Aaron Elkins - Gideon Oliver 09 - Twenty Blue Devils Read online

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  "This is nothing to concern you, Brenda,” Nelson Lau said. “We can take care of it here in Tahiti, thank you."

  Brenda turned her head from the receiver and sighed. Her brother was not one of the world's great telephone personalities. The Stanford-educated Nelson was the only one of the Laus who had gone back to Tahiti from Hawaii, accepting Uncle Nick's job offer of the company's comptrollership fifteen years ago, almost the minute he'd gotten his MBA. And there he'd been ever since, very likely the most straitlaced man in French Polynesia and getting more so every year. Nelson actually wore a suit to work. In Tahiti.

  "Nelson, how can I help being concerned? People have been hurt. Brian's almost been killed, and Therese—"

  Muffled noises of exasperation came from the telephone. “Oh, for heaven's sake, you're making a mountain out of a molehill. Therese has always had a way of blowing things up out of proportion. You know what an extraordinarily suggestible—"

  "Nelson, I want to know: Do all these accidents have anything to do with that awful gangland business?"

  "Does what have anything to do with that awful gangland business? You mean all that rain last April?"

  "Don't be funny, it doesn't suit you. Tell me honestly: Is this some kind of sabotage? Revenge? Are they getting back at Nick?"

  "Now, really, how would I possibly know that?"

  "What do you think?"

  "I think...Brenda, I simply don't want to discuss it."

  "Fine, but what are you doing about it?” As always, talking to Nelson brought out the bossiness in her in self-defense.

  "Doing about it?” Nelson laughed, a sharp, incredulous whinny. “What would you suggest?"

  "I think we should get John's advice."

  Pregnant pause. “Thank you, no."

  "Nelson, be reasonable. John's an FBI agent. Surely—"

  "Brenda, the FBI is absolutely the last thing we need."

  "I don't mean officially. He wouldn't have any jurisdiction in Tahiti anyway. But he'd know about this sort of thing; it's his job."

  "Absolutely not. Out of the question."

  Brenda sighed again, which she did frequently when speaking with her older brother. Nelson had a way about him that made it next to impossible to have a simple difference of opinion with him. All you could do was have a fight with him. Either that, or give in.

  "Nelson, John's part of the family too. For God's sake, he's our brother. He's your brother. He has a right—"

  "Brenda, no. There's nothing John can do. He wasn't involved before, and nothing's going to be served by getting him involved now. That's the crux of it."

  No, that wasn't the crux. The crux was that the FBI agent in the family was Baby Brother; a baby brother who, like Brenda, took more after the Hawaiian side of the family than the Chinese. Consequently, John was five inches taller and sixty muscular pounds heavier than Nelson, with umpteen light years more—well, presence. When John was in a room you noticed him. Nelson could swing from the light fixtures by his teeth and have a hard time getting anyone to notice.

  As a child, being four years older, Nelson had been the more dominant one, and if he hadn't been exactly despotic, he had been pretty damned high-handed; with Brenda too, for that matter. Then John had hit puberty and things had turned around, and Nelson had never gotten over it. To ask John for help was for Nelson an unnatural act. And he was never going to change.

  "All right, Nelson,” she said, “all right."

  "Brenda, I mean it! Now I want you to promise me. No John."

  "All right, Nelson."

  "I want a promise."

  "I promise, Nelson."

  "You promise what?"

  Sheesh. “I promise I won't call John."

  Nelson sniffed. “All right, then."

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  Chapter 2

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  "John, this is Brenda. There's some funny stuff going on in Tahiti."

  She had waited until the weekend to call, not out of deference to Nelson, but because she wanted to think things over. Was she making a mountain out of a molehill? After brunch, when Gus and the kids, stir-crazy from the week's incessant rain, left for a Disney matinee in Hilo, she made herself a pot of tea, put her feet up, and pondered. The longer she thought about it, the less it looked like a molehill, and finally she had placed the call to Seattle and laid it all out for John.

  To her annoyance he didn't agree with her. “Look, sis, all I can say is, if the Mob was out to get Nick, they'd get him. They wouldn't be piddling around with sorting machines. Besides, it's ancient history. Why would they wait all this time to come after him?"

  "Well, how do you account for it, then? I mean everything put together. And don't tell me Pele."

  "How about coincidence? Businesses have bad luck. That's why they're always going under."

  Looked at honestly, it was what she would have said herself—if it had involved somebody else's family, somebody else's business, but of course it didn't. “You're probably right,” she said meekly. “I'm sure you are. I—I guess I'm being silly, but I can't help worrying and I didn't know who else to turn to but you."

  John let out a long exhalation. He was resigning himself, she thought complacently. She'd always been good at getting around John.

  "Oh boy,” he breathed, and then, after a moment: “All right, what do you want me to do, Brenda?"

  She laughed. “That sounds more like my kid brother. One thing you could do is check your FBI files, or the Justice Department files, or whatever, on the whole Gasparone case and see what you can find."

  "What is there to find? It's ten years old."

  "Twelve. But maybe somebody who's been in jail all this time just got out. Couldn't that be why these things just started happening?"

  "Well, yeah,” he said grudgingly. “But I still don't think those guys would be fooling around with stuff like this if they really had it in for Nick."

  "But you'll check?"

  "Yes, sis, I'll check."

  She plowed ahead. “And I think you ought to talk to Uncle Nick and the others about it. It just occurred to me—they'll be coming into Seattle soon, won't they? Aren't they due for a visit to the roastery?"

  This, John thought, was nothing but soft soap on her part. Since it was the end of October, she knew as well as he did that they would shortly be making their fall trip to Seattle. There would be three of them: their brother, Nelson, in his role as comptroller; their cousin Maggie—Nick's daughter and Therese's older sister—who was the plantation's personnel manager; and, of course, Nick Druett himself, the founder, the owner, and the force behind it all. They would be coming for their quarterly business conference with Rudy Druett, another nephew of Nick's, but from his own side of the family. Rudy, the son of Nick's long-dead brother, was manager and toastmaster at the Caffe Paradiso plant on Whidbey Island, where the company's beans were roasted and its American business strategies plotted.

  "Yeah, I'll bet it just occurred to you,” grumbled John, who wanted it understood that while he might be malleable enough, he wasn't any dunce.

  "And don't they usually come to your house for dinner after the cupping?"

  "They always come,” John said. “We're having them out next Thursday. I'll be picking them up at the roastery."

  "Great, that'll give you a chance to bring it up with them."

  "I don't know, sis. Nick's not the kind of guy who's going to appreciate my butting in. If he wants to talk about it he'll bring it up on his own."

  "John, you know that Uncle Nick is never in a million years going to admit there's something he can't handle. You're going to have to do it."

  "Yeah, but I don't like—"

  "I'm relying on you, John."

  Silence.

  "John?"

  "Jeez,” he exclaimed, “you know something, Brenda?"

  "What?"

  "Sometimes you can be every damn bit as bad as Nelson."

  "Heaven forfend,”
Brenda said.

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  Chapter 3

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  Brian sat bolt-upright in the unzipped sleeping bag, not sure what had brought him awake with his heart pounding. A sound, a light, a movement in the bushes?

  "Anybody there?” he called into the darkness, still muddled with sleep.

  There was no answer, of course, and after a few seconds, as consciousness flooded back, his pulses stopped their hammering and he quieted down. What animal was there on Raiatea that would harm a man? And there was probably no other human being within ten miles. Silly to react like that, but he had had such a strong, sudden sense of...of presence. It had been a dream, naturally—what else?—although it seemed to him that he had been dreaming about Therese. He had surprised her with some silly gift she'd wanted and she had laughed...

  He lay back and resettled himself in the bag. Around him the night was silent and soft, the southern constellations as brilliant as diamonds. An exquisite little breeze, heavy with the fragrance of orange blossom and gardenia, flowed over his face. Hibiscus trees, silhouetted against the star-flecked sky, drowsed at the edge of the clearing. From far away, near the lagoon, came the weird, repetitive cry of some seabird, a hollow, echoing wuh...wuh...wuh...

  His eyelids drifted slowly down. Relaxed, tranquil, he slid again into his dreams.

  It was a long time before the bushes moved again, and when they did Brian only stirred, but did not waken.

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  Chapter 4

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  Shhl-l-l-l-p.

  The coffee was sucked from the silverplated tablespoon, rolled over, under, and around the tongue, then held at the back of Rudy Druett's mouth for a few seconds. He chewed, he gargled, he tipped his head back. His eyes closed, his eyes opened. Finally he leaned to one side and delicately dipped his chin.

  Blupp.

  Into the waist-high funnel of the spittoon it went. “Well now,” he said, his long, doleful face pensive. “It's...in my opinion it's...let me see..."

  He moved his tongue over the inside of his mouth, chewed his cheek, hunched his narrow shoulders, muttered nasally to himself. While he thus marshaled his evaluative powers the others took their own spoons from bowls of water and dipped them one at a time into the sample of coffee under consideration. Four shl-l-l-l-ps, four blupps.

  The tasting session had been under way for an hour. There were four of them in the room besides Rudy. Three were officers of the Paradise Coffee plantation: Nick Druett, easygoing, comfortably in charge, and carrying his sixty-nine years lightly; his nephew and comptroller Nelson Lau—John's older brother—looking like a Hong Kong businessman, pompous and serious in a conservative, pin-striped business suit; and Nick's older daughter, Maggie, casually and colorfully dressed in a bright Tahitian flowered skirt, but as blunt and outspoken as ever.

  Although Maggie generally attended the tasting sessions, Nick had never managed to instill in her much interest in the business of growing and selling coffee. What Maggie was interested in was improving the lot of the world's laboring masses, particularly the Tahitian laboring masses, and, on a more general level, in saving the earth from the depredations of its human inhabitants. True to her convictions, she belonged to a number of native-culture groups and had herself founded the Island Culture Club, chiefly dedicated to the reintroduction of the native Tahitian musical tradition; in particular the pahu, a drum made from a hollowed-out tree trunk, and the viva, a bamboo flute played with the nostrils. The society met monthly, had grown to eleven like-minded individuals over the years, and had high hopes of someday acquiring a native member.

  Taking advantage of her natural inclinations and abilities, Nick had made her the plantation's personnel manager, responsible for the productivity, morale, and welfare of the workforce, which varied from twenty to seventy, depending on the season. He had never been sorry, either, even if she got under his skin once in a while and sometimes made him wonder whose side she was on when it came to labor-management relations.

  The fourth member of the group was John Lau, who had twice thus far tried to raise the subject of the accidents and had twice been brushed aside like a fly buzzing around a sacred altar.

  The altar in this case was the rotating, octagonal table around which they stood. In the center of it was an old laboratory beam-balance scale set at 7.5 grams—the precise amount required for a perfect portion of coffee, according to Rudy, who was fussy about such things (about most things, if the truth be told). Sixteen such portions, two of each of the eight coffees to be tasted, had been tumbled in the Probat sample roaster, ground fine, and placed in sixteen squat, thick glasses lined up in pairs around the table's rim.

  The glasses had then been filled with water from an electric kettle set at exactly 190 degrees Fahrenheit (191 degrees would scorch the oils and turn it bitter, Rudy insisted with apparent seriousness; 189 degrees wouldn't extract the flavors properly). Without being stirred, the resulting brew was then allowed to cool and form a crust. Rudy would break one of the crusts with a tap from the back of his spoon, as if cracking an egg, then quickly dip his nose almost into the liquid to catch the initial burst of aroma, and then slurp up a spoonful. The others would follow suit. There would be murmurs and gurgles. They would scrutinize, smell, bite, and pinch the sample of beans that lay in a small tray beside each pair of glasses, and they would render their opinions, with Rudy usually leading off, befitting his position as roastmaster.

  Thus far, they'd accepted beans from Ethiopia, Kenya, and Sumatra as worthy of purchase and rejected samples from Venezuela, Costa Rica, and New Guinea. Under consideration at the moment was a Colombian Excelso.

  Rudy was ready with his judgment at last. “In my opinion, this is...” He paused, brows knit in concentration, mouth still puckered to extract the last remnants of taste. Abruptly his face cleared. “...coffee! Yes, I'm sure of it Don't you agree?"

  John burst out laughing. Rudy often went through one version or another of this routine when he was in a playful mood, always managing to make it funny and surprising, at least to John. But then John hadn't sat in on as many tastings with him as the others had.

  "Very amusing,” said Nelson, on whom playfulness, Rudy's or anyone else's, tended to be lost. “No, if you don't mind, can we get back to business?"

  "Certainly not,” Rudy said indignantly. “Are you seriously suggesting that I permit my dedication to amusement to be diverted by work?"

  Nelson sighed, or rather hissed, exhaling a stream of air between clamped teeth, and turned to the others, pointedly ignoring Rudy. “I would say,” he said through jaws that were even now only barely separated, “that this coffee has decent body, with medium-high acid.” He stroked his thin, perfectly symmetrical mustache with the pinky of his left hand. “Also, it's reasonably piquant."

  John grimaced. Nelson was his brother and he loved him dearly—well, he loved him—but, Jesus Christ, piquant?

  "But," Nelson continued darkly, raising his spoon for emphasis, “I detect overtones of earth. There's a definite groundy undertaste here."

  "I agree,” Maggie said, something of a rarity for her where Nelson was concerned. “It's groundy. Earthy."

  "Dear Cousin Maggie and Cousin Nelson—” began Rudy with a sigh of sweet condescension.

  "I'm not your cousin,” Nelson said. “Thank God."

  "—I yield to no one in my admiration for your many virtues, but I feel compelled to say that neither of you would recognize a good cup of coffee if you fell into it from a fourth-story window. No offense."

  "Rudy...” Maggie glowered at him, her head lowered like an irritated bull's. Painted, hand-carved wooden earrings shaped like tiny tropical fish swung against plump cheeks. “...I know you think you're the be-all and end-all of anything that has to do with coffee, but—"

  "I?” Rudy said. "Au contraire. I have an absolute and unequivocal lack of belief in my own judgment. Thereby,” he added without losing a bea
t, “confirming the perspicacity of my opinions."

  And there was Rudy in a nutshell: droll, biting, double-edged—but ultimately even-handed in his barbs, digging them into Maggie, or Nelson, or himself with equal relish. John had been on the receiving end for his share too. Even Nick had. And other than Nelson, they all laughed now—except for Rudy himself, whose dry, dour expression rarely changed very much.

  "Come on, Rudy,” Nick said, “what about the Excelso?"

  Rudy decided to be serious. “I don't taste any groundiness,” he said. “There is a little woodiness, but it has a nice, nutty, buttery finish. Definitely not for one of our premiums, but I was thinking it would be all right for the Weekend Blend."

  "That's what I think too.” It was rare that Nick didn't go along with his roastmaster's judgment. "If you can get it for under a buck-five. You say something, John?"

  John shook his head, wiping his chin with the back of a finger; he didn't quite have the others’ knack with the spittoon. He had joined in the tasting—the cupping, as they called has much to be sociable as anything else, but what was there to say to this bunch once they got going on coffee? Like them, he had tasted seven different coffees from seven different countries. Unlike them, he had liked them all. (He had swallowed down the first few until a scandalized Nelson had noticed and made him comply with international cupping conventions.) But if you had told him that all seven samples were exactly the same coffee, he would have accepted it without reservation.

  It wasn't that he didn't like coffee; he liked it as well as the next guy. Two cups with breakfast to get the kinks out, and then one, maybe two lattes during the day, from the SBC coffee bar across the street from the federal building on Fourth Street. Great stuff, got the juices going. But buttery, for God's sake? Earthy? What were they talking about, coffee or baked potatoes?

  He would have had a hard time taking them seriously, except that he knew how well they were doing. Rudy, in particular, had built Caffe Paradiso, Nick's American retail outlet, from a sleepy storefront business with an ancient, secondhand, one-bag roaster in the basement into the number-three coffee-seller in the Pacific Northwest, and he'd done it largely with his nose and his taste buds.