On Monday night King met his partners in Ridley Squire’s bar. They had ordered drinks and were sitting in the back room as usual.
King took a sip of his rum and milk.
“Lex’s dead. I don’t know what he was trying to do. I heard that the police killed one of his attackers and captured the other one.”
“The police didn’t give out their identities?” G.C asked.
“All the police said was that they are still investigating,” Brad replied. “But it’s a move he made against Mc Creed and it backfired on him.”
“The funeral will be next week Thursday. His wife called me. She told me that she intends to sell out the business and then migrate,” King told them.
“After what happened, I can’t say I disagree with her, if the man had only listened to us. It’s a good thing they don’t have any children. So how did it go, Brad?” G.C inquired.
“It went well, I used some city men,” Brad said in response to G.C.
“That’s how I like it, we take out anybody this time?” he asked.
“We knocked out one man and tied him up, it looks as if it was his field,” Brad replied. “We got a good amount.”
“The guy who’s arranging the shipment for us, says we will have to wait. I think he’s getting scared,” King told them.
Brad drank some more of his rum and orange juice.
“If he can’t do it, we’ll have to get somebody else. Pity Lex isn’t around anymore, he had a lot of contacts on the ports. I’ll try to contact one of them.”
Jack drank some of his white wine.
“Good if you could do that, Brad. Anyway, it’s a good blow we give the guy and we have a lot more to give him.”
“I would like to attend Lex’s funeral, but I’m not sure that Mc Creed’s fighters won’t be around waiting on me to show up,” Brad stated.
“I’ll be going so I’ll represent the syndicate,” King told him.
Brad was a very relieved man knowing that he would be represented at his friend’s funeral.
“On Tuesday we’re going to raid one of his fields down at Plum Valley in St. Catherine,” he stated.
“How soon are we going to get down those other drying machines, G.C?” Jack asked.
“I spoke to Ruddy the other night. He was pleased with what we’re doing. He knows some of the people, who make them and he’s going to get in touch with them. He says that anytime we’re ready, we can start. He can get a plane down here anytime. He knows the right people, who have the money,” G.C declared.
“You get the markets for us through Ruddy, G.C. I know him, damn smart boy. I can’t understand why he’s not making it over there,” King wondered out aloud.
“He’s the wild type. He has to earn a lot of money to support the large number of women he has,” G.C replied.
“Is he coming down here?” Jack asked.
“You know that it was Mc Creed’s men, who shot him. He’s not afraid of them though. He says he knows somebody, who’s willing to lend him a gun to use when he comes out here,” G.C replied.
“I hope that all of you have your guns on you if it’s even to carry one of those guys with you,” King told them.
“I got one to rent, if anyone of them come after me, I am going to empty it out in him,” G.C threatened.
“You can bet that they took away Lex’s gun after they shot him,” King opined.
Jack yawned.
“I’m feeling sleepy,” he stated.
“It’s time we leave, I’ll contact you about our next meeting,” King told them.
They all stood up and filed out of the room to their respective cars.
***
Ruddy debated the idea of coming to Jamaica for several days. It wasn’t that he was afraid of Mc Creed; it was the feasibility of the trip. King had told G.C to tell him to come. He would have to borrow a gun when he got there, as he didn’t believe that he could provide him with any type of security. G. C had painted a rosy picture, but it could never be, not if Mc Creed was still alive. Something else was on his mind, thus his need for a gun. He had heard that Ken Stone was saying that he didn’t want to come to Jamaica because he was afraid of encountering him down there. He felt that the man was jealous of him because of the life he lived, while he had to be scraping around to make ends meet.
Lately, though everything had gone wrong for him. He had lost most of his entertainers to more powerful organizations. His bank balance had taken a plunge. He couldn’t go to the big scenes any longer. His creditors had all but declared him bankrupt. The Colombians, Mafioso and other Latino groups were controlling the drug market so there wasn’t much for him there. He decided he would go to Jamaica, avoid Mc Creed’s men and see what G.C and his friends had to offer. If he didn’t like it, he could always return to the States and forget about them. If he met Ken he would show him which one of them was braver. He wouldn’t be taking any of his Miami women with him.
He put through two calls, one to G.C to tell him that he was on his way. Of course he wouldn’t be able to meet him at the airport, as he wasn’t sure that they wouldn’t be spotted. The other call was to one of his women, whom he knew would be overjoyed to accommodate him on his short stay in Jamaica.
***
So then on Wednesday evening a tall man of good physical stature, handsome and well dressed, stepped out of the Air Jamaica jet, collected his baggage, went through immigration and customs and was hugged and kissed by a stunningly beautiful girl.
“Ruddy, I’m so glad to see you. When you called me last night I felt so glad knowing that I was going to see you again.”
“What’s going on, girl? Every day I think about you. I don’t think I can stay so long without you again.”
“You have so many women over there that you don’t even remember me.”
“A lot of them are after me, yes, I won’t deny that. But it’s you alone I’m interested in, so they can go on wasting their time.”
They were coming towards her Honda Prelude motor car now.
“See my car here, Ruddy, you drive. I’ll give you the directions to my apartment. It’s off Constant Spring Road. You don’t even know that I’ve moved from Portmore.”
They had driven to her apartment. There he had a hot bath and then dinner under candle lights. You had to give it to Donnette; she knew how to look after a man. They had then gone to a cabaret show at the Drummond Court hotel on Old Hope Road. When they returned, they had made love after which both of them had dropped off to sleep. When he woke up she had gone to her work at the bank.
He took a bath, then ate the breakfast, she had left for him. He phoned her about using her car and she told him to take a taxi down for it.
***
In a small back room of Angella’s sports bar on Dunrobin Avenue, five men sat having drinks. They were Danny King, Brad Elliot, Jack Marriot, G.C. Cox and Ruddy Brown.
It was Ruddy’s first meeting with King’s syndicate.
“I have people calling me every day about the stuff I used to supply them. When I tell them that my supplies have been cut off they don’t believe me. They think I’m trying to pull a fast one on them,” Ruddy said to his eager listeners.
“Good to hear you, Ruddy. What we want is ready cash to build this organization. That’s why we sent for you. You get the stuff sold for us over there or get the contacts to come for it and pay us on the spot,” King stated.
“You’ll get the ready cash, King and no bad money. Once I can guarantee the stuff, my friends don’t need anything more than that,” Ruddy boasted.
“Could have kept myself afloat meddling in the South
American and South East Asian stuff, but I didn’t want to spoil the reputation that Jamaican weed gave me. Now you guys are giving me another chance and I intend to grab it with both hands,” he continued.
“We’ll guarantee you a good fee for each of our shipments,” King told him.
“That’s okay by me; tell me how do you stand security wise? Will the police bother our planes? Will you let them know that our airstrips aren’t to be touched? My people might not want to come unless their safety can be guaranteed.”
“As soon as things begin to roll we’ll put a few influential policemen on our payroll,” King stated.
“Better put them on before it’s too late. I know these guys out here. It’s going to take a lot of money for them to look in the other direction,” Jack opined.
“About how soon can Ruddy tell his people to come for the stuff?” G.C asked.
Brad took the cigarette from his lips.
“About next week Saturday. We should have enough ready for shipment,” he replied.
“We have thousands of pounds of the stuff down at the warehouse. We could let one or two of your people handle it. As from next week we’ll have to begin finding buyers fast because my men will be hitting his fields at least three times a week,” he continued.
“Are your boys good, Brad?” Ruddy asked. “Understand that the first set were shot up. Two died and two are still in hospital.”
“Those were country boys, we’re using city men now,” King replied.
“Good, good,” Ruddy replied. “Hope you cover your tracks well, Brad.”
“Even though they nearly wiped out the first set, they weren’t going to squeal on us. I’m one hundred percent certain the two injured youths don’t know who hired them,” King replied.
G.C started to bow his head. Brad looked at his watch.
“It’s after ten,” Ruddy said. “I think I’ll better be going.”
“Yeah, it’s about time. I’ll phone you men to let you know when’s the next meeting,” King said as they all got up and filed out of the room.
***
Ardez sat around a table in his shack with Grosset, Premba and Rattigan.
“The police killed Pennant and captured Duffus. Last night some men went into Alton’s weed field, knocked him out, tied him up and then stole his weed,” he reported.
The men sat with heads bowed.
“We might have to go down there to chop and shoot some more of those guys,” Ardez threatened.
“Since we killed Lex, I thought the poaching would have stopped, but it seems to be continuing,” Grosset remarked.
“I feel it’s that guy, Brad, who’s behind it. If we could capture him, we would make him tell us about their whole set up,” Ardez declared.
“He has disappeared, but his business is still operating. I feel that it’s he and some more men who’ve teamed up to fight against us,” Premba opined.
“I’m going to send some men from the camp to go on patrol with some of the growers,” Ardez explained.
“That sounds good to me,” Grosset stated.
“Where’ll our bases be?” he asked.
“Rattigan’s drafting up a timetable, which will show the group’s base on the night they’re operating. More than one group won’t be leaving here at the same time,” Ardez explained.
“Just collect your time tables from me in the morning,” he finished.
Premba stood up.
“Some men are really stubborn. It looks like they want us to come down there to shoot up the place again.”
“If we catch any of them, we might have to bring them up here just to show their friends how we really deal with people, who fool around us. We might just go after those two youths and make sure they are dead, this time around,” Ardez stated.
“We might do that, yes,” Premba replied as they filed out of the room.
***
Gus McCreed was worried; somebody was after his business. They had only used the stupid Lex Malcolm as a front. Since all of his enemies were dead, destroyed or exiled, it had to be somebody new. Probably somebody with overseas contacts, who wasn’t
prepared to plant, only to reap. Such a person or organization he would have to destroy. If it came to a war he was prepared to lead his fighters into it.
He had to pay the medical bills of the two growers, who had been beaten up. These were heavy strains on his resources. He hoped that the plans they had formulated, would stop the poachers in their tracks.
He had to buy two more dogs to replace Polo and Roxy. The killers must have shot them before they jumped the gate for those dogs wouldn’t have given them a chance.
So Brad was still alive and had virtually vanished. His house had been stripped by both the Wareikans and thieves from the area. His small auto-parts business was still operating, however.
If he was found, then he would provide the lead they needed. But the gang had just about exhausted their search for his possible whereabouts. So Ardez had changed the shoot on sight orders to capture and bring to the camp.
Finding such an elusive person would depend on luck.
It was getting dark. He felt for a night on the town. The Outer Edge would be ideal. He picked up the phone.
***
Delbert Wood drove through the light afternoon traffic for his rendezvous with Bendoo. He parked his car in one of the parking lots of the Garden Terrace beer joint on Molynes Road.
Bendoo was waiting for him, as it was mid-afternoon the place was quite scanty. The undercover man was already sipping a stout and he ordered a malt beverage for Wood.
“We can’t get a word out of the guy we captured.”
He was surprised by the large growth of beard the undercover man had grown since the last time he had seen him.
“Don’t worry yourself, he’ll soon talk. We can hold him for Lex’s murder,” Bendoo told him as he took a seat.
“Are you sure you weren’t followed here?” Wood asked.
“I came down to go to Jones Town. I told them that I have a girlfriend down there. I stopped a couple of times to see if they were following me but I didn’t see anybody. They trust me as one of the gang now. I’ve taken part in nearly all of their operations since I’ve gone up there.”
“So you told me already, but the Minister is worried. He’s under a lot of pressure from the Prime Minister. He wouldn’t mind if everything could keep on the level so he wants us to move faster.”
“As soon as I get to know the boss, I can wrap up this operation. But it’s hard work, Rattigan insists that when we aren’t operational we go into training. I can hardly get time to come and give you a report .”
“How soon will you get to know the boss?”
“About next week, he has a big meeting with Ardez and the other commanders. They want me to go too, so you can see that they trust me.”
“Are you sure it’s not a trap? Remember, it’s two of their men they’ve lost since you’ve been up there, plus we’ve captured two of them too.”
“You got anything out of Indian?”
“He doesn’t want to talk, but we have charges, we can book him on.”
“See the weed here,” Wood said, handing Bendoo a paper-bag of marijuana, which the latter stuffed into his travelling bag and stood up.
“I’ll see you, Woody, maybe in another week or so to update you on any new developments.”
“Sure, I’ll be waiting,” Wood said as the two men shook hands and went their separate ways.
He took a bus to Half Way Tree and then another over to Rockfort.
***
Premba’s visit to St. Ann on Friday night had proved fruitless. It couldn’t prevent one of the grower’s fields from being reaped.
On Monday night some heavily armed growers were on a routine patrol of fields in the area when they came upon the reaped field.
Talbot, the grower, looked at the empty land in total disbelief.
“The damn thieves stole my weed,” he cried out.
The others were speechless. Only a few days ago Talbot had been boasting that he would soon be ready to reap his field.
On Tuesday morning McCreed got Ardez’s call that Talbot’s marijuana field had been poached. Slowly he was being pushed into a fight, he thought. Somebody wanted to give him hell; well they would get more than they had bargained for. Fred Billings hadn’t yet gone to the office. He came into the living room where Mc Creed was.
“They reaped another of our fields,” he told him. He looked downcast.
“What the hell are you saying, another poaching? This is getting out of hand,” Fred declared.
He poured some orange juice into a glass, took a swallow and looked at Fred.
“We worked out a plan to trap them. If it succeeds that should take care of them.”
He explained the plan to Fred.
“It sounds good, but I’d like to see us capture their leaders and take them up there and really work them over.”
Mc Creed paused before replying.
“That’s what we plan to do.”
Fred stood up.
“I have to run as I’m late already. I’m just going to eat a sandwich,” he said, hurrying off into the kitchen.
“Tell Caslyn to make an omelet for me,” Gus shouted over his shoulder.
“I’ll do that.”
***
Danny King looked at the shapely figure of his wife. Betsy had kept her figure down the years. At fifty she could pass for a woman fifteen years her junior. He was glad for her, she had given him a challenge and he had lived up to it. After all it was now twenty six years since they were married and while he had a couple of extramarital affairs with a few women, he was sure she had never been unfaithful to her marriage vows. Now their marriage was facing a crisis and he was not sure he knew how to deal with it.
“Betsy, I didn’t hear what you were saying last night. Are you thinking of going to live in the States?”
“I’m planning to spend some time with the children. Danny, I’m going to stay with Gail until I’m ready to return home.”
Gail was the last of the their three children. The two boys were engineers. They came home to visit their parents regularly. It seemed surprising that King should be fighting to get a piece of the drug trade again. But his underlying ambition was to destroy McCreed.
“So how long do you intend to stay over there?”
“Danny, I don’t know why you have somebody like G. C
coming here. I just feel that you’re going to get yourself in trouble again. I just don’t want to be here when any police or gunmen come to look for you.”
“I’m running a legitimate business, and you know that too. G.C is one of my long time friends. If you don’t want him to come here I can always stop him.”
“Danny, ever since Lex was killed, I’ve been worrying about you. One of my friends told me that he had run away, leaving his house. Mary was running the business. Now that he’s dead, she’ll have to give back the people their clothes. She told me that she’s selling out the business and going away and I don’t blame her. Danny, are you not satisfied with what you have, what more do you want? My friend says she was surprised to hear that he was dead because she thought that he was in the States. I understand that Brad has also run away, leaving his house. I understand one of his employees is operating his business for him. Both of them were coming here nearly every day.”
“So they used to come here, but they used to go to lots of other places too. What else do you see me doing except running my business?”
“Okay,” she replied. “G.C isn’t just down here on vacation?”
“What G.C does is his business and I don’t want to hear anymore.”
Betsy stormed away to her room, crying.
Just then a car drove up to the gate and immediately his two Alsatians were beside it howling in fury. The gate lights were on. From the patio King could see the car, but couldn’t make out the driver. He went out to the gate cautiously.
It was Ruddy Brown; he got out of his car.
“King, what’s going on? I thought I would just come by you to see how you’re doing,” he said as he closed the car door. King had the dogs under control as they came through the gate, sniffing at the stranger.
“Come in, Ruddy, the dogs won’t trouble you. The bad ones are locked up.”
King waited until Ruddy went through the grill door and onto the patio before he let the dogs go.
“You want a drink, Ruddy?”
“Sure, give me a cold beer.”
King took some white wine and the two men sat on the patio.
“I like your ranch, King.”
“It took me a lot of years to build and lots of money too,” King replied as he switched on the patio lights.
Ruddy took a long drink of his beer. He had heard that King had a fabulous wife and he was hoping to meet her.
“I want to set up myself in Jamaica, settle down and start a family. Out here the people are natural. In America, they’re too
artificial. I’m not getting any younger, so I might just call it a day anytime now.”
“You can’t do that yet, Ruddy. We still want you to work on the Miami part of our operations.”
“Give me about two weeks or so and I’ll have all the contacts you’re going to need, so that’s no problem.”
“We still have the McCreed problem to deal with.”
“G.C told you that I got something to borrow. If I see any of those guys, who shot me, you know what I’m going to do. I have it in my pouch.”
He patted the pouch.
“Don’t worry yourself, we’re going to get rid of that son of a bitch sooner than you think.”
Ruddy acted as if he didn’t hear.
“King, I guess you know Ken Stone. I hear that he’s in Miami, issuing threats about what he’s going to do to me if we ever meet up, out here.”
“What’s the problem between both of you?”
“To cut a long story short, his parents used to help me out. You know how it is in Kingston sometimes. Well, that guy wants me to finance him and his parents. I give them money sometimes, but not him. Because of that, he’s saying that I am disrespecting him. Now he’s spreading all sorts of rumors about me.”
“You’d better watch yourself, because Ken won’t be afraid to draw his gun on you.”
“I want to tell him that I’m not afraid to draw my gun too, so anytime he’s ready, he can come.”
“So when are you returning?”
“I’m staying until next week with one of my girlfriends, but my money has run out. I’m looking a small loan, say about three hundred dollars. I don’t want her to feel that I don’t have any money.”
King whistled.
“That’s a lot of money, are you sure you can use it off before you leave?”
“I have a few things to buy before I go up plus I want to buy some things for my girlfriend.”
“You want a check or cash?”
“I’ll take cash because I don’t have a bank account out here so I might have problems changing a check.”
“I don’t have that kind of money on me now, but you can check me at my office in the morning.”
“Are you crazy? When I was coming here I had to stop a couple of times to make sure that nobody was trailing me. I don’t
trust Mc Creed. Are you sure that they aren’t watching your office?”
King considered for a moment.
“Come and check me here tomorrow for it then,” he told him.
“Yes, that’s cool,” Ruddy replied as Betsy King came to the doorway and couldn’t help noticing the neatly dressed man. She thought that he was in his mid thirties.
King rose.
“Ruddy,