The Vivero Letter

by Desmond Bagley

  Gatt looked at the matchbox with fascination as it went up into the air, and winced involuntarily as I fumbled the next catch. I was running a colossal bluff and to make it stick I had to impress him with an appearance of ruthlessness. I tossed the box again. 'Three more yards and neither of us will have to worry any more about the treasure of Uaxuanoc.'

  He broke! 'All right; it's a stand-off,' he said hoarsely, and lifted both arms in the air and waved them. The line of men drifted to a halt and then turned to go back into the forest. As I watched them go I tossed the matchbox again, and Gatt said irritably, 'For Christ's sake, stop doing that!'

  I grinned at him and caught the box, but still held it in my fingers. There was a slight film of sweat on his forehead although the heat of the day had not yet started. 'I'd hate to play poker with you,' he said at last.

  'That's a game I haven't tried.'

  He gave a gusty sigh of exasperation. 'Listen, Wheale: you don't know the game you're in. I've had tabs on Fallon right from the beginning. Christ, I laughed back there at your airstrip when you all played the innocent. You really thought you were fooling me, didn't you? Hell, I knew everything you did and everything you thought -- I didn't give a damn what action you took. And I've had that fool Harris chasing all over Mexico. You see, it's all come down to one thing, one sharp point -- I'm here and I'm on top. Now, what about it?'

  'You must have had some help,' I said.

  'Didn't you know?' he said in surprise, and began to laugh. 'Jesus! I had that damned fool, Halstead. He came to me back in Mexico City and made a deal. A very eager guy, Halstead; he didn't want to share this city with Fallon -- so we made the deal. He could have the city and I'd pick up the gold and get rid of Fallon for him.' The corners of his mouth downturned in savage contempt. The guy was too chicken to do his own killing.'

  So it had been Halstead, just as Pat Harris suspected, and when we found Uaxuanoc he had tipped off Gatt. No wonder Pat had been running round in circles when Gatt knew our every move. It made me sick to realize how ambition could so corrupt a man that he would throw in his lot with a man like Gatt. The funny part about it was that Halstead had meant to cheat Gatt all along; he had never expected anything of value to turn up for Gatt to get his hands on.

  I said in a hard voice, 'Where is Halstead now?'

  'Oh, the guy's dead,' said Gatt casually. 'When you chased him out my chicleros got a little trigger-happy and he caught one.' He grinned. 'Did I save you the trouble, Wheale?'

  I ignored that. 'You're wasting your time here. You're welcome to come and take your loot, but you'll get wet doing it.'

  'Not me,' said Gatt. 'You! Oh, I know what you've done with it. Halstead didn't die right away and he told me where the stuff was -- after a bit of persuasion. It took time or I'd have been here sooner before you put the stuff in the water. But it doesn't matter, not really.' His voice was calm and soft and infinitely menacing. 'You can get it back, Wheale; you're a diver, and so is that Halstead bitch. You'll swim down and get it back for me.'

  'You don't know much about deep diving. It's not a five-minute job.'

  He made a slashing motion with his hand. 'But you'll do it all the same.'

  'I don't see how you can make me.'

  'Don't you? You'll learn.' His smile was terrible. 'Let's say I get hold of Fallon and go to work on him, hey? You'll watch what I do to him and then you'll go down. I promise you.' He dropped the stub of his cigar and tapped me on the chest. 'You were right when you said there's a difference between you and me. I'm a hard man, Wheale; and you just think you're hard. You've been putting up a good imitation lately and you had me fooled, but you're like all the rest of the common punks in the world -- soft in the middle, like Fallon. When I start taking Fallon apart slowly -- or the girl, maybe -- or that big ox, Rudetsky -- then you'll dive. See what I mean?'

  I saw. I saw that his man used cruelty as a tool. He had no human feeling himself but knew enough to manipulate the feelings of others. If I really had made an arrangement with Fowler I'd have dropped that matchbox there and then and taken my chance on being killed as long as he was eliminated. And I cursed my thoughtlessness in not bringing a pistol to shoot the bastard with.

  I caught my breath and strove to speak evenly. 'In that case you must be careful not to kill me,' I said. 'You've heard of the goose and the golden eggs.'

  His lips curled back from his teeth. 'You'll wish I had killed you,' he promised. 'You really will.' He turned and strode away and I went back to the hut -- fast.

  I tumbled in the door and yelled, 'Shoot the bastard!' I was in a blind rage.

  'No good,' said Fowler from the window. 'He docked for cover.'

  'What gives?' asked Rudetsky.

  'He's mad -- staring stone mad! We've balked him and he's done his nut. He can't get his loot so he is going to take it out in blood.' I thought of that other madman who had shouted crazily, 'Weltmacht oder Niedergang!' Like Hitler, Gatt had blown his top completely and was ready to ruin us and himself out of angry spite. He had gone beyond reason and saw the world through the redness of blood.

  Rudetsky and Fowler looked at me in silence, then Rudetsky took a deep breath. 'Makes no difference, I guess. We knew he'd have to kill us, anyway.'

  'Hell be whipping up an attack any minute,' I said. 'Get everyone back in the hut by the cenote.'

  Rudetsky thrust a revolver into my hand. 'All you gotta do is pull the trigger.'

  I took the gun although I didn't know if I could use it effectively and we left the hut at a dead run. We had only got halfway to the cenote when there was a rattle of rifle fire and bits of soil fountained up from the ground. 'Spread out!' yelled Rudetsky, and turned sharply to cannon into me. He bounced off and we both dived for cover behind a hut.

  A few more shots popped off, and I said, 'Where the hell are they?'

  Rudetsky's chest heaved. 'Somewhere out front.'

  Gatt's men must have gone on to the attack as soon as Gatt had gone into cover, probably by pre-arranged signal. Shots were popping off from all around like something in a Western movie and it was difficult to tell precisely where the attack was coming from. I saw Fowler, who was crouched behind an abandoned packing case on the other side of the clearing, suddenly run in the peculiar skittering movement of the experienced soldier. Bullets kicked up dust around him but he wasn't hit and he disappeared from sight behind a hut.

  'We've gotta get outa here,' said Rudetsky rapidly. His face was showing strain. 'Back to the hut.'

  He meant the hut by the cenote and I could see his point. There wasn't any use preparing a hut against attack and then being caught in the open. I hoped the others had had the sense to retreat there as soon as they heard the first shots. I looked back and cursed Rudetsky's neat and tidy mind -- he had built the camp with a wide and open street which was now raked with bullets and offered no cover.

  I said, "We'd better split up, Joe; two targets are more difficult than one.'

  'You go first,' he said jerkily. 'I might be able to cover you.'

  This was no time to argue so I ran for it, back to the hut behind us. I was about two yards from it when a chiclero skidded around the corner from an unexpected direction. He was as surprised as I was because he literally ran on to the gun which I held forward so that the muzzle was jammed into his stomach.

  I pulled the trigger and my arm jolted convulsively. It was as though a great hand plucked the chiclero off his feet and he was flung away and fell with all limbs awry. I dithered a bit with my heart turning somersaults in my chest before I recovered enough from the shock to bolt through the doorway of the hut. I leaned against the wall for a moment, gasping for breath and with the looseness of fear in my bowels, then I turned and looked cautiously through the window. Rudetsky was gone -- he must have made his break immediately after I had moved.

  I looked at the revolver; it had been fully loaded and mere were now five shots left. Those damned thugs seemed to be coming from all directions. The man I had shot had come
from behind -- he had apparently come up from the cenote. I didn't like the implications of that.

  I was wondering what to do when the decision was taken from me. The back door of the hut crashed open under the impact of a booted foot. I jerked up my head and saw, framed in the doorway, a chiclero just in the act of squeezing off a shot at me with a rifle. Time seemed frozen and I stood there paralysed before I made an attempt at lifting the revolver, and even as my arm moved I knew I was too late.

  The chiclero seemed to flicker -- that movement you see in an old film when a couple of frames have been cut from the action producing a sudden displacement of an actor. The side of his jaw disappeared and the lower half of his face was replaced by a bloody mask. He uttered a bubbling scream, clapped his hands to his face and staggered sideways, dropping his rifle on the threshold with a clatter. I don't know who shot him; it could have been Fowler or Rudetsky, or even one of his own side -- the bullets were flying thick enough.

  But I wasted no time wondering about it. I dived forward and went through that doorway at a running crouch and snatched for the fallen rifle as I went. Nobody shot at me as I scurried hell for leather, angling to the left towards the edge of camp. I approached the hut by the cenote at a tangent, having arrived by a circuitous route, and I could not tell if the door was open or even if there was anyone inside. But I did see Fowler make a run for it from the front.

  He nearly made it, too, but a man appeared from out of nowhere -- not a chiclero but one of Gatt's elegant thugs who carried what at first I thought was a sub-machine-gun. Fowler was no more than six paces from the hut when the gangster fired and his gun erupted in a peculiar double booom. Fowler was hit by both charges of the cut-down shotgun and was thrown sideways to fall in a crumpled heap.

  I took a snap shot at his killer with no great hope of success and then made a rush for the door of the hut. A bullet chipped splinters from the door frame just by my head, and one of them drove into my cheek as I tumbled in. Then someone slammed the door shut.

  When I looked out again I saw it was useless to do anything for Fowler. His body was quivering from time to time as bullets hit it. They were using him for target practice.

  II

  The rifle fire clattered to a desultory stop and I looked around the hut. Fallon was clutching a shotgun and crouched under a window; Smith was by the door with a pistol in his hand -- it was evidently he who had shut it. Katherine was lying on the floor sobbing convulsively. There was no one else.

  When I spoke my voice sounded as strange as though it came from someone else. 'Rudetsky?'

  Fallon turned his head to look at me, then shook it slowly. There was pain in his eyes.

  'Then he won't be coming,' I said harshly.

  'Jesus!' said Smith. His voice was trembling. 'They killed Fowler. They shot him.'

  A voice -- a big voice boomed from outside. It was Gatt, and he was evidently using some sort of portable loudhailer. 'Wheale! Can you hear me. Wheale?'

  I opened my mouth, and then shut it firmly. To argue with Gatt -- to try to reason with him -- would be useless. It would be like arguing against an elemental force, like trying to deflect a lightning bolt by quoting a syllogism. Fallon and I looked at each other along the length of the hut in silence.

  'I know you're there, Wheale,' came the big shout. 'I saw you go in the hut. Are you ready to make a deal?'

  I compressed my lips. Fallon said creakily, 'A deal! Did he mention a deal?'

  'Not the kind you'd appreciate,' I said grimly.

  'I'm sorry that guy was killed,' shouted Gatt. 'But you're still alive, Wheale. I could have killed you right there by the door, but! didn't. You know why.'

  Smith jerked his head and looked at me with narrowed eyes. There was a question in them which he didn't put into words. I closed my hand tighter round the butt of the revolver and stored him down until his glance slid away.

  'I've got another guy here,' boomed Gatt. 'Big Joe Rudetsky. Are you prepared to deal?'

  I knew very well what he meant. I moistened my lips and shouted, 'Produce him alive -- and I might.'

  There was a long pause. I didn't know what I'd do if he were still alive and Gatt carried out his threats. Whatever I did would be useless. It would mean putting the four of us into Gatt's hands and giving him all the aces. And he'd kill us all in the end, anyway. But if he produced Joe Rudetsky and began to torture him, could I withstand it? I didn't know. Gatt laughed. 'You're smart, Wheale. You sure are smart. But not tough enough. Is Fallon still alive?' I motioned to Fallon to keep quiet. 'Oh, I suppose he's there -- with maybe one or two more. I'll leave them to argue with you, Wheale, and maybe you'll be ready to make a deal. I'll give you one hour -- and no more, I don't think you'll be tough enough for that, Wheale.'

  We stood there, quite still, for two full minutes and be said nothing more. I was thankful for that because he'd already said enough -- I could see it in Smith's eyes. I looked at my watch and realized with a sense of shock that it was only seven o'clock in the morning. Less than fifteen minutes earlier I'd been talking to Gatt outside the camp. His attack had come with a ruthless suddenness.

  Fallon eased himself down until he was sitting on the floor.

  He laid the shotgun aside carefully. 'What's the deal?' he asked, looking at his feet. The voice was that of an old man.

  I paid far less attention to Fallon than I did to Smith. Smith held an automatic pistol; he held it loosely enough, but he could still be dangerous. 'Yeah, what's this deal?' he echoed.

  'There's no deal,' I said shortly.

  Smith jerked his head towards the window. That guy says there could be.'

  'I don't think you'd like to hear it,' I said coldly.

  I saw his gun hand tighten up and I lifted my revolver. He wasn't standing very far away but I don't even know if I could have hit him. They tell me that revolvers are very inaccurate in inexperienced hands. Still, Smith wasn't to know I wasn't a gunman. I said, 'Let's all kill each other and save Gatt the trouble.'

  He looked at the gun in my hand which was pointed at his stomach. 'I just want to know about this deal,' he said steadily. 'All right; I'll tell you -- but put the gun down first. It makes me uneasy.'

  The thoughts that chased through Smith's mind were re-flected on his face and were as clear as though he had spoken them, but at last he made his decision, stooped and laid the pistol at his feet. I relaxed and put my revolver on the table, and the tension eased. Smith said, 'I guess, we're all jumpy.' It was an apology of sorts.

  Fallon was still regarding the tips of his bash boots as though they were the most important things in the world. He said quietly, 'Who does Gatt want?'

  'He wants me,' I said. He wants me to go down and retrieve the loot.'

  'I thought he might. What happened to Rudetsky?'

  'He's dead. He's lucky.'

  Smith hissed in a sudden intake of breath. 'What's that sup' posed to mean?'

  'Gatt's way of persuading me to dive isn't pretty. Hell take any of us -- you, Fallon or Mrs. Halstead, it doesn't matter -- and torture him to put pressure on me. He's quite capable of doing it, and I think he'd relish using his imagination on a job like that.' I found myself looking at it in a detached manner. 'He might burn your feet off with a blowlamp; he might chop you up joint by joint while you're still alive; he might -- well, there's no end to that kind of thing.'

  Smith had averted his face. He jerked nervously. 'And you'd let him do it? Just for the sake of a few lousy trinkets?'

  'I couldn't stop him,' I said. That's why I'm glad Rudetsky and Fowler are dead. You see, we got rid of the air bottles, and diving without them would be bloody difficult. All we have are a few charged aqualung bottles -- the big bottles are at the bottom of the cenote. If you think I'm going to dive in those conditions, with someone screaming in my ears every time I come up, then you're even crazier than Gatt.'

  Smith whirled on Fallon. 'You got me into this, you crazy old man. You had no right -- do you hear me? You had no
right.' His face collapsed into grief, 'Jesus, how am I going to get out of this? I don't wanna be tortured.' His voice shook with a passion of self-pity and tears streamed from his eyes. 'Good Christ, I don't want to die!' he wept.

  It was pitiful to watch him. He was disintegrating as a man. Gatt knew very well how to put pressure on a man's innermost core, and the hour's grace he had given us was not intended to be a relief. It was the most sadistic thing he had done and he was winning. Katherine had collapsed; Fallon was eaten up with cancer and self-recrimination, and Smith had the pith taken out of him by the fear of death by torture.

  I was all knotted up inside, tormented by my sheer impotence to do any-thin? about it. I wanted to strike out and tear and smash -- I wanted to get at Gatt and tear his bloody heart out. I couldn't, and the sense of helplessness was killing me.