by Paul Moomaw
Someone laughed. It was a male voice, but Joshua was sure it wasn’t his father; his father had a laugh that was half sneeze, half giggle. This laugh was loud and cackling. When it stopped, Joshua’s mother was still saying “Please, please,” and he wondered what she was asking for. Then he heard a loud, slapping sound, and his mother stopped talking.
Then someone screamed, and at first, Joshua couldn’t tell who; then the scream came again, and for the first time, he began to feel really afraid, because it was his father screaming. Joshua had been in his front yard one day when a car had run over a neighbor dog—squashed it flat. The animal had screamed the way his father was screaming now. Then the screaming stopped, and Joshua could hear his father saying, “It hurts, it hurts,” in a high, funny voice.
Joshua began to feel sick at his stomach. Someone was making a funny moaning, crooning sound, and he realized with a start that it was him. He tried to stop, but he couldn’t, so he slid the trap door shut again and scrambled over to the window. He was still crouching there when the two men appeared below him, walking rapidly down the front steps to the waiting car. He could see that they were laughing and joking as they climbed into the vehicle and drove away. Only the man who looked like an Indian didn’t laugh, or even smile.
Joshua went back to the trap door and slid it open a little way again. He bent over and listened. At first he heard nothing, or at least didn’t realize he was hearing anything. When the sound finally registered, he still didn’t recognize it—a tortured sound, a rhythmic wheezing and whuffling, like someone trying to gargle and sing at the same time. He bent lower, trying to identify it, not understanding why silent tears kept falling off the tip of his nose. After a long time—so long that Joshua’s legs were cramped from squatting over the trap door—the sound stopped, and the house filled with a deeper silence than he had ever experienced.
Joshua cocked his head. His whole body felt funny—cold and shivery, and not his, somehow. He rose to a crouch and went back to the window. Then he sat down and stared out into the beginning of evening, hugging himself and rocking. He recited the license plate number of the Idaho car. Then he recited all the license plate numbers he could remember, in a clear, sing-song voice. When he ran out, he started over again. He was still reciting them when the police came the next day.
Chapter 20
Terry Parker watched silently as Chet Tarbell poured an inch of bourbon into a glass and added a splash of water from a jug on his desk.
Tarbell hoisted the drink, his raised eyebrows carving deep creases in his forehead. “You’re sure you don’t want anything?”
“I’m sure.” Parker shifted in his chair, straightened a leg and tugged at his trousers. “Do you drink in the office much?” His voice was level, neutral.
“Only on social occasions.”
“This isn’t a social occasion.”
“You know what I mean.”
Parker shook his head. “No, I don’t know what you mean. I do know that there’s been talk.”
Tarbell drained the glass, and went back to the cupboard. He paused in front of it, then shrugged and closed the cupboard door on the bottle.
“People in embassies go around looking for things to talk about.” He lowered himself into his worn swivel chair.
“Exactly.” Parker pressed his manicured fingertips together. “You could even say that’s the point. Men who intend to achieve supergrade status have to be like Caesar’s wife. Even the slightest rumor of anything that might leave an officer vulnerable to the other side is too much.”
“Don’t worry.”
“I’m not the one who needs to worry.” The two men stared at each other in silence, until Tarbell looked away.
“How is our nasty old Nazi doing?” Parker asked.
“The good Herr Meissner?”
“Ja, doch.”
According to Ilona, he was delighted to take our money. She says he’s pretty sure it comes from us, and doesn’t understand why America wants to help buy arms for a bunch of crazy Basque separatists. But as long as the money is good, he doesn’t really give a damn. He’s got something hot going anyway, according to Ilona.”
“Does she say what?”
“Says she doesn’t know, except it has to be big. She says he’s excited, and that he doesn’t get excited about much.”
Parker frowned. “Some assholes got away with a huge amount of plutonium oxide recently. Waltzed it right off the Hanford reservation.”
Tarbell grinned. “I bet our elegant friend is in it up to his neck.”
“If he is, it may be his head he’ll have to worry about. He’s useful, but there are limits. The hornets are swarming on this one. He has to understand that he can make himself too expensive to play with.”
“I’ll pass something through Ilona.”
“However you do it, just make it clear to him that he’s playing with fire, and I’ll burn his ass to a cinder if he doesn’t stop.”
Parker cradled the back of his head in his hand, stretched back and grinned. “Are you fucking her? Ilona, I mean?”
“I can just maybe grant you the right to meddle in my drinking habits. My sex life is none of your business.”
“If you want me running interference for your career, every goddamn thing you do is my business.” Parker’s voice snapped, and his eyes and nostrils widened. “Do you understand that?”
“Yessuh, boss man.” Tarbell grinned, but he didn’t meet Parker’s eyes.
“Stand up!”
Tarbell slouched to his feet.
“And stand straight.”
Slowly, as if the air resisted him, Tarbell squared his shoulders.
“Now look at me and tell me you understand. And make me believe it.”
“I understand, Mr. Parker.”
“That’s better. Sit down.” Parker let his own body sag. He laced his fingers together and cracked his knuckles loudly. “I want you to take a trip for me.”
“A trip?” Tarbell looked at Parker questioningly.
“To Paris. I need you to deliver an envelope to the Librairie Francaise, on the Rue l’Abbe Gregoire, on the Left Bank.”
“You’re kidding. That’s a neo-Nazi joint.”
Parker nodded.
‘But,” Tarbell paused, glanced over his shoulder at the cabinet, then rose and poured himself another drink. He swallowed half the contents of the glass and wiped his mustache with the back of his hand. Then he sat down again.
“Those guys are a bunch of crazies, like that Belgian, what’s his name, Jean Thiriart, who thinks he can unite Europe once he kills enough American soldiers.”
“They respond to money, just like Meissner. We pay them, they do what we want.”
“They’ve killed a lot of American boys.”
“Calm down, Chet. When there’s a job to be done, you use whatever tool you have handy that will do the trick, right?”
“But Nazis?”
“They’re not very nice. But we have parallel aims, for the time being. They want to bring their governments down. They’ll never do it; they’re too stupid. But the trouble they stir up serves our ends.”
“Our?”
“The people I work for. That you work for, come to that. The people who haven’t been blinded by all the peace talk, and the rest of that crap. Did you ever stop to think what it would mean if there ever really were a united, peaceful Europe? What that would mean economically to America? For God’s sake, we’ve got enough trouble already with the Japs. Add in a strong, united Europe flexing its economic muscle, and the good old U.S.A. is a third rate power overnight.”
Parker stood. He paced restlessly back and forth, his voice growing gradually louder, pausing now and then to lean across the desk and shake a finger at Tarbell.
“And it’s already happening, old boy. Look at all the mergers going on. The European airlines are talking merger to compete with our lines. The British and the Dutch have put an arm lock on medical electronics. Deutsche Bank has bo
ught out one of Italy’s biggest commercial banks. A German outfit owns France’s biggest book club. The Germans and Italians own big chunks of French television. And the Germans and French have formed a joint military unit. The Germans and the French, for God’s sake!”
Parker threw himself back down into the chair. “Fortunately,” he said in a quieter voice, “Some of us see things a little more clearly. We’re on the way up, at the Company and other places, and we use anyone who fits, even temporarily, whether it’s nasty little fascists or jerks like Bernie Rogers.”
Tarbell laughed. “You mean old ‘Rekjavik gives me gas pains’ Rogers.”
“The same. Generals have useful connections, even when their political views are twenty years out of date.” Parker smiled. “As I said, we’re on the way up. I’m on the way up. And that means you’re on the way up, if you play the game.”
Tarbell sighed. “So I take a trip.”
“To Paris.”
“Terry Parker’s delivery boy.”
“Because I trust you, Chet.”
A scowl and a frown dueled across Tarbell’s face. The smile won.
“What am I delivering?”
“Money. Nice, crisp American dollars.”
“For services rendered?”
“For services to be rendered.”
“Such a trusting soul.”
Parker laughed. “It’s only a partial payment. An advance for materials.”
“What are we paying for? Or shouldn’t I be asking?”
“You shouldn’t be, but I’ll tell you, anyway. The man you’ll be making the delivery to is named Delon. He’s our contact with the NFE, the European National Fascists, they call themselves. He’s also working hard to take the reins when old Francois Genoud kicks off. Genoud’s the grand old man of the French nazis. He’s done some work for us before, too—we financed the trip when he helped Nasser set up the Egyptian secret service back in the 50’s. But I think Delon’s main interest in the old man is that he owns the posthumous publishing rights to all the holy scriptures—all the stuff Hitler, Bormann and Goebbels wrote. Delon wants those. The silly bastard thinks they’ll make him rich.” Parker yawned and stretched. “Jet lag’s getting to me.” He yawned again. “Anyway, the money is to pay for a spot of sabotage.”
“You’re kidding,” Tarbell said.
“I never kid.”
“Christ, don’t I know it,” Tarbell muttered.
“A spot of sabotage,” Parker repeated, smiling as if the phrase pleased him. “There’s a place in northeastern France called Cattenom.”
“Nuclear reactor complex. On the Moselle River.”
“Go to the head of the class. I suppose the French placed it there because it’s such a boring part of the country; a meltdown wouldn’t fry any tourists. More interesting to us, it lies about twenty five kilometers from Luxembourg, and maybe twice that distance upriver from Trier. The Germans are already upset as hell about the place. The Greens are raising a storm. The French, of course, are doing what they always do.”
“Telling everybody to fuck off.”
“Exactly. So we have hired Monsieur Delon and company to create a small disaster, so to speak.”
“They’re going to blow the place up, I suppose.”
“You Texans are very crude.”
“And the French are tres sophisticated.”
“Mais oui, mon cher sauvage.”
“It sounds a little risky for the people downwind.”
Parker laughed. “It’ll cause a panic, for sure. On the other hand, you could say all we’re doing is giving the French a chance to test their emergency drills. And the thing is being scheduled to go before the new reactor is fully fueled and active, anyway. Just a little scare, is all.”
Tarbell shook his head slowly from side to side. “What if the emergency drills don’t work?”
Parker shrugged. “Nothing’s perfect.”
“Jesus.” Tarbell rose and poured himself another two fingers of whiskey.
“I’ll have one of those myself, now,” Parker said.
Tarbell poured another and handed it to Parker. He sat down across from his self-designated mentor and shook his head again.
“You’re a cold-blooded fucker, ain’t you?”
“I’m a realist.” Parker took a swallow of bourbon. “I expect you to be a realist, too.”
Tarbell looked at his hands without answering. Then he tossed his head forward with a snort, and glanced back up at Parker with a small smile.
“We got an interesting package the other day,” he said. “Came in the diplomatic pouch. A gun, and about a kilo of what sure as hell looks like cocaine.”
Parker sat suddenly erect, his eyes narrowing. “What the fuck is this about?”
“Damned if I know, but I thought you’d be interested.” Tarbell took another swallow of whiskey. “The designated recipient was a man named Albert Troy. He’s a part-time asset, an American I keep on retainer off the books for sleazy jobs. He likes sleazy jobs. Fortunately, he likes to keep his nose right here, too.” Tarbell patted his rear. “Otherwise I wouldn’t have known about this. He said, in fact, when he came rushing to tell me all about it, that Larry Biven had warned him not to breathe a word to me.”
Parker sat up even straighter. “Biven? What’s he up to?”
“You ask such good questions. All I know is what Troy told me—that he was to pick the package up, make sure I didn’t find out about it, and deliver it immediately to Adam Pray.”
“Jesus Christ!” Parker jumped up and poured himself another shot. “Pray is in Vienna?”
“You bet. Just by coincidence, in fact, I bumped into him with some gorgeous redhead named Gabriela something-or-other at the airport. They’re staying at the Koenig von Ungarn, if you want to go calling.”
“What else did Troy tell you?”
“He hinted pretty broadly that I didn’t need to worry, but somebody I was close to did, and that he wanted to warn me, just as a favor, to keep my head down when the shit hits the fan.”
Parker dropped into his chair again and slammed a foot onto Tarbell’s desk. He drained the glass and held it out. “Give me another,” he ordered.
Tarbell got up with a grunt. “When I get to be a big shot I bet I won’t have to say please, either, will I?”
“Goddam Biven has gone too far,” Parker muttered, half to himself, not responding to the gibe.
“You mean he’s not one of the charmed circle?”
“Not even close.” Parker took the refilled glass from Tarbell, and swirled the bourbon around, gazing at it meditatively. “He’s been causing us a pain for two or three years, now. Seems to have a thing about Meissner.”
“Why?”
“Who knows? I could never understand Biven’s kind; I never know whether they’re total hypocrites, or if they really believe all the idealistic bullshit they preach.” Parker took a thoughtful swallow of bourbon. “But it’s time to send the man a stronger message. I can’t touch Biven, not yet, but if Pray’s here on some of Biven’s business, he’ll just have to be neutralized.”
“Come on Parker. What do you want to do, shoot him?”
Parker gave Tarbell a long look over the rim of his glass. “You won’t need to be involved, whatever.” He paused, took another swallow of whiskey. “I’ll be by tomorrow with the money for your Paris trip. In the meantime, I need to use your telephone. Alone.”
“Help yourself. It’s quittin’ time, anyway.” Tarbell stood up and slouched out of the room.
Parker waited until the door closed behind him, then opened his briefcase and pulled out a flat box of black plastic that had a bank of numbered buttons on one side and a slender telephone hand set on the other. He pulled the wire from Tarbell’s desk telephone and plugged it into a jack on the rim of the box. He dialed an area code, and a telephone number, waited briefly, and dialed in a credit card number.
The hand set purred twice, and a voice answered in French.
“Turn on your little black box,” Parker said.
There was a brief spatter of static, and the voice returned.
Parker nodded. “Good. Now, listen. The money is on its way. There is going to be a small bonus, as well, because I have another job for your people. I want a man killed. His name is Pray. Adam Pray. He’s American, but he’s in Austria now, and I want him taken care of while he’s here. I’ll see to it that you get a picture of him, and know where to look for him. But I’m sending the money now. Call it a sign of my great confidence in you, Monsieur Delon.”
The laughter from the other end still rang in Parker’s ear as he hung up.
Chapter 21
Peter knocked lightly on the bedroom door and entered. It made him uncomfortable to walk in without waiting for his employer to acknowledge him, but Reinhardt Meissner preferred it that way. Meissner sat at his desk, a fragile looking antique with curved, ornately carved legs, upon which rested an equally ornate telephone of brass and marble, bathed in the light of a small lamp with a shade of stained glass. The chair was of the same, ornate design. Peter didn’t care for most of the furniture in the house; it was the kind of stuff that looked as if it were meant to be seen but not used. Some of the chairs, he was afraid to sit on.
Meissner smiled at Peter. He wore the maroon satin robe that Peter had learned to recognize as a sign that his employer would want sex. Peter felt his own loins prickle as he closed the door almost furtively behind him, his small village morality and his prick engaging in the same battle they always had when he was called to Meissner’s bedroom. It was a perversion, an unnatural act, what he and the older man did together. He had been taught that from childhood by everyone, even by the village priest who had preached against sin on Sundays while he gave Peter furtive blow jobs in the afternoons when Peter came to sweep the floor of the small church. Yet he had never experienced such intensity of feelings when he had sex with women. And Meissner had introduced him to a secret world of velvet curtains and satin sheets, exotic body oils and fine brandies, cocaine and hashish. Peter lived in terror that his brother would find out. He wasn’t crazy about the idea of anyone knowing, but especially Hannes, who had guided him, and protected him from their drunken father’s fists, and who had been the most important person in Peter’s life, until Meissner.