The Death Dealers Read Online Free PDF Page A

“Please ... ?”
    “You were running scared. You knew he could throw the whole bit into a panic if he wanted to. Don’t give me that international-law crap. Law is where and how you find it. If you think we’re going to stand by Saudi Arabian law where they chop your hands off for stealing a loaf of bread you’re nuts. They try that on Teddy and some bigwig over there is going to have the supreme pleasure of seeing his genitals proffered to him to eat on the end of a stick. Who the hell do they think we are? Damn it, we got what we wanted because we took it from those who couldn’t hold it and we did it the hard way. You think gooks with blunderbusses and archaic ideas don’t know this? So now we walk the road easy because nobody in the capital wants to disturb the status quo. They’d better learn there’re still some left who can lift a head on the end of a pole as well as the poor uneducated can. Goddamn, I skinned a guy alive once and he screamed his state secrets with no trouble at all. Sure, he died, but he died like he killed other people and we got the answers. I want to see our eggheads trying that, or the Peace Corps, or the politicos.
    “Girl, we’re strictly civilians working to keep this country out of the hands of the garbage heads who want to give it away to the half-asses. We’re people who object to punitive income taxes that destroy the brains of the nation and put control in the hands of those who know nothing. Let’s say we’re right wing ... like so far right we go through the wall ... but anything to knock out the destroyers of our country. Damn, but Jefferson or Adams or Teddy R. should see what goes on now. They’d flip.”
    Whatever she saw in my eyes turned her face into a mask of fright. She sucked her lower lip in between her teeth and held it there, her hand slowly coming up to cover her mouth.
    In a half whisper she said, “You’re not fit ... ”
    “I’ve been told that before. What you don’t understand is that when you play with the death dealers you use the only weapon they understand—violence. It isn’t pretty, but it’s effective. You train yourself to lose the squeamishness and sense of fair play our society bred into us because the other side was born without it and has a head start in that direction. They can maim and kill and put the world on edge and it’s written off to their lack of understanding and culture because they’ve been held back and exploited by the supposed land-gobbling capitalist nations. Everybody seems to forget that the leaders of these countries are sharp cookies. Most have been Western-educated and with what they were taught and their own native ingenuity, they put the screws to us, their own kind, and live a life of luxury you don’t find outside of fairy tales. Right now world security can hinge on just which way one of those jerkwater kingdoms moves.”
    “You don’t ... solve world problems ... with killing,” she finally said.
    “Then tell them that, baby. Let Interpol find out how two of our technicians died over there. Let them check into that supposed landslide.”
    It caught her off base and her eyes showed it. “How did you ... nobody was supposed to know ....”
    “Martin Grady’s money can buy a lot of information.”
    “Yes. I see that.” She seemed to be deciding something, then made up her mind. “The death of those men was one reason Interpol was brought in. Tedesco’s activities gave us an excuse to probe.”
    “Then why use you? Interpol has some hot people on the staff.”
    “Simply because I am a woman. The native leaders show a marked preference for Western types.”
    “You know how fast a woman can disappear there?”
    “I’m aware of it.”
    “You know they still traffic in slaves of all types?”
    “Yes.”
    “Ever hear what happens to the fringe-area showgirl types who take jobs in some of the Latin American countries and get stranded there? You know this is a deliberate setup that eventually