by Moulton, CD
There wasn’t much else to do. The fact that they might be able to make calls at the spot on the way added to the desire to get there and be ready.
Clint drove the car to the bus where everyone got their luggage and packed it in. The surfboards were on top, wrapped in a blanket. The car was packed tight. He drove to the spot on this side of the mud and waited for them to walk up an hour later to each claim what was theirs. He then went back with the Indios to get their produce, what was left. Clint noticed that Salvador did as much as any of them, carrying heavy sacks of yuca and onions that very few gringo kids his age would even consider. They had everything there and covered with the tarp from the culverts when the light drizzle got a bit heavier. There was enough room for them to crowd under the tarp with Judi, Clint, Silvestre, Salvador and Ana Ricardo inside the car. It wasn’t very comfortable, but wasn’t uncomfortable. The close togetherness suited the Indios very well, but the Sandros family started complaining about everything. Soon they were by themselves. No one would even speak to them. It wasn’t Panamanian to start complaining about things when everyone was in the same fix. You tried to make things better, not worse.
Clint got out and went to them when Robinson came to say there was going to be trouble if they didn’t stop acting like the world owed them more than the others. He told them to stop acting like they were from Colón. If they looked around they could see that everyone was in the same situation and it wasn’t pleasant for anyone – though everyone but them were trying to make the best of it. They got sullen and gave him hard looks. He gave them as hard looks back. He went back to the car.
He thought a lot about the murders and couldn’t figure it unless someone came from outside. He was sure no one had. He wanted to solve this thing before these people could cross that mudslide and go. He had about two and a half more hours. It wasn’t looking like he could pull it off.
Salvador was asleep. He hadn’t slept last night and things were under control so he could relax a bit. That Silvestre was proud of the way his son was acting was as obvious as anything could be.
Judi gave Clint a look and slightly tossed her head. She wanted to talk to him privately so they got out and went a little way from the car.
“Clint, you have to tell me who the real suspects are. I can figure who aren’t on the list definitely, but have to know who is. I know you won’t let your personal opinion enter into it. I’ll treat it as confidential.
“You went up above that mud bank so you were looking for a way for someone to come across. That means you were serious when you said it could be someone from outside. It was also obvious you didn’t find a way across. What’s going on now?”
“Santamaria carried a satellite phone that’s missing. He called someone so I felt it might have been someone following us who didn’t get to the mud until it was already across the road. I have to find who has that phone. That one’s the killer. It could only be two people.”
“Santamaria’s dead, but so is Sucha. Why?”
“He either saw or heard something that would give the killer away, I suppose.”
“Like that satellite phone in someone else’s hand after Santamaria was killed?”
“Uh-huh.”
“So. You won’t tell me who because it would put me in a bad spot. I’ll try to find if anyone saw a very expensive phone in anyone else’s hands.”
“That’s about it. I have to find some way to identify the killer in less than two hours. I won’t be getting anything more than I have right now. That, as the saying goes, ain’t good!”
“That’s part of being in hell. I want out of here for a nice long shower and some good sound sleep. If anyone breathes too heavy or snores or just turns over in their sleep I’m suddenly wide awake.”
“Welcome to the club.”
The Key
Clint couldn’t help but feel that satellite phone was the key to solving this mess. He had an idea there was a number or two in storage on it that would tell him what was going on. His problem was that he had no effective way to find it.
He did have one idea. He said a few quick words to Judi, then started walking up the road toward the culverts. He held his breath as he approached the spot he found a signal before. There was a signal, but it was weak. The legend said emergency calls only.
That might do! He punched 999 and waited. There was no response. He punched 103 and the fire department came on. He identified himself and said he had reported a murder to the police, but the signal was too weak to get an answer. This one worked. All he wanted was for a call to be made. It was to a roaming satellite phone. The phone was missing. The murderer might have it. There were people where they could hear if it rang. Please call the number.
There was a weak reply he couldn’t quite make out so he said the signal was fading and gave the number again.
Then he headed back. There had been no ringing from any of the packs or anywhere else.
He thought for a minute, then headed back to the bus in the car – with passengers.
Cecilio had heard a phone ringing in the bus. It stopped by the time he got there. Clint had him place as closely as he could the area of the call. About mid-bus.
He searched carefully, but found nothing. He was thinking literally of taking the bus apart screw by screw when it rang again from above his head. He checked and found it was coming from a speaker. (The buses have speaker systems that they used to play music on the trips.) Clint pushed up on the speaker and it moved aside just enough for him to see the phone. He twisted the speaker around enough to reach it and took it to slip into his pocket, then put the speaker back in place. He then went to the car and was getting in as the phone buzzed again. He answered. It was the fire department. He said they found the phone. Thanks more than it was possible to say. It might mean a killer would be caught before he could get away. The Indios were chattering and Judy was grinning.
Clint went through the stored numbers, noting the ones that had been called since the last erase. There were only four. One had been called three times. The last three calls.
Clint called it. When it was answered with, “Habla Licenciada Maria Castillo, como se ... oh, alo Guillermo. Que pasa?” he hung up.
So. The killer was Guillermo Robinson. Cecilio reported that he came to get his shaving kit and some underwear. He had hidden the phone then. He left it there when they got the rest of their stuff because he was never in the bus alone then. He probably figured that it would be found eventually, but he could be long gone and there wouldn’t be a way to connect him to it.
“Know who it is?” Judy asked.
“Oh, yeah!”
“One of the three?”
“Oh, yeah!”
Clint looked at his wristwatch. It would cut it awfully close. He hoped to get back before the path was opened.
He didn’t make it. The path was opened and most of the people had left on the waiting bus to go back to Chitre. It would be another hour or more before he could get his car through.
He used the satellite phone to call the police and identify himself. He said to stop that bus and get Guillermo Robinson off. He was prime suspect in two murders and must not be allowed to escape.
Now Clint could wonder what it was about, but he had an idea. Guillermo was selling a large property. He had been caught in some kind of fraud or other and was trying to get some kind of deal done that he could use to get away with a lot of money. Santamaria had found out about it, but had let Robinson know he knew. Robinson had killed him, then Sucha had seen him somewhere or with something, probably the satellite phone. He had confronted him, probably demanding to know why he didn’t let the others know he had the thing.
That wasn’t right, but it might not be too far wrong. All Clint could do now was wait and hope the police got Robinson off the bus. If he reached Chitre he could disappear for a short while. They had his ID and information so there was little doubt he would be found before long, even if he went into hiding.
The road was
open in slightly less that an hour and they headed for Chitre. The Indios were delivered to the bus station to get their stuff. The murder bus and Sucha’s body would be taken directly to the police impound and searched minutely. Clint went by there and gave them the downloaded photos. He’d taken more than fifty more with his own camera when he was alone where the others wouldn’t know.
Robinson had gotten off the bus before it was stopped. He was close to the secondary road that went to Divisa. Either he was heading for his property or he was trying to make them think he was. Clint decided to give it a day or two to cool down, then he would go after Robinson if the local police hadn’t rounded him up by then. They were efficient so would probably bring him in soon.
He and Judi took the main road this time and headed for Santiago. She would go to Bocas Town from there, Clint would try to find that lawyer. Maria Castillo. Santiago was as likely a place as any, but she was listed as being in Chitre.
Clint sat back to think. She had gotten those calls after Santamaria was dead and had that number stored on her numbers listing under Robinson’s name. That was the only possible way she could have known who it was who was calling.
So. She was in on the scam – minimum.
He thought of something else and grinned a small tight grin. He called Judi and said he was on his way back to Chitre. He could have thought of something before Santiago and saved himself eight hours of driving.
“What?”
“I think that there’s another little detour in this ridiculous mess,” Clint answered. “Something’s added up.”
“Such as?”
“Such as a lawyer knowing who was calling from a cell phone taken from a murdered man’s belongings at the time of the murder.”
“Yech! I see!”
“See you in Bocas. Just don’t know when.”
“I’ll be waiting to hear the whole sordid thing about our trip to hell.”
“Sordid. Brother, does that fit!”
He rang off, sighed deeply, cleaned up, changed clothes, swore a lot, got the tank filled and headed for Chitre. He’d stop for the night in Santiago. He’d been driving for seven hours straight already and would definitely need the break in four more.
It was raining a bit, which didn’t make driving easy in the mountains, but Clint was so used to it he hardly noticed. He was in Santiago in a little under four hours and stopped at the Bocas del Toro Hotel, slept for six hours (His usual sleep time, even after an adventure like this), ate a good hearty breakfast and was on the road again. The Willie Nelson song kept going through his head. He would have liked to know what kind of car Robinson might be driving so he could check on whether he was heading for Santiago. He would most likely head for Panamá City to be able to hide among the overpopulation in a major city. Santiago wouldn’t serve at all and David wasn’t that populated, either.
He got an idea before he reached Chitre and stopped in a small puebla not far away to don a disguise he used that he liked. He would become Donald Harrison, a man who would look like possibly a relative of Clint Faraday, but would be shorter and a little heavier (to the eye) and would walk and talk differently. That car wouldn’t do. Robinson had been in it.
Clint paid the auto storage lot there $3.00 per day and took a bus into Chitre. He wouldn’t rent another car there unless it became absolutely necessary.
It took about two hours to locate the lawyer’s office, which was in a private house just a few minute’s walk from downtown. She wasn’t there for the day. She would return tomorrow afternoon, according to the sign on the door. She specialized in real estate and immigration.
That would be how she met Williams. Clint remembered that conversation. He would be someone who had a residency through her. She would handle property titles and such for him. He might not be hard to find if he lived in or near Chitre. The name would probably find him. Santamaria would have been in the Chitre area to investigate the property. That alone would make it probable he was there.
The way to find a gringo living in that kind of place was to simply ask the natives. It would be perfectly logical that a gringo in town would know about other gringos there and would like to visit. The best place was in a local bar gringos frequented.
Clint asked a taxi driver where the most popular gringo bar was. He was taken to a semi-fancy place that would be more expensive than others and wouldn’t have anything to offer other than the fact the gringos went there. The place was better than he’d expected and the drinks were only a little more than the average. They served food that had a good reputation so he ordered a ribeye steak. It wasn’t the best he’d ever tasted, but was fairly good. A little tough, but meat was tough in most places in Panamá. The yuca was fried in garlic butter so was very good.
There were two Williams who came in every so often. Maybe once a week. One was a negro and one was white. They were both average popular. The black was in his thirties and the white was in his sixties. The black had a boat that took people out for fishing. The white studied animals for some book he was writing or something. He had written one that was sold at the universities. It was about animals that lived in or near water. He also wrote specialty articles for the English-speaking tourists about what to avoid or do to prevent denge, leichmeniasis and so forth. The black was there two years ago for several months and had been back this time for two months already. The white had been there three years.
It would be the white on a land scam. The black owned a boat and lived aboard. He wouldn’t be interested in any large plot of land, though Punta Arenas was on the water. Robinson’s finca was supposed to be in Arenas.
Maybe he’d have to go to Arenas to see what was going on there and trace back. The only reason he was interested in that end of the deal was because the types who pulled land scams would concentrate on people like Williams, who were probably living on a pension and had some money saved over years to invest. It was a serious problem in Panamá that wasn’t treated as such. The corruption in land deals was unbelievable. Each president who came along promised to do something about it, some did little things, most did nothing so it went on and on. Dave, Clint’s nutty musician friend, had been caught in that kind of deal and had learned enough to help Clint find those kinds.
He was sidetracked. His focus was to be on Robinson and Castillo for the moment. He wasn’t going to change the corrupt system overnight. He probably wouldn’t be able to change it in his lifetime. It was Thursday night. The likely time for either Williams would be Friday or Saturday nights. Clint could spend the following day tying up details. He could go to the police station and check ... no, he couldn’t. He was in disguise.
He called and got filled in on everything that had happened. Not much. They had found a woman near where Robinson got off the bus who had seen a man waiting near the road, but back in the trees. A car had stopped and he had gotten in. It left heading toward Divisa. It was a new dark gray car. She didn’t know or care about make and model. It was a car. A new-looking one.
The police were quietly checking out everything around Divisa. So far, only one person had seen what might have been them. Two men and a woman, the woman driving, had filled their tank at the bombas. It was a Nissan, 2009, two door, Sentra. Silver-gray and black.
Clint told them what he’d found, then hung up and sat back.
Divisa. Either they were seen at the logical place they would be seen going through or they were leaving a trail that would make it appear they were going through. They might go back toward Chitre or go to Santiago or Panamá City. If they came there to divert the police it would buy them time. All they needed was a day to get something set up in Panamá City. Castillo would return after being gone for less than two days. It would be Panamá City. It would also be very difficult to root him out in Panamá City.
Clint thought about it, then grinned. He went back to store his car and caught the bus for Arenas. That would be the last place they would expect him to go and the best place to find a connection. Maybe he could d
o a bit of diversion himself!
Donald Harrison would come to Arenas in a truck driven by an old Indio named Lorenzo Betas. Clint knew him from several years ago and had been invited to come to his finca anytime. He would always be a welcome guest. He was the man who saved the life of Lorenzo’s son, Lucas, in Santiago when some crooks tried to mug him – using a machete.
Some Disguise!
Clint drove the older rented car into the Betas’ finca. He’d never been anywhere close to this place. He liked the scenery and the place. The Pacific could be seen about half a kilometer away toward the north. It looked very inviting and tranquil from this distance.
Lorenzo and his wife came out to hug Clint and welcome him to their modest abode, in a manner of speaking. No disguise would work with the Indios, Clint had found. They recognized him almost immediately and asked why he was disguised.
The home didn’t look like much from outside, but was clean and comfortable inside and quite nice, really. The Indios aren’t into ostentation and aren’t trying to impress anyone or compete with the Joneses. They want a clean comfortable efficient home. A place to enjoy your family and to relax. They are homes, not just houses.
Clint spent a time looking over the place. It was beautiful and peaceful. Lorenzo had four cows, two pigs, numerous chickens, two horses, corn, yuca, otoe, beans of several varieties, nance, guayabana, guavas, avocados, moroñon (cashew) – just about everything he needed for himself, his family and a number of the poorer neighbors.
That’s the Indio way. He had, so he shared with those who didn’t have. In return they would give him things he didn’t have and would work their asses off to help him with the farm. He didn’t like a couple of them and they didn’t like him, but that had nothing to do with them helping each other. They may beat hell out of each other Saturday night, but would be back at working together on Monday. Clint was understanding more and more about the Indio way of life. He loved the people and he loved most of their lifestyle. They would stop to chat with everyone who was working that day, then move on.