Fiction: Finsoup (a novel) [41]

Dog with a Bone

By edRogers

[Reviewed here on the novel’s publication day, October 6, 2018: “Coming soon to a Barnes & Noble store near you?”]

Charlie had received a letter from Diego Acedo, Margot’s attorney, who asked if Charlie could drop by for a chat.
    The little bell over Acedo’s office door tinkled when Charlie walked in. “Have a seat, I’ll be right with you.”
    Charlie sat in the attorney’s old leather visitor’s chair, wondering what Diego wanted to talk about. After the loan for the boat had been repaid, he had had no more dealings with the attorney. The boat now lay at the bottom of the ocean and the deed for it was still with Diego waiting to be picked up by the other party. Charlie had kept his end of the bargain by returning from the sea.
    The heavyset man with the big, warm smile came in from the back room. “So glad to see you, Mr. Blankenship.” He shook Charlie’s hand and went to his desk. He shoved aside the papers he had been working on to create a clean opening between himself and Charlie. “I guess I should have reached out to you before now, but I did not want to interfere with your grieving.”
    “I doubt there will ever be a time when I don’t feel the loss.”
    Diego smiled knowingly. “I too miss her. We were friends for many years.”
    Diego’s office smelled of old papers and old furniture, and while Diego was a very nice man, Charlie was ready to go. “What can I do for you, Mr. Acedo?”
    The attorney opened a drawer and removed a document. “This is Margot Rosenburg’s Last Will and Testament. She had no family and three days before her murder she came in here and made a new will, which leaves everything she owned in this life to you.”
    Charlie wasn’t sure what that meant. “What are you talking about? Why would she leave anything to me?”
    Diego handed Charlie the envelope. “I don’t know, Mr. Blankenship. She left this letter – maybe it will shine some light.”
    Diego slipped the will into a folder with other papers. “I have made out the paperwork you will need at the bank and the registrar’s office. You should get the bank account and the house transferred to your name as soon as you can.”
    He walked around his desk and put out his hand. “If there is anything I can do to help, please call.”
    Charlie took Diego’s hand and he could feel the warmth and sadness the attorney was feeling at that moment.
    The next thing Charlie was aware of, he was standing on the sidewalk with a letter in one hand and a folder in the other. There are three streets in Puntarenas, and all three meet at the end of the peninsula. There is the one that runs along the inlet ending at Tai’s warehouse and the main street that runs through the business part of town with all the stores and schools. Then there is the beachfront street. It runs from the end of the peninsula to the main highway and is the exit road. From the end of the peninsula all the way to the big ship dock where tourist boats and Tai’s finning boat tie up to unload, nice indoor cafes line the beachfront street on one side and small outdoor beach cafes and bars dot the landscape on the other. The attorney’s office was beyond the tourist area, so he drove the jeep to find a café.
    Charlie parked by the curb and walked across the sand, where he found a table in the shade and ordered a beer. He was still looking at the folder when the girl placed the bottle of Imperial beer and a glass of ice in front of him. He poured the beer over the ice – something he had got used to doing in Costa Rica, where the Ticos drink their beer slowly and so needed ice to keep it cold. He downed two swallows and picked up the letter.
    He opened it and saw Margot’s beautiful handwriting:

Dearest Charlie,
    If you are reading this, something has happened to me. I know it will be a surprise to find I have left everything to you. I have no one else in the world to leave my things with but you. I know you will care for and love my home as I did. Charlie, don’t be sad. No, that is not true, I want you to be sad and to miss me as much as I would miss you. But don’t give up on life, there are a lot of good things that can still be done in this world. I want you to find them and become the man who will make you happy and fulfill you.
    Have a good life, Charlie, and always remember you were loved more than anything in this world.
    Good-bye, my dear Charlie.
                    –M

    Charlie wiped the tears from his eyes and gently refolded the letter and returned it to the envelope, which he put into the folder. He felt devastated to realize that he and Margot had wasted so much time and that he had been such a fool. And he and he alone was responsible for all the deaths. His stupid pride had started the killing.
    He finished his beer and ordered another one. His pity party suddenly came to an end with the arrival of Captain Araya. “Mind if I join you for a few minutes?”
    Charlie gave him an extended go-to-hell look.“And if I do mind – what then?”
    Araya touched his handcuffs. “Then we’ll go to my place for the conversation.”
    Charlie pushed a chair out with his foot. “Then, by all means, please have a seat.”
    Araya dropped a folder on the table between himself and Charlie, who asked, “What do you have now – more family photos?”
    Araya opened the folder. “Not exactly, it is more of a timeline. I find it strange when people tell me they don’t know each other but they show up in the same place and time. I don’t like loose ends, so stop jerking me around— May I call you Charlie? It seems like I know you well enough.”
    Charlie drank some of his beer and leaned back in the chair. “Sure, Captain Araya, call me anything that makes you feel good. You’re like a dog with a bone. It no longer has any meat or flavor – it’s just a hard old bone – but you cannot let it go.”
    Araya smiled. “ Even a hard bone has its uses, Charlie. For instance, the DNA on the gun that killed your friends belonged to a well-known enforcer of the Morales Cartel, a dumb shit by the name of Papo Romero.”
    Charlie reached for his beer. “Well, I’m happy to know you have cleared me of those murders, anyway.”
    Araya couldn’t stop the laugh that erupted from his throat – he hadn’t seen it coming. “Hell, this doesn’t clear you of anything.”
    Charlie shook his head. “Didn’t you just say the DNA belonged to this Papo person?”
    “That doesn’t mean he pulled the trigger. It just means it was his blood on the gun. By the way, you don’t seem surprised that your friends were killed by a drug cartel. Why is that?”
    Charlie was tired of playing cat and mouse. “Tommy owned a cigar boat and Howard owned an airplane, two sorts of things that have been used to move drugs, so why would I be surprised? If you have some kind of proof I killed somebody, then arrest me. Otherwise leave me the hell alone.”
    “Well, Charlie, I wish it were that easy. Here is why I keep coming back to you. I have you taking a trip to Nicaragua on the same bus as Papo Romero. Then somehow you leave the town of La Virgen, where both you and Papo had gotten off the bus. There have been no sightings of Papo since he got off that bus. Do you have any idea where he is or where he went? Because I know where you went. I just don’t know how you got there. But, somehow, you end up flying out of Emerald Coast Airport, which is a good hundred miles away from La Virgen. The really strange thing about all this is that Agents Morris and Nowak of the D.E.A. – whom you say you don’t know – were at the same airport. In fact, they caught a flight back to the States shortly after you left on a plane to Liberia.”
    Only a little beer was left in the bottle so instead of pouring it in the glass he drank from the bottle and emptied it. “I’m sure you checked the video and know I never entered the International Terminal; I caught a local flight at the other end of the airport. So, what is your point, Captain Araya?”
    “What I’m saying is, when four people who don’t know each other show up at the same place at the same time, it means they’re lying about knowing each other.”
    Charlie abruptly grabbed his folder and stood up. “Then prove it!” He walked out of the café, got in Margot’s jeep, and headed to her house. On the way there he remembered it was his house now, and sadness returned to cover up the irritation that Araya had just been aggravating.

Copyright © 2018 by Ed Rogers