Black Widow

by Randy Wayne White

  Even so, I felt uneasy. It was one big damn dog.

  Sunset on the island was at 6:30 p.m., and the two had arrived shortly afterward. Now it was nearly nine, and Wolfie still hadn’t shot anything worth a damn.

  I had. That morning, I’d bought a palm-sized Kodak plus a mini shotgun mic, so I could film and record from a distance. The camera shot HDV, and it had infrared mode for filming at night.

  I didn’t need a tripod. I’d packed a military-grade spotlight with an infrared cap—a Golight. Cap off, you could see the beam from miles away. Cap on, you couldn’t see the beam from a foot away—unless you were wearing night-vision optics.

  I was. The green-eye monocular over my right eye.

  It was almost funny. Countersurveillance occasionally is. Wolfie was in the spotlight and didn’t know it. The infrared Golight lit up the blind like a stage, and my camera captured it all. No reaction from behind the camera blind, either, where the dog was.

  I got close-ups of Wolfie’s face as he focused his camera. I did slow zoom-outs to show the viewing window and camouflaged blind . . . then panned to the swimming pool where Bandanna Man, Dutch, and Clovis were working the tourist ladies.

  No cuts—if you cut from scene to scene, it’s useless in court. Same’s true of digital memory. Too easily manipulated. That’s why I was using videotape.

  I got a close-up of Ritchie looking sneaky as he opened the envelope, then poured powder into the blender, making margaritas. Kept shooting as he poured drinks and handed them to the ladies. Got close-ups of the ladies drinking, then did another slow zoom-out and panned to Wolfie in the camera blind. He was standing beside the camera, not shooting, but the shotgun mic recorded him saying in French, “Finally!”

  The earbud I was wearing amplified it nicely. Good sound—until Carol turned the music loud.

  Because I thought Wolfie might bail when the twins left, I’d burned through four tapes, getting it all down while I had the chance. The brides-to-be weren’t coming back—it’d taken the twins a long time to find their New York farmers. They were devoted ladies; no interest in a last fling.

  But blackmail targets didn’t have to be prospective brides, because Wolfie hadn’t given up. Humiliation is a broad-spectrum weapon. In lieu of husbands, grown children could be leveraged. Or careers. Mattie was a mother; Carol owned her own business.

  Finally!

  Wolfie said it again.

  He was right. Down by the swimming pool, it was starting to happen.

  I got a shot of Wolfie putting an eye to his camera as he began to film Mattie and Carol dancing with Ritchie and Dutch. They’d finished their drinks and were working on seconds. Good dancers for big women, loosening up fast, feeling tequila along with the unexpected rush of the drug.

  “Mattie? Mattie!” Carol was laughing, talking loud enough to hear without the shotgun mic. “Do you know what this terrible young man just suggested? He wants to . . .”

  I couldn’t hear the rest. But Ritchie was taking off his shirt as they danced, big grin, doing a slow striptease.

  I paused long enough to load a fresh cassette into the Kodak . . . and felt a familiar surge of revulsion. It was unlikely the stuff I was shooting would get to court—but, if I worked it right, the video could cost tiny Saint Arc millions in tourism if this blacklist story was leaked to news agencies or hit the Internet.

  Make the Saint Arc power structure aware of the tape, and the island’s money people would do my work for me. Local authorities would react with shock and indignation before arresting the blackmailer, then crucifying him publicly. Reassure the tourists—the island’s economy came first.

  There was another angle I could work, too. The island was a member of the French Commonwealth. According to my research, it was one of only four French overseas departments in the Caribbean. People born on the island were French citizens, entitled to French passports. France seldom interfered with the local government, but her laws could be applied—if I twisted enough arms.

  The video of Shay and her friends could damage their lives for years to come. The video I was shooting could put their extortionist in jail for a lifetime.

  Blackmail the blackmailer. He was ruthless, but no dummy. He would either cooperate eagerly, or eagerly try to have me killed. Either approach would be time-consuming. Shay would have her wedding.

  Yet, I was reluctant to continue shooting as Dutch, who’d stripped his shirt off, began goading Mattie to dance, taking her in his arms and turning her in slow circles as Carol shrieked, “My God, I wish I had a camera. This man could make poor ol’ Lucy Hunt smile. No, wait! I take that back—no one can know about this!” as she laughed and danced with Bandanna Man, then reached to touch his face. “Ritchie? You are the sweetest, dearest young man I’ve ever met. I mean that. I think you’re just . . . a beautiful person.”

  I was remembering what I’d read about the drug called Icebreaker.

  It is common in group MDA experiences for people to explore mutual touching and the pleasures of physical closeness. Participants may feel very loving toward one another. They describe a “warm glow” that radiates gradually ...

  I told myself it wasn’t my concern. Mattie and Carol were adults. I was here to gather evidence, not make moral judgments.

  I put the camera to my eye and touched record.

  Carol was feeling it now, drunk but more than that, judging from the way she lifted her arms, sleepy-eyed, cooperating as Ritchie began unbuttoning her dress, his hands pausing on her breasts as she arched her back in invitation . . .

  But Dutch wasn’t getting the same cooperation from Mattie at the other end of the pool, where he’d danced her into the shadows. I heard Mattie yell, “Hey, that’s enough, damn it. Please quit!” She pushed his hands away as he tried to slide the straps of the yellow dress off her shoulders.

  ... for a small percentage of users the drug has the opposite effect, causing paranoia ...

  I remembered reading that, too.

  Mattie was having a bad reaction, but Dutch wouldn’t stop. He was forcing it, holding the woman close, kissing her neck as she tried to fight him off—“Get your hands off me. I’m serious.”—and now Peter Lorre was there, too, sandwiching her from behind as she tried to wrestle free until the spaghetti straps broke, both men grinning as they peeled the yellow dress to her ankles . . . then began to laugh at her oversized white panties and bra.

  “Hey . . . hey!” Carol had finally noticed. “What are you doing over there? Stop that!” She turned, holding her unbuttoned dress together, speaking to the sweetest man she’d ever met. “Ritchie—look what they’re doing! Are your friends drunk? Make them stop. Please.”

  Bandanna Man’s grin turned nasty. “You on our island, why should we be the ones got to leave? Most old women, they’d love a chance to party with me and my boys.” When she started to reply, he cupped his hand behind her neck, laughing.

  I’d already stowed the camera and Golight in my backpack. I was moving downhill when Carol screamed.

  16

  SOMEONE WAS FOLLOWING ME as I jogged down the trail. Who? How?

  I stopped, listened. The reflective tape I’d tied to the bushes was only visible through night-vision optics, infrared switched on. Because I was wearing the green-eye, strips of tape glowed like road signs as I turned to look uphill.

  I heard a faint, rhythmic crashing of brush in the distance. A man running through ferns? No, not a man . . . but something.

  Wait . . .

  A beam of light was now scanning the tree canopy, but there was something odd about the light.

  Experimentally, I killed the night-vision monocular and the beam vanished . . . vanished into a night hollowed by tree shadow and stars. I flipped the power switch and the monocular glowed green—and the light beam reappeared, sweeping along the ridge above me.

  Someone was up there with an infrared spotlight. I wasn’t the only one wearing night vision.

  Wolfie?

  No, the light was
farther up the mountain, to the east of the camera blind. Whoever it was had found my trail, but continued to pan back and forth over a single section as if they’d spotted something of interest.

  Then I saw it . . . two coal-red eyes dolphining in rhythm to the crashing noise that was closer now, coming fast.

  A dog.

  Wolfie’s pit bull was after me. Had he sent it after me, or had the dog reacted to the noise of me descending the trail? No way of knowing. But some unknown person was up there using an infrared spotlight to follow the animal as it charged downhill, scenting my trail.

  Shit.

  I turned and ran. For the first minute or so, I ripped the reflective ribbon from bushes as I rumbled past, but then it came into my mind the dog was using its nose to follow me, not its eyes. Canines have better night vision than primates. With the green-eye, though, my night vision was a hundred times better than the dog’s. Unless the person with the infrared spotlight was after me, the tape wasn’t worth slowing for.

  I was on the narrowest section of trail—the spot where I’d thought about stringing a trip wire. Why the hell hadn’t I? The path was only a couple of feet wide, rain forest to my left, darkness to my right, where a gravel incline descended a hundred feet onto more rocks. Through the monocular, the rocks resembled miniature volcanoes.

  On the next turn, I slipped . . . caught a bush as my feet swung from beneath me over the precipice. As I hung there, heart pounding, I could hear the hard, scrabbling sound of the pit bull’s paws clawing for purchase.

  I also heard a distant scream—Carol? No . . . Mattie.

  I panicked. Came damn close to risking the fall onto the rocks rather than waste more time or face the pit bull. Instead, I got my feet on the ground, checked the trail behind . . . and could hear the dog coming, growling now, aware the quarry was near even though it couldn’t see me.

  I couldn’t outrun the damn thing, there were no low limbs to grab, and the panic in me was turning into fury. In my left hand was the Golight, power off. I removed the infrared filter and put it in my backpack. The lens—the size of a paperback book—would blast a white, blinding beam when I hit the switch. In my right hand was the little Colt semiautomatic.

  Facing the trail, I squatted, focused the monocular, and waited for the dog to appear.

  Come on, you bastard ...

  It did, running hard, eyes glowing, teeth bared. I could see the animal clearly in the eerie green world of night vision . . . but the dog couldn’t see me, I realized, as long as I remained statue still.

  Come on ...

  I was going to kill it. Didn’t want to use the gun and alert Ritchie and the others, or some distant cop. What I wanted to do was break the animal’s damn neck—all the fear in me now converted into anger—but that was irrational, so, yes, I would use the gun. Try to drop the dog with one shot, which meant I couldn’t shoot until the animal was almost on me.

  I thumbed back the gun’s hammer, feeling the weapon’s metallic density as I leveled the sights. Could hear the pit bull’s harsh breathing now, its eyes a dull dead yellow as it closed in . . . twenty yards . . . ten . . . shoulder muscles rippling horselike.

  The dog still hadn’t seen me as I touched my index finger to the trigger . . . but suddenly the animal sensed a change in polarity; maybe sensed that the quarry had turned killer, because it abruptly slowed to a trot, pointed ears alert, growl deepening.

  Five yards away, the dog stopped. Now it could see me. The dog pivoted one ear toward me, then the other, nose up, sniffing, as it gathered sensory data. It took a step toward me . . . then jumped away, as if dodging a striking snake.

  I waited and watched, gun ready . . . then slowly lowered the gun, surprised, as the pit bull dropped to its belly and began crawling toward me, no longer growling but making a whining sound of submission as its stub of a tail thumped the ground.

  What had Tomlinson said about sharks sensing their kindred?

  I reached out a tentative left hand. It took a few seconds for the dog to find my hand with its nose. Then it lifted its head into my palm—a beta animal requesting acceptance.

  My nerve endings were on overload as I scratched the loose skin on the dog’s neck, then turned and looked uphill. No sign of the infrared light now. Who was up there?

  I stood. Looked at the dog, then stomped my foot, hissing, “Get out of here!”

  The pit bull turned and ran.

  AS I EXITED the trail onto the beach near the house, I was looking at the wall of forest to my right where the camera blind was hidden. Next time—if there was a next time—I’d rig a rope so I could rappel down the rock wall instead of taking the long way around.

  I glanced at my watch as I ran toward the house. Nearly ten minutes since Carol’s first scream. Too long . . . but not long enough for Ritchie, Dutch, and Clovis to finish what they’d started. The place was brightly lit, windows showing the undersides of palms, casting shadows on white sand, so I hugged the forest wall.

  I expected the men to be in the pool area, where Bob Marley music was still wailing, or inside the house.

  Wrong.

  They were outside, standing behind a maintenance shed at the rear of the property. If I hadn’t spotted them from a distance, I wouldn’t have slowed in time and they would’ve heard me coming.

  I lifted the night-vision monocular from my eye because I wanted to see the night as the three men saw it. Dark of the moon. Mountain black against a black sky. No palm shadows on white sand, and I could barely make out the shape of the shed. No hint the men were there.

  I glanced behind me, worried that I was backlit by the house. Nope. Rain forest, waxy black beneath stars. They couldn’t see me, and I couldn’t see them . . . until I pulled the monocular into place, hit the power switch, and it became dusky green daylight again.

  There they were ...

  The three of them were huddled together, whispering. Clothed now, too, and smoking another cigar-sized joint. Dutch had his back to me as Ritchie turned to Clovis, gesturing with his hands—pissed off about something, maybe—because Clovis and Dutch were nodding the way kids do when they’re being scolded.

  And Ritchie was . . . holding a towel to his nose?

  Yes. A white towel splotched with black. The man was bleeding.

  What the hell had happened in the last ten minutes?

  I moved closer, sliding along the forest rim, ready to freeze or duck into the shadows if they noticed me. I was also aware that Wolfie could still be in the blind, looking down on the house from the ridge. I’d been unable to see the maintenance shed from my rock platform. Could he?

  I stopped, removed my backpack. Considered using the infrared beam to locate the camera blind . . . but decided, no, someone else was up there in the jungle equipped with night vision.

  Instead, I hid the backpack behind a tree, checked to make sure the Colt was secure in its holster, then got down on hands and knees and continued toward the men.

  When I was close enough, I heard Dutch whispering, with his accent, arguing with Ritchie. I dropped to my belly, crawled a few feet closer, and listened.

  “. . . So why you want to risk something like that when you know they’re gonna tell the law?” Dutch asked.

  “Of course they’re gonna tell the Babylon. That’s what I’m saying. We need go back and take care of them old women before they start flapping their gums. They got no phone, they’ve got no car. What’s that tell you? Tells you they ain’t gonna risk leaving this house tonight.”

  “Take care of ’em. What you mean is—”

  “Whatever it takes, that’s what I mean, man.” There was a sustained orange glow—the man with dreadlocks inhaling on the joint.

  “And what’re we gonna do with the bodies? I got to remind you that bodies don’t sink so easy. And that stink. I don’t want no more blood on my hands, man. Let the women go, that’s my advice on this subject.”

  “Let them go? They go back to the States, what’s gonna keep them from gettin
’ on TV and telling what happened here? Wolfie didn’t get nothing on the camera that’s gonna keep them quiet,” Ritchie said. “How’s the Widow gonna react to that news?”

  “The Widow—fuck the Widow.”

  “Man, you’re crazy to use that talk about her. You’re beggin’ for something bad to happen to you. Watch!”

  “You sound like some damn ignorant child. Why you bring that crazy woman into this?”

  “Because she’s paying us, that’s one reason. Plus, I’m telling you, the Widow’s got magic ways to find out things. She’ll know even if Wolfie don’t tell her, that’s why.”

  The Widow—a name spoken with reverence. I’d spent enough time in Cuba and the Caribbean to know that locals take the power of magic seriously, and even the best educated practice forms of santeria or obeah, a complex mix of Catholicism and an ancient African religion.

  I thought about it as Ritchie said to Dutch, “You don’t believe she’s a vitchy woman? Man, you’re gonna believe she’s a witch by the time she’s done fuckin’ you over, man!”

  “Don’t be talking that stupid shit, Ritchie, there’s no such thing as that. That’s the old ways, not modern times. You’re just mad ’cause one of them twin bitches hit you. Clovis? What do you think? You want to go in there and help this crazy man kill a bunch of old women?”

  Clovis wasn’t taking sides. “Those women aren’t so old, man. Those two cornstalk women, they scare the shit out of me. Done fucked up Ritchie’s nose pretty good, I’d say. But it would be fun, so I’m not sayin’.”

  I smiled from the shadows—that’s what had happened while I was coming down the hill. The twins had returned. There’d been a confrontation, and Ritchie had gotten his nose busted. Perfect.

  But Ritchie wasn’t done with it. He’d been humiliated, he wanted revenge, but his partners weren’t jumping into line. Murder? That was a long-term commitment, and they were smart enough to know it. Which really pissed off Ritchie.

  “Then you boys run away. I’m going into that house and do what needs be done. Faster you get outta my sight, the sooner I can do a man’s work. Dutch, you got a knife on you, that much I know.”