Circle of Scorpions

by Nick Carter

  "Just going over the whole thing in my head."

  "And it's funny?"

  "Deliriously," he replied. "I've decided that we've got about a ten percent chance of coming out alive."

  * * *

  They landed at Amsterdam's Schiphol airport at eleven-ten. Customs were cleared quickly, and by noon they were in a Mercedes taxi heading for 1 Professor Tulpplein.

  They mounted the steps to the imposing stone structure of the Amstel and moved into its sweeping, three-story-high main lobby.

  "I have a reservation. Two rooms adjoining. Kashmir."

  "Yes, sir."

  Both rooms were luxurious and high up with a view of the whole city.

  "We won't be able to do much until this evening," Carter said. "Tired?"

  Carlotta shrugged. "More uneasy than tired."

  Carter brushed his lips across her forehead and lightly caressed her cheeks with his hands. "I'll call Garrett. It's likely he has the contact for our meet set up by now. Why don't you freshen up and try to rest for a while? We can have an early dinner."

  Carlotta nodded and moved toward the connecting door. Just before she closed it behind her, Carter thought he caught a look in her eye.

  He dismissed it as the lock clicked, and he headed for the lobby and a pay phone.

  "It will take about twenty minutes, sir," the overseas operator said in barely accented English. "If you will leave your name at your hotel desk, I will have you paged."

  Carter grabbed a quick sandwich and was just sipping the last of his coffee when the page came.

  "This is Kashmir."

  "Yes, sir. I am ready with your call. Go ahead. New York."

  Both men waited for the distinctive click of the operator departing the line, and then Carter spoke.

  "It's me. Are you on, Al?"

  "Oh, yeah. Everything is set. Our lady in Manhattan is a very efficient conduit."

  "And the computer codes were no problem?"

  "None. Child's play for an old-time genius like me."

  Carter grinned. "I love your modesty. Give it to me."

  "All right. You are Jasmine. Your contact is Oakhurst. The contact will be confirmed with the word 'decibel. Use it in a sentence."

  "Got it," Carter replied. "When?"

  "Tonight. Take a boat ride on the Singel Canal at nine o'clock; it's the number three boat. Get off at Kroman. Two blocks down from the canal, there is a cafe called The Jazzman. Your contact will pick you up there. It will be a woman."

  "Anything else?"

  "Maybe," Al said and floated from the phone for a moment. When he returned, Carter could hear papers rattling. "I've uncovered a couple of earlier deals where Kashmir has used Oakhurst. It might be good for you to know about them, as further proof of who you are."

  "Good man, Al."

  Garrett quickly ran through the details of the previous two arms deals, and Carter catalogued them in his mind.

  "That's it. I don't imagine I'll be hearing from you again."

  "I don't like the way you say that, Al," Carter said with a chuckle. "I owe you a dinner in Arlington in six weeks. I'll be there to pay off."

  "You're on."

  "Ciao."

  Carter returned to his room, stripped, and took a long shower. When he emerged from the bath with a towel around his middle, the door linking his room to Carlotta's was ajar.

  She was in bed, with just the sheet over her long, slim body. Her eyes were open, and they rolled his way when he stepped into the doorway.

  "Are we on?"

  Carter nodded. "Tonight. I'll give you the details over dinner. Can't you sleep?"

  "I told you, I'm more uneasy than tired."

  The look was age-old, and Carter didn't miss it. He moved to the side of the bed and stood looking down at her. The drapes were pulled, the only light coming from his own room through the open door behind him.

  He leaned forward, hooked a thumb in the sheet at the top of her breasts, and slowly pushed it down to her knees.

  She was naked.

  Only her arm moved as she tugged the towel from his body.

  Her eyes roamed with approval over his body. His chest was a solid plate of muscle, and his belly was like a washboard. Thick ropes of muscle rippled down from his shoulders through his arms, and he moved into the bed beside her.

  Without a word she moved to him, kissing his chest, her lips heating the flesh while her hands worked to excite him.

  "Do you think this is wise?" Carter asked.

  "No, but I don't give a damn. Do you?"

  "No."

  Her face was close to his. He loosened the coils of her hair, and it cascaded down around her shoulders like a black waterfall. She twisted her head from side to side, whipping his face with the silken strands.

  "Sadist," he teased.

  "Masochist," she replied. "I'm prolonging the agony."

  "Then let's get down to it."

  His hands reached behind her to fill with the lush swells of her buttocks. He then pulled her forward until his lips could find the tips of her throbbing breasts.

  Carlotta curled her fingers in his hair, pressed his face tighter against her for a second, then pulled his head back.

  "I love that."

  "Then why stop?"

  "Because I want more."

  Again her head moved, and her hair whipped the length of his body, missing not one square inch of skin.

  Carter was not passive through all this. His hands stroked the silken length of her back, squeezed her buttocks, and rolled and molded her breasts that hung away from her body when she bent over.

  "Enough," he finally growled, rugging her up and over him.

  She pressed herself against him, her breasts spreading as they flattened to his chest. He kissed her wildly, then pulled back and rolled her over.

  He took her in one smashing second, and the room began to spin around them. His lips muffled her cries as he drove himself against her.

  His body fit hers perfectly as his hands found her breasts. Each time he crashed against her, Carlotta's body moved an inch or two on the smooth surface of the sheet.

  "Do it… do it!" she suddenly cried.

  He did, all of it, until she arched toward him, urging him with every gesture and sound.

  Slowly, and together, in matching rhythms they moved, each sensing the tide of rising passion in the other until their bodies were whirlpools of frenzied motion.

  Suddenly, with her nails digging into his straining back, she arched and writhed as though her entire body had become a taut cord about to snap.

  And then it did, and Carter with her.

  Both their bodies settled with slowly diminishing spasms until Carter rolled to her side. She snuggled against him. molding the length of her body tightly to him.

  "What time do you leave?" she asked, all desire drained now from her voice.

  "Around nine."

  "It will be nonstop from there, won't it?"

  "Yes," he said, and nodded.

  "Good luck," she whispered.

  She relaxed against him, and just before sleep came, he felt her tug his hand upward to cover the pouting firmness of her breast.

  * * *

  The Jazzman was filled with hippies ranging in age from late teens to early forties. A pungent, acrid odor hung in the air. and the tables were filled with wine bottles.

  It was obvious why the little cafe had been chosen; Carter stuck out like a sore thumb. He guessed that whoever his contact was, she would also be «different» from the crowd.

  Just inside the door, something resembling Vampira sat at a small table with an open cigar box in front of her.

  Carter dropped a few bills into the box, moved on into the club, and found what looked to be the last empty table.

  On the stage sat a gorilla with the face of a cherub, dangling a banjo in his paws. He wore greasy motorcycle boots, faded and patched blue jeans, and a wrinkled blue work shirt.

  Mournful and unintelligible so
unds came from between his lips as he listlessly strummed the banjo.

  A lean blonde moved toward Carter. Her feet were bare, and her hair was a tawny tangle to her shoulders. She looked to be about sixteen.

  Wine?"

  "Scotch," Carter replied.

  "We have only wine.

  "I'll have wine… two glasses."

  She disappeared with a sharp little wiggle and was back in less than a minute. She plopped the bottle on the table and shifted her weight to one hip.

  "You want hashish too?"

  Carter's nose wrinkled. Now he recognized the smell that had assaulted his nostrils when he had entered the club. Hashish was common, and legal, in Amsterdam.

  "No."

  "Five florin," she said, holding out her hand.

  He gave her a five-florin note and some coins. She ambled away, and Carter poured a glass of the wine. It was awful, but at least he didn't grimace.

  Carter didn't have long to wait. The mournful singer was just stepping down for a hash break when she came through the door. One roll around the room with her eyes and he was spotted.

  She was short and compact beneath a big poncho and a pair of snug jeans. Her face was stark white, devoid of makeup, and her eyes were almost concealed beneath dark bangs.

  Carter thought mat she would have fit right into the place if it hadn't been for her hands. They always tell the story, and these hands said the short creature in the poncho would never see forty again.

  "May I join you?"

  "Please do."

  She sat as he poured wine into the second glass.

  "Are you a tourist in Amsterdam?"

  Carter shook his head. "I have business with a Mr. Oakhurst."

  "And what are you called?"

  "Jasmine."

  The slight tenseness left the hand and arm holding the glass. She set it on the table and leaned forward.

  "And…?"

  "And the decibel level of chatter in this place is deafening. Could we go somewhere else?"

  "One moment."

  And men she was gone, into the darkness beyond the rear door of the cafe.

  Carter guessed mat somewhere back there was a telephone. He lit a cigarette and waited.

  She was back in less than two minutes. "Mr. Oakhurst is nearby."

  Carter took her elbow to guide her through the crowd. He almost missed it, a quick but deft exchange between the woman and two of the rowdier men at the bar. Just as they passed, arm in arm, into the street, Carter saw the two men separate themselves from the rest of the crowd.

  They were silent for two blocks before Carter spoke out of the side of his mouth. "We're being followed."

  "I know. They belong to us."

  "Trusting, aren't you?"

  "No," she said, and smiled. "It is a very dangerous business. You, of all people, should know that."

  At the canal, they turned and followed it for another few blocks. Suddenly she grasped his arm and halted.

  "There, the fourth floor. Knock twice, wait, and knock twice again."

  It was an old house of crumbling red brick turning gray from years. She made sure he understood which one, then faded from his side into the shadows.

  Slowly, he ambled toward the entrance and climbed the steps. The front door opened into a small alcove. Beyond the second door was a hall and rotting stairs.

  Carter covered the four flights of stairs three at a time and rapped sharply on the floor's only door. He waited ten seconds, then rapped again. An ear to the thin panel told him that someone was very carefully twisting the lock on the other side.

  "Yes?" came a thin, reedy voice through a crack in the door.

  "My name is Jasmine. I've come to see Mr. Oakhurst."

  "Come in."

  Carter stepped through the crack into pitch darkness.

  "Stand right there, please."

  The voice was behind him. The hands that patted him down came from in front.

  "He is not armed."

  The door closed behind him, and a bare bulb blinked on in the ceiling. The room was ratty, a table, a few chairs, and a cot its only furnishings.

  The man before Carter was short and squat. His face was lined, and his skin was puckered beneath his neck as if he had once been much heavier but had shriveled. A Walther PPK was lolling easily in his right hand.

  "You are Oakhurst?" Carter asked.

  "I am Oakhurst."

  Carter turned slowly.

  He was tall and scarecrow thin. His face beneath a heavy growth of beard was gaunt, the cheeks hollow, the eyes sunken in dark pockets.

  He looks strung out, Carter thought, or tubercular.

  Carter knew it was the latter when the man moved to the table and immediately started hacking into a ready handkerchief he held in his right hand.

  "I trust our last two exchanges met with your approval?" he managed to say between coughing spasms.

  "Quite," Carter said, slipping into an opposite chair. The squat man, still playing with the Walther, moved to a window ledge and sat. "Except, of course, the vests on the first shipment were not of the quality you said, and you shorted me two crates of mortar shells on the second."

  The man's thin lips creased into a smile, and Carter sighed inwardly, giving silent thanks to Garrett's analytical thinking.

  "My apologies. I will make it up to you with a credit on these items."

  He flattened a piece of paper and a map on the table.

  "Now, shall we get down to business? The goods are currently in a warehouse in The Hague. They are still legit, with an end-use certificate for Caracas. We can ship by air or by sea, depending on your true destination."

  Carter flipped the map around and traced his finger down the coast of Italy. "Here."

  The man's eyes darted down and then back up to meet Carter's. Beneath his beard, the jawline tensed as his teeth clenched. "We can't consign at that distance and you know it."

  "You will this time, "Carter replied in a flat, even voice. The squat man lifted his butt from the windowsill and steadied the Walther. "And tell your man to put that away or I will give him an enema with it."

  The man took one step forward, and Oakhurst held up his hand. "I shall have to make a call. One moment."

  He stood and moved through a curtain serving as a door into another room. Carter lit a cigarette and turned to the other man.

  "Sit down."

  He did, and slid the Walther into his belt.

  It took almost a half hour before the bearded man returned to his chair.

  "It can be done. A Libyan freighter, the Alamein, departs Marseille in two days' time. We will recrate there and ship as pottery."

  "Can the exchange be made at sea?"

  The man nodded and jotted on a pad. "These coordinates in five days. Midnight… sharp."

  Carter memorized the coordinates and touched his lighter to the paper. When it was ashes, he stood.

  "Now, the money."

  Carter opened his shirt. From beneath it he withdrew a fat money belt and draped it across the table.

  There is fifty thousand. The remainder when the exchange is made and I have all the goods."

  "Agreed," the man replied, but the crooked smile beneath the beard told Carter the truth.

  He had just made a cardinal error in the purchase of munitions from an illegal arms dealer. Oakhurst had fifty thousand, and he still had the cargo.

  Ergo, he could run with the down payment and sell the arms to the next bidder.

  It was unethical but very practical.

  A man like the bearded one before him wouldn't worry about losing a good customer like Jasmine. There were too many other good customers right around the corner, and fifty thousand was a good night's work if one didn't have to deliver anything for it.

  But Carter had made this cardinal error on purpose. If there was one thing a man like Oakhurst feared more than making a bad deal, it was death itself. He would go to any lengths to protect his own skin, even to the point of remain
ing honest. He simply had to be shown the way.

  Carter meant to do just that.

  "By the way, give me the number here — in case there is a change of plans after I make my delivery contact tonight."

  The two men exchanged wary glances, and then the bearded one seemed to shrug with his eyes.

  Carter could almost read his thoughts: Why not give the number to this fool? He'll never live long enough to dial it!

  He clipped it off between thin lips, and Carter left the room.

  On the street, Carter paused to light a cigarette, the corner of his eye on the fourth-floor window. When the light went off and on twice, he moved off at a steady, brisk pace.

  Five

  It was cat and mouse for almost fifteen minutes. Carter never saw them behind him, but he heard their heels matching his pace as he moved farther and farther into the old part of the city.

  The streets had long since given themselves up to narrow alleys, and streetlights were nonexistent. The only illumination came from an occasional barred window high in the walls through which he passed.

  As he searched for just the right place, Carter made no effort to elude them. On purpose, his own heels left a clearly audible trail that only a deaf person wouldn't be able to follow.

  And then he saw it, a tiny alley. It was no more than a corridor between low buildings.

  He turned into it and immediately broke into a run. They were still behind him, making the turn themselves, as Carter veered between the buildings. As he sprinted, he paused at every alcove to try the doors he found.

  Behind him, he could hear two sets of pounding feet. He wondered how close behind them the woman would be.

  Carter was about to halt and try the game where he was, when the alley before him swerved in a Y to the left and right. He chose the left and, around the corner, checked his flight with a growl of satisfaction.

  The alley ended with a heavy, iron-studded double door. The entry was slightly ajar, and a bare bulb cast eerie yellow light through the crack between door and jamb.

  It was perfect.

  Behind him, the footsteps slowed in caution. They thought they had Carter boxed, and now. hopefully, they would move in for the kill.