The Mordida Man (29 page)

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.”

“He's right,” Dunjee said.

“You do see it, don't you, Mr. Dunjee?” Timble said.

“I see it.”

“See what?” Keeling said.

Timble sighed. “We wish to rescue Mr. Bingo McKay from his captors and return him safely to his family. For this patriotic action we, of course, expect to be rewarded. At worst, a light suspended sentence for our past youthful mistakes. Mr. Dunjee's objective is essentially the same as ours—rescuing Mr. McKay. However, Mr. Dunjee is near his objective, while we are as far away as ever.”

“We've got Dunjee,” Keeling said.

“But only Mr. Dunjee has any rapport with Mr. Abedsaid. We have no leverage. Mr. Dunjee does. However, we cannot let Mr. Dunjee go his own way, can we? At least, not until Mr. McKay is safely on his way home.”

Dunjee pressed both hands against his stomach, closed his eyes, and leaned back in the chair. He wondered how long it would be before they arrived at the solution and which one would suggest it first. He decided to place a small private bet on Reese.

He lost. It was Spiceman who said, “We've got half the answer already. All we need is the other half.”

Dunjee opened his eyes. Spiceman was staring at him. “What was he going to hand over to you when you gave him the dirty pictures?”

“A map. The real map.”

“When?”

“At six this evening.”

“Where is he now—Abedsaid?”

“At the FAO—negotiating with Ambassador Dokubo.”

“The Nigerian?”

Dunjee nodded.

“The delay in the final transaction,” Timble said, “that was to make sure that the money was actually transferred to Abedsaid's account in what—some Swiss bank?”

Again Dunjee nodded and closed his eyes. Now it comes, he thought.

“He's with Ambassador Dokubo now,” Timble said. “How long do these negotiating sessions usually go on?”

Dunjee opened his eyes again. “You talking to me?”

“Yes.”

“Abedsaid told me a couple of hours. Dokubo is stalling.”

“He wouldn't carry the real map around with him, would he?” Timble said. “No, of course not.”

“Why not?” Dunjee said.

“The scale,” Timble explained, as if to a child. “If the extract you showed us is from the original map, it is an extremely large scale. One centimeter to five meters. It would be most cumbersome.”

“His hotel safe, maybe?” Keeling said.

Timble shook his head. “No, I think not. It might draw attention to it. I think … yes, I think if I were Mr. Abedsaid, I would keep the map in my hotel room. Tucked away securely, of course.” Timble shifted his gaze to Jack Spiceman, the former FBI agent.

“A black bag job,” Spiceman said. “Right?”

Timble nodded. “Don't you agree?”

“But not me,” Spiceman said. “If I got caught, it would blow everything.”

“No, not you, Jack,” Timble said. “What we need, it would seem, is a rent-a-thief. A good one.” He smiled his happy-face smile and looked around the room.

After a moment, Dunjee said, “I know one. A good one.”

30

In his third-floor room in the Hassler Hotel, Harold Hopkins answered his phone on the second ring with a hello.

“This is Dunjee. We've got a small problem.”

“A small one, you say? How small?”

“Almost tiny.”

“Tell me about it.”

“I think,” Dunjee said, “that the Arab's going to try a cross.”

“Shame on him. What kind of cross?”

“I think he's going to take his money and run.”

“What about all those lovely pictures? Of him and the German gent with all the blond hair.”

“I think he's decided to bluff it out—if we send them to the Colonel, which he probably doesn't think we will.”

“And he's right, isn't he?”

“There wouldn't be much point.”

Hopkins was silent for a second or two. Finally he said, “That means no map.”

“No map,” Dunjee agreed. “Unless you'd like to make an extra—say—ten thousand?”

“Ten thousand. Dollars?”

“Dollars.”

“Something to do with the map, most likely.”

“Take it out of his hotel room.”

“For ten thousand?”

“Ten thousand.”

“No thanks,” Hopkins said.

“Look, Harold, it's a quick in and out. Abedsaid's not there. He's negotiating with the Nigerian Ambassador. You've got at least an hour—maybe even an hour and a half. Five minutes' work and you're fifteen thousand richer.”

“Fifteen now, is it?”

“Fifteen.”

There was a long silence. At last Hopkins broke it. “Okay. What do I look for?”

Dunjee told him exactly what to look for, and Abedsaid's room number in the Grand Hotel, and where to bring the map after he had stolen it. Hopkins wrote it all down on a sheet of Hassler stationery.

“I still don't like it,” Hopkins said.

Dunjee sighed over the phone. “Fifteen, Harold.”

“Not much lolly, is it?—considering the risk and all.”

“Fifteen, Harold. Top price.”

“Well, I had to try, didn't I?” Hopkins said and hung up.

He turned from the telephone, a smile on his face, and looked at the two persons seated in his room, the man in the chair, the woman on the edge of the bed.

“How was I?” Hopkins said.

“Utterly convincing,” Delft Csider said.

Paul Grimes nodded his head and his several chins. “Perfect.”

“Now it gets a bit tricky, I imagine,” Hopkins said.

Again Paul Grimes nodded. “A bit,” he said.

Hopkins got out of the cab in front of the Grand Hotel, overpaid the driver, looked around casually, and entered the lobby. He turned left toward the newsstand and purchased a day-old copy of the
Times
of London.

When he turned around, the plump woman in the green slacks and the orange sweater and the mouse-colored hair was just coming into the hotel. Hopkins turned toward the elevators and read the headlines as he crossed the lobby.

He came out of the elevator on the third floor and moved quickly down the corridor to room 318. The newspaper was now tucked under his left elbow. He reached into his right pants pocket, looked sharply left and right, took out a key, unlocked the door, and slipped inside.

The Libyan was standing in the center of the room. He was a tall man of about thirty with a prim, disapproving mouth and totally suspicious eyes. Hopkins wordlessly offered him the room key.

The Libyan took the key and in exchange handed over a thick ten-by-fourteen-inch manila envelope. Hopkins slipped it inside the
Times,
looked at his watch, then back at the Libyan.

“You speak English, mate?”

The Libyan shook his head no.

Hopkins pointed at his watch, then held up his right hand, all four fingers and the thumb widespread. The Libyan nodded. Hopkins looked around, found a chair, sat down, took out his cigarettes, and lit one. The Libyan moved to the dresser, folded his arms, and leaned against it.

After five silent minutes had passed, Hopkins ground out his cigarette, rose, and moved to the door. He turned and said, “Ciao,” to the Libyan. “Ciao,” said the Libyan as Hopkins opened the door and slipped out into the corridor, closing the door softly behind him.

Halfway down the corridor the mousey-haired woman in the green and orange outfit was slowly walking from door to door, a piece of paper in her hand, a frown on her face. She appeared to be looking for a room number. Hopkins put his right hand up to his face and started rubbing his eye. He averted his face slightly as he strode past the woman. She didn't bother to look at him.

Outside the hotel Hopkins found a taxi and showed the driver the address that Dunjee had spelled out over the phone. The driver nodded. Hopkins got into the back seat butt first. He noticed that the mousey-haired woman was just coming out of the hotel.

The mousey-haired woman watched Hopkins's taxi drive off. She turned and went back into the hotel. At one of the public telephones she made a call. It was answered on the second ring by a man's voice.

“Yes.”

“He's on his way,” the woman said. She spoke English with a slight Italian accent. “He was inside the room approximately five minutes and twenty-one seconds.”

“That's long enough,” the man's voice said.

“That's what I thought,” the woman said and hung up.

It was Alex Reese who took the call from his mousey-haired CIA operative. But it was Jack Spiceman who was standing outside the villa's garage door when Hopkins's taxi pulled up.

Spiceman waited until Hopkins paid off the driver and got out of the taxi. Then he moved down the short drive. “You Hopkins?”

“I'm Hopkins. And who might you be?”

“Benedict,” Spiceman said.

“Where's Dunjee?”

“Upstairs.” Spiceman took out the small black box, aimed it at the garage door, and pressed the button. The overhead door went up.

“Magic,” Hopkins said.

“Magic,” Spiceman agreed.

Hopkins went first up the narrow wooden servants' stairs. When they ended, Spiceman moved around in front of Hopkins and led him down the hall and into the sunny corner room. Once inside, Hopkins looked slowly around. Leland Timble, seated, was wearing his silly happy-face smile again. Both Alex Reese and Franklin Keeling were standing. Dunjee sat in the chrome and leather chair, one hand still pressed against his stomach.

Hopkins's eyes settled on Dunjee. “Took in some partners, did we?”

Dunjee nodded. “A few. Did you get it?”

“I got it.”

“Any trouble?”

Hopkins shook his head. “It went a treat.”

“Give it to him,” Dunjee said, nodding at Alex Reese. “The guy with no hair.”

“He must mean you, mate,” Hopkins said as he took the envelope from its newspaper wrapping and handed it to Reese.

It was a large map that Reese unfolded on a glass-topped table near the window. The map was almost five or six feet square and printed on extremely heavy paper. Timble was up now, the sheet of paper which designated the site of the farmhouse in his right hand. “It's an island,” he said in a surprised tone as he stared at the map.

Reese nodded. “Comino.”

“I never heard of it.”

“It's the smallest Maltese island,” Reese said, studying the map. “About a mile square. As I remember, the population at last count was nineteen. Maybe twenty.”

“And our piece fits right in here—see the farmhouse,” Timble said. Jack Spiceman and Franklin Keeling moved over to look. While the four men gathered around the map, Hopkins turned toward Dunjee.

“You know what?”

“What?” Dunjee said.

“We went right by it, we did, on the way over. Drove halfway around it, in fact.”

“The Colosseum?”

“The Colosseum. Would've been a shame to come all the way and not see it. Looked a bit smallish, I thought, and kind of falling down, but it was a sight.”

At the table, Timble said, “Would you get that ruler over there, please, Franklin?”

“Sure,” Franklin Keeling said. He wiped one large hand across his mouth and moved across the room. He picked up a draftsman's ruler from a table and started back. When he reached the point just behind Harold Hopkins he paused.