Clear and Present Danger

"Why not both? They're both fuckin' murderers, ain't they? Hey, sir, I was aboard that yacht, all right? I seen what they did - have you? It's a real mess. You see something like that all the time, maybe. I never have, and - well, I don't mind tellin' you, sir, it shook me up some. You want 'em hung, yeah, I'll do it and they won't bitch about it the next day, either. Okay, maybe I shouldn't 'a snapped the one over the rail - lost my cool, and I shouldn't have - okay, I'm sorry about that. But those two little fucks took out a whole family, probably did some rapin', too. I got a family, too, y'know? I got daughters. So does Portagee. You want us to shed tears over those two fuckers, you come to the wrong place, sir. You sit 'em in the electric chair and I'll throw the switch for you."

"So you didn't hang him?" Murray asked.

"Sir, I wish I'd'a thought of it," Riley announced. It was, after all, Oreza who'd thought of it.

Murray looked at Bright, whose face was slightly pink by this time. It had gone even more smoothly than he'd expected. Well, he'd been told that the captain was a clever sort. You didn't give command of a ship to a jerk - at least you weren't supposed to.

"Okay, gentlemen, I guess that answers all the questions we have for the moment. Thank you for your cooperation." A moment later, Wegener was leading them away.

The three men stopped at the gangway for a moment. Murray motioned for Bright to head for the car, then turned to the captain.

"You actually operate helicopters off that deck up there?"

"All the time. I just wish we had one of our own."

"Could I see it before I leave? I've never been aboard a cutter before."

"Follow me." In less than a minute, Murray was standing in the center of the deck, directly on the crossed yellow lines painted on the black no-skid deck coating. Wegener was explaining how the lights at the control station worked, but Murray was looking at the mast, drawing an imaginary line from the yardarm to the deck. Yeah , he decided, you could do it easy enough .

"Captain, for your sake I hope you never do anything this crazy again."

Wegener turned in surprise. "What do you mean?"

"We both know what I mean."

"You believe what those two -"

"Yes, I do. A jury wouldn't - at least I don't think one would, though you can never really tell what a jury will believe. But you did it. I know - you can't say anything..."

"What makes you think -"

"Captain, I've been in the Bureau for twenty-six years. I've heard lots of crazy stories, some real, some made up. You gradually get a feel for what's real and what isn't. The way it looks to me, you could run a piece of rope from that pulley up there, down to here pretty easy, and if you're taking the seas right, having a man swing wouldn't matter much. It sure wouldn't hurt the radar antenna that Riley was so worried about. Like I said, don't do it again. This one's a freebie because we can prosecute the case without the evidence you got for us. Don't push it. Well, I'm sure you won't. You found out that there was more to this one than you thought, didn't you?"

"I was surprised that the victim was -"

"Right. You opened a great big can of worms without getting your hands too dirty. You were lucky. Don't push it," Murray said again.

"Thank you, sir."

One minute after that, Murray was back in the car. Agent Bright was still unhappy.

"Once upon a time, when I was a brand-new agent fresh out of the Academy, I was assigned to Mississippi," Murray said. "Three civil-rights workers disappeared, and I was a very junior member of the team that cleared the case. I didn't do much of anything other than hold Inspector Fitzgerald's coat. Ever hear about Big Joe?"

"My dad worked with him," Bright answered.

"Then you know that Joe was a character, a real old-time cop. Anyway, the word got to us that the local Klukkers were mouthing off about how they were gonna kill a few agents - you know the stories, how they were harassing some families and stuff like that. Joe got a little pissed. Anyway, I drove him out to see - forget the mutt's name, but he was the Grand Kleagle of the local Klavern and he was the one with the biggest mouth. He was sitting under a shady tree in his front lawn when we pulled up. He had a shotgun next to the chair, and he was half in the bag from booze already. Joe walks up to him. The mutt starts to pick up the shotgun, but Joe just stared him down. Fitzgerald could do that; he put three guys in the ground and you could see in his face that he'd done it. I got a little worried, had my hand on my revolver, but Joe just stared him down and told him if there was any more talk about offing an agent, or any more shitty phone calls to wives and kids, Big Joe was going to come back and kill him, right there in his front yard. Didn't shout or anything, just said it like he was ordering breakfast. The Kleagle believed him. So did I. Anyway, all that loose talk ended.