Mary Beth and I spent yesterday walking around Bequia. We acted like tourists and were mistaken for honeymooners by the shopkeepers. I felt easy with that. She made me feel good about life. I didn't want to think about her finding a crew berth and parting ways with me.
But I didn't have much to offer a woman. Woman — she was only a few years older than my daughter. I needed to get a grip, keep my perspective. What could she see in an old man like me? Even aside from the parts of my life I couldn't share with anybody, I was old enough to be her father. She was a breath of fresh air awakening hopes I suppressed for years.
But to her, I was sure I was just part of her current environment, one more piece of whatever puzzle she was working on. Not that I doubt the sincerity of the affection she expressed toward me, but I knew too much more about life to rely on her feelings du jour.
Glancing at my watch, I saw we would be landing in Kingstown in a half hour. I buried my thoughts about Mary Beth. She was a distraction I couldn't afford for the next couple of days. I had work to do, and wondering whether Mary Beth and I had a future could get me killed.
My target in Kingstown was a man who called himself Willi Dimitrovsky. He may have been Bulgarian, but no one was sure. He appeared out of nowhere, feeding large amounts of money into some whacked-out groups of extremists in the States.
His allegiance wasn't known for sure, but he was suspected of working for Russia. Whoever he represented, he was distributing large amounts of money to organizations at both ends of the political spectrum. His agenda appeared to be fomenting anarchy in the U.S.
St. Vincent was a hub for the drug trade in the Caribbean. That meant there were well-developed channels for funneling untraceable funds into and out of the States. That was probably why Dimitrovsky set up shop in Kingstown. He may have been smuggling drugs to fund his political activity, but it was the political meddling that put the target on his back.
He was running a grungy little seaman's bar called the Jolly Mon Tavern in one of the less savory parts of Kingstown. The word was that you could satisfy almost any appetite at the Jolly Mon. He lived in a villa in an upscale area, and he had the fix in with the authorities. His office was in the back room of the bar, and he had two eastern European thugs who served as his muscle.
It was going to appear that Willi was killed by a rival drug kingpin. That was my role in the play.
My first challenge was to figure out how to get an audience with Willi. I needed to get inside his back room. That's why I wanted to get to Kingstown a day early.
My last intelligence on Willi said he was leaving St. Vincent in three days, heading for Europe. That was why I picked tomorrow for the execution. We didn't want him in Europe. St. Vincent was a much better place for him to die, for several reasons.
The ferry was approaching the dock in Kingstown. I headed for the lounge where several people were finishing breakfast. Buying a cup of coffee, I sat down next to the exit door and waited for everyone to queue up to go ashore. I planned to lose myself in the crowd, just in case.
11
After I disembarked from the ferry, I changed clothes in the men's room in Kingstown's public market. I put on a faded, stained T-shirt and a pair of greasy blue jeans that were worn through at the knees. In place of my scuffed boat shoes, I slipped on a pair of worn running shoes that were once light gray. I stuffed my good clothes into my oil-stained duffle bag.
From the sink in front of the shattered mirror, I scraped up a little grime and rubbed it into the unkempt stubble on my nut-brown face. Pulling on a ratty straw hat, its brim in tatters, I slung the bag over my shoulder and stepped back out into the market. The disgusted looks I got from the women tending their stalls told me my disguise was a success.
Before I left the immediate area of the market, I found a trash tip that reeked of rotting fish and smeared a little slime on my T-shirt. On my way from the market to the Jolly Mon Tavern, I stopped in a couple of scruffy watering holes, spilling most of my cheap rum drinks on my clothes.
I was in a filthy room in a guest house across the street from the Jolly Mon Tavern. By the time I got there, no one would have guessed that I was anything but a drunken deck hand from a commercial fishing vessel. When I checked in, the desk clerk wrinkled his nose and asked for my passport.
"We put in the safe," he said, "Jus' to be sure."
I gave my head a confused shake and handed him $50 E.C. in soiled, small-denomination notes.
The clerk folded the money into his pocket instead of putting my passport in the safe. He charged me another $50 E.C. for a room for the night, rattling off a litany of forbidden activities. I asked him for my room key.
He laughed. "No locks, mon. Only honest people stay here. No one gon' mess wit' you, prob'ly. Up those stairs, firs' door on the lef'."
There was a clear view of the Jolly Mon Tavern through the room's one window. Most of the glass was broken out; what was left was flyspecked. Typically, there was no screen, and the flies liked the way I smelled. The room was marginally bearable; I put up with worse. I was stretched out on the stained sheets, propped up enough so I could watch the entrance to the Jolly Mon.
It was mid-morning, and there was no activity at the tavern. I was surprised; it looked like the kind of place where people who looked like me would go to start their day. As I stumbled past the tavern's door on my way here, I noticed it was padlocked.
If I didn't see a sign of life by early afternoon, I would ask around and see if it was still in business. If not, then I would buy a prepaid phone and check in with my client. I left my phone on Island Girl. People who look like me didn't carry iPhones. That would have blown my cover for sure.
A dented SUV pulled to a stop at the curb in front of the Jolly Mon. The windows were heavily tinted, but the driver, a black man with a shaved head, had his window rolled halfway down. A burly white man got out of the front passenger door. He was looking up and down the sidewalk, one hand on what must have been a pistol in his waistband under his untucked sport shirt.
He looked back into the SUV and nodded before closing the door. Walking to the entrance of the tavern, he unlocked the padlock and opened the door. He disappeared inside for almost a minute. Then he came back outside, standing in the doorway. He gave an offhand wave, and the rear passenger door of the SUV opened.
Another burly white man stepped out, looking both ways, again with a hand on a concealed pistol. He said something I couldn't hear, and Willi Dimitrovsky got out and hustled to the tavern entrance. He was a careful man, or maybe he heard rumors about somebody gunning for him. I hoped it was the former, but it didn't change what I had to do.
The SUV pulled away and turned at the next corner, probably headed for a parking place behind the Jolly Mon. I was a little surprised that Willi didn't use the back entrance if he was worried about security. On my way to the hotel earlier, I poked my head into the alley that ran behind the tavern. Maybe Willi didn't like it because the alley was a dead end; there was only one way in and out.
About two minutes passed, and then the black man with the shaved head came up the sidewalk, accompanied by a heavy-set, middle-aged black man and a young woman. From her scanty attire, I guessed she was the barmaid. I was a little surprised by that. People in the islands are pretty conservative when it comes to dress. She would look at home in Vegas, but she was out of place in Kingstown, even at the sleaziest joint in town. The heavy-set man was carrying a stack of three rectangular foam plastic containers — take-out breakfast or lunch, I guessed.
My original plan was to wait until the place was busy enough for me to blend in with the clientele while I had a drink and checked things out. Seeing that Willi was there, and the place had no customers, I decided to move the schedule up a little. Somebody had to be their first customer of the day, and I wouldn't have to worry about bystanders if I struck while the place was empty.
I took the razor-sharp 12-inch filet knife out of my duffle bag and strapped its sheath to the inside of my l
eft calf. Feeling around in the bag, I found the coiled, three-foot length of two-hundred-pound-test stainless steel wire leader. It had a half-ounce lead sinker on each end. That was an odd way to rig a leader for fishing, but it made a perfect garrote, and it wouldn't arouse suspicion if someone saw it. Neither would the knife, except that it was hidden under my pants, strapped to my lower leg. That wasn't where a fisherman would have carried his knife, but I wanted to conceal it.
I slung the duffle bag over my shoulder and went downstairs. The desk clerk wasn't around. I let myself out the front door and paused, looking around like a drunk hunting the closest liquor. Grinning, I locked my eyes on the door of the Jolly Mon Tavern and stepped off the curb. I staggered a little crossing the street, in case anyone was watching.
The interior of the bar was about what I expected. The two white men were sitting in a booth, eating scrambled eggs from the take-out containers. The middle-aged black man was behind the bar. The three of them checked me out, and the two white men went back to their food. I figured Willi was in his office, but the barmaid wasn't in sight. I wasn't sure what to do about her yet, anyway. The black man with the shaved head was missing, too.
The bartender studied me as I approached him, his eyes sending the signal that I didn't belong there. "Not open yet," he said, leaning on the bar, both of his beefy arms straight, hands folded into fists.
"How 'bout a couple beers to go," I asked, giving him a loopy grin.
He shook his head, staring at me. I kept grinning, swaying a little. I took out my rumpled wad of E.C. notes and counted out $20, dropping it on the bar. I raised my eyebrows, and he shrugged. I put another $20 on the bar. He swept up the bills and turned, dropping the money into a cigar box behind the bar.
Reaching down, he picked up two bottles of Carib and set them on the bar in front of me. Putting my duffle bag on the bar, I unzipped it. I picked up one beer and put it in the bag while he went back to leaning on the bar, his weight on his arms again. I reached over and picked up the second beer by the neck, flipping my hand at the last minute.
He frowned, trying to make sense of my odd grip. I uncoiled my tensed muscles, swinging the bottle in a backhand that struck him on the side of his head. His eyes rolled back, and he slipped out of sight, collapsing behind the bar in slow motion.
The beer still in my grip, I whirled and leapt across the narrow space between me and the two men in the booth. I smashed the beer into the back of one white man's head with enough force to break the bottle. The other one put his hand on his pistol. He was struggling to free it from his waistband when I cut his throat with the broken bottle. Then I smashed my left fist into his chin. He would bleed to death while he was unconscious.
The man I hit from behind fell face-first into his scrambled eggs. I grabbed his hair in my left fist and pulled his head back, cutting his throat with the bottle too. I helped myself to their pistols, sticking one in my waist at the small of my back, holding the other. Nine-millimeter Glocks. No safety to get in my way.
I stepped around behind the bar and cut the bartender's throat with my filet knife. I wasn't sure what his role was, but I couldn't afford to leave a witness. I took a one-liter plastic bottle of club soda from the refrigerator and twisted off the cap, pouring the contents down the sink. Then I went looking for Willi.
I walked through the open door at the end of the bar, looking for the back room. It was at the end of a short hall. Willi looked up just as I entered his office. The man with the shaved head was sitting in front of the desk facing Willi, his back to me. When he saw the surprised look on Willi's face, he turned and saw me. He was reaching for his pistol as he tried to stand. I held the neck of the empty soda bottle over the muzzle of the Glock and pulled the trigger four times — two for Willi, two for his friend. The soda bottle wasn't as good as a real suppressor, but it did an okay job of silencing the pistol, considering we were inside. It was doubtful that anyone outside heard the shots. There was still no sign of the barmaid. That was just as well. It was her lucky day.
Willi's friend was missing most of the back of his head, but Willi took his two shots to the heart. I reached down and checked Willi's neck for a pulse, just to be sure about him. He wouldn't be stirring up any more trouble with the extremists in the States. Back out at the bar, I found a damp rag to wipe down the two pistols. I wrapped each one in its owner's hand and left the two dead thugs at the table. Then I wiped my prints off the soda bottle and the broken beer bottle, leaving both on the table.
My mission accomplished a day ahead of my plan, I strolled back to the city market. I resumed my identity as a cruising yachtsman in the men's room there and caught the next ferry back to Bequia. I figured I would surprise Mary Beth and take her out for a nice meal at the French restaurant.
12
As the ferry pulled into Bequia's Admiralty Bay, I spotted Island Girl at anchor over near Princess Margaret Beach. We were too far away for me to make out much detail, but the dinghy was trailing off her stern. I thought Mary Beth must be aboard.
If I had a phone, I could have called her to pick me up at the town dock. No, I guess I couldn't; I didn't have her cellphone number. Thinking about it, I realized I didn't even know if she had a phone. Surely, she must; didn't everybody have one?
I made my way down to the main deck as the ferry slowed and swung around, the engines revving in reverse. The captain was backing into the town dock. As soon as the ramp went down, I worked my way through the crowd on the dock and walked to where the water taxis were waiting.
I boarded a water taxi, and in a few minutes we were alongside Island Girl. I paid the operator and scrambled over Island Girl's lifelines. As the water taxi pulled away, I called out to Mary Beth, surprised that she didn't come on deck to see what the disturbance was.
There was no answer. I dropped my duffle bag and went down the companionway ladder. She wasn't aboard, and the main cabin was in disarray. There was a plate on the cabin sole, the remains of a half-eaten sandwich near it. A soft-drink bottle was on its side, rolling across the saloon table with the motion of the boat. There was a sticky splotch of stale, drying soda pop on the tabletop.
Frowning, I checked the forward cabin. She wasn't there. I opened the locker where she kept her backpack. It was still there, so she didn't find a crew berth during the few hours I was gone.
Worried, I did a more careful examination of the main cabin. Nothing appeared to be missing. Our passports were still in the drawer under the chart table with the ship's papers, in their clear vinyl envelope.
As I stepped onto the companionway ladder, leaning out into the cockpit to retrieve my bag, I noticed the reddish-brown smear on the ladder's top right handgrip. I moistened my fingertip with saliva and ran it across the stain, watching as it smeared. It was dried blood, but was it hers or someone else's?
I reached out and grabbed my duffle bag, taking it to the forward cabin and tossing it on the V-berth. Opening the second drawer under the nav station, I found my iPhone. That's where it stayed most of the time. I turned it on and watched as it powered up. I was trying to decide what I should do next.
The phone had a good signal, but there were no texts or voicemails. I dropped it in my pocket. The keyring with its orange foam float was hanging by the companionway opening. I took it off its hook and climbed into the cockpit. I would take the dinghy into town. As I was unlocking the dinghy, it occurred to me to take our passports and papers; I went below to get them.
Back in the dinghy, I cranked the outboard. At the noise, a man poked his head up through the companionway of the boat anchored about 75 feet off our starboard side. Nosy neighbor, I thought, giving him a smile and a wave. He waved back, and I steered the dinghy over to his boat and killed the engine.
"Good afternoon," I said, as I drifted alongside.
"Afternoon," he said, climbing into his boat's cockpit.
"I'm Finn, from Island Girl. You been here long?"
"I'm Dave," he said. "Good to meet you, Finn. W
e got here a couple of days ago. Saw you guys come in yesterday, but you left before we could welcome you to the neighborhood."
"Yeah; first time here for my lady. We did a little sightseeing."
"Uh-huh," Dave said. "We saw you leave this morning while we were gettin' breakfast together. Thought we’d stop over and say hello to your wife later. We saw her come back after she took you ashore."
"She's not here," I said. "I wondered if you saw her leave."
"No. She came back about the time the first ferry left the harbor. The wife and I were gonna swing by and visit after we ate, but by then, there was a speedboat with two guys and a woman alongside your boat. We went on into town to buy groceries. When we got back, the speedboat was gone and your dinghy was there, so we rapped on the hull, but she didn't answer. Figured the folks in the speedboat must be friends of yours, and she caught a ride to town with them."
"What kind of speedboat? One of the water taxis?"
"No, it was one of those rentals, like from the marina over there in the corner of the harbor. Little fiberglass tri-hull — maybe 12 or 13 feet — with a 25-horse Mercury."
"I better go see if I can catch up with her, then," I said. "Good to meet you, Dave. Maybe we'll see you later."
"Sure, Finn. You folks stop by any time. We're most always aboard."
I started the outboard and headed for the marina, hoping they were still open. Maybe I could find out who the people were.
I was no more than a hundred yards from Island Girl when my phone rang. I pulled it from my pocket and throttled back the outboard while I checked the caller ID. I didn't recognize the number, but the first three digits were 784, the country code for St. Vincent and the Grenadines. I accepted the call and held the phone to my ear, killing the outboard so I could hear.
"Yeah?"
"Hey, Finn, it's me."
Assassins and Liars Page 5