“And if Therese is your ‘pauvre petite’, what does that make me?” She posed the question in the form of a challenge, not just idle conversation, all the while holding my arm with both of hers, while Therese just held my hand on the water’s side of the walkway. We were crossing on the left-hand side of the bridge, looking from town outwards to the Bahnhof.
I had to process that one for a few seconds, which I covered up with a large “Hummm.” while I was thinking. What I was thinking had little or nothing to do with what Evie was thinking, of that I was sure. When I came out of this completely, I’d be sick for a bit, I knew that much. That meant that the sooner we were holed up, the better.
“I’ll let you know later, fair enough?”
“I guess it’ll have to do.”
We all walked on across the bridge without incident. Then across the intersection of the Bahnhofstrasse, and into the station itself. I put them in a kiosk selling tea and magazines while I went to get the tickets from one of the little ticket machines. First Class all the way. Four franc fifty each. The next train left in three minutes. In Zurich that actually meant three minutes, not three and a half minutes, or two minutes and fifty-five seconds.
I got the girls, and we got the train. The First Class car is quite comfortable, and for the moment we were clear of any immediate danger. I couldn’t stop the process of returning to the real world. Everything that I looked at was just that bit less clear, and people were moving around at a fairly normal speed. I concentrated on meeting up with Ronnie, and tried to keep myself adrenalized, but it was having only a small effect on my condition. Maybe marginal would have been a better way to put it.
Once we were seated in our compartment, I ordered a pitcher of orange juice, and the girls got teas to replace the ones they didn’t get to drink at the station. Apparently, they had picked up a pastry for each of as well. As soon as the waiter left, I slumped back in my seat, sweating and cold. I would need help this time, and Therese wasn’t strong enough to take care of herself yet, so I needed Evie.
“Evie?”
“Yes, Mister Claxton?”
“No kidding around Okay? I’m going to be reacting physically to what happened back there tonight, and I think it’s going to hit me hard enough that I’ll need some help, maybe. If I do, can I count on you? We have to get settled for the night in a safe locale. No other person than us should know where it is, I wouldn’t go back to the hotel tonight. Tomorrow we’ll get our stuff. Tonight, we have to hide out, and I may not be that much help to you soon. Terry is under our arrest, Okay? Don’t trust him with a toothbrush until I’m back on my feet, right?” I looked at her and for the first time it struck me how green her eyes were. I was starting to shake a little, again.
“Don’t give it another thought. Of course, I’ll look out for you Jeffry. Christ at The Judgement—that’s where I’d be right now, pleading my case, and a bloody tough one it would be too—if it hadn’t been for you this morning. Are you cold?”
At that I nodded my head. I was losing it fast. While Evie was getting a blanket out of the small cabinet next to the W/C, the waiter came back with our order. Evie stepped right in and paid him, quickly getting us back the privacy we needed.
I tried to get as many glasses of the orange juice down me as fast as I could. Both Evie and Therese insisted that I eat all three pastries, which I did—with great enthusiasm—as I was told later. I was as comfortable as I could get while the train headed through the night. The lights of Zurich were already fading into the distance.
About twenty minutes and we’d be back with Ronnie. Evie kept me as warm as she could, putting her arm around me, getting Therese to sit on my other side and do the same. And talking the whole while. I don’t remember anything she said. Not one word. I was hurting inside, some of it was physical, and some wasn’t, but the psychological side of things managed to manifest itself in some physical manner. It was hard for me to tell the difference for a while, and then the defense mechanism kicked in and I slept.
~
Chapter Twenty-Six
B
y the time I woke up again, we were in Weiden. I was still kind of shaky on my feet, and cold. With the help of Evie and Therese, we managed to look fairly normal as we waltzed into the coffee shop. There were some regulars playing chess in the corner, and the owner, an older fellow of maybe sixty or so, was cleaning out one of his expresso machines.
Ronnie and Terry were sitting in the back room, through an archway—perfect for framing a target—and both of them had their backs to the wall.
Terry looked like he was waiting for one of those Latin American ‘death squads’. Ronnie just looked happy to see us. Nobody else was on this side of the café, so we sat down and Evie ordered three coffees, then at my request added fresh orange juice to the order. The old fellow had stopped cleaning the machines long enough to take her order, then he disappeared back to the other side, through the archway.
So, we were all one big happy family again. I was feeling weak, but otherwise not too bad considering what I’d gone through.
Godsen spoke first.
“Well? Don’t keep us in suspense. What happened?”
Evie answered for us.
“Nothing. Jeffry came to get us. We’d been having a good time, too. Then we got the train to here. He’s also not feeling that great right now. I think the plan is to hole up for the night, and then just carry on tomorrow, based on our existing plan, and any new information we might get tonight.” At that, Terry shifted in his seat, managing to look as uncomfortable as a person could without being physically abused in some manner or other.
“I’m already late for a date with the girl I’ve been seeing lately, and I had planned…”
I gave Terry a shot, across the table, backhanding him with my right. The blow was meant to be heavy, and it was. He slammed back in his seat so hard that his head knocked against the wall. It made an odd ‘thunk’ sort of noise. It dazed him pretty fair, but he opened his eyes right away, blinking several times in a row, so I hadn’t knocked him out.
He gave me a look that was mad and afraid at the same time. there was a small trickle of blood from his nose slowly making its way down over his chin, where it dripped onto the table, where he had put both of his forearms, to prop himself up. The blood on the table irritated me even more. I considered just knocking him out, but then he’d be hard to handle. I was in a weakened condition temporarily, and Terry was a bit large for Ronnie and Evie to be hauling around town.
“Tilt your head back to stop the bleeding. Then think about who you’d rather have to face, them… or me. Both of the shooters are dead. Their point man is dead. If it had been anywhere except the Niederdorf, both drivers would be dead as well. So when I say THINK—I want you to use the apparently diminishing brain God gave you once upon a time. Wipe up the blood on the table. You make me sick.”
“Colonel, how has he been since I left him in your care?”
There was a slight hesitation, then she spoke up for him.
“He’s been fine Jeffry. Despite the fact that he was camped with the enemy, I believe what he’s said about being back with us now, and wanting to help. This kind of treatment is distasteful, and I won’t tolerate it.” She took a sip of what must have been cold cappuccino, and as she set her cup down, the owner came back with the order.
He looked at Terry, and the small puddle of blood on the table top. Before he could say anything, I asked if he could bring a hot towel, and a cold one as well, with perhaps an ice cube or two in it. I passed him two fifty franc notes and apologized for my friend’s inconsiderate bleeding on his table cloth. He laid down the tray on my side of the table, and trundled off to get the towels.
I kept my eye on Terry as I spoke to Godsen.
“Colonel, I don’t much care what you think about ‘this kind of behavior’. There’s a conversation that’s going to take place tonight before Terry goes anywhere, including to sleep or to meet his maker. You didn’t expe
ct to see me again, did you Terry?” I waited.
“What do you mean? I don’t understand, I really don’t.” He was going to play dumb. That meant that I had to spell it out for him.
The owner finally came back with two hand towels on a tray, one steaming hot, and one with a bowl of ice beside it. Everyone had taken their coffee, and in my case, the OJ, from the first tray, so he put the second down on top of the first.
“We are closing in ten minutes.” He left both towels, the bowl of ice, took his trays, and left.
“You talked about the balaclava. About how they made you put one on, then they shot you.”
“Yeah?”
“Well. What about the fact that the mouth is covered with a mesh, so that you might knock out a couple of teeth, but you can’t get a kill shot there? Only in the eyes, and the eyes are small. Very small. They roll into action with the contempt Pizarro may have shown the native people he met. And murdered and looted. Pizarro was well noted for that.
“The mesh! I forgot about that, I really did.”
I stood up.
“Let’s get out of here. Evie, check him for any comms device.” I got up and went to the front of the shop. It was pretty quiet, and the old guy was finishing up cleaning the second cappuccino machine. He wasn’t so old that he didn’t recognize an odd table of customers when he ran across them. He stopped what he was doing, and stood looking at me, a large white cloth in one hand, and a steel small-barreled pot in the other. He waited for what I was going to say.
I pulled out the wad of fifties I kept, and peeled off two, putting them down on the counter next to his cappuccino machine.
“That’s for not seeing us tonight. Do you think that’s fair enough?”
“Depends who asks.” This guy was on the ball. His look was deceiving.
“Anyone except for the Swiss Authorities. If any police ask, you’re free to say the exact truth. If anyone you don’t know, especially foreign, asks anything, you don’t know. Simple.”
He thought about it for a minute. I didn’t have the time, so I pulled out the now famous Gold Shield. He studied it for a moment, then nodded his head in agreement.
“That would be acceptable.” He picked up the bills, and pocketed them, then went back to cleaning his coffee machine. What the hell, being polite never cost extra.
“Thank you. I appreciate it.”
The others were ready now, walking up behind me, with Terry carrying the box. He’d managed to stop his nosebleed, but it would be easy enough to start it again. The mesh over the mouth would have given the enemy an edge, if I’d been using regular rounds, and operating in real time. It might even have gotten me killed, but I wasn’t using regular rounds, and a mouth shot would have killed them just as dead as the shot I chose. It may have taken a second or two longer, and that would have been a long time in a fire fight. If it had been anyone except me, the end result would probably have been totally different.
We all trooped out into the night, and headed for the train station. Once back in Zurich, we took a taxi across the bridge and into the downtown area, where our hotel was. Everyone sat in the cab while I walked over a block to see if the van was where I’d left it. Evie insisted on coming with me, citing some excuse about checking for any recently added bugs on or in the van. There were none, so maybe it hadn’t been spotted yet. I checked the engine compartment, and underneath the vehicle, particularly near the backside of the wheels. That was a popular place for a nice small car bomb. The wheel blows off and in the ensuing carnage as the vehicle rolls out of control, you can get lucky and end up with a police report that cites ‘accidental crash’ on the Cause of Accident line. Everything looked fine. Evie hopped in with me while I changed the parking spot. Two blocks over and one up. Another residential street. The neighbours would think someone had a visitor.
As we hoofed it back to the cab, Evie held onto my arm, the way she had when we had left the Niederdorf, with both of hers. Tonight it helped me to stay on my feet, so I didn’t say anything. Everyone piled out of the cab when we showed up again, and he flipped his light back on and pulled away from the curb.
It was late, but early enough that the chef’s assistant was still on duty in the kitchen, and he answered the door right away. As soon as he saw who it was he tried to just go back to his work, and pretend we weren’t there. I managed to slip him a fifty as he locked up behind us, though. He didn’t say anything, but I did.
“Monsieur,” I remembered that the chef was French, and so was betting that his right hand underling would be, also. “J’ai besoin d’un gros steak, et trois œufs, avec beaucoup de pain et jus d’orange. Je comprends que vous êtes fermé maintenant, mais c’est une mauvaise situation.” I handed him another three fifties, and he got the message.
“Monsieur, tout suite.”
“Merci bien. Oh, et un café, s’il vous plait.”
Once we were ensconced in our suite, Terry looked around and commented. “Nice digs. By the way Jeffry, I didn’t know you spoke frog. Don’t you live in Toronto these days? Hey, which one is mine?” He’d begun scouting the place, and he’d opened the door to Therese’s room. He was about four steps from me, and empty handed, having dropped the box of armour as soon as we were inside the suite with the door shut.
I walked the few steps between us and stood right in front of him.
“What we have here, is a failure to communicate. You don’t seem to get it Terry.”
He put up a braver front than he was feeling on the inside before he answered me.
“Get what?” He put both of his hands up beside his shoulders, palms up, combined with a shrug. Like ‘I don’t know nothin’ man’, that kind of thing.
I back handed him so hard this time, that he staggered backwards a few steps, and fell onto the sofa. The blood from his nose started again, this time from both nostrils, but he was too dazed to even notice it. This time I’d left him a fraction of an inch from unconscious. I walked into the bathroom and filled a glass with cold water, letting it run for a minute, so that it did get cold, then picked up one of the hand towels. Everyone was tiptoeing around me and refusing to say a word or get involved in any way. My hand was steady as a rock as I returned to the sofa where Terry had landed. He still hadn’t moved from the position I’d left him in. He was still blinking his eyes rapidly, but otherwise, nothing. He was just trying to hold onto consciousness. He wanted to snap out of it, but not hard enough.
Nobody in the suite had offered to help him stop the bleeding, and he hadn’t tried to stop the flow of blood yet either. It had managed to drip down onto his white shirt, which made it stand out vividly.
I walked over to him and tossed the glass of water in his face, followed by the hand towel. That snapped him out of it, and brought on the pain as well. The imprint of the back of my hand was standing out in red like it had been photocopied onto his face. Soon it would start to swell a little, and discolour from the bruise that would result from the smack, but I hadn’t actually hurt him. I had, however, gotten his attention.
Therese had gone straight to her room after Terry had looked in, and closed the door. Ronnie and Evie were getting comfortable, and Evie had already started taking one of the captured transmitter/receivers apart to see how it ticked. She had this great little MicroTool-Kit that fit into a leather case about the size of a pocket Day-Timer, or organizer. It was amazing what she had in that case, I mean, it was all ordinary kit-tools, right?, but miniaturized, like I’d never seen.
It was true, though, that there had been a complete multi-generation revolution in the field of electronics engineering since I’d last been outfitted with the latest and greatest of everything for a mission.
Terry had taken several deep breaths in a row, and was on the verge of hyperventilating himself. The man was an idiot. It was easy to see why he’d risen only so high in the organization, and then stayed there. I wouldn’t allow him access to anything more classified than next week’s TV Guide. There was no doubt in my
mind that these Grey Ghosts were going to end Terry’s contract the wet way.
“Slow down your breathing. You’ll start to pass out if you keep up like that.”
He mopped up with it, then put the towel behind his neck and tilted his head back. With a stuffy accent like he had a cold, he started talking to me.
“I don’t know exactly what that was for, but I’ll assume you felt it was necessary.”
“That was for trying to get me killed. You didn’t tell me about the mesh in the balaclava. Simple. That kind of thing pisses me off. When you take liberties that you haven’t earned, or asked for, that pisses me off. We’re going to have a nice long chat now. If you have a hard time with your memory, that’ll piss me off. Are you starting to see the pattern here, Terry? I may have saved your sorry ass tonight, but I can give it back just as easily. Or maybe just kill you myself.”
I walked into the room I was sharing with Therese, to get my briefcase. Therese was just pulling on one of those sleep shirts. It was over her head when I came in, and I had to admit, there were times when she seemed like a little girl, but right now wasn’t one of those times. I could see she had brief cotton panties on, and then the sleep shirt fell down into place, coming almost to her knees. Before it had, I’d seen her breasts, and the rest of her as well, really, and I felt embarrassed. She turned her head to face me when the shirt was down over her body. I felt that I should communicate my embarrassment.
“I’m sorry, Therese. I should have knocked first.”
She smiled at me. “I know you watch out for me. I don’t mind. It makes me feel more normal to have a man around. Men are always walking in at the wrong time. It’s their nature.” She pulled back the covers, and got into bed. “Are you going to stay up very late talking with this Terry person?”
“Probably. You just go ahead and get some rest while you can. It’s a big day tomorrow.”
She snuggled down into her pillows, never taking her eyes off of me the whole while I was in the room. I picked up my briefcase and stopped just before opening the door to leave the room. Her eyes were still on my face. She was going to wait for me tonight. Only I couldn’t take advantage. She was under my protection, and that wasn’t the way to protect her. Not the way I worked, anyway.
The Diamond Dust on Dragonfly Wings: A Jeffry Claxton Mystery Novel Page 57