CHAPTER VII. The Boys
Back in the neighborhood of the warehouse, he found a parking spot across from the bar that also had a view of the main entrance to the warehouse. It was about 3:25, and already cars were starting to pull up to the warehouse, their occupants getting out and letting themselves in through the security gate, which obviously had a coded security keypad. DiNozzo guessed the code changed on a daily basis. Entrance into the building itself also required punching a code into a keypad.
As the next shift was arriving, workers from the previous shift were leaving. The Navy was nothing if not predictable. Shipboard shift changes occurred on one schedule, but a facility like this would operate on civilian schedules because many of the workers were civilians. First shift from 7:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m., second from 3:00 p.m. to 11:00 p.m.
Soon enough, three men emerging from the warehouse and the fenced yard headed down the street toward the bar instead of going straight to their cars. DiNozzo watched their animated conversation and their entrance into the bar with satisfaction. He'd had a hunch, he'd played it, and now he hoped it would pay off.
He allowed the men enough time to get seated and order the first round before getting out of his car and heading for the bar himself. Once inside, it took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the gloom. It was a standard joint of its type—several wooden tables, scarred by many years of use, with wooden chairs, a grungy floor littered with peanut shells, a bar with eight stools, a TV up in one corner tuned to a basketball game on ESPN with the volume relatively low. Baskets of peanuts in the shell sat on the tables and the bar, and the place was filled with the distinctive odor of hops and stale frying oil. The only occupants were the barkeep and, at one of the tables, the three men from the warehouse.
Tony slid onto one of the barstools, positioning himself so that it looked like he was watching the TV but carefully turned so that he could observe his fellow patrons out of the corner of his eye. He noted that the bar offered two kinds of draft, but he ordered a local brew that was offered only in cans. He had no intention of getting drunk; to prevent anyone from noticing that he wasn't downing a full glass each round, he planned to take only one or two swallows from each can.
After his first swallow, he began paying close attention to the conversation going on at the table.
"God knows I didn't drop that container on purpose," said one. "But that goddamned Jew-boy jumped me like I just committed sabotage er somepin'."
"Goddam bastard," concurred his buddies, and all three raised their glasses in a negative toast to the "bastard."
The second man offered his opinion. "If it wasn't fer them Jews, things would go a lot smoother in that place."
"Dam straight," echoed the third man, and once again they raised their glasses.
"Don't know why I keep workin' there," grumbled the first.
"Yeah, I'd quit tomorrow if I could find another job," offered the second.
"Pay's not that dam good," the third stated.
"Buncha under-paid, over-worked pack mules is what we are," the first one said.
"Pack mules," the others echoed in unison.
They paused to drain their glasses and then signaled the barkeeper to bring them the next round. Tony added his own signal, indicating he would pay for the round.
The barkeeper served the three, letting them know that the stranger at the bar was picking up the tab.
Lifting the fresh glasses in a salute of thanks toward Tony, they drank deeply.
When he put down his glass, the first man, glancing at his companions in an unspoken suggestion and getting their assent, addressed Tony.
"Wanna join us?"
Tony looked over at them as if he were appraising them. "Don't mind if I do."
As he moved from the stool to a chair, he signaled the barkeeper to bring him another can as well. When he was seated and served, he stuck out his hand and introduced himself.
"Tony DiNozzo."
The first warehouse worker's name was Ed Kern, the second Joe Jackson, and the third Andy MacMillan.
"We were just talkin' about our goddam bosses," Ed advised him.
The other two mumbled their usual imprecations.
Andy asked DiNozzo, "You gotta boss?"
Tony smiled with what he hoped was the right degree of bitter sarcasm.
"Oh, yeah, I gotta boss. Goddam ex-Marine. Hard as nails and just as mean. Likes to swat me on the back of the head whenever he thinks I'm not working hard enough." For a moment, Tony imagined Gibbs' hand materializing out of thin air to give him the usual slap.
The guys mumbled again, and Joe muttered, "Goddam bosses." The four of them raised their drinks once more.
"What kinda work you do, Tony?" Joe asked.
"Research," he replied.
"No kiddin'," Ed exclaimed. "So do we."
"Well, we don't do the actual research," Andy corrected. "We're just the mules moving all the goddam equipment and what not around."
"What kinda research is it?" Tony asked as casually as he could.
"Oh, it's somethin' to do with all these high-tech weapons systems," Ed said. Tony had the distinct impression that Joe was kicking Ed's shin under the table to shut him up.
Ed continued, "'Course, it's all hush-hush. Somethin' the Navy's doin' for those goddam Israelis. Ya ask me, we should blow all them dam Aye-rabs and Jews to hell and be done with ‘em."
Joe looked at Ed. "Them Aye-rabs and Jews is the ones payin' your salary."
"Yeah, well, ain't that goddam good of a salary," Ed retorted.
"Who's in charge? The Navy or the Jews?" Tony asked.
"Oh, there's a Navy guy in there, all right," Ed responded. "But it's the goddam Jews that're runnin' things."
"Ole Avram," added Andy.
"Yeah, ole Avram," Ed continued. "Goddam jerk's nose is bigger than he is."
Joe and Andy laughed at Ed's joke.
Ed went on. "Some kinda of nukiler scientist or somepun. Tryin' to build a better bomb, I guess. I dunno."
"Is he the only Jew?" Tony asked.
"Hell, no." It was Joe who answered this time. "There's about a dozen of ‘em runnin' around. "All scientists. Think they're a shitload better'n us."
"Hoity-toity," Ed added. He lifted his hand, imitating someone drinking tea with a raised pinkie, rolling his shoulders in an exaggerated simper.
They all laughed.
"Speakin' of hoity-toity." Andy was about to change the subject. "You still goin' out with that bitch, Ed?"
The conversation took a decided turn into the scatological as Ed discussed the bitch. Both Joe and Andy, it turned out, were married, but they were not loathe to bad-mouth their wives. Tony had a story or two or his own to tell. After a couple of hours, his companions seemed to feel as though he could have been their buddy for a long time.
By six o'clock they had downed several rounds of beer, except that Tony, by virtue of just sipping at his cans, had consumed the equivalent of only half of one can. It was time for Joe and Andy to head home to their respective missuses and dinner; Ed was planning on meeting the bitch for more drinks, maybe even some food, and who knows what else.
Outside on the sidewalk, Ed asked Tony, "Say, how'd you find this place anyways?"
"I was just drivin' around, and it looked like a good place to stop."
"You gonna come back?"
"If I can find it again."
They all guffawed and punched Tony's arm.
Joe spoke eagerly. "You're one of the good guys, DiNozzo. You come back any time."
"I will," he assured them.
NCIS Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo had a lot to think about on his way home from the no-name bar. Although the investigations of the three murders were not moving forward very fast, it had been a stroke of luck for him to follow up on his hunch that the bar near the warehouse might be a source of good intel.
Gibbs didn't believe in coincidence, and DiNozzo was pretty sure he didn't either, but, by coincidence, he had shown up in the bar on a day when the three laborers had had some issues with their supervisors and were wanting to vent. They had recognized Tony as one of themselves. They had had just enough booze to lubricate their tongues so that he had learned more about the warehouse than he ever could have by going through formal channels.
Actually, of course, it wasn't even really a warehouse. It was a stage set designed to look like a warehouse, but it really was a weapons research facility, a black ops one at that. Nuclear stuff. The Navy and the Israelis cooperating on…what?...a new type of weapon? a new delivery system? some sort of timing device? The guys weren't privy to that level of information, but they did know that something was about to happen. There was to be a delivery or a pick up in the next few days of part of whatever it was that the facility was working on.
He had learned in the ebb and flow of conversation that a lot of new guys were showing up in the building in anticipation of this event, guys who wore dark colored suits and earwigs.
"Security guys," Ed had said, nodding his head knowingly. "A lot of ‘em is Jews, too."
"Mossad," offered Andy.
"Mossad?" repeated Tony. "What's that about?"
"Like Israeli CIA," Andy explained.
The information had clicked into place in Tony's brain like a puzzle piece. He had no doubt that the murders were connected to whatever event was about to occur at the facility, but he couldn't see the why of it, unless the someone who was doing this was merely amusing himself by setting up a giant puzzle as if he was daring the police and NCIS to put it together, hoping that they probably wouldn't be able to do so in time for…for what?
And was it really Mossad that was working there? Did Ziva know about this? She was still officially a Mossad agent herself. If it was Mossad, she probably knew at least some of the people assigned to the operation. Would they have been in touch with her, if only to let her know they were in town? Did she maybe have some deeper involvement in what was going on? She had, after all, been control for a supposed Mossad officer, the traitorous, murdering Ari. Was she perhaps still acting as a control for one or more of the agents now working at the Navy black ops research facility? DiNozzo knew it was unlikely that he would get answers to those questions any time soon.
Tony also reflected that he'd broken a bunch of rules in running his little undercover operation at the bar. He hadn't really thought about it at the time he'd decided to do it, but now he had to consider that, if the Director or, God forbid, Gibbs ever found out about it, he might well find that he had screwed any chance he had to be promoted to one of the new teams. He could even lose his job.
He hadn't told anyone where he was going. Had he gotten into any trouble, he would have had no backup, no one to call for help. It was just plain silly ass luck that the guys had been so willing to break their own oaths of secrecy, and give him more information than they should have.
Of course, one of the reasons he'd decided to go to the bar tonight was that he enjoyed doing undercover work. He knew he was good at it. Others, including Gibbs, recognized that his humor-filled, easy-going manner was a big part of his success. He had a lot of instinctive skill in dealing with people at different levels of society. Even though he was movie star handsome and obviously intelligent, when needed he would show no ego, blending in with his surroundings, putting people at ease, gaining their trust and admiration as naturally as he breathed. His school-boy jokes and pranks at work covered a sensitive nature that others sensed more than perceived, and caused them instinctively to trust and admire him. He was a chameleon, a born actor who could easily put on and take off different personalities.
It had happened again this evening. The boys at the bar had accepted him readily. Despite the rudeness of their language, he had liked them, and let it show. His grandmother DiNozzo, who was devoutly religious, spoke of such people as "salt of the earth," even as she deplored their language and their biases. As a cop, he'd met many similar souls, and he appreciated them for what they were. Their obvious low-grade anti-Semitism bothered him, but he would never "out" Ed, Joe, and Andy for their indiscretions, and he hoped they would return the favor.
He stopped at a small neighborhood restaurant near his apartment that he patronized frequently. It was a little more upscale than the no-name bar, but it was cozy, and the owners friendly and accommodating. After wrapping himself around some of Mrs. Keller's delicious meatloaf and hand-mashed potatoes, he ordered a piece of apple pie and coffee, savoring it for well over an hour while he chatted with the host and hostess. Then, well-sated, he headed home, where he turned on the TV to watch more basketball for a few hours.
He slept better that night than he had the night before, and Kate did not visit him again.
Author's Chapter Notes:
DiNozzo solves a mystery the old-fashioned way.
Chapter End Notes:
WARNING: This chapter contains objectionable language. Don' blame me--I just wrote down what the boys said.