would head for his jeep. He wouldn't know anyone knew where he'd parked it.
Chapter Thirty
The first leg of the trip to the place where West had left his jeep Chee covered at a run. That phase ended when he ran into a pinon limb, which knocked him off his feet and inscribed a bloody scratch across the side of his forehead. After that he alternated a fast walk, where visibility was bad, with a cautious trot, where it wasn't. The rain squall passed away to the east, the sky lightened a little, and Chee found himself doing more running than walking. He wanted to reach the jeep before West got there. He wanted to be waiting for West. But when he found the thickets where the jeep was parked, and pushed his way through them as quietly as he could, West was already climbing into the driver's seat.
Chee pulled out his pistol and flicked on the flash.
'Mr. West,' he said. 'Hold your hands up where I can see them.'
'Who's that?' West said. He squinted into the brightness. 'Is that you, Chee?'
Chee was remembering the bloody throat of the man in the Lincoln. 'Get your hands up,' he said. 'That sound you hear is me cocking this pistol.'
West raised his hands, slowly.
'Get out,' Chee said.
West climbed out of the jeep.
'Put your hands on the hood. Spread your legs apart.' Chee searched him, removed a snub-nosed revolver from his hip pocket. He found nothing else. 'Where's the knife?' he asked.
West said nothing.
'Why didn't you take the money?' Chee asked him.
'I wasn't after money,' West said. 'I wanted the man. And I got the son of a bitch.'
'Because your son was killed?'
'That's right,' West said.
'I think maybe you killed the wrong one,' Chee said.
'No,' West said. 'I got the right one. The one who gave the orders.'
'Put your hands behind your back,' Chee said. He handcuffed West.
Chee was suddenly dazzled by a beam of light.
'Drop the gun,' a voice ordered. 'Now! Drop it!'
Chee dropped his pistol.
'And the flashlight!'
Chee dropped the flashlight. It produced a pool of light at his feet.
'You're a persistent bastard,' the voice said. 'I told you to stay away from this.'
It was Johnson's voice. And it was Johnson's face Chee could see now in the reflected light. 'Hands behind your back,' he said, and cuffed Chee's hands behind him.
He picked up Chee's pistol, and West's, and tossed them into the back of West's jeep.
'Okey dokey,' Johnson said. 'Let's get this over with and get out of the rain. Let's go get the coke.' He gestured with the pistol toward West. 'Where've you got it?'
'I guess I'll get me a lawyer and talk to him first,' West said.
Chee laughed, but he didn't feel like laughing. He felt stupid. He should have expected Johnson. Johnson would have found a way to intercept West's instructions about the meeting. Certainly if another telephone call was involved, tapping a line would be no problem for the dea agent. 'I don't think Johnson is going to read your rights to you,' Chee said.
'No, I'm not,' Johnson said. 'I'm going to leave him with the same deal he made the organization. He keeps the five hundred thousand dollars. I get the coke.'
'How do you know he hasn't already delivered it?' Chee asked.
'Because I've been watching him,' Johnson said. 'He hasn't picked the stuff up.'
'But maybe he had it stashed out in the village up there,' Chee said.
Johnson ignored him. 'Come on,' he said to West. 'We'll take my car. We'll go get the stuff.'
West didn't move. He stared through the flashlight beam at Johnson. Johnson hit him with the pistol—a smashing blow across the face. West staggered backward, lost his balance, fell against the jeep.
Johnson chuckled. There was lightning again, a series of flashes. The rain came down harder. 'That surprised him,' Johnson said to Chee. 'He still thinks I'm your regular-type cop. You don't think that, do you?'
'No,' Chee said. 'I haven't thought that for a while.'
West was trying to get to his feet, awkwardly because of his arms cuffed behind him. 'Not since when?' Johnson asked. 'I'm curious.'
'Well,' Chee said, 'when you were hunting for the shipment down by the crash site, down in Wepo Wash, one of those guys hunting with you was one of the hoods. Or at least I thought he might be. But I was already suspicious.'
