Clint Faraday Collection C: Murder in Motion Collector's Edition (3 page)

“
I sort
of explained that Danny sometimes has trouble holding his likker.
He usually only drinks beer but some asshole got him started on rum
or seco or whatever they call it and he was a little wasted. We’d
get him to the hotel and he’d sleep it off. Danny said he would go
to the fucking hotel and shut his fucking mouth when he was
goddamned good and ready and not before. Freddie smacked him and
said he was gonna cause us headaches. He always did when he got
drunk. He’d go to the hotel now or get his stupid fucking ass
kicked royally. Freddie can do it. He’s done it before.

“
Danny
was still mouthing off, but we got him to the hotel and Freddie
sort of put him to sleep. Not serious, but ‘til the
morning.

“
Then he
got his throat cut and we think maybe some badass we don’t even
know his name will come after us.

“
See, if
you know about it there ain’t no reason to come after us no more.
If the fucking turkey just came and talked to us like a man ‘stead
of having to pay some fucking runner-boy to talk to us we’d make
him see we ain’t no problem. We said we’d keep clammed and we would
keep fucking clammed, no matter what.

“
That was
before they trashed Danny. Now we just want to get out and go back
to the states.”

“
Do you
know who, the name of the person was who contacted you?” Clint
asked.

“
We
called him Pedro, but I don’t think that’s his name,” Sam
answered.

“
I heard
some guy call him Nando,” Larry volunteered. “That guy by the big
supermarket they call Juli – I mean the guy, not the store – Juli –
but I don’t think he’s queer. He don’t act like it.”

“
His
name’s Julio. It’s a common name here,” Clint said. “So I can find
out what it’s about. You’d be smart to get as far away from here as
fast as you can. If it’s the Russian mafia or the Mexican mafia
this
ain’t
the
country you want to be in.” (He said that to scare them. There
wasn’t much chance they were involved in anything like
this.)

“
That
cop, the fucking captain who dumped our beer, said we couldn’t go
nowhere ‘til he said so,” Freddie said. “I only want to get out of
this fucking hole of a country. We don’t fit here. I don’t never
know what the fucking hell is going on!”

“
I think
I can get them to let you go if you leave the country fast. They
don’t want trouble from those people. I work with the police quite
a lot. Those mafia types tie up the whole department and the courts
are afraid of them and let them go, even when they’re
convicted.”

Larry and Freddie both groaned. Sam looked
surprised. “You mean some asshole set us up to keep a fucking cop
away from where they were doing...! Fucking goddamned SHIT! You’re
a fucking COP?!”

“
Sort of.
How fast can you be out? I have to give him so many hours before
they pick you up. You would go, but they’d keep everything you
have, including money except to pay for your flight
home.”

“
I can’t
get on no plane! I won’t never get on no fucking plane!” Freddie
whined.

“
We can
get out in ... is there someplace near here? I heard there is. To
Costa Rica,” Sam said.

“
Changuinola to Sixola and cross. I guess they can get that
monster across. The roads are bad in Costa Rica, but that thing
will take them.”

“
How
long?” Larry asked.

“
You left
the Hummer in Almirante?” Clint asked. “Water taxi to Almirante,
one more hour. Almirante to Changuinola, one hour. It’ll take less,
but you have to have some bit of leeway. Changuinola to the border,
thirty minutes, two hours of passport and paper handling this
side.

“
You can
be out by three if you leave in an hour. I’ll get Sergio to allow
you until six tonight.

“
Listen!
You do NOT tell anyone you’re going. Let them think you’re just
going to Changuinola to shop because you heard they have everything
there and it’s cheap as all hell. You can be gone before they even
suspect anything. They wouldn’t expect you back here before five or
six, anyhow.”

They agreed. Clint went to town separate from
them so no one would connect that they were at his place. They
would tell people they went to the beach, but it sucks. They
wouldn’t cancel the hotel. They’d say they were going shopping and
would be back.

Clint talked to Sergio and told him basically
that they were set up. It would be far better to let them go than
it would be to have a couple more of them killed in Bocas Town.
Sergio agreed. He had an officer contact them, ostensibly to ask
some questions, and tell them they had to get out fast and the way
Clint Faraday suggested.

Clint went out to see if he could find
Juli.

Rednecks. Go
Home!

Clint couldn’t find Juli so he went home.
Judi called to say he should come over for a snack.

“
I found
out a little, but not much,” Judi said over the hojadres and pollo
aguisada. “Juli Williams was talking to a man called Fernando about
the one who was killed. I said that was interesting. Did he know
where anyone had some decent carne?

“
He said
the backstreet China and that Nando was connected with some big
money man in Panamá City and was here on some kind of deal to do
with the one who had his throat cut.

“
I said
it wasn’t smart to get tied up with those kind of people and did he
see the big tuna Maxi caught?

“
Do you
any good?”

That was Judi’s method. Cause a comment by
dropping a name or something, then act like it was only a comment
and change the subject. Then the person will try to impress her
with what they know. It always seemed to work with her.

“
It
confirms some things. I have to know who this Nando is.”

“
Fernando
Selamas. Dona was talking with him at the Laguna and I stopped to
ask her how her mother’s doing. She’s in the hospital. She sort of
had to introduce him.”

“
You’re
amazing.”

“
He works
for some guy who owns a trucking company. Freight haulers. All over
Central America. He gave me his card, which was why Dona didn’t
really want to introduce us.”

Judi is very attractive and exotic with her
oriental heritage.

Judi gave Clint a little business card.
Eugenio Taylor Transport Systems, S.A.

Clint shook his head. That would save him a
week and a lot of travel. Now he wanted to know exactly what a
transport company was transporting that would get his specific
attention.

He waited until he had figured part of it
clearly, then called Manny. Manny could get all kinds of
information through his contacts. This one he didn’t know much
about, but would try to find the information.

Clint then went back to town. The Larry,
Curly and Mo Trio, as he thought of them, were gone. Sergio had
them discretely followed and they were between Ojos de Agua and
Changuinola. Another car was following them so Sergio had the
follower stopped for an insurance and license check when he passed
in an illegal zone (which everyone did. It was usually ignored, but
was an excuse – seeing the police truck was two cars behind.).

That would work out well. It would be easier
to learn things with them gone. Though it wouldn’t be intentional
this time, they would still be a distraction.

Nando was in the parque with Dona, sitting on
a bench. Clint thought of saying something to him, then thought
better of it. Wait until the trio were out of the country. He waved
to Dona and kept on walking. He went to the dock, thought about it
for a few minutes, then went home and got his boat to go to
Almirante and to the ferry offices.

“
Did
Eugenio Taylor Transport bring in anything or take out anything the
past three days?” he asked.

Jorge checked the manifests and shrugged.
“Not for about two weeks, if I remember. They took a load in and a
load out. Trucks loaded both ways.”

Clint thanked him and went to the compound
where they kept the trucks, but Taylor didn’t leave anything
there.

Where? What kind of stuff did they generally
carry?

He went to Ojos de Agua. Taylor didn’t handle
anything there. That eliminated construction materials. The card
didn’t mention anything about a specialty.

He went to Changuinola. Taylor sometimes
brought washers, refrigerators, and such to the bigger stores.
Nothing for two weeks or so.

The other ... Sixola? Contraband through
Costa Rica?

A quick trip. No. They didn’t come to
Sixola.

Chiriqui Grande. They delivered regularly to
several places there. They stopped in Mali and points between. They
sometimes went to Punta Pena and Rambala.

Was that a connection?

Possibly. Probably. That’s why whoever knew
he went to the comarca fairly often and that he would move to
protect the Indios so fast.

He had another idea and went back to Chiriqui
Grande and to the aduana. Taylor sometimes picked up loads from the
docks there. Mostly furniture items from Colombia and the Caribbean
islands. They carried loads to be taken to those places.

Whatever came in was very carefully checked.
What went out was sealed and seldom checked. That was the job of
wherever the stuff was delivered.

They were taking something out of Panamá.
What?

It would be a matter of finding where the
stuff was picked up. The major transshippers were in David,
Santiago and Panamá City. Maybe directly from Colon, but this was
going out, so that wasn’t likely.

So. David was closest. He caught the next
bus.

Clint booked into the Pension Costa Rica,
then, as it was getting late, went to dinner at La Tipica, then to
Peter’s place in the Hotel Iris to mingle and chat with people. Not
much was new and tomorrow might be long and hard so he went back to
the Costa Rica and had a good night’s sleep. In the morning at
daybreak he went to four places where the drivers hung out when
they were in town for a night to wait for tomorrow’s loads. There
were two Taylor trucks near Brother Bar, parked down the street.
Chiriqui was playing Herrera at the nearby stadium and the drivers
had gone there last night, stayed at the nearby hostel and would be
in about seven thirty to get the trucks to be loaded. They were
usually loaded at terminal #3 or #4. These would be at #3 or they
would have stayed over by the fairgrounds.

Okay. If this was the pick-up point, it would
be stuff brought in from the area of Chiriqui and kept in the
warehouses until it was picked up. So far as Clint knew there
wasn’t anything worth this mess anywhere in Chiriqui.

Next stop, Santiago! The bus left on the
hour. He could get the 9:00 bus and be in Santiago by 1:00. That
would leave him time to come back ... unless he had to go on to
Panamá City.

He sighed, went to a local restaurant for a
good breakfast, then to the pension for his bag, then to the
bus.

Santiago is laid back and lazy on the
outskirts. Cattle country, though a lot of government business was
handled there.

Trucking permits? It was an idea.

He checked places Taylor picked up stuff.
Only Lopez Storage. They hadn’t picked up anything going toward
Bocas in two weeks or so.

Clint went to the registro to check the
permits issued lately. Taylor had nothing from Panamá City for
several days. They picked up a load in Santiago that was bound for
Bocas Province. Household appliances. That could mean he had to
concentrate on David. Back there.

He went to transhipping terminal #3. Taylor
had picked up a load of appliances there in the time frame. The
other terminal, #4, they picked up a load of boxes labeled
household items. It was left for them from a Taylor truck eight
days before.

Back to #3. The stuff was left by three
wholesalers from Panamá City and Colon.

#4 was most likely. Leave whatever for a few
days so there wouldn’t be apparent connection. Clint wanted to know
what was really in those boxes. It wasn’t household items!

He waited around until lunch break and talked
to the loader operators. They didn’t remember anything about
Taylor. It was just “Load pallets in section four B” on the Taylor
truck.

Clint thought, then went to where the
dispatch director was eating. He was about twenty and said his name
was Luis. He just checked off the stuff as it was loaded or
unloaded.

“
You note
which trucks delivered and which ones picked up?” he
asked.

“
Sure.
Takes a genius! I need the work until I find a decent job, though
it pays well enough. I can’t gripe.”

“
Could I
see the records from eight days ago?”

“
With a
legal order or if you’re a cop or something.”

“
I’m
police. National. Check with Panamá City or with Bocas
Town.”

“
Good
enough for me. I’ll be back in about forty five
minutes.”

Clint thanked him and had a fair meal, then
walked around for a few minutes before he went back to the
terminal. Luis dug through some files and handed him a sheet before
going out to check a load going out. He could find whatever he
needed in the files.

The stuff came from some local furniture
manufacturers. There were seventy nine boxes, each with a code
number. On the third.

Clint sat back. He looked at the manifests
for Taylor (Luis said they were in the files. Look at whatever you
want, but don’t take anything) trucks loaded in the past four days.
Just one. Eighty four boxes. What? Five boxes appeared through
teleportation?