Clint Faraday Mysteries Collection 5 books: Murderous Intent Collector's Edition

by Moulton, CD

  Clint called a friend in Florida who followed the news. He hadn’t heard anything about it.

  This was getting scary! Here we go again! They would never learn. The internet would make it impossible to hide. How could anyone in politics here think this kind of thing had a chance of working? It was going to get messy. It would be a lot easier to freeze all action on the projects until meeting with the leaders of both sides could find a compromise.

  Bocas. He was a Ngobe Bugle by declaration. He would be with his friends and the people he considered family. He was getting his things together in the car when the TV said the roads in Bocas and Chiriqui were closed. Nothing at all was getting through. The commentator was trying to make it sound like the Indios were threatening the whole country. Interviews with people concerned, except a few government officials, were backing the Indios more than 90%.

  Well, what could he do about his case here in these conditions? The gruas was here in David, so that would be an avenue to explore. He found the company and checked around with a lot of the locals. It seemed that the place didn’t have a good reputation. It was tied in with a junkyard and auto repair company who were known as cheap crooks and wannabe gangsters. They were mostly into property theft through bribing corrupt officials. Everyone knew what they were doing, but the courts and police refused to act.

  Why is there always a bug in the beer? Clint loved Panamá and the people. These few could ruin investment with their schemes. They had already caused some very big companies to back off from coming to Panamá. Maybe Clint could see that these, at least, were out of business!

  Bad-asses

  There were a few people in the Cantina Parque. This is a little local bar across from the entrance to Romero’s Super Market. The talk was about the “insurrection” and most agreed that the Indios had been no more than second rate citizens for too long a time in Panamá and it was time they were treated like people. Panamanians were mostly very strong on individual rights.

  Clint managed to mention Perez. Only one there, a minor official with IDAAN, had heard of him. “He’s supposed to be a businessman who deals in old things and jewels and that kind of thing. Not much is known about him except that there are some here who are suspicious of a Colombian who would come to David and Bocas looking for those things. What there is will be in Panamá City. No one in the old families here in Chiriqui would ever sell the family memories. I don’t think he’s honest in all things.

  “He got drunk and used some kind of tae-kwan-do at Brothers once. He almost killed a man. A lot of places on the carretera won’t let him drink more than a beer. Those two he hangs around with are as bad. They’re all usually nice enough, but none of them can hold his liquor. I hear they get drunk about once in two months at that place they rent. The dueño signed a five year lease and can’t make them move.

  “This is what I heard. I’m not saying it’s true, but I did once see a fight at that place when I was checking a hook-up. They didn’t use any of that martial arts stuff, but they ran the Arauz brothers away. The Arauz brothers were supposed to be mean and dangerous, but it didn’t take long for them to be hurt enough that they never went back yet. The Colombians are a lot rougher than most people, even if they don’t act like it most of the time or look like it.

  “Didn’t I see you at Ya Rock one night? You were with that nutty gringo who played the guitar and sang a lot of gringo things that most people thought was good, even though they don’t often listen to music in English – well, most of them know words in English to a lot of the old rock music.”

  “Dave? He can be a real trip sometimes,” Clint replied. The subject was changed. He had what he wanted. Don’t push. He finished his Balboa and left.

  Next stop: Rey. He went in to talk with people he knew and be introduced to more. Some lived in the near area and he learned nothing new about the Colombians, though the things he’d heard at the Cantina were more or less confirmed. Most of the time they were alright, but about every two months they got crazy for a day or two. They didn’t start things, but they would more or less instigate. They liked to show people how tough they were.

  “How long until they want to try again?” he asked a three-houses-down neighbor.

  “They’re due.”

  Clint grinned. Maybe he’d be the next one they wanted to intimidate. He was fifty eight years old and in prime condition. They would think he was just a hotshot gringo easy pushover. They got started in two local bars, Chaco’s and Music Night. They started there, but there was never any trouble inside the place, which was the only reason they were allowed.

  Clint would be ready to barhop tonight! This was silly, but the only way he would be able to get them into a position where they would make a serious enough mistake to lead to an official investigation. Clint knew a way to tie them to Pablo’s death. It was murder. There had to be motive established. He could do that.

  Clint dressed in old jeans and a “muscle” shirt and wore Crocks. His beard was a three-day one already. He sported a tiger tatoo on one arm and a death head on the other. The tatoos wouldn’t come off with soap and water or alcohol. They needed a special acetone-based paste solvent. His black-shot-with-gray hair was shoulder length and ponytail style. His belt was studded and he wore a studded leather bracelet. He had one flashy ruby ring and a cheap rhinestone friendship ring. He had a small earring in his left ear. Diamond. He used the Hofai motorcycle a friend kept at Dave’s place in Quiteño that was much like his own in Bocas Town. He had a large black leather wallet in his right back pocket attached to his belt with a chain. He also wore an attitude of an old hippie biker.

  He decided to start with Music Night because there was a live band of sorts there that was doing semi-rock in Spanish. They weren’t bad, but they definitely weren’t good. The talk was about the Indigeno uprising and was negative toward them. Almost half of the people there were blacks, who don’t get along with the Indios.

  Not much was happening there so he went to Chaco’s. Not much there either except that the Mitsubishi truck went by going toward Music Night. That gave Clint an idea. Dave was in town so he called and asked for a favor. Dave would come into Music Night in about an hour with his guitar. He would look a bit more hippie than usual.

  Clint knew that Dave loved the Indios as much as he did. He could picture him in that crowd. He warned him it could be dangerous. Dave laughed and said that wouldn’t be anything new. Everyone told him going into the mountains and into the comarcas was dangerous and he was safer there than in the middle of David!

  Clint went into the bar and stood next to Pancho Vallartes at the bar. He was able to get him into a conversation and was chatting about different things when Dave walked in and went to the other end of the bar to lean his guitar against the wall and order a large Atlas. Clint looked at him and said he thought he’d seen him in town, at Cervantes Park. He was playing for some Indios and talking with them about their situation.

  “Martinelli should order the police to shoot every single one of them who start that bullshit!” he declared. “You can’t let that bunch of pagan savages get control of the situation!”

  “Didn’t you say you were Colombian?” Clint asked.

  “Yes. Santa Marta.”

  “Then why don’t you keep your obnoxious fucking bigoted opinions to yourself here in Panamá?”

  “Yeah? What’s it to you, gringo? YOU aren’t Panamanian anymore than I am!”

  “I’m Ngobe, so I’m Panamanian,” Clint snarled. “You’re an ignorant arrogant asshole shithead from Colombia!”

  Pancho stared at him a few seconds, hissed, “Watch your back!” and started moving away. Clint called, “My back. You seem that type. I say what I have to say and do what I have to do in your face, fuckoff!”

  Pancho stalked over to Perez and Simon and started a whispered conversation that included waving his arms and pointing at Clint, who gave them the bird. Clint went over to Dave and said, “You were playing in Centro. You’re not too bad. A h
ell of a lot better than that wad on the stage.” Loud enough for the one nearest on the stage to hear.

  “I played a few things from the sixties and early seventies for the Indios. We were protesting civil rights back then, though we were working for the blacks – who seem to be the worst bigots here.”

  The band were one Latino and three blacks. The one who heard the exchange went to the others and said something. Their lead singer, such as he was, took the mike and announced they had a celebrity from the seventies in the states there. How about if he came up and did a few protest songs for his Indio friends. See how it went over in that PANAMANIAN place.

  “The Indios are the only real Panamanians,” Dave replied quietly. “WE are the interlopers.” He picked up his guitar and went to the stage and did Come Together and Travelin’ Man. He was good at that kind of thing and the crowd liked the songs. Pancho yelled that he should do something for the Indio friend he was talking to, seeing that seemed to be timely.

  “Oh, yes. You’re that fellow who was declared Ngobe?” Dave asked. “I think this one should be taught to the Indios. Maybe I’ll write something along the lines. I’ll do it in Guayme.”

  He did Blowin’ In the Wind, which the crowd really liked.

  Clint stayed until Dave left after doing two more numbers. Everyone liked his music if not his views. Pancho, in particular, was steaming. As Dave went out he was headed for the door. Clint stepped in front of him and said, “Go sit down, Colombian! Keep you fucking nose out of our affairs here!” Four people close heard it and said that seemed a good idea to them, too. They wouldn’t go to Colombia and interfere with their politics. Have the decency to return the favor.

  Pancho went back to his brother and Perez. Nobody would talk to them anymore.

  The Panamanians here had different points of view than the Indios, but they deeply believed in compromise. They understood that the Indios had tried that and it hadn’t worked. They didn’t like what was happening, but understood it. They wanted the government to back down before it got more violent.

  The band left the stage and the bartender turned on the TV. The news was on. An Indio had been killed. A 26 year old man.

  “Oh, SHIT!” the bartender cried. “Now it starts! Oh, SHIT!”

  That fit Clint’s reaction perfectly. The crowd was suddenly almost totally in sympathy with the Indios. They were afraid that this would make a compromise impossible.

  “I think the Indio leaders will call for calm,” Clint said. “There will be a strong reaction, but maybe the government will see that the whole world’s watching and come to some kind of agreement.”

  An Indio woman came on and called for her people to remain calm. Martinelli and the police would answer for that atrocity. The time for accord was fast coming to an end. Let there be no more violence.

  Clint nodded. The bartender said he was now solidly for the Indios. There was no excuse for killing anyone. The whole world would get the idea Panamanians were a bunch of uncivilized barbarians. Noriega-types were again in charge! Clint agreed, but said Martinelli was a businessman who understood what that kind of thing would do. He would surely try to stop it. He was money-oriented and this could hurt investment and tourism very badly.

  He went back to the hotel. He had expected the Colombians to lay for him, but they hadn’t. Maybe they saw they could only lose to carry anything any further than they already had.

  Your Move

  Tonight the Colombians would make some kind of move. The situation with the Indios had gotten worse for a time, ending when the Indios burned the police station in Volcan. There were suddenly meetings with the Indigeno’s representatives and an effort was being made to find some kind of meeting ground from which to work. The police had broken up the barricades on the roads, but it was still chancy to drive anywhere. Gasolene and foods were now coming into David. Another Indio, very young, was killed in Las Lomas. It was now critical that an agreement be reached or there could be repercussions that would make it a concern past the borders of the country.

  Clint would stay in the hippie/biker disguise tonight. He would go to places a little distanced from Chaco’s and Music Night later. The Colombians seemed to start at those two places and act in others a little farther away. If he could get them to attack him he could call in Tonio, say he was investigating Pablo’s murder, this Perez character was in Hornitos and was interested in where Pablo lived, he found the items in Pablo’s burned house, he was attacked here, those three always hang around together, they had gone to Chiriqui Grande where Pablo’s girlfriend said there was some kind of trouble between Pablo and those three, they represented an antique and jewelry dealer in Colombia, there were no antiques or jewels in Hornitos or Chiriqui Grande except for the ones found in Pablo’s house. There’s some kind of money laundering scheme being run by the person they met in Chiriqui Grande. Two and two are still four.

  Tonio would enjoy hearing that list of “clues” Clint had discovered and would insist on a complete investigation of all those named and concerned. When they had given their statements he would throw in his ace.

  Clint was at Rey just before six o’clock, had a comida corriente in a local restaurant he would definitely remember. It was good! Two dollars and all he could eat. He had a choice of pollo, loma, mondongo, carne, puerco or pescado. He took the carne with aroz, frijoles and a salad.

  He was waiting to see the Mitsubishi drive by about seven when he got a call from Samuel, a police officer he knew. Dave was attacked by two men. He wasn’t harmed and had used a pepper spray on them and had knocked one of them down and kicked him in the face before a third shoved him aside and pushed the three into a red truck. No one was close enough to identify anyone, but Dave told him they were Colombians he had seen last night when he played some music in a bar over near Rey.

  Clint started to get royally pissed, then thought about it. Seventy five year old Dave, five eight and a hundred forty pounds taking on three Colombians half his age and twice his size. It was almost funny.

  He called Dave, who said it was no big deal. He figured that was about what Clint wanted and had carried pepper spray for that reason. He hadn’t counted on the third one being able to get them away, but maybe Clint didn’t need that.

  “It’s just an item to add to a list, but don’t get involved with my shit to where you get hurt.”

  “I suppose they’ll try something a little worse soon, but I have to go to Punta Piedra tonight so won’t be here. Too bad!”

  “I want them to come after me. It’ll be the lever I need to find out what’s really going on with that woman and her gringo boyfriend in Chiriqui Grande.”

  “Linda? That restaurant bit?”

  “Uh-huh.”

  “It’s an old scheme to launder money. They’re Colombians. DUH!”

  “It’s not drugs.”

  There was a short pause. Dave asked, “Is that certain?”

  “Directly, yes. It could be something that was originally financed through drugs, but they’re not there anymore.”

  “Know what it is?”

  “Not even a good suspi.... I might have an idea, but Santa Marta? Why Santa Marta?”

  “What?”

  “It’s not in that area.”

  “Which makes good old Santa Marta a great place to run it maybe?”

  “Could be. It just could be!”

  “Watch your back!”

  “Yeah. You too. One of them suggested the same thing, but in a different tone.”

  They chatted a little, then Clint rung off and sat back to think over another cup of coffee. “Why Santa Marta?” could be the same question as “Why Chiriqui Grande?”

  Should he change tactics?

  If they came by within the next hour, keep to the plan. If not ... maybe wait another day or two. He thought a bit more, then called Manolo. “Is there a big trade in stolen jewelry in Santa Marta, Colombia?”

  “Not that we know of.”

  “I think just maybe now you
know of.”

  “Tonio sent me descriptions and pictures of what you found in Hornitos. The one emerald is large enough to be of interest to us, but there’s no indication it’s anything illegal. It’s not reported missing anywhere and it’s worth about a mil and a half.”

  “Manolo, I think there’s a big find somewhere in northern Colombia. Emeralds. I think they’re on government land or something. I think you can find out what’s going on. Trace the Colombians I asked about from the first time they farted to the last.”

  “Will do! You might have found something valuable. Some trades in unregistered large stones have been showing up in Sweden. They might have come through Australia. No one can prove anything. We have to treat them as legitimate even though we damned well know better.”

  They chatted until the Mitsubishi went by. Clint decided to wait until he had more information.

  The truck stopped and backed up. Clint sighed. It wouldn’t hurt anything.

  Donaldo got out and came to where he was sitting. “I’m not looking for trouble. We were getting out of line. I just want to know what Clint Faraday finds so interesting about us.

  “You see, that old hippie said that about you being the one who was declared a Ngobe. We checked.”

  “Maybe it wasn’t you I was interested in until last night.”

  “May I ask who, then?”

  “You can ask, but I won’t answer. It was to do with some things that happened in two places, neither in David. It’s tied into a murder.”

  “But ... you confronted my brother last night. I don’t know why?”

  “We were just chatting like people do in a bar when he made a sick remark about killing off the Indios. I am a Ngobe. He was suddenly not the sort of okay guy I was talking to in a bar, he was a bigoted piece of shit who wasn’t even from this country.”

  “That’s all it was?”

  “Then. I’ll probably let it drop if nothing else happens. If something else happens I won’t let it go.”