“I’m trying to give some money away, is what I’m doing.”
Baseball Cap glanced down again. The big kid looked at Weir and shook his head. “Just bring it right over,” said Baseball Cap. “Dump it anywhere.”
“Are you Dave Smith?”
Both men leaned down into the guts of Duty Free now. All Jim could see were their rumps, legs, and elbows. When they stood back and signaled, the winch revved and the cables tightened. Jim looked to the winch operator, sitting quietly behind the glass of his cockpit, a cigarette dangling from his lips.
He heard a door slam from the main office, and looked back to see Miss Buzzard clomping toward him across the yard. Her arms swung purposefully at her sides, and her eyes were fastened on Weir. She stopped three feet away from him, breathing heavily, the wind hissing past her teeth. “Remove yourself from this property immediately,” she said.
“Sorry, Miss Buzzard, but I’m in now.”
She pointed toward the chain-link exit gate. “You will leave this instant.”
Jim saw that the two men on Duty Free had risen from the engine compartment and now stood watching from the deck. The blond was smiling. Baseball Cap wasn’t.
He climbed down from the boat and came toward Weir, wiping his hands on his pants. He introduced himself as Lou Braga and offered his hand. Braga was younger than Jim had thought, about his own age, with plenty of dark hair curling out from under his cap. His face was all sharp angles, nothing round except the big Roman nose. His eyes were almost black, and his handshake was strong. “He’s okay, Marge.”
“He is trespassing, I remind you.”
“I’ll talk to him.”
“I’d rather you did not,” she said. Jim noted the fury with which she glared at Braga.
“But I’m the ops manager around here, so I’ll manage this operation. Thank you, Marge. It’s all right.”
She looked at Weir with unalloyed hatred, then back to Braga. “This didn’t happen when Dick was alive.”
“I miss him, too, Marge. Go inside — it’s okay.”
Weir tossed her the key. She regarded him with a final disdainful look, then turned and marched back the way she had come.
“After all that, I hope you’re not selling somethin’. I’ll be on her shit list for months now.”
Weir explained his mission — the settlement and Dave Smith’s seven hundred grand. Braga listened closely, nodding. “Trouble is, there’s no Dave Smith here.”
“Know where he is?”
“That’s what I mean, we never had a guy named that.”
Jim wondered whether this was the party line here at Cheverton Sewer, or if Becky and Virginia had simply gotten it messed up. “He used a Cheverton credit card a few weeks ago, minor purchase. He’s got an authorized name.”
“Gotta be some mistake. You know, we’re owned by about ten other companies. He must have been with one of them.”
“He said Cheverton, gave the card number and expiration date.”
“You TRW or something?”
“I’m on the level. Never thought I’d have so much trouble giving away seven hundred grand.”
Braga nodded, studying Weir’s face. Then he turned and watched the motor of Duty Free rising like some steel Lazarus from the engine compartment. The big blond steadied the cable, jumped off the boat, and helped guide the block onto a waiting tarp. “Looks like they’re doing fine without me. Come in, maybe we could straighten this out.”
The inside of the manager’s trailer was neat and minimaclass="underline" a master calendar on Braga’s desk, an old coffee can full of pens and pencils, an upturned car piston full of cigarette butts, a smudged telephone, the usual girlie calendars on the walls, and a photo of Braga and his family hanging over the air conditioner. There were a couple of faded pictures from fishing trips, too. In one of them, Dale Blodgett stood beside Braga, holding a heavy yellowtail toward the camera so it would look bigger.
They sat on either side of the battered gunmetal gray desk. “What’s the deal with Marge?” Jim asked. Braga laughed, both rows of even white teeth showing. “She’s been here too long to get rid of. Everybody’s scared of her but me. She’s not so bad, but this is her whole world, so she guards it like a Doberman.”
“Mr. Cheverton passed away recently?”
“Five years ago. He was doing a cesspool when one of the pump trucks jumped into gear, and he was standing in front of it. Knocked him out and pitched him in. It was bad.”
“That his picture in her office?”
“You don’t miss much, Weir. You a PI?”
“No. Just doing basic research work for attorneys now.”
“Used to be a PI?”
“Sheriff’s Department for a while.”
Braga nodded, studying Jim with his black unhurried eyes. “Marge loved him to death. She was bad before. After Dick died, she’s been pretty much out there. Keeps that picture of him wiped and polished like it’s the Virgin Mary or something.”
Weir accepted a cigarette from Braga, who lit his own, waved the match out, and tossed the book toward him. Braga placed the piston in the middle of the desk. “Now about this Dave Smith, there’s gotta be some mistake. Like I said, our corporate credit cards are issued from headquarters, so who knows who actually called it in. What’d he buy?”
Jim hesitated. “Minor purchase. Hardware, I think.”
“If you’re not TRW, how do you know who charges things on a Cheverton card?”
“I’m a legal researcher. That stuff isn’t too tough to find out.”
Braga shrugged. “Guess not. Thanks for the tip, though. If someone here is charging personal things to a company card, I want to know. What’s the number?”
“I’d think so.” Jim copied it from the slip Becky had written out for him.
Braga glanced at it. “What about this settlement?”
Weir remained vague: class-action suit, settled out of court; couldn’t reach him at home for over a week; Smith said his current employment was here.
Lou Braga listened without interrupting, then shook his head slowly. “Just a mistake, I guess. Maybe he was just using us to look legit or something. I don’t know. But he isn’t here, that’s a fact.” Braga waited then, as if expecting something from Jim, an air of suppressed curiosity surrounding him. He sat up a little straighter, drawing on the cigarette. “You’re Ann Cruz’s brother, aren’t you?”
Jim nodded.
“I’m real sorry about what happened.”
“We buried her today.”
“I guess they’ve got it narrowed down to that nut from Ohio.”
“There’s not much evidence, to tell you the truth.”
Jim could see from Braga’s eyes that he was rising to the bait, but he wouldn’t take it. Braga said nothing.
“So,” Jim said, “the family is doing a little investigation of its own. Trying to keep everything covered.”
“Sure. I would, too. This whole business about Dave Smith wouldn’t be about Ann, would it?”
“Not unless you know something I don’t.”
Braga smiled uncomfortably, both rows of teeth again. He raised his open hands. “Hey, hey, I was just thinking out loud.”
Jim waited.
“No, not at all. It’s just this story about a settlement seems so goddamned weird. Like a sting the cops would pull, or something.”
“How many people are verified to use the Cheverton company card?”
“Three of us here — Marge, me, and the field supervisor, Manny Rueda. But like I said, that card is issued from corporate, so they might keep some other names on it. For verification, I mean.”
“Who is corporate?”
“Cantrell Development owns us. PacifiCo owns them. They call the shots.”