Middle Man by David Rich Read Free Book Online Page A

Voster M.E.A. was the name Dan gave to his enterprises, for private consumption only. After a successful venture, he would return to whichever girlfriend he had at the time, pop the champagne and toast to Voster M.E.A. Amalgamated. Loosely translated, Latin
voster mea est
means “yours is mine” in English. I looked it up once and it’s pretty close to correct, close enough for the private joke.
    The salesman led me over to racks of suits. “Forty-two long? Try this one on.” He put a gray jacket with a white stripe on me and it felt like it fit pretty well. “What do you have right now, so we don’t duplicate?”
    I looked at him and shook my head and said, “I’m sorry. I don’t own any suits. You’ll have to decide.”
    He managed to mask any thoughts he had about that. “No problem. Step over here and we’ll get you fixed up properly.”
    He moved me in front of the mirror and in that one glance I was fourteen again, in Dan’s closet, trying on one of his suits. He had five: three had labels from a tailor named Tartaglia, one said Corneliani, one said Huntsman. I was wearing the dark blue tailor-made jacket, the sleeves hanging past my hands, and the shoulders down near my biceps, when I noticed that Dan had come in and was watching me. “You have good taste, Rollie boy,” he said. “Had that one made in Beverly Hills. Hell of a tailor and a good friend.” That meant Dan had not paid him, at least not the full amount. “With clothes, your best policy is to have just a few really good pieces rather than a closet full of junk.” He did not have to mention that philosophy allowed faster getaways. I looked around and realized for the first time the closet was not full. It had always seemed like a thick forest to me. The conditions for poking around in Dan’s closet frequently occurred: I was bored and he was out. I searched without pattern or plan for artifacts or secrets. Or money. Anything that would help augment my understanding of him, help me clear the mist. Dan always dressed well. He always looked sharp, so I always made sure I never looked sharp. For Dan, clothes were a uniform: jeans and cowboy boots, khakis and blue blazer, a fancy suit; he was careful to overdress just enough to contrast with and accentuate his relaxing charm.
    Dan took the coat and hung it up. “Bet those boots almost fit you by now.” I looked down; I was wearing shorts and his fancy cowboy boots. They were dark, like chocolate, on the lower part and black on the leg with a design that looked like wings. I admitted they did almost fit. “They’re made from caiman. Know what that is?” I lied and said I did. “It’s a sort of South American crocodile. I had to kill one once.”
    He smiled at the memory, or the smile was a reflex that helped him invent the memory. For a moment, I thought of trying to dart past him, but he filled the doorway, and I knew I wanted to hear the story whether it was true or not. “We had pulled our canoes up on the riverbank, it was an Amazon tributary, and grabbed our packs. There was a village just a quarter mile away through the forest where we planned to camp. A woman in our party lost her balance and fell into the river as she was hoisting her gear. The bottom was muddy. She was flopping around, struggling to get up. We all turned to the guide, he was an Indian, but he just watched her, so we figured it was no big deal. At least I did. Then the woman screamed. The caiman wasn’t five feet from her. Still the guide didn’t move. If this was a lesson, I didn’t want to learn it. I took my pack off and threw it at the beast. It spun around and bit into the pack. I pulled my knife and moved forward into the water. The tail thrashed and hit me in the leg and that hurt. I almost fell. But I knew I would get only one chance. So I put my knife into its brain.”
    I remember looking