by Jeff Gulvin
‘A butcher’s store?’
‘Yes.’ Birch sat forward. ‘You see, we were watching Mujah al-Bakhtar, better known as the Butcher of Bekaa, bodyguard to Osama Bin Laden.’
Kovalski felt the chill rush through him, the prickling of his scalp as the implications hit him.
Birch’s face was the colour of slate. ‘He’s behind it all, Tom. He got hold of Harada and funded his grudge. He used Harada’s yakuza contacts to pose as Hong Kong troops and kill the militia leaders, to incite the people against us. Then he funded the weapons for them to fight us with.’ He shook his head slowly. ‘He knows he can’t beat us by conventional terrorism, so he’s fomenting revolution.’
Harrison drove his truck for three days, north and west from New Orleans. As he passed the airport at Kenner, he heard a jet taking off and he thought of Jean, and for just one moment his eyes glassed. He knew he would see her again; she would come back for the trial, but it would not be the same. The emergency was over, the circumstances that had thrown them together had passed, and now lives had to be looked at in detail. He could sense the need in her to get back to London, to return to the sick children she cared so much about. And who could blame her? Before her son died, they had been pretty much her whole life. Equally, he needed to get on with his, make something of it, yet his direction was much less sure.
They had spent one last night together in her room at the Hotel Provincial. They made love for hours, but talked little, as if there was nothing more to say. When she was asleep, Harrison had got up and smoked a cigarette at the open window, listening to the hiss of the rainstorm on the pavement below. By the time she had awoken he was back in his room on Burgundy and Toulouse.
Harrison left the truck in a lock-up garage in Laramie, Wyoming, slipped the snub-nosed .38 into his boot and the Beretta into his waistband. He had his bowie knife and his FBI-issue Sig-Sauer in his pack. In the pocket of his army jacket, he found the black bandana he had earned by initiation at the Saratoga freight yard.
For a month, he rode the northern railroads and was surprised to find a lot of regular hobos on his travels. He ate with them, talked with them, stayed out of the cold with them, and huddled round camp fires at night. And he sensed an ease about the way they talked and carried themselves. He saw barely a handful of blue bandana-wearers, the Highrollers of the FTRA. The Voyageur was now in custody and the word was out that the FBI had smashed the membership.
He lost himself in the journeys, allowing his mind to beat time with the rhythm of the wheels as they rode the iron tracks. He wondered at his past and he wondered at his future, and then one day he jumped the Union Pacific at Cokeville, Wyoming, and headed into Idaho.
Harrison had been to Shoshone a few times before, when he was on an undercover mission a couple of years previously. It was a small, wind-blown town with the freight line dominating it. Once upon a time, Amtrak had run its passenger service through here, but not any more. He jumped off the train as it slowed on its westbound journey and listened to the bell ringing as it rumbled across the junction. He stood with his pack on his back, rolled a cigarette and cupped his hands to the wind. One or two of the old-timers he had met since leaving the truck had told him whispers of the man they called Whiskey Six, a name that for years had struck terror into seasoned men of the skids. Harrison could have come straight here, given what Sidetrack had said, but he figured that Six would be lying as low as the rest of the FTRA membership.
He stood in the road, listening to another long whistle blast from the locomotive, and then he crossed the street to the Columbia bar. The interior was dark and empty: a couple of pool tables, and one long bar to the right as he entered. He ordered a Coors Light and shot of Blackjack, and sat and nursed his drinks. The bartender cleaned glasses and wiped down the counter. Harrison ordered another shot and asked her if the haunted McFall hotel, a couple of blocks along, was still empty.
‘Oh, yeah,’ the girl said. ‘Nobody ever bought that place.’
‘Still got that big old yard?’
‘Oh, yeah.’
‘Still got all the rattlesnakes?’
‘I guess. Nobody ever did anything about them.’
Harrison knew that the run-down hotel had been subject to a rattlesnake infestation problem, largely due to the plentiful supply of rats.
He sipped beer and was suddenly aware of a weird sensation across his shoulders. He swivelled round on his stool and looked through the window. Across the train tracks, a hunched figure in a battered cowboy hat paused at the door of the Manhattan Café to put out a cigarette. Something about the set of his shoulders, the stoop, the skinny frame in profile, sent Harrison’s mind spiralling into the past. He sat for a long moment staring at the half-empty bottle of beer, aware of a tingling sensation running through his veins. He took a ten-dollar bill from his money clip and laid it on the counter. Then he went outside and looked across the street as the sun beat down on his head. He hesitated, considering for a moment, then walked the two blocks to the hotel and vaulted the fence at the back.
From his pack, he took the small hessian sack he had procured for just this purpose, and then he stood absolutely still in the shadow of the cedar tree that rose beside the fence. The hotel was still, dark and malevolent. Harrison could feel the menace in the place and he figured it was an excellent home for Idaho’s largest population of diamond-back rattlesnakes. He stood for maybe fifteen minutes, and then he saw movement to his left and caught sight of the tail of a snake as it disappeared under a rock. In a split second he was across the yard, had grabbed the tail and hauled the snake into the air. It was about six feet long, and Harrison cracked it like a whip and its head flew off. He stood for a moment, as it jerked, the rattle like a maraca under his fist. He could not see the head anywhere, but that did not matter. He laid the snake on the ground and squatted, the hotel brooding behind him. Carefully, he coiled the snake and placed it inside the hessian bag. When he was done, he vaulted the fence, checked his guns and crossed the street to the Manhattan Café.
He paused for a fraction of a second outside the door and then pushed it open. There were not many diners, just a couple in a booth and a trucker on his own drinking coffee. And there at the counter, slicing a piece of pie, sat a man in a T-shirt and jeans. He had a multicoloured kerchief tied at his throat: red, blue and black. On his right forearm was the tattoo of a grinning rat standing upright, a whiskey bottle in one hand and a six-gun in the other. Thirty long years had passed since Harrison had seen him—Ray ‘the Probe’ Martinez.
Harrison stood a moment, then stripped off his own jacket. He was wearing only a singlet underneath. He took a stool three down from Martinez. His own tattoo was exposed now and he felt the sudden weight of Martinez’s glance. He kept looking ahead, and the waitress served him iced water and some coffee. Martinez spooned pie into his mouth and chewed very deliberately.
Neither of them spoke. Martinez did not look at him again and, for a moment, Harrison wondered if he even recognised him. Mentally, he checked his weapons, aware of just how hard his heart was beating after thirty long years. He needed all his senses working together in unison. Martinez was one of the most dangerous men he had ever met in his life. And then the irony struck him: the last time they had seen one another, Martinez had saved his life.
Martinez finished his pie, sipped coffee and dabbed at his mouth. Harrison heard the whistle of the approaching train, and Martinez tugged dollars from his pocket, tossed them on the counter and slipped off the stool. Picking up his coat and his pack, he stepped out into the sunshine. In the mirror behind the counter, Harrison saw him shuffle off up the sidewalk. He sat for a while longer, listening to the train and attempting to still his heart. Then the bell rang at the crossing and Harrison paid for the coffee, and the train thundered through Shoshone behind him. He knew it would slow and slow, until eventually it stopped for the drivers to swap over. Outside, he could see Martinez walking the length of the tracks.
The day was dying
now, the sun sinking in the west and the shadows long. Harrison had to shade his eyes to see. Up ahead, Martinez disappeared from view. This was dangerous: Martinez out of sight and with his back to the sun. Harrison kept one hand on the butt of his 9mm. He walked on, with the train on his right, until he was a quarter of a mile outside town. He passed tanker cars and open-topped coal cars, and cars carrying lumber and potatoes. He passed enclosed metal containers in yellow, rust and blue. Then he came to the first wooden boxcar and saw that the door was open.
He slowed and, as he did so, the train started to lurch forward. Up ahead, the whistle blew across the empty Idaho landscape. Harrison grabbed hold of the rail and hauled himself into the semi-cool of the darkness.
He rolled on his side and for a moment thought he was alone. But then he saw the hunched figure, back to the far wall, knees drawn up to his chest and his hands hidden in his lap. Harrison shuffled backwards until he squatted against the other wall and there were eighteen feet between them, broken by the light from outside. Martinez did not move. Harrison did not move, but he had his pack, with the hessian sack inside, open and the .38 was loose in his boot.
The train gathered speed and the wheels rattled and clanked underneath them. Harrison watched Martinez, unable to see his eyes, and he figured Martinez was watching him. The train rolled on through Bliss, following the line of the Snake River towards Glenns Ferry. Harrison could see flashes of the river through the open door on his left, the sun sheeting across the surface in bands of silver.
‘Johnny Buck.’ The voice was quiet, almost a whisper, and it came at him out of the darkness. Harrison felt the hairs rise on the back of his hands and all his senses were tingling. ‘Hello, Ray.’
‘Last time I clapped eyes on you was in the Iron Triangle. You remember, Johnny, when that VC fucked with your head?’
‘I remember.’
‘You blew it, man. That was your last time in the hole. Guess you didn’t have the stomach for it, after all.’
‘Guess not, Ray.’
And silence between them, thirty years of it, laid out in grey like a ghost. Harrison eased his hand inside the hessian bag and gripped the snake.
‘You ruined a good business, Johnny.’
‘Did I?’
‘Oh, yeah. I never woulda figured the Feds to bother enough to get wise.’
‘Who’d give a fuck about a buncha hobos?’
‘Who indeed?’
‘You made a mistake, though, Ray. Sidetrack killed an English kid on his way to New Orleans. He was the son of a friend of mine.’
Martinez did not say anything for a moment and then he hissed breath. ‘Well, there you go. You of all people. You come up here to arrest me, Johnny?’
‘Something like that.’
‘Got yourself a SWAT team backing you up?’
‘Just me, Ray. I figured after thirty years, this was personal.’
Silence again and Harrison tensed. He could see Martinez draw one foot up a fraction further, and he gripped the body of the rattlesnake. Martinez had been more adept with a handgun than any other Rat in the platoon and Harrison knew he was still no match for him in a straight fight. He heard him sniff and cough, and the rays of the sun pierced the shadows across his face. His eyes were as wild as they had been thirty years previously.
Harrison hurled the snake. The rattle sounded and Martinez screamed like a child. He threw up his hands, as the snake thwacked against him and curled round his neck.
Harrison was across the floor in a flash. He hit him full in the face and Martinez’s gun went spinning. Harrison knelt on his chest then, and pointed the 9mm at his face. Under him, Martinez was stiff as a board, back arched to breaking point, the weight of the snake still on him. His eyes bulged and saliva bubbled at his lips like a rabid dog. Harrison eased the snake’s body from his throat and then showed him the decapitated end. He pressed the barrel of the 9mm against the flesh between his eyes.
‘I quit the FBI, Ray. I’m a private citizen now, so I got no rules and I’ve a mind to pop you right here.’
Martinez’s twitching was slowly subsiding.
‘You wanna give me one good reason why I shouldn’t? You know, gut-shoot you and drag your pants down to your ankles. Toss you over the side.’
Martinez looked him in the eye. ‘A hole in the ground in Cu-Chi.’
Harrison stared at him—the hammer cocked on the 9mm, the barrel pressing into the skin of his forehead. He thought of Jean and all he had found and then lost. He thought of the other killings; the sedition, treason and murder. And then he heard the voice of that VC underground, calling out his name, and this man taking over as he fired six rounds in panic.
Reaching to his back pocket, he pulled out a set of handcuffs, then rocked back on his heels. ‘Buckle up,’ he said, and dropped the cuffs on to Martinez’s chest.
They jumped off the train at Glenns Ferry, and Harrison called the FBI computer center at Pocatello, told them who he was and that he had Whiskey Six in his custody. He sat by the banks of the Snake River, watching the sun go down in the distance. Martinez sat with the cuffs on, a safe distance from the gun.
Three agents came down from Boise and took him away. As he was being led to the car, he looked back over his shoulder. ‘You never forgot about the snakes, then, Johnny.’
Harrison had a cigarette burning and he let smoke bleed from his nostrils. ‘Some kinda purgatory, huh?’
He took a flight to Wyoming and went back to Laramie for his truck. She fired up first time and he sat behind the wheel not knowing where he should go. He could go back to Idaho and check on that cabin by Payette Lake, but for some reason his instincts told him south. He did not hurry: there was much to think about and no special place to go. But a week after he left Wyoming, he parked his truck in the French Quarter and climbed the stairs to his apartment. Mrs Abbeyville, the old black lady who rented across the corridor, must have heard him because she opened her door and handed him his mail. He thanked her and went into his apartment, threw the windows open and lay down on the bed. The city sweated and he could hear music drifting from Bourbon Street.
He dozed, then woke and sat up, rubbing his eyes. He picked up the bundle of envelopes and shuffled through them. They were mostly bills, but then he saw a blue airmail envelope. It was postmarked London and his heart leapt against his ribs. He tore it open and found a plane ticket written in his name. The smile twitched at his lips and he opened the single sheet of paper accompanying it. There was Jean’s handwriting and the words: I love you. I miss you. And her phone number. Harrison closed his eyes for a moment, then dialled the number and waited. Finally, it connected, rang in that peculiar English way, and then a voice drenched in sleep sounded in his ear.
‘Hello, Jean Carey speaking.’
Harrison lay back on the bed, the heat on his face through the window. ‘Hey, Miss Lady Mam,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry if I woke you.’
Glossary
ASAC assistant special agent in charge
ATF Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (Bureau of)
BLM Bureau of Land Management
DCI Director of Central Intelligence
DDO deputy director of operations
DGSE Directoire Générale du Service Extérieur
EOD Explosives Ordnance Disposal
FEMA Federal Emergency Management Agency
IAD International Activities Division
INS Immigration and Naturalization Service
ISA Intelligence Support Activity
JTTF joint terrorism task force
NCIC National Crime Information Center
NSA National Security Agency
2nd REP Régiment des Etrangers Parachutistes
SWAT special weapons and tactics
TOC tactical operations center
About the Author
Jeff Gulvin is the author of nine novels and is currently producing a new series set in the American West. His previous titles include three books starring maverick detect
ive Aden Vanner and another three featuring FBI agent Harrison, as well as two novels originally published under the pseudonym Adam Armstrong, his great-grandfather’s name. He received acclaim for ghostwriting Long Way Down, the prize-winning account of a motorcycle trip from Scotland to the southern tip of Africa by Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman. The breadth of Gulvin’s fiction is vast, and his style has been described as commercial with just the right amount of literary polish. His stories range from hard-boiled crime to big-picture thriller to sweeping romance.
Half English and half Scottish, Gulvin has always held a deep affection for the United States. He and his wife spend as much time in America as possible, particularly southern Idaho, their starting point for road-trip research missions to Nevada, Texas, or Louisiana, depending on where the next story takes them.
All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook onscreen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2000 by Jeff Gulvin
Cover design by Barbara Brown
978-1-4804-1837-0
This edition published in 2013 by Open Road Integrated Media
345 Hudson Street
New York, NY 10014
www.openroadmedia.com
EBOOKS BY JEFF GULVIN