Lone Wolf #5: Havana Hit by Mike Barry Page B

helped me into Vegas,” Wulff said. “You helped me into fifty murders, you helped me into a hijack, you helped me into a helicopter with a man who expected to kill me. Any more of your help, Williams, and they’d carry me out of here for a state funeral.”
    “This is your war,” Williams said, “Not mine. I don’t want any responsibility for it. You were the one who started this. You asked me for help—”
    “And you gave it, Williams,” Wulff said. “Oh boy did you give it. Do you help everyone this way? It’s a lucky thing I caught you at the precinct, you know. Your wife really wasn’t sure where the hell you were. But I had a feeling, Williams. Old cop instinct, you know? I figured that you were downstairs in the stationhouse, probably beating the shit out of some suspect. Upholding the system, of course.”
    “I got no time for this,” Williams said, “I’m on duty now. I don’t know what you want but there’s nothing—”
    “I’m calling international wire,” Wulff said, “and it’s taken me about fifteen minutes to get this one through so don’t think that I’m going to keep you. I’m not going to keep you at all. I got a big problem down here. I just wanted to tell you one thing, though.”
    “What’s that?”
    “Are you sure you want to know?”
    Williams took the mouthpiece slightly away from his lips and said, “I have no time for shit, man. I don’t know what position you’re putting me in, what you’re trying to make me but you’ve got this wrong—”
    “I don’t have anything wrong. I have most things right, Williams. Do you know what I’m going to do? I’m going to get out of Cuba with that valise. Nobody thinks I’m going to make it now but I’m going to do it.”
    “I hope so. I really hope so, man.”
    “And you know what then? I’m going to take that valise straight up north to your pretty little living room in St. Albans, Williams, and I’m going to dump it at your feet and open the clips one by one and show you a million dollars of shit, most of it stolen from the property clerk’s office in the good old municipal court. Have you ever seen a million dollars worth of shit?”
    “No I have not.”
    “Well neither had I, Williams,” Wulff said almost gaily. “So don’t take it personally. There are very few people walking around, even top-type organization people who have even seen a quarter of that. A tenth of it is pretty big stuff nowadays. And you know what I’m going to do after I’ve got the clips open on the valise and you’re staring down at all that stuff? You know what the next move is?”
    “I couldn’t imagine. I simply couldn’t imagine, Wulff, so you tell me what the next move is.”
    “I will. I’m going to ask
you
what to do with it, Williams. I’m going to let it be your fucking decision because I’ve had enough decisions for the time being. I’m going to rest on this one. You’re the one who sent me out for the shit;
you
can make a decision on what to do with it next. You always knew all the moves, Wlliiams: you got the mortgage and the pregnant wife; you’re the one who loves the system so you make a decision
for
the system. What is best in terms of your fucking system, Williams?”
    “Enough,” Williams said and withdrew the phone from his ear.
    “Think about it over the next few days,” Wulff said thinly, “because I’m getting off now but I guarantee you, I absolutely guarantee that I am going to come out of here alive and I’m going to have that stuff with me. What is it going to do if it gets into New York? Can you throw it into the sea and say it doesn’t exist? Can you toss it into the market and watch what it does to prices? Do you want to take it back to the property office and say that, here, they can cover their tracks; we’ve pulled them out of an embarrassing situation? Do we go with the system or against it? And if we go with it do we know what’s right? It’s time you did some thinking, that you