WATER WORKS: 20) DECARLO'S

Sunday Funnies: A Novel of Intrigue, Lunacy & H2O

26.

I’m working on a Beefeater martini at the bar in DeCarlo's, Spring Valley NW DC, when Pikestaff shows up.

We nail a booth.

"I know who's behind Dulci Acqua," I say.

"Who?"

"Three guesses, Pikestaff."

Pikestaff shifts, a silent butt-snort, then straightens himself. "The Sultan of Brunei?"

"Too obvious," I say. "I would've guessed that too. Next."

"The PRC?"

"Wouldn't have surprised me either. Those Chinese are going to take over the world one day. Aside from anything else, Nostradamus predicted it. Third guess.”

"The Russian mafia?"

"You struck out, Pikestaff." I drain my martini. "It's the Scrogg twins."

"The who?"

"Why am I the only person who's ever heard of Tommy and Teddy Scrogg?"

"Who the hell are they?"

"Very shrewd British businessmen. Low profile. They made hundreds of millions in construction, then moved to Monaco to avoid British taxes. That's where I came across them. They used to hang out at Cafe de Paris at noon every day waiting for the English papers to arrive. You'd think these guys would be waiting for the Financial Times, right? Not the Scrogg twins. They gobbled up The Sun and the Daily Mirror—the UK gutter press."

"They're in Monaco?" asks Pikestaff.

"Past tense. They bought an island in the Caribbean about three years ago. They've probably got water on the brain from looking at it too much."

Pikestaff nods absently.

"So, Pikestaff, we're no longer talking about a subversive foreign country intent on bringing harm to the national security of the United States. Maybe it's time to wrap this sucker, turn it over to the feebs and let them go after the Scrogg twins for criminal fraud."

"If they're English, we should probably share what we have with the cousins."

"Sure, go ahead and score brownie points with Perfidious."

"I'd like you to do it," says Pikestaff.

"Why me?"

"You're the one who's been bouncing around the world, costing me thousands of dollars."

"I was hoping I'd be excused."

"From making two thousand dollars a day?"

"Yeah, well." I look away. "Morton Levi offered me four grand a day to work for him."

"Four thousand dollars a day?" Pikestaff's eyes lurch from their sockets. "To do what?"

"Save the Aral Sea."

"You're nuts."

"No. Morton Levi is nuts. He wants to save the Aral Sea, and he's hiring me to help him. I think he wants to win the Nobel Peace Prize or be on the cover of Time magazine or something."

"But how are you supposed to save the Aral Sea?" Pikestaff's incredulity turns to amusement.

"Beats the hell out of me." I shrug. "Morton wants me to fly to Uzbekistan and scope it out."

Pikestaff shakes his head. "Well, I wouldn't be going anywhere yet. This isn't over. I need you here. We don't know for sure that it ends with the Scraggs."

"Scroggs."

"There might be another dimension to this, beyond the Scroggs."

"I doubt it, Pikestaff. These Scrogg twins are very independent, bordering on paranoia. They don't trust anyone. They're even trying to start their own country."

Pikestaff raises an eyebrow. "How can they do that?"

"That island I mentioned. I think they bought it from the Dutch government. Last I heard, they were trying to negotiate their independence from Holland."

"Hmm," says Pikestaff. "We should hear what SIS has to say about them before channeling this to the Bureau. I'll arrange lunch for you with someone from their station here.”