Dead Men's Dust

    'Honestly. He wouldn't say, so I didn't ask. Whatever it was, he said he could sell it, to make life better for everyone,' she said. As if that made things all right.

    I swore under my breath. I knew exactly where this was taking us now. Who the fake CIA agents probably were. 'Who was he working for?'

    'Sigmund Petoskey,' she said.

    'Uh-huh,' I said. 'But who was he collecting from?'

    'I don't know for sure. A gangster from up north. Henry-somethingor-other.'

    'Hendrickson?'

    'Yes. That's it.'

    'The men who were beating you this morning,' I said. 'They work for Hendrickson, huh?'

    'They're the ones that John's running from,' she agreed. She turned her face to the table, began playing with her empty cup.

    'Have they been pressuring you for John's whereabouts?' I asked. 'Before this morning, I mean.'

    Without answering, she leaned back, lifted up her blouse. I saw a toned abdomen. She pulled down the waistband of her skirt and there were three definite cigarette burns peeking above her panty line. 'I'd show you more,' she said, 'only I don't know you as well as my gynecologist.'

    I bit down on my lip. One thing I was sure about: there was going to be a reckoning with the two who'd escaped us this morning.

    'Why didn't you say something, Louise? We could've stopped them from hurting you again.'

    Her downcast eyelids trembled. 'I was trying to protect John.'

    I looked at Harvey. 'Any word on the street about the two who got away from us?'

    'Nothing, Hunter,' he replied. 'You ask me, they heard the news and took off to the Mojave to try an' pick up John's trail. Which I suggest is probably your best play, too.'

    'I've been thinking the same thing,' Rink told me.

    Yeah. Me, too. But there were still a few loose ends I wanted to clear up first. When we'd raided Petoskey's building, I thought he'd been too ready to talk. Made me wonder if he'd been hiding something else about John. His anger at my brother had never been about a gambling debt. It had all been about this something big Louise mentioned. 'Louise, what involvement did John have with Petoskey?'

    She pulled her hair into a rope with her hands. 'Petoskey was paying him decent money to drive up- country. I don't know where he was going, but he was gone about three days each time. He'd come back with his van loaded with packing crates and he'd drop them off at a warehouse Petoskey owns. That was his only part in it.'

    'What happened to the packing crates after they were dropped off?'

    'I don't know, John didn't tell me.'

    'And you've no idea what was inside them?'

    'No.'

    Rink asked, 'Any word about what Petoskey is up to, Harvey?'

    'Nope,' Harvey said. 'Petoskey's probably only playing the middle man. Likely, whatever's in the crates is getting shipped out of the country.'

    'Where to?' I asked.

    'Beats me, man,' Harvey said.

I had my suspicions but let them lie for now.

    'What do you think?' Rink asked me. 'Petoskey, Russian Mob? The Mambo Kings, Cuban? You think there's some kind of communist connection? You know where I'm going with this?'

    'Could be. But it's not our concern just now. I'm more interested in finding John before anyone else gets to him.'

    Rink exhaled. 'You want me to wait before I call this in?'

    'Yeah, Rink. The last thing I want is more involvement from the government. It's bad enough we had to call in a cleanup crew for this morning. As far as Walter's concerned, we offed a hit man. That's all.'

    Walter had come through for us on this one. However, just the sniff of foreign involvement would mean the entire weight of the Central Intelligence Agency coming down on us like an avalanche. At best our movements would be severely hindered, at worst we'd be locked in a small dark place for fear we'd jeopardize their mission. Our suspicions had to remain just that.

    'Don't worry, Rink. If things do turn out as we suspect, Petoskey will be made to pay when this is over with,' I told him.

    Louise watched us with dawning horror. Panic was building in her and I gave her a look to stop her from raising her voice. But she did blurt it out. Maybe it was more of a frantic whisper. 'Are you saying those men at my house could be terrorists?'

    'No, I'm not saying that,' I told her.

    'They could've killed me.'

    'Of course,' I said. It was pointless lying. If the beating didn't finally get what they wanted from her, who