Hot Mahogany

21

Stone was at his desk at the crack of ten. Joan had left a list of the bills needing to be paid, and it turned out to be a rather depressing list, since there was not enough cash in his bank account to meet them.

Joan came to his office door. “Good afternoon,” she said archly.

“Don’t start, Joan.”

“You saw what we owe?”

“Yes.”

“And what we have in the bank?”

“Yes. Use your own judgment as to which and how many to pay.”

“Is there any oil in the pipeline?” she asked.

“There is oil in the ground, and as soon as I locate it, there will be an abundance in the pipeline.”

“So much for geology,” she said, then returned to her office.

Stone called Bob Cantor.

“Good morning,” he said.

“Bob, you sound a little down.”

“I guess you could say that.”

“What’s the problem?”

“I can’t go into it.”

“Let me ask you a question: Was the guy you saw at Clarke’s Charlie Crow?”

There was a dead silence.

“Bob?”

“How did you know that?”

“The information came my way in connection with some work I’m doing for a client.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“Bob, how else would I be able to guess that? And it was a guess.”

“I only saw him for a minute.”

“And he saw you.”

“Well, yeah.”

“Why didn’t he speak to you?”

“Look, we made a pact a long time ago not to contact each other.”

“Do you think his presence at Clarke’s was just a coincidence?”

“It’s a popular place; a lot of people drink there.”

“Do you think it was a coincidence?”

Cantor sighed. “I don’t know,” he said. “I just didn’t expect him to pop up on my radar.”

“Another of your former Marine buddies has popped up, this time on my radar.”

“Huh?”

“Ab Kramer.”

“Holy shit. How’d you run into him?”

“I was having dinner at a restaurant in Litchfield, Connecticut, with Barton Cabot, and he stopped by our table to say hello, then stayed for a drink.”

“Why were you having dinner with the Colonel?”

“At his invitation. I’m trying to help him recover the property he lost when he was, well, mugged, shall we say?”

“How is he?”

“He seems to have recovered himself, except that he can’t remember anything about being beaten up.”

“Do you believe that?”

“I don’t think he would conceal anything from me that would help find his property.”

“The Colonel is a complicated man,” Cantor said.

“You mean he lies a lot?”

“I wouldn’t put it quite that way. Let’s just say that he plays his cards very close to his vest. Always.”

“You know that Kramer has done well on Wall Street?”

“I read the business pages.”

“What do you know about Charlie Crow’s business life?”

“I read Page Six in the Post, too.”

“So you know that Charlie seems to have an unscrupulous side to his nature?”

“Charlie Crow was born with an unscrupulous side to his nature. When we were in ’Nam, if there were two ways to get something done, he would always choose the crooked way, and he’d always make a profit doing it.”

“Would you say that Charlie has a tendency to hold a grudge?”

“Forever,” Cantor replied.

“So, you think he might still be just a tiny bit peeved about the split in your caper with the gold coins?”

“How’d you know about the gold coins?”

“The Colonel told me.”

“Oh. One of the many reasons I was glad to agree never to contact any of the others again was that I would never again have to listen to Charlie Crow bitch about his cut. If he walked in here right now, the first thing he’d say to me would be ‘Y’know, I got screwed on that deal with the Colonel.’ ”

“Did Charlie have violent tendencies?”

“Shit, we were in a jungle war; we all had violent tendencies. That’s why we’re still alive.”

“Would Charlie have trouble letting go of that after reentering civilian life?”

“I wouldn’t be surprised. If an argument got heated, Charlie always threw the first punch. Or, more likely, the first kick in the balls.”

“A street fighter, then?”

“He wouldn’t need a street; he was ready to go anytime, anywhere.”

“What about Ab Kramer?”

“Ab was smarter than Charlie and cooler, too. He’d pick his moment to take a swing at somebody, but he’d get around to it, if he was mad enough. He knew how to stay mad but not show it.”

“Did either of them ever kill anybody who wasn’t wearing black pajamas and carrying a Kalashnikov?”

“Let’s not get into that.”

“Let me put it another way: Would Charlie hesitate to kill somebody who made him mad enough?”

“He might; maybe he grew up some over the years.”

“Would Ab?”

“Ab was too smart for that. If he wanted to do more than just throw a punch, he’d find a way to do it so that the other guy never forgot it. I saw him maneuver a guy right into the stockade once. The guy did a year, and when he got out, Ab walked up to him in a bar in Saigon and asked him how he enjoyed his stay. Ab was fearless.”

“Which one of them would be more likely to have stolen the Colonel’s piece of antique furniture?”

“Stone, Charlie Crow might take a broken bottle to somebody who’d crossed him, but he wouldn’t know his ass from antique furniture.”

“Thanks, Bob. I think I get the picture.”