The Big Wheel

by Scott Archer Jones

  He gave a spring and caught the bar with both hands. He chinned himself but hung there stymied—he didn’t have the strength to clamber on up. Staring at his own knuckles, he gasped for air, feet dangling. With a squeal, the ladder broke free of its years-old rust. His feet hit; he let go. The ladder rattled all the way down and smashed his left foot.

  He found the windows locked on both the second and third floor. He couldn’t find a way in from the roof. He grimaced. He searched his pockets and found nothing useful. He kicked the roof parapet and swore at his humiliating defeat.

  On the way down, he spotted the putty on a third story windowpane, rimming the glass in white, different than the black ancient surrounds of the other panes. An elastic ear stuck out, and he tugged at it. Someone had been through here before. He unzipped the putty, caught the glass before it fell. He reached in, unlocked the window. With difficulty, he forced the window up on its decrepit dirt-crusted tracks. Triumphant, he wiggled across the sill, picking up more filth on his jeans.

  He crouched beneath the third floor ceiling, dirty beams but inches above his head. He canvassed the space but left the small rooms un-inspected—their padlocks, encased in dirt, hung limp in stout old hasps. He descended to the second floor, relieved to find fourteen-foot ceilings. There a vast room had been abandoned by humanity. Only a couple of dismal toilets crouched naked in one corner. He knelt at the top of the stairs, listened, and crept down. His heart sounded as loud as a punk band—anyone nearby would hear it. Lucky for him and his heart, the floor below held no mercenary.

  LeFarge’s army did indeed operate out of here. Two large black SUVs with tinted windows hunkered near the front warehouse door. To the side squatted a mechanic’s bench, littered with tools, clamps, and ammunition in various sizes. They had stacked large plastic storage tubs—he lifted the lid of one and discovered several bulletproof vests. Another tub yielded up digital radios with earbuds hanging off coiled wires. He wrinkled his forehead, thought about it, and decided. He hung one on his belt and stored the mike and earphone in an inside pocket—there might come a time when he needed access to the Foreign Legion’s chitchat. He wished he knew something about channels.

  He found three desktabs on their chargers. When he turned them on, he found their thumbprint locks awaiting someone else’s whorls. He was stymied.

  He shrugged, then stared around the large space. He wondered what to look for. A waste of time, a wasted trip. He wandered over to a shipping container. He swung half the end open to let light into the black space within. The smell assaulted his nose. He stepped up into the container, and his shoes made scratching sounds on the dirty floor.

  He found a cot, a blanket on the floor, and a five-gallon bucket full of dried excrement. Someone had been kept here, locked away. The captors had left a chain padlocked to a tie-down on the wall, left in laziness or readiness, he could not tell. Its other end lay slack on the floor with another padlock hooked through a loop, waiting.

  The air hung very silent in that container, very heavy. The metal walls pushed inward; the ceiling hovered dark above his head. He spun on his feet and ran through the door. He closed the container up. Surprised, he heard his own breath ripping ragged, in and out, gasping.

  He had nothing but the stolen radio—no ideas, no evidence, no plan. He trudged back over to the gunsmith bench and rummaged. Like snakes, they lurked there, wrapped in rags in the clutter—he picked up two pistols. The slides said they were 380s. After some study, he ejected the clips, saw bullets at the top of each, and reinserted them in the butt of each gun, slapping the bottom. He heard a click—he guessed that was good. Thomas settled one in each of the front pockets of his jacket. Now he had some manhood. He returned to the stairs to leave by his window.

  The warehouse door rattled and he sprinted up the stairs, hesitating at the top. He lay down on the landing to peer into the space below. From his aerie, he gaped at the limo as it slid in, stared at the driver as he climbed out, and closed the door. Recognition struck when he saw the man stride to the back of the car—LeFarge! The bastard was supposed to be on his way to California.

  LeFarge hauled Isobel Dupont out. He marched her across the floor with hands in a rigid grip around her arm. He stood her up in front of the shipping container. “Open it.” She struggled with the handles and swung the door back.

  Thomas eyed them as they were limned against the faded light from the front windows. LeFarge leaned into the woman, their two heads inches apart. Broken words drifted up the stairs to Thomas, fragments tight and angry. Isobel shook her head. LeFarge dragged her into the door of the container. She broke. Her shoulders fell; her head drooped. LeFarge talked to her for a minute more. As he did so, he reached up and pushed her hair back with one hand, back behind her ear. LeFarge caressed her; he consoled her. Dropping the gesture, he frog-marched her back to the car.

  O’Brien waited by the back door. The three were shoulder to shoulder. Thomas stared as O’Brien’s hands rose up behind the woman’s head and jerked her into his kiss. The Governor kept her smashed to him, spoke, and grinned an ursine grimace. She nodded. The two men shoved her into the car.

  ***

  In the long, low light of a fall dawn, Sibyl and Robko left their mid-price, Vegas motel room, and drew the door shut behind them. They slid into the van, she on the left and he on the right. She simpered and reached over to pat his hand. “Did we go to the bathroom before we got in the car?”

  This was good; he liked this acting. He whined, “Are we there yet? Can we stop to eat soon?”

  “Be a good boy, and we’ll pick a place for tonight that has a swimming pool.”

  “Better a pool hall.”

  They followed the railroad tracks southeast, made a right, and picked up the entrance ramp to the freeway. They passed under one of Nevada’s electronic speed signs, one that monitored traffic, one that announced time delays and informed drivers of upcoming problems. Its camera looked down upon them. Somewhere in Connecticut, code running in a giant rack-mounted computer recognized an aged minivan and a junky trailer. It saw two people in hats and sunglasses. The software failed to make the leap of identification. But this software could learn.

  Chapter Twenty-Three: Fall from Grace

  What do you mean, he’s gone!” Dennis Malley O’Brien balanced at his desk, both hands on each side of the phone, and shouted down into it. Thomas roosted in one of the dwarf chairs across from the Governor. He watched the great head hang down towards the speaker and camera. “You crap-covered scrotum!” The desktop flecked with spittle.

  Thomas couldn’t see the phone screen, but he could hear clearly. Garland’s voice quavered on the other end. “We’ve been on location four days and haven’t found him. It’s a sure bet Zlata has slipped past us again.” Don cleared his throat. “We did find two apartments that had just been vacated without notice. Each had a couple living there, but we don’t know which couple was our target. We’ve found the transient population here is remarkably suspicious.”

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  LeFarge, another disembodied voice from California, said, “It means they wouldn’t tell you shit if the stink was in the air.”

  “Captain LeFarge is correct. Our efforts to I.D. one of these two couples as Zlata and Boxwood have not worked out. We had an incident between a LeFarge employee and one of the Latino men here, and word has spread through the community. Anyone who is a stranger here—anyone—gets blank stares and no answers.”

  Thomas asked with his blandest voice, “What kind of incident?”

  LeFarge’s voice rattled up through the speaker. “No big thing. One of my men could distinguish a lie when he heard it and brought some pressure to bear. He didn’t appreciate being jerked around.”

  Appalled, Thomas flashed a glance at the Governor but held his silence. The Governor didn’t even react. O’Brien didn’t care about the battered man or the community’s hostility. “Forget the apartments. They’re not in the goddamn apart
ments, so who cares,” said the Governor.

  “Yessir.” Garland had nothing left to say.

  O’Brien asked, “Are you tracking Zlata again? Do you have him on the radar?”

  Thomas replied, “My department, that. Tran Cam didn’t spot them as they left Atwater Village and has not reported any hits.”

  “Brilliant. Frickin’ brilliant.”

  Thomas plowed on. “If they’re not on the bike, we may not get a clear sighting of them for some time. We have to write off the bike as a tool to find them, and we have to go on facial recognition software alone. It’ll be tough.”

  O’Brien’s face clouded up like a storm front. “Specifics, Thomas. What are you telling me?”

  “We think we would catch them on camera in places like ATM machines, hotels, and restaurants, that type of place. Tran Cam coverage in those sectors is limited. It just doesn’t have a lot of restaurant customers.”

  O’Brien got quiet as Garland described further local efforts. Garland didn’t have much to say, but he took a long time to say it. The Governor interrupted, “Stop.”

  Garland did stop. LeFarge interpreted it as a chance to get a word in. “He may still be here in California. We’ll continue working L.A. until Steward finds Zlata again. Either way, we’re on it. The Polack can’t stay ahead of us forever.”

  “I—said—stop. Your operation out there is dead. Bring the troops home. We’ll discuss if there should be some personnel changes when you get back. And I mean leadership changes.” O’Brien tapped the vidi’s screen, and the call ended. He swiveled his big head up towards Thomas and asked, “Well?”

  “LeFarge is killing my good luck.”

  “Maybe.”

  “Do you want a postmortem or a guess on what happens next?”

  “I don’t give Mary’s Sacred Veil for your stupid look-back. How do we get back on Zlata’s tail?”

  “Hard work, same as before.”

  “And what is your opinion on the performance of your two peers?”

  Thomas coughed. “Garland does well for a man who suddenly finds himself in charge of a spy agency. You know my opinion of LeFarge.”

  “You want me to fire him.”

  “You can’t. Everything he’s done he did in your name. You can’t fire a murderer who could bring you down.”

  “The thought had crossed my mind. I got a goddamn tiger by the tail.”

  “You could have him killed, but then you might have a saber-tooth tiger by the tail. It escalates.”

  “And I thought you were my moralist.”

  “Not me, sir. I’m your pragmatist.”

  “And what about you, Thomas? Should I replace you?”

  “I’ve run a clean operation, sir, and I’ve found Zlata for you twice. If you want to send me back to Acquisitions, I’ll go right away.”

  “I’m not bitching about your smarts or your hard work, Thomas. You used to be lucky. Now it’s Zlata who’s lucky. You may be the wrong horse to back.”

  ***

  They made Dallas by the third day as they idled across America. Modifying their old pattern, they stayed out of both cheap and high priced hotels. As a change-up, he chose a resort associated with an exclusive golf course outside the metroplex. They checked into a bungalow.

  Dumping the suitcases on the bed, he said, “Any objection if we stay a couple of days?”

  “I like the sound of that.” She ambled through their living room and out the back where the deck cantilevered out over a fairway.

  He followed. “It’s time to change our look again. They may know the old Robko and Sibyl, so we’d better switch out. We need to go shopping.”

  “Ooh, I know. You could be tall this time.”

  “Ouch. I could be blond. You’ll have to do the eyebrow too. And I could grow a goatee… or a beard.”

  “That won’t grow in blond.”

  “True.”

  “Can I be a redhead?”

  “I always liked banging redheads.”

  “Instead, you got a hothead. Well, I told you all men have their kinky fantasies. Maybe I should go as a man, just for you.”

  “We’re going to Georgia, you know, before we get to NYC. Times haven’t changed that much. Out-of-state gays traveling the back roads of the South—we might solve O’Brien’s problem for him.”

  “I could still go as the man, and you could go as the woman.”

  He shot her a look and then decided to drop it. He strode back into the bungalow. “We can talk it out tonight. Let’s shower and call room service.”

  “What would you like?”

  “It’s Texas. Organically raised steak for you of course, but order vegetables and a starter for me. Fish if they have it. Clean living for me.” He sauntered on in to the palatial bathroom, stripped, and cranked on the shower. He stood beneath the multiple jets. In a minute or two, she strolled in behind and pressed up against his back. He said, “Hothead, huh?”

  “We don’t have much time. Room Service is on the way.” He turned around to face her, the water spraying them from all sides. He began to shampoo her hair. She soaped his chest. Even in this moment, she said, “Loan me five hundred dollars. I’m good for it. You can trust me.”

  Room Service arrived just as they finished toweling off. The waiter, noncommittal about a couple of guests wrapped in bathrobes, set up a table on the deck, placed out dishes under cover, and served out a glass of Bordeaux on Sibyl’s side. He seated Sibyl, accepted a tip from Robko, and slid gracefully away.

  Robko gazed at her across the table—a small woman barricaded behind a large steak. She fought it tenaciously. He shredded his way through his green stuff.

  She had also ordered cheesecake for two with exotic chocolate. He dissected his cheesecake with a fork and spread it around the plate while hers disappeared. She nibbled at her chocolate. “Straight up, they say, with a red wine chaser back. Chocolate and wine, a match made in heaven.”

  He sniffed.

  She sloshed the wine around in her glass before belting it back. “Have you been thinking about the score?”

  He pushed his plate back. “No, I’ve been thinking about your other career, all these pictures you keep snapping. And you never keep the pretty ones.”

  She sneered, “I did photography in art school. The really beautiful photos are immediate, visceral. Often ugly. Pretty is what your mamma took at your tenth birthday party.”

  “Huh?”

  “You ever see photos by Weegee or Diane Arbus?”

  “I have no idea who you’re talking about.”

  “Of course not. Weegee photographed dead bodies on the pavement. Arbus photographed midgets.”

  “What happens to all your photos, especially the ones of dead midgets?”

  She glanced at him, then at the empty wineglass. “When the wrinkles set in, when my career is over? Then I’m going to get gallery shows set up as a Richard Avedon or Tommy Chan. Be a name.” She sloshed more red into her glass.

  “I thought you wanted to be a thief?”

  “I want it all. I want to live to be a hundred and be rich and powerful. I want fame and lovers forty years younger.”

  He looked out off the balcony into the orange light of sunset. He just wanted O’Brien. “How about you? Have you been thinking about the job?”

  “No. I’ve been thinking about you. How come you’re not a petty criminal with two tours in the pen? You should be broke half the time and screwing around with small stuff.”

  “I am all that… exactly what you said.”

  “For an impoverished loser, you treat a girl pretty nice.”

  He shrugged. “I got some breaks; that’s all.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “I don’t do the bio, even within a crew. But you’re different; you still have my five hundred dollars and half the bond money. I’ll sell you the story.”

  “Will you take it in trade?”

  He shot her an amused glance. “I’ll pay for sex or drugs, but I like it
better when you give them to me for free.”

  “So tell me about the lucky breaks.” She eyed his dessert plate.

  He handed it to her. “First break? Figuring out who I was early on. Everybody else around me loved a punch-up. The dickheads thought knives were cool and bought cheap-ass guns that blew up in their hands. Those turf wars in high school showed me I had no guts for blood and violence. Lucky I’ve got that streak of cowardice, I guess.”

  “But you can hang by your fingertips from a balcony six floors up?”

  “As long as no one steps on them.”

  “So you found out you don’t like guns and knives. What happened next?”

  “Well, Mirko and I….” He stopped and stared off at the golf fairway.

  She caressed his hand. “Still hurts, doesn’t it?”

  He slid his hand back and blew past her question. “Mirko and I got high most days with a friend who had an older brother. Big brother stole cars and delivered them to a chop shop—and made a good living. We got involved in ripping cars too and did it for a while. I dropped out of high school about then. Between Mirko and me, we made and spent more money than our school superintendent ever took home.”

  The corner of her mouth twitched up. “The American Dream.”

  “Mirko arranged it so we could move up, and we joined a high-end car gang. They smuggled cars into Central America and sold them to ‘legitimate’ businessmen who didn’t want to pay the import fees. We found the downside—we were both over eighteen. Mirko got copped one night. They caught him hot-wiring a limo. This was in a parking garage in downtown Chi. He couldn’t get the beast out before they sealed him in. He did beat the hell out of the limo trying, though. That was the first time he went up.”