Trap Line - Carl Hiaasen [45]
It was, to Manolo’s eyes, a disaster; fragile beauty gone forever. Still, he supposed, one could not have it both ways. The venal officials charged with protecting what little of beauty remained in the Keys were the same ones who were supposed to suppress the commerce in which he himself traded. If they were effective at one, they might also be good at the other.
Manolo directed his full attention to rehearsing the lines he would say to Jorge. The conversation with Colombia that awaited him would be an ordeal. The time and location made that plain. Matilde was a punishment.
The booth sat in the middle of a desert, the survivor of a get-rich-quick scheme gone bust. “Trade Winds, a Community for Tomorrow,” read the slick aqua-and-tan billboard along US 1. For perhaps ten acres the land was totally flat and absolutely barren, limestone broiling in the sun. Nothing grew and nothing moved. The fifty-foot lots, each with its carefully carved finger canal, were a study in desolation. The square stucco sales office, single-story with a cypress fronting, was marked by broken windows and the smell of urine. A few come-on flags still hung limply from the roof, colors faded to gray by the merciless sun.
It must have been 120 inside the blue-and-white phone booth. But at least the phone worked: in Jorge’s books the phones always worked. Manolo jammed the door open with a chunk of coral in the forlorn hope some fresh air might seep in. Then he sat in his Cadillac with the engine running, waiting.
The phone rang precisely at noon.
“Con Carlos Ibañez, por favor,” the voice said.
“El no está,” Manolo gave the prescribed response.
“Cuando vuelve?”
“Para la pascua.”
“Momentito,” the girl’s voice said, and Manolo heard some clicks. Electronic games, probably.
“Manolo. What the fuck is going on up there?”
Manolo sighed. For Jorge, no pleasantries.
“Business is fine. Is there a problem?”
“Not the business. The transportation. What happened? What went wrong?”
“You asked for a boat and I provided it. You asked for a first-class captain and I found one, although I told you it wasn’t easy. That nobody here would touch that kind of job. What else should I know?”
“What I know is that I have had about a half-dozen hysterical phone calls from Miami already this morning. Fewer than half the people I sent have arrived. And they were screaming about shooting and explosions. One van apparently got caught by the highway patrol in the fallout. I need twenty people in Miami, and right now I got nine. How come?”
“I can’t answer that. But if there were big problems, I would have heard it already. The pickup was by your people from Miami, remember? I don’t know what went wrong. I only did what you told me.”
“Don’t feed me that Pontius Pilate bullshit, my friend. You are paid to take care of things for me up there. If things got screwed up, it was because something went wrong with the boat, or the captain got smart. I had a good man on that boat to run things for me, and he’s one of those missing.”
“Was it a clean pickup, Jorge? Like I suggested? Cash and no hassle?”
From Colombia came only static and silence. Instantly, Manolo understood.
“Because if it wasn’t,” he continued, “maybe the Conchs didn’t like the way you wrote the ending. Maybe that’s what happened, huh?” The booth was an oven. His soggy shirt stuck to his ribs like a rag; his tongue seemed bloated.
“I believe that is what happened,” said the voice from Colombia. “And now you must repair the damage for me—permanently. My prestige has suffered. I will not tolerate it.”
“Look, for God’s sake, Jorge, like I told you, people don’t like that kind of thing around here. This is not Colombia.”
“That is no concern of mine. Without a reputation I have no business. My reputation has been damaged by someone you provided. I don’t have to spell out what must come next.”
“This is a lousy connection. Let me get some facts and I’ll call you in a couple of days, OK? After the next shipment.”
“The shipment will arrive on schedule. Your other instructions