Shooting Script

by Gavin Lyall

  But the eye of a hurricane isn’t big; the hard core, the 150-mph winds spinning around the calm centre, isn’t usually more than forty miles across. And that’s the part that does the real damage: guts houses, throws steamers halfway up Main Street, flips heavy aircraft on their backs. But it’s still only theyolk of a broken egg; the white spreads far and wide. Clara could be changing clouds 1,000 miles from her eye, dragging winds into an anti-clockwise spiral 500 miles ahead.

  And there was our trouble: coming as she was, the first hint we’d get of Clara would be a shift of wind so it came from the north. And with only an east-west runway – like every runway in Jamaica -a north wind would be a crosswind. It might be too much crosswind to risk a takeoff. So I could find myself pinned down with the eye still nearly five hundred miles off -and even if it didn’t arrive for another twenty-four hours, me and die Mitchell would still be here when it did.

  The spray pilot asked: ‘Going this afternoon?’

  It would make sense. Yet the first wind-shift could hardly come before three o’clock in the morning. And it might not come at all. Sooner or later Clara wouldhave to recurve – turn north and east. And Caracas, or anyornersafe airport south of here, was a lot of petrol away…

  ‘I’ll wait,’ I decided.

  ‘It must be love,’ the radio man said.

  The spray pilot snorted. ‘If he’s got any sense he’ll be sleeping with the plane tonight.’

  I nodded. It would be nice to trust die met office to ring me at the hotel if the wind shifted northerly and reached more than, say fifteen knots, but… I’d be sleeping widi die plane. I was the aircraft captain.

  I walked up the runway to see how die electricians were getting on and warn diem not to leave any loose ends diis evening. But diey were just about finished. A new set of clean, bright plastic-covered wires direaded along the dowdy soundproofing behind the cockpit; a neat little panel of one master switch and four press-buttons on the instrument panel.

  ‘Works okay,’ the chief assured me. ‘And when they’ve finished the scene, we’ll strip it out. Can use them coils and magnets again. Unless you was thinking of setting up professionally as a bomber?’

  Big joke. Everybody laughed brightly.

  I had a quick drink at the Golden Head, dienback to diehotel to stockpile a little sleep, stopping on the way to buy an oil lamp.

  At seven I woke up and rang the Palisadoes met office – and Clara was still coming. Reports were also in about what she’d done to Puerto Rico during the early morning: trees and telephone lines down, flooding, landslips in the interior – the usual catalogue. But all at a range of three hundred miles at least. The Repúblicamust have got the same treatment during the day. Well, I just hoped General Boscogot caught out of doors without a raincoat.

  But not me. I wanted no part at all of sister Clara. She sounded a very big girl by now.

  I washed, had a solitary drink at the bar, a leisurely dinner, and finally forced myself to head for Boscobel at half-past nine.

  TWENTY-TWO

  At this time, I had the strip to myself. The terminal hut was dark and locked, the hangar of small planes quiet. At diis end of the island, Hurricane Clara was strictly my problem from now on.

  I walked down to the east end of the runway with the hurricane lamp, lit it, and hung it up on a tree just right of the runway. At 3,000 feet it would be just a spark of light, but that’s all you really need for a night takeoff: an aiming point. As long as I remembered to aim left of it.

  I walked back up to the Mitchell. There, I took off the rudder control locks so that the first north wind would bang the rudders and wake me – in the unlikely event of my being asleep. Then, because you don’t officially start a sleepless night until you start trying to sleep, I sat down against the nosewheel, lit my pipe, and breathed smoke at the sky.

  It drifted away slowly. The night was very still, very clear and very dark, with that gigantic echoing distant darkness youonly get in the tropics. Not quiet, though: the trees and bushes – not quite a jungle – on either side of the runway buzzed and clicked and purred busily, with an occasional squawk or squeal to break the monotony. But a tropical night never gets spooky the way a northern night can. At least, not on an island where the worst things that can bite you are scorpions and hotels.

  I smoked and looked at several thousand stars and wondered if, somewhere out there among the bug-eyed green monsters, there wasn’t some poor bug-eyed green bastard sitting under an old bomber waiting for an ammonia storm and looking out at the stars and wondering if, somewhere out there…

  On an engineering-type guess at the stars and odds involved, I decided there probably was. And maybe he was even thinking about how he’d come to get mixed up in somebody else’s war and trying to work out how he felt about it. And perhaps remembering that he’d have no bomb-aimer, so he’d have to go in low, like a fighter-bomber, and wondering how low he dared go with 500-pounders. Even assuming the delayed-action fuses worked on bombs that had probably been stockpiled for years in the steam heat of some Central American hideout…

  I banged my pipe out on the brake drum and went to bed.

  I didn’t know what woke me, except that I wasn’t much asleep anyway and tuned to catch the first sound as the start of the north wind. I just found myself sitting up among the engine and cockpit covers in the rear fuselage and listening.

  Nothing.

  So I went through the usual charade of pretending I was going to get back to sleep without getting up to make sure there was nothing. After a bit of that, I crawled over to one of the old gun windows.

  Two men, walking up the runway in the starlight towards me.

  A couple of old crop-spraying friends come to tell me Clara had recurved north and I could cease my lonely vigil? Like Hell. I woke up with a jolt. As the two rounded the end of the wing, they both pulled out knives.

  For a moment I thought about sealing myself up tight in the Mitchell. I could probably have done it: an aeroplane is a fairly solid affair. All I needed to do was jam the floor hatch tight… Then I knew I’d got to go down there.

  Oh yes? And with what? – against two knives.

  No use looking around; it was as dark as the inside of a coffin in here. I wonderedif I’d left any tools lying around -but I knew I hadn’t. And somebody would have pinched them anyway.

  Then I remembered the tail ‘gun’, the piece of painted broomstick stuck through the rear-gunner’s window. I crawled quickly and, I hoped, quietly back there.

  It jammed for a second, then slid free; it was only held in by insulation tape. About three feet long and smooth in my hands, which suddenly seemed damp.

  I poked a cautious eyebrow up into the transparent aiming blister above. They were standing a few yards off, staring at the side of the aeroplane. I froze, thinking they’d heard me. But they seemed to be discussing something. Finally one of them got out a piece of paper, looked carefully around, and struck a match to read it by. The other leant in over his shoulder.

  Two sharp Spanish faces, one with a small black moustache. Open-necked white shirts. I couldn’t see any more. The match died. They looked back at the aeroplane, discussed a little more – then moved forward, under the wing.

  I crawled for the hatch. It was open, for ventilation and wind noise. I eased down, hoping the little collapsible step wouldn’t creak. But it was too rusty and jammed-up for that. Me and my broomstick arrived on the tarmac a few feet behind the wing without being spotted.

  One of them was bending down beside the starboard wheel, the other out by the nose. I took three long careful steps and, as I reached the wing, ran.

  The man by the nose saw me and yelled. The odier jerked up and around, his hands and knife coming up in front of his chest. I swung the stick like a baseball bat.

  It crashed through his hands and thumped on his chest; he bounced back against die engine. But he still had the knife.

  I lunged with the stick, like a bayonet. He said the Spanish for �
��Oof and folded forwards – and the knife clinked on the tarmac.

  But now the second man was coming around the propeller. I stooped, grabbed the knife, and waggled it fiercely, to show him I was in the same business by now. He stopped.

  ‘Avanze, amigo,‘I suggested. I wanted him under die wing with me. If he knew about knife-fighting, he knew about it in the open and the light. I didn’t know any more than you pick up from American films about teenage Ufein the rich suburbs. But under the wing was my world. I’d worked here, had an instinctive feel of heights, distances, obstructions.

  Slowly, he hunched into the knife-fighting crouch, the blade weaving hypnotically in front ofhim. He knew, all right.

  I shortened my left-hand grip on the stick for a quicker swing and copied his crouch.

  ‘You may have plane tickets,’ I said conversationally, ‘but they won’t be any use tomorrow. All flights’ll be cancelled. There’s a hurricane coming -un huracán-so you’ll be stuck here. Just wailing in the final departure lounge, for the police. It’ll be like picking money out of the gutter. Apúrese, amigo.’

  Heapúresed, all right – a fast sliding step and a wriggling thrust with the knife. I caught it on the stick and tried to twitch the knife out of his hand; no luck. I lunged myself and he stepped back and banged into a propeller blade and swore, but when I lunged again he’d slipped away.

  He circled towards the wingtip, rotating me so that my back was to the first friend, still gasping and grunting down by the wheel – but due to wake up and join the party at any moment.

  All right: if his pal had decided he should play a part, let him play a part. I stepped aside and back, dropped the stick and grabbed the man up by shoving a forearm under his chin and lifting. Then I banged the haft of the knife against his ribs. I thought I heard both of diem gasp.

  ‘You understand, ‘ I said to the one with the knife, ‘that if this fight is to go on I must first kill your friend. Esjusto, no?’

  ‘Como usted quiera.‘Asyou like. But perhaps not quitenonchalantenough to be convincing. The man on my arm squirmed nervously.

  I said:‘Como usted quiera,‘and swung the knife wide so it glinted in the starlight.

  The other man said: ‘No! ‘

  I waited. Car headlights swept across the airstrip. Two cars.

  I yipped:‘Policía!‘although I didn’t think it was.

  The man with the knife looked – at the cars, at me, at the trees on the edge of the runway. Suddenly he chose the trees.

  I let the man on my arm drop and he dropped, saying something both unmistakable and unforgivable about his partner’s mother as he went down.

  I warned him not to hurry off, then stepped out to meet the cars. As they pulled up, I recognised them: Whitmore’s station-wagon, J.B. ‘s Avanti. The gang was all here – right down to Miss Jiminez.

  Whitmore stepped out, saw the knife in my hand, and said: ‘We’re friends. You don’t need that, fella.’

  ‘Not mine. Belongs to a couple of gents who came calling.’ And nodded at the man under the wing. ‘The other’s heading for the hills.’

  That stiffened them. Then Miss Jiminez plunged a hand into her vast crocodile bag and came up with a silver-plated automatic. ‘Where are they? They killed my brother.’ The pistol swung in a rather too comprehensive sweep.

  ‘Not with knives, they didn’t,’ I said mildly.

  Whitmore and Luiz walked up under the wing and came out half-carrying the man over to the cars’ headlights.

  ‘What are you all doing here?’ I asked. I’d finally had time to look at my watch, and it was just past one in the morning.

  J.B. said: ‘We got some news. It can wait, though.’

  In the pool of light from the headlights Miss Jiminez was pointing the gun at the trio of Whitmore, Luiz, and the man.

  Whitmore said testily: ‘Put that damn thing away.’

  Reluctantly, she decided it wasn’t really necessary and tucked it back in her bag. ‘But he must talk. We mustmake him to talk.’

  In the light, the man looked about fortyish, medium high, medium fat, and much more than medium frightened.

  Whitmore said: ‘You heard the lady. Start talking.’

  The man shrugged and muttered: ‘No unnerstan’.’

  Whitmore clamped a vast hand on his shoulder and shook him like a jammed door. Miss Jiminez said: ‘We must make him to talk now. Some torture.’ She looked around for inspiration.

  I said: ‘Why don’t I start up an engine and you feed his arm into the propeller? By the time you reach his elbow he’ll probably be talking a blue streak.’

  J.B. said: ‘Are youserious?’

  Ishrugged. ‘As much as anybody here. What do we want him to talk about? Where he comes from? – we know where he comes from. Who sent him? – we know who sent him. What for? – we know. Ask him about the weather in Santo Bartolomeo and throw him away.’ Whitmore let go and stood back. ‘You could have a point there, fella.’

  Miss Jiminez stared: ‘You mean – to let him go free?’

  I said: ‘Unless you wanthim as a souvenir.’

  She frowned, trying to adjust to the idea. Then she said slowly: ‘But a principle of good counterespionage is never to give the enemy even a negative report – unless it is deceptive, of course. Do we wish him to report failure?’

  ‘But his pal got away anyhow; we can’t stophim reporting. Just hope he knows dictators well enough to be scared of saying he fell down on the job.’ I walked over to the man and, standing clear of his breath, ran my hands through his pockets. As I expected, I came up with a passport.

  I looked up in time to catch a stare of sullen hatred. ‘Now look,’ I said quietly, ‘I just saved yourlife. Not your job, perhaps, but at least your life. Don’t come looking for this passport: I’ll burn it. And don’t come looking for me; you aren’t good enough. Vamos, amigo.’

  He went, reluctantly-and unbelieving at first, then accelerating. By the time he reached the trees he was in top gear.

  I tapped the passport against the knife, still in my hand. ‘It’ll delay him, even if he dares go back there. And taking a man’s passport is a pretty childish punishment: he’ll hate to admit to it.’

  J.B. said: ‘What I don’t see is why they didn’t use guns. I mean, if they used one at a busy airport like Kingston at around nine o’clock, why not on a deserted airstrip at one in the morning?’

  The legal mind.

  I said: ‘They weren’t after me – just the Mitchell. Going to slash her tyres. They didn’t know I was here at all. Spent an age standing out there arguing if it was the right plane. I suppose the markings threw them off.’ I nodded at that ‘Amazonian’ insignia on her flank.

  Whitmore said: “That’d have fixed her, huh? Slashed tyres?’

  ‘No spares. They must’ve guessed that. But I could get some in a few days. They should have guessed that, too.’

  ‘A few days is all they need.’

  ‘What d’you mean?’

  He jerked his head.‘Juanita-she got a radio message from her old man. He wants the attack for’ – he looked at his watch – ‘thirty hours’ time.’

  After a while, I said slowly: ‘Well, if the bombs are here by then – and I can rig a fusing circuit-‘

  Whitmore said flatly: ‘No bombs. ‘ Then to J.B.: ‘Tell him.’

  She unfolded a copy of the Miami Herald and read tonelessly: ‘ “Four aeroplane bombs were found hidden under the nets of a fishing boat boarded by a Guatamalan Navy patrol boat in the Gulf of Honduras last night. The destination of the bombs is not known for certain, but it was surmised that they were headed for anti-Castro rebels in Cuba or possibly even Florida…” Well, they’re wrong.’

  ‘They aren’t likely to be wrong for ever. What happens when the boat crew talks?’

  Whitmore said: ‘They didn’t know. We were dealing with a guy in Kingston and he was sending out a boat to meet ‘em halfway.’

  Then I remembered Agent Ellis and his ‘holiday’.
If the FBI had once had contacts here, Ellis was old enough to have known them – and bright enough to have remembered them.

  He should be able to claim expenses on this holiday.

  But I just nodded and said: ‘Well – that seems to do it. So Jiminez can’t move. Anyway, we could have a hurricane here tomorrow.’

  Luiz said quietly: ‘That is exactly the point, my friend: the hurricane. The Repúblicahas had bad winds and rain all day. Telephones are out, roads are blocked by landslips, communications are mostly gone. The army is stranded in the hills, the jets have been grounded all day. That is what Jiminez wants: he can take over Santo Bartolomeo before anybody knows.’ He sighed. ‘It makes sense… so he moves at midnight. In twenty-three hours’ time.’

  ‘It makes sense if the Vampires were blown around, or if Ned flew them off the island-‘

  “The message,’ Miss Jiminez said, ‘says they are still there and they were not harmed.’

  ‘Then tell him not to move! Christ, with the Vamps loose-‘

  ‘Capitán,‘she said calmly, ‘we have solved the problem. You will drop mortar shells instead.’

  Whitmore said quickly: ‘Seems there’s a shipment of 3-inch mortar shells on the way to Jiminez. We can get ‘em diverted here before tomorrow night.’

  Miss Jiminez said: ‘For the same weight, you can carry nearly two hundred shells. In fact, it might be better than bombs anyway.’

  I looked carefully around them. ‘Mortar shells?’ I said. ‘Two hundred of them? How do I attach them to just four shackles? And fused, I suppose -live, before I took off. It just needs one to shake loose among two hundred… I want a fast takeoff, but not without the plane.’

  Miss Jiminez gave me a look that made it clear Clausewitz wouldn’t have condescended to fight in the same war as me. Even on the other side.

  J.B. said: ‘Well, no posse, no horse – better turn in your badge, Carr.’

  Whitmore heaved his shoulders, growled: ‘I suppose we could always throw rocks at them.’

  ‘We’d bloody well better, if he’s really going to make hismove,’ I growled. Then an idea struck. ‘Although bricks would be better.’