‘Hey, Harry, I got to hand it to ya. I never thought we’d find Aslan, even working together, but you went and did it all by yourself.’
I waved him off. ‘I’m going inside now, Hansen. You coming along?’
‘Yeah, sure, but if it’s not too much trouble, would you mind telling me exactly what you hope to accomplish. Just so we’re on the same track.’
‘Do you remember those pictures that surfaced six or seven years ago, of American soldiers humiliating prisoners in Iraq?’
‘Don’t tell me you’re gonna strip him down and sic a dog on his balls.’
My reply wiped the smile off Linde’s face. ‘It’s a culture thing,’ I told him. ‘The Chechens have been resisting the Russians for two hundred years. No matter what the Russians do to them, they keep on fighting. Fighting Russians is how boys become men. The widow of a man who died fighting is honored for the rest of her life. All of their national heroes are warriors who fought the Russians. For Chechens, surrender is the ultimate sin.’
I pushed the door open and dropped my right foot onto the running board. ‘You still want to come along, Hansen?’
Linde stared at me for a moment, his face solemn, his gaze speculative. Then he grinned and nodded up and down several times.
‘You betcha,’ he said as he reached for the keys.
TWENTY-TWO
The home of Formatech Money Services was long and narrow, a single open space broken only by a small bathroom at the rear. There was a gray ping-pong table in the center of the room, chest-high workbenches along three walls, and a desk and a velour-covered couch along the fourth. Whorehouse red, the couch was the only spot of color in the room.
Aslan Khalid was sitting at the desk when I made my appearance, followed closely by Hansen Linde. Though Aslan’s mouth expanded slightly, he did not rise to greet us. On the other side of the room, two men stood next to the workbench. The older, a Latino, was stripped to the waist. He held a screwdriver in his left hand and his narrow face was streaked with sweat. The younger man was in his early thirties. He wore a white polo shirt over a pair of decently-tailored linen slacks and lattice-work sandals without socks. Silky fine, his carefully-styled hair reached his shoulders, while his beard and moustache were immaculately groomed.
‘What’s your name?’ Linde asked the younger man.
‘Nicolai Urnov.’ He took a deep breath, then walked to within a few feet of Linde. ‘I own this business. Who are you?’
‘Oh, yeah,’ Linde said, ‘I almost forgot.’ He reached into his jacket, withdrew the billfold containing his gold shield, then flicked it open for an instant before slapping it closed. ‘Now, what about this other guy? The guy standing behind you. What’s his name?’
‘What do you want with him? He just works here.’
‘I want his name.’
The older man turned to face Linde. ‘Miguel Sierra,’ he said. ‘I am not do nothing.’
‘Just work here, right?’
‘Si.’
‘Well, I’m giving you the night off, Miguel. Come back tomorrow.’ Sierra didn’t have to be asked twice. He was still buttoning his shirt when Hansen closed and locked the door behind him.
Thus far, I hadn’t said a word, nor had I turned my full attention to Aslan, though I could feel his gaze boring into the side of my head. Linde had placed himself at center stage and I was content to watch his performance. The fever that had driven me had now vanished. There would be time enough.
‘I’m going to call my attorney.’ Nicolai’s gaze became more intense and I got the distinct impression that he wasn’t accustomed to being ordered around. Still, he was a small man, not more than five-nine, and slightly built, a sullen monkey to Linde’s menacing gorilla.
‘Okay, great, but first I’m gonna have to search you. I mean, a guy could get himself in a whole lotta trouble by not checking a suspect for weapons.’
‘Suspected of what crime? I’m a legitimate businessman.’
Linde walked over to the workbench and pointed to a row of ATM machines. ‘Tell me about these, if it’s not too much trouble.’
‘I’m a legitimate businessman,’ Urnov repeated. ‘I place ATM machines in stores and split the service charge with the owner. I have a license from the Department of Consumer Affairs.’
Linde held up a slim plastic panel. ‘And what’s this?’ When Urnov didn’t answer, Linde said, ‘It’s a card reader, Nick. You add it to the slot on the ATM, it reads and stores the data on every card dipped into it.’
‘I want my lawyer,’ Urnov half shouted. ‘You don’t have a warrant. You have no right to be here.’
‘And what about these?’ Linde scooped up a handful of credit cards and carried them over to Urnov. Though each had a series of raised numbers on its face, the cards were white, the name of the bank conspicuously absent. ‘What do you plan to do with these?’
‘I’m not saying another word. I know my rights. I was born here.’
‘That makes you one up on me. I was born in Minnesota.’ Linde allowed the cards to fall through his fingers. ‘Now I want you to put your hands on the edge of that bench while I search you, Nick, and I really think it’d be a whole lot better if you did it now.’
Urnov’s mouth worked silently for a moment, then his eyes flicked to Aslan Khalid, his gaze accusing. Aslan first frowned, then gave the tiniest of shrugs. Our presence was his fault, no doubt, but there was nothing he could do. Finally, he looked up at me.
‘First preliminaries,’ he said, ‘then comes main event.’
‘Alright.’ Linde rubbed his hands together, then dropped them to Urnov’s shoulders. His fingers clamped down hard, then opened, then closed again as they moved along Urnov’s arms, inch by inch. ‘Now, stop me if you heard this one,’ he said. ‘What’s the difference between lutefisk and snot?’
‘Jesus Christ,’ Urnov protested, the words issuing between grunts of pain.
‘Nope, wrong answer. What’s the difference between lutefisk and snot?’
Linde continued to ask the question and his hands continued to clamp down as they moved from Urnov’s arms, to his ribs, to his waist, to the outside of his thighs. It was only when Linde reached Urnov’s ankles and started to come up the inside of the man’s legs, toward his crotch, that he truly caught Urnov’s attention. Was the psycho detective with the vice-grip hands running a bluff? Did he have a stopping point? There was simply no way for Nicky to be sure. Meanwhile, the family jewels were on the line.
‘What the fuck is loochapiss?’ Urnov finally cried.
‘Loo-te-fisk. What’s the difference between lutefisk and snot?’
‘I don’t know, okay. I don’t know the difference between lutefisk and snot.’
‘The difference between lutefisk and snot,’ Linde declared as he finally led Urnov to the couch and sat him down, ‘is that kids won’t eat lutefisk.’
Urnov’s tongue ran across the bottom of his mustache. ‘Is that supposed to be funny?’ he asked. The question was posed an instant too late. Linde was already beside himself with laughter.
‘Oh, yeah,’ he declared when he finally caught his breath, ‘that was a hot one.’
I gave Hansen a moment to recover by carrying a three-legged stool from the workbench to the front of Aslan’s desk. ‘What happened to the flag?’ I asked.
‘Flag?’
‘Yeah, the one that hung over your desk at Domestic Solutions.’
‘I have never heard of this company.’
‘How’d you know it was a company? Why not a rock band?’
‘If this stupidness is all you are having to speak, you should be going on your ways. I have living to make.’
‘At what?’
‘At whatever I am choose to be doing in free country.’
‘Fine, let me see your green card again.’
The request caught him off guard. Should he refuse? Comply? I watched the wheels turn for a moment, until he reached into his back pocket, withdrew his wallet, then extracted the document. I took it from his hand and passed it over to Linde.