Caravan of Thieves

by David Rich

  Two men wearing hoods and masks stood on the narrow shore. They held rifles. Two more stood on the other shore. The rafts behind us edged closer. Dan was trying to get us going, but it wasn’t going to work because a net was stretched from shore to shore blocking us, keeping us in place. Dan saw it at the same moment I did.

  “Can we cut it?”

  The flares still burned. We were still boxed in. The steepest, roughest part of the rapids was still ahead of us. I was sure their rafts could outrun our boat. “Let’s get in the water,” I said. “Where’s the fish knife?”

  “I’ll get it.” He came back in a few seconds. “You have a plan?”

  “I have an idea.”

  “I’ll follow you. Just let me know when I’m supposed to do something,” he said.

  We waited until the flares died, then we climbed over the aft rail. The water was cool and ran strong. I pushed off first and grabbed the netting. We made our way along the netting toward the shore until we were just a few yards away. The two men waited nearby and I suppose they saw us even through the darkness, though I didn’t have time to check. The net was nylon, but the knife was sharp enough.

  “Keep a tight grip. We’re going to swing out. Try to keep your legs in front. Let them hit the rocks first,” I said.

  “I’m ready,” he said.

  I cut the last piece of the net and immediately we were pushed downriver, holding on to the net, which acted like a swinging gate. I was in front and took the brunt of the bumps. The net had just extended fully when I heard Dan yell, short and sharp. I grabbed him.

  “My ankle.”

  “Hold on to me.” The net was going to swing us toward the opposite shore. Flares dropped light through the canyon again. I let go of the net and pulled Dan with me into the current. In-stantly, I tumbled and lost hold of him. He shot out ahead of me. I let the water take me without fighting it. Dan rolled and flopped through the chute like a rag doll. I went after him wildly. At that moment, for the first time ever, I worried that Dan might die, and suddenly I was frantic at the picture before me. I was not ready for him to die. I struggled forward and managed to grab Dan’s collar. We were around the bend and past the worst of the rapids. We paddled to the shore and pulled ourselves onto the rocks.

  Dan couldn’t stand without support. “I’d be better off in the water,” he said.

  “They’d be all over us.”

  “They won’t kill me. Not yet. I’m not sure about you, though. You should go.”

  “Get on my back.”

  He laughed, but after he limped along for a few yards, I asked again and he gave in.

  The helicopter set down on the plateau and the flares had gone out. I didn’t see the rafts coming through the rapids yet. The men on the shore weren’t visible in the dark, either. I stumbled along to a spot where the shoreline widened. I set Dan down and went along the rock face, hoping to find a path that would lead up the cliff side. It was a useless gesture in the dark. The whooping of the helicopter blades and the rumble of the rapids conspired with the dark to blot out my senses so I felt like I was the subject of an experiment like the one the Marines once put me through to see how I handled stress. I stumbled my way back to Dan. He was propped against the rock wall, legs bent, looking comfortable, like a guy who drifted away from a party for a little quiet time. His head fell to the side. I was too late reacting. Two men grabbed me from behind. I felt the needle go into my neck.

  10.

  We haven’t talked about the money.”

  “I don’t want to know.”

  “I was never a violent man. Have no instinct for it. There have been times when I just forgot that slugging someone or threatening to was an option, just like some people forget to lie. You gotta know who you are. Remember that. Not just right now, but the past, too. Remember that. Don’t expect much from me.”

  “I stopped expecting anything from you a long time ago.”

  He tried to chuckle, but it sounded more like a cough. “I guess you did.” The effort at conversation exhausted him again and he fell silent. He might have been sleeping; I couldn’t tell anymore because his breath was always labored from the beatings. His eyes were swollen shut. The cell had two cots and a concrete floor. No window. The walls were thin. I could hear the interrogations and the beatings and Dan’s relentless, futile attempts to charm the jailers or trick them, whoever they were. I never saw anyone’s face. Two men wearing masks would open the door, enter, kick me or throw me to the ground or, if I attempted to resist, inject me, then grab Dan and take him out. No one ever said a word to me. Periodically, a man would drag me to a toilet then drag me back. When I tried to piss on him, he stepped away calmly, then kicked me in the nuts when I finished. The only way to sense the passage of time was to keep track of the cold and the heat. The cold times were nights, I assumed, and the transition came suddenly, without the usual pleasant in-between period of feeling thankful for the relief and hopeful that the middle ground would hold. I was groggy from the drugs they injected and uncomfortable lying on the cot, or the floor, leaning against the wall. Too weak to exercise for more than a few minutes at a time, I tried concentrating on my mirage. Shutters, swing, well, trees: I couldn’t hold on long enough to bring the vision into focus. The house swayed and bits faded into a vague background. The voices came from the open living room window in the big house.

  They shouted at Dan, “You’re a scumbag. A degenerate.” And much more. They argued among themselves, someone would defend Dan.

  “He’s a degenerate, but I like him anyway. He’s gonna cooperate if we just ask him right.”

  Efficient soldiers they were, but they had misjudged their customer if they thought that lame stuff would affect Dan. In another circumstance, I would have felt sorry for them. Dan shouted in pain. Sometimes I thought I could hear the punches landing. I crawled forward on the porch of the big house, closer to the window, closer, but stayed below it. The house changed colors, but the window was always right above my head. Open. I could hear.

  “Join us. Join us, Dan. Tell us where the money is.”

  “He can’t tell us if he’s dead.”

  “You took the money, Dan. Admit it.”

  “I took the money. Plenty of money. Never counted it.”

  “And where is it now, Dan?” That voice was the boss. Calm and threatening. “Join us, Dan. We have a need for a man like you. Tell us where the money is.”

  “I don’t know.”

  They hit him and he gagged from the pain.

  It became a chant: irritation, diversion, even comfort. Verses repeated like a song that gets stuck in your head. I used it to conjure the mirage and I used the mirage to conjure the conversation, and all the while I strained to see inside the house but I never could. What ritual accompanied the chant? A big pot of boiling water on a platform; Dan tied next to it, waiting to be cooked. But, no, Dan would be suggesting the recipe, selling it to them, withholding the secret ingredient.

  When Dan was in the cell, the refrain played. “I never had anything I didn’t steal. Remember that.”

  “I will.”

  “Figure out who you are.”

  “I will.”

  “I never had anything I didn’t steal.”

  I had never seen Dan under physical stress. Plenty of soldiers resort to gibberish after they’re wounded or when the attack is too intense. At a small station north of Jalalabad, a captain kept muttering “Go no more, go no more,” as if he were in a horror movie. I ran into him a year or so later in Kabul, drinking tea in a cool courtyard, and asked him what it meant. He had no idea, barely remembered having said it. Even through the haze of the drugs, it hurt to see Dan like this. He kept trying to smile, but the swelling distorted his expression, making him look like a guy trying not to vomit in front of his girlfriend.

  “Nobody knows me as well as you do. That’s why I couldn’t stay around. Do you understand?”

  “No.”

  “Yes you do.” I did. “It was wr
ecking my confidence,” he said. His voice was a whisper but clear. He wanted to make sure I heard him and understood him. “You’re going to make a great middleman.” I smashed the butt of my hand against the solid wall, which was as close as I could come to telling Dan how I felt about him. Dan chuckled and coughed. Then he said, “You know where the money is.”

  “I don’t.”

  “You do. You just don’t know it.”

  “They can hear us.” We were whispering, but it sounded like a shout to me. I looked around, as I had a thousand times already, for signs of hidden microphones. Whether I found them or not, we had to assume they were there. The door opened. Two masked men came in. First they assessed whether I was going to be a problem. I sat back. They came forward and lifted Dan to his feet. As soon as they started out, I kicked one behind the knee. He buckled. The other man threw Dan against the wall and turned to me. I punched with my right. Too slow. He dodged, caught my elbow, and rammed me headfirst into the wall. By then, the other man was up. He slugged me in the kidney, but he didn’t have to. I was on my way to the floor, woozy and beaten. I looked up at him. His mouth hung open, showing the gap where his front teeth should have been.

  From the next room, I could hear the desperate chorus.

  “You’re out of your league, Dan.”

  “National security implications. Join us. Join us.”

  “We know who you are. We know your past.”

  “Tell us where the money is, Dan.”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Bring in his son.”

  They dragged me out of the cell. I didn’t resist. Before we went into the next room, I caught a glimpse of a thin man, medium height, wearing a mask, walking out the other way. I had never seen that one before.

  The interrogation room had a window, a desk with a couple of bottles of water on it, and two chairs. Dan was passed out in one of them. They hadn’t bothered to tie him to it. His face was raw and swollen from the beatings. Fresh blood dripped on the dried blood on his shirt.

  For the first time, I saw faces. Two guys, older than me, in their thirties, stood guard over Dan. They wore combat gear. The one on the right wore gloves. He had blond hair and a huge chin. His eyes glinted with delight. It wasn’t because he was going to beat Dan; it was because I was going to watch it happen. The one on the left held a baton. His head was shaved, and when he spoke his words were mush. His mouth did not open properly. Then Blondie said, “Maybe he’d like to take a turn hitting the old man.”

  The other man said something like, “Ah wanna killminetoo.” He was mumbling to hide the gap in his mouth. But then he smiled. The combination of baldness and missing teeth made him look more zany than threatening.

  The man in charge sat in a chair facing Dan. He wore fatigues and a black beret without insignia. His skin was tight and tanned and his eyes were such a light blue that he looked possessed or alien, though you could tell they were his pride and joy and he thought everyone was transfixed by them. He said, “Stand over here, soldier, so your father can see you.”

  I looked behind me. The two who brought me in were guarding the door, masks still on, weapons drawn. I moved in front of Dan. One of the guards had to move aside to make room for me. “You’re McColl,” I said. He gave me the full treatment with the eyes, blank, disinterested. But I could tell I was right and he didn’t like me knowing.

  “Your father stole money from us and he isn’t cooperating. Now you’re going to have to help us.”

  “You want what you’ve rightfully stolen.”

  “Do not be insolent, soldier. You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “National security, huh? Top secret. Hush-hush. How about if I take a vow of secrecy and we all put on our masks and do the initiation ceremony? In this case, that would be the Order of the Greedy Fucks Who Washed Out of the Third Army.”

  The baton came down hard on my shoulder. I buckled for just a moment. Toothless held the baton ready, threatening more. McColl gestured for him to back away. “I know your record, soldier. I respect it. I have no gripe with you. I’m only doing what’s necessary to accomplish the mission.”

  He seemed to think his little speech would convince me that torturing Dan was okay. I couldn’t see any sense in arguing with McColl and I had the feeling that I shouldn’t have shown defiance to start with. Dan wouldn’t have.

  “Dan, your son is here. We’re going to kill him if you don’t tell us where the money is.”

  Dan showed no sign of life. Eyes swollen tight, head slumped to a side. McColl nodded to the two men beside him. Toothless held up Dan’s head and tapped his cheek with the baton to bring him around. Blondie unsheathed a buck knife and looked at me to make sure I could see how pleased he was that it was his turn. The two guards at the door came around and held me by each arm.

  “Dan, tell us where the money is. Watch. Here’s what we’re going to do to your son.” Another nod. Blondie dragged the knife diagonally across my chest. I growled low, expelling all my breath so that I didn’t scream. Dan’s eyes flickered so I know he saw the cut, but they were all staring at me and didn’t notice him. I stared at McColl and he stared at me and all I was thinking was that every minute he let me live brought him closer to his own death. I never liked killing and I never hated it, either. It was just the way things had to be. It never made me angry or sad. On my first step into the war zone, I accepted that killing was part of living. But this was different. If I lived, I was going to kill McColl as cruelly as I could. And for the first time, I was going to enjoy it. At that instant, I knew this meant a change in me, not for the better, and I did not care, not at all. I was thrilled to find it there. The blood dripped into a puddle at my feet. Toothless slapped Dan again to make him pay attention. He said something like, “Wake up.” McColl turned back to Dan.

  “Where’s the money, Dan? Where’s the money?”

  “I don’t know,” said Dan.

  “You admitted you stole it.”

  “I stole it. I never had anything I didn’t steal.” Dan raised his arm slowly. The guards tensed, poised to hit or cut the helpless guy in the chair. Dan turned his face from McColl to me. He pointed at me. “He stole the money.”

  McColl shouted, “You stole the money!”

  “I stole the money. And he stole it from me. I don’t know where the money is.”

  I wanted to growl again, but that would have been the only sound in the room other than the slowing drip of my blood hitting the floor. McColl stared at Dan, and Dan’s head slumped to the side as if the gaze had knocked him out. I had the sense Dan did it to mock him. McColl looked at me for a moment, then nodded to Toothless, who, again, propped up Dan’s head and gave him a slap. McColl wasn’t too quick of a thinker. I could tell that receiving information that did not fit in his tiny compartments made him want to pull the blanket over his head. I didn’t understand Dan’s game, but I knew there was a game being played.

  “Let me make sure we understand you, Dan. You’re saying you don’t know where the money is, but your son does. Is that right?”

  “I’m sorry, Rollie Boy. I told you not to expect much from me.”

  “I’ll try to remember.”

  “Answer me, Dan.”

  “You have it right.”

  McColl had been in command long enough to know he had to respond. He got up and paced over to the window. He looked out for a full minute. The guards stood still, waiting for orders. McColl turned back to the room. He said, “That would mean we don’t need you anymore, Dan. Do you understand that?”

  Dan’s head stayed slumped on his shoulder. I gave McColl the blank stare, a taste of his own medicine. Let him try to read me. He ordered the guards to take me back to the cell.

  The air refused to enter my lungs. Maybe it was too thick. I sucked hard over and over again but kept needing more. I forced my eyes open and turned to the other cot. Dan lay still. I drifted out again, but the discomfort came from more than the drugs, and I fought back to
the surface and rolled off the cot onto the floor. Dan had not moved. I crawled over to him. He wasn’t cold and he wasn’t warm and he wasn’t Dan anymore. I managed to turn away before I vomited. I straightened him up a bit, folded his arms across his chest. I stood up and pounded on the walls for a few minutes and yelled at McColl. I told him Dan was dead and a lot of things about himself that he needed to know. No one answered. No guards rushed through the door to beat me up or inject me. I kicked the door. And it flew open.

  I stepped into the hallway and leaned against the wall to steady myself. The drugs were still clouding me and I knew my movements weren’t sharp. I slid along to the room next door. A misshapen rectangle of light tumbled across the desk and onto the floor. No movement. No sound. I looked in. The room was empty. On a corner of the desk was my wallet, the fish knife I had used to cut the net in the river, matches, and the car check receipt from Las Vegas: all the contents of my pockets. Nothing of Dan’s was there. The light hurt my eyes when I checked outside. There was nothing to see but desert.

  The rest of the building was empty. There were eight rooms like the one we were kept in. All empty. The place must have been a storage facility. I walked outside and the sun staggered me with its intensity, made me bow my head and step back inside for a moment. We were in the high desert: scrub brush, gray rocks and sandy dirt, and small patches of Jimson weed and primrose and some blue flower I didn’t know. A gravel drive led away from the building and out of sight around a small hill. A jeep was parked twenty yards from the building. I approached. The keys were in the ignition. There was a canister of gasoline in the backseat. I caught motion out of the corner of my eye and spun around. A roadrunner dashed along the drive, into a swale, and behind a bush. The wind purred softly. I noticed the sound of a bird repeating a call but couldn’t locate it.