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getting the full title for them. What
happened?”
    “ They
want me to divide it into two or three pieces so they can buy it
with two or three partners or something. I don’t have the plata for
that!”
    “ I have a
bit set by. I can lend you enough until they pay and you can pay me
back. What does it entail?”
    “ I will
have to get a new separate plano, then will have to fence the
sections, but they will do some of the work and will pay the
workers.”
    “ No!”
Clint shot back sternly. “I will pay the workers so there is no
question later about who they were working for.”
    “ But ...
Clint ... amigo! That is a LOT of money!”
    “ A couple
of thousand. You’re getting almost a million dollars for that
property so can pay it back when you sell. This sounds like a thing
I’ve heard about here. They get their hands on the papers – like
they already have, hire people to work on the place – for them –
then claim the land. That could work with the old right of
possession bit, which is why I insisted you get a title. You’re
pure Indio so can get a title. They’re Spanish and mestizos so they
CAN’T get a title on those islands.
    “ Please,
amigo. They aren’t above trying to steal your land. I’ll use the
time to investigate them. I’ve heard some things, like they’re
fronting for ... some other people who would never be welcome on
Cristóbal. At all! Find out what it’ll cost and I’ll finance
it.”
    “ Clint
... you are a true friend,” Ronaldo replied seriously. “I think an
honest and good person ... I will do as you say.”
     
    “ Yo,
Clint! Como esta?” Carlos Conant called as he passed in his boat.
Clint was on his porch over the dock at his Saigon Bay home having
coffee with his only close neighbor, Judi Lum.
    “ Bien!”
Clint replied. “Usted?”
    “ Very
well, thank you! Hear you’ve stuck your neck out for Ronaldo. Be
careful of those Indios. They never pay back a loan. Lending them
money is the same as giving them money.” Carlos was Black and the
Blacks and Indios here do not like each other. Unlike in the
states, Clint had found that the Blacks were the worst bigots,
followed by the pure Spanish. The Indios laughed at the Blacks,
mostly. They have entirely different cultures.
    “ Lending
any Panamanian money is giving it to them – EXCEPT for the Indios –
in my experience. Hell, I’ve lent you a couple of hundred over the
past few months and you’ve never so much as bought me a beer. I
don’t expect to get it back. I learned that the first week I was
here. You do owe me favors, though.
    ” What do
you know about that bunch of clowns at Forthingwells in
Panamá?”
    “ THAT
crowd? Colombian mafia, I hear. They’re having that Montez
character and his wife front for them while they buy up a lot of
places to build resorts and drug drop-off spots. They own a lot of
politicians and judges and such, same as always.
    “ Why?
Because they want that nice plot of land on Cristóbal?
    “ You
can’t fight them. They’ll end up with the land and nothing anyone
can do about it. Ronaldo will get maybe a thousand dollars to get
him by, but that’s it!”
    “ Oh,
there are ways to handle that type. I have friends ... well,
acquaintances ... in the states who’ve been in the organized crime
bit for centuries in Europe and in the US. THEY owe me some favors,
bigtime! I can get answers fast. Maybe I’ll have to go to Panamá
and have a bit of a talk with some of them.
    “ AFTER I
make a couple of calls to the US!”
    “ Clint,
check up on what’s really going on with this shit. Fifty-fifty you
end up dead if you aren’t VERY careful. This is NOT the
US!”
    Clint nodded and went inside to the phone to
call a number he hadn’t used in ten years or more. The person who
gave him the number had died just after giving him the number. He
was a very big don in the states and made it a point to let his
sons know he – therefore, they – owed Clint Faraday any favor