Clint Faraday Mysteries collection A Muddled Murders Collector's Edition (65 page)

Dr. Orison said it would take several years
for the cancer to kill him and that it would soon be too late to
stop it from spreading. He could use the morphine and treatments to
make him do anything he wanted. Frieda asked why he was doing what
he was doing to the children and Orison said it kept them in
control.

I decided to kill those three bastards right
then. I knew, I suppose, that I could save Father’s life if he got
the proper operation, but I hated him almost as intensely as I
hated Frank and now Frieda. I couldn’t believe, in one part, that
anyone could be as cruel as them – but another part was telling me
that I could turn it on them and make them all suffer the way they
had made me and my siblings suffer. It was Father, but they were
pulling the strings.

Things went along. I found that they were
fixing races and taking millions of dollars to an offshore bank,
but it was in Donald’s name so they couldn’t be charged with
anything if it fell through for any reason.

I told Donald, who hated Father almost as
much as I did. I took some pictures of the deals with the horses
and put them on three CD’s. Donald used them to make Father
continue with the plan and to not tell anyone else involved about
it. Father also had to make Razzy and Orison put Donald on their
corporation and to leave him off. He would die soon and the control
had to be there. If anything happened it would still look like
Donald was running the show – like he was.

We started taking vacations using other
passports. We all had passports from two or three countries since
we were in business or born in countries where our parents weren’t
citizens. This was to work the offshore accounts.

We can now fast-forward to recently. Not much
new happened except someone who was working with fixing races was
killed and that had to stop for a couple of years or they would all
be killed by gangsters.

I suppose the next thing was when we were
there in Bocas del Toro and I came into Father’s room to see him
dead and Donald trying to revive him. I thought Donald was killing
him and grabbed the syringe and stuck it into Donald. He was dead
in less than a minute.

I was in a rage. I suppose that’s when I, as
Clint says, went over the edge for real. No more fantasies. I
couldn’t watch Father die a slow and horrible death. Donald had
taken that away. I stabbed Father in the throat with the syringe
and gave him another dose, but he was already dead.

Clint is the one who soon showed us what
Father had planned. He would suicide and make it look like murder
that we would all be suspected of. We would get no money, but would
inherit a lot of land that we couldn’t keep because we could never
hope to pay the inheritance taxes.

I knew about the offshore accounts and that
they were in Donald’s name. That scared me because I didn’t know if
we could inherit it.

Well, the new will wasn’t recorded so that
plan was avoided. We would get the money in the legal accounts if
nothing else and that would be more than two million Euros apiece.
After death taxes we would still have almost a million apiece –
more, because Donald was dead.

You know the rest. Trudy, the only sane one
among us and someone who deserves it, gets the offshore accounts
and Razzy and friends get nothing.

I had to kill them too fast. I had wanted it
to take a long time and be very painful, particularly Orison. I did
manage to pay him back a little.

Wanda figured it out and was going to tell on
me. I truly hated to do anything to her, but was paranoid and very
much confused. I killed those and ran.

Clint had shown that the poison that was used
on Father was sent in some phials by Frieda and Frank. I went to
California and convinced Frank that Frieda would implicate him in
the murders because Clint had that part figured out and he would go
to California to arrest him. He always hated Frieda and had a
girlfriend he didn’t much like either, so he killed both of them. I
wanted to kill Frieda slowest and most painful of all except Frank,
but I had to be practical. I had to get out of California, and
fast. I took Frank with me to Peru, where I was able to finally do
what I wanted to at least one of them. He was the most important
one to me and I was very damned happy to have done most of what I
wanted to do to him.

The others just happened because they tried
to use me sexually and other ways and I’ve had all of that I ever
intend to allow.

Anything else?

A few points. You didn’t feel you had to go
after Mr. Faraday, who was pursuing you?

No. He was only doing his job and there was
never anything personal about it. It was soon a game where I knew I
would be caught sooner or later, but where I could have a little
fun in life. Show I was the superior, you know. I obviously wasn’t.
Here I am, a friend of Clint. No hard feelings. He was and is
always up-front and honest about it.

I see. You deliberately left clues for
him
.

Clues? No. I left evidence that I had been
there to let him know I was ahead of him. I didn’t leave clues to
anything in the future that I knew about. He is very intelligent
and was able to add two and two and come up with four. I didn’t
know I was going to act so fast when I talked to him in Bocas and
gave him the clues to where I would go. I know how he figured those
spots. As I said, he’s very intelligent. They weren’t deliberate
clues.

Just an unimportant note. You’ve covered
enough with this to take care of the legal end.

How did you con Gloria Sorento into helping
you?

That one’s for the cops in Rio to see if her
statement jibes with what I say.

I met her in a lesbian bar. She is bi. I told
her I was running from a millionaire husband who was trying to kill
me rather than divorce me because he had a steady string of
girlfriends on the side and a divorce would give me half of those
millions. She didn’t know anything. I told her he would try to have
me charged with all kinds of things so the police would be looking
for me. He had already hired a private detective to try to find
me.

What now?

To Panamá. You will be their problem after
tomorrow.

I’ll bet they’re thrilled about that.

Sworn and attested

Amanda Beatrice Lesley

Amanda Beatrice Lesley

18/ Dic/ 2008

“
Well,
that seems to cover it,” Clint said after reading the form over.
“It’s pretty much what I’d figured.”

“
We will
be most relieved to have her out of here,” Gonzalo said.

Bye. Y’All!

“
She’s
actually got a lot of people here to like her. I can’t understand
it!” Judi protested. “She’s got to be the most depraved, cruel,
inhuman nutcase I ever heard of!”

“
Hah! The
type can charm you like a boa constrictor charms a chicken,” Dave
said. “It’s a survival trait. She’s probably a likeable type of
person. She was what her life made her. As Bob Seger said,
‘Tomorrow is the price of yesterday.’ This one proves that in
spades!

“
Serg is
coming over in about an hour. He’s finally going to be able to go
fishing with us.”

They were at his place on San Cristóbal.

“
Now I
have to beg off,” Manny said. “The better half and brats want to go
to David to do some Christmas shopping. She always leaves it to the
last minute.”

“
They
don’t go to that extreme here with gifts,” Clint said. “Something
sentimental to your closest friends and family.

“
All
along she was a step ahead of me, in reality. It was mostly by
chance I was able to get her. A bus went by in Peru. She talked
about places they had in South America when we talked here in
Bocas. I was in front of a hotel in Rio.

“
If any
one hadn’t happened she wouldn’t be caught. Manolo was a tremendous
help in some ways. He got me onto the offshore accounts. Trudy is
worth hundreds of millions now and is going to give some to the
Smithsonian. She’s going to add to the funding here for the clinic
and school and is donating a lot of new equipment to Bocas
Hospital.

“
Martime
is going back to Europe. He gets almost two million Euros to play
around with. Nobody except Wanda got offed who didn’t more than
deserve it in one sick way or another. Even Amanda admits
that.”

“
I think
you should go along with her on an insanity plea,” Judi said. “If
there ever was an insane person, it’s her!”

“
I can
understand it. I can’t condone it,” Dave said. “I worry that it’s
not over. She gave up far too easily.

“
On the
other hand, she might figure she did what she set out to do, so why
drag it out?”

“
You can
figure what she’ll do about half the time,” Clint agreed. “It was
always a choice where I had a fifty-fifty chance of being right. I
was lucky in a couple of them to have something else decide it for
me.

“
The
truth? I think she won’t kill again.”

“
Then
you’re stupid as hell!” Dave snapped. “Some guy would want to lay
her and she would revert back to the same ‘I’m being used again’
phase and knock him off. It happened twice in South
America!”

“
I
agree,” Manny said. “You tend to like her and forget those little
details. You can’t allow yourself to forget she’s a homicidal
MANIAC and will always act in the manner of a homicidal
maniac.”

“
There is
that,” Clint replied. “I can hear Sergio’s boat. I guess we’ll be
going to the Zapatilla’s?”

“
Nope!
We’re taking Manny’s fast boat and going east of Chiriqui Grande to
almost Cusapin. There’s a little group of coral heads just outside
of a bay there that the tourists haven’t discovered. Yet. I’m told
there’re some very weird fish in the area and the islands and
shoreline have a lot of orchids that aren’t found anywhere else
they know about. We can snorkel, fish, whatever and I can explore a
little.”

“
And
bring back a couple of thousand orchids!” Judi accused. “It’s sea
level so they’ll grow here.”

“
Uh-huh.”

Sergio came in, they packed the boat, took
Manny and family to Bocas Airport, then headed east. It was a
perfect day.

“
Well,
Amanda Lesley will be deported to California. She did kill those
people from there and Panamá really doesn’t want the expense of
housing her for the rest of her life,” Sergio reported. “That took
some doing, but your friend, Manolo, was able to get someone to
pull some strings. I don’t know how he does those
things.”

“
By
intimating that it MAY have something to do with major drug
movements,” Manny said. “I admit I pulled a few strings myself. We
don’t need her here in Panamá. They aren’t equipped to deal with
her.”

“
They’d
better get a better grip on their local criminals or the tourist
trade is going down the tubes,” Dave said. “Two more muggings in
Bocas last night. You can’t tell me the cops don’t know who’s doing
it.”

“
It’s a
matter of being able to prove it,” Sergio said. “We’re watching
that bunch past sixth street from Colón. We know damned well it’s
them, but which ones?

“
Dave,
you suggested that the gringos living here get together and handle
the problem. We may take a holiday and let you try to clean up the
mess. We look on vigilantes here in a different way than they do in
the states. If there is true cause and no other alternative we are
very slow in investigating such things. Most times the judge will
hold there is insufficient evidence to charge them.”

“
Locals.
Not the gringos,” Dave warned. “This one will state that he’s
Panamanian when you walk in and then will refuse to even charge a
local when there are ten witnesses. I’ve seen it.”

“
You go
over his head,” Judi said. “I’ve seen that, too. Appeals from this
branch routinely get overturned. He’s mostly just an arbiter with
an attitude about gringos.”

“
Whatever, it has to stop,” Dave said. “Doesn’t the idiot
realize that running off the gringos runs off investment and jobs
at the same time? Bocas Town is already ninety-nine percent tourism
and construction investment. People come here because there are
jobs. The thugs come here because there’s a lot of money. Look
what’s happened to Costa Rica lately. It’s downright dangerous for
a gringo to even walk down the street at night in San José’
anymore. The tourists don’t go there much. Gringos are selling out
and leaving. Costa Rica is going right down the tubes because they
let this crap get started. We can’t let it happen here!

“
I
realize that some gringos are arrogant snobs. Go up to Boquete and
you see it everywhere. There are some pretty disgusting crooks from
the states here, too. No argument.

“
Most of
us really care about Panamá. All we ask is fair play – and we’re
not getting it here in Bocas.”

“
I have
to admit what you say is true,” Sergio said. “We find our hands
tied much of the time because of the way this underjudge handles
things.”

“
We have
to find a way to stop this,” Judi said. “I hate to see the way
Bocas is headed today. It’ll spread all over the country in a few
years and Panamá will go right back to being a banana
republic.”

“
We’ll do
what we can. Change comes slowly here so it might not be enough,”
Manny said. “David is still fairly good. It shouldn’t be too badly
affected for a few years, but you never know. That stuff follows
the money. If gringos move to David the crime will move with
them.”