White Cargo

7

“The senator is sorry he couldn’t be here to see you, Mr. Catledge. He’s chairing an intelligence committee hearing right now. I’m counsel to the committee, and I should be there myself, but the senator is very grateful for your past support, and he wanted to know what we could do for you.”

They were in the small conference room adjacent to the office of Senator Benjamin Carr, Democrat, the senior senator from Georgia. Carr’s chief administrative assistant sat across the table from Cat.

“I understand, of course,” Cat said. “I’ve taken too much of his time already.”

“Not at all,” the man replied. “He’s been very concerned about your situation.” The younger man, fortyish, Cat thought, placed his elbows on the table, folded his fingers together, and rested his chin on them. “I’ve been doing all the liaising with the State Department, though, so it’s just as well that you and I should talk. You’ve just come from Foggy Bottom, have you?”

Cat nodded. “I saw the head of the Colombian desk.”

“Barker?”

“That’s the one. He was very sympathetic.”

“But...?”

“But he says he’s done all he can. The Colombian police are unwilling to open a new investigation on the basis of a single word spoken on the telephone from somebody who’s been confirmed dead.”

“I was afraid of that,” the assistant replied. “After all, you saw her dead yourself, and the Coast Guard frogmen confirmed what you saw.”

Cat shook his head. “What I saw was only for a fraction of a second, not long after I’d taken a shotgun blast in the chest. I wasn’t a very reliable witness. I know I saw Katie; she was lying on her back on the port settee, but Jinx... the girl I thought was Jinx... was facedown on the saloon table, naked. I haven’t seen Jinx naked since she was nine or ten, I guess, and as I said, I looked away immediately. Since we were the only three on the boat, I naturally assumed she was Jinx.”

“Who was the girl you saw, then?”

“There was a girl on the boat with the Pirate, Denny’s accomplice. Maybe she was somehow substituted for Jinx — I don’t know, I know it doesn’t make any sense. I only got a glimpse of her — I think she was probably older than Jinx and that she was Latin, but in the state I was in when I came to — well, it’s the sort of mistake I could easily have made.”

“I can understand that.”

Cat leaned forward. “What I didn’t make a mistake about was the voice on the telephone. It was Jinx. She said, ‘Daddy.’ It was almost the first word she ever said to me, and I’ve heard her say it all her life, at least until she started to grow up and decided to call me Cat. I’d know Jinx’s voice anywhere, and I’d know it especially well saying that particular word. It was Jinx.”

The assistant was staring down at his reflection in the table. “I believe you,” he said finally. “What are your plans now? Are you going back down there?”

The mere thought of returning to Colombia filled Cat with panic. “I don’t know,” he replied. “Barker, at State, advised against it in the strongest terms. He says I’m not equipped to conduct my own investigation, and God knows that’s true. He won’t give me assistance of any kind if I do go. Says the department won’t take any responsibility.”

“So what are you going to do?” he asked, watching him closely.

Cat leaned back and sighed. “I’m going to go back down there,” he said. “It’s all that’s left, and I could never live with myself if I didn’t do everything I possibly could to find Jinx.”

The man seemed to search Cat’s face for doubt. “That’s your final decision, then? You won’t be dissuaded?”

“No. I’m going. I’ve got some money; maybe I’ll go to the newspapers and offer a reward.”

A twitch of alarm seemed to cross the assistant’s face. He stood up. “Will you excuse me for a few minutes? Don’t leave; I’ll be right back.” He left the room.

Cat walked to the window and looked out toward the Capitol dome. There really was nothing else left to do. He dreaded the thought, but he would have to go back to Colombia, to Santa Marta, and make a start. Somebody, somewhere in that country knew something. Maybe he could buy the information. The money was all he had left. They could have it all if they’d give Jinx back to him. He watched people enter and leave the Capitol, his mind growing numb with the fear of what was ahead of him.

Ten minutes passed. The assistant walked back into the room. “Sit down, will you?” he said.

Cat dragged himself back to the table.

The younger man placed his hands on the table in front of him and opened his fingers, as if to spread out some invisible map. “Let me be sure you understand this,” he said. “Our conversation ended when I left the room a few minutes ago. I expressed my sympathies, said there was nothing further the senator could do, we shook hands, and you left.”

Cat snapped back to the present, puzzled.

“This part of our conversation never happened,” the assistant said, seriously, “and no one — not the senator, or anyone else — is ever to be told about it, do you understand me?”

“Yes,” Cat said, his pulse accelerating. “Of course.”

“You’re staying at the Watergate?”

“Right, though I’d planned to check out before lunch and go back to Atlanta.”

“Stay another night. Sometime tomorrow, probably in the afternoon, you’ll get a phone call from someone who will introduce himself as Jim. Just Jim.”

“Jim. Tomorrow afternoon.”

“Maybe sooner. Don’t leave your room until you hear from him. Don’t expect too much, but he will probably have some advice for you. I can’t promise you’ll like the advice, but this is the only other thing I can think of to help you.”

Cat stood up and offered his hand. “Thank you for believing me. Nobody else has.”

The man took his hand. “Mr. Catledge, I only wish I could do more,” he said.

Cat was asleep when the phone rang. He hadn’t slept much the night before, and late in the afternoon he had dozed off in front of the TV. It took him two rings to orient himself. He glanced at the bedside clock as he picked up the phone. Just after six.

“Hello?”

“My name is Jim. I believe we have a mutual friend.”

“Yes, we do.”

“Come to 528 now.”

“Where?”

“Room 528, here, in the hotel.” The man hung up.

Cat threw some water on his face and slipped on a jacket. He rode the elevator down to the fifth floor, found the room, and knocked. The man who opened the door was in his late fifties, nearly completely gray-haired, and was dressed in a three-piece suit, button-down collar, and a paisley tie. He didn’t look very fresh. He was wearing a day’s growth of beard, his shirt collar had a sweat ring, and his hair was greasy. He beckoned Cat into the room and pointed at one of a pair of wing chairs.

“Take a pew,” he said, walking to the other chair.

Cat sat down and glanced around the room. It didn’t look occupied. “Thanks for seeing me,” he said.

“Any friend of the senator’s,” the man said.

Cat relaxed a little. “Let me tell you about my problem,” he said.

Jim held up a hand. “I’m acquainted with your problem,” he said. “I read the newspapers. Just let me do the talking for a while.”

Cat nodded.

Jim opened a briefcase, the smaller of two beside his chair, and took out a file folder. “Let’s see,” he said, flipping through pages. “Born Atlanta, Northside High, decent fullback — not good enough for college, though; Georgia Tech, Class of ’53, missed Korea with a student deferment — smart move, let me tell you. Naval ROTC, took your commission in the Marines. Why?”

“I was young and stupid,” Cat said, honestly.

Jim laughed. “Didn’t you like it at Quantico?”

“Can’t say that I did,” Cat said.

“I was there a few years ahead of you,” Jim said. “I guess I didn’t like it much, either.” He looked at the file again. “Still, you did okay. They had a nice word or two for you on your efficiency reports.”

“I kept my mouth shut and did as I was told.”

“That’s not what it says here,” Jim said, consulting the file. “Says here, ‘Extensive use of personal initiative, tends to improvise.’ That’s Marine-ese for maverick, or sometimes just pain in the ass.”

Cat shrugged. “Guess I wasn’t cut out for the military.”

“Is that why you turned down the Agency?” Jim asked. “You thought it would be too much like the military?”

“The Agency?”

“The Central Intelligence Agency. You’ve heard of that,” Jim said dryly.

Cat’s eyebrows went up. “Jesus, is that who that guy was? I thought he wanted me to reenlist! He kept going on about service to my country. I told him to get stuffed.”

Jim laughed. “Recruiters in those days were a little too subtle, I guess.”

“Is that what you are? CIA?”

Jim ignored the question and returned to the file. “Let’s see; out of Tech you worked for IBM, then Texas Instruments, then went off on your own with your financial whiz brother-in-law. Not cut out for the corporate life, either?”

“I guess you could say I made extensive use of personal initiative, tended to improvise. Big business didn’t like it any better than the Marines did.”

Jim nodded. “Then you got rich. Invented that printer, Ben took the company public. You paid all your debts, built a new house, built a boat. Net worth of a little over sixteen million, mostly in your remaining shares in the company, some real estate, money market, stocks. You’ve got a smart brother-in-law.”

“You’re pretty well informed,” Cat said, squirming a little. “Do you know where my daughter is?”

Jim shook his head. “Sorry. You seem to think she’s alive somewhere in Colombia, though.”

“Yes.”

“And you’re determined to go down there and look for her.”

“Yes.”

“Colombia can be a very dangerous place,” Jim said. “Is there anything I can say to talk you out of it?”

“Not unless you can tell me another way to get my daughter back.”

Jim shook his head. “I’m afraid I can’t,” he said, “and if she were my daughter, I’d go after her, too.” He rubbed his eyes with his knuckles. “Listen,” he said, “why the hell not go down there? You’re just as smart as the State Department guys and the Colombian police, who’ve done all the looking so far. Hell, smarter — you’re rich! Your problem is, you’re a little short of resources. But you can buy resources.”

“Such as?”

“You’re going to need some help down there, somebody who knows the territory. You don’t speak any Spanish, do you?”

“No. None.”

Jim opened the larger of his two cases and took out a hefty camera. He got up and removed a picture from the wall. “Stand over here,” he said, taking off his necktie, “and put this on.”

Cat did as he was told.

Jim continued talking while he snapped a picture, pulled a tab on the back of the camera, and glanced at his watch. “There’s a guy who might be just the man, and fortunately he’s in Atlanta. He’s an Australian, name of Bluey Holland; he’s lived in this country for a while — well, off and on, anyway. He’s spent a lot of time in Colombia, and he knows all the wrong people, if you know what I mean.”

“Do you think he might be free?” Cat asked.

“Well, not exactly,” Jim said. “He’s in the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary. But he’s up for parole soon. I can see that somebody puts in a favorable word for him. You’ve changed a lot since your last passport picture was taken,” he said, holding up a sheet of four photographs of Cat.

“Well, apart from the beard and haircut, I’ve lost about fifty pounds.”

“That’s good. Nobody’s going to recognize you as the man who had his picture in all the papers a while back.”

“What’s Bluey Holland in for?” Cat asked.

Jim returned to his chair, fished in the large case, and came up with some sort of small machine. “Old Bluey is a hotshot pilot — Australian outback, bush flying in Alaska, that sort of thing, and he’s made not a few runs between this country and various strips in South America.”

“I see,” Cat said.

“This last time, though, Bluey got mixed up with some Cubans on a deal — Jesus, nobody should get mixed up with Cubans these days — and they stuck him in Atlanta with them.”

“Is this guy a hard criminal?”

“Well, let’s just say that old Bluey has always taken a liberal view of U.S. Customs regulations. He doesn’t hit people over the head and take their money, doesn’t do contract killings. Bluey loves flying, preferably low and fast, and he prefers small, dark airports to big, brightly lit ones. He’s a pretty capable sort of fellow, and as I’ve said, he knows the territory down there.”

“How can I contact him?”

“I’ll have him contact you when he’s out. He won’t know where the message came from. Tell him Carlos pointed you at him.” Jim snipped the four photographs apart, took a small blue booklet from his case, and, using the machine in his lap, sealed a photograph into the booklet. “There’s not a hell of a lot more I can do for you, except give you some thin cover.”

“How do you mean, thin cover?” Cat asked.

Jim tossed him the booklet.

Cat opened it to find his photograph in the United States passport of one Robert John Ellis.

“You’ll need this, too,” Jim said, tossing something else.

Cat caught a well-worn wallet. Inside were half a dozen credit cards, a social security card, a Georgia driver’s license, and other cards, much like the ones in Cat’s pocket.

“Sign them and the passport.”

Cat started signing.

“Ellis is a salesman with your company,” Jim said. “Other than having a different name and address, he’s a lot like you. His passport expires on the same date and it has the same stamps as yours, the same travel history. In fact, since you’ve lost so much weight and shaved the beard, his passport information is more like you than yours is.”

“You really think I’ll need all this?” Cat asked, a little nonplussed.

“I don’t know, but if I were going where you are, I’d want some cover. The passport, the driver’s license, and the credit cards are all real. You’re on all the right computers as of today. If you go through Colombian or U.S. Immigration, the passport will hold up. If you charge dinner on the Ellis American Express Card, it will go on your company account. Oh, when you get back to Atlanta, have your company print some Ellis business cards, and tell your switchboard operator that if he gets any calls, to say he’s in South America. You’d better brief your brother-in-law, too, but don’t tell him about any of the ID materials, just that you might be travelling under the name of Ellis and to back you up.”

“You’ve done all this since yesterday?” Cat asked, amazed. Now he knew why Jim was unshaven — he’d been up all night.

“All part of the service,” Jim said. “Come over here to the window for a minute.” He took some pieces of plastic from his pocket. “This is a Colombian entry stamp; you just pull off the plastic sheet, press it onto your passport on an empty page, then write in the date of your entry in ink. Be sure to use one on both your passports and on these.” He went back to his briefcase and stapled photographs to two printed cards. “These are Colombian tourist visas for both your identities.” He took two envelopes from the case. “This one is a passport for Bluey.

He doesn’t have one at the moment. Don’t give it to him until you have to. He might use it to travel in another direction. Tell him he can keep it, just a little gift from Carlos.” Jim held up the other envelope. “There are two passports here for Jinx, one in her own name, one in another; same photograph. If you find her, you’ll want to leave in a hurry, I expect.”

“I’m a little overwhelmed by all this,” Cat said.

“I wish I could do more,” Jim replied. “I wish I could tell you how to find your daughter. But I think this stuff will improve your chances of getting in and out alive.”

“I’m very grateful for your help, Jim,” Cat said.

“Don’t worry about it. Maybe one day you can do me a favor.”

“Just ask. Anytime. Is there some place I can reach you when I get back? I’d like to let you know how it all works out.”

“No.” He started to pack up his equipment. “Give Bluey Holland a few days to spring himself, then he’ll be in touch. Offer him fifty grand — ten now, and forty when you’re back in the States. That ought to do it.” Jim snapped a case shut. “You and I never met, of course.”

“Right.”

The two men shook hands. Cat opened the door.

“Listen, Catledge,” Jim said with some feeling. “You’re liable to be in some rough places. Watch your ass.” He closed the door.