Cat Chaser Part 18

"Your silent partner," Moran said. "Who you talking about, Scully?"

Moran saw Nolen's fuzzed gaze s.h.i.+ft to Rafi and return to stare at him. Nolen shook his head from side to side. The drunk being secretive. But Rafi was even drunker and didn't notice; he was eating 223.

his ice. Nolen pulled himself out of the sofa, took Rafi's gla.s.s from him-Rafi still holding his hand up, cupped-fixed another rum and c.o.ke and put the gla.s.s back in Rafi's hand. Nolen stumbled sitting down. They were both in bad shape.

Moran could not see Jiggs Scully bringing these two into the game. Unless he had a special use for them.

"We're gonna publicize Mr. de Boya's past sins," Nolen said and gave Moran a stage wink, obvious enough to be seen in the back row, "unless he comes across with a generous piece of change... Isn't that right, Che?"

" 'Less he pays," Rafi said.

"Tell George what the man did," Nolen said, "when he was in charge down there."

"What he did?" Rafi said. "He was the head of the Cascos Blancos, he sent out the death squads to get people he don't like or people who talk against Trujillo. He take them to La Cuarenta in Santo Domingo for the torture. Sometime he take them to Kilometer Nueve, the army torture place at San Isidro."

"Tell him what de Boya did to people," Nolen said.

"Well," Rafi said, "he like to sew the eyelids to the eyebrows and put them in a light. He like to beat them with Louisville Sluggers. He like to put acid on them sometimes. He like to castrate people. He like to take the nipples and pull them out and cut them off with scissors."

Moran said, "Is that what happened to you?"

"No, no, he do that to girls. Cut the nipples off. Men he cut everything off with-how do you say it, these big tijeras? tijeras?"

"Shears," Nolen said.

"Yeah, chears. Cut off your business with them. I had a uncle that happen to. Then when General de Boya finish with them he have them killed and thrown from the cliff into the sea to be eaten by the sharks. You want to find out what happen to somebody, you ask, n.o.body knows. They say he's gone to Boca Chica to visit the tiburones tiburones, the sharks. Or sometime to Monte Cristi. That was twenty years ago-the sharks still come looking for General de Boya to feed them. He like to put ants on people, too."

Rafi rolled his eyes back.

"I don't like to think about it."

"Have a drink," Nolen said. The answer to most things.

Rafi took a drink. "I don't feel so good. Maybe I go lie down; I'm feeling tired." He stood up unsteadily, spilling some of his drink.

Moran watched him. He wanted to get up but didn't have the energy; the scene was depressing. He watched Rafi shuffle into the bedroom, Nolen 225.

calling after him, "Don't throw up on the floor, Che. You hear? Go in the bano bano."

He said to Moran, "I don't know what it is about them, partner, those people just don't hold the juice."

Moran watched Nolen pour himself another scotch.

"What're you gonna use him for?"

"He's our spray painter, man. You see his work?"

"But he doesn't know Scully."

"Jiggs wants to see how he works out first. So I told Rafi we got a guy on the inside, but he doesn't want his ident.i.ty known just yet."

"I don't imagine he would," Moran said. "All right, what's the deal? What're you going after?"

"Jiggs says he told you."

"Come on, this isn't your kind of a thing."

"Is that right? Tell me what I'm saving myself for. It's the best part I've read for in ten years. s.h.i.+t, I don't even have to act tough."

"He's using you," Moran said.

"Jesus, I hope so. I need to be used, man."

"You know what he asked me to do?"

"I sent you to him, didn't I, for the interview?"

"Come on-you know what he wants?"

"Yeah, he wants you to ask your lady where her husband hides his cash. What's hard about that? s.h.i.+t, call her up right now."

"Jesus Christ," Moran said. He drank down his scotch and sat back. "How does he know ...Hey, you listening?"

"Yeah, I'm listening. What?"

"How does Jiggs know she won't tell her husband what's going on? How does he know I I won't tell him?" won't tell him?"

"Well, s.h.i.+t," Nolen said, "because I told Jiggs you're my bud, we see eye to eye. I said sure, George's the old Cat Chaser, we served down in the D.R., man. I told him it was me almost put out your lights with the one-oh-six and Jiggs got a kick out of that. He sees the humor in life, everybody busting their a.s.s trying to score off each other. I told you he's a funny guy and I was right, huh?"

"Yeah, he's funny," Moran said. "But I still don't understand. Why would he trust me? Tell me a story like that?"

"I just told you. And you want the husband out of the way, don't you? Jesus Christ, or else I came in late and missed something."

"Look," Moran said, trying to keep Nolen's attention. "You listening to me?"

"Yeah, I'm listening." Pinching the roach, sucking his cheeks in with a sound like the north wind.

"I'm not in it," Moran said.

"What happened?" Nolen grunting the words as he held his breath. "You change your mind? There's nothing to be scared of."

"I never was was in." in."

227.

Nolen expelled smoke in a long sigh. "Well, Jiggs says you gave him a h.e.l.l of an idea. He told me. Make the man run and head him off at the pa.s.s. I said to Jiggs, I told you he's good, he's a fighting leatherneck. Jiggs says he didn't think much of the idea at first, frankly, 'cause what if the man took off in his boat? Jiggs doesn't like to have anything to do with boats. He goes, 'I don't want no parts of them f.u.c.kers.' He gets seasick he goes out. But then, hey, with the dock gone the man can't bring his boat in, can he? He runs, he's got to go by car. And when he does, Jiggs says he'll be way ahead of him...He likes you," Nolen said.

Aw s.h.i.+t. Moran felt heavy, out of shape, and the scotch wasn't helping at all. He said, "Nolen?"

"What?"

"I'm not in. I didn't give Jiggs anything. You understand? What he's doing, he's using you. I don't know for what, but when he's through he'll dump you. He can't afford not to."

"We made a pact," Nolen said. "Us against them."

Moran tried again. He said, "You told me who he works for, what he does for a living, right? He leans on people. He breaks their bones. Isn't that right? That's what you told me."

"He used to."

"Okay. But does he sound like the kind of guy you can trust? You can put your life in his hands?"

"Jiggs says we're his kind," Nolen said. "He's sick and tired of the guineas and the spics raking it in, taking everything, guys like de Boya sitting on top. Look at the guy. He's a f.u.c.king death squad all by himself. And he's married to your lady. What more like incentive you want, for Christ sake?"

"Don't call her my lady, all right?"

"What should I call her?"

It annoyed him, "my lady." He never liked the expression; but that was something else. "Think a minute," Moran said. "What if somebody else put Jiggs up to this and he's playing a game with you?"

"That's it, man, a game." Nolen was half-listening. "It's us against them. s.h.i.+rts against the skins, man. They're swarthy f.u.c.kers, but they got white legs...if you know what that means on the basketball court can figure it out." He gave Moran a feeble grin. Then came alive again. "We'll get little Loret some pom-poms, she'll be the cheerleader. Muerte a de Boya Muerte a de Boya, Fight! The old locomotive. M-U, M-U, M-U-E-R; T-E, T-E...What do you think? Get her a short little red and white pleated skirt..."

"Where's Loret?"

"Jesus, that's right. She hooked up with some guy at the Fontainebleu, guy in the lounge smoking a cigar. She gives him the eye, says excuse me, going to take a leak and I haven't seen her since. I know, 229.

you told me. But don't say it, all right? I hate guys like that. Have to rub it in."

Moran said, "What am I gonna have to do to get you to understand something? You dumb s.h.i.+t."

Nolen grinned, eyes out of focus. He held up the dirty stub pinched between his fingers. "How 'bout a smoke? Good stuff."

"It makes me hear tires squeal when I'm barely moving," Moran said. "No, this'll do me." He raised his gla.s.s. "Like it's doing you in. I don't want to sound preachy-"

"Then don't."

"But I got to tell you. You're in a no-win situation. The best you can get out of this if you're lucky, I mean if you come out alive, would be something like fifteen to twenty-five at Raiford. Hard time."

"Don't sweat it," Nolen said. "I'm having fun."

Moran stared at him before easing back in the sofa. All right then. Okay....

He was tired.

He saw Mary in his mind, in the room in the University Inn, her hands between her legs on the chair cus.h.i.+on and could see the line of her thighs beneath the tan skirt. He saw her looking at him with her look of quiet awareness, waiting. What did he need to talk to this s.h.i.+thead for?

Corky came out to the red and white Cadillac in the drive. He asked Jiggs, getting out of the car, then reaching in to punch the headlights off, what he wanted. Jiggs said, "If I thought I had to tell you, Corko, I'd be in pretty bad shape. Tell Mr. de Boya I'll be around back where you used to have a boat dock somebody took out while you're keeping an eye on it." And walked away.

He was inspecting the splintered stubs of the pilings, barely visible in the dark water, when de Boya came out to him. Jiggs turned very carefully on the crumbled edge of the retaining wall and stood with his back to the tide breaking in below him, giving de Boya a casual, death-defying pose.

He said, "Seems you got a problem here," with a grin of sympathy. "Jimmy Cap says take a look. He don't care to see any his friends get f.u.c.ked over by parties unknown. Jimmy says it's like they're doing it to him."

De Boya was looking down at the water now, at the stump remnants of his dock.

"How do you think of it?"

Jiggs took cautious half-steps from the cement edge until he felt the safety of gra.s.s underfoot. "Well, my first thought when I read about it in the Herald Herald, I think to myself, some dopers're having a disagreement and one of 'em sends his guy to the wrong address. 'Seven hundred Arvida. Oh, thought you said six hundred. Oh well.' " hundred Arvida. Oh, thought you said six hundred. Oh well.' "

231.

De Boya's reaction: nothing. Like a statue with clothes on.

"But then I started asking around."

"Yes? What did you learn?"

"You understand we got contacts in Little Havana," Jiggs said. "I first come here they're referring to it in the company as Sowah Seda. This girl Vivian Arzola used to work there says, 'Go on over to Sowah Seda,' I'm supposed to see somebody over there. I ask her where Sowah Seda is. She says, 'Sowah Seda, Sowah Seda.' Finally it dawns on me. Oh, Southwest Eighth Street. She says, 'Yeah, Sowah Seda.' Well, I talked to a guy down there this time name of Benigno, runs a tavern, if he's heard anything. What's this s.h.i.+t, a man's dock getting blown up? He looks around see if anybody's listening. They got the salsa on so loud I can't even hear Benigno. He says it's the work of the FDR. I said FDR? Franklin D. Roosevelt? You said that name to my mother she'd genuflect. Christ, she'd have left home, all the kids, for FDR, he ever wanted to get it on. But, it turns out, Benigno says it stands for Democratic Revolutionary Front."

"It's Salvadoran," de Boya said. "It has nothing to do with me."

"That's what Benigno says, they're from El Salvador. But evidently these people, your different revolutionary groups, are getting together, helping each other out. They don't give a s.h.i.+t you're Dominican, you're Nicaraguan, you come from the ruling cla.s.s you're one of the bad guys. What do they call it? The oligarchs. You're one of them and they're all working for Castro anyway, they don't give a s.h.i.+t. See, he's sending 'em here to spread a little terror."

"For what purpose would that be?"

"I check around, hear it from some other sources there," Jiggs said. "These people with little bugs up their a.s.s, they come here to cause trouble, score a few big names."

"What do they destroy the dock for?"

"Get your attention," Jiggs said. "So you know it's coming. Like toying with you. Little terrorist foreplay. You go to the cops for protection you're all right for a while. Then when you aren't looking- whammo. They hit you a good one, for real this time and get their initials in the paper."

Jiggs felt de Boya studying his face in the dark, probably trying to look in his eyes, the truth test. De Boya said, "Yes, and what do you do for me?"

"Well, are the cops helping any?"

"They say they keep an eye on my house. They drive by."

"You hire any more people?"

"Not yet." De Boya turned abruptly. "We go inside."

"I know you like Corky, but get rid of the rest of 233.

'em," Jiggs said, following de Boya, "and I'll send you over a couple guys, couple heavy-duty Cubans worked for the CIA when the CIA had a hard-on for Castro. Now these guys're freelance. Jimmy Cap says take care of you, that's what I'm doing."

"It's kind of him," de Boya said.

They went up on the deck, through the two-story hallway filled with plants and young trees like a path through the jungle, and into de Boya's study. Jiggs liked it, the oak paneling, the gun cabinet, the framed photographs of people in military uniforms all over the walls. There was a big one of Trujillo himself in a white uniform full of medals, shots of de Boya with different people, another one of de Boya in what looked like a German SS uniform, de Boya nonchalantly holding an old-model Thompson submachine gun. Jiggs paid his respects to the photographs, nodding solemnly, while de Boya went around behind a giant oak desk and sat down. There was a tape recorder on the desk, a tray that held a brandy decanter and gla.s.ses.