Clint Faraday Collection C: Murder in Motion Collector's Edition (37 page)

Clint sat back to think. She had gotten those
calls after Santamaria was dead and had that number stored on her
numbers listing under Robinson’s name. That was the only possible
way she could have known who it was who was calling.

So. She was in on the scam – minimum.

He thought of something else and grinned a
small tight grin. He called Judi and said he was on his way back to
Chitre. He could have thought of something before Santiago and
saved himself eight hours of driving.

“
What?”

“
I think
that there’s another little detour in this ridiculous mess,” Clint
answered. “Something’s added up.”

“
Such
as?”

“
Such as
a lawyer knowing who was calling from a cell phone taken from a
murdered man’s belongings at the time of the murder.”

“
Yech! I
see!”

“
See you
in Bocas. Just don’t know when.”

“
I’ll be
waiting to hear the whole sordid thing about our trip to
hell.”

“
Sordid.
Brother, does that fit!”

He rang off, sighed deeply, cleaned up,
changed clothes, swore a lot, got the tank filled and headed for
Chitre. He’d stop for the night in Santiago. He’d been driving for
seven hours straight already and would definitely need the break in
four more.

It was raining a bit, which didn’t make
driving easy in the mountains, but Clint was so used to it he
hardly noticed. He was in Santiago in a little under four hours and
stopped at the Bocas del Toro Hotel, slept for six hours (His usual
sleep time, even after an adventure like this), ate a good hearty
breakfast and was on the road again. The Willie Nelson song kept
going through his head. He would have liked to know what kind of
car Robinson might be driving so he could check on whether he was
heading for Santiago. He would most likely head for Panamá City to
be able to hide among the overpopulation in a major city. Santiago
wouldn’t serve at all and David wasn’t that populated, either.

He got an idea before he reached Chitre and
stopped in a small puebla not far away to don a disguise he used
that he liked. He would become Donald Harrison, a man who would
look like possibly a relative of Clint Faraday, but would be
shorter and a little heavier (to the eye) and would walk and talk
differently. That car wouldn’t do. Robinson had been in it.

Clint paid the auto storage lot there $3.00
per day and took a bus into Chitre. He wouldn’t rent another car
there unless it became absolutely necessary.

It took about two hours to locate the
lawyer’s office, which was in a private house just a few minute’s
walk from downtown. She wasn’t there for the day. She would return
tomorrow afternoon, according to the sign on the door. She
specialized in real estate and immigration.

That would be how she met Williams. Clint
remembered that conversation. He would be someone who had a
residency through her. She would handle property titles and such
for him. He might not be hard to find if he lived in or near
Chitre. The name would probably find him. Santamaria would have
been in the Chitre area to investigate the property. That alone
would make it probable he was there.

The way to find a gringo living in that kind
of place was to simply ask the natives. It would be perfectly
logical that a gringo in town would know about other gringos there
and would like to visit. The best place was in a local bar gringos
frequented.

Clint asked a taxi driver where the most
popular gringo bar was. He was taken to a semi-fancy place that
would be more expensive than others and wouldn’t have anything to
offer other than the fact the gringos went there. The place was
better than he’d expected and the drinks were only a little more
than the average. They served food that had a good reputation so he
ordered a ribeye steak. It wasn’t the best he’d ever tasted, but
was fairly good. A little tough, but meat was tough in most places
in Panamá. The yuca was fried in garlic butter so was very
good.

There were two Williams who came in every so
often. Maybe once a week. One was a negro and one was white. They
were both average popular. The black was in his thirties and the
white was in his sixties. The black had a boat that took people out
for fishing. The white studied animals for some book he was writing
or something. He had written one that was sold at the universities.
It was about animals that lived in or near water. He also wrote
specialty articles for the English-speaking tourists about what to
avoid or do to prevent denge, leichmeniasis and so forth. The black
was there two years ago for several months and had been back this
time for two months already. The white had been there three
years.

It would be the white on a land scam. The
black owned a boat and lived aboard. He wouldn’t be interested in
any large plot of land, though Punta Arenas was on the water.
Robinson’s finca was supposed to be in Arenas.

Maybe he’d have to go to Arenas to see what
was going on there and trace back. The only reason he was
interested in that end of the deal was because the types who pulled
land scams would concentrate on people like Williams, who were
probably living on a pension and had some money saved over years to
invest. It was a serious problem in Panamá that wasn’t treated as
such. The corruption in land deals was unbelievable. Each president
who came along promised to do something about it, some did little
things, most did nothing so it went on and on. Dave, Clint’s nutty
musician friend, had been caught in that kind of deal and had
learned enough to help Clint find those kinds.

He was sidetracked. His focus was to be on
Robinson and Castillo for the moment. He wasn’t going to change the
corrupt system overnight. He probably wouldn’t be able to change it
in his lifetime. It was Thursday night. The likely time for either
Williams would be Friday or Saturday nights. Clint could spend the
following day tying up details. He could go to the police station
and check ... no, he couldn’t. He was in disguise.

He called and got filled in on everything
that had happened. Not much. They had found a woman near where
Robinson got off the bus who had seen a man waiting near the road,
but back in the trees. A car had stopped and he had gotten in. It
left heading toward Divisa. It was a new dark gray car. She didn’t
know or care about make and model. It was a car. A new-looking
one.

The police were quietly checking out
everything around Divisa. So far, only one person had seen what
might have been them. Two men and a woman, the woman driving, had
filled their tank at the bombas. It was a Nissan, 2009, two door,
Sentra. Silver-gray and black.

Clint told them what he’d found, then hung up
and sat back.

Divisa. Either they were seen at the logical
place they would be seen going through or they were leaving a trail
that would make it appear they were going through. They might go
back toward Chitre or go to Santiago or Panamá City. If they came
there to divert the police it would buy them time. All they needed
was a day to get something set up in Panamá City. Castillo would
return after being gone for less than two days. It would be Panamá
City. It would also be very difficult to root him out in Panamá
City.

Clint thought about it, then grinned. He went
back to store his car and caught the bus for Arenas. That would be
the last place they would expect him to go and the best place to
find a connection. Maybe he could do a bit of diversion
himself!

Donald Harrison would come to Arenas in a
truck driven by an old Indio named Lorenzo Betas. Clint knew him
from several years ago and had been invited to come to his finca
anytime. He would always be a welcome guest. He was the man who
saved the life of Lorenzo’s son, Lucas, in Santiago when some
crooks tried to mug him – using a machete.

Some
Disguise!

Clint drove the older rented car into the
Betas’ finca. He’d never been anywhere close to this place. He
liked the scenery and the place. The Pacific could be seen about
half a kilometer away toward the north. It looked very inviting and
tranquil from this distance.

Lorenzo and his wife came out to hug Clint
and welcome him to their modest abode, in a manner of speaking. No
disguise would work with the Indios, Clint had found. They
recognized him almost immediately and asked why he was
disguised.

The home didn’t look like much from outside,
but was clean and comfortable inside and quite nice, really. The
Indios aren’t into ostentation and aren’t trying to impress anyone
or compete with the Joneses. They want a clean comfortable
efficient home. A place to enjoy your family and to relax. They are
homes, not just houses.

Clint spent a time looking over the place. It
was beautiful and peaceful. Lorenzo had four cows, two pigs,
numerous chickens, two horses, corn, yuca, otoe, beans of several
varieties, nance, guayabana, guavas, avocados, moroñon (cashew) –
just about everything he needed for himself, his family and a
number of the poorer neighbors.

That’s the Indio way. He had, so he shared
with those who didn’t have. In return they would give him things he
didn’t have and would work their asses off to help him with the
farm. He didn’t like a couple of them and they didn’t like him, but
that had nothing to do with them helping each other. They may beat
hell out of each other Saturday night, but would be back at working
together on Monday. Clint was understanding more and more about the
Indio way of life. He loved the people and he loved most of their
lifestyle. They would stop to chat with everyone who was working
that day, then move on.

Robinson’s finca was about three kilometers
east. It wasn’t much. He’d been trying to sell it for years. The
description was excellent, but the buyers would leave almost
immediately when they saw it. Lorenzo took Clint out to a small
island that was considered part of his property to point out the
place to him. It had a lot of small islands out from it and was a
very rocky small peninsula that was only about a foot or so above
the waterline at high tide. At low tide it looked very nice from
that distance, with beautiful patches of white beach between the
points of rocks.

“
There is
no water at low tide. It is maybe six or eight centimeters deep
where there are no rocks. The sand is only for a little bit, then
it is more rocks. The bushes and other things make it very
difficult to get to the water at all. The land can’t be farmed
except in small patches. There are too many rocks and cattle will
break their legs. There is little where a plant can make roots. It
is not a good place. The Robinsons are not good people. They are
not honest so the rest of us will not stay silent when they try to
get money from others for the land that is not worth
anything.”

“
There’s
someone named Williams who’s thinking of buying the land,” Clint
said. “I’m investigating. I think Guillermo Robinson killed two
people. He’s working with a crooked lawyer-cum-real estate-agent in
Chitre.”

Lorenzo nodded and said that was about what
could be expected from such people. Clint could expect full
cooperation with almost anyone here. Certainly with his people.

Then he showed Clint things to change in his
disguise. Only the Indios would even notice, but Robinson was
mostly Indio. It was simple little things and surprised Clint with
how much it was effective. He remembered a time in Puerto Armuelles
when an Indio friend saw through his disguise from fifty feet away.
It was because his hands were different when he took off the little
ring he often wore or something Clint never understood. Lorenzo
said that was obvious. The ring would distract from seeing the
little scar on his thumb and would hide the way the veins crossed
just before the fingers on the backs of his hands. He then showed
Clint how differently the vein pattern was on his hands. Two others
there showed their hands and Clint could just barely make out the
pattern. It looked as distinctive as a fingerprint when he trained
himself to see it.

Lorenzo showed him how to use a very small
bit of darker pigment from some handy clay to change the pattern to
the eye. The clay would make a different pattern and was the same
slightly darker shading as his veins – and that was just one of
several things they would notice without being aware of using any
such odd means of identification! It was automatic with them. He
could wear sunglasses to hide the pattern of his retina. He knew
about that, but his personal notice wasn’t ten percent of what was
automatic with the Indios.

When Clint left to go to the Robinson farm he
looked exactly the same from sixty or seventy feet, but was very
different closer – in ways gringos and the Spanish and mixed
Panamanians wouldn’t notice. Clint didn’t look like Clint to even
them when they finished showing him the tricks.

A photo wouldn’t show anything different at
all unless you used a magnifying glass and knew what to look
for.

Clint wondered if a program could be made for
computers that would find those features in a photograph and could
positively identify anyone, anywhere.

Probably, but there was already far too much
intrusion into peoples’ lives by the agencies that surveyed them
now. Screw it!

He said his goodbyes and promised to come
visit again. He really meant that! He would definitely come back to
this place. It was as much a paradise as some other places he’d
visited.

Panamá was paradise to Clint, but these
places were special places in a special place. He rented a car in
Arenas and drove to the gate that had a sign that said, “Se vende”
and had the phone number of the owner or real estate agent. He
called it and was told there was no one available to show the place
at this time, but he had their permission to go in as he pleased.
There was an apology because the road only went in a short way and
not to the coast. Clint said he would look over what he could from
the road and thanked the woman for her time.