“I’ve got something I need hauled.”
“What?”
“That’s rather delicate.”
“If you want something delicate, I suggest that you look in the women’s department at Macy’s downtown.” He walked over to a utility sink.
“Let me rephrase that then. I have about three hundred kilograms to bring out of Colombia.” Davis quickly glanced at him again, his gaze slightly askance.
“Just who referred you to me?” Holding his hands under the faucet of a utility sink, Davis scrubbed his hands with a mechanic’s soap.
“Tell me, Mr....”
“Hewlett. Paul Hewlett.”
“Tell me, Mr. Hewlett just how you came to know about my alleged services?”
“Do you recall a Mr. Jacob Townsend?”
“Townsend?...Townsend?...Townsend?”
“Just under six feet, light brown hair, southern drawl.”
“Doesn’t ring a bell? Should it?”
A moment passed. Then like a fine timepiece set in motion, one could see the gears gathering speed in Davis’ mind. “Let me guess. Talks about Texas as though it was God’s gift to the world? Doesn’t miss a single University of Texas football game on his satellite TV? Flunked out of school there in his first or second year?”
“One and the same. He’s a stockbroker now.”
“I pity the people who trust him with their money.”
“Actually, he’s not a bad stockbroker.”
“Bullshit. Every time I worked for him, payment was late and light. Hell it once took me six months to get my money from the man. Still owes me a thousand.”
“Really?” Hewlett felt a little crestfallen from the news but knew it was not beneath Jake to hold out on paying bills until the bill collectors came knocking. But why anger those who helped you when it came down to moving illicit contraband. That was why, when he said he wanted to be in charge of finances of their small operation, Hewlett put his foot down. “Well then, Scruffy Brewer also recommended you to me. You don’t have any problems with Scruffy, do you?”
“Well, Scruffy’s a different matter. I don’t know why the hell Townsend referred anyone to me. I think he’s a grade “A” asshole. One of life’s mysteries I guess.”
“You’d have to understand Jake to make sense of it. Jake, though I love him like a cousin, sometimes has the common sense of a lemming near a cliff. I think he was really impressed with your beast out there. I don’t know how else to put it.”
“Well, we all make mistakes.”
“Just how did you know he was my partner?”
“I’ve been married five times. After a while, things like marriages and partnerships are a dead giveaway. Besides, it would be typical for Jake to send someone else on an errand he shouldn’t entrust to anyone but himself or his partner. Given our history, he’d send his partner.”
“I see your point. Besides, this is a big haul.”
“You can’t expect me to haul something for you on Townsend’s recommendations.”
“No. Especially of this nature.”
“Let me guess. It involves an illicit cargo from a faraway land.” He paused as he rinsed his hands under the faucet, first using Borax to remove the grease. “Tell me, Mr. Hewlett. How can I trust you?”
“Scruffy Brewer will verify me as someone you can trust. Besides, you’d be paid handsomely. And I’m not Jake.”
“I haven’t spoken to Scruffy for a month or two. See what he has to say.” He paused a moment. “Jake Townsend. I was hoping to never hear that name again.”
“Scruffy and I go back a long ways. All the way to high school. If anything, he’s my best friend. Jake, well, Jake is just my cousin.”
“Your cousin!” Davis took out a second cigarette and lit it. “We all have our cross to bear.” Taking a deep drag, he blew smoke rings in the dust-strewn light of the hangar. “I guess we have no choice just whose blood we have in common when we’re born. I told my doctor I’d stop smoking. I’m down to five cigarettes a day. Just thinking of Townsend made me double my quota.”
For those who knew Jake, there was no middle ground. They either loved or hated him. To the former, he was nothing but a glad-handing loser; to the latter, he was an ungrateful, irritating liar. Unfortunately, most of those who knew his cousin well fell into the second coterie. Hewlett, who knew Jake to be cheerful, positive and mercurial. He was also aware of his other side. He was unreliable, arrogant, self-centered, and, always, ungrateful. Many loathed him. Hewlett took the good with the bad.
“Friends call me Skeeter, but we never reached that point, Townsend and me. As far as I’m concerned, you can call me Mr. Davis for now too. Oh, and it is a fairy tale. Deal in illicit drugs and sooner or later, you’re going to pay for it.”
“Why’s that Mr. Davis?’”
“It just is that way. Mr. Hewlett, get out while the getting is good.”
“I can’t.”
“Tell me Mr. Davis, where’d you pick up the nickname of Skeeter?”
“Have to live with it. Have to answer to it. But don’t have to explain it. Would have preferred something in a more normal range Mr. Hewlett...”
“Please call me Paul.”
“Well, Mr. Hewlett you caught me at low tide. As I said, I’ve got five ex-wives, and they’re all screaming for money. I’ve got a boy with a bad back. He needs surgery...the sooner the better. And he’s got no insurance. There’s irony for you: the richest, mightiest country in the world, and we can’t take care of our own when they get sick. And now some stranger I just met wants me to fly contraband to fix his back. I’ve got a daughter who just needs a couple thousand to break into the modelling business. And to top that off, I’ve got a son who’s convinced he’s the next George Lucas in the movie business. He tells me he just needs a start. I got no idea who George Lucas is.” Davis paused. He picked a bottle of hand conditioner and rubbed it over his hands and forearms. “My one glaring fault is that I can’t say ‘no’ to people. Some people claim it’s my temper that’s my fault, but that just ain’t so; it’s saying ‘no’ to people. It’s gotten me into more trouble than I’d care to remember. Come over here to my office.” The inside of the hangar smelled like an auto mechanic’s used rag at the end of the day.
“I tell you what. You join me having a beer, and I’ll tell you what I can or can’t do for you or that bullshitting partner of yours. Fair?”
“Fair enough. A beer sounds good about now.”
Following Davis, he walked over to the office of the hanger and sat in the sofa, while Davis sat in the leather chair behind the desk. “It fits you, Mr. Davis.”
“It does, doesn’t it?” Davis stood up and walked out of the