Jeffery Deaver - Bloody River Blues

"Find me Stettle," Crimmins growled in a furious whisper. "I don't care where he is, what he's doing. I want him now."

The river was muddy today.

The water seemed no more turbulent than on any other day-the wind was brisk but it still hadn't broken the surface into whitecaps. But some disturbance was churning up clayish mud and staining the wide water from shore to shore.

John Pellam stretched out in the driver's seat of the camper and tried Nina's number once more. Her machine answered and he hung up without leaving a message. They had had a brief conversation earlier during which she assured him she was fine.

She simply wanted rest. Could he call the head of Makeup and explain?… Of course he would. Was there anything else he could do? Did she want company? No, she'd visited her mother at the hospital and asked the woman's doctor for a couple of Valium for herself. Pellam could hear the slurred words and he hung up to let her get some sleep.

He had just now replaced the phone when a very distraught Tony Sloan called and said the final shoot was about to go down. Pellam knew this and had planned on attending. What was ominous was that Sloan had summoned him so adamantly. He couldn't possibly be thinking of new locations, could he? The key grip had let slip the information that Sloan had fifteen straight days of film-that was twenty-four-hour days of celluloid-to boil down into a 125-minute movie. Pellam, thanking the Lord he was not Sloan"s film editor, promised he would be there before the last blank gun shot was fired. He stood up and adjusted his Abel Gance Napoleon poster, the only decoration in the camper. He slipped the Colt into the inside pocket of his bomber jacket and was about to leave when his phone buzzed again.

"Nina?" he asked.

"Are you sitting down?" The voice was a man's.

"Hello?"

"Sitting down?"

"I can hardly hear you, Marty. Where are you?"

"I'm in Berlin."

Pellam pressed the cellular phone hard into his ear, as if that might improve the connection from the state of Missouri, in which -Winston Churchill coined the term Iron Curtain to the place that had once been behind it.

"I tried to get you in London and Paris," Pellam shouted. "Look, I'm sorry about the other night."

"You don't have to shout. You break up when you shout. I can hear you fine. What?"

"I'm sorry I missed you. I had an accident."

"Well, it was a damn expensive accident. Telorian was interested but he got pissed because you blew him off a second time. What's the trouble, John, some Freudian thing against Iranians? Excuse me, Persians. You should've called. Are you sitting down?"

"What do you mean?"

"I've got some Hungarian money lined up."

"What?"

"I know. It's weird. Paramount balked at the last minute on the terrorist script. It's totally cratered. So it's a green light for Central Standard Time. This guy in London put me in touch with these investors in Budapest. They're a real East Village duo. Young guys. I pitched you sort of as a Jarmusch."

Hungarians financing a cult film noir flick set in Wisconsin. So this was the New World Order.

"Well, I'm happy about that, Marty. What do we do now?"

"You can get a hundred fifty?"

"If I hustle."

"Well, hustle, boy."

'They understand I'm directing?"

They're all for it. They know all about you, John… It's not a problem." His voice filled with transatlantic sincerity.

"You know what I'm saying?"

The death of Tommy Bernstein was what he was saying.

"They like your work. They like you. Or who they think you are. Don't disappoint them."

"Who are these guys?"

"Their names, you mean? Unpronounceable. Funny marks over the letters. Who cares? Get your money. I'm having my shyster in New York put together the partnership agreement. Let's try to sign it up by the first of the month. Is it doable?"

"It's doable. It's very doable… Listen, Marty… thanks. You know what this means to me."

The broken connection mercifully cut short the gratitude and Pellam found the conversation was over.

Outside he kicked a piece of dried mud off his Nokonas and walked to the Yamaha.

"We saw your advisory about the assault on that Sassower women."

Ronald Peterson cocked an eyebrow at Bob Gianno. And?

"We talked to Crimmins."

Neither of the Maddox cops noticed Petersons eyes flick with minute satisfaction toward Nelson, who could not restrain the less subtle smile.

Hagedorn continued, "He denied having anything to do with the assault, of course. What did you expect?'

What indeed?

"But naturally we didn't care about that. We just wanted to flush him. We mentioned Pellam's name. We pretended it was a slip. You should have seen his eyes."

Peterson said, 'That was a clever move."

"We thought so. He'll do something now. Either try to hit Pellam directly or just spook him. Either way, we'll move on him."

They sat in Peterson's office. The cops had noticed the toy collection and each seemed to be trying to think of something witty to say about it and came up blank.

Peterson was oh so happy with their immense discomfort.

"Keeping the pressure on Pellam. That's good." Peterson took a long moment to read a low-priority report that had nothing to do with this meeting. He dashed a note in the margin and dropped it on the desk. "You know Pellam did time."

"What?" Hagedorn laughed.

"Manslaughter. San Quentin."

"Damn. San Quentin," Gianno said. "Hard time. How 'bout that."

Peterson watched the local detectives stew a bit as they were poked by guilt that they themselves hadn't unearthed this information. He asked, "Can you use that?" He himself had considered Pellam's criminal record and concluded that local police couldn't do much with it.

Hagedorn and Gianno looked at each other. The blond, good-looking cop-more handsome than most of the FBI agents who worked for Peterson-lifted his hands and scrunched his lips together in reflection. Finally he said, "I don't see how. Film permits are already issued. I mean, I don't think a prior conviction has any bearing on that. But what about parole?"

"Parole?"

Hagedorn continued, "Did he break parole by leaving the state?"

This was something Peterson had not thought of. A microscopic frown crossed his brow. Being outthought by this smarmy shit-town cop. Peterson decided that Nelson would twist in the wind a few revolutions for missing this. "Given the dates of the crime and his traveling-man career, I doubt that's an issue but I'll have my associate check into it. Now, I think we've agreed that Crimmins knows Pellam reported him for the assault on the girl, and-thanks to the clever thinking of our friends from Maddox here-he may make some overt move against Pellam. We'll monitor that. But I think we need to step up the pressure too."

"Any ideas?" Gianno asked glumly, suspecting sarcasm but unable to identify it.

Peterson responded, "I have one, yes. Two of my agents were on the movie set the other day and they found something interesting. I'd like to ask them to stop by and tell us about it."

MISSOURI RIVER BLUES

SCENE 179E-EXTERIOR DAY-ROAD BETWEEN FIELD AND RIVER

This is a narrow road between the field and the river. There is a small, one-story CHURCH an the river side road, surrounded by B USHES and TREES. Past the bushes the road continues through the field, open space on either side.

MEDIUM ANGLES OF BOSS'S PACKARD parked fifty feet past the church. DEHLIA dabs FAKE BLOOD on her forehead and stretches out in the front seat of the car with the door open. Ross and the three GANG MEMBERS take their MACHINE GUNS and hide in the bushes, waiting for the armored truck. Ross stops and runs back to Dehlia. He gives her his FAVORITE PISTOL.