by Cave, Hugh
"You and the child will sleep on the front-room floor tonight, as you did before. Her father will be returning."
"If you say so. Move over a little."
"What?"
"Move over. It's more comfortable for you to have this on the bed"—she meant the tray she was holding—"than on the table, where you have to reach for it."
He obeyed without an argument. A sign, she guessed, that he was as tired as he claimed to be.
Having deposited on the bed his evening meal of Creole chicken and rice, she stepped back with folded arms and frowned at him. "Has the child's father given you any more trouble?"
"No, he hasn't."
"And the other two—her mother and the pilot—what about them?"
"They are not so easy. He has a will, that pilot fellow. But in the end they will do what I want them to. Never doubt it."
"Where are they?"
"At the moment, just waking up with confused minds and tired bodies after walking all night and sleeping all day in exhaustion."
"Walking where?" Clarisse asked.
"What?" He was critically inspecting his food.
"You said they spent the night walking. Walking where?"
"Does it matter?"
"I suppose not, but I'm curious. If you don't mind."
"Very well, they were walking the back roads around here but thought they were lost in the Citadelle."
"Our Citadelle? In Haiti?"
"Yes."
"But why, Margal?"
"God in heaven, don't ask so many questions! But all right, just this one more. My mind is tired, no? With the way I've been forced to use it these past few days, it has a right to be. So when projecting my thoughts, it was less of a strain to project a setting I knew well."
"You could have taken them to our house," Clarisse persisted. Her beloved red house in Haiti's northern mountains was the one she referred to. The house she longed to be in right now.
That would have been harder for me. They have never been there."
"And they have been to the Citadelle?"
It was my guess that he had, at least. He worked there in the north." Margal shrugged. "And so long as one of them could accept the illusion and they were concerned about each other . . ." He shrugged. "As it turned out, both had been there."
"I see." Not being anxious to return to the kitchen, where she had left Merry Dawson sitting like a small zombie at the table, Clarisse risked another question. "Have you a plan for those two now?"
"Of course."
"May I ask what it is?"
"Another time. I'm tired now."
"Well, just one more simple question, if you will."
He looked at her.
"You told me, if you remember, that she is easy for you. Easier than he is, at least. Why, then, can't you get rid of them both by commanding her to kill him and then destroy herself?" So you and I can return to Haiti and forget all these distractions, she added silently.
"Because she is a woman."
"What is that supposed to mean?"
"He is stronger. If she tried to kill him, he would defend himself."
"If he were asleep? And she crept up on him with some kind of weapon?"
"My, we're full of ideas this evening, aren't we?" With his mouth full of chicken, Margal could hardly grin but made the effort. "Well, then, let me philosophize for a moment. First, one should never dispose of a tool one may yet need to use. Second, it amuses me to play with people's minds. It sharpens my skills." He shrugged. "Besides, it might be hard for me to persuade her to kill him. You see, she loves him."
"What?"
"It's true. Every time I get into her mind, I find his image there."
"What about her husband?"
He shook his head. "She has no such thoughts about her husband. Only about this man and her daughter. Has the daughter stopped complaining, by the way?"
"No, and it's natural. She's just a baby and is now frightened." Clarisse folded her arms. "She isn't to be blamed, you know. It was exciting in the beginning, with the sea voyage and all, but she's been cooped up for days now like a baby chick in a box. She has walked the house until she knows every crack in the floors. Now she just sits and shivers. And sometimes cries, brave as she is."
"Tell her that she will soon be with her parents again."
Clarisse brightened. "Do you mean that, Margal?"
"In my own way."
She gasped. "No! Are you saying that when you've finished using the three of them, you—"
"Didn't you just suggest I command the woman to destroy herself?"
"But I—" I love that child, Clarisse wanted to say, but was afraid to. Yet it was true. The two of them had been together now for half a lifetime, it seemed. Had played together, eaten together, slept together. By the hour they had talked, Clarisse discovering childhood memories of her own she had thought long buried.
Afraid to speak up now, she was even more afraid not to. "Master, I beg you—"
"Not now!" he said angrily.
"But—"
"Leave me! Let me have my supper in peace!"
When annoyed he could not be reasoned with. Later, perhaps—not now. Without further protest she departed, closing the door behind her.
In the kitchen little Merry Dawson sat motionless at the table, gazing moodily into space. Clarisse sank onto a chair across from her and reached over to touch the child's hand.
"Don't fret, little one. M'sieu Margal told me your daddy will be here again soon."
The sad brown eyes focused on her. "I want my mommy, too."
"Well, it's very likely she'll be coming as well."
"With Daddy?"
"Perhaps not with him. I don't know about that. But she—"
"They don't like each other," Merry said.
"Oh?"
"For a long time they haven't liked each other. They don't say so, but I know." She frowned. "Where did Jumel go?"
"I don't know, child. What do you care? He doesn't even talk to us."
"I just wondered. He looked sort of—scared, I guess. When he came out of Mr. Margal's room, I mean. He stood there in the doorway looking at me as if he wished I wasn't here. I mean as if he wished I'd never come here. Then he went out. You don't know where he went?"
"No, I don't."
"He took that big, long flashlight he has."
"Perhaps he had to do something in the citrus groves where he works. It would be dark when he got there. I don't suppose they have lights."
"I'm tired," Merry said. "Can we go to bed?"
"How can you be tired? We haven't done anything all day but sit around and talk."
"Well, I am."
No, you're not, Clarisse thought. You're frightened. For a while Margal made an effort to keep you from being frightened, but now he doesn't care. "Well, all right," she said. "But we have to sleep on the mattress again."
That was another thing. When the child's father was here, why did he have to spend his nights in Margal's room instead of with his daughter? Was he that essential to what was going on?
Couldn't Margal afford even one small grain of compassion?
She stood up to go into the front room and arrange the mattress. Merry slid off her chair. At that moment the two black dogs began snarling, and she heard a car stop outside.
"That must be your father now," she said on her way to the door.
It was. Looking close to exhaustion, Brian Dawson merely nodded as he stepped past her. Attaché case in hand, he went straight to Margal's room without even seeing the child who stood in the kitchen doorway with her arms outstretched, waiting to be spoken to.
Merry's look of eager expectation dissolved behind a trickle of tears. The dogs stopped snarling. Clarisse stood silent, biting her lower lip in displeasure.
Dawson opened the door of the bocor's room and walked in. Closed it behind him without being told to. Strode to the man sitting there and handed him the attaché case.
Without even greeting him, M
argal fingered the case open and took out, first, the items brought by Dawson's father from the White House.
"A pen. A handkerchief. A page of his handwriting. His signature." He scowled. "This is all?"
"Everything you ordered me to get is there," Dawson meekly protested.
"Well, yes. And what are these?" He held up the shorts Dawson had taken from the chest of drawers in his father's room.
"They belonged to my father. As you can see, he has worn them."
"What is the blood on the handkerchief?"
"That, too, is my father's." Dawson explained how it had got there. "The case itself belonged to the President."
"Ah!" the bocor exclaimed softly.
A look of desperation crept across Dawson's once handsome face. "Please, may I go to my daughter now?"
"You may not." Margal pointed to a chair. "Bring that here and sit. You have some talking to do."
"Talking! My God, I have just driven—"
"I must know what happens when your President takes a trip. Being the world's most powerful leader, he obviously does not simply drive to an airport and board a plane. I require knowledge of the details. How and when will he arrive here? Who will be with him? Tell me everything!"
"But there will be time enough for—"
"Not so much time as you may think. Perhaps not very much at all."
Chapter Thirty-six
When he could no longer stand the silence, Ken Forrest broke it by speaking to the black man peering down at him.
"Well—hi."
"Evenin', mister." The small eyes shifted their gaze to the woman at Ken's side. "And missus."
Sandy was awake. She had not spoken, but her hand had groped for and found Ken's and clung to it now with a pressure that told him that she was frightened.
"Are you all right, hon?" he whispered.
"I don't know. I think so."
He pressed her fingers. "Just let me get things sorted out."
"Me, too," she breathed. "I'm confused."
He struggled to sit up, aware that his head throbbed and his sight kept slipping in and out of focus. "Where are we?" he asked the man gazing down at them.
"I believe that is your car over there."
Ken looked where the fellow was pointing. Yes, the car behind the screen of melaleucas was the one he had rented after Sandy wrecked the first one. In it Sandy and he had driven to Gifford, where a hooker had told him how to find the house they sought. After hiding the car behind the trees, they had been walking to the house when the road dissolved into a Haitian nightmare.
He looked at Sandy again and was reminded of his headlong dive to save her from walking off the edge of the Citadelle's loftiest level. Had it really happened? He had ripped his slacks on the stone, he recalled. Had bloodied his knees.
Examining the slacks, he found jagged rents in both knees, caked with blood. Easing the pant legs up, he looked at his knees. Both were raw. So raw that just touching them sent a wave of pain through him, nearly causing him to black out.
It had been no illusion, then. His desperate dive to save Sandy, the hours of frantic wandering through the old Haitian fortress, the pursuing footsteps, the white owl—all of it was real!
Or was it? How could he be sure he hadn't acquired his raw knees by falling from exhaustion after walking through an unremembered night here in Florida? How could he be sure of anything anymore?
But something had pushed him to the brink of exhaustion. And Sandy with him. And what had the man just said? "Good evening?"
He frowned up at the fellow. "What time is it, friend?"
Their visitor looked at a watch on his wrist. "Half past eight, mister."
"In the evening?"
He and Sandy had left the car and begun their walk to Jumel's house later than that, so it could not be the same evening. What the hell was going on? Had they been lying here in the grass all night and all day? If so, why was he so dead tired?
"It will be dark soon," their visitor added, as though aware of his bewilderment.
Struggling to his feet, Ken drew Sandy to hers and put an arm around her while peering around them in disbelief. But the fellow was not lying. The light had faded even more in the past few minutes.
He scowled at the man confronting them. "May I ask who you are, friend?"
"My name is Jumel."
"What?"
"Elie Jumel. And I'm not here by accident. I came lookin' for you, to help you."
Too stunned to answer, Ken could at first only stare. Then he said lamely, "Let's go talk in the car."
"All right."
He settled Sandy on the rear seat and sat beside her while the little black man faced them from the front. Then, with the dome light on so he could better size up this man who claimed to be Jumel, Ken noticed a tinge of red lurking in Sandy's eyes.
Was she still in the bocor's power? She must have been when she tried to walk to her death at the Citadelle. Or was she still being influenced by thugs the TV man had persuaded her to take? Either way, he must be on his guard. Even on guard against her.
In a voice that now sounded unmistakably Haitian, Jumel said, "I know why you are here, friends, but you have come too late."
"Too late for what?" Ken demanded.
"To rescue madame's daughter from the man who stole her."
Oh, sure, Ken thought. Now you're going to tell us she isn't in your house but has been moved to somewhere miles away. So we'll go looking there for her, and your bloody bocor can work us over some more.
"Why?" he fenced.
"She is not at my house any longer. M'sieu Margal moved her."
"To where?"
"To a place you will never find without help. But I will help you."
"Why should you?"
Jumel's face sagged with a look of sadness. "Because I want no more of that man, m'sieu! Look what he did to me. I was living peacefully by myself in a fine house the people I work for let me use. Certainly a better house than I ever had in Haiti. I had a good job. I made good money. Then—" He wagged his head.
"Then what?"
"He came, with the lady and the child. I had to put them up. I had to buy food for them because they had no American money. I became a servant in my own house!"
Sandy implored the man with her eyes. "Mr. Jumel, is my daughter all right?"
"She is well, Madame."
"Is she frightened? Has she—has she cried a lot?"
"Only a little. The woman looks after her well. You'll see for yourself when I take you where she is."
Ken said, "You mean this woman is with her now?"
"Yes, m'sieu."
"And Margal?"
"No, not Margal. It was because he had other things to do that he ordered the woman and child from the house. But, like I said, I can take you to her."
"Why should you?" Ken demanded.
"M'sieu?"
"Why should you risk a bocor's displeasure to help us?"
"I told you: I'm afraid of that man. I want to put an end to all this before he ruins everything I have here."
"All right. Mrs. Dawson and I have to talk about it, so why don't you give us a few minutes alone together? Go for a walk."
"Of course." The little man opened his door and got out. Without even a backward glance he walked away into the deepening dusk.
Ken said dubiously, "Well, Sandy?"
"I—think I believe him."
"It could be a trick, you know. We're only a few minutes from his house. It could be a ruse to get us away from there."
"Ken—" The pink was still in her eyes as she stared at him. "Where were we last night?"
"Don't you know?"
"Were we in Haiti? At the Citadelle?"
"That's what he wanted us to think, at any rate."
"And we thought so, didn't we? I did, I know. And if he could do that, why would he need Jumel's help now? No, I don't think Jumel is lying. He wants to help us."
"But why, damn it? You must have noticed he didn't a
nswer that when I asked him."
"But he did. And there's more to it than what he said, if you think about it. He wants us on his side when this is over. Otherwise he'll be considered an accomplice in the kidnapping."
"You want to go with him, then?" Ken said. "Instead of to the house or the police?"
She touched his hand. "I—think so. Yes."
"All right." She just might be making sense, he decided. At a time like this a mother's intuition might be a more reliable guide than cold reasoning.
He opened his door. "Jumel! You can come back now. We've decided."
Chapter Thirty-seven
In the Oval Office at the White House, Rutherford Franklin Dawson perspired so profusely that he had to keep patting his face with a folded handkerchief. But up to now the man behind the desk had not seemed to notice.
"Am I surprised, Mr. President?" Dawson said. "Not at all! As a matter of fact, I was going to suggest that very thing."
"We needn't be there long, you know."
"Of course. Just long enough to show the nation you are vitally interested in this particular shot. And it is of great importance, sir. I'm sure you'd be the first to say so."
"I already have."
"Forgive me."
"What time must we be there, Ruddy?"
"The shot is scheduled for three-fifteen P.M., Mr. President. We should leave here—"
"Just let me know in time to be ready."
"Of course."
The man behind the desk leaned forward, smiling. "You know, Ruddy, you never cease to astonish me. I swear we have some sort of ESP going for us."
The father of Brian Dawson felt he could smile now, too. Commanded by a voice in his head to make his President see the wisdom of this unplanned journey, he had entered the Oval Office full of trepidation. But now it seemed that his talent for persuasion would not even be put to the test.
He was enormously relieved. "ESP, sir? It would certainly seem so!"
"I swear, Ruddy, I had no thought of going to Florida until I awoke this morning. Then suddenly my mind was full of enthusiasm for it, and I wondered why I hadn't seen its importance before. After all, this is a key step in our new program. I should be there."
"As I remarked before, sir—I meant to suggest it, had you not brought up the subject first."