“I think so.”
“So quick like a snake I send some of our people over to Valletta, and guess what?”
“No yacht.”
“No yacht. Well, hell, you can’t hide a ninety-two-foot yacht, so we call the Navy. And they send some planes up and guess what?”
“This time I give up.”
“Well, out there in the Mediterranean, halfway between Valletta and Tripoli is the True Oasis, broken down with engine trouble and radioing for help. And the real funny thing about it is that they’re radioing for help when a U.S. destroyer is only about five miles away. Well, this destroyer of ours rushes over and hoves to, or whatever the hell they do in the Navy, and sends a crew aboard. A twelve-man crew. And sure enough those Libyans have got engine trouble, which took our guys about fifteen minutes to fix. Then the Libyans claim that they’ve got a few other problems they’d like the U.S. Navy to look at while they’re there. So our guys are given a tour of the whole fucking yacht, from stem to stern. And you know what? There weren’t any funny-looking people aboard any more — not unless you count the Libyans.”
“That’s quite a story,” Dunjee said as the car reached the top of the hill and turned into a short straight drive which led to a garage that occupied half of the ground floor of a four-story cream-colored villa.
In the front seat, Jack Spiceman took out a small metal box and pointed it at the garage. He pressed a button and the overhead door went up. The car drove into the garage. The overhead door came down.
“This is what in our business we call a safe house,” Reese said.
“A safe house.”
“We’re all going to get out of the car and go upstairs and talk to somebody about that little map of yours.”
“Who’re we going to talk to?” Dunjee asked.
“A patriot.”
“You know something?” Dunjee said.
“What?”
“That’s what somebody accused me of being the other day.’
29
They went up three flights of stairs, Alex Reese leading the way, with Dunjee next and Keeling and Spiceman bringing up the rear. They were narrow wooden stairs, located in the rear of the building. Dunjee decided they were the servants’ stairs. The building appeared old enough to have been built back when there were still servants to be had.
At the top of the stairs they walked down a short hall and into a large sun-drenched corner room that seemed to be mostly windows and angular furniture made out of chrome and glass and leather. There was also a marble floor. Part of it was covered by a thin worn rug that looked old and expensive.
Seated in one of the chrome and leather chairs was Leland Timble. He wore an Indian-made military style shirt with many busy pockets in the sleeves, tan slacks, and on his face a happy smile that Dunjee thought looked silly. Timble studied Dunjee carefully. Dunjee only glanced at Timble and then looked out the windows at the view of Rome. He decided it was a splendid, probably expensive view, but one that did nothing at all to tell him where he was.
“You are, I expect, Mr. Dunjee,” Timble said.
Dunjee looked at Timble again. “I’m Dunjee.”
“I am Leland Timble.”
Dunjee nodded. “You rob banks.”
Timble giggled. “And you are the Mordida Man.”
“Newspaper stuff.”
“Isn’t it dreadful?”
“Terrible,” Dunjee said. He turned toward Alex Reese. “This is the patriot you were telling me about?”
Reese smiled and shrugged. “He’s working on it.”
“Now then, what does Mr. Dunjee have for us?” Timble said.
Reese took the Grand Hotel envelope out of his pocket and handed it to the seated man. Timble slipped out the folded sheet of paper and opened it. He studied it carefully.
“Exceedingly well drawn; quite detailed.” He looked up at Dunjee. “The building would appear to be a farmhouse of some kind.”
“I didn’t get a very good look at it,” Dunjee said.
Timble held out the sheet of paper. Dunjee moved over, accepted it, and looked at it carefully. “As you said, a farmhouse.”
“It would appear to be near the sea,” Timble said.
Dunjee nodded, still examining the map. “Looks that way.”
“But what sea?”
“I wouldn’t know,” Dunjee said and handed the map back to Timble. It took several seconds for Timble to refold the map and slip it back into the envelope. The happy-face smile vanished. He looked up at Franklin Keeling and nodded glumly.
Keeling turned quickly and hit Dunjee hard in the stomach, just below the belt buckle. The air exploded out of Dunjee’s mouth. Keeling hit him again, again very hard, in approximately the same place. Dunjee doubled over holding his stomach. He fought for air, but his lungs refused to work properly. He sank to his knees on the marble floor, still doubled over. The nausea came then and Dunjee tried to fight it back, but lost, and vomited on the marble floor.
Jack Spiceman turned and left the room. When he came back, Dunjee was still bent over on the floor. Spiceman tossed him a rag. “Here,” he said. “Clean it up.”
Dunjee straightened slowly. He tried a series of quick shallow breaths. They seemed to help. He used the rag to mop up the vomit. Then he rose slowly, took out a handkerchief, and used it to wipe the tears from his eyes and the vomit from his mouth.
“That was to save time, Mr. Dunjee,” Timble said. “We’re extremely short of time.”
“What do you want?” Dunjee said.
“Why don’t you sit down — over here by me?” Timble said, patting a chair.
Dunjee moved over and lowered himself into a leather chair whose chrome frame somewhat resembled a Z.
“What we want is quite simple,” Timble said. “We want Bingo McKay. The President’s brother,” he added, as if there might be several of them.
Dunjee nodded.
“Abedsaid knows where he is, doesn’t he?” Reese said.
Again, Dunjee nodded and pressed his right hand against his stomach. It did nothing to ease the pain.
“The way I figure it,” Reese said, “it’s a two-stage deal. That little map. That’s the first stage. The second stage is where you get the map coordinates, the latitude and longitude and all that good stuff, which you need to tell what country it’s in, right?”
Dunjee cleared his throat. “Something like that.”
“Tell me,” Reese said. “What’re you using on Abedsaid — bribes or blackmail?”
Dunjee stared up at him. “A little of both.”
Reese nodded, almost in approval. “How little’s a little — the bribe, I mean?”
“A million.”
“Where’d you get it?”
“Paul Grimes,” Dunjee said. “He transferred it this morning.”
“Grimes got it from the President?”
Dunjee nodded.
“And the million paid for our little map, right?” Without waiting for an answer, Reese continued. “What’s going to buy the coordinates?”
“Pictures,” Dunjee said.
“Dirty pictures?”
“Filthy,” Dunjee said. “The Colonel’s something of a prude.”
“Where’d you get the pictures?” Reese said.
“Abedsaid’s apartment. In London.”
“What’re the pictures of?” Spiceman said.
“Abedsaid and the German — Diringshoffen.”
“In the sack together?”
Dunjee nodded.
“No kidding?” Spiceman said. He looked at Reese. “Does Diringshoffen swing that—”
Leland Timble interrupted. “We’re at an impasse,” he said in a tone that ruled out any further discussion.
Franklin Keeling smiled at Dunjee. “Leland’s always a little bit ahead of the rest of us slow thinkers.”