by G M Eppers
“Sylvia, does Harelip knead you?” Nitro asked.
We hadn’t even gotten to the real hardware yet, but her leather and chains outfit plus her HEP belt made her look like a Hell’s Angel in search of a posse. Because of the homonym for need, it was an open, loaded question and Sylvia hesitated. She decided to go high. “Nope.” I caught her eyes with mine, still pleased about the lack of eye patch.
The interior door opened and Dinny came in with the key to the arms locker. It was on a chain attached to a petrified piece of wood about six inches around. “It is currently raining, although not very hard. Temperature is 44 degrees Fahrenheit, cloudy, wind about five miles per hour. Chembassador Zickman is waiting for you on the tarmac.” She opened the arms locker and watched carefully as we chose our weapons. I took one of the several CURDS issue subcompact Glock 33s and a small box of shells. The Glocks vanished one after the other, and there was rhythmic clicking and clacking as we loaded initial rounds.
Zickman had been at the White House for Big Block of Cheese Day. I remembered seeing him talk to Badger in the Entrance Hall. He must have gotten back to Ireland only shortly before our arrival.
We all put on our CURDS jackets, short-waisted things that didn’t interfere with the HEP belts and had CURDS in big letters on the back. The jackets had hoods, which we put up over our heads, securing them with Velcro tabs, and we each slung our go bags cross-wise over one shoulder. It sounds like we were carrying a lot, but it’s all about geometry. There was a place for everything and the equipment had been designed to allow for full range of motion. Finally, after Dinny closed and locked the armory, we were ready to deplane. “Welcome to Ireland,” said Dinny, opening the door. Down the staircase we went, with raindrops coming down on the beats of Syncopated Clock.
As promised, Chembassador Zickman was waiting for us at the bottom with three modest limousines. Badger greeted him in Irish. It’s weird about Irish. You don’t hear it much in America. You’ll hear other languages and their accents pretty equally, but not Irish. I guess the Irish are much better at assimilating than others. Maybe their culture puts a lot of pressure on them to learn the language of a host country moreso than others. In any case, hearing Irish made me feel like I’d had a stroke. It sounded like something you should be able to understand, but just don’t.
The Chembassador switched to English as he greeted the rest of us and guided us to the limousines. He, Badger, Nitro and Sylvia took the first one, the twins and Billings got in the second, and I joined Roxy and Sir Haughty in the third. As we slid into place, the little window between us and the driver opened. “Hello!” said the driver cheerfully. He wore a black brimmed cap over strawberry hair and was clean-shaven, evidently not bothered by the serious dimples in his cheeks. “I’m supposed to tell you that these cars are networked. You can communicate with the other cars by intercoms on the inside of the doors. Push the appropriate button to talk to either of the other cars, or lock the channel open to just hear everything. And don’t worry, the front seat here is soundproof. I won’t hear a thing and there is no recording equipment of any kind.” He slid the door closed again.
“Networked limousines?” asked Roxy. “I see a can of First Amendment worms here.”
“First off, we’re not in America, we’re in Ireland,” corrected Sir Haughty. “Your First Amendment doesn’t apply. Secondly, you heard him. He can’t hear and they are not recording. It’s like we’re all in the same car. They must host a lot of large groups, I would imagine.” Sir Haughty found the buttons and locked both channels open. “Testing, one, two, three.” Over the intercom, we heard the engines of the other limousines start up, but ours was still sitting.
There was a brief knock and the driver slid his door open again. “You Muppets going to buckle in then?”
No wonder why we hadn’t moved! We apologized and immediately put on our seatbelts. The driver again retreated and we were on our way. “Begorah Farms is quite remote,” came Chembassador Zickman’s voice from the first car as the airport terminal building, with its swooping roofline and largely glass walls slid past our windows. Our path gave us a brief tour of some of the city of Cork before we left the city limits.
The Republic of Ireland is metric, so road signs were showing kilometers instead of miles and cars were keeping to the left. Even though we traveled frequently, I still found this disorienting, expecting to crash at any moment. I turned my gaze inward, noticing again that Sir Haughty’s hair was just long enough to start curling and lamenting the fact that he’d be getting it cut soon. He always did. We had gotten a little wet moving from the plane to the cars and tiny beads of water clung to our faces and clothing. They glistened on Roxy’s red hair, which pooched out of her hood in odd little clumps. “Excuse me, Chembassador,” I said, “but is there a Mrs. O’Shea?”
His voice came back somberly. “Yes, there is.”
“From your tone, I’m guessing she hasn’t been informed.”
“That’s correct. I didn’t want to do it by phone and I’ve only gotten back from the States a few hours before you landed. I imagine our arrival will tell her for us, and we can move on from there. Have you never notified next of kin before?”
“I can’t say as I have.”
Also from the same car, Nitro spoke, “I have, but only in an academic setting. It was part of Bedside Manner 203.”
“I have,” admitted Sir Haughty, smoothing his hair and tucking a few curls under his hood. “Several years ago. I was given the task of informing my cousin Iris that her grandmother had passed. It was, however, not unexpected as she was 103 years old and in quite ill health.”
“Well, none of you need worry about it. I will handle Mrs. O’Shea,” said Chembassador Zickman.
Roxy, pulling more hair out from under her hood to round out the clumps, said, “We’ll need to examine the farm. Do you think she will be cooperative?”
“It’s hard to say. Possibly not right away. You may need to be patient.”
“We can do that,” I said immediately. “I really don’t want to have to force the poor woman with a warrant.”
“Agreed,” Nitro said. Roxy, whose job it would have been to get the warrant, almost looked disappointed. She kind of enjoyed ‘saving the day’, but we normally tried reason first. Fortunately for her, in our job, many of the people we dealt with were not reasonable.
I was noticing that Billings and the twins were very quiet and looked at the switches to make sure the channel to the second car was indeed open. It was. Perhaps the subject made them uncomfortable, or maybe they had forgotten to open their end.
“As I mentioned,” Zickman continued, “Begorah Farms is remote. While we could take the cars there, the terrain is rocky and irregular. As these vehicles are provided by the taxpayers, I prefer not to risk them. We will be stopping at a Farmer’s Market on the outskirts of Cork. It’s not particularly large or particularly busy, especially in this weather. You may browse and enjoy yourselves while I contract with someone to take us the rest of the way.” There were some the sound of some fidgeting and an almost inaudible click. “I estimate we’ll arrive at the farm near 4:30.” There was another soft click. I think he had pulled out a time piece to consult with.
“That sounds delightful,” said Sir Haughty.
“Who gets me?” asked Badger from the first car. Local merchants were not likely to speak English and his translation skills would be valuable.
“I think we should stay together,” was my reply. I always thought we should stay together. Unless, of course, I had to delegate responsibilities. Because this part would be considered leisure, that wasn’t going to be necessary. “Let’s not make Chembassador Zickman have to round us up once he’s got transportation for us, okay?”
“Oh, it’s quite alright,” said the Chembassador quickly. “Your jackets are perfectly distinctive. Please, accept every hospitality and let them enjoy the market.”
It wasn’t often we got leisure activities during a mission. We wer
e usually kept busy with investigating or researching or attacking, and, on occasion, running away. I liked to make the most of it myself, but I certainly wouldn’t be able to do that if my team were scattered and out of earshot. When I find them again they are sometimes in chains or have an injured tuxedo cat. Even in Las Vegas, it wasn’t “look, Helena, I won the jackpot!” but “Sorry, boss, I’m stuck in an elevator.” Everyone had their own interests and leisure time is leisure time. “Very well,” I said. “You guys can draw straws for Badger then.”
Further from the city, the disorienting effect of metric driving was much less and I started to enjoy the scenery. The landscape seemed to crawl by because it didn’t change much from mile to mile, but the vast expanse of green was impressive. Although it didn’t look green. Between the clouds drifting above and the lowering sun all the greens looked like navy blue. We left paved roads almost immediately and the path was hard-packed dirt, but wide and marked here and there by wooden fencing or lines of shrubs. The rain was still light and not enough to make the dirt seriously muddy. Far from the road, I could see modest houses with long, curving driveways like the flowing tails of kites, the farms powered by lone modern windmills towering above even the grain silos.
Twenty minutes later the three limousines pulled into a gravel parking lot, looking very much out of place. There were several very old, battered pick-up trucks and a few horse-drawn carriages parked so the horses could snack on the grasses and weeds around the edges of the parking lot. The drivers slid in next to each other with practiced ease, facing the market. Across the access road, a large field held two or three dozen booths, each covered with a brightly colored canopy. As we got out of the cars, and gathered, I could see all kinds of interesting produce. We wouldn’t be able to buy anything we weren’t prepared to eat, of course. We couldn’t carry it around long and we certainly couldn’t store it anywhere. I looked around trying to predict what Dinny would buy when she got there.
I noticed Sylvia moving with purpose. As she passed Billings and the twins she pointed at each of them and said something I couldn’t hear. Immediately, they all looked down at themselves, then turned their backs, adjusting their clothing discreetly. When they turned back, I managed to be there. “You three stay with me,” I said. “You’ve already had your leisure.”
“Mom!” Billings complained in a forceful whisper.
I let him know with a look that I was not going to allow any discussion. “I know it’s a small market,” I said, “but I don’t want us to get scattered to the four winds.” From his height the market was even smaller. He could probably see nearly the entire thing if he stood on tiptoe. If I stood on tiptoe I could see him standing on tiptoe. “Don’t worry,” I added, relenting, “you take the lead and I’ll stay with you. How’s that?” He looked like he wanted to rub the top of my head and give it a little teasing shake.
“Come on, then.” He put an arm around Avis’ shoulder and she slid her hand into his back pocket.
Rain pattered a slow uneven rhythm on the canopies as we walked. The first booth we came to was selling a variety of potatoes. The second booth was selling potatoes and turnips. The air was filled with the smell of fresh food and the unintelligible calls of vendors announcing their wares. Occasionally, we could see negotiating going on, so they were open to bartering. Like the rest of the team, I did carry a little cash, but it was all American money. Our CURDS cards were accepted almost everywhere, but I wasn’t sure if such a small local market would be set up for that. Surprisingly, we saw a sale taking place in which the buyer paid with a VISA charge card, which emboldened Billings. When Avis stopped to admire some strawberries, he pulled out his card. Despite the vendor knowing very little English, they managed to complete the transaction and we soon had a lunch size bag filled with juicy red berries.
As we came around the end of the aisle, I heard Nitro’s voice. “Ask him if it’s okay for me to test it.”
The booth in the next row was selling packages of cheese. Nitro and Badger were there, examining the merchandise. I immediately noticed the license tacked to a wooden support post. “Nitro, what are you doing?”
“I want to test the cheese. It might be connected.”
Looking again, I also saw that each package was stamped in blue with the official CURDS/FDA logo. It all looked proper and above board to me. “Firstly, there was nothing wrong with the cheese. This case might not even be Uber related. If we can verify it’s just a simple murder mystery we can pass it off to Interpol. Secondly, this product is properly marked, the license is clearly displayed and signed by Chembassador Zickman himself.” I turned to the merchant, who was waiting patiently. “I’m sorry for the inconvenience, sir.”
“He doesn’t speak English. Badger was translating. And there’s the . . . thing.”
“What thing?” Nitro hesitated, then mumbled something. “What thing?” I repeated.
“The fortune.”
Billings asked, “what fortune? I don’t remember any fortune about cheese.”
Badger dug into his pants pocket and pulled out the pile of paper slips. He started leafing through them, then handed me one. “It’s not one that got read aloud. I don’t know who it belonged to.”
I looked at the slip he had handed me. He who eats cheese eats trash, it said. I showed it to Billings, who showed it to the twins. “I can’t believe this.” Before I could stop him, Badger took the fortune back and stuffed them all back into his pocket. I wanted to take them and grind them into the damp ground. “What happened to it’s all a coincidence? You are men of science! We will not be ruled by mass market fortune cookies.” Speaking directly to Badger, I added, “I know you want to study the Chinese words, but if you say one more word about the fortunes I’ll make you eat every last slip.”
“He could use the fiber,” said Nitro.
“And he’d get arrested,” said Roxy, coming up the aisle toward us hurriedly. Sylvia jogged behind her to catch up, holding a brown bag cinched closed.
I asked, “What are you talking about?”
“That’s illegal here. Talking about fortunes. Anything occult. They consider it witchcraft.” She was answered by a group glare. “I’m not kidding.”
I threw up my hands in exasperation. “No wonder I’m getting gray hair!”
Nitro jumped on this like a four-year-old on a bug. “You’re going gray?” He was trying to examine my hair, most of which was hidden under my hood.
“I plucked it, okay?” I wasn’t about to tell him there’d been one in my eyebrow.
Evidently, the merchant thought he’d been following the gist of the conversation and assumed we were arguing about his cheese. “I goit nufin ta hoid,” he said haltingly.
“He says he’s got nothing to hide,” translated Badger.
“Yeah, I got that.” I was still annoyed about the fortune cookie thing and started to herd my group further along.
Nitro pulled me aside to speak confidentially. “Look, I noticed he’s got some Durrus from Begorah Farms here. Even if the big block was clean, O’Shea might have been murdered for Uber. Also,” he paused and looked around to make sure Zickman wasn’t returning yet, “it would be a sign that Zickman isn’t the inside man. If it’s clean.” He waited for me to absorb the reasoning.
Nitro’s arguments seemed sound to me, though it might have been only in comparison to the Chinese fortune excuse. I hated the thought of finding out that Zickman was a double agent. We were dozens of miles from the airport and our welfare was pretty much in his hands. “Okay, go ahead.” We turned back to the group. “Nitro says he’s got stuff from Begorah Farms. Ask him how long he’s had it.”
Badger spoke to the merchant, who was a personable man in his mid-sixties. Badger found the package of Durrus, which was encased in black wax. A moment later, he told us, “it’s been aged in his root cellar for about a month. We’re welcome to cut off a piece to test it.”
“Tell him we’ll pay for it.” I said. Badger spoke again.
I took a strawberry and did the same, watching Nitro perform the field test. Using a small knife from the kit, he sliced into the wax coating and dug out a tiny sample of the creamy cheese. Using the tip of the knife, he slid the sample into a glass vial and shook it down. Then he produced his small bottle of catalyst and poured just enough into the vial to cover the cheese. Putting one finger over the open end, he shook it vigorously for about thirty seconds, then placed the vial into an orifice on the machine in the field kit. Four small lights blinked red and green in various sequences, then there was a very quiet beep. All the lights settled on green. “It’s clean!” he said happily.
“Of course, it’s clean.”
Chembassador Zickman had come up behind us unnoticed. “Sir, I –“
He patted my shoulder. “You were doing your jobs, Mrs. Montana.” He spoke Irish to the merchant, who shook his hand and replied in kind.
Nitro packed up his field kit and slung it back over his shoulder. “Spot inspections. We’re even keeping an eye on Chembassadors, sir,” he quipped.
“I take it I’ve passed muster, then?” Zickman’s tone was genial and amused.
“Yes. Absolutely.” I didn’t mention that muster included suspicion of criminal collusion.