Persuader

and unwrapped another one. Loaded it and clicked the safety and laid it next to the first one. Caught Duffy looking right at me.
    "It's what they're for," I said. "An empty gun is no good to anybody." I put the empty Brenneke boxes back in the carton and closed the lid. Villanueva was looking at Bizarre Bazaar's crates. He had paperwork in his hands.
    "These look like carpets to you?" he said.
    "Not a whole lot," I said.
    "U.S. Customs thinks they do. Guy called Taylor signed off on them as handwoven rugs from Libya."
    "That'll help," I said. "You can give this Taylor guy to ATF. They can check his bank accounts. Might make you more popular."
    "So what's really in them?" Duffy said. "What do they make in Libya?"
    "Nothing," I said. "They grow dates."
    "This all is Russian stuff," Villanueva said. "It's been through Odessa twice. Imported to Libya, turned right around, and exported here. In exchange for two hundred Persuaders.
    Just because somebody wants to look tough on the streets of Tripoli."
    "And they make a lot of stuff in Russia," Duffy said.
    I nodded. "Let's see what, exactly." There were nine crates in three stacks. I lifted the top crate off the nearest stack and Villanueva got busy with his claw hammer. He pulled the lid off and I saw a bunch of AK-74s nested in wood shavings. Standard Kalashnikov assault rifles, well used. Boring as hell, street value maybe two hundred bucks each, depending on where you were selling them. They weren't fashion items. I couldn't see any guys in North Face jackets trading in their beautiful matte-black H&Ks for them.
    The second crate was smaller. It was full of wood shavings and AKSU-74 submachine guns. They're AK-74 derivatives. Efficient, but clunky. They were used too, but well maintained. Not exciting. No better than a half-dozen Western equivalents. NATO hadn't lain awake at night worrying about them.
    The third crate was full of nine-millimeter Makarov pistols. Most of them were scratched and old. It's a crude and lazy design, ripped off from the ancient Walther PP. The Soviet military was never much of a handgun culture. They thought using sidearms was right down there with throwing stones.
    "This is all crap," I said. "Best thing to do with this stuff would be melt it down and use it for boat anchors." We started on the second stack, and found something much more interesting in the very first crate. It was full of VAL Silent Sniper rifles. They were secret until 1994, when the Pentagon captured one. They're all black, all metal, with a skeleton stock. They fire special heavy nine-millimeter subsonic rounds. Tests showed they penetrated any body armor you chose to wear at a range of five hundred yards. I remember a fair amount of consternation at the time. There were twelve of them. The next crate held another twelve.
    They were quality weapons. And they looked good. They would go really well with the North Face jackets. Especially the black ones with the silver linings.
    "Are they expensive?" Villanueva asked.
    I shrugged. "Hard to say. Depends on what a person is willing to pay, I guess. But an equivalent Vaime or SIG bought new in the U.S. could cost over five grand."
    "Then that's the whole invoice value right there." I nodded. "They're serious weapons. But not a lot of use in south-central LA. So their street value might be much less."
    "We should go," Duffy said.
    I stepped back to line up the view through the glass and out the back office window. It was mid-afternoon. Gloomy, but still light.
    "Soon," I said.
    Villanueva opened the last crate in the second stack.
    "What the hell is this?" he said.
    I stepped over. Saw a nest of wood shavings. And a slim black tube with a short wooden section to act as a shoulder rest. A bulbous missile loaded ready in the muzzle. I had to look twice before I was sure.
    "It's an RPG-7," I said. "It's an anti-tank rocket launcher. An infantry weapon, shoulder- fired."
    "RPG means rocket propelled grenade," he said.
    "In English," I said. "In Russian it means Reaktivniy Protivotankovyi Granatomet, rocket anti-tank grenade launcher. But it uses a missile, not a grenade."
    "Like the long-rod penetrator?" Duffy said.
    "Sort of," I said. "But it's explosive."
    "It blows up tanks?"
    "That's the plan."
    "So who's going to buy it from Beck?"
    "I don't know."
    "Drug dealers?"
    "Conceivably. It would be very effective against a house. Or an armored limousine. If your rival bought a bulletproof BMW, you'd need one of these."
    "Or