The Medusa Stone - v5

by Jack Du Brul

  Settled comfortably on their haunches, the Sudanese ringed Steiner, their assault rifles held between their knees. The leader lit a Turkish cigarette and passed it to his men, each taking a long draw before giving it to the next. The cigarette made three complete circles before the leader took one last drag, pinched off the burning tip to shred the remaining leaf, and tucked the filter in the pocket of his uniform blouse.

  The hunt had ended in another of the countless dry river-beds that snaked through the lowlands. The banks were not steep but still radiated the heat like mirrors. Blisters of sweat appeared on the men’s faces and exposed arms for the first time. They shuffled their feet in the flaky stones at the bottom of the wash, waiting for their leader to give them the order to dispatch the interloper.

  Jakob’s chest rose and fell in a rapid cadence. His heart felt like it was breaking his ribs with each beat. Somewhere beyond his pelvis, in the sea of pain that had once been his legs, his shattered knee throbbed with an unholy pounding. Already the joint had swollen to twice its normal size. Each time his heart beat, the sharp bone fragments ground against each other, further mincing the tendons and ligaments. Through cracked and bleeding lips, he muttered long forgotten pieces of scripture, freely quoting the Talmud and the Old and New Testaments, mangling faiths in an attempt to supplicate a god, any god.

  “Lo, I walk through the valley of the shadow of death.” It sounded more like poetry than prayer.

  “Thou shall not kill,” he screamed, but the sound was little more than a dry croak.

  “You are a spy for America,” the young terrorist leader accused again, sliding closer to Jakob. “Only your death has worth to us.”

  “It’s not true,” Jakob Steiner cried.

  “You were sent here to steal from us, and we were sent to stop you.”

  “Oh, God, please, I only study the past. I don’t care about—”

  The cadre leader, a man who called himself Mahdi, crashed the butt of his rifle against Steiner’s head just at the hair line. The blow was not enough to kill, and Jakob screamed loudly, curling into a ball in a purely reflexive gesture.

  Mahdi stood and swung his weapon down again, missing Steiner’s head but breaking his collarbone with the blow. Like jackals, the others sprang on him, raining blows on the defenseless scientist. Steiner screamed for only a few seconds before being beaten into unconsciousness. Soon Steiner was dead, but Mahdi allowed his men to continue for another minute before calling an end to the assault.

  “Enough,” he said, and his men backed away from the bloody corpse. “Strip the body and then we’ll return to his camp to erase all evidence of his presence.”

  Mahdi tossed aside his old and worn boots and replaced them with Steiner’s before joining his troops for the run back to the base camp. There were a number of items that would fetch good money on the black market in Sudan, and he wanted to make sure his undisciplined men did not ruin them in their frenzy of destruction.

  Arlington, Virginia

  Four Months Later

  Philip Mercer was in the habit of waking just before dawn so he could watch the pearly light seep through the skylight above his bed. These early-morning minutes were an important time for him. It was when he did his best thinking, oftentimes coalescing thoughts that had come to him in his sleep.

  The night before, he’d helped his friend, Harry White, celebrate his eightieth birthday. The octogenarian was sleeping off the night’s excesses on a downstairs couch. Mercer hadn’t indulged nearly as much as Harry, so his head felt reasonably clear, but this morning his mind was troubled. He wanted to stay relaxed, but the muscles in his legs and back began to tense, his fists tightening with unreleased energy. He grunted and rolled out of bed.

  Mercer was a mining engineer and consultant who had reached the pinnacle of his profession. Within the hard-rock mining industry, his capabilities were almost legendary. A recent article in a trade publication credited him with saving more than four hundred lives following mining disasters and in the next paragraph detailed the more than three billion dollars in mineral finds he’d made for various mining concerns all over the globe. His fees had made him a wealthy man, and maybe that was part of his problem. He’d become too comfortable.

  The thrill of making a new find or the adrenaline rush of delving into the earth to pull out trapped men had begun to pale. Since his struggle against Ivan Kerikov and his ecoterrorist allies in Alaska last October, Mercer was having a hard time returning to his normal life. He felt a hollowness that just wouldn’t go away. He wanted to believe he hadn’t become addicted to that kind of mortal danger, but it was difficult to convince himself. Pitting his reputation against the normal hazards of his career didn’t seem to be enough anymore.

  His street was lined with identical three-story town-houses, close enough to the city center to be convenient but far enough away to remain quiet. Unlike the others, Mercer lived in his alone and had done extensive remodeling to turn it into his home. The lion’s share of his income went into its mortgage. The front quarter of the building was open from floor to roof with his bedroom overlooking the atrium. An antique spiral staircase connected the levels. He dressed quickly and spun down to retrieve the morning paper from the front step.

  The second floor had two small guest rooms and a balconied library with a view of the tiled mezzanine. It also contained what had become Mercer’s living room, a reproduction of an English gentleman’s club that he and his friends affectionately called The Bar. It had two sectional leather couches, several matching chairs, a television, and a large ornate mahogany bar fronted by six dark cane stools. The lump under a blanket on one of the couches was Harry. Behind the bar was a circa 1950s lock-lever refrigerator and shelving for enough liquor to shame most commercial drinking establishments. The automatic coffee maker on the back bar had already brewed a barely potable sludge.

  Seated with his coffee and paper, Mercer tried to read through the day’s fare. The Post led with another story about the fatal bombing at Jerusalem’s Western Wall six weeks ago. Defense Minister Chaim Levine, a hard-line candidate for the upcoming elections, said that if he were leading the country, such attacks would never happen, and if they did, the investigation would take days, not weeks. He was calling for a draconian crackdown on all Palestinians and a suspension of the latest peace talks. Mercer read that another victim had died in the hospital, bringing the death toll to one hundred and sixty-seven. The destabilized Middle East held his attention for only a couple of paragraphs, and he slid the rest of the paper out of reach.

  Harry still snored from the couch. His rattling breathing sounded like the explosive grunts of some large animal. He gave a startled snort, and then he was awake, yawning broadly.

  Mercer smiled. “Good morning. How do you feel on the first day of the rest of your life?”

  “Jesus Christ,” Harry rasped “What time is it?”

  Mercer looked at his watch. “Six-thirty.”

  “I liked it better when you and Aggie were together. You never came downstairs until after nine.” Harry immediately recognized his gaffe. “Oh, shit, I’m sorry. That was a rotten thing to say.”

  Aggie Johnston had been gone for four months, and Mercer still felt the ache of her absence. She had been in Alaska with him and had gone through even more than he had. The relationship that followed had been rocky even at its best. Though she came from a wealthy family who controlled a multinational oil company, she was an ardent environmentalist, and the attraction she and Mercer shared was not strong enough to overcome their different views of his profession. He had not wanted it to end, but he couldn’t stand the arguments either. All he remembered of the day of their breakup was walking around Washington for nearly ten hours in a total fog, his mind unable to accept what had happened even if the decision had been his.

  For the first time in over a decade, since the death of his fiancée, Tory Wilkes, Mercer had let someone into his life only to lose her again. Now, whenever he looked at a woman, h
e wouldn’t allow himself to feel anything. He lived like a monk, and the pain made it easy to ignore the sexual side of his nature. On the rare occasion an attractive woman entered Tiny’s, the neighborhood bar he and Harry frequented, his conflicting emotions would leave him sullen and withdrawn.

  “Don’t worry about it.” Mercer tried to smile.

  Harry levered himself up from the couch and took a moment to roll up his pant leg to strap on his prosthetic limb. He’d lost his leg so long ago, his walk to the bar was natural and without any trace of a limp.

  Mercer had met Harry the night he moved into the renovated townhouse. He had gone to Tiny’s as a distraction from the monotony of unpacking while Harry seemed to live in the seedy establishment. Harry was more than twice Mercer’s age, but both enjoyed a recluse’s solitude and a bachelor’s aversion to sobriety. They never analyzed the deep friendship that had grown since then, but others who knew them realized that, in each other, they sought the family neither had. Childless, Harry needed to know that there would be someone who remembered him after he was gone. Mercer wanted the stabilizing force that his friend represented, a responsibility and loyalty to someone other than himself. In many ways, one was an older version of the other, yet they complemented as well. Harry acted as a temper to Mercer and Mercer’s vitality reminded the octogenarian what his life had once been. And along the way, they had learned to rely on each other, an act alien to both men. What had started casually had solidified into a bond stronger than any father and son’s, for this was an association of choice.

  Mercer made a fresh pot of coffee, one not brewed to his masochistic tastes, while Harry smoked through his first of forty daily cigarettes. Harry was quieter than normal, and Mercer sensed something was bothering him. “You okay?”

  “Ah, it’s nothing.” While time may have thinned his frame so that his hands and feet seemed oversized and folds of skin hung from his face, Harry’s voice still grated like a rusty machine tool. “How long have we known each other?”

  “Going on seven years now. Why?”

  “I made the mistake of watching this news show a couple days ago. They had a segment about aging.”

  “Oh shit.”

  “Oh shit is right,” Harry replied. “Do you know that statistically I’ve been dead for nearly fifteen years? According to the experts, I have a more dangerous lifestyle than an L.A. gang member. I smoke two packs a day, down a couple bottles of booze a week, and the last time I got any exercise was World War Two.”

  Mercer grinned. “Don’t worry about it. You’re the other end of the spectrum, that’s all. You make up for the health-nut Wall Street types who drop dead at forty. When was the last time you were sick?”

  “This morning.”

  “Hangovers don’t count.”

  “Christ, I don’t know. It’s been years.”

  “So what’s the problem?”

  “I don’t know. Death, I guess.”

  “You afraid of dying? Who’s not.”

  “I guess that’s it. I’m more afraid of living nowadays,” Harry said through the cloud of a fresh cigarette. “Death is starting to sound good to me.”

  Mercer looked at him sharply. “Don’t you talk like that, old man.”

  Mercer had lost both his parents when he was still a child, and while his grandparents had been wonderful surrogates, they, too, had died while he was a freshmen at Penn State. Death was not unknown to him; he’d seen it in a hundred forms. But to hear Harry talking about it, sounding like he embraced it, was chilling. For Mercer, death was the enemy to be fought at all costs.

  “Relax, I’m not dead yet. It just doesn’t sound so bad anymore.” Harry pulled himself from the sullen mood. “Besides, if I go, Tiny will lose his best customer.”

  “If you paid your bar tab, maybe.”

  “I guess it’s just post-birthday blues,” Harry dismissed easily. “So what are you up to today?”

  “Probably start working on my final report to Yukon Coal,” Mercer replied.

  “You don’t sound thrilled by the prospect.”

  “You have no idea,” Mercer breathed. “This is my second contract since Alaska, and I just can’t make myself interested anymore. I’ve changed and I don’t know why.”

  “Yes, you do. You just don’t want to admit it.” Harry eyed Mercer, judging how much honesty his friend needed and guessed correctly that Mercer wanted it all. “You’re lonely. You miss Aggie, but you can’t go back to her. I chose bachelorhood and it’s a lifestyle that suits me, but you’re different. It isn’t for you. I stayed single because I just don’t want to be bothered with the whole thing, but you’re single because you’re scared of women.”

  Mercer was surprised by Harry’s statement. It wasn’t at all what he’d expected. “I wasn’t talking about that, but what in the hell do you mean, I’m scared of women?”

  “You are. Ever since Tory’s death, you’re afraid of losing someone again, so you keep people, especially women, at a distance. When you let Aggie in and your relationship ended in disaster, you stopped letting yourself feel. You’ve shut yourself off because you’re afraid of being hurt again. Hell, right now I’d say you are more afraid of living than I am.”

  “Bullshit,” Mercer said angrily.

  “Hit a nerve, didn’t I?”

  Mercer said nothing. The pain of Tory’s death was right under the surface. He could feel it now, but deeper than that, he felt anger, anger at himself for not preventing it. He had been there when she was murdered by an IRA gunman and still blamed himself for not stopping it, even if there had been no chance he could.

  “Hey, listen, I’m sorry. Maybe that was out of line.”

  “No, it really wasn’t. I don’t think I’m afraid of living, but you’re right, I am scared of being hurt.”

  “Who isn’t? That’s what it means to be human. Every time you let someone in, you run the risk of pain. I think for a long time you were willing to accept the loneliness, but Aggie reminded you of the actual price you’ve been paying. You haven’t been yourself since you two split.”

  Mercer considered Harry’s words. “I’ve been thinking it has to do with the danger we went through. It was the excitement I was missing.”

  “I’m sure that’s part of it. I never felt more alive than during the war. There’s nothing like being chased by a Japanese sub or surviving a kamikaze attack to tell you what it means to feel. Do you think surviving the oil rig collapse and the tanker fire and all the other stuff in Alaska opened you a little bit and Aggie stepped through your armor?”

  “So she caught me at a vulnerable moment?”

  “No, she caught you at a time when you were actually feeling for a change. You aren’t the hardened recluse you thought you were.”

  Mercer couldn’t deny the charge, but he wasn’t ready to admit it was true either. “So what should I do?”

  “How the hell should I know?” Harry laughed. “I am the hardened recluse I think I am.”

  “Bastard,” Mercer smirked.

  “For whatever it’s worth, I think just talking like this is good for you. It’s the first time you’ve ever brought it up, which means you’re probably ready to start dealing with it. I don’t have much in the way of experience to help, but I’m here to listen.” Harry struggled into his windbreaker. “Why don’t you work on your report and meet me at Tiny’s around four?”

  Mercer considered for a second. “Yeah, I think I need that.”

  Mercer was just toweling off when the phone rang. It was twenty minutes until four, and thinking it was Harry telling him to hurry, he answered, “Keep your dentures in. I’ll be there in a minute.”

  “Dr. Philip Mercer?” an unfamiliar female voice asked.

  Oops. “Yes, this is Philip Mercer.”

  “Please hold the line for Undersecretary of State Hyde.” The woman put him on hold before he could ask if he’d heard right.

  Hyde came on the line an instant later. “Dr. Mercer, this is Prescott Hyde, Under
secretary of State for African Affairs. I hope I’m not disturbing you.”

  “No sir. Not at all,” Mercer replied, naked and still dripping on the carpet next to his bed.

  “Good, good.” There was an element of the Teddy Roosevelt bluff in Hyde’s voice, a collegiate jocularity that might not have been forced but was certainly polished. “I’m surprised to find you home on a Monday afternoon, but Sam Becker said you worked strange hours.”

  While Mercer did not know Prescott Hyde, he was familiar with Sam Becker, the head of the National Security Agency. The two had worked together on the Vulcan’s Forge affair in Hawaii. Mercer knew the use of Becker’s name was more than just name-dropping. In just that single sentence, Hyde told Mercer that he’d done some checking into his background and knew of his reputation. Mercer wanted to be incensed, but he found he was more intrigued than anything else.

  “What can I do for you, Mr. Undersecretary?”

  “Please, call me Bill. Sam tells me people just call you Mercer, is that right?”

  “Among other things.”

  “Excellent. Good to know the boys at the NSA have their information correct,” Hyde laughed. “Listen, Mercer, I’ll come to the point. We’re both busy men, after all.”

  It had taken only twenty seconds for Mercer to dislike Hyde. Most public officials took at least a full minute. “You called me,” he said cautiously, feeling he was walking into a trap. “What can I do for you?”

  “Right to business, I like that,” Hyde said as if it was Mercer who had instigated the call. “All right, then. I may have a job for you. Something right up your alley, so to speak.”

  “I didn’t know the State Department was into mining these days.” Mercer tried to keep the disdain from his voice.

  “It’s nothing like that. But it is a little hard to explain over the phone, if you know what I mean?” Hyde’s bonhomie was wearing on Mercer fast. “Something’s come across my desk that is tailor-made for your unique talents. I’ve asked around town and you’ve got yourself quite a reputation for getting tough jobs done. I know all about what you did in Hawaii a few years back and what happened in Alaska last year. While not nearly as exciting, what I have represents a similar challenge.”