Relic of Time (16 page)

When they got to the private aviation area, Ray told them—actually he addressed Don Ibanez—that Mr. Hannan was due in an hour. He and Laura of course would meet his plane. Don Ibanez said that he, too, would wait, apparently leaving Traeger with an option. He didn't take it. But where in hell was Crosby? Laura put the same question to him when she joined him where he had gone to make the call.

“Crosby doesn't answer his cell phone.”

“Good Lord, I hope nothing has happened to him.”

The thought had occurred to Traeger. With one dead body, a priceless religious object, and a suitcase with a million dollars in it, the setting was, as Dortmund might put it, fraught with danger. He did not encourage her fears, not least because Laura's expression was the one she had been wearing when he insisted that Ray Whipple hand the money to him over the fence. Laura went back to her husband. Traeger imagined what the two of them might very well think: he and Crosby had staged the whole thing and Crosby had gone off with the loot to their eventual rendezvous, where they would open the suitcase and run their hands through a cool million dollars. After all, who else knew about that money?

Anyone in the parking lot could have seen Whipple pass the suitcase over the fence to him and then put it into the trunk of Don Ibanez's car. Crosby, the one presumed witness; Crosby, who was to monitor the transaction and come swiftly to the scene if anything went wrong—had Crosby, like Morgan, decided to sell his soul? Traeger couldn't believe it. Morgan must have had his own Crosby on the scene. Maybe the treacherous Morgan had in turn been betrayed. Stewing in the little terminal of private aviation, Traeger wished that he had made another tour of that parking lot before leaving. Was Crosby, like Morgan, sitting dead at the wheel of his car, or crumpled on the blacktop awaiting discovery?

Ray Whipple avoided him. Well, Traeger wasn't anxious to talk to him either.
Nice going
. He might very well say more now that the loss of that money had really sunk in. Don Ibanez sat, eyes closed, the picture of a man without a worry in the world. But the old man had to feel a million times worse than Ray Whipple. What was a suitcase full of money compared with the miraculous image of the Virgin?

Traeger went outside for a cigarette. Smoking is dangerous to your health. What isn't? Think of all the nonsmokers he had known, men younger than himself, who were now dead. They might as well have lit up while they had the chance. Laura joined him.

“Got another?”

He passed the package to her, then lit her cigarette.

“Cigarettes always smell so nice when someone else is smoking them.”

“How will Hannan take this?”

“Don't worry about it.”

“Me, worry?” He tried unsuccessfully for an Alfred E. Neuman look. He did not want to think how he would explain this to Boswell. Or to Dortmund.

Laura pointed to Hannan's plane as it landed and then taxied to where they were waiting. Don Ibanez rose slowly and stood for a moment, as if composing himself.

“I will, of course, recompense Mr. Hannan for his loss.”

Laura shook her head and laid a hand on his arm.

Hannan, in shirtsleeves, his suit jacket slung over his shoulder, moved swiftly toward the terminal and came inside in a rush of air.

“How'd it go?”

So they hadn't told him en route about the screwup. Ray Whipple, as if he had been rehearsing the tale, brought his employer up to date.

“You didn't get it?”

Don Ibanez came forward, and the two men shook hands. It was the failure to retrieve the sacred image that depressed Ignatius Hannan. Again, Don Ibanez said that he would replace the lost money.

“I just hope they wear Ray's size,” Laura said.

The two men looked at her. Traeger, who had been keeping to the edge of the reunion, came forward. Laura hitched her shoulder bag higher and smiled at Hannan. Traeger, unable to stop himself, came up to her and pulled open the shoulder bag. It was full of money.

“You tricked them.” He could not keep the admiration out of his voice. He felt only half as stupid as he had before.

“Not intentionally.”

Their instructions had been to exchange the money for the image. At Traeger's insistence, Ray had handed his suitcase over the fence. But it turned out that he, too, thought it contained the ransom money.

“That was my idea, Ray,” Hannan said. “Always divert the man with whom you are negotiating.”

So Ignatius Hannan was not out a million dollars. Nor Don Ibanez either, if he would have insisted on recompensing Hannan's loss. But what Ignatius Hannan had wanted was the return of the miraculous image.

“We don't know where Crosby is.”

Hannan's nose moved like a rabbit's. “You smell of smoke.”

Traeger began to tell Hannan of the arrangements he had made with Crosby.

“Don't worry about Crosby,” the zillionaire said. “I need something to eat.”

“You must all be my guests,” said Don Ibanez.

Crosby had arrived early, found a spot in long-term parking, lit a cigar, and waited. Planes landed at regular intervals, and others at less regular intervals took off. Being the backup man had its advantages, providing a few stolen moments of leisure. He and Traeger made an odd team, not that Traeger had wanted a team, but why should two men on the same assignment not pool their resources? Of course he had checked with Dortmund to make certain they were on the same assignment. You never knew with Traeger.

“Ignatius Hannan could not have made a better choice,” Dortmund had purred over the phone.

“Traeger was his first choice.”

“Only because Traeger had worked for him before.”

In the course of the conversation, Dortmund had voiced his usual admonition. “Watch your back.” They had kidded about such caution, calling him Rearview Dortmund, but it remained sound advice. Crosby smiled, remembering how Traeger, even though watching his back, had failed to notice Crosby on his tail as he whisked along the interstate. Of course he had his eye on another tail and Crosby had admired the way Traeger had shaken it. He himself just waited by Traeger's car, certain he would come back for it, and so he had. Crosby's smile faded. And then Traeger had given him the slip. Was Traeger still under surveillance by those who had called him back into action? Not that Traeger had been all that reluctant.

“You still in computers?” Crosby had asked. What had once been largely Traeger's cover had become his job after retirement from the Company.

“I sold the business,” Traeger said.

That was all. But Dortmund had told him how Traeger had lost his secretary on his last assignment. How much violence all of them had stowed away in their memories.

A car pulled into an opening several rows over. No one got out. Crosby lifted his binoculars and Morgan leapt into view. The show was about to begin. Crosby rolled down the window and pitched his cigar.

Suddenly two men appeared, one on either side of Morgan's car. They were armed. Crosby sat forward, holding his breath. There was always the unexpected happening that changed all plans, and this was one of them. The back door of Morgan's car was pulled open and one of the men ducked in. Then the trunk popped. The second man, having checked it out, rapped on the roof of the car.
Pfft
. The sound of a gun with a silencer on it is distinctive, once heard never forgotten. Morgan fell forward. Busy with his glasses, Crosby imprinted the two men on his memory. Both of them were behind the car now, wrestling something out of it. They moved swiftly with the cumbersome object toward a vehicle down the row. A Hummer. Huge. Crosby, who had started his motor when he heard the
pfft
that had removed Morgan from this vale of tears, backed out of his space and followed.

As the Hummer cleared the airport and headed north, Crosby was about to notify Traeger what was going on. He decided to wait. What he had just witnessed might have been some part of the plan Traeger had not confided to him.

Up the coastal road and then a turn, taking them east, over the mountains and lesser hills and then into the wide-open spaces, eventually the desert. Fortunately, the Hummer used more gas than Crosby's rental and stopped several times to refill its tank. Crosby pulled in behind and kept a safe distance away.

The men took turns going to the john, and Crosby studied their magnified faces with his binoculars. He was sure he did not know them. Meaning, he was satisfied that they were not in the Company. He amended that. They had not been in it in his and Traeger's time. Back in the Hummer and off again, ever eastward. Where the hell were they going? Crosby was not only hungry but his bladder was sending him urgent signals. At the truck stops where the Hummer tanked up he had not wanted to risk going inside because one of the men would be in there and when he came out the Hummer would soon be on its way.

During the drive he had time to think. Morgan had been hooked up with Theophilus Grady and his Rough Riders. Grady had publicly claimed responsibility for the theft of the sacred image from the basilica in Mexico City. Morgan had tried to pull a double cross on Grady and market the picture for a cool million. It seemed obvious that those who had thwarted his plans were in the Rough Riders. And they were bringing the recovered treasure with them. So it looked as if Crosby would learn where Grady was holed up. He saw no reason now why he shouldn't check in with Traeger.

“Where were you when the shit hit the fan?” Traeger demanded.

“What are you talking about?”

“Someone got to Morgan before we did.”

“I know. I saw it happen.”

A pause. “You saw them empty the trunk? Morgan's trunk.”

“I am on their tail right now. So what else happened?”

“The whole plan blew up when we found Morgan dead.”

Traeger wanted details on what Crosby had witnessed. “Have you got the plate number of that Hummer?”

Crosby read it to him.

“Where exactly are you now?”

“We're going east on I-80. Reno is just ahead.”

“Rough Riders?”

“That's my guess.”

“If I knew where you were going I'd meet you there. They've got what we're after.”

“I'm not going to try to get it back alone.”

“Of course not. Once you're there, wherever
there
is, I'll join you.”

“Good.”

“And Crosby? Watch your back.”

“Why, what's it doing?”

Crosby had been watching his back. There had been one false alarm, when he was certain a car was keeping with him, but it was too obvious, and soon the car pulled into an oasis and was seen no more. Crosby went back to admiring the country through which he was driving.

Once, years ago, he and Lucille had packed up the kids and just driven for two months, going all the way to the coast, the southern route on the way west, the northern going home. He remembered coming off the desert into Gila Bend with more than a sense of relief. The wasteland behind them was deserted; they almost never saw another car; the sun was merciless. It was a stretch of highway better driven at night, but once he had gotten under way, there seemed nothing to do but go on. And on he had gone. Lucille fell silent; even the kids in the back of the van settled down. The tension they had all been under became clear when they greeted their arrival at Gila Bend with a cheer.

It must have been a hundred in the shade, but a kid wearing just jeans was painting the overhang of the motel into which Crosby had pulled with his family. They were all into the pool five minutes after he registered, romping in the tepid water. What memories he had of that trip, and of so many other moments with his family. The kids were all grown now; there would be no more such family trips. He wished he could share these memories with Lucille. God, how he missed her. It occurred to Crosby that Traeger had no family. That was probably the best way, given the work they were in, but Crosby could not have borne the danger if he had not known that he would be returning to Lucille and the children.

Hours later, at Salt Lake City, the Hummer turned north onto I-15. On the roadside signs the distance to Pocatello was given.

Ten miles out of Salt Lake he noticed the Hummer behind him, as huge as the one ahead. After another twenty miles, he was sure that second Hummer was following him. He put through a call to Traeger and told him what was happening.

“You're south of Pocatello?”

Crosby gave him the mileage.

“I'm on my way.”

Emilio Sapienza, bishop of Santa Ana in Orange County, in moments of levity said that he was prelate of Disneyland and Busch Gardens; but usually he was serious, perhaps too serious. He disdained the insignia of office, wearing a red zucchetto only with reluctance, and then with a black cassock that looked as if he had had it from his seminary days. He preached the preferential option for the poor and, more surprisingly for a bishop, lived it. He was forever wandering around the farmers' markets in his diocese, haunting the barrios, speaking the Castilian that was almost unintelligible to Latinos. His one vanity was to think that, when his seventy-fifth birthday came in a few weeks, the Vatican would refuse his pro forma letter of resignation. He had miles to go before he slept, as the poet said, but which poet he, like Bertie Wooster, would not know, and he had no Jeeves to enlighten him. Whenever George Worth came to see him, Sapienza would shake his head and murmur, “Palo Alto, Palo Alto.” He had wanted the Catholic Worker house located in his diocese and had never forgiven Worth for establishing it in Palo Alto.