Clint Faraday Mysteries Collection B :This Job is Murder Collector's Edition Read Free

it was
any of their business. The Indio saying was something like, “If you
have an itch, what difference does it make which hand you use to
scratch it?”
    Clint thought of an itinerary for tomorrow
and went to bed.
     
    Over an omelette and coffee in the morning
Clint decided to go to Solarte and Bastimentos and check on storm
damage. He was close to the Indios there and could collect a little
information the police couldn’t. He would wait until the last wave
of the storm front passed. Probably early tomorrow. The wave would
hit Bocas about four o’clock. He could handle McDonald this morning
and Quiroz and Larienze tomorrow. He may not have to worry
tomorrow.
    He took his boat out and ran it for awhile to
get it hot enough to evaporate all the water that had managed to
get under the cowl, then headed to Solarte. He met several of his
Indio friends and chatted. They were always up and working by
seven. It was ten ‘til when he got there. Magali insisted he have
some hojaldras, coffee and patacones, so he sat with her and her
husband, Milcare, and their two kids. Milcare said there wasn’t
much to say about McDonald except he was a black foreigner with an
attitude that would guarantee privacy – whether he wanted it or
not.
    “ If everything’s so horrible here in
Panamá, why doesn’t he return to Nassau?” Li asked. “Is there a
reason he can’t? Like they don’t like his attitude there
either?”
    There wasn’t much more. Clint said he was
just checking to be sure everyone was alright and that there wasn’t
damage that couldn’t be repaired before the next wave hit in the
afternoon. The natives had weathered storms a hell of a lot worse
than this minor atmospheric disturbance. Clint said he knew it. He
just wanted to be sure his friends were OK.
    He stopped at two of the other places before
coming in close to the McDonald finca. McDonald was on his dock
trying to get his boat up. It was sunk. McDonald was a bullish bald
man with a lot of gold teeth. He was just fat enough to make him
ugly as homemade sin to Clint.
    “ Leave it there until tomorrow,” Clint
called. “There’s another one coming in this afternoon, then it will
clear up.”
    “ I have to get the motherfucking motor
off and try to dry it out if it’s any of your goddamned
business!”
    “ Well, I could offer to help you. I
could take my boat alongside and lift one side to dump some of the
water, then it would float to where you could get the motor off –
if there was a chance in hell you could handle a three hundred
pound engine by yourself.”
    “ Let’s do that.”
    “ Or I could treat you the way you’ve
already treated me and decide to do one of two things,” Clint
continued. “I could tell you to fuck off and enjoy watching your
shit ruin in the salt water or I could say I’d help for a hundred
bucks.”
    McDonald grinned. “You, I could like. You
aren’t wimpy like these shitheads here.”
    “ They aren’t wimpy. They simply treat
people with respect until they get to know them well enough to know
if they want anything to do with them. They’ve solidly decided they
don’t want anything to do with you. Push it and you’ll end up
learning how wimpy they are right quick!”
    “ I could take any three of them without
working up a sweat!” he snarled.
    “ Maybe before you turned into a fat
out-of-shape pig you could’ve taken one of them. They’re small
people. Right now, I’d say there isn’t one of them who couldn’t
take you down pretty fast.”
    He laughed. “OK. A hundred bucks. I got money
up the ass.”
    “ So do I,” Clint replied. He went
alongside the sunken 18 footer and dropped the grapple anchor under
the front, caught the molded seat underneath and lifted. It slowly
began to rise, then sluggishly dumped water over the motor in the
rear. After about three minutes about a third of the boat front was
above the water. Clint let go and stepped hard on the front. The
water leveled until the gunnel had