What’s the tail number?” He jotted something down and hung up.
“How about that? There was such a guy.” He ran a finger down the list on the clipboard. “There’s his tail number; he’s one Ted Larson, from Fort Lauderdale.”
Stone looked at the clipboard. “Can you access the FAA list of registered aircraft from your computer?”
“Sure,” DePoo said. He went to the website and typed in the tail number. “Cessna 182 RG, 1984 vintage, registered to a Frank G. Harmon, Sarasota.”
“Can we take a look at it?” Stone asked.
DePoo looked at the clipboard. “We hangared it for him, come on.” He got up and led Stone and Dino out of the building and across the tarmac to a big hangar containing half a dozen airplanes of different types.
“That’s it,” Dino said, pointing to a red Cessna parked in a corner, behind two other airplanes. The three men approached the airplane.
“Nice paint,” DePoo said. “Couldn’t be more than a year old.”
Stone looked in the pilot’s window. “Nice interior, too—all leather. Hey, nice panel!”
“Glass cockpit,” DePoo said. “You don’t see that on old Cessnas. This guy has spent a hundred and fifty grand on a twenty-fi ve-year old airplane.”
“Yeah,” Stone said, “but even if he stripped it and replaced the engine and everything else, he probably only has two-fifty or three hundred in it, and a new one would cost, what, double that?”
“About that,” DePoo said.
“Does your clipboard say when he plans to leave?”
“Ten o’clock this morning.”
Dino was looking through the window into the rear seat. “Have a look at this,” he said.
Stone looked through the window and saw an aluminum briefcase on the rear floor. “He could get four guns in there.”
“And a silencer or two as well,” Dino said.
“Hey, you guys,” DePoo said, “are you cops?”
“He is,” Stone said, jerking a thumb at Dino, “and I used to be, but we’re going to need some local talent for this. Dino, will you call Tommy and tell him we think we’ve got a lock on his shooter.” Stone tried the airplane door, but it was locked. “I don’t suppose you’ve got a Cessna passkey?”
DePoo shook his head. “No, and I’m not in the habit of breaking into customers’ airplanes.”
“I understand,” Stone said. “Let’s wait for the local cops.”
33
THEY HUNG AROUND the hangar looking at airplanes for the half hour it took Tommy to get there.
“What’s up?” he asked.
Stone crooked a finger. “This way.” He led Tommy to the corner of the hangar and the bright red Cessna. “The guy who flew this in yesterday carried a shotgun or rifle case and gave a name different from the registered owner of the airplane. Also, if you’ll cast your eye toward the rear floor, there’s an aluminum case commonly used to carry handguns.”
“Okay,” Tommy said, “now what?”
“I don’t know. I just thought you might like to get a search warrant.”
“On what evidence?” Tommy asked. “The guy hasn’t done anything illegal.”
“Maybe he stole the airplane, since it isn’t registered in his name, which he gave as Ted Larson, of Fort Lauderdale. The registered owner is one Frank G. Harmon, of Sarasota.”
“Maybe he borrowed it or rented it.”
“This airplane has had a ton of money spent on it; it’s not the kind of thing an owner would lend to a friend, let alone rent out.”
“Come on, Stone, how many times have you stood in front of a judge and been told to take a hike? I don’t like to do that around here, because I get the same judge or two every time I go for a warrant, and I want to protect my reputation for having real evidence.”
“Tommy, you’ve got an assassin in your town.”
“Yeah, and if I arrest him, I want to get a conviction, not get the case thrown out for an illegal search.”
“He’s scheduled to leave at ten this morning,” Stone said. “You want to stick around and see what he has to say for himself?”
“Sure, I’ll do that.”
“You fellows want some coffee?” Paul DePoo asked.
“Sure, why not?”
“Tell you what,” Paul said, “I won’t pull his airplane out of the hangar; that’ll delay him for half an hour while we move the two others blocking him.”
They all walked back into the air-conditioned building and got coffee.
“Are you guys always this lucky?” Tommy asked. “’Cause I’m not. You stroll into an airport hangar a few hours after a shooting and find a guy who landed with a rifle case and a handgun case in his backseat? That never happens to me.”
“Then you’re not working hard enough, Tommy,” Dino said. “I find that the harder I work, the luckier I get.”
“Just how much work have you done this morning, Dino? You and Stone had a chat over breakfast and decided to amble out here? That kind of work?”
“There’s a certain amount of instinct involved, too,” Dino said, blandly.
Tommy burst out laughing. “It’s a pity vaudeville is dead,” he said. “You’d make a great duo on the stage.”
“I didn’t say anything,” Stone pointed out.
“You didn’t need to; I was supplying all the straight lines.”
DePoo’s desk phone rang. “Yes? Did he mention what hotel he’s in? Okay, thanks.” He hung up. “This Ted Larson, or whoever he is, just called and said he’d be staying a day or two longer.”
“Please ask her to describe the man,” Stone said. DePoo called back to the desk, asked and hung up. “White guy, middle-aged, medium height and weight, wearing a yellow baseball cap.”
“Well,” Tommy said, “I choose not to wait for him to show up or to institute a manhunt for a guy answering that description. Paul, will you call me the minute he shows up?”
“Sure,” DePoo answered. He wrote down Tommy’s cell number.
“Take mine, too,” Stone said, handing him a card. The three men walked outside to the parking lot.
“You two sticking around?” Tommy asked.
“Yeah, for a few days,” Stone said.
“You really think you’re on to something here?”
“Well, I guess we’ll have to wait until Evan Keating gets shot at again before we’ll know for sure. I hope he doesn’t get dead in the process.”
“I’d put a police guard on him, if he didn’t have the lovely Gigi to watch his back,” Tommy said.
“At least she knows how to shoot back,” Dino said.
“Tommy,” Stone said, “do you know if Evan is being discharged this morning?”
“Looks like he’s going to be there another day,” Tommy replied.
“Apparently, he’s running a fever, and they’ve got him on intravenous antibiotics. Best guess now is tomorrow. My uniformed guy is still on him, though, so he’ll be okay.”
“See you later, then,” Stone said, and they went to their respective cars.
“So you want to go looking for Ted Larson or Frank Harmon or whatever his name is?”
“What’s the point? If I were a hit man, I’d fly in here and give a false name, then register in a hotel under another false name and give anybody I met another false name.”
“I’m glad he doesn’t know who we are,” Dino said.
34
STONE AND DINO went back to the Marquesa, and Stone got into a shower, thinking about the events of that morning. When he came out onto the porch, Dino was at the pool with a vividly colored drink in his hand, chatting with two young women. Stone was about to join him when his cell phone buzzed.