The Camel Club

“It’s Milton, right? Well, thank you very much, they’re beautiful.” Even as she said this, Adams saw tears forming in the man’s eyes.

Next came Caleb, who’d decided not to wear his Abe Lincoln outfit after Stone had spoken with him, something to the effect of not wanting their hostesses to think he was dangerously insane. However, in an act of subtle defiance he had worn his fat pocket watch and chain.

“Nice to meet you, Caleb,” Kate said pleasantly. “Go right in.”

Oliver Stone brought up the rear. He was dressed in some of his new clothes and was holding his motorcycle helmet in one hand. “Would you care to give me a preview of the agenda?”

She looked at him with a twinkle. “But that would take all the fun away.”

“This isn’t a fun business we find ourselves in.”

“I agree. But I think you’ll find the evening informative.”

Lucky met them with a pitcher of sangria. As she scuttled around talking and pouring, it was clear that the old woman was in her element. Sufficiently refreshed, they passed a pleasant hour before dinner was served.

Reuben and Caleb ate heartily. Stone, Milton and Adelphia merely picked at their meals. Coffee was served in the library. Cigars were offered by Lucky but only Reuben lit up. “I like to see a man smoke,” she said as she sat next to Reuben and patted his big shoulder. “Now, you look to me to be a man who packs heat.”

As Reuben stared at her quizzically, the conversation, craftily guided by Kate, turned to intelligence circles.

“I tell you what,” Reuben said, “the best security in the world can be defeated by a rumbling stomach.”

“How’s that?” Kate asked.

“Just this. I knew before anyone else the exact time the bombings of Afghanistan and Iraq were going to start.”

“Were you with DIA back then?”

“Hell no, they’d long since kicked my butt out. I knew because I was the dispatcher for Domino’s. Each time, the pizza order for the Pentagon spiked right before the bombs started falling. So yours truly knew before the likes of Dan Rather or Tom Brokaw or probably even the president.”

While Reuben had been talking, Caleb was making the rounds of the books on the massive shelves, with Lucky as his guide.

Caleb’s face brightened with each new discovery. “Oh, that’s quite a good copy of Moby- Dick. And a Hound of the Baskervilles, first English edition. Very nice. And over there, is that Jefferson’s Notes on the State of Virginia from 1785? Yes, it is. We have one in our collection. Lucky, you really should let me get you acid-free boxes for these, computer-cut to the book’s exact dimensions.”

Lucky was hanging on Caleb’s every word. “Oh, acid-free boxes cut by computer, how terribly exciting. Would you, Caleb?”

“It would be my honor.”

Reuben helped himself to more coffee spiked with a little something from a flask he pulled from his coat pocket. “Yeah, you’ll find brother Caleb a real dynamo in the excitement department.”

“Lucky,” Kate said finally, “we’re going to head out to the carriage house. I need to talk over some things with my friends.”

“All right, dear,” she said, patting Caleb’s arm. “But first they have to promise to come back.”

Reuben immediately raised his glass. “Lucky, you couldn’t keep me away with a squad of Special Forces.”

Kate led them outside and over to the carriage house, where they settled down around a table on the large sofa and two wing chairs.

“I’m assuming you’ve told them of our discussion and the discovery of the boat?” Kate said in a businesslike tone to Stone.

“I have,” he answered, casting a glance in Adelphia’s direction. “And for some reason you believe that we were in that boat and on the island?”

“I don’t believe, I know. Now I want to know how much you saw.”

“There’s no evidence that we saw anything,” he replied evenly. “Even if Adelphia has told you that she followed us to the river and watched us head to the island, that doesn’t mean we were witness to that man’s death.”

“But I believe you saw everything. And I think whoever killed Patrick Johnson discovered your presence, and you had to make a run for it. That would explain the bullet hole in the boat and the blood. What I can’t understand is why you didn’t simply go to the police and tell them what you saw.”

“Easy enough for you to say,” Reuben interjected. “They’d believe you. But look at us, we’re a scruffy bunch with questionable pedigrees.”

“So you’re admitting you did witness the murder?”

Caleb started to speak but Stone broke in. “We’re not admitting anything.”

Kate said, “Oliver, I’m just trying to help you. And don’t forget, someone tried to kill Alex and me after we found the boat.”

Reuben shot Stone a puzzled look. “Oliver, you didn’t tell us that.”

Milton blurted out, “But what about Chastity? They’ve kidnapped Chastity!”

They all stared at him as tears fell down his twitching cheeks.

“If someone’s been kidnapped,” Kate said, “the police should be notified immediately.”

“It’s not quite that simple,” Caleb said, glancing at Stone, whose gaze was on the floor. “We really can’t go to the police.”

Kate looked at Stone. “Oliver,” she said quietly, “as a team we might be able to do something.”

“Hell yes, we could,” Reuben said. “She’s official, being with DOJ, and our sorry asses can only get things second- and third-hand.”

“It is time to work together,” Caleb chimed in.

Stone still said nothing.

Reuben put down his cigar “Okay, since our exalted leader is uncharacteristically mute, I hereby call a special meeting of the Camel Club to order. And I move that we tell Kate here everything. Do I have a second?”

“Second,” Caleb said immediately.

“All in favor,” Reuben said, his gaze on Stone.

The ayes carried.

Reuben said, “The Camel Club has spoken.”

“What is the Camel Club?” a puzzled Kate asked.

“Let me do the honors,” Stone finally said.

CHAPTER

50

“YOU DID WHAT!” ALEX YELLED into his cell phone. He had been sitting in his hotel room the next morning just strapping on his gun when Kate called.

“See, that’s why I waited until this morning to call you,” she said. “Because I knew you’d be upset.”

“What the hell did you expect me to do? Say, ‘Good job, Kate, and I’m really glad you’re not a corpse’?”

“I told you I was going to check into Oliver Stone and his friends, and you said it was okay.”

“But I didn’t know they were eyewitnesses to Johnson’s murder, which was the very thing I told you to stay away from in the first place!”

“Well, I didn’t know they were connected either. So just hear me out. I’ve got a lot to tell you.” She spoke for several minutes, relaying what Stone had told her last night.

When she finished, Alex shook his head incredulously. “Okay, okay. Let me get this straight. They saw the murder and didn’t go to the police because they were afraid the police would think they were involved?”

“I don’t believe Oliver likes the police very much. Maybe it’s to do with his past.”