Kirk Russell - Dead Game

“Ludovna.”

For a moment Marquez was unsure whether Raburn was gaming them, then realized he was serious. Raburn picked up a heavy fish hook lying on the table, a treble hook with three hooks joined together. Trebles were used to snag bottom feeders like sturgeon.

“I saw him get angry at a guy selling sturgeon.”

“Saw who get angry?”

“Nick Ludovna, because the fish he came to buy was old, and he thought he was getting ripped off. But it was just a Mexican guy with no money who screwed up. He caught the sturgeon and he didn’t have any way of moving it, so he’d tied it off to a tree in a slough, just like the one I sold you the other night.” Raburn touched his gut. “It was full of eggs and on its way up the river last April. Anyway, this Mexican called me first, and I went out and took a look at it because I’ve bought from him before. When I checked it the fish was fine and still alive.” He shook his head. “I told him not to kill it, but I think he got scared the fish was going to get away so he clubbed it to death. Then he lied to Nick about when he killed it, and Nick knew he was lying and got real mad. It was out of the water by then. They’d dragged it up on the bank and there was a treble hook still in its mouth, and Nick worked the hook out. He wanted to see the eggs so they cut it open and took out the ovaries. They were filled with eggs and they would have been perfect for caviar, except that the sturgeon had been dead for too long. Nick got mad because he’d paid him already. He wanted his money back and the Mexican kept arguing and saying it had died just before they got there.”

Raburn turned the treble hook in the air, gestured toward Shauf, sweeping it through the air slowly in her direction though nowhere close to her.

“Nick took the treble hook and swung it at his face.” He gestured toward Shauf again. “Like that, and it went right through his cheek and he pulled him in like he was fish. He took his money back while the Mexican was screaming and trying to get the hook out.”

“And what did you do?”

“He told me to leave. He said go back to my boat and forget about it, so I left.”

“Did you call the police?”

“No.”

Marquez had a hard time with that. It wasn’t difficult to picture what a treble hook could do, and there were plenty of fishermen poaching sturgeon who were poor and without work or money.

The tarp tore loose and blew back over the roof of the houseboat. It covered the four windows on the river side and steam hissed off the barbecue. Raburn looked at the tarp but didn’t react to it and looked back down at the table.

“I want to work with you,” Raburn said, “but I’m afraid of him, and I’m not ashamed to say it. He scares me sometimes. It’s like he’s okay and then he just blows up.”

“We’ll deal with Ludovna, but you’ll have to testify.”

“I don’t know about that either.”

“We can set it up so it’s done in the judge’s chambers.”

Marquez flipped a page in the file, slid more photos over. He knew the treble hook story might have been made up for them, but he didn’t think so.

“We want to meet Ludovna and we’ll want to sell to him. We’ll take a ride this afternoon, and you show me your whole routine when you go to deliver to him. Then you’ll have to convince him you trust me and that I supply fish to you. After that I’ll cut you out of the business.”

It took all of them to tie off the tarp before they left. While they were doing that, Shauf leaned into Marquez and, with rain running down her cheeks like tears, said, “He should be more scared of us. He should be more afraid of losing his boat and going to prison. I get the feeling he’s already working us.”

“He’s all we’ve got.”

“Then maybe it’s not worth it.”

Raburn’s cell phone played “Take Me out to the Ball Game” with each ring. He pulled the phone from his windbreaker as they followed the river road toward Sacramento.

“Don’t answer it,” Marquez said.

“It’s my brother.”

“He’ll still be your brother after he leaves a message.”

The phone stopped playing, and the windshield wipers slapped back and forth. It rang again a few minutes later, and Marquez looked at mist low over the fields and asked, “Are you and Isaac close?”

“We’re twins, but he’s the hardworking one.”

“And what are you?”

“The fuckup.”

Raburn smelled of fish and stale clothes. When Marquez lowered his window a crack the rain found its way in. A lot had to be going through Raburn’s head, but he probably didn’t see himself as a fuckup. Earlier he’d made a little stab at being a victim of his own ineptitude and alluded to ignorance of the game laws, but he wasn’t that guy either.

“What’s your brother going to say about this?”

“There’s no reason he needs to know.”

“You work out of the pear packing shed, and we’re going there. He’s going to find out.”

“He doesn’t have to, and he’s got enough problems already. Leave him out of it.”

They drove through Courtland, and, as they neared the sign for Raburn Orchards, Marquez slowed. But he didn’t turn down the steep road. Below on the levee island were long rows of pear trees, some still with fall leaves, wet red-brown, turning in the storm wind. They looked like a fire burning across a field. Between the rows, the soil was dark from rain. Pears had all been picked before the end of July this year, Bosc and Reds last. A hundred yards from the road was the pear packing shed, a big wooden building with a gable face that Raburn worked out of.

There were other outbuildings, an equipment barn, two aluminum prefab structures, and the main house in the distance, a big three-story wood frame with a sagging roof. Half an hour later they drove past Ludovna’s one-story ranch house in the Land Park area of Sacramento. Brick wainscoting. Painted redwood siding. Lawn out to the street. A good-sized but ordinary house in the suburbs. On one side of the garage was a white BMW 330i, the car’s polish gleaming through the rain.

“Ludovna’s car?”

“He has a lot of cars.”

“Is he into cars?”

“I don’t know what he’s into.”

“Fair enough, but when we made the offer to you, Abe, we did it because we believed you know enough to help us. If it turns out on the drive that you don’t remember anything, we’ll have to rethink it all.”

Marquez jotted down the plates as though it was new information, but it wasn’t as if he’d never seen this house. There was a man who worked for Ludovna who drove this car. They called him Nike Man because his standard outfit was a running suit. The BMW was registered to Ludovna’s fish brokerage business. They’d assumed Nike Man was both an employee of Ludovna’s Sacramento Fresh Fish and a bodyguard. In the last month they’d steadily tried to gather more information on Ludovna, but their focus had been August, Raburn, and a dozen poachers who were feeding sturgeon to Raburn and a couple of other suspects. He turned back to Raburn.

“How much does Ludovna pay you?”

“A dollar fifty a pound for meat, fifty dollars a pound for roe. Sometimes I freeze the eggs, sometimes I make caviar.”

“How did you find him?”

“I didn’t.”

“He found you?”

“Right.” He stared out the windshield. “His guy just showed up at my boat one morning, and I could barely understand him. Ludovna speaks English okay, but not the guys that work for him. They’re all from Russia or places like that.”

“How many of them are there?”

“Including the guys who work at the shop, I guess about five. They like vodka and they like to play cards. They all wear black clothes.”