The Quality of the Informant cc-3

by Gerald Petievich

  "What kind of checks?" Carr said.

  The black man's expression changed to one of fear. His eyes were suddenly on a dresser drawer. "Didn't Tom tell you I didn't know what kind of checks?"

  Carr shook his head.

  "I don't think I'd better say anything else until I talk with Tom." The black man said this in the hesitant tone of someone who had dialed the wrong number.

  Kelly stood at the door. He reached behind him and opened it with his left hand. The agents walked out to the sedan. Kelly was mumbling under his breath. Inside the car he took out a pen and notebook and scribbled. "I got a name and number off a driver's license," he said.

  "Ten to one he's wanted," Carr said.

  Kelly laughed. "I'd say he didn't exactly look like your average Baja tourist."

  The Ensenada police station was a diminutive green building that reminded Carr of the tiny one- and two-bedroom stucco homes that dotted the narrow streets in East Los Angeles where he'd grown up.

  Kelly followed him in the front door. The place contained an office with three desks and a steel door that probably led to the prisoner lockup. The walls looked like the walls of any police station: lots of photographs and sketches of ugly people, lists of names, duty rosters. In the corner was a gun rack that contained a shiny Thompson submachine gun.

  A stocky Mexican man wearing a rumpled black suit with a Mexican flag lapel pin and a snap-brim bat was parked behind a desk. He held a peeled orange like a hand grenade. Deftly, he slid his roller chair to a wastebasket and leaned over. Without so much as acknowledging the Americans' presence, the barrel-chested cop bit viciously into the orange. The juice from the fruit dripped into the basket. With two or three chomps, wet and loud, the fruit disappeared. Using two fingers, the Mexican pulled a handkerchief from his back pocket and wiped his mouth thoroughly, taking special care to dab his Pancho Villa mustache. He wiped his hands on the rag and put it away.

  "Do you speak English?" Kelly said.

  "If I didn't, I guess you'd be shit out of luck," the cop said. He rolled back behind his desk.

  The T-men looked at one another. Carr thought the cop's shirt looked like it would pop its buttons. The desk plate read "A. Rodriguez-Chief of Detectives."

  "L.A. cops on vacation, right?" Rodriguez said.

  "U.S. Treasury agents," Carr said. He showed his gold badge.

  "Federales," Rodriguez said sarcastically.

  "We're looking for an American fugitive," Carr said. He handed Rodriguez a mug shot of Paul LaMonica. "He hangs around Teddy's Bar."

  The policeman examined the photograph with a blank expression. "All the American assholes hang around Teddy's Bar," he said offhandedly. He tossed the photo on the desk.

  "Does the face ring a bell?" Carr asked.

  "I've seen him around," Rodriguez said. He opened a desk drawer and pulled out another orange.

  "Do you know where he lives?" Kelly said.

  "I can find out." Rodriguez bit a bole in the orange and pulled off large chunks of peel. "And just what are you gonna do if I find him?"

  Carr and Kelly looked at one another.

  "This ain't your ranch down here, cowboys," Rodriguez said before they could answer. "If you take someone into custody in Mexico, it's kidnapping. You arrest them, then I arrest you. How would you like that, eh, cowboys?" He rolled over to the basket, still chomping the orange. More juice.

  Carr stared at the Mexican. "He's a federal prison escapee and he killed one of my informants," Carr said.

  The cop went through his wipe-off routine again, then stood up. Carr figured his height at more than six-foot-two. "And what would you tell me if I came across the border into your country and said I was looking for some sonofabitch? Huh? What would you tell me?" Rodriguez's eyes were half shut.

  "We'd probably tell you that we'd handle it," Carr said.

  "That's right, cowboys. And that's what I'm telling you. I'll handle it…by the proper police procedures."

  Kelly's face was red. "And what does that mean?" he said.

  "That means when I find the sonofabitch you're looking for, I kick his ass, handcuff him, toss him in the backseat of my car and drive him up to the border where you people are waiting. I pull the sonofabitch out of the car and boot his ass across the line to you. That way things are done nice and legal." The detective smiled broadly. His canine teeth were gold.

  The special agents smiled back. Carr introduced himself. He shook hands, as did Kelly. "Frank Garcia said to say hello," Carr said.

  "You're friends with Frank?" The Mexican's eyes lit up.

  Carr nodded. "Drinking buddies."

  The Mexican laughed loudly. He picked up the mug shot. "In that case, maybe we'll kill this pendejo when we catch him. You just say the word."

  "Thanks anyway," Carr said. He smiled wanly.

  "But first we've got to catch the sonofabitch." Rodriguez picked up the phone and dialed. "There's only one real-estate man in town who rents to Americans." He held a phone conversation in Spanish. Near the end of the conversation he wrote something down. He said gracias and hung up. "This pendejo used the name Roger Brown when he rented the place…paid two months' rent in advance." Rodriguez stood and pulled a cowboy-style two-gun belt out of a desk drawer. He fastened it around his waist. "Let's go, men." He yanked the submachine gun from its rack and strode out the door.

  The patrol car sped south along the coast. Rodriguez had turned on the red light and siren as if they were heading for a bank robbery in progress. He rounded turns in the narrow road like a stock-car racer. A few miles south of town the detective vaulted the police car off the pavement and onto a dirt road. Kicking up a camouflage of dirt, he raced along a path bounded by heavy chaparral and fir trees for a few miles. Finally, at a clearing, the vehicle was brought to a halt. The siren was turned off. Ahead of them, at the edge of the woods, lay the charred remains of a small structure. It was surrounded by a makeshift fence that the fire had not touched. The men exited the vehicle and stared at the ruins, the dust from the police car swirling around them like smoke.

  "The pendejo sure as hell doesn't live here anymore," Rodriguez said.

  Kicking through the debris, Carr made his way into the middle of the charred pile. He picked up a half-burnt scrap of lumber and poked at the ashes. "LaMonica is a counterfeiter," Carr said without looking up. "He may have had a good reason to burn this place down."

  The Mexican detective furrowed his brow. "Destroying the evidence," he said somberly. He turned on his heel and headed back to the patrol car. Having unlocked the vehicle's trunk, he flung it open. He pulled out a shovel and a pick and tossed them on the ground. Without hesitation, he removed his coat and unfastened his gun belt. He dropped them in the trunk. Stripping off his dress shirt, he hung it neatly from the trunk latch. He grabbed the tools and strutted into the middle of the ashes like a bull entering a ring. He tossed a shovel at the T-men and went to work with the pick.

  Chapter 22

  By noon it was a hundred degrees. The three men were covered with soot and perspiration. Rodriguez had made a beer run for which he refused to accept any money; there was a pile of Carta Blanca bottles in the trunk of the squad car.

  Kelly stood to the rear of the ash pile. He poked the point of a handkerchief into his eye for a moment and pulled it out. He wiped something on the back of his hand. "Got it," he said. "It felt like I had a two-by-four stuck in there."

  Carr kept digging, hacking around.

  Next to the patrol car lay a collection of items that had withstood the fire: a couple of ink cans (labels burned off), a feeder that looked like it might have come off a printing press, a charred paper cutter…

  Rodriguez was fifty or so yards away in a clump of trees.

  He whistled. The T-men sauntered over. The Mexican pointed to the ground between some trees where the earth appeared freshly spaded. Without a word the men began digging. The sound of metal on metal. Carr dropped to his knees and dug with his hands. "It's a printing
press," he said.

  They took turns digging. Finally the upper section of the machine was free. Following Rodriguez's suggestion, they used a rope to attach the press to the rear bumper of the police car. The Mexican started the engine and pulled the press, dirt and all, from its burial site. Oddly, it came out of the ground upright, as if all the machine needed was a brushing off to be operable again. The men used bare hands to knock the remaining dirt off the moving parts. "There's no blanket roller," Kelly said.

  The cop looked puzzled.

  "The blanket roller might have an ink impression of what was printed," Carr explained.

  Rodriguez nodded. He stepped closer to the heavy machine. As if the machine were an adversary, he slammed his open palms against it. With a mighty shove, he knocked the printing press over. With another flurry of hands, the men cleared the dirt off the bottom of the press. A piece of white bond paper was stuck to the base of the apparatus. Carr pulled it off. There was nothing on it except a glob of purple ink. They passed the sheet around.

  "The inks that LaMonica bought in L.A.," Kelly said. "Blue and red…"

  "Makes purple," Carr said. "Blue and red makes purple."

  "But what the hell kind of negotiable paper is printed with purple ink?" Kelly scratched his head. "Foreign money maybe, or checks."

  "Could be any number of things," Carr said.

  "It's for sure the sonofabitch didn't go to all this trouble to cover up printing birthday paper," Rodriguez said. He laughed loudly.

  It wasn't yet noon, which probably accounted for the fact that the motel bar was nearly empty. LaMonica faced Lockhart across a cocktail table hidden in a corner. Other than the whispers of the two men, the only sound in the place was the splashing of highball glasses as the bartender dunked them in and out of soapy water.

  "I want to see your money," LaMonica said. "Surely you don't expect me to just hand over the package of checks and hope for the best. Like what's to stop you from taking the checks and just flat out walking away? You're smart enough to know my client can't stroll into the local police station and make a complaint about someone stealing her phony checks." Staring at the fat man, he swished the ice in his drink and took a sip.

  Lockhart finished his drink and looked into the glass. "On the other hand," he said, "you see no danger in me showing you people fifty thousand dollars — real dollars, mind you, not some worthless printed paper shit like you are selling, but real honest-to-God greenbacks. " He shook his head. "You must think I'm a rube, Mr. Brown, an honest-to-Christ, shit-shoveling hillbilly."

  LaMonica's finger pointed at the other man's chest. "On the contrary," he said. "You're like a lot of executive types. Always holding a few cards out of the deck. And as a matter of fact, you're holding one right this very minute."

  "And what might that be?" Lockhart said, leaning back in his chair.

  "The goon you had with you at the Houston Airport. He's your man. He followed me. Do you want to sit there and deny that?" LaMonica smiled sardonically. The fat man's face reddened. He fidgeted.

  "Don't embarrass yourself by saying no," LaMonica said. "Now, if you are so pure and honest, then why have a goon to follow me? Why the muscle? I'll tell you why…because you're planning to rip us off. It would probably mean a promotion for you. Maybe even a fucking double Christmas bonus! Recover the checks without spending a dime out of the good old company till. I know how you people think and so does my client."

  "You really are paranoid, aren't you?" the fat man said. There was a mist of perspiration on his brow.

  "I don't like the way you do business," LaMonica said.

  The men stared at one another for a while.

  "We're not going to get anywhere like this," said the security man. "I came here to discuss the final transfer. You keep changing the subject."

  "There's nothing more to discuss," LaMonica said. "You can show me your money or the whole deal is off."

  "Then the goddamn deal is off," Lockhart said. He stood up abruptly. "If you change your mind and choose to do it my way, I'll be in my room for the next thirty minutes. And don't try to contact me again once I leave." He marched out of the bar.

  LaMonica hurried upstairs to his room. He knocked. Sandy let him in. She was dressed only in bra and panties. He rushed past her to the dresser and poured a drink. He sipped. "It's going perfectly," he said. "We're over the hump."

  "What if he walks over here right now and kicks in the door? How do we know he's not secretly working with the cops? He's got to figure that the checks are right here in the room.

  LaMonica slugged down the drink. "He'll have figured wrong, that's all. The checks aren't here. If he puts a gun to my head, I'll tell him that the checks are still in Mexico. He would never have the balls to drive us over the border to get them. He, and any cops, would have to walk away…leave us alone and walk away." He glared at her. "Why don't you put some clothes on?"

  She ignored him. "What about the car? The checks are sitting right there in the trunk."

  "We got here before he did," LaMonica said to the mirror. "We haven't been near the car. The parking lot is full." He looked at his watch. "Things are going perfectly."

  "I'm keyed up," Sandy said. She fingered the elastic band on her panties. "If you feel like it, so do I. I want to get my mind off this whole thing for a few minutes."

  LaMonica's mind was still on the details as he unzipped his trousers.

  Lockhart sat at the tiny desk in his motel room, the phone to his ear. He wore a.38 in a shoulder holster. The rig caused his armpits to perspire more than usual. Next to the telephone was a box of doughnuts with three jelly-filleds left. He knew that such between-meal snacks were unhealthy, but at least he wasn't a heavy smoker or drinker. Someday he hoped he would be able to put his mind to the task of losing weight, but for the time being it was impossible. When he felt tense he liked to eat, and that was that.

  The chairman came on the line.

  "I've made my final demand, sir," Lockhart said. "I gave him an ultimatum. He is still adamant about wanting to see our money, but I don't think we should do this. It's just too dangerous under the circumstances. Is that your thinking as well, sir?"

  There was a long silence. "If the checks are there, I want them. I want you to do what you have to do to get them."

  "Well…uh…sir, do you think I should show him the money?" Lockhart said. "Just let him see it?"

  "That's not what I said, Omar. I said that if the checks are there, I want them." The chairman enunciated each word.

  "Certainly, sir," Lockhart said. He cleared his throat. "I'm on top of it. I'll make it work." Be assertive, he remembered from a recent one-day seminar.

  "I'll wait to hear from you," the chairman said coolly. The phone clicked.

  Lockhart wished there was someone with him, someone to talk the situation over with. His stomach growled. A doughnut was at his lips. He bit down and the jelly squirted pleasantly onto the corners of his mouth. He chewed. It was gone in three bites. Now there were only two left in the box. He wiped his mouth with a Kleenex. Standing up, he peeked out the curtain. "I can take care of myself," he said as if speaking to his mother.

  The phone rang. Lockhart jumped backward. He took a deep breath and picked up the receiver.

  "I'm willing to compromise," Roger Brown said. "We can both show at the same time. You bring yours and we bring ours and we deal. This way will be fair to both parties. "

  Lockhart agreed. After putting down the phone, he finished off the last two doughnuts and washed his hands thoroughly.

  The motel parking lot was fairly busy: a family loading luggage into a station wagon, people coming and going from the registration office. LaMonica got in the driver's side of the rented sedan and unlocked the passenger door for Sandy. He removed a snub-nosed revolver from the glove compartment and laid it on the seat between them.

  He handed Sandy a key. "Put it in your shoe," he said. "If something goes wrong and he gets the drop on us, tell him we never h
ad the checks, that the whole thing was just a con game.

  Sandy hid the key in one of her flats. "I think I have to go to the bathroom," she said.

  "Nerves," he said.

  "There are too many people around here," she said.

  "All the safer," LaMonica said. "He'll be less likely to try anything in a public place."

  Lockhart came out of the motel office carrying a briefcase. He looked around nervously and started walking toward them. There was a bulge under his left arm.

  "He's packing," LaMonica said. Sandy bit her lip.

  Cautiously the fat man shuffled up to the passenger window. He was out of breath. "Are you ready?" he said.

  "Yes," Sandy said, "just show us that you have it."

  "We agreed to do this at exactly the same time," Lockhart said.

  "I have the traveler's checks," she said. "Just flash your money and let's get this thing over with. Please."

  The fat man's eyes twitched. He looked around the lot again.

  LaMonica's right hand gripped the butt of the revolver.

  Lockhart balanced the briefcase on one hand in front of the passenger window. He flipped it open. It was filled with stacks of twenty-dollar bills. He slammed it shut again. His hand reached inside his coat. "You've seen the money. Now let's see the checks, right now. You'd better not try anything. I've got a gun." Lockhart's lips had turned white.

  LaMonica tapped Sandy Hartzbecker's arm. She opened the passenger door and went to the trunk. LaMonica followed, holding the gun under his jacket. He faced Lockhart.

  She removed the key from her shoe and unlocked the trunk. The checks were in plain sight in a large open suitcase with straps. "Drop the briefcase in the trunk and take your checks," LaMonica said. The fat man complied by closing the suitcase and fastening the latches. He jerked the bag out of the trunk and walked backward, wide-eyed, wary, his gun hand inside his coat.