Chapter 2

The second man had some identification in his wallet, but it was nothing special. He had a Russian-sounding name, but a lot of good Americans had that, so it was meaningless data at the moment. The only money he was carrying was all American, so he very easily could have been a run-of-the-mill hood. I pulled him back until he was completely on the porch so that I could close the door.

At last, I could spend some time with my captive. He was back to normal now, so I pulled him into the kitchen. I searched him and found no more than I did with the guy on the porch. I leaned him against the wall and said, "Okay, Boris, I am sure that you can speak enough English to understand me. I plan to question you about what is going on. Rest assured, all of that stuff you may have seen on TV about how cops question suspects has nothing to do with me. You have no rights as far as I am concerned, and I will cause you more pain than you can imagine if you do not answer my questions completely and truthfully. That will be your only chance to live through this little session.

"The first question will be easy because I want to discover just how good your English might be. I hope that it is better than mine because that will make things easier for both of us. Okay, here it is: Is Boris Spatsov your real name?"

Well, good old Boris was acting true to form: he spat at me. I was expecting it so he missed. "Oh, my dear Boris, that was your first mistake. You have answered the real question that I was asking, but you have also made me even more angry with you."

It was not easy, and I thought that he was going to break the table before I finished, but I managed to drag him up onto the table and lay him on his face. I fastened his arms and legs to the four table legs with more of the plastic ties. I cut his clothes away so that he was completely naked. I could tell that I was breaking through his assumed air of toughness because he started to sweat. It was just past noon by now, so I stopped long enough to fix myself a sandwich and a cup of coffee. I made a point of letting Boris see me eat, but I never offered him anything, even a glass of water.

Once I had finished eating, I returned my attention to Boris. I said, "Boris, if I have to kill you, and you make that look like a very likely option, you will never be found. I will slit your belly and weight your body before dumping you into the lake. Nobody but me will ever know what happened to you."

I refilled the coffee pot and returned it to the stove to heat until the water boiled. "Boris, you may wonder why I am heating water until it boils. Well, it is intended for you. Do you know what boiling water feels like? I can assure you that it is very painful. In fact, I have heard of people spending 10 years in prison for pouring boiling water onto another person. Actually, I have never done it, but we may soon find out just how painful that can be."

Boris looked at me and said, "My real name is Boris Spatsov. I am an American citizen, and I know that you cannot do this to me."

"Well, Boris, we will soon find out what I can and cannot do to you. My first experiment will be to pour boiling water into your ass crack. You do realize what will happen, don't you. The boiling water will run down your ass crack and over your ass hole. You may not notice that event because you will already be screaming in pain. From your ass hole, the water will run down to your balls. Of course, the water will have cooled a little bit by then, but probably not enough for you to notice the difference.

"From your balls, the water will run down your cock. I don't now about your balls, but I expect that you will feel the water on your cock. I expect that you will piss by this time, maybe even shit some, as you react to the pain. Well, don't concern yourself about that. That will give you a measure of revenge because I will have to clean it up. I expect that you will be in such pain by then that you will not even notice when I clean it up."

"For God's sake, don't do that to me! What do you want to know?"

"Well, for starters, why did you and your friends try to kill me this morning?"

"I don't know. I was just following orders."

That was the kind of answer that I was expecting, so I did not even comment. By this time, the water was boiling vigorously. I picked up the pot and turned back to Boris. "Last chance, Boris. Either answer my question or get you first experience with boiling water on your ass."

"Okay, okay! Please put that pot down." I put the pot back on the stove where it immediately returned to boiling. I turned back around and gave Boris a questioning look. He said, "I heard the boss say that you might have talked to your friend Andrew Hatfield before he was killed, so you had to be killed before you acted on the information."

"All right, that was about what I expected. Now, let us try another question since you did so well with that one. Who is your boss, and where can I find him?"

"Oh, my God! I can't tell you that. I'd be wearing concrete overshoes if they ever found out that I had told you that."

I didn't say anything. I just turned back to the stove and picked up the pot of boiling water. I started to walk toward Boris with that pot in my hand, and he broke completely. I put the pot down and he proceeded to tell me the whole story. There were a number of fits and starts in Boris' telling of the story, so I will summarize it here.

The Russian Mafia had been contacted by somebody in the Iranian government to supply terrorist groups in the USA and Canada with weapons and explosives. These guns, etc. would come through the port of Halifax and be moved about the continent by the Russian Mafia. The material would we delivered to several distribution points, and the terrorists would take over from there. The goods headed to the USA would be moved by truck through New England to the distribution points. Boris didn't know where these distribution points were, and he did not know what was to be done in Canada. That information would have to come from somebody else, maybe the boss.

The Boss was located in a penthouse apartment in Boston, at least for now. Once he was sure that the information leak had been plugged here, he would return to NYC. His name was Alexei Vasily Vladovich. That seemed to me to be an unlikely name, but I did not speak Russian, so I could not know for sure. It really made no difference as long as he was using that name in America.

I had spent nearly two hours questioning Boris, so it was getting late, and there was still that mess in my front yard to clean up. I went out to the boat and picked up my cellphone from the tackle box. I called Det. Bains to report what had happened in my yard. I would wait until he showed up to give him the information I had gotten from Boris. That was too sensitive to give out over the cellphone. Det. Bains promised to show up within half an hour, so I took the time to shower and dress. By the way, I had also told Bains that Boris would need some new clothes.

Bains showed up as promised and the morgue trucks were right behind him. They picked up the bodies and Bains had even brought somebody to clean up the spilled blood. Now, that was a friend.

A second cruiser had come to pick up Boris. They had the regulation orange prisoner jumpsuit for him to wear. Boris was not all that happy about going to jail, but he accepted it to the alternatives I offered him. Once everybody else had left, I told Bains what I had learned from Boris and asked his opinion on how to proceed. Neither one of us had any confidence in Homeland Security, but we had no better ideas.

Bains heard me out and called his contact in Homeland Security. That functionary simply did not believe his story, and Bains hung up in disgust. Shit!!! Det. Bains had no further advice, except that I should take a long vacation until this blew over.