by Dan Pollock
Of course, he’d brought it all on himself. The chain of bad decisions went back several days at least, perhaps farther. And he’d surely forged the last link climbing up to the sundeck in search of a clear head, then, at the first opportunity, making a drunken ass out of himself. Oh, yes, the images featuring himself and Jacqueline Lee remained indelible and erotic—mouth-to-mouth intoxication, for God’s sake! But analyzed in hindsight, his behavior was irresponsible, if not downright juvenile—especially all the subsequent fondlings and gropings. The girl was, after all, his associate’s daughter, and younger than his own Teresa. Thank God he’d finally found the gumption to call a halt. Unfortunately, restraint had come too late to salvage sobriety.
But plastered though he was, Sam negotiated a careful descent to the upper deck, where, with both feet well planted, he stiff-armed the nearest bulkhead. This helped to keep the luxury yacht from listing any more than it already was. Which, of course, had to be a subjective perception, since the Orinoco was hardly known for storm waves, and the Kallisto was obviously still tethered to the dock.
But what next? He couldn’t drive to the nearest hotel. All right. What was the alternate plan? Call Enrico to come and fetch him? That would be a hell of a sadistic trick to play on a friend who was probably just getting to sleep after two days of nonstop partying.
But Sam had to do something, if he didn’t want to finish flat on his face for D.W. or Jacqueline to trip over in the morning. So he squinted at the glossy swarm of limousines under the dock lights. Why not hitch a ride in one of those? But staggering up to the nearest politico in his present disarray wasn’t exactly going to enhance his prestige—and he was going to need all his prestige intact in the days to come. Which left what? Hitchhiking through some of San Félix’s more colorful districts? Trying to flag down a por puesto minibus on the waterfront and getting rolled for his Rolex?
Samuel, he exhorted himself, for God’s sakes, do something!
Gradually, then, he became aware of a masculine murmur from farther down the deck. The words were indistinct, but Sam recognized Spanish cadences and a tone vacillating between charm and menace. Sam surveyed aft, expecting to find a wavy-haired lothario putting the make on some toothsome señorita. For a dreadful instant, he even envisioned Félix Rosales with Jacqueline Lee in the role of enthralled listener.
He was relieved—and amazed—instead to see Bernardo, Owen Meade’s youthful factotum, posed nonchalantly forty or fifty feet away, readily identifiable by his spiky hair and basketball high-tops. In apparent deference to the occasion, however, Bernardo was wearing a suit, or a hip facsimile thereof. It was altogether the baggiest jacket-and-trouser ensemble Sam had seen outside of a clown act.
The young man was definitely on the make, but all that could be seen of his feminine target was a forward-thrusting knee, nicely linked to a swell of naked thigh above and calf below. The rest of her was hidden behind the fiberglass curve of one of the Kallisto’s two speedboat tenders; but gauging by the upward tilt of Bernardo’s face, she had to be considerably taller than he. This was confirmed an instant later as a bangled arm extended into view and brushed slowly over Bernardo’s spiky crown. It was almost a maternal gesture, and the young man rose to it like a cat to a caress. Despite his grogginess, Sam found the vignette arousing.
But, what the hell, the kid was a Proteus employee. So he could damn well stop hustling the guests and drive Sam to the Intercontinental. Sam pushed away from the bulkhead and began navigating in the general direction of the cradled speedboat. He traversed the distance in a series of surprising tacks, the last of which fetched him hard against the Kallisto’s starboard rail, before he spun off and teetered directly in front of Bernardo. It took a moment before the young man’s puzzlement yielded to a grin of recognition.
“Señor Sam, you got bombed, eh?”
“Very observant,” Sam said, weaving ever so slightly as he stood. “I am indeed bombed, Nardo. And I am, therefore, in need of your assistance.”
“Oh, yeah?” Bernardo’s enthusiasm dimmed noticeably, as his eyes wandered back toward his erstwhile quarry, who had just leaned into view. She was indeed taller than Bernardo, considerably heavier, and, Sam reckoned, easily a couple decades older. A mass of brassy curls overhung a hard, glamorously preserved face. The woman’s carmine-caked lips and plucked-and-penciled eyebrows reminded Sam of Hollywood sweater girls of the Forties and Fifties. Bernardo had picked a rather formidable target, he thought, as those improbable eyebrows arched and turquoise-shadowed eyes appraised him, while the bombshell lips crinkled into a sensuous smile.
Sam smiled back. “Buenas noches, señorita.”
“Buenas noches, Señor Warrender. This is a really fantastic yacht.”
“It’s not mine. But if you like it, I understand it charters for around twenty thousand a day.”
The blonde laughed artfully, while Sam wondered how she knew his name. But he couldn’t waste his remaining coherence finding out. He got back to business: “Nardo, I need a ride to the Intercontinental.”
“You don’t mean now, Señor Sam?”
“Yes, I do mean now. But first I want you to go down to the lower deck.” Sam struggled to recall the layout. “There’s a cabin all the way back on this side. It should be unlocked. If not, get the key from Owen or D.W. Inside, on the floor, you’ll see a big black satchel, clothes on the bed, car keys on the desk. They have an Alfa Romeo logo. Just grab all that stuff and meet me on the dock in five minutes, okay? I’ll be right by the Alfa. It’s a black convertible. Got all that?”
Bernardo nodded his spiky head. “Sure. But I could get you a limo, you know? Those drivers, they’re just hanging out down there, getting bombed on José Cuervo.”
“Bernardo, just do what I asked.”
“Hey, no problem!” He gave Sam a cocky salute, turned and tossed the same salute to the woman. “Esperamé—wait right here for me, Babe.” Then he swaggered off toward the companionway.
“Señor Warrender, what is the matter?”
Sam turned to find the big blonde right in his face, and wearing a look of deep-etched concern. It took Sam a second to figure out why. He must be tottering again. In fact, she apparently thought he was going to hit the deck, as she seized his arm.
“I’m okay,” he said. “But maybe I could sit down a second.”
“Hold on to me.” Bracing her hip against him and using her forearm as a crutch, the woman marched him several steps to a nearby bench, then eased him down.
“Look, I’m sorry,” Sam said. “I think I just need to catch my breath.”
“I’m in no hurry,” she said. “Anyway, my boyfriend told me to wait.”
“Bernardo? He’s your boyfriend?”
“That’s a joke, honey.”
“You never know, right?”
“Frankly, Señor Warrender, you’re more my type.”
“How do you know my name?”
“You are a very famous man, Señor Warrender, especially in Venezuela. I know of your exploits. So tell me, this ship, it truly costs twenty thousand bolívars each day?”
“Dollars, not bolívars. Plus tips for the crew.”
She threw her head back and laughed. “To have such money, I think one must be in the coca export business.”
Sam, meanwhile, took in the brassy tangle and the assiduous warpaint, then slid down to cavernous cleavage above her gold-beaded and sequined cocktail dress. He got momentarily lost in these scenic regions, before working his way back up to her face.
“You naughty boy,” she said when he reached her elaborately mascaraed eyes, which nevertheless seemed to be tracking him shrewdly.
“I remember you now, señorita. Weren’t you doing some kind of cha-cha or bossa nova earlier?”
“It is possible. I love to shake it up, you know? And you, Señor Warrender, do you dance?” Her hip nudged him massively.
He shook his head. “Call me Sam, okay? It saves syllables.”
“And I am Marina. Mar
ina Estévez. Perhaps you have also seen me on television?”
“Shaking it up in that little gold dress?”
She launched another histrionic laugh. “Oh, please, you are making fun of me. No, I am not a professional dancer. I am a reporter. I work for Noticolor—Ciudad Bolívar TV. And sometimes I anchor the weekend news.”
Sam struggled with the implications of this unlikely revelation. “A TV reporter? Here to cover D.W.’s party?”
“Don’t worry, Sam. I am only here to amuse myself.” She leaned close enough to prod him with her nearside knocker. Her scent also invaded his space, enveloping him in a potent musk cloud. “But perhaps I should warn you, Sam, there is a video crew on board from Venevisión. And Bernardo saw some paparrazzi guys hanging around the limos.” She waggled a lacquer-clawed finger under his nose. “So, if you wish to leave the ship discreetly, you will have to be very careful.”
“Oh, Christ! I’m probably already late. Nardo will be waiting.”
“We could leave together, Sam, and you can hide your face right here.” She patted her deeply cleft bosom. “No one will see you. They will see only me, and the back of your head. If you like, I can even accompany you to the hotel.”
“Uh, no, I don’t think so, but thanks, Maria.”
“Marina. Say it, please.”
“Marina, sorry. But if you can just get me to the companionway, I think I can get down to the dock myself.”
“Yes, yes, all right. Come on, sweetie.” She stood up, clapping her hands like a gym instructor. “And don’t worry. I can hold you up. I’m a big girl.”
“I can see that.”
To demonstrate her prowess, she yanked Sam upright, draped his left arm over her shoulders while locking her right arm around his waist.
“See, I’ve got you? Now here we go.”
Side by side they started forward. Sam, without having to worry about his balance, discovered he could shuffle slowly ahead, working his rubbery limbs as he might a marionette.
“Are we there yet?”
“Don’t be silly. Come on, you’re doing great.”
“How much farther?”
“Let me worry about that. You just hang on to Mama.” Suddenly she began to giggle.
“What’s so funny?”
“The way our hips are bumping, Sam, right on the beat. Don’t you hear the band? They’re playing a bolero. We are dancing, mi amor.” She began to sing:
“Bésame, bésame mucho, como si fuera esta noche la última vez...”
She continued to hum the melody, then turned to compress herself against him.
“Marina?”
“Yes, Sam?” She licked his earlobe.
“I’ve got to... stop a moment.”
Sam sagged against her as a wave of dizziness swept him. She managed to prop him up, while searching for another bench.
“Where are we?” he asked.
“I think we must cross over here, Sam.” They had reached the bridge wing, and Marina pointed to the port side, where a companionway slanted down to the main deck gangway—the quickest way off the boat.
“It is just a little bit farther.”
“Okay.” He took a faltering step.
“Wait, I have an idea.”
She deposited Sam at an angle against the steeply raked front of the pilothouse, then began alternately tugging and sliding him sideways. It was surprisingly effective, and both found it enormously funny. Then, halfway across, while he giggled at his ineptitude, Sam’s knees buckled, and he clutched at Marina for support, but succeeded only in snagging her already plunging neckline and dislodging one of her breasts.
After she caught him, he stood there, studying this remarkable protuberance, which seemed to return his stare from its dark cyclopean orb.
“Sam!” Marina scolded. “I’ll let you play with it later. But now please put it back where you found it, so we can go down the stairs.”
“Sorry.” He fumbled with the tremulous globe, then glanced up. “I think you better do it.”
“I can’t let go of you, or you’ll fall on your face. Just stuff it inside.”
It really wasn’t that difficult when he applied himself. “Marina, thanks for all your help,” Sam said with Jacqueline suddenly on his mind, “but I think I’d better go down those stairs myself.”
“Ha! I don’t think so!”
“No, really, I can do it.”
He started down the companionway, then quickly realized he could not manage it alone. But Marina was quickly beside him, instructing him to grip the rail, while she encircled his waist and guided him down, step by step. Then, as sounds from below filled the companionway, he realized the party was still churning at full volume. How was he going to slip through unnoticed? Perhaps Marina could go down first and scout out a route to the gangway.
Sam turned to suggest this—at precisely the wrong moment. Marina had just stepped down and was not where he reached. He overbalanced and began clawing air. Although he was the one in motion, her face seemed to be sailing past him, a mask of cosmetic shock with chandelier earrings aswing. When he knew he was definitely falling, and unfortunately when it was too late to do anything about it, he made an unavailing grab. As earlier, he managed only to catch the spangled fabric of Marina’s flimsy dress, which came away in his hand, peeling her to the waist and toppling her in his wake. They tumbled together to the main deck.
*
Sam opened his eyes on a sprinkling of stars, neatly framed by the window cutouts of the enclosed main deck. But he couldn’t identify the constellations. Several looked vaguely like the Big Dipper. But this was the wrong hemisphere for that, wasn’t it? The Southern Cross ought to be up there somewhere, but where?
Then the sky erupted in blinding light, and Sam shut his eyes, became aware at the same instant of a good deal of pain, mostly radiating from his tailbone. But that made sense. After all, he had just fallen downstairs.
Footsteps, shouts, even laughter began converging rapidly around him. He opened his eyes—this time not on twinkling stars, but on a ring of curious faces. Then he felt heat against his face and turned once more into blinding light. He squinted his eyes nearly shut and saw a quartz-halogen floodlight mounted above a minicam.
Why was a TV camera pointing at him? Was a drunk falling downstairs all that newsworthy in Venezuela? And why wasn’t anyone helping him up? But people were rushing forward, so there was apparently some concern. Owen Meade, for instance, was shoving aside a small individual whom Sam recognized as the minister of health. Then Owen stooped, revealing D.W. standing behind him and looking distraught. Then, pushing in front of everyone and kneeling close, was the one person Sam least wanted to see at that moment. It was Jacqueline Lee, regarding him with what seemed to be spreading horror.
“Sam!” she cried out. “Are you terribly hurt?”
“Don’t think so,” Sam answered in a strangely sepulchral voice. Perhaps he was badly injured—or disfigured or even partially paralyzed. He managed to wiggle something down there. And then all at once he remembered Marina. What had become of her?
Something large and cushiony shifted suddenly beneath him. He rolled his head to the side to see what it was and pivoted his face directly into a familiar—and very naked—breast. Instantly the video camera, which had been momentarily extinguished, bathed him again in hot light. Sam glanced over the imposing pneumatic curve at the face of Señorita Marina Estévez. She looked extremely angry, he thought.
But perhaps not as angry as Jacqueline Lee, when Sam swung back to face her. What he desperately needed then was to lose consciousness. Unfortunately, he seemed wide awake.
Chapter Twenty-Four
Sam thought he was prepared for the worst when American Flight 91 touched down at New Orleans International around eight p.m. the following day. But he was wrong.
He had left Caracas seven hours earlier. And during the final hour leg from Miami, he’d been constantly on the airphone with three Proteus executives, two of them bo
ard members, then his executive assistant, Bill Tuck, and finally with Lewis Thurman, his outside counsel. With all that input, he figured he had a pretty good fix on the enemy positions and firepower. But walking down the airport concourse behind a waddling giant of a chauffeur, who had once been an LSU nose tackle, Sam glanced over at a newsrack and got a figurative arrow in the neck. He saw his media nickname name plastered across a front page. He moved closer and discovered much worse.
Racked beneath the Times-Picayune, the two Houston dailies, the Wall Street Journal and USA Today was a green-sheet tabloid called the Crescent City Sun. Its bold-type banner screamed: “Wham! Bam! Thank You, Cowboy Sam!” Immediately below was a grainy black-and-white photo showing himself, sprawling over a woman whose dress was ripped to the waist and whose face was plainly outraged. Sam, meanwhile, with tuxedo askew and mouth agape, seemed to be lost in close-range contemplation of the woman’s protruding left breast. The photo was captioned: “Drunken party antics of Sam Warrender, maverick chairman of New Orleans-based Proteus Industries, embarrass colleagues and may endanger Venezuelan mining project.” The story, absent by-line and vanishing beneath the fold, was datelined Ciudad Guayana.
Sam tossed a quarter on the counter and stuffed the rag furtively under his arm as he walked away. On the way to the limo, he unfolded it and began scanning the six-inch column. Before he finished, his initial revulsion, much of it self-directed, had become full-blown fury, directed at the anonymous character assassins behind the piece. The account was wildly speculative, although a certain humiliating truth remained beneath all the salacious goop the writer had troweled on. It described “a rum-drenched, South American yacht debauch,” where “decadent party games climaxed with Louisiana’s favorite corporate cowboy falling downstairs with a buxom blonde TV newswoman, stripping her topless in the process and nearly landing them both in the crocodile-infested Orinoco.” There was more of the same en route to a bit of terminal nastiness: “The tipsy CEO was hustled by bodyguards into a dockside limo,” Sam read, “before he could wreak further damage to his company’s considerable South American interests.”