“I hear you got the little turkey to open up. Frazier was impressed.”
“Swell,” I said, sighing. “Where is Frazier? I was hoping he’d finish that briefing he was giving us.”
“He’s on the phone.” Spinney stared intently into his soup. “You think this is safe to drink?”
“I’m not about to find out. How’d things work out in Lebanon?”
He took a tentative sip and raised his eyebrows. “Pretty good. Lebanon was a wash, as expected. We figured the angle of fire came from the supermarket parking lot across the river-confirms that car you saw.”
“Silencer?”
“Not necessarily. The water was noisy enough to cover a cannon. Whoever it was wasn’t taking chances on his marksmanship, though. The ME said he used one of those new Rhino jobbies that blow apart on impact. Looked like he’d swallowed a hand grenade. We combed the whole area, canvassed for witnesses… They’re still at it, more or less, but… How ’bout you? What did you learn from your new friend?”
“That Da Wang’s declared war. He and his friends were supposed to hit a restaurant downtown, but they got lost and went to Plan B, which was the house. ’Course, Plan B was screwed up, too. They were supposed to kick in the doors and wipe the place out-make a statement no one would forget. My friend, as you call him, blames the lead car-said they lost their nerve and turned it into a drive-by. Da Wang’s going to have to improve on his talent.”
“What’s the scope of this war?”
“That’s where this kid fizzled out. I guess they knew enough not to give him the whole picture. He’s positive he was one of several teams, but he had no idea what the other targets were. Didn’t know who ‘Sonny’ was, either, although Da Wang’s made him their top priority. Nor did he know how much damage Sonny’s inflicted, although I guess we can assume things are not going well.”
“What about the snakehead angle?”
“That was more interesting. We were right about the alien smuggling-it’s a major cash cow, and it’s where Truong seems to be doing Da Wang the most harm. Da Wang has a new snakehead, but he’s having a tough time getting customers. Word’s gotten out the organization ain’t what it used to be. The RCMP’s been getting tip-offs-presumably from Truong’s crew-telling them where the illegals are being assembled prior to crossing. Chewy-the kid’s nickname-claims everyone’s getting sweaty palms, wondering if Da Wang’s losing his touch. Sonny’s taken over a lot of the Vermont restaurants, money’s started to dry up, and word’s gotten back to Da Wang’s backers in the old country. Truong has his own contacts there, so now alien and heroin suppliers are either playing both sides or holding off entirely until the dust settles.”
“Guess Truong’s putting all those import-business contacts to use after all,” Spinney mused. “Makes you wonder if we’re missing the boat here. Could be all that bad-boy-goes-straight stuff was pure smoke screen.”
I silently watched him as he sipped from his cup. It was an uncomfortably plausible point he’d just made, and one to which I was inordinately sensitive. In our line of work, greed, power, and frustration were the most popular criminal stimulants, and they tended to be expressed hot and fast. Ten-year-old, karma-induced revenge rarely came up. What were the chances I was overstating Truong’s motive-ennobling a crook whose ambitions were no different than Da Wang’s?
I backed away from any hard-set conclusions, biding my time with a short-term truism. “Either way, we get the same mess on our hands.”
Walt Frazier suddenly appeared at the doorway, looking worn and tired. Nearing retirement, he probably wished nights like these would be forever banished to his past. In that, he was not alone. Even Spinney, the youngest of us, looked ready for twelve hours of sleep. I doubted any of us would be allowed that luxury.
“We gonna keep Chewy or let the Burlington PD have him?” I asked as Frazier approached.
He pulled a molded-plastic chair over and sat down heavily, stretching out his legs. “That’s what I was trying to sort out. Maggie wants to see what we’ve got first. Nice interview, by the way-too bad it was such shitty news. I suppose we can hope the other hit teams are as brain dead as this one. I wish to hell he could’ve told us more-be nice to head ’em off, instead of running around picking up the pieces.”
“We could do that if we knew what properties Truong controlled,” I mused, half to myself.
“Oh-good luck with that one.” Spinney finished off his soup with one last gulp.
Suddenly inspired by the challenge, I got up and moved over to a pay phone mounted on the wall. “There might be a way.”
I picked up the receiver, dialed Dan Flynn’s pager number, and hung up, smiling. “Sweet revenge.”
Five minutes later, the phone rang. “Morning, Dan. It’s Joe. Walt and Lester and I were shooting the shit up here in Burlington. Thought you might like to put in your two cents.”
“Fuck you. What d’you want?” Flynn’s voice was barely a mumble.
I laughed, feeling no guilt whatsoever. “A while back, you were telling me how some of the Asian restaurants get their supplies exclusively from outfits in New York or Boston-everything from napkins to noodles to menus.”
“Yeah. They don’t buy anything locally.”
“You said that’s what made it difficult to know what was in the delivery truck, or what might be moving from place to place.”
“Right.”
“What was your source for that? Is there someone we could talk to so we could identify one of these trucks-maybe put a tail on it? We’re trying to find a way to pinpoint Truong’s properties.”
“I heard it at a conference in New York. Someone on the Asian-crime squad down there was talking about it. His name was… Damn. I don’t have my computer handy. Fred something… Wilkinson. Fred Wilkinson. Give him a call. He was real friendly.”
I thanked him, dialed Information, and eventually worked my way to Wilkinson’s office, preparing to leave my name and pager number, along with a brief message. Instead, Wilkinson picked up in person, sounding as tired as I was.
I briefly explained who I was and what we were up to. His response, almost cutting me off in mid-sentence, was, “Ryder, U-Haul, sometimes just a plain step-van. They don’t go regularly, they don’t follow the same route twice in a row, and most of the time they’re clean as a whistle.”
“There been any upheavals at your end recently? A change in management at one of the suppliers?”
“Who knows? But I wouldn’t waste my time with delivery trucks. Unless you got some inside dope, you’ll probably end up busting a shipment of rice.”
His disinterest was as palpable as his fatigue. I thanked him for his time, and let him head off to bed-not without some envy.
Spinney read my expression. “No soap?”
“Not really…” I scratched my head. “Still… There’s a restaurant owner in Bratt who was squeezed by Truong’s boys. If we can squeeze him in turn, maybe we can get some help about the rest of the pipeline.”
Spinney leaped to his feet in mock enthusiasm. “Hot damn. Another drive down the interstate?”
That thought hadn’t occurred to me yet. “S’pose so.”
Frazier spoke up. “Look, if you two are heading off again, let me at least give you the punch line to my briefing on Truong Van Loc. I think you’ll find it useful. The rest I can give later.”
We both looked at him expectantly.
“Joe, you were saying that when you stopped his car last winter, you thought none of them knew each other. Turns out that when Truong went legit, he had a small staff-mostly warehouse people to handle the imports. One of them was Henry Lam. Henry disappeared when Truong did. Apparently, they were pretty tight-the San Francisco police labeled Lam a surrogate son of sorts.”
Spinney and I exchanged glances, having guessed at some kind of connection.
“Also, I got the goods on Wang Chien-kuo. Not only was he in San Francisco at the time Truong’s little brother got whacked, he was one of the Dragon Boys leaders.”