Росс Томас - The Mordida Man

In the small denlike office on the third floor of the Old Executive Office Building, the Director of Central Intelligence, a stiff, stubborn look on his face, said, “For the record, Mr. President, I must object to Mr. Grimes being present at our discussions.”

Paul Grimes smiled sleepily, as if trying to fight back a yawn. The President shifted in his chair behind the desk and stared at Thane Coombs with a look that mingled amazement with dislike.

“Let me tell you something, friend,” he said. “You’re not in any shape to be objecting to anything.”

A tide of pink rushed up Coombs’s neck and brightened his ears. “For the record, Mr. President,” he said stubbornly.

“Noted,” the President snapped. “Now tell him what you told me.”

“That is an order?”

“Tell him, god damn it!”

“Yes. All right.” Coombs shifted in his chair so that he could look at Grimes. Actually, he looked at a spot that was an inch to the left of Grimes’s right ear. “The Israelis in New York were approached by Gambia’s permanent representative to the UN, a Dr. Mapangou. He claimed to represent the kidnappers of Gustavo Berrio-Brito.”

“Felix,” Grimes said.

“Yes. Felix. Dr. Mapangou had evidence. The evidence was in the form of Felix’s severed right forefinger. Its print matched those on file in Paris. Mapangou said the kidnappers were demanding a ransom of ten million dollars. The Israelis contacted us. We agreed to pay half the ransom. The ransom, the entire ten million, was paid. A few hours later, Dr. Mapangou was murdered in Central Park. Nothing has been heard from the kidnappers.”

Grimes nodded. “What about Bingo?”

“His name was never mentioned during the negotiations, according to the Israelis.”

“Ten million,” Grimes said. “A lot of money. It wasn’t cash?”

“No. A bank transfer.”

“Can’t you trace it?”

Coombs turned back to look at the President. It was an almost beseeching look.

“Tell him,” the President said.

“The method used to transfer the money was set up by the CIA several years ago. It is virtually foolproof. The money, changed into several currencies, was picked up yesterday afternoon at a casino in the Bahamas.”

“Where in the Bahamas?”

“Nassau.”

A wise smile spread across Grimes’s face. “Who owns it?”

Coombs opened his mouth, but nothing came out. He closed his mouth, snapped it shut actually, then opened it to try again. He failed.

Grimes looked at him almost sympathetically. “Let me guess,” he said. “It’s owned by Gogo Consentino and his bunch.”

“They are not the owners of record,” Coombs said.

“Well, bullshit, mister, you’d better get your head out of the sand. What was their payoff for washing the money?”

“One percent.”

“And what did you call it — the system, the route, whatever?”

Coombs shifted in his chair again and resumed his examination of the spot an inch to the left of Grimes’s right ear. “The Panama Laundry,” he said after clearing his throat.

Grimes nodded. “All right. Now the obvious question. Who thought up the Panama Laundry — invented it?”

“The man is dead. His name was Eubanks.”

“Okay. Eubanks is dead. But who else knew about it — other than Eubanks?”

“Only two persons.”

“Who?”

Coombs gripped the arms of his chair. He stared at the space on the carpet between his feet. “The former Director... and myself.”

“Well, hell, he’s ambassador to where now — Brazil?”

“Brazil,” the President said.

“And you,” Grimes said, staring at Coombs, who still sat, head bowed, gazing at the floor. “Well, hell, you don’t look hungry enough. So there must’ve been somebody else.”

“There was nobody.”

“Nobody you know about anyway.”

“Tell him the juicy part,” the President instructed Coombs.

Coombs slowly raised his head and turned to stare past Grimes and out the window. The view between the drapes was a small slice of Pennsylvania Avenue that included the top floor of Blair House.

“At two P.M., Nassau time, yesterday afternoon,” he began in a dry, distant, precise tone, “a young black man approximately seventeen or eighteen years old drove up in front of the casino in a van. He identified himself to the casino authorities as Samuel—” Coombs stopped and sighed. “Samuel Jones. He then recited the coded phrase.”

“The password?” Grimes said.

“Yes, all right, the password. Or words. The money was transferred to the youth’s van. It was later found abandoned. The youth has not been located.”

“They just gave him the money?” Grimes said, trying to keep the incredulity out of his tone, but failing. “All ten million?”

“It was actually twenty million,” Coombs said in a whisper.

“Twenty million! How the fuck could it be twenty million.”

“There were two transfers out of New York to the bank in Montreal. One was from the Israelis. The other ten million came from the Libyan Arab Republic’s account at Chase Manhattan.”

“They sold him twice!” Grimes said, staring at the President. “The fuckers went and sold him twice.”

The President nodded wearily.

“And they just gave this kid the money — all twenty million?”

“Less their one percent commission. Their instructions were strict, explicit, and of long standing.”

“And Consentino made a nice little profit.” Grimes frowned. “Okay. You couldn’t find the kid. So you started checking who was in and out of Nassau yesterday. Private planes, boats, yachts, all that. Who?”

“Now comes the real juicy part,” the President said.

Coombs’s eyes flickered around the room as though seeking sanctuary. They finally lit upon a wastepaper basket in a far corner of the room and stayed there. He said something in a voice so low that it was almost impossible to hear.

Grimes leaned forward. “Sorry.”

Coombs repeated the name of the twenty-seven-mile-long, one-mile-wide island Democratic People’s Republic in the Caribbean. “They bought a plane some time ago,” he said. “They bought it for one dollar and then leased it back for one million a year to the person who sold it to them. The plane, a Boeing 727, landed at Nassau yesterday. Only one person got off. He carried a Canadian passport. The airport officials made no record of his name. They never do. Their description was vague. The man returned in an hour and loaded six crates of bonded rum aboard the plane. The customs officials, of course, did not inspect the rum. The plane then took off after filing a flight plan for Miami. It never landed in Miami.”

“The plane,” Grimes said. “Who leases the plane?”

With his eyes still locked on the remote and apparently comforting wastepaper basket, Coombs swallowed and said, “Leland Timble.”

Grimes blinked and then said totally without inflection, “Well, I’ll be goddamned.”

There was a silence while Grimes stared first at Coombs, then at the President, then back at Coombs. “Timble. The boy genius bank robber, right?”

“Yes.”

“The finger. How’d Timble get hold of Felix’s finger?”

“Records at London’s Heathrow show that the plane, the same 727, was there for four days prior to and including the day that Felix was kidnapped.”

“Timble snatched him, then. By himself?”

“It gets even better,” the President said.

Grimes stared at Coombs. “Well?”

Coombs sighed. “Timble has a former FBI special agent and a former CIA employee working for him. Either one — or both — could have engineered the abduction.”

Grimes stared up at the ceiling. “You know what?” he said. “I bet they cut off two fingers and sold one to the Israelis and one to the Libyans. I bet that’s what they did.” He looked at Coombs again. “Okay. The plane. The 727. Where is it?”