by John Molloy
Henry was apprehensive about what way to proceed when Kerstin told him about Tukola’s plans. “We have no alternative now but to sail to Maiquetia and wait for him to arrive; we’ll have to tail him while he’s there and see what his movements are.”
Kerstin who had predicted Henry’s response was already at the chart table. She drew in a course and measured the distance. “It’s over four hundred miles so with a fair wind it’s going to take us two days.”
“Right, let’s get underway.”
Chapter Forty-One
They sailed and picked up a fresh north easterly breeze that pushed them along at ten knots. Henry was steering and Kerstin was busy reefing sail to get every last puff of wind into them. They cleared the harbor at nine hundred hours and had hopes of being well ahead of Tukola with his powerful launch. Kerstin estimated his trip at twenty knots and showed it would take him twenty hours, so they were hopeful they could be there before him. The wind held and they were halfway by next morning. At ten hundred hours they passed the small island of Blanquilla as the sun scorched down from a clear blue sky.
Kerstin came to relieve Henry at the wheel. “What are we going to do when we get there? You were saying something about following him, how are we going to go about it?”
He laughed for the first time in almost a week. “A couple of bicycles I suppose. How are you with the cycling?”
She smiled. “Would you believe it I can’t remember the last time I threw my leg over a bicycle, I must have been eighteen, when I was throwing my legs over lots of things!”
He looked at her admonishingly. “You were quite the naughty girl back then. Seriously though, I think we will have to hire a car.
It was almost midday when they arrived and tied up at the pier in Maiquetia.
“This is one place I’ve never been, it looks beautiful, and the old fort like buildings gives it a sense of colonial days. I’m sure it changed hands between the great powers numerous times.”
“Yes, it’s quite something. I suppose we better venture ashore now.”
Within a few minutes’ walk from the harbor they found a car hire company.
After filling in forms and signing various pieces of paper, Henry was handed the keys to a shiny, nearly-new Volkswagen Beetle.
Kerstin was delighted with the little car, as she peered in through the window. “I didn’t know they still made these,” she said, somewhat surprised.
Yes, they still make them. I think the factory’s in Mexico.”
They drove into Caracas and toured around, getting the feel of the place.
“My goodness what a sprawling city; how many people did you say, Henry?”
He turned to her keeping his hands firmly on the wheel. “Six million, are you enjoying this little baby?”
“Yes, I have a passion for this ugly little creature. If I could I’d take her on the Witch with us, I certainly would.”
“Just as well we can’t,” he laughed, “but I promise if we ever make ourselves a home port I’ll buy one for you.”
She jumped round in her seat. “I’ll hold you to that.”
That evening they sat on deck and before they saw it, they heard the loud drone of a big launch’s engines. They stood up and saw the Windsong come alongside the pier about thirty yards up from them. Henry looked at Kerstin. “We’ll have to watch her now and see who goes ashore.” He went and got his Panama hat and donned it and putting on his dark glasses he said, “well, how do I look?”
“Perfect, your own mother, God rest her soul, wouldn’t recognize you. But why the disguise now; what are you intending doing?”
“We have to see if that young girl is brought ashore and if so, find out where they’re taking her.”
“Right Henry, if they leave without the girl, you follow them in the beetle and I’ll stay and look around the launch to see if she’s ok.”
“That sounds the best way to go. I’ll walk up near the car and keep a watch.”
A half an hour passed and Henry thought they must be staying on board for the night then he saw Tukola and Chen come onto the pier. Henry was inconspicuous in the shadow of a small hut, they passed about ten feet away from him and he waited before following them. To his surprise, they got into a big black limousine which was parked at the end of the pier. He ran back and jumped into the Beetle. He followed slowly behind them and they turned onto the main road to Caracas. Chen was driving and he never broke the forty mile an hour barrier. Just as well thought Henry because he wasn’t sure how fast the Volkswagen would go. They drove on to the outskirts of the city and turned into the shanty town area. Henry wondered what business they could they have in an area like this. They turned into a side street with pot holes that nearly shook the Beetle to pieces. Then the limo pulled in between two large shacks and Henry saw the lights go out. He parked and turned off his lights and got out of the car. There was no one around except a few children who were playing with a mangy dog further up the street. It was dark now, there was no street lighting just that what came from the dim lights of the shacks. The limo was empty.
He stood outside the bigger of the two shacks and heard voices, so he stealthily moved to a high window which was open. He had to stand on his toes to peer inside the dimly lit room. Tukola was standing stern faced. “Bring them in. I hope they’re better than the last lot of trash you showed me.”
A withered old crone accompanied by two younger women brought six young girls into the room. They stood there in the half-light; young undernourished waifs, no more than thirteen years old any of them. He inspected them and pointed to one. “Her,” he barked, “take her clothes off.”
The old crone lifted the flimsy dress over the child’s head and she stood trembling naked with her hands trying to hide her modesty.
“Is she a virgin? The last ones were all deflowered, so I hope this one is a virgin.”
The old crone answered in a croaking voice scratching her head. “Yes, she is a virgin.”
She put her dress back on and he said in a lecherous voice. “I’ll take her.”
The old woman walked up to him and took the wad of dollar bills he handed her. “You are generous, will you take another one? It costs too much to feed all these.”
“One is enough this time, I’ll be back again soon.” He grabbed the trembling girl by the hand and with Chen in tow, took her to the car. Keeping out of sight, Henry ran back to the Beetle and followed them.
They drove back onto the main road and continued for a couple of miles. The houses around this district were a bit smarter than where they’d just come from. The limo turned off, drove up a leafy avenue and parked across the road some distance from a big house. Further back, Henry pulled into the side and got out. Keeping well in the shadows, he crept up to the entrance of the house and saw that Tukola had gone inside and left Chen Yun with the young girl.
He crept into the garden and went to the back of the house. He was only about ten feet from the building and could hear voices. Then a man came out and went to a shed; opening the door he turned on a light and Henry could see a lot of glass tanks. The man who was wearing leather gloves, remove the lid of a tank that was full of water; then he put in a rod and pulled it out with a snake wriggling on the end, and took it to the house.
Henry crept over to a semi-opened window and peering in from behind thick shrubs, he could see Tukola inside with the snake man and a woman. She had a glass vial and she was milking the snake’s venom into it. After she had finished, he heard the woman telling Tukola about the extra potency of the water snake.
“The venom is the strongest of all snakes and so deadly if you get it in the blood you will die. You make sure you have no open skin,” then hesitating, she added, “but you know all this, you have been using other types of venom for many years now.”
Tukola stood gazing at the small vial.
“With this powerful venom you will experience sexual arousal like you have never known, and it will last for several hours,” she l
aughed. “If you have pretty girls, they will squeal with delight.”
The man came back with another snake, and the procedure was repeated.
Tukola paid her, carefully picked up the vials and left.
By the time Henry had got back to the Beetle they had gone, so he decided to head back to the yacht.
Back at the harbor, he saw the limousine was already parked up. It was near midnight and Kerstin was sitting out under the awning sipping a cold mineral water.
She jumped up to greet Henry. “I was so worried; I imagined everything from the hire car breaking down to you being mugged or Tukola’s henchmen catching you.”
He gave her a peck on the cheek. “Thank you for being so concerned, come on below and I’ll tell you all.”
“Now who goes first?” he said.
“I will,” Kerstin said, as she closed the cabin door and pulled the small curtains. “Don’t mind me, just a little dose of paranoia. Henry, I went on board the Windsong and had a good look around. There was no young girl, although I couldn’t get into the main cabin, I could see through all the ports. I did see clothes which definitely belonged to a young girl. They were strewn around one cabin. I don’t know just what to make of it. Did he bring a young girl from Kingstown I wonder, and if he did, what became of her?”
Henry shrugged his shoulders, but inside he feared the worst as he began to tell her what he had witnessed.
“Kerstin please brace yourself for what I’m going say.”
She listened with intensity and as the whole scene unfolded, her face creased with horror as she imagined the plight of the girl Tukola had brought back to the launch.
“What’s with this venom Henry? I really don’t understand. How does he use it?”
“I’m sorry, I should have explained, he drinks it. Apparently, it’s an aphrodisiac like a super charge of Viagra.”
“Oh my Lord Henry, this is unbelievable! what can we do? If he took a girl from Kingstown she must be gone. Oh no, could it possibly have been Annabel?”
Henry showed a fear and helplessness for the first time as he spoke with overflowing emotion. “That young girl he has now will never see Kingstown. We’re going to have to save her.”
Kerstin was crying. “I’ll kill him with my bare hands, Henry what can we do?” she pleaded.
“I’m going to stow away and sail on the Windsong. I will stop this murdering bastard once and for all”
“Do you think you can do it without them knowing you’re on board?”
“I’m not sure. You know a bit about launches, where do you think would be the best place to hide?”
“There’s a pair of double doors aft of the main after deck, that’s the entrance to the engine space. I think that would be the only place to hide and I’m sure they never go into that space; I bet it’s only opened for scheduled maintenance.”
“I see.”
She squeezed his hands. “Do you realize he’ll probably have a weapon; a gun or guns on board, so what are we going to use against him.”
He let go of her hands and stood up. “Did I hear right, did you say, ‘we’ just now, meaning both of us?”
“Why yes of course I meant both of us. How do you think you could overpower both of them? I’m not letting you go there alone. What would I be doing anyway? Just following on in the Witch and I wouldn’t catch up for two days. By then you’d probably be shark food.”
He placed his hands on his head. “Kerstin, I’ve gotten you into enough of this, how could I live with myself if anything happened to you?”
She stood up and put her arm around him. “We’re in this together and there’s a young girl’s life at stake here and how could I live with myself if I did nothing and let her be murdered.”
“Of course you’re right, now we better organize and plan some kind of campaign.”
She picked up a piece of paper and pencil. “Ok, you start and I’ll write.”
“Weapons. what have we got?”
She opened a drawer and pulled out a pair of handcuffs. “We have these.”
“I’ve never seen them, where did they come from?”
“Don’t ask because I haven’t a clue. They were here when I joined, must have been the previous owners. It’s unbelievable what some of these so called decent people could be up to, but never tried it myself though!”
“Never mind you’ve plenty time yet! We have one decent knife.” Henry got it and laid it on the table. “Now, if I use that, will you use the carving knife here?”
“No, I couldn’t use a knife. I’d surely stab myself. Get me that crowbar from the engine space.”
He went and brought back a two foot crowbar and handed it to her. “Try this for size.”
She waved it about and laid it on the table. “Yes, just right if I get near him with this he won’t know what hit him.” She rounded up a flashlight, two large bottles of water, some chocolate and a few cookies. She placed them in a bag with the rest of the gear and looked at Henry. “Can you think of anything else?”
“No, that seems to be it. Now, how do we get on board? Do you think we should go there tonight while it’s dark?”
“We’ll have to; they could sail anytime in the early morning, so we should get on in the next few hours”.
At one o’clock Henry walked along the pier and scanned the Windsong for lights. The only lights on were deck lights - all cabin lights were out. He feared for the young girl, hoping Tukola hadn’t harmed her. Then he thought, he’d be too clever for that; he wouldn’t do anything while they were in port. He walked back to Kerstin she was standing on deck waiting for him.
“Well,” she said, “what do you think are they turned in for the night?”
“Yes, not a sound, only the humming of the generator. I say we should wait another hour and move on.”
“Good, that settles it, two o’clock and we go.”
He looked down at her feet. “Just checking we both have our light canvas shoes on.”
The pier was deserted and dimly lit, so they were confident walking to the rail of the launch. They stood listening like burglars, and when Henry nodded they silently went onto the after deck over the rail. They stood in the shadow and took in their surroundings which would serve them whenever they decided to make their assault. Henry looked up at the controls, where he thought Chen would be, and then at the cabin door where Tukola would probably come from. Both were in close proximity, so things could be coordinated in a quick strike. Kerstin had the door to the engine space open; the sound of the generator was quite loud, so they both got in as quickly as possible and closed the door behind themselves.
Turning on the flashlight they looked around for someplace to sit. The oppressive heat of the day still prevailed in the tightly enclosed space and the smell of diesel didn’t make life any more bearable.
They remained silent and only spoke if they needed to. The perspiration was trickling in little rivulets down their overheated bodies. How long they remained in this suspended animated state, it was hard to put time to it.
“Henry,” she poked him in the rib cage.
“Yes.”
“Do you hear that?”
Listening intently, they could hear voices, then footsteps coming from the pier and they thought, going into the cabin space. They recognized Tukola’s commanding voice and Henry thought there were at least two more different voices. It sounded like they were carrying something into the cabin space and had made four trips in total. Moments later the engines where started and the small space became very noisy.
Henry took the flashlight and looked at his watch; twenty minutes before five. It would be dark for another two hours. They moved as far away from the noisy engine as they could. They had to speak loud to hear each over the noise. “What should we do now?”
“I’ll peep out and try to see who’s at the controls.”
He crept up the engine space ladder and opened the door an inch and could see the outline of Chen up at the controls. He ass
umed Tukola was below in the main cabin. He came back down and reported his findings.
“When the time’s right, first we’ll overpower Chen.”
“Ok Henry, we should have no trouble there; we’ll be on him and have him in handcuffs before he realizes it.”
The next time Henry checked, he was greeted by welcome daylight. The launch must be doing all of twenty five knots, he thought.
He went back to tell Kerstin.
“I’m sure Tukola will emerge soon to relieve Chen at the controls.”
“Kerstin licked her dry lips opened a bottle of water and took a long gulp. “At twenty five knots we’ll be a hundred miles out in an hour’s time,” looking at her watch, “that will be eight thirty.”
“We’ll be nearing that island, what’s its name again, I’ve forgotten,” said Henry, desperately scanning his memory banks.
“It’s Blanquilla; we passed close to it on our way there. I think if he is going to harm that young girl he’ll do it before we get too close to the island because there will be a fair amount of yachts in that area.”
“I believe you’ll be right.”
The next time Henry went up for a look, Tukola was in the cabin with Chen. He moved the controls and the engines stopped. It took a few minutes before the launch was floating free and took on a slight rolling motion in the gentle swell. Tukola took up the binoculars and scanned the horizon. Satisfied, he handed the glasses to Chen. “Make sure you call me if anything comes close.”
“Yes sir, I will keep a good watch out.”
“Here you are.” Tukola handed Chen a small object; Henry couldn’t make out what it was. He left the controls and went below.
Henry was worried and anxious. “What do you think we should do?”
She put a finger to his lips. “Be silent and listen.”
Every sound above the barely audible creak of the launch was magnified in the stillness and reverberated off the water. Like statues sitting at the partly open door, armed with knife, crowbar and handcuffs, they waited with nervous trepidation.
A muffled scream and a loud thumping noise brought them immediately onto the deck. At the controls Chen was bending down snorting a line of white power as Henry put an arm around his neck and held him in a lock. Then he placed the knife at Chen’s throat and told him if he made a sound he’d cut his head off. Kerstin pulled his hands together behind his back and after threading the cuffs through a spoke of the steering wheel, had him firmly secured. Henry pulled out a length of rag and gagged him tightly, he warned him that if he made a sound he’d come back up and throw him to the sharks, and to empathize this he struck him a blow on the side of his head with his fist.