McGarvey loosened his tie. “He was a friend of mine, Artime. A very good friend. I had him make a few inquiries for me, and he was shot to death for his trouble. Left a wife and children.”
“I told you, goddamnit. I sat there and told you over and over again. But nobody would believe me. Called me a slimeball. Well, maybe now you believe me.”
“He’ll probably be coming after you next.”
A momentary look of alarm crossed Basulto’s face. McGarvey got the impression that it might have been a put on. But then Basulto was an unusual man and hard to read.
“Then we’d better get the bastard.”
“That’s what I’m here for.”
“Have you got a plan?” Basulto asked eagerly.
“I’m going to need your help, Artime,” McGarvey said, patiently. He took a drag on his cigarette. He wanted to be almost anyplace except here.
Beside the dresser was a large paper bag. Basulto pulled a couple of beers out of the bag, opened them, and brought them over to the table. A peace offering. He hadn’t shaved in a couple of days, and his complexion was red and splotchy. He’d probably been boozing it pretty hard, cooped up here like this. He smelled ripe.
“Anything,” he said eagerly. “I’m a pretty good trigger man. Christ, Mr. McGarvey, I don’t give a shit, see. As long as you guys hold up your end of the bargain, I’ll do my part. Anything.”
“We appreciate it, believe me,” McGarvey said, accepting a beer. He motioned for the Cuban to sit down.
“Anything, Mr. McGarvey,” Basulto said sitting across the table. “I mean anything. Goddamnit, I love this country. You could be Roger Harris’s twin, you know.”
“He was quite a guy.”
“Yes, he was …”
“Ambitious, from what I gather,” McGarvey said. He took a deep drink of the warm beer, then raised the can to Basulto; two conspirators gathered to share a little secret.
“You talked to someone else about him,” Basulto said. “You looked up his record. Found out about him. All right, so what are you doing here? What do you want from me? I told you I’d give you anything.”
“The truth, Artime,” McGarvey said.
Basulto drank his beer with a nervous energy, as if he were a man just off the desert who’d suddenly found himself in the midst of a grand party; he didn’t know which way to look or how to behave.
“Okay. What do you want? Just ask me,” he said defiantly. “I’ve gone over this so many times, not only with them, but in my own mind, that I’m not sure of anything. Do you know what I’m saying? You capice?”
He’d internationalized his act, but it was no more convincing than it had been in Switzerland.
“Just a couple of minor points, nothing terribly important. Just something I have to get straight in my mind before we fly off the handle. Lives are at stake here, you know.”
“Yeah, mine for one.”
“Back to Miami. I’m interested in that period,” McGarvey said softly. “After Roger Harris had recruited you and you’d been sent up here for training. I’d like to know about that. You never really did cover those days in any detail.”
Basulto just looked at him, his eyes unblinking.
“I’d like to know about the team that trained you. Their names if you can remember them. Maybe their methods. What sorts of things they were filling your head with in those days. What kind of a place they put you up in.”
“A dump,” Basulto said, and he took another drink of his beer. “Not far from here. But it’s all gone by now. Torn down. Progress.”
McGarvey handed him a cigarette and held a light for him.
“Who was it got wasted?” he asked. “Anyone I know?”
“There were two of them.”
Basulto’s hand shook.
“One of them was looking up your records, and the other was Darby Yarnell’s old boss.”
“Christ,” Basulto swore softly. “Christ.” He glanced at the door. “Were you followed down here?”
“He knows I’m here, Artimé. And there’s a good chance he knows you’re here, too.”
“Oh, well, that’s just goddamned fine now, isn’t it. Why didn’t you take out a full page ad in the newspapers? Send the bastard a printed invitation.”
“We’re running out of time.”
“No shit.”
“I’m going to need your help. The truth now, it’s the only thing that’s going to save your ass. We’re going to have to burn Yarnell, and whoever he’s working with. But in order for me to do that, I need to know everything.”
“It’s his army, isn’t it? His mob.”
McGarvey looked at the man in amazement. “Where’d you hear that?” he asked softly.
Basulto hadn’t heard or understood the question. He was sweating now, nervously tapping the cigarette against the edge of the ashtray until the ash fell off. “I don’t know how the hell we’re going to nail him now. You were supposed to be the best. What a joke.”
“You mentioned Yarnell’s mob. Where’d you hear about that?”
“I don’t know,” Basulto said absently, his mind still on his own troubles. He looked up. “Mr. Trotter mentioned that we were going to have to be very careful. He was talking with Mr. Day and some of the others. They said Yarnell had his own private army.”
“A mob?” McGarvey asked again, wondering why it was that sometimes the little things bothered him more than the bigger issues.
“Mob. Army. Crowd. Christ, I don’t know. Crucify me for a choice of words.” Basulto was becoming agitated again. “If he sends his army down here after us, we won’t have a chance in hell.”
“What makes you think that?”
Basulto shook his head. “The sonofabitch has managed to survive this long, hasn’t he?”
“But we know about him now.”
“So what are you going to do about it? Are you going to talk him to death?”
“Do you think it would work?”
“Not fucking likely!” Basulto snapped. “You’re going to have to blow him away. It’s the only way. He’s too smart for you. Roger Harris got in his way, and he got wasted for his stupidity. Don’t you be next, because this time my ass is really on the line. I got no place else to go.”
“He’s working with someone, Artimé.”
“Yeah, his army.”
“He’s a spy. He has a control officer. Someone who calls the shots. Someone he reports to. He’s got his own Roger Harris.”
“The Russian from Mexico City.”
“Perhaps. But that was a long time ago.” McGarvey was watching the Cuban’s eyes. There was no clear-cut reaction.
“Maybe he’s still around.”
“It’s possible. But Yarnell has someone else he’s working with, or for. Someone in Washington.”
Now Basulto’s eyes narrowed. “Who?”
“I don’t know. Not yet.”
Again Basulto glanced toward the door. “Mr. Trotter? Could it be him? He’s trying to burn us both and keep his hands clean? It sounds like something Yarnell might have done.”
“Had you ever met him before they brought you to Switzerland?”
“No.”
“How about Mr. Day?”
“No, never saw either of them until they showed up down here.”
“Yarnell never made an appearance during your training here in Miami?”
“I would have recognized him in Mexico City. We went through all this before. He never came here. Neither did Roger, for that matter. I was sent up here for my training, and when I was finished they shipped me back to Havana.”
“So how many people were here in Miami for you, Artimé? Two? Three? A dozen?”
“Two of them, mostly. And don’t ask because I can’t remember their names, except for the communications expert. He was the third man. Showed up for a couple of days then left. He was called Scotty. Had just gotten out of the army.”