CHAPTER 15 of 20
After a light lunch of processed ham, Swiss cheese on rye, and a bottle of beer, Stoner had planned to spend the afternoon resting up for tonight’s adventure—no telling when he’d get home. But he’d barely had time to swallow the last of his brew when the doorbell rang.
“If this keeps up, I’ll have to replace the door with a turnstile,” he thought.
Stoner stashed the plate and glass in the sink and the empty bottle in the trashcan. “Hold your horses,” he yelled.
He didn’t have to open the door to know Hannigan was on the other side: the stench of his cigar had already seeped through the cracks. When Stoner yanked it open, the trio waltzed in as if they lived there.
Hannigan headed straight for the easy chair and plopped his rotund backside with a groan. The agents drifted to the kitchen area and blended with the wallpaper—the thought jumped into Stoner’s mind, “I didn’t know chameleons were people.”
“What you want, Hannigan?”
“What’s with you, Stoner? Just when I was getting used to the idea of working together like pals, you have to go and spoil it. Maybe you should get larger-sized underwear.”
“Funny, you ain’t, Hannigan. I’m hounded from all sides, and I don’t have enough meat on these bones for everyone to take a bite, so get to the point. I need my afternoon beauty nap.”
“All right, Stoner. Have it the hard way.”
Hannigan shifted his weight in the chair, trying to stuff five pounds, of you know what, into a four-pound bucket.
“So that we’re all on the same page, this is how it’s gonna play: the boys are gonna follow you to the warehouse. I’ll be there, waiting. Then we’ll crash the party as you’re handing them Nazis the blueprints.”
“Why’d you bust in here to tell me something I already knew, Hannigan. There’s more to it, so give.”
Hannigan looked at the floor and then slowly raised his head until our eyes met.
“Hate to break it to you, pal, but the dame ain’t getting off Scot-free.”
“But you said,” Stoner shouted, moving toward him.
The agents came at Stoner, but Hannigan waved them off, and they blended with the wallpaper again.
“That’s how the cookie crumbles, Stoner,” Hannigan said, slowly shaking his head. “Sorry, but I made a promise I couldn’t keep.”
“You bastard!”
“She goes down with the rest of them,” he said with a cold, steely look in his eyes.
“Them? Who’s them?” Stoner waved his arms about and looked one way and then the other frantically.
“Sometimes, I wonder about you, Stoner,” Hannigan said with a puzzled look. “Didn’t you ever question whose mansion that was? Who were the butler and house staff? Nobody can escape the country without help. Who’s helping them? It’s like a spider’s web of Nazis, or at the least, Nazi sympathizers involved, and we want to catch them all. So the dame’s gotta go down with the whole bunch.”
“Then I won’t have any part of it,” Stoner said, holding his hands up defiantly.
Hannigan cocked his head. “Trouble is, Stoner, you’re on that short list of Nazi conspirators. And the question is, will you be a hero or a goat? Every way you cut it, you’re up to your neck in this...” Hannigan pointed his cigar at him. “So you’re gonna havta choose: work with us or against us. Go free or go to jail, and we ain’t playing Monopoly here.”
Stoner had always used the phrase, between a rock and a hard place, without giving it much thought. For the first time, he understood what it meant. Hannigan was right: he didn’t have a choice. He had to go along, but maybe there was still a chance he could help Anne in the chaos that was bound to happen. So he took a deep breath and slowly exhaled.
“All right, Hannigan. You got me where it hurts; just don’t squeeze.”
“See, boys...” Hannigan said, cocking his head toward the kitchen. “Where’d they go?”
“Over here,” the first agent said, stepping from the shadow—except there weren’t any shadows Stoner could see.
“See, boys, I said Stoner would come around.”
“Don’t rub it in, Hannigan. You got me by a thread but only by a thin thread.”
“Okay, Stoner, here’s the deal: when the blueprints are in that bastard Nazi’s hands, me and the boys will rush in and nab them with the goods—case closed!”
“What’s your backup?”
Hannigan raised his eyebrows and glanced toward the agents.
“Don’t need no backup. We got this one, flat.”
“And Sid?”
Hannigan gestured with the nonchalant wave of his hand.
“Sid doesn’t figure in, a non-player, a non-entity.”
“Then you don’t know Sid.”
Stoner couldn’t imagine Hannigan brushing off Sid as if he didn’t exist—that hadn’t been his experience with Theo and Leo. But Hannigan was a big boy, and Sid was his problem; Stoner had enough problems of his own.
“Well, it’s enough to know that he ain’t gonna give us no trouble,” Hannigan said confidently.
Hannigan’s overconfidence unnerved Stoner. He always believed in the old saying: once pride got hold of you, your downfall was just around the corner.
“And how you gonna do that?” Stoner asked.
Hannigan chomped on his stogie, then huffed and puffed—Little Red Ridinghood would’ve trembled in her shoes.
“You see about the blueprints,” he growled, pointing his cigar at Stoner’s face, “and we’ll see about Sid.”
Stoner shrugged. “Arrogance can spell disaster.”
“Since when you become Sigmund Freud?”
“Ever read Proverbs? They’d do you some good, Hannigan.”
Hannigan waged his head and snorted. “Got a beer?”
“Sure... Got a buck?”
“That’s highway robbery!” Hannigan said, sliding to the edge of the chair.
“Gotta pay the rent somehow. Take it or leave it.”
“Come on, boys. Stoner’s beer’s probably the cheap stuff, anyway.”
Hannigan wiggled loose and grunted, getting to his feet.
“Be nice, Hannigan,” Stoner said. “It’s imported...”
“Imported?” he said; his face lit up like a Christmas tree. “From where?”
“Milwaukee.”
“Stoner, you’re hopeless,” Hannigan said, frowning. He started toward the door and stopped. “Tonight, and don’t be late.”
Stoner closed the door, hoping that was the last of his afternoon interruptions. The room needed airing out, so he opened the windows to catch a crosswind. The breeze felt so good that he lay on the davenport for a few minutes. Before he realized it, he was fast asleep.
Someone knocking on his door awakened Stoner from a good snooze. He glanced at his watch: quarter past three. He sat on the edge of the davenport and shook the cobwebs from his brain. Whoever it was, they were persistent: the knocking was non-stop.
“Don’t break the door down,” Stoner yelled. “Give me a minute.”
The knocking stopped.
Stoner opened the door and found a small man, not more than four foot ten, skinny with thin, slicked-down, jet-black hair. He had an Asiatic look to him. His eyes were slits, and he smiled a row of teeth too big for his mouth.
The man bowed and said with better diction than Stoner, “So sorry to bother you, Mr. Stoner, but I saw some trying to break into your car.”
Stoner looked past him at his car in the driveway. It was still there, so he turned his attention to his Good Samaritan.
“What did you see, exactly?”
“A man checking each door—one after the other.”
“And you happened to be passing by, Mr... Sorry, I didn’t catch your name.”
“Toshio... Toshio Okada, Mr. Stoner,” the man said, grinning from ear to ear and bowing.”
A couple thousand Japanese lived in San Diego County, but none were in Stoner’s or the surrounding neighborhoods, so he was immediately suspicious of Mr. Okada—if that was his real name. What were the chances that Okada had happened to come by just at the right moment? And with all that was going on, he’d reached the point of trusting no one.
“Thank you, Mr. Okada, but I’ll check his car later.”
“I wouldn’t want any tragedy to befall you, Mr. Stoner,” Okada said, grinning.
“What the hell you mean by that?”
“We’ll be watching to keep you safe.”
Stoner leaned over him and looked both ways but saw no one.
“Who’s we?” he asked.
Okada smiled, bowed, and zipped around the corner, leaving Stoner totally dumbfounded. The rumbling feeling in his gut returned, and he headed for the throne.
End of Chapter 15