Rough Weather: A Spenser Novel

and looked at the litend, seemed satisfied with the way it was burning, and put the cigar back in his mouth.
    “But Leonard doesn’t do it himself,” I said. “Instead, he hires these guys from Far Goofystan, and they botch it.”
    Tony let out a soft puff of smoke. I always like the smell of a good cigar.
    “And Leonard panics,” I said. “He knows he shouldn’t have gone around you and he doesn’t know what else to do, so he tells you. You know that the trail will eventually lead back to you unless you take action. So you send Lamar down to see what these guys are likely to do, and get them out if he can. And you kill Leonard to underscore his fecklessness. Lamar can’t get these guys out, but he explains their language limitations, and that so far he’s the only one can talk with them. So you got a couple days. You use the time to make arrangements, and when Quirk and Epstein schedule an interview with their own interpreter, Lamar gives you the news and you have the two goons killed.”
    “Fecklessness,” Tony said.
    “It is also my theory that you got nothing to do with Tashtego except that Leonard dragged your name in.”
    Tony blew some more cigar smoke around.
    “Fecklessness,” he said. “I like it. Fecklessness.”
    I waited.
    “The theory makes sense,” Tony said after a while.
    “Anything I might have missed,” I said.
    “Nothing that matters,” Tony said.
    “And I shouldn’t anticipate any problems from your, ah, organization,” I said.
    “Not if you are discreet,” Tony said.
    “Any idea where Leonard got these guys?”
    “Might have been a guy he met up in Marshport,” Tony said. “There was some Afghani influence, wasn’t there?”
    “Boots Podolak was in business with an Afghani warlord named Haji Haroon,” I said.
    “It wouldn’t be feckless,” Tony said, “to think there could be a connection with Leonard.”
    “Worth looking into?” I said.
    “Dead end,” Tony said. “Somebody aced Leonard’s only contact up there.”
    “Could that someone be Ty-Bop?” I said.
    “The boy gets restless,” Tony said. “Trust me, there’s no loose ends up there.”
    “So,” I said, “you got this buttoned up pretty tight.”
    “I didn’t initiate this. I wouldn’t have permitted it. I don’t need any of this. It interferes with business.”
    “So you closed it down.”
    Tony nodded.
    “Except for Lamar,” I said. “That’s how I got to you.”
    “Lamar is my attorney,” Tony said.
    “And,” I said, “being your attorney, he can invoke privilege whenever he needs to.”
    “And will,” Tony said.

 
    It was the way it was
supposed to be in Boston in November. Gray and kind of chilly and a steady rain falling. Cars had their headlights on at ten in the morning when Hawk and I drove to Epstein’s office in Government Center.
    “I be out here by the elevators,” Hawk said. “I not going in any FBI office.”
    “J. Edgar’s ghost will be grateful,” I said.
    “You think it wearing a dress?” Hawk said.
    I went in. Epstein pushed a folder across the desk at me as I sat down.
    “Been working with our forensic accounting folks,” Epstein said.
    “The excitement never stops,” I said.
    “You can learn a lot from accountants,” Epstein said.
    “I have no doubt,” I said. “What’d you learn?”
    “Van Meer and Bradshaw are both nearly broke,” Epstein said.
    “Can Heidi take credit for that?”
    “She costs both of them a sickening amount of money,” Epstein said. “Van Meer didn’t help himself much by being a drunk and slopping through most of his inheritance. Bradshaw pays a huge alimony, and he still maintains that private island. Essentially, since they’ve split, for her.”
    “Tashtego,” I said.
    “Yep. He was never as rich as Van Meer in the first place, though from the looks of what he spent, he tried to pretend he was. If it was to impress her, then she pretty well cleaned him out.”
    “That college professor was lucky to escape with his life,” I said.
    “Her first husband, yeah. Other than sort of a modest income from what investments he still has working for him,” Epstein said, “Bradshaw’s biggest asset is a very large life insurance policy with Heidi as beneficiary.”
    “I were Bradshaw,” I said, “that might make me nervous. How about Van Meer.”
    “He cashed his in for the surrender value,” Epstein said.
    “So he’s not worth much to them dead or alive,” I said.
    “The bank is moving to