Flight of the Scarlet Tanager

by Bevill, C. L.

  “Fitch,” she moaned softly. “For God’s sake, tell me we’re almost down.”

  Chapter Eleven

  August 15th

  From Routen’s Birds of North America, edited by Houston Routen, Cacky Press, 1992, pg. 276: The Caspian Tern, Sterna caspia, is one of the largest of the North American terns, ranging from 19 to 23 inches in height. A big bird, it possesses a large neck, body, head, and bill. The bill itself is dark red in color, sometimes with a dark tip. The broad wings, black cap streaked with white in winter and a forked tail all intelligibly identify this tern. Its habitat is the open water, salt or fresh, and it nests on barrier beaches, natural islands, and shoals, where there is an abundance of sand and, or shell, with sparse vegetation. Dining exclusively on small fish this bird dives underwater from flight to seek its meals. The tern is also a thief, having little qualms about stealing a freebie from other avian members of the community, sometimes scaring another fishing-bird in flight by abruptly diving at them, then catching that bird’s prey as it falls from the victimized bird’s beak...

  Fitch didn’t mind lying upon occasion. It seemed to him that human beings were created to lie, that it was in fact built into their very genetics. In any case, who wanted to tell the truth a la George Washington? A story that Fitch had always thought was a big whopper fabricated to make little children behave better. Humans could and would lie at will, for silly, stupid reasons. Fitch had long since come to the conclusion that his father lied on a regular basis, largely lies of omission, almost always dealing with national security issues, but lies all the same. Witnessing his father performing the deed gave tacit permission for the son to repeat the action. But he had also seen what lying had done to his mother. She had divorced his father when he was twelve, explaining to her sons that the intelligence community was too stressful for her to deal with. She wanted to be able to live a life and not worry about every nuance and every word uttered as a potential security risk, and possibly causing the onset of World War III. She wanted to be able to entertain socially without worrying about whether she spilled some hors d’oeuvres on her evening dress or spilled the beans about some intelligence issue. She wanted to be able to speak her mind without fear of reprisal. So she explained the ‘polite lie’ to her sons and obtained joint custody from the general. It worked out well. Fitch got the best of both worlds. He and Bishop got along, and his sons learned about the ‘political lie.’ Fitch and his mother got along better. She was a free spirit and not meant to be tied up to an Army career where one lived in a house with glass walls upon which huge stones struck with great repetition. There was truth and then there was the truth.

  Accordingly, Fitch didn’t like to lie. He tried very hard to do it only when he thought it was necessary. There seemed to be more wit and challenge in keeping to the truth without hanging oneself with the rope that was inevitably tied around the neck of every person he’d ever met. Dangling on the side of a cliff face with the rocks as slick as he’d ever seen them and the young woman above him trembling with each movement she made and her back stiff against a debilitating wind made lying seem more than necessary. It was essential.

  He looked down. He’d told her twenty feet to the beach. It was more like fifty. “Hey, kid,” he called, blackness swirling around them. The fog was beginning to form early on this autumn night with a cool breeze arching across the ocean, moisture heavy in the air. “Wedge your hand into the crevice and then make a fist on the other side. It’ll prevent you from falling while you rest.” And here was the lie, not an outright untruth, but merely creative elaboration in order to motivate the shaking young woman above him, “We’ve only got a little way to go. On the beach in five.”

  Teddy sighed again. It was a rickety exhale that gave away what she was experiencing. She could feel every bruise and contusion of her battered body and never had she been so tested. In the first days of her flight she’d had a little money and hadn’t needed to work. But the first time the money had dwindled to almost nothing, she’d taken a job at a roadside café, waitressing for truck drivers who pinched her butt and men who carried well-sharpened knives in their steel-tipped boots. The work hadn’t been excessive by later standards but a young woman, still an adolescent, who had never had a job before that time, had found it almost unbearable. Waiting on tables. Carrying trays of food. Hurrying back and forth. Staying on her feet for ten hours. Cleaning the tables up after the customers were done eating. The owner of the café had bet with his short-order cook on how long she would last, the owner’s bet was no more than a day. Surprise of surprises she’d managed three months there before she had felt that invisible itch between her shoulder blades, something that told her that it was time to move on.

  She had crisscrossed the country, taking jobs where she could, eschewing the oldest trade because she knew she couldn’t sink that low. There had been jobs in the fields, the only white face in a sea of brown. Jobs sweeping floors. Jobs in darkened, stinking bars where someone getting killed in a fight was the norm rather than the exception. Jobs where the labor was back-breaking. Jobs where the owners tried to get more than just work out of her and where Teddy had run to avoid them as well. But this was the worst thing. It was the fear that drove her. The fear that pushed her to run like a madwoman through uncharted territory, to shoot a man who was a complete stranger, to travel down a perilous cliff face in pitch dark.

  “Did I tell you about Justo Silvestre?” she asked Fitch, knowing perfectly well she hadn’t known him long enough to tell him anything of the sort. It provided her with her own personal indication of just how rattled she really was. She shoved her hand through a craggy crevice and made the fist he’d directed her to do and dared not look down. The pressure against her extremity was not particularly uncomfortable, and it strangely made her feel safe for a moment, allowing the panic to seep away.

  “Lean up against the rocks and rest as much as you can,” he told her from below. “Listen, I don’t think I know you well enough to have you telling me about men named Julio Silvester.” His tone was tacitly amused.

  “Justo Silvestre,” she corrected him, her voice a thread. “Nice man. In El Paso, Texas. You ever been there?”

  “No, been through Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport once.”

  “Very Hispanic town. It looks so desolate at first, but you get used to it. There’s this southwest feel there that’s incredibly unique with these ancient missions that look like the Spanish just came across the Rio Grande. And when you see the little mountains they have there in the morning light, it’s quite lovely.” The rocks were tugging at her skin and she tried to relax her body more in order to rest more effectively. It was difficult to do knowing that the level ground was so far away that if she had looked she couldn’t see it. “I thought he was a drug dealer. Big drug town. At least Juarez is, the Mexican city across the border from El Paso. Lots of people trying to cross the border there with the goodies. Justo is a guy in his forties. Heavily Catholic. Wanted a messenger to cross the border for him. I told him that I wouldn’t be a mule.”

  “A mule,” Fitch repeated. “Put your foot here.” He put his hand on her leg and guided her. She withdrew her fist from the wall and started her descent again, moving automatically, counting on the young man below her to make the decisions for her, counting on another human being in a way that she hadn’t done for years. Every inch of her was trembling, and she couldn’t tell if it was from the climb or from having to trust a virtual stranger.

  “Someone who transports drugs across the border. Cocaine or heroin is usually the most popular. A little bit sells for a lot.” She paused, jamming her hand into another crevice while she decided where the next handhold would be. “At least that’s what I hear. I never got involved with that. But that’s what I thought Justo was. A dealer for the Juarez Cartel. So I told him to shove it and got ready to run again. Before he could do something to me.”

  A weak laugh came from Teddy and Fitch peered upward. He almost missed his footi
ng when he did that. She sounded like a different woman now. A woman who had grown up in a matter of minutes rather than years. She went on, “But it turned out he had a problem with the IRS. Once he used to work for the CIA. Then he decided he liked working for himself better. Liked to hire illegal aliens who were mostly family members and didn’t like to pay the government money that he didn’t think they were owed. But mostly he needed someone who could come and go across the border. A young white woman would never get questioned. He didn’t trust the telephones because he thought he was being bugged. Same with cell phones. Voilà, me.”

  “And did you get questioned?”

  “No. Never did. Never even asked for a driver’s license. Just asked my nationality and anyone can tell where I’m from. Hell, they have people floating across the Rio in inner tubes, so what have they got to worry about from one little gringa.”

  “Sounds like the south to me. Your accent, that is,” he replied. “Watch this rock, it’s got a big hump to it and it’s easy to slip over. Only a little bit to go, Teddy.”

  “But Justo liked me, never messed with me, paid me regularly, and even introduced me to one of his sons because he thought I’d make a good wife. You know, brave, young, full of moral turpitude, and reasonably cute. That was when I had blonde hair and no nose stud, no eyebrow ring.” Teddy made a noise in her throat, almost strangled. Fitch glanced up again, concerned. She was leaning over a rock, with her arms curled around it as if it would protect her. “I couldn’t tell him that even had I been interested in his son, that it would be a really bad idea. But Justo didn’t care about that. He thought I was some good kid with bad parents somewhere. And he really believed in the principals of the US of A. Especially the Amendment that gives us the right to bear arms. He taught me all about guns. Taught me about Glock, Beretta, Smith & Wesson. All because he thought the IRS were listening to his phones. He thought I should carry a gun with me, except that Mexico doesn’t allow weapons over there. I left the gun in the car when I went. It wasn’t such a great idea if I’d been caught by the Border Patrol or Customs. So if you want to thank someone for that man getting shot, you can thank Justo Silvestre. He could put a shot group in a target tighter than Superman’s grip.”

  “Thank you, Justo,” Fitch said, obediently, who had been wondering how someone like Teddy got to learn how to effectively use a weapon like the one she had tucked into her waistband. Now he knew. He looked down. Maybe ten feet to go. “Teddy, there’s another little drop here. You’re going to have to let go and trust that the sand will keep you safe. Nothing but soft sand below.”

  Teddy looked down and wished she hadn’t. She could hear the ocean not so far away as it crashed into the shoreline. She could see wisps of fog curling around their bodies. And the expansive range of stars above them with the bit of a silver moon grinning inanely down at them didn’t eliminate the great shadow of the cliff that made the base a bottomless hole of colorlessness. “I don’t know if I can do that, Fitch.”

  It was Fitch’s turn to sigh. All he wanted to do was get past this forced isolation until he could go back to the university again. Now he had this. Defying his father’s will and abetting a possible criminal wasn’t exactly bad. No, it’s wicked bad. But it was on the edge, just the way he liked it. When he climbed without a rig, when he played around with explosive materials in the science lab at the U, when he was on the side of an ice fall, listening to the frozen water creak as if it might fall away at any time, it was all on the edge, as extreme as he could go.

  Nothing like almost being killed to make a guy feel like he’s vitally alive. And there was that other troubling matter; he believed that Teddy was being wronged by someone. It was only a matter of time before she shared the reason with him. Like all puzzles this one intrigued him. There was a game here, a strategy to be played and the thrill at outwitting people who were as smart as he was. Fitch reconsidered, Naw. No one’s as smart as I am. “Teddy, trust me. I could have left earlier. I could have taken the gun and turned you over to the cop in the house. You know I could have. You probably would have helped me. You didn’t want to shoot that guy. You only did it because he was going to shoot me. God, you saved that kid yesterday from drowning. You want me to believe you’re this terrible person who deserves whatever those guys up there are going to throw at you. Forget that shit.”

  He stopped and his voice floated away beneath her for a moment. Then he resumed, “I’m going to let go here and when I’m gone, move to my position. There’s a foothold about four feet down. Just this last thing. And then you let yourself dangle with your arms, as low as you can get. The cliff is washed away at the bottom; it forms a cave here that goes back twenty feet. No rocks below here. Just sand. Soft, nice sand. Okay?”

  Teddy nodded, forgetting that he couldn’t see her face. She listened to him for a moment and closed her eyes as his clothing rustled. He dropped away and she knew if she looked down all she would see is blackness. She glanced down once and saw the gaping aperture of the huge black beast. When she looked up three birds exploded out of the cliff, because Teddy had inadvertently disturbed them.

  There was a shriek that she bit back, even though she wanted to let it out and as she let go of the bits of granite and stone that had prevented her from falling, and did just that, fell.

  •

  Gower quickly discovered that Sailor Jack’s Whale Watching and Fishing Tours was deserted. The gates were locked and both ships floated serenely in their berths in the bay below the bridge. He checked the locks three times and suspected that Jack Little wouldn’t give the dock keys to an itinerant worker, no matter how much he liked her. He checked the top of the fence. It was shallow enough for Teddy to climb over. If she could squeeze through a chained door, and run across a lawn like a deer escaping the hunter, then a chain-link fence would be a minor obstacle.

  With that observation Gower made his own entrance, using a similar method, damning his suit to the grime on the gate and fence. He made his way down the misty stairwell to the wharf, checking every corner, shining his flashlight into the tiny office that the Little’s used and finding nothing but shadows and darkness. At sea level intermittent lights from above dimly illuminated the berths of the Mary Celeste and the Sir James Murray. Both ships bobbed in an ebbing tide, gently knocking old tires tied on their sides against the rubber bumpers that lined the mooring.

  The smell of gutted fish and rotting seaweed permeated the air, intermingling with salty brine and a moist wind. This was the only way down to the two ships unless the girl was willing to take another dip in the cold, cold sea. Gower had glanced at her medical chart and decided that that was unlikely at best.

  The tall man leapt from the wharf to the Mary Celeste with an ease that indicated his physical readiness. He searched the ship quickly. It was a small vessel, with few places to hide and fewer places to sit and watch for whales on the edge of the ocean. He went to the other ship and made the same examination. Both ships were locked, their keys missing, and presumably in the hands of their owners. Finally, he completed his last task, quickly disabling both vessels so that if the girl made it to this point she wouldn’t be going anywhere in these ships. He glanced across the tiny bay to rows of other boats snuggled in their respective berths and decided that he would alert the security company that watched the marina, so that if Teddy managed to elude him at this point she would be unable to take one of those ships as well.

  Back on the wharf he watched the critical components from both ships sinking into the black waters of the bay, making sure none of them floated back up.

  When he returned to the street level above, he scaled the fence once more and looked around a street that was devoid of traffic. The tourists had left for their motels and time-shares. The restaurants and bars were on the far side of the town, and the daytime shops were closed up tighter than drums. There wasn’t anyone around.

  Perhaps my girl is smarter than this. She wouldn’t dare come back here, knowing I might be waiting. P
erhaps she has another ship waiting for her. Perhaps the younger Lee has access to a ship. Rich general. Beachfront property. Why not a ship as well? Gower frowned. He retrieved his cell phone and dialed the number for Redmond’s phone.

  When Redmond didn’t answer Gower knew without a doubt that Theodora would never come back to this place. He returned to the rental car and called the local police once more, requesting the local address of Lieutenant General Bishop Lee. This time, after providing his identification, a different operator gave it to him with the qualification that units were in route to the dwelling, that shots had been fired there, and Lincoln County Sheriff’s Department deputies were requesting assistance with a specific code. The code was one that Gower recognized. An officer was down. There had been a police fatality.

  •

  Darkness enveloped her and Teddy tried to scream, but she didn’t have the breath to do it. Suddenly she wasn’t falling from a cliff, she was falling from a night sky, and everything had gone black. Her mother was moaning over the roar of engines. Her father had a death grip on his daughter’s arm. One of her father’s personal assistants was shrieking out questions, “Why is this happening? Oh, dear God, are we going to crash?” until her father yelled at him, “Stop that! Stop saying that!” and the man dissolved into meaningless gibberish.

  Teddy had been crying soundlessly from when there had been an explosion and the plane had dropped a thousand feet in seconds. After long seconds the pilot managed to gain a modicum of control, even while the cabin filled with smoke, and flames could be seen outside the cabin windows. The pilot informed her father of the situation with a graveness that she would have later recognized was a death knell. He was looking for a place to put down, on a trip from their home in the south to Washington, D.C., they weren’t close to any major airports. When the lights faltered and went out, leaving them in extreme darkness that clawed at them, pried at them, called out to them, a twelve year old had begun crying.