The Monkey Handlers Read online

  “Now you’re thinking like your guard! The stakes are too high to make any assumptions but the worst. I’ll send Metz over on the next plane. You are to cooperate with him fully. Keep me advised until he arrives; after that, Metz will communicate with me directly. Good day, Kramer.”

  Hoess hung up. Kramer noticed that his hand holding the now-dead telephone was wet with sweat. The last thing he wanted was Metz. Chief of security for Riegar worldwide, Metz would have felt right at home in his native land fifty years ago.

  * * *

  As Stone was running and Kramer was on the phone with Hoess, Sara Rosen was yawning. Out of habit, she tried to stifle it by putting a hand over her mouth. She was prevented from doing so by the handcuff chain looped inside a belly chain around her waist. She was yawning because she had not slept all night. As she had been led back to the women’s detention pen from the matron’s office at the conclusion of her telephone call to Stone, the female deputy sheriff guarding her said, “Don’t get too comfy, sweetie. Chow for court cases is five o’clock.”

  “What happens then?” Sara asked.

  “R&D. Where you processed in at. Receivin’ an’ Discharge. You gets your own clothes back to wear to court. Then, when ever’body ready, you takes the van to court.”

  “How about a bath first?”

  “Bath?” The deputy laughed. “This the jailhouse, sweetie. Ain’ got no bath here. Shower, maybe. But you only been here one night. You gets to shower ever’ third day like ever’body else.”

  Swell, Sara thought. When I meet my lawyer for the first time, not only do I look like drek, I get to smell like it, too. Well, why not. The closer she got to the holding tank for women, the more she realized that the whole place stank of it. And urine. And sweat. And floating over it all was a powerful disinfectant odor, intended to mask the others, but that only added to the general stink. The combination smelled to Sara like … hopelessness.

  When she entered the tank itself and the barred door clanged shut behind her, her sense of smell was assaulted anew. The drunk in the corner on the tile floor had vomited all over herself and everything else in range. But before Sara had a chance to react, a different female deputy called to her through the bars. “Rosen.”

  Sara turned. “Yes.”

  The guard opened the door. “C’mon.”

  “Where are we going?”

  “R&D to get yer shit. You going for a ride.”

  “But court’s not until seven-thirty. And I’m hungry.”

  “I only work here, lady. Let’s go.”

  * * *

  The city court of the city of Rhinekill was located upstairs on the second floor of the two-story building at the corner of First Avenue and Main Street. The first floor housed Klein’s Retail Wine & Liquor. Apart from affording drunks given suspended sentences a convenient place to resupply themselves downstairs—thus guaranteeing another appearance upstairs—the location was convenient to the lawyers and the police. The county courthouse was on the opposite street corner; the police station across the street.

  Michael Stone skipped breakfast to arrive early at 7:15. He climbed the stairs and slipped into a seat at the rear. The place looked as much like a storefront church as it did a court. A high but crude wooden bench held the center of the front of the room. To the left and right of the bench, at a slightly lower elevation, were two matching boxed-in enclosures. One served as a witness box, the other as a workplace for the stenographer. In front of all was a fencelike low wooden railing. Everything was stained a deep brown by a combination of varnish and years of accumulated dirt.

  Six feet back from the railing, pews taken from an old church ran to the rear of the room. An aisle separated the rows of pews. Once upon a time, the floor had been stained. Years of footsteps of people who had rejected society, or been rejected by it, had long since worn the flooring into raw wood.

  Along the right wall, prisoners sat on benches under the watchful eye of a police sergeant. Lawyers sat in the front pews, but Stone didn’t know that. The police sergeant noticed Stone and recognized him as a lawyer—it was his business to know who was who in his small city. The sergeant spoke to the court clerk. “We got a newcomer, sittin’ in the back, observin’.” The sergeant chuckled. “Maybe he’s gonna run for your job.”

  The clerk, also a lawyer, glanced back at Stone. The lawyer sitting next to the clerk caught the motion and glanced back. He was an assistant district attorney: very young; the lowest in seniority or he would not have been there. Next to him were another young lawyer, an old-timer who had never made it, and at the far end, keeping her distance from the DA’s representative, a woman in her early thirties from the public defender’s office. Together, they composed the bar of the city court.

  The whispers started.

  “Who is he?”

  “Don’t know.”

  “Yes you do. He was at the bar association dinner in September. Stone. Old Harry’s nephew. Took over his real estate practice, such as it was. All he does.”

  “Must have some kind of service pension or something. Can’t be earning much.”

  “He’s some kind of aging, frustrated jock. Always exercising down at the athletic center.”

  The old-timer broke in, “Watch who you call aging, kid. That guy doesn’t look forty. Dry behind the ears means aging to you?”

  “All rise,” interrupted the bailiff.

  Stone searched the prisoner bench. There was only one woman. She was black. He waited as the court processed the prisoners, one after another. Mostly they were Discon—disorderly conduct; D&D—drunk and disorderly; Possession—of misdemeanor amounts of a controlled substance. Then there were the arraignments on serious charges that could not be heard by a court of such lowly jurisdiction: Assault Two—assault in the second degree; Burglary One—burglary in the first degree.

  For these defendants, the proceedings consisted of advising them of the charges against them, seeing to it that they were represented by counsel, and, when on occasion they were, scheduling a hearing for the judge to determine whether there was enough evidence in the hands of the state to bind the defendant over for the grand jury.

  Defendants represented by counsel usually demanded the hearing at the earliest possible date so they could learn something of the prosecution’s case. The assistant district attorney always tried to have the hearing put off as far as possible. It was the official start of a race. If the grand jury, whose proceedings were secret, could hand down an indictment before the date set for the preliminary hearing in city court, the hearing was rendered moot and the defendant effectively precluded from learning anything about the state’s case against him. The result was known among criminal lawyers as “trial by ambush.”

  As Sara Rosen failed to appear, Stone grew more and more uneasy. By the time the court started to try petty civil disputes, it was clear to him that something was wrong. He made his way up the center aisle to meet the assistant public defender. She was on her way to the stairs to leave. Stone stuck out his right hand. He knew the woman’s name from listening to her being addressed during the proceedings.

  “Miss Hannigan, Mike Stone. Could I take a few minutes of your time?”

  “Ms.,” she corrected, automatically. “Sure, counselor. What brings you to the awesome chambers of city court?” Stephanie Hannigan was a short, shapely honey blonde whose fashionable horn-rimmed glasses emphasized eyes that reflected an elfin wit.

  “Good question,” said Stone. “I’ve never been here before, and I’m not eager to come back, but I’m trying to do a favor for an old service buddy whose sister got picked up last night, apparently trespassing on the grounds of the Riegar plant. She told me she was due in city court at seven-thirty this morning, but she never showed.”

  Hannigan frowned. “If she was out on her own recognizance and didn’t show when she was supposed to, they’ll issue an warrant for her arrest and—”

  “She wasn’t out. She was in custody. This was to be her first appearanc
e before a magistrate.”

  Hannigan combed her fingers through her shoulder-length hair, “Hmmmm. Come to think of it, they would have called her name. They didn’t. It could be one thing, but I doubt it.”

  “What?”

  “Well, as you probably read in the paper, some animal-rights group has targeted Riegar—picketing, blocking the gate, and so on, just generally making a pain in the ass of themselves because Riegar, like every other drug manufacturer, tests out new stuff on animals. It’s the law, you know. FDA. They have to, before they can get permission to try it out on humans. The cops busted a bunch of them last week, but they were all let out on their own recog because most were from the area, and we’re talking like a twenty-five-dollar fine here. They’ll probably not even have to pay that. They want a trial so they can try out a screwball application of the necessity defense. They want the publicity. But the city fathers aren’t going to give it to them. Riegar’s about the only real tax base left in this town. The major employer. The council’s not about to blow it for a bunch of guinea pigs. Is your client their leader?”

  Stone moved aside to let some people pass them. “I don’t know, but I don’t think so. Why?”

  “Well,” said Hannigan, “if she was, they might be pulling something the cops and the DAs do from time to time to harass a defendant they’re pissed at and to try to get information. They ‘put ’em on the bus.’ A police car, actually. Take them from the sheriff’s to the city PD to the state police barracks, et cetera, on the pretext that each of those jurisdictions needs to question the defendant about uncleared crimes, so they can get all the charges together and present them to the grand jury in one fell swoop. For efficiency. It’s bullshit, of course.” Hannigan looked directly at Stone. “A good defense lawyer wouldn’t let them get away with that.”

  Stone looked back at Hannigan with eyes that went suddenly hard. “I do real estate. Searches and closings, mostly. But I don’t like being fucked around. I really don’t like it when someone I’m supposed to be taking care of is being fucked around. Where should I start? The sheriff’s office?”

  “No. You don’t play that sucker’s game. No matter how fast you drive from one place to another, they’ve got radios. She’ll be long gone before you get there.”

  “So what do I do?”

  “Look,” said Hannigan, “if it gets known you’re helping these wackos, you’re gonna get some heat. If it gets known that I’m helping you, I’m gonna get some heat. But what they’re doing is wrong. So I tell you what. Go to that park down the street there, and read the paper for a bit. I’ve gotta hit the office or they’re gonna wonder where I am. I’ll see you in a few minutes.”

  Stephanie Hannigan turned and loped across the street to the public defender’s office. Stone, eager to find his client and chafing at the delay, reluctantly put thirty-five cents into a street-corner vending machine for a paper and pulled up on the handle. It jammed. “Consistent with my day so far,” he mumbled to himself, then struck the side of the machine a sharp blow. That freed the handle, and he retrieved the paper, tucked it under his arm, and walked to the park. He was about to sit when he noticed that the benches were all covered by pigeon droppings. Standing, he checked out the news.

  The front page was full of the latest from the Mideast. Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi was once again beside himself with rage. Months ago, Israeli bombers had taken out the Libyan chemical-warfare manufacturing facility at Rabta. Claiming that it could not have been done without the aid of photo intelligence from a U.S. KH spy satellite, Colonel Qaddafi had hurled threats of vengeance against the United States as well as Israel at the time, but, so far as was known, had not followed through. Now the Libyan colonel had suffered another blow, and the U.S. role was not a matter of conjecture.

  The Soviet Union had provided Qaddafi with a dozen new Sukhoi Su-24 swing-wing fighter bombers, each capable of carrying up to 24,250 pounds of bombs. Even stationed at the air base at Bumbah, on the eastern seacoast of Libya, their 805-mile operational radius was insufficient to reach Israel. The Soviets, however, had mischievously provided Quaddafi with two Ilyushin I1–76 air-to-air refueling tankers. Using them, the Su-24s could reach London, let alone Israel.

  Qaddafi had apparently tried for Israel. A flight of six Su-24 “Fencers” had intruded on Israeli airspace. Three had been shot down immediately by Israeli fighters. The other three had jettisoned their bombs and fled west to link up with the two Ilyushin tankers, Israelis hot on their tails. The Ilyushin pilots, hearing all this going on over their radios and knowing the Israeli fighters had over twice the speed of their 500-mph tankers, panicked, made a 180-degree turn, and tried to escape.

  The Israelis ignored the tankers and went after the “Fencers,” who ran out of fuel and ditched at sea. The frightened Ilyushins ignored several warnings from a U.S. guided-missile frigate protecting the carrier U.S.S. John F. Kennedy that they should change course. The four-engine Ilyushins had the same radar signature as bombers. The U.S. frigate launched missiles and shot them down. Qaddafi had now lost half his Su-24 fleet and, more importantly, any long-range capability. He was certain the United States had done it purposely and promised a strike against the United States that would “change history and avenge the honor of the Libyan people.” The Department of State discounted the threat as rhetoric for internal consumption but noted that U.S. antiterrorist forces had been placed on “heightened alert.”

  Stone looked further through the paper, all the way to the back page. Nothing about the arrest of his client. Nothing about any protests at the Riegar plant. He was just folding up the newspaper when Stephanie Hannigan walked up.

  “Lemme see your paper,” she said.

  Stone handed it over. Inartfully, Stone noted, Hannigan slipped some papers into the newspaper, pretended to look at it for a few moments, then handed it back to Stone.

  “What you do,” said Hannigan, “is you go storming noisily into county court with a writ of habeas corpus laying out the facts and demanding access to your client immediately, followed by a hearing before a magistrate. Threaten to go to supreme court if the county court doesn’t order it done yesterday. What you have in the paper is a Xerox of our petition the last time they tried to pull that shit on the public defender. The court built the DA a new ass. Good luck.”

  Hannigan paused. “Is she pretty?”

  “I don’t know,” Stone said, “I haven’t met her yet.”

  Hannigan looked up at Stone. Her eyes sparkled.

  “Congratulations, counselor,” she said, “you’ve got the makings of a real criminal lawyer.”

  2

  The slender hispanic male in his late twenties sat on a bench just inside the international terminal at John F. Kennedy airport in New York looking carefully over the top of an opened copy of The Wall Street Journal. His clothes were elegant. Everything, including the gleaming black leather shoes, was of Italian cut and manufacture. The man’s wristwatch was the epitome of taste, a Patek Philippe with a leather strap. No knowledgeable person would have questioned his presence in the lobby of the most exclusive hotel—except, perhaps, hotel security, to whom, unfortunately, he had recently become a bit too well known. The Patek had come from the wrist of a Swiss businessman checking into the Waldorf Towers.

  Angel Garcia was a master pickpocket. A gypsy, he had been studying his craft since the age of six. He was a “cannon.” He took but did not “hold,” passing off almost instantly to an accomplice anything he had lifted with his extraordinarily skilled right hand.

  This morning, his accomplice was an attractive gypsy woman of nineteen, her hair colored blond at one of Manhattan’s finest salons so as to look gloriously natural. A seductively cut dress that would distract the eye of any male not in a coma enabled her to do more than merely receive a handoff from her partner. The two of them knew a number of short routines, like plays out of a football coach’s playbook, to distract, decoy, or upset someone for just a moment—and a moment was all it took fo
r Angel Garcia to work his magic.

  Garcia checked the Patek. He had in his head the arrival schedule and had already clocked how long it took the first-class passengers, the first off the plane, to emerge from customs, immigration, and out the door into the general-population area of the terminal. Next up was British Airways’ Concorde supersonic transport direct from London.

  Garcia preened. As effective as his partner, Magdalena, was at distracting men, Angel Garcia prided himself as being equally effective with women. He wasn’t, but he’d never have believed that, even from his mother, who was a gypsy princess.

  Right on time, the doors from immigration burst open and the Concorde passengers headed for the street, to waiting limousines and taxicabs. Garcia scanned them. A thickset man in his early forties with thinning sandy hair and a hard jaw strode rapidly ahead of the others, clearly determined to get the first cab. He was wearing an expensive black capeskin leather trench coat. In his left hand, he carried with ease a well-crafted two-suiter.

  It was what was in the blond man’s right hand that attracted Angel Garcia’s attention, however. It was briefcase-sized, but not a briefcase. A computer, Garcia concluded, one of those five-thousand-dollar 386-chip portables. Garcia nodded to his partner across the room and fell in behind his mark at a discreet distance.

  The man in the black greatcoat paused before the first taxicab in line and nodded affirmatively in response to the inquiry “Cab, mister?”

  At that, the driver started to get out to put his fare’s bags in the trunk, but the big man shook his head. “I keep them with me.”

  The driver closed his door and reached around to unlock the passenger door. His fare, feeling the warmth of the May New York sun being rapidly absorbed by the black leather across his back, put down his luggage and shrugged off his coat.

  It was the moment for which Angel Garcia had been waiting. He nodded to Magdalena. Immediately, she rushed up to the cab shouting “Taxi!”