by Jon Land
Sheriff Junk didn’t give much thought to that as he meandered through his appointed rounds. His plan was to sneak out the back of Nellie Motta’s house, which was a scant twenty yards from the covered entrance to the tunnel leading to the jailhouse. If everything went as planned, he would enter the house, exit unseen through the back, and make his way into the tunnel. After finishing in the jailhouse, he would store all pilfered weapons back at the start of the tunnel for easy access later. Junk figured if things went well he could repeat the process on almost a daily basis.
He entered Nellie Motta’s house, explained briefly what he was up to, and then moved quickly to her back door. The entrance to the tunnel was clearly in sight, and no soldiers were anywhere in view. This didn’t put Heep particularly at ease because he knew that plenty of bad things could happen in the time it would take him to cover the ground. Nonetheless, he steadied himself with a deep breath and bolted out Nellie Motta’s back door.
The short dash seemed to take forever, and his war-ravaged joints and bones creaked and cracked in protest. He plunged the final yard into the brush that camouflaged the tunnel entrance and chewed down the pain long enough to begin stripping the brush away. A few minutes later the passage into the depths of the earth was revealed. A twelve-foot descent by ladder would take him into the tunnel and then he would follow the serpentine route to its end beneath the jailhouse where there was another ladder.
Holding the flashlight in his right hand, Sheriff Junk lowered himself down the first rungs after testing the strength of the old wood. It creaked but held his spiny frame and, trembling a bit, he gave it all his weight and started down.
He was halfway to the bottom when the ladder seemed to crumble, wood snapping and the whole apparatus tearing itself from its delicate perch. The rung he was standing on gave way and his fall tore the others beneath him out as well. He took most of the impact on his lower back, but one leg twisted beneath him and a fiery pain erupted in his ankle. He located his flashlight and pulled himself to his feet to check for other injuries, cursing the ladder silently. The rest of him was whole, which was more than he could say for the ladder. He could forget all about climbing back out this same way, a reality that shot his entire plan to hell.
Heep brushed the dried dirt from his clothes and, limping slightly, pressed on down the dank corridor. The tunnel was barely high enough to accommodate his height, as if it had been constructed for the herd of children that had played here years before. In a few spots, the ceiling was so low he was forced into a crouch which placed more pressure on his twisted ankle and made the pain even hotter. The walk seemed endless, but at last his flashlight caught a dirt wall and a second ladder that would take him up into the rear of the jail. He inched his way up the rungs deliberately, distributing his weight as evenly as he could manage. He hadn’t stopped to consider just how he was going to get out yet, nor what he might do with the pilfered weapons. One step at a time, just one step at a time… .
At the top of the ladder, the floorboards forming the bottom of the century-old jailhouse rose before him, the original hatch long since covered over. They had been loose and rotting for years and he had little trouble working them free with a tire iron lifted from the back of a car with a midget spare tire. The hardest chore was balancing himself on the ladder while he worked. He had survived one fall already. Another from a full fifteen feet would be disastrous.
When the first board started to come free in his hand, Heep stilled his own breathing to listen for boards creaking nearby. The absence of that sound told him no soldiers were walking above. That didn’t mean they weren’t close enough to hear him but he had to chance it. He pushed the loosened floorboards aside and hoisted himself up through the portal.
Since he would not be returning by the same route, he covered the hole again as neatly as he could. The lighting was dim as always but there was enough to pick out just what he had come for: rows of large crates containing plenty of ammo and weapons. A quick inspection revealed grenades, Laws rockets, and automatic rifles. But what good would they do now with no place to hide them? He had to come up with a fresh plan.
Ahead, in the jail’s front section separated by a short corridor and a heavy wood door, there was stirring, and Heep pressed himself behind some crates. If they came back here and found him now… . Well, there was no sense in even considering that; he was better off not thinking about it. Sheriff Junk padded forward as lightly as he could. He had the rudiments of a plan, his eyes falling on the pair of never-used jail cells, each with moth-eaten wool blankets tossed over a pair of rusted cots. Yes, yes! It wasn’t much, but it was something. The next best thing to storing some of the weapons in the tunnel would be to store them where they might be removed at some later point.
Heep felt his back muscles spasm as he hoisted upward a box marked GRENADES. Careful not to drop the crate, he took it to the never-locked cell and opened the door, which squealed so loudly that Heep felt certain at that moment he was done for. But no soldiers appeared, so he proceeded to slide the crate under one of the cots and then replace the blanket to cover it. The soldiers had enough supplies stacked back here so they certainly wouldn’t miss four crates, and one beneath each of the cots was all he could safely fit. How they might be retrieved later was open to further consideration. But at least he had separated these from the main supply, and if it hadn’t been for that damn ladder… .
Sheriff Junk was ready to lift the fourth crate upward when he heard a key being turned in the door. He froze for an eternal second, was about to duck again behind the slightly shorter stack of crates when something else occurred to him. He hurried across the dusty floor and pinned his shoulders against the wall behind where the door would open, thus shielding him and perhaps offering him a way out if he moved fast enough.
The locks came free, and the door swung open. Heep saw the backs of a pair of soldiers as they started toward the stack of supply crates. That was all the time he wasted. Not looking back, he slithered around the door and into the short corridor. Almost to the front room, he heard a loud congestion of voices, four at least, and swung back toward the cells, striding down the corridor again as if he belonged.
A pair of men with one box each appeared before him.
“Hey, what are you doing here?”
“Looking for your commander,” Sheriff Junk said without missing a beat. “You know, the Latin guy who’s always playing with his mustache.”
“He’s not here.” The soldier grabbed hold of his arm with his free hand. “Come on, get out. How’d you get in here anyway?”
“Walked. How ’bout you?”
“I could report you.”
“Gaw ’head. Might be the best way I got of finding that miniature shit of yours.”
A pair of them escorted Heep rudely from his own jailhouse and Sheriff Junk waited until he was well away before letting his smile break.
The smile was gone a few hours later when Guillermo Paz summoned him and Dog-ear to the command post he had set up in the fire station.
“Gentlemen,” Paz said with a pair of fingers working his mustache, “how rude it has been of me not to get formally acquainted with you since my arrival two days ago. Contrary to what you have heard, I am a reasonable man.”
“Where’s the other guy?” Dog-ear wanted to know.
“That would be Colonel Quintell,” Guillermo Paz reported with a thick Spanish accent. “He met with an accident and had to leave.” The major rose from behind a desk and paced before McCluskey and Heep. “I would have hoped the precautions enacted upon my arrival would have rid this town of the misinformed faction that had taken to killing my men. Unfortunately this has not been the case. Two more nights have passed and three more have died. Six in all, gentlemen.”
“You’re a regular whiz with math,” observed Mayor McCluskey dryly.
Paz ignored him. “My predecessor failed to make his point with you. The leaders of any group are responsible for that group’s actions.”
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“We ain’t a group, friend. We’re a town you got no business bein’ in.”
“Your point is academic. Mine is not. My predecessor was lax in his response to problems, and the problems festered. I had hoped the kind of response I had planned could be prevented in view of increased vigilance on your own parts. Obviously I was mistaken. Unless you produce for me now the man who has been killing my men, I will have no choice but to act.”
“We don’t know anything,” said Dog-ear.
“And if we did, we’d piss in our soup ‘fore telling you,” added Sheriff Heep. “Whoever it is got the only sense in this town. At this rate, a few more weeks and there won’t be no more of you bastards left.”
“Now it’s I who must compliment your math, Sheriff,” said Guillermo Paz, lifting his hand from his mustache to pat the taller man on the shoulder. “But since we are on the subject of subtraction, perhaps you gentlemen should follow me outside.”
Heep and Dog-ear gazed at each other as they exited, with a half-dozen soldiers following close behind. What they saw stole their breath away and set them trembling. Across the street, lined up against the front of the boarded-up K Mart, were six citizens of Pamosa Springs with their hands tied behind their backs. Fifteen feet before them stood three soldiers armed with automatic rifles.
“Six of your people,” Pax explained. “One for each of mine lost so far. But I am willing to forego this equalization if you give me the killer; at least tell me who you think he might be.”
“Damnit, we don’t know!” pleaded Dog-ear. “Can’t you see that?”
“What I see is that someone in this town is an expert at what he does. He has penetrated our security and killed without ever being seen or leaving a trace, only bodies. Such a man could not go unnoticed by men in your position.”
“But there isn’t anybody like that in the Springs,” ranted McCluskey. “Hasn’t been for years. Maybe after Korea but we all got old. Look at us. See for yourself.”
Paz cocked his head toward the six figures lined up before the building. “I’m looking at them. They are about to die.”
“You can’t do this!” screeched Dog-ear, starting forward until he was restrained by two soldiers.
“Tell me who is killing my men.”
“We don’t know! I swear it!”
Paz turned to the rifle bearers. “Ready!”
“Please,” begged Dog-ear, “take us instead!”
“Aim!”
“We don’t know! We don’t know!”
“Fire!”
The bursts from the rifles lasted barely five seconds, slamming three of the victims up against the store front and dropping three as they stood. Blood spread and pooled, seeming to form one splotch across Main Street. A jean-clad leg and sneakered foot kicked once more. A red-smeared dress fluttered in the breeze.
“Oh God,” sobbed Dog-ear. “Oh God, oh God, oh God… .”
“Others will die,” Paz promised. “Ten for every one of my soldiers who meets the same fate as the other six. And I think, gentlemen, I will accept your offer as well. Take them,” he ordered the men behind Dog-ear and Sheriff Heep. “And lock them in the jail.”
Chapter 24
THE TRAWLER RODE the waves listlessly, protesting each bit of speed McCracken requested of it with a rumble that led him to ease back on the throttle. He stood on the exposed bridge in the morning winds, steering for the Moroccan port of Tangier en route to Marrakesh and the shadowy El Tan.
With Washington no longer supporting his quest, and in fact probably pursuing him, he decided it would be safer not to make a continuous journey by air from country to country. Customs details would accumulate on a man of McCracken’s description traveling from Athens, where his enemies in Washington now knew he had been. A rental car and then a boat were the safest and fastest means to flee Spain and reach Morocco. He almost fell asleep at the wheel several times before reaching a port in Tarifa on the Strait of Gibraltar. Arriving there at the peak of darkness in the early morning hours of Sunday, he was able to steal the trawler and set out to sea.
Through the long hours he had only his thoughts for company, and the company wasn’t pleasant. Fatigue, and lingering injuries courtesy of the Minotaur, added to his anguish. He felt confused, no longer sure what exactly he was after. He had started out on the trail of Atragon, hoping it would bring him to T.C.’s murderer. Natalya brought Raskowski into the picture and the trails separated. And yet he had continued on his probably hopeless quest. Why?
The question had plagued him throughout the long voyage and in the end he supposed the answer was that there were millions of people, innocent people like T.C., who might die if he failed. He knew he could just walk away and let the world take its chances. His arrangements were made: There was plenty of money in discreet Caribbean banks. But then the buffer he formed between the masses and the fools who ruled them would be gone and, no matter how hard he tried not to, he could not help but feel for the people who were as much victims of the fools’ decisions as he was. He was still fueled by T.C.’s senseless murder. But he realized that she could be best avenged by stopping Raskowski from killing millions of others like her.
He docked at Tangier just past noon, abandoned the trawler, and made his way to the airport where flights for Marrakesh left regularly. The terminal was jammed, though, and it was nearly two hours later before he squeezed on to an eighteen-passenger turboprop plane.
Upon arriving in Marrakesh, McCracken took a cab from the airport to Djema El Fna Square, center of activity in the city’s ancient sector. Since it closed at nightfall, his major concern all day had been that he wouldn’t make it in time and would waste the entire night as a result. But he arrived with an hour to spare and set about locating Abidir the snake charmer.
The square was a haunt for both tourists and locals. The merchants screamed prices that were four times too high, screamed as if to drown each other out. Bargaining had become an art here at Djema El Fna, the merchants enjoying it as much as the tourists. They sold their wares from the backs of horse-drawn carriages or beneath canopied shops set up in the morning and occasionally toppled by the wind. They knew only as much of a given language as served them, always the conversion tables for francs and dollars. To listen to their claims, they made up a uniformly generous lot whose children frequently went to bed hungry due to the generosity of their fathers’ merchant souls.
Blaine walked among the shops and stands. Distinct sections of the square were reserved for storytellers, acrobats, fire-eaters and sidewalk musicians who left large tins about in which passersby might deposit money for the “free” entertainment.
Abidir’s spot turned out to be separate from the other snake charmers, down a small side street lined with shops already closed for the day. The charmer sat stubbornly on, as if to arouse the pathos of those passing by to gaze at a blind man who could not tell the time of day. A cobra dangled around his neck and an empty silver cup sat before him.
Blaine approached and saw that both Abidir’s eyes were covered by black patches. Those parts of his face left exposed by his cap showed ancient skin, dried and wrinkled, scarred by both age and the elements. The eyes of his cobra twitched as Blaine stepped before him and blocked out the sun.
“Test your courage, my good man,” the blind man offered. “Pet the snake for a few pennies. For a few more, I’ll play a tune and have him do a dance.”
“You knew I was a man.”
“The blind see much when they’re careful about it. I can sense much about you from this wretched frame I’m stuck in. A brave one you are, you might pet the snake near its fangs.”
McCracken dropped a pair of coins into the cup. “I would have dropped bills but the sound might not have caught your attention.”
“You’d be surprised, my friend. Enough of your American bills and I’ll change the snake into a woman for your pleasure.”
“It’s information I’m after. I’m looking for a man who calls himself El Tan.�
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Abidir’s expression remained the same. The cobra stirred briefly on his shoulder. “I know no such man.”
“I heard different.”
“You heard wrong.”
“I’m prepared to pay.”
“Only if you don’t mind receiving nothing in return.”
“What a pity… .”
McCracken was in motion very fast, lunging behind Abidir and grabbing for the snake. He used the beast to drag the charmer backwards behind the cover of his wagon. Then he pulled the snake tighter, using it the way he would a rope.
“Don’t worry,” Blaine soothed, “I won’t hurt him any more than whatever drug you’ve got him on.”
“I can’t … breathe!”
“You can talk. That’s good enough.”
“Please, you can’t rob me. I’m just a poor blind man. Have compassion!”
McCracken felt the tranquilized snake make a futile effort to free itself. “You’re no more blind than I am. But you will be, unless you talk. Where can I find El Tan?”
The snake charmer gagged for air. “I can’t direct you without the proper signal. It would mean my—”
McCracken shut off more of his wind. “This should do… .” Finally he let the pressure up and Abidir slumped over, gasping.
The snake charmer caught the breath Blaine allowed him and gave up his resistance. “Le Club Miramar. Pass a note to the dancer Tara with El Tan’s name written on it. She will take care of the rest.”
Le Club Miramar, Blaine learned upon entering, featured exotic dancing all day long. Exotic in Marrakesh might have been referred to as topless back in America. Add to that a bit of sexually explicit posturing thrown in for good measure and you have the definition of “exotic.”