“Yes, sir, Jim Cho—”
“Well, come the hell on in, Jim.”
The door opened onto the living room which appeared remarkably full of other men and one woman, slight, brunette, pretty, who flashed him a smile and offered him a beer. “No, thank you.”
“Something wrong with the beer we serve in this establishment?” bigstick said.
“No, sir. I just think I might be flying later today.”
“Oh you do, do you?” bigstick gave him an appraising glance before turning to address the horde, all of whom appeared to be having second thoughts on accepting their beers. “All right, get ’em out.”
Everyone got out their wallets. Jim did, too.
“Let’s see ’em.”
Everyone got out their driver’s licenses. Jim did, too. He was standing right next to bigstick so he showed his first. His host snorted. “You been here, what, twenty years?”
Jim had no idea how bigstick knew this but felt on the whole the better part of valor was to agree. “Yessir.”
His driver’s license was waved away and he put it back in his wallet and put his wallet back in his pocket. He was starting to enjoy himself.
The crowd resolved into five men other than his host, who examined all their licenses carefully. When he was done he gave what could only be described as a triumphant smiled and produced his own. “Mine’s only four numbers long, the rest of you yahoos got five and six.” He snorted. “Bunch a cheechakoes.”
Jim hid a grin.
His host fixed the room with a paralyzing eye. “I got one plane for sale, at one price, and I ain’t dickering. Who wants it?”
Three of the younger men tried in a chorus to get bigstick down on his price and were booted from the house unceremoniously. The fourth man got mad and stomped out. The last guy stayed, stubborn. bigstick looked at Jim. “Well?”
“You had it listed for $559,000,” Jim said. “Let me take a look at her, take her up. If she’s as sweet as you say I’ll take you to my bank and get you a cashier’s check today.”
The other guy—no one had yet howdied or shook—looked at bigstick. “I’ll give you ten grand more.”
bigstick scowled. “I told you, goddammit, no dickering, I set a price and that’s it,” and by damn if he didn’t open the door and invite the guy out.
bigstick closed the door behind him and looked at Jim. “I got her parked at Merrill. You got a license?”
Jim was smart enough to produce his pilot’s license this time. The woman had been the only one to sit down during the entire to-do. She winked at Jim from the couch as they left.
They went out to Merrill Field. It was from bigstick’s pilot’s log that Jim finally learned his name, Robert Weisner, “And don’t goddammit call me Bob. The name’s Robert. Ro-bert. Get it?”
Jim got it. The Stationair looked brand new, white with blue and gold stripes in a sort of wavy pattern interrupted by the tail numbers, a custom job that must have cost some bucks. The engine started at a touch and purred like a kitten full of his mama’s milk. Jim flew left seat and they took her down to Homer, ninety-plus air miles south. They did a few touch-and-goes in turn with the Air National Guard Herc that flew in there every day for practice whose crew seemed delighted to have company, and then Robert had Jim do three full stop landings. The Homer airport was a long strip of paved bog that rolled like a giant-sized washboard and the first time Jim gave the struts a pretty thorough testing. Robert grunted. “Take her around again.”
Jim did two more full stops, six landings in all, each landing smoother than the previous one as he became attuned to where the gear was relative to where his ass was, the sensitivity of the controls and the power of the engine. It was blowing twelve west southwest, big white clouds scudding across the sky, and the view of the Spit and Kachemak Bay was spectacular.
After the third full stop landing Robert grunted again. “Let’s go home.”
They landed back at Merrill at one p.m. and taxied to Robert’s tiedown. Jim kept everything running and waited for the verdict, which was not long in coming. “Well, I spose you won’t ding er up too bad if I sell her to you.”
Jim called a mechanic he knew over at Spernak, got clearance from the tower and taxied over. The mechanic poked around the insides and ran a few tests and gave Jim a thumbs up. Jim tipped him a hundred and turned to Robert, who was grinning. “No flies on you, youngster,” he said genially.
They drove to Alaska USA, who did the title search while they were standing there because Robert knew the loan officer and transferred a small fortune from Jim’s account into Robert’s. They drove back to Merrill, where Jim took formal possession of one airplane, an electronics package that seemed to include every state of the art ATON that had been invented up to yesterday, all the handbooks that came with them plus the ones for the aircraft which together filled a wetlock box right up to the top, along with six Bluetooth headsets that looked brand new, and so, according to the paperwork, was an Aircraft Spruce E.L.T. 406 with GPS. Weisner unscrewed the baggage panel so Jim could verify the emergency locator transmitter’s existence and the wires leading to the test switch on the panel and the external antenna.
She was, in fact, an aircraft cherry in every respect. “Robert, I gotta ask,” Jim said. “How can you bear to part with her?”
“You met my wife?”
Jim thought of the slender brunette back at the house. “Uh, sorta.”
“We’re dragging up, heading south for warmer climes.”
Jim put an already affectionate hand on the side of 18 Kilo Oscar. “This baby sure would have given you a cushy ride Outside.”
Robert looked a little sad. “That she would have.” He said no more, and Jim was wise enough to leave that where it lay.
Robert drove him back to the house to pick up his rental and he drove back to Spernak and taxied 18 Kilo Oscar over to gas her up for the first time, topping off both tanks even though Robert had been classy enough not to run the fuel down to the last drop before he sold her. He taxied back to Spernak and negotiated a couple of hours’ parking with the manager, who displayed noticeable drool. Jim had another thought and asked him if he’d given a Martin Shugak a ride to or from the Park and the manager checked his computer and came up nil. If Jim hadn’t just bought the perfect aircraft he might feel a little downcast about that.
Jim drove back to the condo. Still no Kate and she hadn’t responded to his text. Fine. He drove out to International to turn in the rental and was waiting for a cab to show up when his phone rang. To his astonishment it was Agent Mason.
“Yes, Mr. Chopin. My associate in Anchorage lifted the prints from the glass and faxed them to me. I, ah, ran them through NCIC and came up with a match.”
“Jesus.” Jim went back into the warm and sat down. “When it’s business as usual it takes you guys six months, when it’s a rush it takes at least four weeks. What the hell?”
“Yes, well…” Mason hesitated. “I don’t know if I told you, Mr. Chopin, but I’m something of a special agent without, ah, portfolio. Currently, as it, ah, happens, I’m in Chicago, working a racketeering case that has to do with the Outfit. You’ve heard of them?”
“Vaguely. The Mob for Chicago.”
“Yes, ah, well. The prints on your glass belong to Carmine DiFronzo, a known associate.” FBI-speak for two-bit hood. “Although one gathers not the smartest bulb in the DiFronzo box, who was given a job strictly as a favor to his father, a distant cousin of the current boss. Said cousin is also a known associate. You said there were two men?”
Jim found himself sitting bolt upright. The Mob was in the Park? “Yes. Two.”
“Ah. Yes. Well, DeFronzo is often seen in the company of two other gentlemen of interest, Milton Spilotro and Dante Accardo. Accardo was away for a while on a little matter of assault and battery and other, ah, supplementary concerns, but DiFronzo is almost never out of Spilotro’s sight.”
“Spilotro is DiFronzo’s babysitter.”
“Ah, possibly. Probably. Both men have been in and out of juvie and prison since they didn’t graduate from grade school, B&E, armed robbery, assault and battery, Spilotro was once arrested for rape but she was a prostitute so that went away fast. The locals like him for a couple of murders but neither were civilians and one gets a general, ah, feeling of relief that someone took out the trash.” A pause. “I made a few calls. Neither of them have been seen in Chicago in the last month.”
“For crissake.”
“I’d very much like to know what they’re doing in Alaska, Mr. Chopin.”
“And in the Park,” Jim said, the numbness beginning to wear off. “Especially in the Park. So would I. Do you have mug shots?”
“I’ll text them to you. This number work?”
“Yes.” A cab pulled up outside the glass and he waved at it. “I’ve got to go, Agent Mason, I don’t have lights at my airstrip yet and I want to make it home before twilight.”
“I quite understand. I’ll inform the, ah, local authorities there in Anchorage, shall I?”
“I’d appreciate it.” Jim hesitated.
“Perhaps without specifically naming my, ah, CI.”
“I appreciation your discretion, Special Agent Mason, and I can’t thank you enough for your help.”
“Their files were literally on my desk, Mr. Chopin. Sometimes you get lucky.”
They hung up and Jim cabbed it back to Merrill in a daze.
Only there to discover that yes, sometimes you did get lucky, and then sometimes that luck ran out. Chick Noyukpuk, coming off what appeared to be a monumental bender, was looking for a ride home and of course he was too broke to buy a ticket on Spernak, for which the manager looked indecently joyous. Jim looked from Chick to the pure, pristine, brand new treasure that was 18 Kilo Oscar and with reluctance told him to get in.
Halfway there Chick, in the middle of a tall tale involving a piece of heavy equipment he’d lost in a bog somewhere between Ahtna and Tonsina after shaking off heavy law enforcement pursuit, began sweating profusely and announced that he was going to barf.
Jim made him do it into his own boot.
Eleven
Saturday, November 5th
Anchorage, the Park
Kate returned to the townhouse a little shaken. First Sylvia McDonald, then Magnus Campbell. And Fergus McDonald, whose disappearance appeared to have kicked off what was now feeling like a cascade of events, was still missing.
Absorbed in speculation, she was inside before she realized that Jim wasn’t parked outside waiting for her. She looked again at his text.
I’m in town. Call me.
Her finger hovered over the call back button when the phone beeped and whistled, startling her so that she almost dropped it. It was Kurt. Mostly, it wasn’t Jim. “Hey, Kurt.”
“Kate, I’ve gotten a look at the McDonalds’ Visa card. Two cards, same account, they both charged everything for the miles, had automatic payments set up for all their utilities.”
“How did you even do that, Pletnikof?”
“Girl, please. One odd charge popped up just last month, a one-time payment to a guy named Commodore Lippy.”
“Sounds like someone who commanded a destroyer at the Battle of Manila Bay.”
“I know, right, but it turns out the guy’s an independent assayer.”
A brief silence. “Really.”
“Really. I called, said I had a sample for him to look at, he said he worked out of his home and he’d be there all day. I’ll text you the address.” Her phone dinged. “Kate, you know how paranoid gold miners are.”
“I do.”
“Assayers are even more so, mostly because they know too much about too many claims and they’re always afraid someone’s going to bust in and demand they give it all up at the point of a gun.”
Kate sighed. “You know, Kurt, if this turns out to be some kind of pissing contest between rival claims I will not be a happy camper.”
“I hear you.”
“Something else. Magnus Campbell was killed this morning in a home invasion.”
There was a brief silence. “Jesus, Kate.”
“Yeah, I know.”
“It has to be connected.”
“I know, Kurt.”
“You need to be careful.”
“I always am.”
He snorted. “Jim called this morning. He’s in town.”
“Yeah. He texted me.”
“Uh-huh. You overnighting again?”
“I think I’ll head for home this afternoon.”
“Good.” There was a wealth of meaning in the single word. It was evident that Kurt thought Kate needed someone to have her back. At this point she didn’t disagree, but before Ken Halvorsen she’d never felt the lack. “Call me if you find anything else.”
“Wilco.”
She called Max Maxwell next. “Girl!” he said, like he always did whenever they spoke reminding her of Old Sam, who used to call her the same thing. “You in town?”
“Only momentarily, so don’t even think about scoring one of your ten-martini lunches off me this trip.”
He laughed, a reassuringly robust sound. They’d lost too many old farts lately and the ex-Territorial Policeman was one of her favorites. “Quick question. You know Commodore Lippy?”
“The assayer? Sure, we’ve both been around for a while. Although I’ve been around longer than him.”
“Of course you have. What can you tell me?”
“He’s got the same poker up his butt about his business they all do, but he’s a good guy.”
“Will he talk to me if I show up on his doorstep?”
“He might. He might even let you inside.” And then he laughed in a way that Kate knew from experience meant he knew something she didn’t and he wasn’t going to share.
The address Kurt sent her to was a one-story log cabin on Lois Drive between Turnagain and Spenard that looked old enough to have been built by Vitus Bering, if he’d ever stepped foot on shore. The logs were so weatherstained they were almost black in color, although they gleamed with log oil, and the green asphalt shingles on the roof were newer than everything else by at least a century. It was set back from the street on a large lot, surrounded by an eight-foot high chain link fence, which could have been there to protect the enormous raspberry patch between fence and house from the moose. Kate didn’t think so, especially when she went through the gate and walked up to the front door. It was as solidly built as the rest of the house, with one very small, thick-paned glass window. There was a button next to the door. Kate pushed it, and while she waited spotted the two cameras almost hidden beneath the eaves of the overhanging roof.
“Whaddya want?”
She looked up to see one eye and a nose mashed against the tiny window and took an involuntary step back. “Commodore Lippy?”
“Who wants to know?”
She tried to make herself seem as small and as unmenacing as possible. “My name is Kate Shugak, sir. I—”
“Did you say Shugak?”
“Yessir.”
“Any relation to Ekaterina?”
“My grandmother.”
A bolt was drawn back, another, a third, and there was the sound of a key in a deadbolt. The door opened to reveal a bulky man of medium height with very little hair left. All of it was white and combed very carefully straight back from a face rippling with wrinkles. A pair of blue eyes as sharp as any Kate had met examined her from head to toe. “You’re Stephan’s daughter, then.”
“Why, yes. Did you know him, sir?”
“Him and your mother, too, but I knew your grandmother better. Come inside.”
She did so, wondering what “better” meant in this context and if it was the reason for Max’s laughter.
He offered her coffee and a chair. The cabin reminded her of the one her father had built on their homestead, with the addition of two rooms in the back, the bathroom and the bedroom. The kitchen, dining, and living area occupied the
front of the house, minimally but comfortably furnished. Two rows of vinyl records filled up a shelf unit on top of which sat a turntable between two enormous speakers that looked to have been around since the Ames Brothers. She smiled. “Haven’t seen one of those in a while.”
“Yeah, everyone’s downloading now.” He laughed at her expression. “What, because I’m a vinyl guy I can’t know about iTunes?” He fished around in a pocket and pulled out an iPhone. “A hundred and twenty-eight gigs and most of it’s music.”
“Fair enough,” Kate said. There was no sign of what Commodore Lippy did for a living, not even so much as a year-old copy of the Prospecting and Mining Journal. “How did you know my grandmother, sir?”
“I did some prospecting in the Park back in the Fifties and Sixties,” he said. “Spent some time in Niniltna. Your grandma was the go-to person for permits for everything up to and including taking a leak in those parts. This was before ANILCA and the Park Service taking over every damn thing, of course.”
Treading carefully, she said, “When did you give up prospecting for assaying?”
He looked at her for a long moment, and snapped his fingers. “It was your guy who called earlier.”
She neither confirmed nor denied.
He leaned back in his chair. “I owe your grandmother enough that I’m not drop-kicking you out the door, although that may be all you get. So what do you want, Kate Shugak?”
“Fergus McDonald,” she said.
His expression didn’t change.
“He’s gone missing in the Park.”
Still nothing.
“And his wife was killed, possibly murdered, and a friend of theirs was killed this morning here in Anchorage in a home invasion.”
Less Than a Treason (Kate Shugak Book 21) Page 14