Crooked (20 page)

C h a p t e r                           3 1

 
I
t was an antebellum mansion backed by rain forests on a hill overlooking the expanse of the capital, and each room had a name. “The Rhett Butler.” “The Five Oaks Suite.” “The Aunt Pittypat.” Barney and Nicasia’s room had a balcony, French doors, flowing curtains, and a sweeping view. It was “The Scarlett O’Hara.”

After a leisurely cocktail in the Jacuzzi, they repaired to the bedroom for an afternoon nap. It was evening by the time they arose, the lights of San José ablaze at the foot of their bed. Barney lit some candles and they dressed for dinner. By eight they were downstairs in the Atlanta Room at a table garnished with yellow bougainvillea, candles, and goblets of wine.

“Barney, did you notice what the placard said?” Nicasia sipped her fumé blanc, her pumps falling from her squirming feet.

Barney tugged at his tie. “Placard?” He looked around the candlelit ballroom.

“Not in here, in the lobby.” Nicasia tugged playfully at his outstretched hand.

He smiled. “I’ve been so fixated on you…”

“Yeah, right.” She pulled her hand away in mock annoyance. “Whisking me off to Costa Rica. After all that time with me thinking you…”

“Now we weren’t going to talk about that.” Barney waved a finger at her. “Or about Palihnic, or any of that. We had a deal, OK?”

The waiter stood in the doorway to the lobby. He gave Barney a wave and held up one finger. Barney held his hand below the table and flashed one finger, followed by a fist, and then eight fingers. The waiter disappeared.

“So, did you see the placard?”

“Uh huh.” The waiter was back in the doorway, showing him two fingers. Barney flashed two, made a fist, and then one.

“They’re having an auction here tonight.”

Barney nodded. “Across the way.”

Barney peered at her over the rim of his wineglass as he flashed the waiter two oh two.

“Too pricey for us, though. You won’t believe this, but they’ve got that book Nicholas recovered a few years back.”

“Nicasia, about
Tamerlane
…”

“Yes, that’s the book,
Tamerlane and Other Poems,
by Poe.” Nicasia raised an eyebrow at the waiter in the doorway, who suddenly took to straightening an end table.

“Listen, Nicasia, there’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you and I just, well…” Barney flashed two, made a fist, and then three under the table. “It’s like this, Nicasia. I love you, and I want to come clean about my past. The full truth.”

Nicasia flushed slightly, put her wine down, and dabbed her lips with a napkin. Without looking up, she said, “You were a thief.”

Barney rubbed his jaw, and the waiter ducked out of the room. “Uh, yeah, well, I didn’t think you knew, is all.”

“Oh, Barney.” Nicasia looked up at him, eyes moist and chin crinkling. “You’re such a dope. I’m an investigator, for Christ sake. You don’t think I believe that crap Nicholas fed me about you being from a vault and safe company, do you?” She smiled warmly at him. “I’ve been waiting, though, to hear it from you. I’m glad you respect and love me enough…”

“Excuse me,
señor, señorita.
” The waiter stepped up to the table, handing Barney a receipt and a pen. He glanced sidelong at Nicasia.

“What’s this, Barney?”

Barney signed the receipt and handed it back to the waiter. “I have thirteen million dollars in a bank in Montserrat.”

Nicasia paled and took a gulp of wine.

“You mean in 1855, James D. Bird didn’t switch the
Bunker Hill
gold with brass shot?” she whispered, the corners of her mouth curling. “But the files…”

“Some of it is true. New Haven Steam Ship did go bankrupt. I just, well, twisted the facts. The files are real enough, only I altered them here and there. A little creative photocopying.”

Nicasia put a hand to her forehead. “But you said…you told them to check your research. What happens when Drummond or Newcastle goes to the files at New York Custom House?”

“I managed to manufacture not only the evidence but the source, either by replacing an original photocopy with a doctored one or by inking entries into ledgers. They don’t let you take the files out of the building, but they don’t exactly frisk you when you leave. So I went, swiped, left, returned, and inserted. Or I used a quill pen when they weren’t looking.” Barney took a sip from his wine. “Brass shot, as it turns out, was a regular commodity bought in large quantities by most ship companies for the manufacture of nautical fittings and hardware, so those receipts were genuine. I seeded the boreholes with brass shot. Besides, Newcastle won’t be looking into this again. They’re the ones I sold the gold to. Drummond didn’t hire me. Newcastle hired me to be hired by Drummond and get the gold out from under him. They knew he was likely to double-cross them, and they needed a thief to catch a thief.”

“So, where was the gold, then?” Nicasia gasped, then whispered: “You left the gold in the ground until they flew away, until after Nicholas and Maureen left?”

Barney winked, beaming.

But Nicasia wasn’t smiling. She put a hand on his.

“Barney, why?”

“Why?”

“I know you were basically doing what you’ve been doing, ferreting out a thief. But there’s more to all this. You stole again, and lied to me.” Their eyes were locked. “I need to know why, and to know that you will never lie to me again.”

Barney pursed his lips, eyes dropping to the table. “I needed to know that, too, and that’s why I did it. It’s complicated…there was a man once, when I was a kid. His name was, well, it doesn’t matter. But he had a certain, I dunno, magic.”

“Magic?”

Barney rubbed his jaw. “He taught me something I didn’t learn until I was much older, if that makes sense. Until I met you. About a sense of my own destiny, and the value of truth. I have to be truthful to myself before I can stop living a life of lies and love you with all my heart.”

Nicasia knit her brow. “I’m not sure I understand.”

Barney glanced at her, smoothing the edge of the tablecloth.

“He once told me:
A man must have balance of mind between his accomplishments, that which he desires, and that which he must be.
I’m a thief, Nicasia. I was always meant to be a thief, down deep, and I know that. And while I can’t go on stealing, I needed a connection back to that part of me. This making any sense?”

She looked down at her plate, then at the receipt on the table.

“So…you just bought
Tamerlane
, a book worth over two hundred thousand dollars, in the auction across the way?”

“Uh huh.”

“Let me guess. You once stole it?”

“Uh huh. It was the first thing I ever stole.”

“And this means you’ll never lie to me again?”

Barney looked at her until her eyes rose to his. They were moist with tears, uncertain, and lit with candlelight.
My God,
he thought,
how I love this woman.

His secret smile blossomed, and he squinted. “Pretty sure.”

About the Author

BRIAN M. WIPRUD is a New York City author and outdoor writer for fly-fishing magazines. He won the 2002 Lefty Award for Most Humorous Novel, was a 2003 Barry Award Nominee, a 2004 Independent Mystery Booksellers’ Association Bestseller, and a 2005
Seattle Times
Bestseller. Information on his tours and appearances can be found at his website,
www.wiprud.com.

Also by Brian M. Wiprud

PIPSQUEAK

STUFFED

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SLEEP WITH THE FISHES

Coming in October 2006

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SLEEP

WITH THE

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“
The Godfather
meets Carl Hiaasen in this darkly humorous meeting of the Mob and fishing…. A good, quick, amusing read.”

—Mystery Ink

Available from Dell Books in October 2006

Read on for an exclusive sneak peek and pick up your copy at your favorite bookseller.

SLEEP WITH THE FISHES

On sale in October 2006

F
ront wheels locked sideways, the Volkswagen Rabbit spun backward, sparks flaring as it snapped the cable guide rail and flipped over the embankment. After a few protracted somersaults, the puckered chassis slammed roof-first onto a collection of boulders. Shattered safety glass rained from the windows, and snakes of fire raced up rivulets of gas, igniting the engine. The dark ravine was suddenly dancing with light from the blaze.

Headlights flashed above, and a white Mercury Marquis pulled to a stop on the road. A man in a jogging suit and windbreaker emerged, walking casually to the edge of the embankment, the blaze below reflecting tiny campfires in his eyes. The whole underside of the Rabbit was afire now, and the man figured it would only be a minute before she blew.

“Adios.”
He smirked, tugging on one ear absently, turning back toward his Mercury.

A cough sounded in the ravine, and the man froze. Looking both ways along the road, he pulled a small revolver from his waistband. He cocked it, then stepped back to the edge of the ravine and peered down the embankment.

“Oh, that’s just friggin’ beautiful,” he moaned. A bearded man lay sprawled on the embankment below, steam rising from his coughs into the cold night air.

“Oh my God,” drawled a woman’s voice. “There’s been an accident!” The man wheeled around and staggered with surprise.

“What the hell?” He quickly slipped the gun back in his waistband. “Angel! What the…Jesus! What’re you doin’ in my backseat?” he sputtered.

Her painted face twisted into a scowl as she emerged from the blanket she’d been hiding under.

“Well, big shot, mind tellin’ me what you always goin’ out late at night for?” she shrieked. “Sure, you keep sayin’ ‘I got business, Angel.’ Business my butt. I’m here to find out who she is.”

“Who?” he yelled, throwing his arms wide. “So help me, Angel, I oughta kill you for this!”

“Sid, I heard you talkin’ tuh Johnny. You said somethin’ about how you got an appointment with Sandra.” Angel opened the car door and stepped out onto the pavement in her panty-hosed feet. “And what, for this tramp Sandra, you come all the way up here to Connecticut?” She tugged at her angora sweater.

Another cough echoed up the ravine, and Sid looked anxiously down at the stirring figure below.

“Well, are you just gonna walk back and forth there, flappin’ your arms like a pigeon, or are y’gonna help the poor guy? Jeez, go on, hurry, he could be dying or something!” Angel wailed, leaning on the car and squeezing scarlet pumps onto her feet.

Flabbergasted and red-faced, Sid ogled his girlfriend’s scarlet shoes and shook his head, trying to wake himself from this nightmare. Then he scrambled down the embankment to the victim. Peering down at the flaming wreckage, he could see the arm of another victim protruding motionless from where the windshield used to be. He slipped the gun from his waist and put it to the bearded man’s head.

“OK, Evel Knievel, just keep your eyes and your mouth shut, and I’ll save your sorry ass, you got that?” It didn’t look like the poor schnook could make out much anyway. Probably wouldn’t live. So he tugged, heaved, huffed, and puffed the bearded guy by the collar up to the shoulder of the road, dropping him none too gently.

“Angel—into the car.” Sid wheezed harshly, his white pants and arms smeared with dirt and leaves. “We gotta go get help for this guy.” He grabbed Angel by the arm and thrust her into the backseat.

“Hey!” Angel bleated. “What about—”

“Shuddup, already. We gotta hurry, get to a phone, get this guy an ambulance or somethin’.” He could hear a truck shifting gears, a possible witness, coming up the hill. The Mercury’s engine revved, its tires squealed, and it sped quickly away.

There was a whoosh like a sudden drumroll as gasoline around the Rabbit caught fire. Shrieking flames burst the gas tank, the bearded man’s crumpled form silhouetted by an ascending swirl of fire.

Cryptobranchus alleganiensis
is a salamander of grand proportions. It has a record length of twenty-nine inches and almost exclusively haunts rocky-bottomed segments of the Susquehanna River. By all reports, this muddy, girthsome, and deeply wrinkled beast is like some aquatic English bulldog, and twice as handsome. They call them hellbenders, and their apocryphal appearances in the Delaware River are favored upon a dot on the map labeled “Hellbender Eddy, Pennsylvania.” There hadn’t been a sighting of one since 1888.

It was a frosty May dawn, and the counter at Chik’s Five Star Diner was filled with locals. The joint was old, the walls painted a zillion coats of cream semigloss, its linoleum counter stalwart, long, and black. White and black tiles made a checkerboard of the floor, and deco wall sconces gave the place a dull warm glow. A giant urn brewed coffee by the gallon, residual steam making the hashery mighty humid indeed. Two potted palms in the back thought they’d died and gone to heaven.

On weekdays, most of the locals drifted through Chik’s for a container of coffee and a sauna.

Big Bob Stillwell and Little Bob Cropsey made their usual appearance on the way to the construction site.

“G’morning, fellahs.” Chik smiled, his pencil-thin mustache curling devilishly. “Usual?”

Little Bob poked around Big Bob’s jumpsuited girth with the camcorder he bought at a tag sale. “Yes, Chik, we will have the usual. Tell us what the usual is, Chik.”

Chik looked into the lens, hesitating and smoothing his hair.

Big Bob lifted a meaty arm and looked down at Little Bob like something in his armpit stank.

“Must ya fool with that darn thing so early in the mornin’?” Big Bob let his arm drop and turned to Chik. “
Not
the usual. Just coffee and buttered rolls. Gotta cut out the fat.” Big Bob punched himself in the gut.

“Chik, look into the camera. I want the usual. I don’t got no weight problem.” Chik smoothed his mustache and flashed a dirty smile at the camera. Then Little Bob saw Big Bob’s unshaven face fill the view screen.

“I ain’t got a weight ‘problem.’ I’m not talkin’ about fat, I’m talkin’ about cholesterol. Eggs and bacon is cholesterol, Bob. Cholesterol is bad for you too. Don’t ya even read the papers? Chik: coffee and rolls.” Big Bob was a faithful reader of
Newstime Magazine,
and considered himself quite the scholar of current events. As a heavy-equipment operator on major construction projects, there were plentiful lulls in the pile driving that could be spent memorizing the news.

“Hey, Doc.” Little Bob squirreled over to Lloyd Conti, who was farther down the counter. “Tell me about cholesterol, Doc. Into the camera.” Video Bob was also an equipment operator, but unlike Big Bob, he was kept busy switching between backhoes and front loaders.

Lloyd swiveled on his stool, mopping his lips and Vandyke with a paper napkin. A pack of plastic-tipped cheroots peeked from a top pocket.

“Bob, I am not a doctor. I keep telling ya that. Just ’cause I do electrolysis doesn’t mean I’m a doctor. And do ya think that if I were a doctor I’d be doin’ small-engine repair on the side? Don’t ya think I’d be removing gallbladders or somethin’?” Lloyd turned back to his breakfast.

“Hey, Bob. Com’ere, I’ll tell ya about cholesterol!” Jenny Baker was down at the last stool, a cracked leather jacket draped over her shoulders and her blond hair pinned to the top of her head with a cocktail stirrer. A bit of a looker past her prime, Jenny drove a ten-wheel tanker for Red Eft Trout Farms. Everyone knew the routine: Chik liked to toy with her, get a little fresh, make her take a swing at him. It had become a game of sorts. He kept tally with a pencil on the side of the coffee urn.

“OK, Jenny, tell us about cholesterol. Why is it bad for skinny people?” Little Bob stalked over to Jenny, zooming in and out on the beguiling smile she’d worked up for him.

“Lemme show ya. See this piece of toast? Ya focused your little camera on it?”

“Got it, Jenny. Now what?”

“Well, see how when I dip it in the egg yella? That there, stuck to the end of my toast? Come in real close now.”

“Got it, Jenny. Now what?”

“That’s cholesterol.”

“But why is it bad for skinny people? It don’t make us fat.”

“No, it doesn’t, Little Bob. But it ain’t too good for their video cameras.”

Bob’s image of Jenny was suddenly smeared yolk yellow.

“Hey! Hey! You put egg yella on my lens!” Little Bob poked his camera around, looking for a napkin. Gentle early-morning chuckles filtered through the patrons. Little Bob felt a clamp on the back of his neck. It was Big Bob’s meaty grasp.

“Must ya fool with that darn thing this early in the mornin’? C’mon, we got our stuff, now let’s let these folks breakfast in peace.” Big Bob led his stooped protégé out the door just as Russ Smonig slipped past them with a sleepy nod.

“Howyadoin’, Russ?” Chik was freshening coffees along the counter. “Heard you got into the shad real good last week. How many does that make it now?”

“Yeah, they’re comin’ up. Small bunches, all bucks.” Russ was sandy-haired, with a prominent jaw, squinty eyes, and an edgy manner that betrayed the hardships of rural life. But strictly speaking, Russ wasn’t a local. That is, he hailed from Hartford, where he’d been an insurance executive. Pennsylvania became his roost about ten years before, after some domestic trouble, some said. Now he tried to make a go at being an outdoor writer while getting by tying flies and guiding. He lived in a two-tone sagging trailer on a quality slice of riverfront south of Hellbender Eddy. The land was his outright, his total net asset. He’d once had a five-year plan in which he became widely published, hosted a fishing show, and replaced his shack with a palatial log cabin. Now he didn’t make plans beyond the next three weeks.

“But how many does that make it? What’s your total?” Chik persisted. Huge numbers of shad entered the Delaware River each spring to spawn like salmon, and those who angled for them seriously kept score.

Russ looked a little uncomfortable, but divulged his tally.

“Seventy-five. Chik, just gimme a half-dozen sticky buns, two cups regular, and fill this thermos, OK?” Russ plunked his thermos on the linoleum and pushed back on his stained fedora, trying not to look at the patrons along the counter as they rustled with awe.

“Seventy-five already, huh? Sure took a quick lead. Got a client this mornin’, do yah, Russ?” Chik queried from a cloud of steam at the urn.

“Yeah, I got a sport this morning.” Russ let his gaze wander over the ceiling before snatching a glance down the counter. The whole lot was giving him the envious, expectant eye.

“Well?” Russ looked back at them, and they shifted, looking from one to the other. Jenny spoke up.

“C’mon, Russ. We want the shad report. Lot of us’ve been to all the usual spots—fish all day an’ just pick up a handful. Where are ya taking ’em? An’ don’t give us that doo-doo about ‘trade secrets.’ We ain’t your sports. Not one of us can afford your guiding services. But we are your neighbors, and, well, the neighborly thing to do is tell us where you’re takin’ ’em, that’s all. It’s not like there’s a shad shortage or anything, is there, Russ?”

The group grunted, nodding agreement.

Russ worked up a fatigued smile, the only kind of which he seemed capable anymore. Living was hard and the rewards increasingly scarce. Either he was up at 4:00
AM
and on the river with a sport jigging for walleye, burning the midnight oil tying up four hundred dry flies to fill an order, or he was huddled next to his kerosene heater laboring on yet another article that would be rejected by
Sports Astream
or
Bass Blaster
.

His transition from amateur to professional angler was complete: he caught a lot of fish and could land enough for three square meals at will. But it was all he could do to stay financially afloat, much less give away freebies to his neighbors.

“Tell you what, Jenny. Neighborly is as neighborly does. You throw some free trout into Ballard Pond, and I’ll give you a river sweet spot. Lloyd, you give a tuneup on my Evinrude, and I’ll point out where and how you just might get Mr. Musky you’re always talking about. And, Chik, you…”

“No charge, Mr. Smonig.” Chik winked at Russ and pushed forward the thermos and white bag crammed with sticky buns. Russ plucked the pen from behind Chik’s ear, tore out a receipt from his pad, and started to draw a little map. Folks at the counter craned their necks to see. Russ kept lowering his shoulder to block their view.

“There you go, Chik. Walleye. See you use that size Rapala in that color, and troll it right along through those holes just as early in the morning as you can.” Russ collected his stuff and turned sharply to the audience. “Good day, neighbors.” He backed out the door.