Kirk Russell - Dead Game

“Either of you have a phone number on Beaudry?”

“Hell, no, but he’s up along Lake Berryessa. He’s got a house across from the lake. I bet you can find him if you really want to.”

Marquez laid another twenty on the dark wood bar. “A final and then I’ve got to take off.”

“Well, as long as you’re buying let me tell you another story that went around. Tom Beaudry had a sister who died in a fire down in Henderson, Nevada. Her house burnt up with her in it, and the rumor up here was Tom borrowed money from the wrong people and couldn’t pay them back fast enough, so they killed his sister. There was a retired FBI fellow who used to live around here who told us that.”

“Is he still around?”

“No, he moved to the desert. He knows things about Roswell, New Mexico, that the government has been suppressing. He’s going to write a book about it so he’s got to be somewhere they can’t find him first.”

Marquez thanked the old boys and left enough money for yet another round. He walked out into a cold wind, and from his truck he called the Las Vegas police and ran the arson story by a captain he knew there, who as it turned out knew about the fire and the controversy. He gave Marquez the name of an officer in the Henderson PD that he said was a pretty straight-up guy, but he suggested Marquez call the FBI first.

“Why would I want to screw up my operation?”

Heard the laugh on the other side, the understanding, then got the explanation.

“Because there may be an organized crime angle and that’s the Feds’ turf.”

“What kind of organized crime?”

“The new boys in town are Russians, and that was the rumor.”

Marquez thanked him and sat in his truck still holding his cell phone before deciding against a cold call to the FBI in Vegas. He was holding the phone when Shauf called. She’d followed Ludovna and another man to a cafe on old Main Street in Isleton. She sounded angry or disturbed or both.

“Guess who just pulled up, parked, and went inside a cafe here to meet Ludovna.” She didn’t wait for his answer. “Raburn is at a table with Ludovna and the running suit. Did he call you and say anything about meeting Ludovna?”

“No.”

“They’re in there laughing, John. Ludovna is sitting close enough to kiss him. Does that seem right?”

When Marquez knocked on Tom Beaudry’s door, morning sunlight was high on the rounded hills behind the house. It hadn’t been hard to get an address on Beaudry, a little police magic, but looking around at the other houses and the lake across the street it seemed a surprising place to find a guy who’d scratched out a living with a bait shop and a sport boat. When the door opened he saw recognition, brief shock, then a tightening around Beaudry’s eyes at the invasion of his privacy.

“I’m retired.”

“That’s what I heard.”

“What are you doing here?”

“You used to help us, so I thought you might again. I’ve got some photos of people I’d like to run by you.”

Beaudry had lost weight. His hair had whitened. His skin, though permanently tanned, had paled as though he no longer spent any time outside.

A woman’s voice called from another room, “We have to leave right now, Tom.” Then she appeared in the hallway, a large purse hanging off her shoulder. “Who’s he?”

Marquez stepped aside as she went past him. He slid photos out of a manila envelope that included several miscellaneous faces, a few with features similar to Raburn’s, Ludovna’s, and August’s. He had a single photo of Anna. Because Beaudry’s hands were deformed by arthritis, Marquez held each so he could read them, then moved slowly to the next.

“Well, that’s Abe Raburn, the fool. He and his brother were runaways who showed up in Isleton must have been thirty years ago. In those days whether they ate dinner or not depended on how much fish they caught. They told everyone they were eighteen but they couldn’t have been more than fifteen and spent half their time hiding out. I know for a fact neither one of them had a legal driver’s license until they were in their twenties.” He tapped a gnarled finger on Ludovna’s face. “This man is a foreigner and a communist, one of the Russians that came over after Reagan finally brought those bastards to their knees. He was out on my boat a couple of times bragging how important he was in Russia.”

Marquez showed more photos, including a profile of August taken at fifty feet and not easy to read. Down in the car Beaudry’s companion honked the horn twice, leaning on the horn with the last burst.

“No, I don’t recognize anyone there.”

“How about her?”

In the photo Anna had hair pulled back. She wore sunglasses and a dark blue tank top showing tan shoulders and arms.

“Sure, she worked as a river guide and bartended in Rio Vista at night. Nice girl and cute. You’re not going to tell me she’s poaching?”

“What I’m wondering is whether you remember ever seeing any of these people together.”

“Now her mother was a Russian, wasn’t she?” The horn sounded again, this time a longer blast, and Beaudry yelled, “Goddammit, stop that.”

Marquez nodded. “Her mother was a Russian who immigrated here. She worked at UC Davis as a scientist. She and Anna lived in the delta.”

“You’re wondering if I ever saw her with this other Russian?”

“Did you?”

“Not that I can remember, and I can’t believe she’d be mixed up with sturgeon poachers. That’s what this visit is all about, isn’t it?”

“That’s right.”

“What I remember of her is she loved to be on the water. She worked for one of those guide businesses, but you know that already.”

The horn sounded again, and Beaudry touched Marquez’s arm. He closed the front door and without a word moved toward the steps, calling back to Marquez after he’d started down.

“I’ve got to go.”

Marquez slid the photos back into the envelope and followed him down the steps. He was surprised how unsteady Beaudry was. When they reached the car Marquez asked his last questions.

“Who’d you sell your business to?”

“A young man whose father I knew very well. The boy isn’t made of the same stuff as his father, but I needed the money and I wanted to see him try to make a new start. Sorry I couldn’t be of more help to you.”

Marquez was still at the top of their driveway as Beaudry and the woman drove away. He knew as he got back in his truck that he was going to call the FBI, and that meant starting with someone he trusted. He found his address book and then the number for Charles Douglas, who as far as he knew was still in the FBI Field Office in San Francisco. He’d worked with Douglas twice before, most recently trying to take down a drug smuggler who’d branched into abalone poaching. But it was the first time he’d worked with Douglas in ‘98 that had marked him most. That was during an FBI search for a child abductor who was working California coastal towns the SOU knew well.

“Good to hear your voice,” Douglas said.

“Likewise. How’s your war on terror coming?”

“Until we figure out what the other side really wants it’s going to go on a while. But my kids are growing up, and my wife got her law degree.”

“Congratulate her for me.”

“I will.” Douglas let a beat pass. “But you’re calling.”

“I’m chasing sturgeon poachers, and there was a fellow who used to own a bait shop in Rio Vista named Tom Beaudry. Beaudry had a sister who died in a fire in Henderson, Nevada, and there may have been some question about whether it was a homicide or an accident. I understand the FBI got involved, that the Bureau may have questioned Tom Beaudry about a loan made to him that may have been Russian mob money.”