“So for whatever reason, Matteo was heading for the Gulf of Mexico, with a yacht waiting. A yacht big enough to brave the high seas?” he asked Felix.
“Yes, in fact,” Felix answered. “It was a one-deck yacht, but it was nearly ninety feet long, and from what the skipper told Leon, it was fully outfitted for a months’ long journey. Why?”
Carl had caught on, though. “He was taking the birds to Africa?” he asked. “Why would he be smuggling the birds to Africa? Don’t they originate in Africa?”
“Wait,” Danny said, doing some fast typing of his own. “I’ve got his financials. After his father died, he started giving a lot of money to conservation agencies. The environment was his thing, and endangered species in particular. So….” He paused, his voice growing far away. “What does that get us?”
“A place to start,” Julia decided. “I think it’s time to split up and do some investigating. Who wants to take what?”
“I’ll take the birds,” Carl said. “The bustard’s primary appeal—besides being a weird-looking horny pill—is being falcon food. It looks like these eggs were being sent back to their native habitat to be what? Hunted? In the US, falcons aren’t too pricey—maybe three thousand dollars fully trained. But in the Middle East, at a falconer festival? We’re talking hundreds of thousands of dollars.”
Grace stared at him over his shoulder. “How in the hell do you know that?”
“He likes birds,” Michael said loyally, and Carl grimaced at him in apology.
“I do. But my company also insures birds, and I’ve had to make trips to Doha, in Qatar, before, with a fully trained veterinarian and falconry expert to verify that we could insure a hybrid falcon bred to hunt other birds.”
“There’s falcons in Qatar?” Grace asked, sounding interested and surprised.
“There’s falcons everywhere, but the Souq in Doha is famous,” Carl told him, remembering the giant room, almost like a livestock room at a county fair, with rows of stucco “benches” for the falcons to perch upon. Each bird had been hooded, the hoods brightly colored or decorated with bits of metal, and while their bodies had been at rest, there’d been a coiled tension in the air, as though every bird had just been waiting for its sight—and its freedom. “Falconry is a big part of their culture,” he finished weakly and realized everybody was staring at him, waiting for more. “See, it’s always been part of Middle Eastern culture, but for a while, all the birds were dying out because of pesticides. But in the sixties and seventies, we realized that we could reclaim endangered species by changing our own behavior. When we stopped using DDT, the falcons came back. So once the falcons returned, the Middle Easterners—the well-off ones, anyway—re-engaged in the sport. But by that time, the bustard, one of their principal game birds, was running out of land, and they were a favorite prey for falconers because of the horny-pill thing, so the birds were, like I said, nearly hunted to extinction. They’re starting to come back now, but….”
“But they’re still on the watchlist,” Felix said. He nodded. “So, Carl, you’ve got a start and some contacts. How about you investigate the birds, like you said, and find out why someone might want to be hauling—how many was it, Danny?”
“Three dozen,” Danny muttered, looking something else up on the computer as he spoke.
“Three dozen bustard eggs from California, where no bustards are usually found, to Qatar. Or wherever they were bound.”
“I can do that,” Carl said. “What else?”
“The car,” Julia said. “Michael? Chuck? Cars are your specialty. We need to look into what kind of cars were involved in that accident. Not just Matteo’s, but in particular the ones that drove him off the road. You may not be able to discover paint color, but something tells me that with some traffic photos to narrow down your options, you can get us an idea of what was used.”
“I’ll get the traffic photos,” Stirling said. “I need dates and times and time of days—as many details as you can get me, and I’ll see if I can narrow the rest down.”
“I can work with you on that,” Julia said.
“What do we do?” Grace asked.
“You and Hunter get to research Napa,” Danny said. “We know that’s where the bustard eggs came from, and bustards lead to falconry. Start looking up travel brochures to see what’s mentioned, and call places to see what they have. It’s not glamorous, but—”
“It’s good detective work,” Grace said, throwing his head back. “I can do that while I babysit Cancer Boy. Did you hear that, Josh? I said it.”
Josh gave a rusty chuckle. “I heard it. Since we’re speaking truth, can I call you Asshole? ’Cause that’ll be fun too.”
“Josh actually has his own job,” Julia said, and Carl looked up to watch her lock eyes with her son. “Don’t you?”
Josh looked away. “Only because we owe a debt,” he said. “Because Leon di Rossi is doing this and we owe him.”
Julia’s mouth compressed, and she looked—for the first time in Carl’s memory—displeased with her son.
Felix let out a sigh. “Josh, for whatever reason you’re doing it, remember that Mr. di Rossi is putting himself out. Above everything, son, I hope we’ve raised you to be gracious.”
Josh gave Felix a tortured look. “Of course, Dad.”
And Carl understood.
“So,” Julia said, “we’ll have another family meeting in—what do you think, Felix? Seven days?”
“Four.”
Everybody looked surprised, and Felix elaborated. “I got a call right before we came down. Mr. di Rossi moved heaven and earth, and that moved our timetable up. He’ll be here tomorrow, and we can give him a good meal and some good conversation before his little trip to the hospital with Josh. And then Josh can come back with some more information that we need about his father.”
“He was not my father,” Josh said hotly, and everybody in the den took a breath. Ill, in pain, and emotionally overwrought, Josh was obviously having trouble dealing with the fact that the men he’d loved since he’d been born couldn’t help him with this one damned thing.
“He’s not your dad, son,” Felix said gently. “And he’s definitely not your Uncle Danny. But he was special to your mother, so please, for all of us, remember that we love you most for your heart.”
They could all hear Josh’s deep breath. “Yeah, Dad,” he said after a moment. “I’m sorry, everybody.”
And of course, Grace had to add, “I am so gonna be there when you grill Uncle Leon like a trout,” he said with satisfaction. “It’ll be great. I’ll get to be the emotionally mature one in the room. Did you hear that, everybody? I’m emotionally mature!”
“Yeah, Grace,” Stirling muttered. “We get it. You’re getting laid, so you’re less obnoxious. Go you.”
“Go me,” Grace said, nodding with finality. “I’m having popcorn for dinner in four days.”
Molly sighed. “Great. So everybody’s got something to do but me.”