Caravan of Thieves by David Rich Read Free Book Online

“Ain’t got no tackle,” said the old man running the boat rentals.
    “Going to meet friends. They’ve already been out two days.”
    He seemed to believe it. Maybe he just cared about the question. I counted out the cash for the boat rental and the deposit and the gas. I drove aimlessly around the lake a few times to see if I had any watchers, then cruised out north.
    Dan was where I expected to find him. He was alone this time and had his clothes on, thankfully. I was the biggest thing on the plateau overlooking the houseboat, and I couldn’t crawl under my own shadow to cool off. The heat was bothering me, but it shouldn’t have, so maybe it was more than the heat. Dan spent some time fixing an awning. Then the shadows from the plateau fell over the boat and I started down.
    He must have seen me coming and hidden. The boat was about forty feet, white, with a roof deck. It rested on two aluminumpontoons. A rubber raft with a small outboard was tethered to the stern and pulled up onto the beach. The boat was called
Not Home
. First I stepped into the water and walked all around the boat. I decided that calling out for Dan would only make him suspicious. He might think it was a warning or that I was being forced to call.
    Inside, the boat was clean and well kept. The wood cabinetry was still in good shape. The galley had a small refrigerator and a gas stove and a table where four people could sit if they crammed in close to each other. Two heads. A large bed where Dan slept, and another bedroom with two beds, and a bunk in the passageway, all made up. Aft was a lounge with blue cushions around the sides. There was a box of cigars, Fuentes, on the counter. I took one and grabbed a bottle of beer from the fridge and went outside to enjoy the shade.
    I heard him before I saw him. “Rollie Boy, there’s no one on this glorious earth I’d rather see sitting in my chair, drinking my beer and smoking my cigars.” He came into view, walking along the beach carrying a Winchester Model 70 hunting rifle, low at his side. His hair was thick and white, like a politician’s, which should have been a hint to anyone who paid attention, and it accentuated the deep brown tan he had. He climbed aboard the aft ladder, set the rifle against the rail, and held out his arms. “Damn coyote’s been checking me out, thought I’d turn the tables on him,” he said. “I didn’t know if you were dead or alive. It was torture for me.” We hugged. “You have to tell me all about it. You look great. Great.”
    We settled down and agreed that we both looked great and the sky was blue, the sun was probably going to go down, and the stars were going to twinkle in the sky. Nobody asked anyone but himself what are you doing here? How did you get here? How do you plan to get out? At last Dan showed me where I could sleep. I checkedout the ridgeline before bedding down and was astounded to see a coyote watching us.
    We fished and caught smallmouth bass all morning, enough to make me wonder how long I’d be there eating them, and that made me give in first. “Whose boat is this?”
    “Well, I could claim it for my own, but what for, since I get to use it as much as I like without the burdens of ownership.” Taxes and licenses and permits. “I knew this guy, big guy, maybe six four, sprout of curly dark hair, beanpole of a guy, had a little wife, tiny, barely five feet, very attractive woman she was, but she ran him ragged. It was funny to watch, painful but funny. She’d want him to check with her for permission to swallow his food. And ‘Buy me this, buy me that, take me to Hawaii, take me to France, send the kids to this special school.’ There weren’t enough hours in the day for this guy to make money at the rate she spent it. His name was Simon, by the way. Simon needed to get away sometimes but could never figure out a good plan until he took the family on a houseboat vacation on the lake here. He went off fishing one morning and