Transition

by Henry Charles Mishkoff

  And, of course, the press will get hold of the story within minutes, and then everyone in the world will know.

  He clears his throat. “I’m afraid that there has been an incident.” His voice sounds weak. He clears his throat again. “A kidnapping, to be more precise.”

  “My word!” Lady Smoot is aghast. “The savages!”

  “Athletes?” Lord Smoot probes for more information.

  “I’m afraid so.”

  “Americans?”

  “Yes. American women. And there appear to have been injuries as well, possibly fatalities. They don’t seem to be certain of the other nationalities…”

  “Which athletes were involved?”

  “The young man didn’t offer many details,” Kennedy says. He notices that he has acquired a small audience; about a dozen people seated nearby are craning their necks and leaning toward him. “But it appears that the women who were kidnapped were Jillian Kendal and Sunshine O’Malley.”

  “Oh, how dreadful,” Lady Smoot says. “How positively barbaric these people are. Wasn’t the Kendal woman the gold medalist in the marathon at the Nairobi Olympics?”

  As Lord Smoot finally sits back down, Kennedy begins to follow the page as he edges into the aisle. He looks at Lady Smoot with a vacant look, as if he were puzzled by her question.

  As Kennedy edges past him, Lord Smoot continues to try to make sense of the startling news. “Jillian Kendal,” he muses. “Isn’t she the daughter of that swaggering Texas oilman? I understand that he conducts a great deal of business here in Qen Phon.”

  “G.W. Kendal has been one of my dearest friends for twenty years,” Kennedy says, simply, as the color begins to seep back into his cheeks.

  “And Jillian Kendal,” he adds, with a slight but unmistakable catch in his voice, “Jillian Kendal is my goddaughter.”

  And although it may have merely been a trick of Tanami Stadium’s powerful lights, Lord Smoot is certain that he sees a sudden, intense spark of anger flash deep in the eyes of J. Stanton Kennedy.

  5.2.3: Tanami

  Ivan Petronovich has just replaced the receiver in the telephone handset when the door to his suite at the Tanami Intercontinental flies open and Dimitri Boronov bursts into the room.

  Dimitri stares at the old man for a few moments, his face ashen, at a loss for words. His mouth moves several times, but he does not seem to be able to speak. Then, finally, he manages a few words: “Did you hear?”

  “I just hung up the phone this instant, Dimitri.” The fat Cuban cigar dangling from the old man’s lips bounces as he speaks. “The news is really quite…” he searches for a word… “startling, shall we say?”

  “How can you be so calm?” Dimitri is horrified. Could that actually be the ghost of a smile on Petronovich’s face? Has the old man suddenly become senile? “What is the matter with you?” he demands, angrily. “They find poor Karl bleeding by the side of some deserted road, and you…”

  “Karl?” The old man has been leaning far back in an overstuffed chair, one leg propped up on a footstool to help relieve a sudden onset of gout, but now he leaps to his feet with a surprising display of vitality. “What are you saying? What has Karl to do with this?”

  Dimitri is puzzled. “I thought you knew… you said you had received a call…”

  “I heard that the Americans Kendal and O’Malley had been kidnapped. I heard nothing about Karl. What has happened to him?”

  “I am sorry, Commissioner, I thought you knew. Perhaps you had better sit down…”

  Ignoring Dimitri’s suggestion, Petronovich hobbles over to him, grabs him by both shoulders, and stares at him with fierce intensity. “What has happened?” he croaks. “You will tell me what has happened. Immediately.”

  “There was a kidnapping, as you heard, Jill Kendal and Sunshine O’Malley. Karl tried to prevent it, and he was shot…”

  “Karl? Shot? How can this be? He tried to prevent the kidnapping, you say? Where did this happen?”

  “Some town, near here, I don’t know the name. One of the suburbs…”

  “What was Karl doing there?” Petronovich is shouting, his face only inches from Dimitri’s. “Did I not forbid you to allow any of them to leave the Olympic Village?”

  Dimitri hesitates, looks off to the side for a moment, then meets the old man’s glare. “I take full responsibility, Commissioner,” he says. “I wanted Olga and Marta to meet the Kendal woman before the race, and Karl went with them. I certainly never anticipated…”

  “YOU IDIOT!” Petronovich’s grip tightens, and for a moment, Dimitri is certain that the old man is going to strike him. “How dare you disobey my…”

  He stops in mid-sentence, his jaw slack, as the full import of Dimitri’s words hits him. “Olga and Marta?” he asks, weakly. “The girls were involved in this as well?” Shaking his head in bewilderment, he drops his hands to his side. “I am much too old for this,” he murmurs, his anger suddenly deflated. “Perhaps I will sit. Get me a drink.” He sinks back into his chair and waves summarily at a half-empty bottle of vodka that stands on a table across the room. “Were Olga and Marta hurt as well?”

  As he pours the clear liquid into a glass, Dimitri shakes his head. “They are upset, but unhurt. I spoke with Olga on the phone just a few minutes ago. She was nearly hysterical, the poor girl. She has been through a terrible ordeal. Apparently, one of the American male athletes was shot. He is alive, but Olga was afraid that he might not survive. And a journalist was killed. There may have been others. That is all I know.”

  “But tell me of Karl,” Petronovich urges, after quickly downing a gulp of vodka. “Is he seriously injured?”

  “Olga believed that he was shot in the arm. It does not appear to have been serious. But it seems that he followed the kidnappers – I am sorry, I do not know all the details, I know this must be confusing – but he tried to follow the kidnappers on his bicycle, and apparently he was able to follow them for a time, but then he became too weak. A motorist found him lying by the side of a road, unconscious.”

  “Is he alright?”

  “I know nothing more than what I have told you. He was taken to a hospital. I was on my way to see him when I stopped in here to see if you had heard the news.”

  “We will both go to see him.” Gulping down the remains of his drink, Petronovich rises shakily to his feet. “My driver is downstairs in the lobby. Tell him to have my car ready at once.” He shakes his head in dismay. “This is all very upsetting, my boy. Very upsetting.”

  But as Dimitri scurries off to do the Commissioner’s bidding, he can’t help remembering that when he had first come into the room, before Petronovich had realized that Russian athletes had been involved in the incident, the old man had not been at all upset.

  In fact, when Petronovich had believed that the only victims had been the American women, he had actually, incredibly, seemed to be pleased.

  5.2.4: Tanami

  “You will please to excuse me for a moment.”

  The Minister of the Interior frowns as he reaches for the telephone, which is emitting sharp bursts of harsh beeps. “What is it?” he snaps.

  Whatever it is, it changes his expression instantly from anger to shock. He nods, speechless, several times. He places the receiver gently back into its cradle without saying a word. He seems to be lost in thought.

  His visitor clears his throat. “Bad news?” he asks, solicitously. But he thinks: This is just an act. A good act, but an act just the same. He wants me to think that the call was of grave importance, something weighty enough to justify the fact that his subordinates put through a call even though he gave them strict instructions that he was not to be disturbed. And what I have to do is to play along, act as though I buy it – for the most part, that is. But I need to inject just enough skepticism into my tone so that he knows he’s not fooling me. It’s a fine line: If I’m too obvious about it, I’ll insult him, and he’ll become more intractable. I just want to make him suspect I know. I d
on’t want to hit him over the head with it.

  “Yes, bad news.” The minister nods. He seems distracted, distant. He closes his eyes and shakes his head, suddenly weary. “Terrible news.”

  He’s very good, the visitor thinks, admiringly. But it’s an opening just the same, something I should be able to use to get him to come down another couple of dollars a barrel. A small advantage, to be sure, but one to be exploited.

  “Anything that might interest me?” the visitor inquires. “I’m sorry; I shouldn’t be so nosy,” he adds, without sounding even the slightest bit apologetic. “Just let me know if it’s none of my business.”

  The minister opens his eyes and studies his visitor with a kind of calculating curiosity, as if he were sizing up someone he has just met for the first time. The visitor finds that he is suddenly uncomfortable.

  The minister sighs. “But I am afraid that it is your business, Mr. Kendal,” he says. “I’m afraid that it is something that concerns you very much indeed.”

  5.2.5: Aqevina

  When the blare of sirens screams up the driveway, Jago Danziger looks up from his magazine with a start. For a brief moment, just the barest flicker of an instant, he’s back in Czechoslovakia, and the police are coming to interrogate him again, to question yet one more time the depth of his loyalty to the state and the Party apparatus. He could run – but why should he? He has committed no transgression. He is guilty of no crime.

  He has actually risen angrily to his feet before he remembers where he is. A wave of relief washes over him.

  But then, just as quickly, he realizes that, although the sirens might not spell danger for him personally, they probably do indicate that something is very wrong.

  He hears the car doors slam, the clatter of boots hurrying noisily up the wooden steps, the chatter of voices in the foyer. And then the door opens, and a maid ushers two uniformed men into the den. “I am sorry,” she says, smiling apologetically. “These men are policemen. They look for Mr. Kendal. I tell them Mr. Kendal not here, and Mrs. Kendal not here also. They ask if anyone here, and I tell them…”

  “It is alright, Marja,” Jago reassures the anxious maid, then turns to the policeman. “How may I help you gentlemen?”

  There’s a long silence, during which the policemen look at each other, at Jago, at Marja, but they say nothing.

  They fear to speak, Jago thinks. Or they search for the right words. Something is terribly, terribly wrong.

  Or, perhaps…

  “Do you men speak English?” he asks. No response. “Marja, please ask the policemen if they speak English.”

  “They no speak English,” Marja confirms, after a quick consultation. “You want I…” – she searches for a word – “… you want I speak for you?”

  “Yes, please, I would appreciate it if you would translate for me.”

  “Yes,” Marja nods, “that is the word, ‘translate,’ I translate for you…”

  He watches as Marja and the policemen begin their discussion. Why couldn’t the police have sent someone here who speaks English? How typical of these people – they make a show of being so terribly efficient, but that’s all it is: a show. I’ve read that nearly half of the people of Qen Phon speak at least some English – but when they need to convey important information to some visiting Americans, they send two cops who don’t speak a word of the language.

  Suddenly, Marja’s hands fly to her mouth. She staggers backward with a loud gasp.

  “What is it?” Jago demands. But Marja continues to listen to the policemen, her eyes wide. Covering her face with her hands, she starts to cry. “Marja, for God’s sake, what is it? Tell me!”

  “Oh, Mr. Danzig, is terrible, is terrible. They take Miss Jill, they take her away. Oh, poor Miss Jill, they take her…” At this point, Marja’s lament lapses into her native tongue.

  “Marja, for God’s sake, control yourself.” Jago grabs the blubbering maid by the shoulders. Were it not for the inhibiting presence of the policemen, he might have attempted to literally shake some sense into her. “Who’s taken her? Do you mean that the police have taken her? Where have they taken her to?”

  Marja shakes her head and looks up at Jago, tears in her eyes. “No, not police,” she sobs. “Bad men. Bandits. Terror people.”

  “Terror people… terrorists?” Suddenly, Jago feels physically ill. “Jill was… was kidnapped by terrorists? Is that what you’re trying to tell me?”

  Marja nods and starts to say something, but her sobs are too violent for words. Congregating anxiously at the door, the other servants peer in cautiously, whispering among themselves in hushed tones.

  The two policemen confer briefly, then they speak directly to Jago, as if they have forgotten that he cannot understand them.

  “What are you saying?” Jago shouts in his frustration. “I can not understand a word you fools are saying. Tell her, tell her, she will translate for me,” he fumes, motioning to the weeping maid. “Do not talk to me, I don’t speak your language, you idiots.” And finally, the policemen do attempt to communicate with Marja, but she only sobs louder and shakes her head, it’s all too much for her.

  “Policemans ask to know where Mr. Kendal, Mrs. Kendal.” The head housekeeper, who has been listening with the others by the door, steps forward tentatively. She puts a protective arm around Marja, who is now wailing so loudly that it’s difficult to hear anything else. “Policemans want to tell Mr. Kendal, Mrs. Kendal, what happen to Miss Jill. They want you tell them where Mr. Kendal, Mrs. Kendal.” She exchanges a few words with the officers, then turns back to Jago. “I say to them Mrs. Kendal shopping, I not know where Mr. Kendal. You know where Mr. Kendal?”

  Jago thinks hard. If the housekeeper says that Barbara Anne is shopping, well, that is probably right; Barbara Anne has been shopping nearly incessantly since they arrived. But G.W. has been making the rounds of meetings and other assorted events, some connected with the Olympics, but mostly having to do with his business. He could be anywhere. And with the cell phone service as spotty as it is…

  Reluctantly, Jago shakes his head. “No, tell the policemen I have no idea where G.W… where Mr. Kendal is. And for God’s sake, ask them for more details about Jill. Do they know who kidnapped her? When did it happen? Is she hurt? Please,” he begs, “find out any information that you can.”

  “Policemans say,” the housekeeper says, after an exchange that seems, to Jago, to go on for an excruciatingly long period of time, “they not know more. They say you come back to police house. Other policemans at police house know more. They tell you.”

  Jago shakes his head. “No,” he says mournfully. “As much as I would like to go, I think I had better wait here for Barbara Anne. For Mrs. Kendal.”

  “You go with policemans,” the housekeeper urges. “I tell Mrs. Kendal. You go help Miss Jill.”

  And although it’s sorely tempting, Jago shakes his head firmly. The thought of the servants, with their limited skills in English, trying to communicate this incomprehensibly horrifying news to Barbara Anne would have been comical, had it not been so deadly serious. “No,” he says sadly. “As much as I dread the prospect of being the bearer of such terrible news, I think that Barbara Anne should hear this from a friend.”

  And when the policemen have departed, when the servants have finally left him alone in the den, when the only sound in the big empty house is the ticking of the stately grandfather clock in the hall, Jago is alone with his jumbled thoughts.

  What could have happened? Who could have kidnapped Jill? And why? Were they just after any American, and she just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time? Or were they specifically after her? Why would they want her? As far as I know, she’s never done anything even remotely political in her life.

  The bastards. If they’ve harmed so much as one hair on her head…

  When G.W. finds out, he’s going to be furious. But what can he do here in a foreign country, halfway around the world? Back home, politicians gro
vel at his feet. Here, he is every bit as powerless as the rest of us.

  And Barbara Anne…

  I must compose myself, Jago thinks. Between now and the time Barbara Anne returns, I must find some way to tell her that her beautiful young daughter, her only child, has been taken away from her, has been kidnapped by people whose identities and motivations are frighteningly unknown.

  And about whose intentions, he thinks, with a shudder, we cannot even begin to speculate.

  5.2.6: Aqevina

  When the car drives up to the house, no one rushes out to meet it, and she is immediately annoyed. There are too many packages for me to carry in by myself, she thinks. Where do the servants disappear to every time I need them?

  And then Jago opens the front door of the big house and walks slowly down the steps. His eyes are fixed firmly downward, and behind him she can see that the servants are all huddled by the door, watching. Something is wrong. She starts to press the button that will unlock the car door, but instead she presses the button that slides the window down, as if she feels that she should remain in the car, that its bulk will somehow protect her from whatever evil it is that Jago is bringing with him.

  But when Jago speaks to her through the open window, the protection is revealed to be illusory. His words slash her like razors. First, her hands fly to her mouth. Then, they drop limply to her side. Finally, her head falls back against the headrest, Her eyes glaze and lose their focus.

  After a few seconds, Jago raps tentatively on the window. Slowly, without looking, she reaches over and presses the button that unlocks the door. He helps her out of the car and up the steps. She is gray-faced, ashen. Her steps are unsteady. She leans on him for support.

  Immediately upon entering the house, she asks for G.W. When she is told that he is not at home and that his whereabouts are unknown, she grimaces. Just like him, she says. And the flash of anger brings a hint of color back to her cheeks.