Middle Man (21 page)

“Yes.”

“Anything else you want to tell me about him?”

“Not yet.”

He sat back and looked at one of the TVs as if he had not noticed it was there before. “If you need help. We do have resources.”

I thought about my pledge to utilize Pongo and Perdy, but I was not ready for them. The Major excused himself.

Will and I walked out to the pier. Pigeons strutted and fluttered. Seagulls swooped. Four small sailboats bounced beside the highway of sunlight painted on the water.

“I didn't tell him,” Will said.

“I know.”

“Victor Kosinski has entered the country twice at the Peace Arch into Seattle. I never have him leaving the country. That's it. Until three days ago. He flew into New York.”

“Where was the dig from the fake list?”

“Massachusetts. Pittsfield. What is going on?”

“I can't tell you yet.”

“Why did you want to know when Kristen would be down here?”

Will was a careful, precise man. Questions were phrased to elicit the answers he wanted. He was also a single-minded man, and if I told him that Victor Kosinski was the shooter in Montana, Will would insist on helping me go after him. I did not want Will to die helping me.

“Just because of the timing of the search of the graves. You might be busy for a while.”

“I don't lie to you.” His voice was breathy with passion, a mix of fear and hurt feelings. He slammed his palm on the pier railing, startling two pigeons. His head tilted up while he struggled to control himself and form his next question. He did not look at me when he spoke. The wind took his words and I asked him to repeat what he said. He turned toward me. “Is Kristen in danger?”

The shooter in Montana hit him and missed me, and Will had been wondering about it ever since. Maybe he wanted to believe he had saved Kristen. The shot that killed Sergeant Rios drilled his head and came from farther away. Why was Will hit in the knee? Why was Jim Williams hit in the neck? Will had been thinking about it, just as I had been.

“The shooter wants the money and he is going to want me to lead him to it.”

A
gents Hanrihan and Sampson started following me that night in Santa Monica where I had checked into a motel near the beach. From my motel, I walked over to Ocean Avenue and turned north. The postcard on my left showed the sun touching silvery blue water, a wide beach, two kids standing in the surf, and a sparse assortment of sunbathers. After two blocks, I came across a fish restaurant with a patio in front. Just past the valet parking, a particularly dirty homeless man was sitting against the building. I gave him twenty dollars and pointed out the agents down the street. “Tell the woman I want to talk to her. If the man tries to come in, wrestle with him a little bit, just a little bit. He's an FBI agent, but he won't hurt you.”

I took a table on the patio so I could see the action. The homeless guy stopped the agents about twenty yards before they reached the restaurant. Hanrihan was dismissive and started to move on. Sampson listened. Hanrihan had to wait while Sampson dug in her purse to give the guy money. They proceeded toward the restaurant, but as they got close, the homeless guy stepped in front of Hanrihan to block him. Hanrihan tried stepping around him. The homeless guy was talking and putting up his hands the way a crossing guard would; he had a job and he wanted to do it well.

Sampson saw me and I beckoned her to join me. She took a quick look back at her partner, then came over. Hanrihan pushed the homeless guy out of the way and that made the homeless guy hug him from behind to stop him. Hanrihan was extremely unhappy about that embrace. He threw his arms out wide to burst away. He pushed the homeless guy too hard and landed him on his ass. Passersby were watching. Hanrihan brushed himself off and marched over to our table. He sat down next to Sampson and glared at me. He was still brushing himself off. He brushed back his bang with his fingertips, then looked at them and wiped them on the tablecloth.

“You put him up to that. You think that's funny? What the hell is wrong with you?”

I didn't answer. The silence made him self-conscious. He checked with Sampson. She said, “He'll talk to me.”

That didn't sink in at first. “Okay. Let's hear it.”

“I mean, he'll only talk to me. He'll talk to me only.”

Hanrihan squinted in disbelief and his mouth hung open. And the homeless man spoke from the sidewalk. “That's what I was trying to tell you.”

Hanrihan stood up fast, as if he were going to chase the homeless man. But he just growled at Sampson. “I'll wait across the street.” He went out and the homeless man followed him.

She ordered ice tea. I had a beer. We ordered a seafood appetizer sampler to keep the waiter happy. Sampson waited patiently for me to get started. She wore no makeup that I could see and the small wrinkles near her eyes added to her attractiveness. Her attitude was all business without being abrupt or harsh. “I know who did the killings in Montana, Wisconsin, and Houston.”

“That's nice. We think you did a few of them.”

“You don't. And neither does your partner. He's just pretending to think it.”

“You've lost me.” She wasn't cold and she wasn't warm. She kept her tone in that zone that would allow me to keep talking but would discourage huge exaggeration or outright lies.

“You said yourself I didn't kill Frank Godwin. And witnesses know I didn't do the shooting in Montana.”

“And Houston?”

I told her about Gill killing Arun. “I have no proof. But the same guy did all the others, even the guy with the flame tattoo.”

She sipped her ice tea and looked across the street at Hanrihan, who stood next to a palm and watched us. “He's stupid, but he's not evil,” she said. “He works hard. The sexist comments are so lame they're not worth protesting. But he thinks the best approach is to accuse everyone he interviews. He claims he's had success that way.” The waiter delivered the appetizer. Sampson turned her gaze on me. “How do you know the shooter is the same guy? And who is he?”

“Your partner is bent.”

“Oh, come on.”

“How did you know where to find me in Houston?”

She looked at me for about thirty seconds. “We can check hotel records and rental card records and flight records.”

“Did you do it, or did he?”

“He put in the request.”

My turn to wait. I tried a shrimp. Sipped my beer. She did not rush me. “If you access that request, you'll find that he was looking for Robert Hewitt. That was the name I traveled under. Rollie Waters was not in Houston. The shooter knew I was Robert Hewitt. How did Hanrihan know?”

“I would have to check this out. I can't just take your word.”

“When you do that, see if he ever interviewed a Victor Kosinski entering the country from Canada.”

“Why don't I just arrest Victor Kosinski?”

“I'm going to tell you how you can do that, too.” I explained what I expected would happen over the next few days and the part I hoped she would play. First, Hanrihan was going to be in touch with Victor, letting him know where I was. Then I was going to need Sampson as backup, need her to take Hanrihan out of the mix. I told her we could not meet or talk again and she would have to improvise along the way.

“That's fine. If your story checks out.”

“Be careful of your partner. He's stupid, but not as stupid as he looks.”

Waiting tried to burn me out on a hilltop in Helmand. It might have been on my second tour, but I can't be sure; waiting time is hazy time. Waiting feeds on congealed hope. Every day in every way, I was getting worse and worse. And I was doing better than most. Randy Jackman, a corporal, hounded me. “How do we know it will ever end? How do we know they'll ever attack? This is hell. We're already in hell. This can go on forever.”

“Do you have a dog?”

“What the fuck has my dog got to do with this?”

“Every time you leave the house, your dog thinks he's gone to hell. He thinks you're never coming back. But he waits patiently and doesn't piss all over the house. So try to be a dog, man.”

I was a dog, too. But when I realized I did not have to wait for the enemy to attack, I was fine. I did not have to outwait time; I only had to outwait my commanding officers. Eventually, they would send us to find the enemy and on to a slightly cooler level of hell.

I wanted to set up Victor and grab him immediately. I did not want to wait: I had to wait. Will Panos went east to play the Exhumationist, with plenty of backup, enough for Hanrihan to notice. I had to wait for it to look like I had been taken off the case. I had to hang around for it to look like I had not brought any new information about where the money was hidden. I had to wait for Victor to find me and watch me.

Waiting made me a target. My instinct was to hide. I longed to go to Big Bear and work at Loretta's shelter. But if Victor trailed me there, Loretta would be put in jeopardy. That would be an unforgivable sin. I considered luring Victor into the cave in Arizona the way I had done to McColl's men. But Victor was too wary and maybe even too shrewd to fall for that. I had to wait.

One night while taking a walk, I went into a video store and found a copy of
The Criminal
, the Stanley Baker movie that Bannion was so fond of. Baker played a career criminal, a villain named Johnny Bannion. He ran the prison block he was on, and as soon as he got out, he set up the heist of a lifetime. Slick confederates and his ex-girlfriend betrayed him and he was sent back to prison. The rest of the plot hardly mattered; everyone was trying to get Johnny's money. Johnny just loved being a villain, loved playing one enemy off another. He thought nothing of being sent up again. In prison he operated freely, according to the Universal Law of Villainy. But the money was on the outside. He thought nothing of the cost of breaking out.

The two Johnny Bannions shared a need for chaos, which they believed they could rearrange for their benefit. Both men thought they could cheat their destiny, too. The Bannion I knew was a thorough villain: cruel, treacherous, and deceitful. And he was a lodestone. I consoled myself with the thought that there were probably plenty of Johnny Bannions to go around. He would cheat anyone, but, like Dan, he specialized in the vain and fatuous, the men who thought their epaulets meant something, and didn't know they were there only to store their gloves.

“You miss him,”
said Dan.

“I know what you want me to say and I won't. Not ever.”

“You could do the same. You could take his place.”

But I knew I could not take his place or Dan's. I saw their ends. I saw the consequences. I was on another track and as blind to my future as they had been to theirs.

During the day, I walked down to Venice and joined in with an outdoor tai chi group. Afterward, I ran into two guys fighting quarterstaff and I paid them to teach me. It was similar to Aikido in some ways: your balance, his momentum. Attacking left you vulnerable. Countering was the way to achieve hits. The staff was about eight feet long, but after about a half hour, it became manageable. By the third day, I could hold my own. We worked out for two hours, then went for a beer.

They were Englishmen who made their living performing at fairs around the world. The girlfriend of one of them, who was also part of the act, joined us. At that moment, it sounded like the best life anyone ever had. Perform, leave soon, before the dust of responsibility or duty could settle. We talked about the possibility that I might fill in if they needed me. They had always managed to cover expenses and did not worry about the future. One of them talked vaguely about someday opening a school to teach quarterstaff and other similar skills, but the other guy mocked him: “Teaching kids to hit each other with sticks? I'd rather be selling the insurance policy.”

Other worlds drifted across the boardwalk until a set of crazy, staring eyes sliced through at the far end. On the Venice boardwalk, that should not have been alarming or notable, but these were unforgettable. They belonged to a man a little shorter than me, a little thicker, dark.

The Englishmen were probably relieved to find out how unreliable I was before we got too involved with one another. I got up quickly and walked in the direction where Victor had appeared. He was gone.

Around midnight, I took a walk. The streetlights painted the night with a pale gray tint, making the clear night feel foggy. I walked south first, below Pico, before turning toward the ocean. The homeless men had already settled into their doorways and onto their benches. I always preferred unlocked cars, parks, and cemeteries; the zombies were protection from all the other homeless men who believed in zombies. Any one of the lumps could have been Victor, ready to pop out after me. I sped up like a gang member crossing enemy territory. Across the road, I went down a flight of stairs and followed a path toward the water until the bike path cut across. Uneven white lines rolled hypnotically off the black screen on my left, just ahead of the grunting snare sounds. A couple holding hands appeared from under the pier and they tightened up as they came near me. The boy shifted to the left so he would be closest to me. I kept my gaze beyond them, but I saw no movement.

I walked under the pier, moving slowly. On the other side, the view expanded and the beach spread out. The pier was silent and the cars above, on the bluff, could hardly be heard. I looked back, hoping Victor would materialize like some demented wraith who I could wrestle in a death match. He did not appear.

In the morning, I drove to LAX, parked, bought a ticket to Phoenix, walked through two terminals, came out and got on the Avis shuttle, and rented a silver Toyota. I did not think I was going to lose Victor; I wanted him to think I intended to lose him.

First, north, then east, past Edwards Air Force Base, north again, into the Owens Valley. Tufts of green stained the wrinkled camel hair hills. This was the Garden of Eden ravaged by its promise. Forced water tribute had left behind plains as dry as a forgotten sponge. Outside Lone Pine, I stopped for gas. Victor did not pull in behind me.

Mountains, gray and frosted, jutted on both sides. Though I had driven through there a few times before, I could never tell which peak was Mt. Whitney. None stood out to me. Bishop has a Sears, a Kmart, and a Penney's spaced along a wide, faded, two-story Main Street that looks like the other stores would be featuring record players with stereophonic sound, and TVs with color and remote control. I snuck in between the pickups in front of the hardware store. I bought a shovel, a pick, gloves, and a lantern. Just off Main Street, I found a mountaineering supply store. I bought an anorak, thick wool socks, two sweaters, and a wool hat. I did not know what kind of shelter I would find. I did not know how long Victor would wait.