Chapter2

Buenos Dias Puerto Rico

We met the next morning at El Duque. We had breakfast with Tom in the employee mess area. That was okay. We had our privacy and we neededit.

“Tom, really, they’re out in the open, just like you say?” Hunter asked. “In the liquor industry and fooddistribution?”

“That’s right. Love it or leave it. They’rethere.

“They are major players in the rum market. Same with food. But maybe we focus on one group at a time. I’d say first up go after the rumrunners.

“All of these rum culprits are from the Neutzner (pronounced Noytzner) gang. Basically SS officers from Stuttgart.

“They never should have left Stuttgart. For generations they ran stud farms for war horses. But they fell for that Third Reich total BS about making money providing horses fortroops.”

Anyway, Tom said there were people in Puerto Rico who were positioned to help us. He had a few clever ideas about how to get in the door to meet the rumbarons.

“Franz is the key man. He changed his name and is now called Avedra Ducero, President of Rico Rum which has the third largest sales of rum in theworld.”

Tom kept calling him Franz. He obviously knewhim.

“We went to school together in my younger days when I studied mountaineering in Switzerland. We were at Grindelwald School at the same time and sort of became climbingbuddies.”

“It distresses me to think I could have pushed him off a matterhorn and done the world a favor,” Tomsaid.

“Or cut his rope on a glacier,” Huntersaid.

“But no one knew,” Tom said. “So that’s why we’re here today. Franz owes a debt to humanity for which he must atone. And you men will collect on thedebt.”

“Agreed. Let’s get this plan together and put our show on the Puerto Rico road.” Huntersaid.

It was an elaborate plan. We would go as potential investors for the rum business. Although we were said to be part owners of Claiborne Farm in Paris, Kentucky, we also had the distinction of being connected to the labor rackets in New Jersey. Hunter was Kentucky and I was Jersey. My family was connected. And we partnered in businessventures.

Our entry into Puerto Rico rum business would be established