. I don't care what you say."
"It was a shawl, Doris, not a serape," I said. "And let me give you this to ponder, my sweeting, my shorn angel." I perched on the corner of her desk as she was so wont to do on mine back home. "What kind of front do you think the CIA and the FBI habitually use as covers for their covert operations? Legitimate companies is what they use; no doubt they stole the idea from the Mafia. Travel agencies, language schools, charter airlines, innocuous friendship clubs, and dare I say it? cultural associations. It's no secret, it's no more secret than the fact that anyone attached to an embassy with the title second secretary or cultural attaché is automatically assumed to be in intelligence."
"You don't mean Ethel!" Doris said. "That windbag?"
"Maybe not her," I said, "but what goes on in her back room? It's the easiest thing in the world to set up some phony trust to bankroll an operation. Mrs. Moberg, of the Austin Mobergs. Really. That is why I didn't go near dear garrulous Ethel. All we needed was for me to ask the real FBI to pass on phone calls to a false FBI office right above them. That would be brilliant, that would. Anyway. The fact that we had established ourselves as the real Cul. Ass. is surely beyond any reasonable or unreasonable doubt, will you allow me that?"
"I will," said Benny.
"I will, too, if Benny tells me what 'ay, qué linda' means," Doris said.
" 'What a beauty,' " said Benny.
"Really?" she smirked.
"As for the FBI side of it, surely we established that as well, beyond all possible doubt—the pictures, the ID I showed him, the shoulder holster I flashed, the Washington phone calls, the files, the papers with FBI heading, the secrecy, the locked doors, our skillful acting ability, even the Department of the Interior calling cards. I mean, what's to doubt?
"What's to doubt is what if he knows the FBI doesn't operate outside the U.S.?" she said. "Why didn't you make us the CIA or something like that?"
"Who's the head of the CIA?" I asked her. "Or for that matter, who ever was?"
She shrugged. "Who knows. Who cares."
"Exactly," I said. "Even if I did have a picture of him, who'd recognize him? Also, since everyone knows the CIA has been doing things inside the U.S. it wasn't supposed to, as it's only supposed to operate outside, what's so impossible about the FBI doing the reverse?"
She shrugged again. "OK, OK, get on with it."
"While we were in there having fun, as you put it," I said, "Benjamin and I, with razor-sharp cunning, managed to achieve several extra bonuses. We planted the fact we have a private plane nearby at our disposal, so maybe they won't come looking for us in leaky Titanics. We hid the fact there is a back way out by having you pretend to make coffee in a nonexistent Mexican kitchenette, so it didn't even dawn on the lieutenant he might have to bring an extra guard along or have his driver cover the back door, which would give us one more problem we don't need. We also have Billy coming in normal clothes, which saves us time and trouble. Also unhandcuffed, ditto. Also in a normal-looking
car, not a paddy wagon that might attract the interest of every city cop who passed by. And presuming the driver stays downstairs like he did today, that leaves us with only the lieutenant and one other guard to deal with up here, and we should be able to deal with them quietly and with ruthless efficiency."
"Like beat 'em to death with one of these," Doris said, picking up one of our sample hammocks and swinging it over her head like a war club. Benny immediately picked up another one, and they began to playfully whack each other with them. I smiled tolerantly at their high spirits.
"The part I like," I said, deftly dodging a flailing no. 10 close-weave that the twerp directed my way, "is that either way we win. If by some enormous chance Ethel is up to monkey business, she is not going to so admit to Joaquín unless he produced enormous official pressure, by which time we will be long gone. And if she does finally so admit, what can she do but plead total ignorance, likewise any superiors she might have, because that is what they are—totally ignorant? And if she is really just plain old Ethel from Des Moines putting on shows of macramé plant hangers no one goes to, she'll plead ignorance again because she is still ignorant, or more ignorant, or whatever it is."
"Perhaps, again ignorant," Benny suggested.
"Perhaps," I said. "Either way it's a dead end for the Mexican fuzz. Of course whatever Ethel is or says they won't believe, but by the time they've sorted it all out, if they ever do, I'll be back sitting in a deck chair in Evonne's garden watching appreciatively as she bends over to weed her parsley; Doris'll be back at her typewriter editing extracts of her diary for publication in Cosmo; and you, Benny, 'll be back selling used Dodger farm clubs.
"But let us not forget," I warned, "that up till now it's all been, if not fun, Doris, relatively easy. Tomorrow we will have two armed men to overcome somehow and incapacitate somehow, an office to clean up, a getaway to make, a rendezvous with Jorge or one of his innumerable sons to keep, a drive of several hundred kilometers to suffocate through, another rendezvous to make in blackest night in anaconda country, a lot of seasick pills to swallow, and then the hard bit starts."
"I'm glad you reminded me," said Sara sarcastically. "I wanted to go sightseeing tomorrow to the ruins of Chicken Little, or whatever it's called."
"Whatever it may be called, it is not that," I said.
"Chichén Itzá it is called," said Benny. "Famous for its well."
"Jack Benny was even more famous for his," I said. "Now if you two are finished skylarking about, let's go and eat something and talk over what we have to do before three o'clock tomorrow."
On the way out, Fred gave me a wave and called out, "Buena suerte mañana, señor," which even I knew means "Good luck on the morrow, o handsome one." What I didn't know was why he said it.
"Benny, why did he say that?" I said as soon as we were out on the street. "Does he know something we don't know he knows?"
"I had a word with him after I saw the lieutenant off," Benny said. "To cover the lieutenant's presence here I told Frederico he was a buyer for the army and I was trying to sell him hammocks. A lot of hammocks. I also mentioned he was coming back with a couple of his associates tomorrow."
"That was clever, Benjamin," I said. "Well thought and well done. Doris, I think you might deposit that gum somewhere, chewing gum in public is totally gross, Melvin, and nerdish."
Benny took us somewhere. We ate something thin and brownish green. We talked a lot. Then Benny took himself off to arrange things with Jorge while Sara and I went shopping for the assortment of items we'd need the following day—first to a hardware store, then to a clothing store, then to a pharmacy. I must say it was a relief to go into a drugstore and for once not head directly for the diarrhea display. Maybe washing your hands really did help. If Lt. Esparza ever kissed one of mine, I'd wash it in sheep dip. I don't know why, but I've always had this thing against truly handsome men. To the superficial, this might seem like mere jealousy.
That night I dreamed of Evonne. I was kissing her somewhere moist, like in a steam bath. True, she didn't look like my blond bombshell; as a matter of fact, she looked surprisingly like the beautiful, dark-haired, sloe-eyed receptionist at our hotel, but I knew it was really Evonne because my lips, which are without hirsute adornment, unlike some I could mention, are strictly reserved for her.
. . .
Came the dawn, which I was not up to see.
Came nine o'clock, which I was.
Came ten, which found us in the office. Came eleven and, reluctantly, twelve. I took out the rust-pitted cannon Benny had borrowed from Jorge's number three offspring and looked it over with mistrust for the umpteenth time. It was an ancient, made-in-Spain copy of a Colt .45. At least the cylinder still spun like it was supposed to. I had originally hoped that Benny could score us some knockout drops or similar fast-acting soporific that we could dose the coffee with, but it was not to be, which I found slightly peculiar in a country where all minor downers like Libriums were not only available at any pharmacy without prescription but were handed out free as samples by druggists with every purchase of a family-sized tube of Ipana.
It seemed that I was the only one who was impatient. Benny was at his desk engrossed in some chess problem he'd laid out on his portable set, or at least pretending to be, while Doris was at her desk repainting her nails, which I figured was probably just her way of keeping herself from nibbling them down to the quick.
By one o'clock I was so restless I took myself out for a walk around the block. I returned by the back way to check, first of all, that the key Fred had given me for the rear door downstairs worked—it did—and second to check that the stairwell was open all the way up to our floor—it was. It had belatedly occurred to me that perhaps Ethel stored her millions of unwanted posters out there or that Fred had rented the entire staircase between floors one and three to a tribe of gypsies plus a llama or two, which carried the loads that were too heavy for even the women. While on my stroll, I noticed a Yucatán gray pigeon engrossed in its courtship ritual with a rather scraggly-looking female of the species. I also noticed that our Chevy was still parked where Benny had left it that morning—in the nearest legal parking place to the downstairs door—and also that it still had all its wheels as well as all our baggage, which we'd stowed in the trunk after checking out of the hotel.
At two o'clock me and the troops ran over the plan of action one more time, just for something to do. At two-fifteen, just for something else to do, I began climbing the walls. At two-thirty, I said a dirty word loudly.
"Now what have we forgotten?" said Benny.
"Now what has el supremo bizarro forgotten, is more like it," Doris said.
"I forgot to have someone posted downstairs like I was posted last time for the same reasons," I said. "Which one of you is the more distracting today, I wonder."
"Her," Benny said immediately.
"Yeah," said Doris, "especially in this sleaze you made me buy yesterday."
"Now, Doris," I said. "You have the perfect figure for a four-inch miniskirt and you know it. With that, ol' smoothie'll probably kiss your hand all the way up to your opposite shoulder. And with any luck, it'll give the guard something to pop his eyeballs at and keep his mind well off his work, which is just where we want it."
"So what am I supposed to do down there while I'm waitin'?" she wanted to know. "Practice my nonexistent Spanish on Freddy?"
"Why don't you lurk in the ladies' room next to the elevator," I said. "That's what I would do—only in my case, of course, I would select the men's room. Then pop out and herd 'em all up here pronto before they get into trouble. Simple."
"Sure, sure," she said. "And what if they're late? Won't Fred start gettin' suspicious if he sees me go in and not come out for twenty minutes?"
"Must you always look on the difficult side of everything, Doris?" I said wearily. "It seems obvious to me that he'd find it a lot more suspicious if he saw a tourist who went by a bathroom and didn't go in for twenty minutes."
; "You oughta know," she said. "But OK, you're the boss, although who elected you, I'll never know."
"Benny, got all your stuff ready?"
"Yes, Vic."
"Have I asked you that before, Benny?"
"Yes, Vic."
"I thought I might've," I said.
At ten to three I said to the kid: "Time to get moving, sugarplum. Break a leg—beat it, to you." She beat it.
At three-ten I said, "Maybe they're not coming."
"They're coming," Benny said.
At three-fifteen I said, "I told you they're not coming."
"They're coming," he said.
At three-twenty they came, or at least we heard someone heading our way down the corridor. Benny folded up and pocketed his weeny chess set just before I told him to.
It was them all right, and without any extras. Doris entered first, followed by the lieutenant, who had gallantly held the door open for her, then Gray Wolf in a clean but unpressed white suit far too big for him. He was limping slightly, perhaps from having proper shoes on for the first time in a long time. Billy was followed by a large, uniformed, unsmiling, armed sergeant of the guard, who closed the door behind him and immediately came to attention in front of it.
I went into Doris's office to greet them; Benny remained at his desk frowning down at some paperwork.
"Lieutenant!" I exclaimed. "¡Qué gusto!"
He saluted me con brio with panache, and we shook hands warmly.
"And Sr. Brown," I said. "So glad you could make it."
"I managed to find the time," he said in a croak, keeping his eyes submissively downcast. "But I hated to miss basket-weaving class, it's my favorite."
"¡Silencio!" said Joaquín sharply. "Por allá." He prodded him vigorously toward my office. Billy stumbled and fell in through the door.
While he was slowly picking himself up again, I said, "Tsk-tsk. You really must take better care of yourself, an ex–Eagle Scout like you." In other words, another reminder to be prepared. He nodded once to let me know he'd got the message.