Plain Heathen Mischief

by Martin Clark

  The trick, Joel came to realize, was how to differentiate between heaven-sent persuasion and his own wish list, how to separate holy marching orders from the vanities and narcissistic wants that cluttered his brain. The voices in his thoughts always sounded identical, and the ideas that wandered through his mind didn’t carry labels or certificates of authenticity; the flashy, peacock counterfeits were just as impressive—at first blush—as the pedigreed article. He’d prayed for guidance and remained passive, malleable, and believed he’d discovered the Lord’s will, had kicked tires and examined the fine print on every document. In the midst of his crisis of faith at the Station, wobbly and with his stomach in revolt, he’d been imbued with step-by-step wisdom, and there’d been ample opportunity since then for him to be warned or dissuaded if he were formulating trouble for himself. He’d been given the goods—who could dispute it?

  Then again, how many other pilgrims had received their instructions— and been certain—and then done something obviously maniacal or self-serving, set out convinced of their righteousness only to discover the Almighty wasn’t buying into their job change or car bomb or blood-transfusion refusal or well-intentioned fund-raiser? He’d been asked this question hundreds of times by his church members: “How can I tell?” they’d plead, so many of them anguished and tentative. Now that he faced the very same dilemma, he reflected on his stock answer and realized how facile it’d been, how he’d given them nothing of value. “You’ll know,” he’d frequently instruct his congregation, “you’ll know because it’s the Lord’s desire, and it will swell your heart.”

  Recalling his own worthless advice, he shook his head and tried to imagine what the men and women of his church must have thought when he handed them little more than an open-ended tautology, a soothsayer’s can’t-miss wisdom. He looked at the keys of Sophie’s antiquated IBM typewriter, stuck a sheet of paper on the black roller, pressed the “down” button on the far right side and watched the paper wrap and load. It was the first of March, a week after his last failed telephone efforts on behalf of the police, and Agent Woods would be at Sophie’s in four days, ready to travel to Las Vegas for the next shot at Sa’ad. Joel started to type. “This is the hardest thing I’ve ever done,” the letter began. He was using carbon paper, creating a duplicate of the original page. “Here we go,” he said to himself. “Lord willing.” He finished the letter and put the original and the copy in his sister’s dinged metal mailbox, raising the scrawny red flag to signal the postman.

  Joel slept well the night before departing for the meeting with Sa’ad, and he was dressed and groomed early, eager to leave for Nevada. To Joel’s dismay, Hobbes arrived at Sophie’s along with Woods, and the FBI agent was in particularly bad humor, upset because he’d been outflanked to some extent by Lynette and the U.S. attorney. “This is a wild goose chase,” he grumbled as Joel put his overnight bag in the Taurus. “A penny-ante operation that’ll probably cost us a year of work and ensure the loss of a priceless painting.”

  “In all fairness,” Woods remarked, “you guys must’ve had a bad year, ’cause it was Mr. King who gave you most of what you know. You’d still be spinnin’ your wheels and chasin’ bad info if Ms. Allen hadn’t done your homework for you.”

  “I doubt it,” Hobbes said, but he didn’t bother to elaborate.

  Woods rode with Joel in the Taurus, and Hobbes followed them in a silver sedan. It took two days to reach Las Vegas, and Woods and Joel shared a hotel room the first night on the road. They talked about sports, politics, old movies and fishing, alternated NPR and country-and-western stations when they played the radio. Joel did most of the driving, but he became fatigued with three hours remaining to Vegas, and Woods handled the last stretch while Joel dozed with his head against the window, his sleep sterile and dreamless, the arid desert whizzing by at ninety miles an hour.

  They’d had Joel make an appointment with Sa’ad under a fictitious name and required him to bring the Taurus in case Sa’ad checked the parking lot or asked how he’d gotten to Nevada. The appointment was at four o’clock. An hour beforehand Joel, Hobbes, and Woods met Harry Winton, the Vegas officer supervising the case, at the Stardust Hotel, took the elevator to the fifth floor and knocked on a door without a number. Winton and a colleague were waiting in a room that lacked a bed and dresser, and they gave Joel all manner of advice as well as a makeshift disguise: a hat, wig and sunglasses, amateurish enough that it would appear to be Joel’s handiwork, not the creation of a police sting. They bugged his car and provided him with a fountain pen to place in his pocket, explaining how the miniature transmitter at the top of the device needed to remain outside the cloth, pointed toward Sa’ad. Don’t act nervous, they coached him. Don’t do anything suspicious. Be yourself.

  “I’ll try,” Joel said. “To be honest, I’m pretty darn jittery.”

  “You better hope this goes well,” Hobbes said, his demeanor menacing.

  “No one could possibly want this to succeed more than I do,” Joel vowed. He took a heavy breath, then exhaled through his mouth, fretted with his hands and flicked his tongue over his lips.

  “I need to talk to you about one other matter,” Woods said.

  “Oh, what’s that?” Joel asked. He stopped his hands.

  “You know anything you’re not telling us?” Woods asked. His approach was indirect and genial.

  “About what?”

  “About the friggin’ Lindbergh baby. About the one-armed man,” Hobbes snapped. “What the hell do you think we’re talking about?”

  Woods stared at Joel. “Is there anything else regarding Sa’ad or Brooks or the jewelry we oughta know? Information of any kind whatsoever?”

  “I’m not following you,” Joel said and wrinkled his forehead. He looked at Woods but not Hobbes.

  Woods reached inside his sport coat and withdrew a sheet of paper. It was creased vertically, folded only once. “Take a look at this. It’s a copy.” He handed it over, and Joel feigned surprise, allowed his face to crash and his posture to disintegrate.

  “Oh my,” he said.

  “No kidding, Mr. King,” Hobbes said. “ ‘Oh my’ is right. You’ve been feeding us snacks instead of a meal. Sitting on material facts.” Hobbes’s features were intense.

  Joel pretended to study the page:

  To the FBI and Agent Woods:

  This is the hardest thing I’ve ever done. I love my brother Joel and do not want him to get in more trouble than he’s already in. What you people don’t understand is that he fears Sa’ad. Sa’ad is a wicked, dangerous man, and Joel is scared of him. I’m afraid that Joel will not tell you the whole story, and you’ll never catch Sa’ad. I think Joel knows where one of the stolen rings is hidden, that it’s somewhere in Sa’ad’s office. If you encourage Joel and reassure him, I think he might reveal the location and give you more help. Now, he’s just mixed up and frightened. He doesn’t know what to do or where to turn. But if you could find the ring, you could put Sa’ad away and protect Joel, right? Please work with him on this, but don’t let him know I contacted you.

  Thank you,

  Sophie King

  “So what do you have to say, Mr. King?” Hobbes demanded.

  “Well, I’ve never lied to you guys or anything,” Joel said.

  “Never lied?” Hobbes boomed. “That’s all you ever do. A lie’s a conscious evasion of the truth, and that seems to be your calling card. Never lied? Ha!”

  “Joel, if you know where the dadgummed ring is, if it’s not at Van Heiss’s, you’d better tell us,” Woods encouraged him. “Come on now. We’re out on a limb here, especially Lynette, and we don’t need you keepin’ details to yourself. We can protect you from Sa’ad and his friend, if that’s your worry. We haven’t seen much that leads us to believe either one of ’em’s violent. They’re con men, but they hardly seem dangerous, okay? My guess is they’ll break and run when we get down to the nitty-gritty. Why’re you so scared?”

  “You don’t know Sa’ad. You
guys have no idea.” Joel made his voice quaver. “You better believe I’m afraid of them,” he said, his words freighted with phony conviction. “He’s ruthless. You’ll see soon enough.”

  “Well, tough shit,” Hobbes said. “He’s a typical con man, and you’re a conniving little ferret who’s afraid of your shadow. I could tell you about dangerous. You don’t know the first thing about dangerous. You’re scared of a damn ambulance-chasing lawyer.”

  Woods looked at Hobbes and waited a moment before he spoke. “We’ll do everything in our power to guarantee your safety, if that’s what it takes. So will Ms. Allen.”

  “Let’s cut to the chase,” Hobbes said. “Do you know where the ring is? Do you?”

  “No one asked me that before, okay? Never. I’ve never once fibbed about it. It’s not fair to accuse me of misleading the police. I’ve done everything you’ve asked—made the calls, agreed to the wire, whatever.”

  “Yeah, and you’ve told your damn sister twice as much as you’ve told us,” Hobbes complained. “You know good and well you’ve been jerking us around.”

  “I have not,” Joel protested.

  “So where’s the ring?” Woods asked. “And which ring are we discussing? You told us everything was returned.”

  “Did you guys threaten my sister?” Joel suddenly said.

  “Lord no,” Woods assured him. “This came in the mail. Just her tryin’ to look out for you.”

  “How do I know she wrote it? Maybe this is some police hoax.” Joel felt he needed to ask this, and he momentarily slipped into high dudgeon.

  “It’s not a trick. She sent it to the police station and a copy to Ms. Allen,” Woods said. “We wouldn’t wanna cause your sister any grief.”

  “So what if it is a ruse, Mr. King?” Hobbes was tapping his foot and smacking gum. “It’s fairly obvious you know more than you’re letting on. I’m running out of patience.”

  “Joel?” Woods lifted his eyebrows.

  “Why would she do this to me?” Joel said, touching all the bases.

  “We can’t help you unless you help us,” Woods said. “Your sister’s got the right idea.”

  “Okay.” Joel paused. “Okay—here’s what I know.” He ballooned his cheeks and then let the air escape. “Sa’ad feels very secure in his office, claims it would be difficult to obtain a wire tap or search warrant because of his being an attorney and entitled to protect clients and their files and communications. He views the office as a safe haven. He has all sorts of stuffed hunting trophies and this rack of gum machines in there. The place looks like Dante’s zoo or something, very foreboding. I think the jewelry’s hidden in his office, either in the gum machines or one of the animals.”

  “How do you know?” Woods asked. “Have you seen it? Has he told you?”

  “No, but I’ve seen Edmund fooling with the machines, removing items while he and Sa’ad discussed business.”

  “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Hobbes asked.

  “Did you see the Jewish Museum ring?” Woods asked before Joel could respond to Hobbes. “Why would he keep part of the bait? I thought the plan was to return it?”

  “No. Honestly, I didn’t see it. But if you put it all together—the fact Sa’ad feels his office is off-limits to the authorities, and Edmund taking things from the gum machines, and all the nooks and crannies in these animals—where does it point you? And wouldn’t it make sense for them to keep a bonus, a relatively inexpensive piece, a five- or ten-thousand-dollar trinket the owner would assume was lost or misplaced? It’s easy money, and it adds up.”

  “Makes no sense at all that they’d jeopardize the whole plan and risk hundreds of thousands for a few measly grand, ” Hobbes said. “They’d be morons to raise flags by keeping part of the bait.” He bore down on Joel. “What exactly did Edmund remove?”

  “They didn’t invite me over for a private viewing, Mr. Hobbes. Edmund took the machine apart and reached inside. I guess he just wanted his chewing gum for free.” Joel was sarcastic with the last sentence.

  “I don’t know,” Woods said. “Is this it, everything?”

  “Yeah. No offense, guys, but first you berate me for not being forthcoming enough, and when I tell you what I think, you treat me like I’m an idiot. I can’t win.”

  “I can’t believe an accomplished operator like Sa’ad would hold on to a mediocre piece of stolen jewelry,” Hobbes said.

  “Really?” Joel said. “Is it so difficult to imagine a thief getting greedy, becoming more and more emboldened?” He was forceful and argumentative. “I mean, heck, it’s nothing to me, but I know there’s something other than legal briefs and paper clips in Sa’ad’s office.”

  “But you never saw the ring?” Woods asked. “Either one of ’em? Correct?”

  “Correct. I never saw a ring or anything else. And maybe our stuff’s long gone or never was there or was returned to the owner. I don’t guess you’ll be asking Mr. Van Heiss, though, will you? But I’ll bet you there’s something incriminating in those machines. Why else would Edmund be taking off the top while he and Sa’ad talk about the legal system and their so-called projects, how two ‘claims’ had come to fruition?”

  “Did Sa’ad or Edmund ever tell you—expressly admit—they were planning on keeping some of the Van Heiss jewelry?” Hobbes asked.

  “No, not exactly.”

  “Why do I have to drag every single syllable out of your sorry mouth?” Hobbes complained. “Why?”

  “What did they tell you, Joel?” Woods asked.

  “When they came to Missoula to collect the whole bag, they claimed one piece was missing. A ring. They threw a fit and accused me of stealing it.”

  “Did you?” Woods wondered. “Steal it, I mean?”

  “No, of course not. Why would I?”

  “Because you could?” Hobbes said sardonically.

  Joel ignored him. “So why are they claiming a ring is gone? Huh? Why are they accusing me? Maybe Sa’ad swiped it and wants Edmund to suspect me. Or one might conclude it’s part of their scam somehow, a double-cross. Perhaps they skimmed a taste off the top.”

  “Why would they even alert you?” Hobbes asked. “Why wouldn’t they simply do it and leave you none the wiser? You’re not being rational.”

  “That’s the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question, isn’t it? I have no idea. You’re the expert; I’d hoped you could shed some light on the situation, how the plot progresses. But I know they claim there’s a missing ring, the green one. Add that to everything else you know.”

  “Hmmm,” Woods said, thinking.

  Harry Winton hadn’t joined the debate. He’d listened and peered out the hotel window at the Las Vegas Strip, was watching a teenage hooker wearing cutoff jeans bargaining with a bald, flabby man in a Hawaiian shirt. “Add that to everything else we know, and we don’t know anything,” he said, speaking for the first time since he’d introduced himself. “That letter was typed, wasn’t it? Even the woman’s name?” he asked, directing the question to Hobbes.

  “Yeah. We sent a copy to—”

  “Oh, I got it,” Winton interrupted. “I got it. Thank you.”

  “Yeah. No problem,” Hobbes said, uncertain where the Vegas policeman was headed.

  Winton returned to the window. “Midafternoon and people are paying for sex,” he remarked, still studying the girl and her john. “Me, I’d at least try a few more bars and casinos, keep at it till dark, see if I couldn’t find some tourist for free before I coughed up my hard-earned bucks.” He kept his back to everyone in the room. “Two things you should know, Mr. King.” Winton’s voice was weirdly high, as if his Adam’s apple were clamped. Joel wondered if he’d been injured, his throat traumatized by an accident or scuffle with a criminal.

  “Okay,” Joel answered.

  “One, almost every cop in this town hates Sa’ad X. Sa’ad. He’s a shyster and a crook, and he’s always accusing us of shit we haven’t done to try and shake his clients loose.” Winton swu
ng around as he was talking and gazed at Joel.

  “I see,” Joel said.

  “Second, it’s procedure that we have to search you before you go in with the wire.” The announcement was brief and deft. He’d intentionally jumped Joel, waylaid him, and he paused to take Joel’s measure, studying him for a gasp or erratic breath, field-testing his reaction to see if there was any sign of guilt.

  “I’m not surprised by that,” Joel said. “I understand you’re doing your job.”

  Hobbes’s expression had turned stony. Woods’s face also had changed: he was curious, weighing a new hypothesis, following Harry Winton’s gambit to see where it went.

  “Of course, since it’s only a wire and we’re respectful of your dignity, we don’t want to make too big a deal of it,” Winton said, his voice beginning to sound robotic.

  “No problem,” Joel said.

  “You need to use the toilet or anything before we do the frisk?” Winton asked.

  “That would hardly be advisable,” Hobbes said to Winton. “You can’t be serious?”

  “I’ll go with him if you’re worried,” Winton said. “Keep an eye peeled for irregularities.” He had difficulty producing the last word, chirped it in a cricket octave.

  “I’m not certain your supervision would completely cure my concerns,” Hobbes said.

  “I’ll watch him,” Woods volunteered.

  “I’m fine, gentlemen. I take your point, Mr. Winton, understand what’s not being said, and I can promise you I don’t need to visit the restroom or hide anything. And you won’t find anything concealed on my person.” Joel held each of his arms perpendicularly and made himself into a T. “Go to it,” he told them, attempting to sound flippant and unconcerned while his mouth began to parch and his guts hopped in his abdomen.

  “Oh well,” Winton said. He sternly reminded Hobbes this was a state case—Woods chimed in to support him—and that the FBI was there as a courtesy, end of story. He hoped everybody understood their roles. “You fellows passed on this one,” he squeaked at Hobbes. “Lookin’ for bigger game.” He commenced a superficial, desultory search, had Joel unbutton his shirt, rapidly patted his legs and butt, inspected his shoes and wallet and made him remove his belt. “Clean,” he declared when he finished.