Free Side by Side by John Ramsey Miller

like he was going out to play golf. The lawyer shook his guests’ hands with the enthusiasm of a politician greeting his prime benefactors.
    “May I offer you something to drink? Serge, may I offer you a glass of twenty-seven-year-old Macallan? It was a Christmas gift from the ambassador to Scotland.”
    The damned ambassador to Scotland gives Mr. Ross Laughlin liquor, Peanut thought. If there was ever a more impressive or intelligent man than Ross Laughlin, Peanut sure hadn’t met him. He was also the only man Peanut really trusted.
    The Russian frowned. “I never drink when I am talking business.”
    “He might rather have vodka,” Peanut said. “That’s potato juice and pure grain alcohol.”
    “Too early for me, sir,” Max Randall said, declining.
    Mr. Laughlin sat down in a sleek black leather chair across from Sarnov and Max. Peanut sat heavily on the leather ottoman with the elbows of his long arms on his knees.
    “So,” Sarnov said, placing a gold lighter and a package of fancy cigarettes carefully on the glass coffee table. “Let’s get to it, Ross.”
    Mr. Laughlin folded his hands on his leg. “I met with Hunter Bryce this morning. Monday evening we will conclude our outstanding business,” he said. “And Colonel Bryce is ready to go on to the next load as soon as the financials are ironed out. He assures me that he can provide whatever amount of merchandise you require on a reasonable schedule and at bargain-basement prices.”
    Sarnov looked at Max, who nodded once and said, “Colonel Bryce can certainly do that.”
    Sarnov said, “Nothing I know about this judge gives me the degree of confidence you have that he will give in to pressure.”
    “Max’s plan was a stroke of genius,” Laughlin said. “It will work.”
    “We have his little girl and her kid,” Peanut said. “And my daughter Dixie spoke to the judge personally about how to get them back safe and sound. He doesn’t know he’s going to be as dead as they are.”
    Ross Laughlin plucked a speck of lint off his pant leg. “Judge Fondren is a man who has lost his wife and son-in-law in a tragic accident. His grief is deep and he will not risk the sole remaining members of his immediate family over Bryce—someone whom he has no emotional investment in. The agent Bryce killed knew his risks, was killed in a war of sorts. Plus, I have introduced more than ample reasonable doubt to allow the judge to rule in Hunter Bryce’s favor without drawing too much criticism. The judge will go for it.”
    “You guarantee that?” Sarnov asked.
    “I guarantee it.”
    “My employers take guarantees as blood oaths. I sincerely hope you are correct,” Sarnov said. “By refusing to divulge the location of the shipment, for which my firm paid you three million up front upon my assurances, Colonel Bryce has in effect been extorting my employers for a year.”
    “The advance—a third of the purchase price your firm agreed to pay for the merchandise—went directly from me to the colonel and on to his suppliers to pay for the shipment,” Mr. Laughlin pointed out.
    “I understand business.” Sarnov shrugged. “But the fact remains that the firm’s funds have been in the hands of others, while our merchandise—which we never laid our eyes on—sits gathering dust, only Bryce knows where. We could not keep our word to the people we had promised to deliver to. It made us look like we have no control.”
    “You’re going to make out like bandits,” Peanut told the Russian. “You pay nine million and get stuff worth a minimum of three times that much.”
    “What you think,” Sarnov said to Peanut, “is of no importance or of any interest to me.” He turned back to Laughlin. “For all I know, the Feds have located the missing merchandise. Maybe what we have bought is long gone, or maybe they are waiting to catch us taking possession of it, or maybe they will track it and take down the people we sell it to. Perhaps the risks have risen