Lawrence Sanders - Sullivan's sting

"I think so," Harker said. "There have been no leaks that I know of."

Lester Crockett leaned over his desk, clasped his hands, looked directly at the other man.

"Tony," he said, "you haven't mentioned Rita Sullivan. What part have you planned for her?"

Harker hoisted his briefcase onto Crockett's desk. "Sir," he said, "I've been providing you with abstracts of the tapes from David Rathbone's home. Now I think you better listen to the complete tapes. I know what must be done, but you should be aware of my reasons."

Crockett nodded. "If you feel it's that important, I'll do it now. Is there a machine available?"

"Yes, sir. In the bullpen. I'll have it brought in here."

He wasn't summoned back to Crockett's office until late in the afternoon. The reels were stacked on the chief's desk. He motioned Harker to a chair and stared at him.

"You should have told me sooner, Tony," he said quietly.

"I wasn't sure. Not absolutely sure. She could have been playing her role."

Crockett shook his head. "I was afraid of something like this. And so were you."

"No! I didn't expect anything like that to happen."

"I think you did," Crockett said, "but perhaps you wouldn't admit it to yourself. If you were sure of her, you would have told her about the taps on Rathbone's phones and the bugs inside the house."

Harker was silent.

"I'm sorry, Tony," Crockett said. "People do turn sour, you know. And sometimes the best. Will you handle it?"

"Yes, sir. Before noon tomorrow. What's the most we can offer her?"

"Immediate resignation for reasons of health. Nothing on her record, but never another job in law enforcement. Oh God, what a fool!"

"Rita?" Tony said. "Or me?"

Crockett looked at him sadly. "Both of you," he said. "But perhaps 'fool' isn't the right word. 'Victim' is more accurate."

"Mooches," Harker said bitterly.

Friday morning, February 2.

It was a squally day, no sign of the sun, ripped clouds scudding before a northeast wind. There were spatters of rain, an occasional zipper of lightning, thunder rumbling in the distance like an artillery barrage.

It must have poured during the night; streets on the way to the office were flooded, and a royal palm was down across Federal Highway. Tony Harker splashed through puddles to a coffee shop, but his stomach was churning and he ordered a glass of milk and dry rye toast.

He wondered why he felt no exultation. He was bringing a complex investigation to a successful end, but he had no sense of satisfaction. In fact, this final day was almost anticlimactic. He saw it as cleaning up after a wild party: a mess of cold cigarette butts, empty bottles, stale food, and broken glass. Nothing left to do but throw out the garbage.

His first call was to the sheriff's office, requesting that two plainclothesmen be sent in an unmarked car to stake out David Rathbone's town house. They were to collar Rathbone at noon if Harker hadn't shown up.

He spoke to Manuel Suarez and Simon Clark, and gave them final orders. He called Henry Ullman in Boca to make certain there was no last-minute hitch in their plans. There was no way to reach Roger Fortescue; Harker assumed he was on the road en route to Lakeland. He called his contact at the DEA and was assured everything was on schedule.

Finally, at 9:10 a.m., he called the office of the Fort Knox Commodity Trading Fund. He was connected to an answering machine, and hung up. He called every ten minutes after that with the same result. He had resolved that if he couldn't contact Rita at the office by eleven o'clock, he'd call her at the town house and run the risk of Rathbone's answering the phone.

But at 10:20, she answered the office phone. "The Fort Knox Fund," she said perkily. "Good morning."

"Harker here," he said. "You alone?"

"Yes."

"I've got to see you right away. It's important."

Silence for a beat or two. "Will it take long?" she asked finally. "We're supposed to go shopping this afternoon."

"No, not long. An hour at the most."

"All right. Where?"

"My motel," he said. "I'm leaving now."

He hadn't devised any scenario or even decided in what order to say the things that had to be said. So he'd have to wing it, and he wasn't much good at improvising.

She came into his motel apartment wearing a clear plastic slicker over a peach-colored jumpsuit. Her wind-tossed hair was glistening with mist, and she was laughing because the flowered umbrella she carried had turned inside out. She tossed it into a corner and stripped off her raincoat.

"Let's move to south Florida," she said, "where the sun shines every day. Got a cold beer for me?"

"No," Harker said, and she whipped her head around to look at him. "Sit down," he told her. "I'll make this as brief as possible."

She sat, crossed her legs, took out a pack of Win-stons. She slowly went through the ceremony of shaking out a cigarette, lighting it, inhaling.

"What's up?" she asked quietly.

He was standing behind an armchair, gripping the top. But he found his knees were beginning to tremble, so he paced a few steps back and forth.

"I promised to tell you before we moved on Rathbone. I'm telling you now. We're taking him today."

"Oh?" she said, inspecting the burning tip of her cigarette. "When?"

"Noon."

"Thanks for giving me so much advance notice," she said, making no effort to hide the sarcasm. "Who's going to arrest him?"

"I am. With men from the sheriff's office. The town house is staked out right now. Did Rathbone ever tell you where he might go if he left the country?"

"No, he never said."

Harker laughed, a harsh sound that sounded phony even to him. "Not a word about his ranch in Costa Rica? Close to the beach and city? The two of you leaving early next week? But first let's go shopping and charge up a storm."

She reacted as if he had struck her across the face. Her head flung back, tanned skin went sallow; she stared at him with widened eyes, trying to comprehend.

"Bugs!" she finally spat out. "The place was bugged!"

"And the phones tapped," Harker said.

"And you never told me?" she cried. "You prick!"

He sat down heavily in the armchair, suddenly saddened because despite what she had done, her first reaction was to accuse him.

"It's all a can of worms, isn't it?" he said. "I've learned that logic doesn't always work with human beings."

"What makes you think you're a human being?"

"Oh, I'm human," he said. "I'm just as fucked-up as everyone else."

But she wouldn't let it go at that. "No," she said, shaking her head, "you're vindictive, malicious. You're getting your jollies out of busting David, aren't you? Big deal! That guy's just a con artist who's ripped off a few rich people, and you've gone after him like he's a serial killer. He'll never spend a day behind bars, and you know it. He'll get himself a sharp lawyer. He'll make full restitution-and he's got the money to do it. He'll promise to straighten up and fly right, and he'll get off with a wrist tap. You'll see."

"I told you a dozen times," Harker said, "and you wouldn't listen. Rathbone's been doing more than stealing pencils from blind men. In addition to a dozen financial felonies, we've got him on drug dealing. What did you think the Fort Knox Fund was trading? Their commodities were cocaine, heroin, and marijuana. And we've got him on counterfeiting and bank fraud. Why do you think he made all those trips to Lakeland? It was to pick up packages of the queer printed by an ex-con up there. And we also want him on suspicion of being an accessory to murder. When he got drunk in the Palace Lounge on New Year's Day, he had just fingered a guy who was later found dead in a canal. Someone had stuck an ice pick in his ear. So much for your poor, misunderstood con artist who's going to make