Clint Faraday Mysteries collection A Muddled Murders Collector's Edition by CD Moulton

a picture from his pocket for a quick look, then
lazed back against the rail.
    Clint finished the rum and coke, waved at
Sharon and Bill and went to Bongos to ask Marko, who had gotten a
picture on the phone of the one on the porch, if he rang a
bell.
    “ No.
Santos will check on him. Got the plano. It’s a map of some kind,
alright. Gonna go over to lay out where we want the guest house.
Probably near those rocks because the quebrado is sorta
pretty.”
    Clint nodded. Dave, the author/character he’d
met, first at the Big Bamboo, then at The Plank, came from the
water taxi carrying a guitar and laptop computer, saw him and
waved. He went over to ask if the invitation to stay at his
apartment was still open.
    “ Got
yourself into some shit, I hear. Go for it! I can use some
excitement right about now! Ruskies really gonna have a war
here?”
    “ Not
exactly here,” Clint answered. Manny waved and got into Maxie’s
boat with four Indios with surveying equipment. They pulled out
from the dock and Dave said, “Isla San Cristóbal. Again. Surveying
crap where there’s not a thing to survey anymore. Ruskies. A couple
where the man uses a few terms Normal Joe doesn’t use. Someone
tried to kill an Indio for that land. One hell of a book,
huh?”
    “ You
figure things a lot too close. This is deadly serious, Dave. That’s
not just an expression.”
    Dave smirked. “What the hell! I’m seventy and
have had a great life, no real regrets. I don’t exactly have a
reputation for avoiding confrontation. I know when to be deaf,
mute, blind and stupid.”
    “ The best
one to be here is that last one.”
    Dave grinned and nodded. “Duh!
Chew’ngum!”
     
    Clint went into the Refugio where Manny and
Sylvia were enjoying some of the famous Mahi-Mahi. He greeted them
and was invited to join them.
    “ Clint!
The surveyors found a huge box of MONEY on our land!” Sylvia cried.
“We’ll have to get a big CRANE in there to even MOVE
it!”
    This was for public consumption, of
course.
    “ Money?”
Clint asked. “You mean cash?”
    “ Yeah,
money.” Marko answered. “There’s at least a hundred fifty million
dollars in hundred dollar bills in a big steel box. We thought it
had to be phony, but the bank says all the ones we had tested are
good. A lot of them are old. I would say that it’s got to be drug
money or something, so we won’t get any of it.”
    “ It’s on
your land, you got it honestly enough if you just found it there so
they have to show that it’s not just money some eccentric dead
billionaire hid there, particularly if it’s been there for awhile,”
Clint suggested. “Tell them you’ll split down the middle to take
care of taxes or whatever and they’ll grab the deal.”
    “ I
already told them I don’t want what has to be dirty money of some
kind,” Marko replied. Clint almost laughed at the “innocent” look
on his face. The man from the porch at Bohmfalk’s was around the
potted palm and dropped his drink .“I said it would be nice to get
what I have in the place back, like a sort of gift. The T-man from
the states jumped on it, but the Panamanian government guy said
they had nothing to do with it. We got a deal – made an arrangement
where I get one million dollars and the rest goes into the
preservation and reforestation fund or something. Royally pissed
the T-man off, but he can kiss my ass. Like the Panamá guy said, it
ain – isn’t any of his concern if he can’t show something says it
is. Just because it’s US dollars don’t hold no – any weight here.
Panamá uses the dollar.”
    Clint grinned and called, “Cath! A Balboa,
por favor!”
    “ Who’s
the clown watching us on the porch?” Clint asked (pointing to the
palm) as Dave and Paul, a well-known musician, came in with
guitars. They waved and Dave came to say Manny was an idiot to not
take all that money they found on Cristóbal and make the government
negotiate for a percent.
    “ We
already did,” Manny replied.