Hazard

by Gerald A. Browne

  Badr saw him. Badr fired twice.

  Hazard felt the first bullet pass in the air just a fraction above his head. The second wasn’t that close because by then Hazard had rolled off the edge and down several steps. Once out of range he recovered and took the rest of the steps four at a time to the bottom.

  Badr wouldn’t come down after him. Hazard was almost certain of that. Badr wouldn’t come down those lighted stairs where he could be easily picked off. He’d stay up there in the dark.

  Hazard went into the office. He examined the walls hoping to find the switch box for the lights. It wasn’t there, but he found a flashlight that he took with him to search elsewhere.

  He located the switch box in an enclosed recess under the stairs. He opened it to see an arrangement of high-voltage fuses, and directly below those was the automatic timing device. Off to one side was a separate circuit for the office lights, not connected to the automatic control. The timing device was a flat brass disc like the face of a clock, with white numerals one through twelve for day and the same in black for night. Its perimeter was notched all around at quarter-hour intervals, geared precisely to accommodate a pair of small tripping levers, one for “on” and the other for “off.” The on lever was set for white 8:30. The off for black, 5:45.

  Hazard looked at his watch. It was twenty after six. He figured ten minutes would be time enough. With extreme care he adjusted the on lever so it would trip automatically at 6:30.

  After double-checking the timer and his watch he went back to the office. He shoved the flashlight in his jacket pocket just in case nothing worked. Then he turned off the office light. In total darkness he went to the stairs and up, quietly, all the way to the top.

  He’d already decided he would avoid the stacks. For his plan it was better to go straight ahead, slowly, silently, down the space between the rows. In the total black he didn’t know if he was keeping on a straight course, worried that he might be veering off, might bump into one of the stacks. Even a noise that slight could give him away.

  God, the black was thick. He felt pressed by it, surrounded by its substance. Nothing to go by. The boundaries of his own body seemed inaccurate, his feet on the floor too far below, his hand holding the gun too far away. It would, he thought, be easy to panic.

  He had his right forearm over his left wrist, concealing the luminous face of his watch. Keeping his arms in that position, he paused and brought them up to see how much time was left. Only a glimpse but it was a relief to see something, even that little glow. It indicated less than two minutes before 6:30.

  How far into the room had he come? He’d counted thirty steps. Where would that put him? Halfway was where he wanted to be, centered where he’d have an equal chance all around. For the Llama’s range he’d have to be within fifty feet of Badr, sixty at most. The closer the better. But that part of it was beyond his control. On a hunch he took five more steps and stopped for another look at the time.

  Forty seconds to go.

  He put his imagination to work. Visualized a bright light. If he could prepare his eyes, mentally precondition them, it would give him an edge. Contrary to the blackness his eyes were experiencing, he pictured bright light. He concentrated intensely on the thought, the image of glaring brightness, willing his pupils to dilate, as though they were looking directly into the sun. Brilliant, blazing light.

  It came on.

  Badr was no more than twelve feet away, directly in front of his stack of carpets. Badr blinking, squinting from the sudden shock of the light. Badr, tensed, crouched, but he was confused, betrayed by his eyes. Desperately, he fired a shot in the wrong direction.

  Hazard went down on one knee so that he had an upward angle of fire. He squeezed the trigger of the Llama.

  The bullet struck Badr in the soft spot under his chin, exactly between the jawbones. The bullet spread on impact, peeled apart like a four-petaled blossom, went up through the back of Badr’s throat, entered, tore a path through Badr’s brain, and lodged in his skull bone. Badr snapped as though hit by an uppercut. The top half of him spun partly around while his legs gave way. He collapsed backward on the stack.

  Hazard went over to make sure. Badr’s open eyes looked false and glassy and were beginning to turn pink. The bushy growth across the ridge of his brows twitched and then all of him was still. Blood was seeping from him, spoiling the subtle beauty of that precious Kashan carpet.

  Hazard put the Llama back into its holster. He wondered whether he should leave Badr there. He was repulsed at the idea of touching him, decided he’d just find his boots and leave. He turned and found …

  Gabil.

  In that split second no chance to avoid Gabil’s arm that came down on him like a telephone pole.

  The next Hazard knew he was on the floor looking up, unable to move. It seemed as though he were suspended just below a filmy surface. Gabil loomed above him, a tower with a gun. There was the black little mouth hole of its muzzle and Hazard anticipated the flash that would come from it; the last thing he’d ever see. Gabil reached down to search his pockets. Hazard’s DIA identification. Gabil examined the small plastic-coated card front and back and then dropped it on Hazard’s chest.

  Now his life was supposed to flash before his eyes but he didn’t believe his eyes. Gabil stepped over him and out of view. It was merely a postponement, thought Hazard, a brief reprieve for some reason.

  He lay there for what seemed a long while. Gradually his senses cleared and he was able to move. He sat up and looked around. It didn’t make sense. Gabil was gone.

  Badr’s body was also gone. And the blood-stained Kashan carpet. Gone. No evidence of any of it.

  Why?

  Still aching and spinning from the chop he’d taken from Gabil, Hazard found his boots and went downstairs. The way out he found was a side door. He could have locked it shut after him but didn’t bother. The place deserved to be robbed.

  The Maserati was on Seething Lane where he’d left it. No sign of the white Rolls. Two parking tickets were taped to the Maserati’s windshield. Hazard ripped them off and ripped them up. The rain had stopped but the threat of more was hanging overhead. It was early evening. He got into the car and started up, thinking he’d go to his hotel. However, as he made his way across London, using his memory to guide him, he realized how tired he was and how hungry he was, and dirty. He hadn’t shaved in a day and a half. His clothes had been soaked, slept in and crawled on. He’d been shot at, knocked down, close to death and he didn’t deserve being alone. Besides, he had to return her car.

  When he pulled up at her house on Chester Place he doubted she’d be home. But she was. In long pale blue silk and with a nice smile. She didn’t even mention being deserted the night before. She made all the right moves, knew what he needed and supplied it. Warm bath, shave, food and a big bed.

  When he was relaxed, stretched out between the luxury of the world’s finest sheets, Catherine came to him with a red Cartier box.

  “It’s yours,” she said, tossing it.

  He suspected it was an expensive gift that he wouldn’t accept. He opened it and saw it contained money. A thick sheaf of fifty-pound notes.

  “I couldn’t just stand there and do nothing,” she said. “It was incredible. I’d throw the dice and time after time the croupier would push them back to me along with more chips.”

  He’d left about seven thousand dollars worth of chips at the table. He riffled through the banknotes and estimated fifteen thousand. He didn’t know whether to believe her or not. Maybe she’d lost everything and was more than making up for it. She was now sitting on the edge of the bed. He wanted to believe her.

  “I had no idea what I was doing,” she said convincingly. “But aren’t you pleased?”

  “Very.”

  Delighted, she let her head fall back on the pillow beside his. Her body was angled away but she was close enough for Hazard to breathe the promising clean fragrance of her.

  His conscience did its
best to remind him tonight was one of those every other nights when he was supposed to send to Keven.

  11

  FIVE HOURS difference.

  In London, Keven thought, people were in the middle of their night while hers hadn’t yet begun. She was a little disturbed by the idea of anyone, particularly anyone in London, being ahead of her. It seemed they had the advantage of already knowing the immediate future.

  Fifteen minutes until exercise time. At exactly seven o’clock she’d be in touch with Hazard. In touch, she thought regretfully, wasn’t true. Hearing from? Seeing? Feeling? All those. Maybe a better way of putting it was sensing. Yes, she’d be sensing him. But not in touch, not touching.

  All that day and the day before she’d been looking forward to this exercise, her anticipation building as the time drew nearer. No matter that the connection would be tenuous, brief and one-way. It was, she felt, a privileged form of communion, actually more intimate than a letter or phone call. The intimacy of it was enhanced by the fact that this time she wouldn’t be all wired up. Kersh had suggested they forego the computer analysis and monitoring, at least for the first few of these overseas exercises. He had her sit outside on the flagstone steps with a watch, an ordinary sketch pad, and a spectrum of crayons. She welcomed not being responsible to all that complex electronic equipment and, in her opinion, the late-day sun reflecting on the Sound was much more helpful than a black nothing wall. She was on her own—a condition she’d always told herself was best.

  He’d been gone four days.

  The previous Friday he’d left her in bed at his place, just given her a kiss and picked up his bag and gone to the airport. Good-bye was something they’d never said to one another, so it would have seemed an ill omen to say it then. Earlier he’d asked her if she wanted to see him off at the airport and she’d told him no, keeping her reason to herself. Soon after he left she got up, dressed hurriedly, and took a cab out to Kennedy.

  She knew which flight he was taking and from a discreet vantage she watched him check in at the counter. Him, outstandingly familiar to her among strangers. It was a sad amusement for her to observe his stance, the various physical ways he alone expressed himself, gestures and facial expression. She recognized signs of his impatience and believed she also saw his anxiety.

  He stopped at a concession to buy candy bars and she mentally chastized him for eating such junk. He also bought a couple of magazines she knew he’d be able to read from cover to cover in practically no time. He’d be bored, she thought, but not if she were going with him. If she were going with him she might even let him eat the candy without saying a word.

  He headed for his boarding gate. Going up the long red-carpeted tunnel there weren’t many people, and if he’d turned to look back then he would have seen her. If that happened she was prepared to run to him and present herself as a surprise. But he didn’t turn and she kept her eyes on the back of him, picturing how he looked from the front.

  She didn’t follow him into the boarding lounge. She waited in the tunnel until she was sure he’d gone aboard and then she went to the vacant lounge to stand by the window and see the silver, red and white mass of the jet already disconnected and moving slowly away sideways. There were the plane’s many windows framing the lighted faces of passengers looking out. She tried to find his face but couldn’t definitely and finally had to settle on one she believed was his. She waved for attention with both arms, and she kept on waving until after the jet rolled forward and out of view. For a long while she stood there. It wasn’t like her to cry and as usual she didn’t have any tissues in her bag. She blamed the damned airplane.

  Back in the city she went to her own place. She hadn’t been there for days and mail had accumulated. Nothing important, just junk mail trying to get her to send money. Among them a solitary handwritten one. A letter from the mother. She knew what it would say and she skimmed the lines for the sum of it. Can you spare a little? Love and kisses and God watch over her. At least this time, thought Keven, the mother wasn’t asking for the money to be sent Western Union, not that desperate this time.

  Better do it now and get it out of the way. She wrote a check for a hundred, tore it up and wrote another for a hundred fifty. The check alone in an envelope seemed too severe. She enclosed a short note saying all was fine and hope this helps. She stamped it with an air mail and then, as an afterthought, put on enough additional stamps and printed “Special Delivery” above the mother’s current address. If she mailed it that night it would arrive in Salt Lake City the next day. But she undressed completely, let her clothes just drop anywhere and went into the kitchen hoping to find something to eat that suited her mood.

  Not much there. Celery and carrot sticks she’d cut a week before had kept fresh in a jar of water; so, some of those and a slightly stale slice of organic whole-grain bread. She poured too much Tupelo honey on the bread and ate it standing there, getting honey on her fingers and the corners of her mouth. As she licked off the stickiness she suddenly became very aware of her tongue, reminded of its various uses. She recognized the thought as a wedging one that might open up serious self-appraisal if she allowed it. She replaced it with the happier prospect of ice cream. In the freezer compartment she found some forgotten rocky road, her second most favorite. Half a quart weeks old with lots of frost crystals on it. She took it and a spoon into the other room.

  An everything room. She called it that rather than the renting term “single.” One space with a section near the entrance that was supposed to be a dining area. Every time she moved she vowed the next place would have a bedroom but she always eventually settled for another similar everything room. Always only partially furnished because she too quickly lost interest in it.

  She lay nude and uncovered, with a leg up on the back of the convertible sofa, an immodest alone position, and her thoughts went to him flying away at thirty-five thousand feet. He was way up and she was down. The ice cream had a refrigerator taste but it was better than nothing. He was just away on an ordinary trip he would surely return from, she pretended, thinking positive. She couldn’t keep her thoughts from turning over to the negative side. The spoon was too short for the quart container and the ice cream was frozen hard but she dug in, scraping, not wanting to wait until it softened. He was flying away at hundreds of miles per hour. Why is it, she thought, men are always hurrying away and women always waiting? There was no consolation in his reason for going. Actually, his reason was selfishly masculine, indulgent, careless, and … admirable. However, he could have stayed to fight insomnia and watch old movies and been safe with her.

  Cope, detach, she advised herself. And, trying, she reviewed some of the rules she’d set for survival: Win without sympathy for the loser, never accept defeat, and never even consider surrendering. Abandon, amputate without a wince, hurt instead of be hurt no matter how much it hurt. Avoid the pitfall of the old romantic promises. Don’t let your body trap you!

  New by-laws of her gender.

  Keven wondered if any woman could really live up to them. She knew deep down that she couldn’t. As much as she wanted to prevent being victimized, from being unfairly forced into the old abject female role, she had to admit to a natural side of her that found virtues in those very things she resisted. Sometimes, especially lately, she thought it would be marvelous to have the courage to surrender, the confidence to just give in. Maybe she’d already had too much independence, been on her own too long. Somewhere along the line she’d come to realize there was a rock-bottom fact of life that one had to get down to sooner or later.

  Aloneness.

  Not to be confused with loneliness. There were many clever cures for loneliness, but aloneness was something no one could overcome. Everyone wanted to join and share, share experiences. Trying to do that, trying vainly to make up for not being able to do that, left one feeling so futile. And certainly independence didn’t help. If anything, independence left one facing aloneness alone, and who could handle that without cras
hing?

  Maybe, thought Keven, aloneness was not without purpose. Maybe things were intentionally arranged that way to get people to depend on each other all the more, to take comfort from one another. To love. Of all the alternatives it seemed to her that love was the only possible way to offset aloneness. Not a remedy but at least it helped.

  If at that moment he’d been there she would have insisted on doing his feet.

  She finished the ice cream and turned on her portable television, just picture, no sound. Burt Lancaster was being an incredible pirate. She’d seen that movie three, probably four times. Nevertheless she watched intently as Burt invited danger and miraculously escaped death with chest and teeth bared.

  Haz could do it, Keven thought with recharged optimism. He could come back all right.

  After the movie she decided against converting the sofa into a bed because a bed would be lonelier. From the bottom drawer of an unpainted chest she got a crocheted wool afghan to cover herself. She was chilled, possibly from the ice cream. The afghan smelled of moth repellent. It had been a gift three Christmases ago from the mother, who claimed months of loving labor spent on it. But the mother had overlooked a little manufacturer’s label sewn to one corner that gave away her lie. The mother was always incriminating herself ridiculously like that, often in ways most people would consider unforgivable. Keven had long given up blaming her or hoping she’d change.

  Numerous times over the years the mother had voluntarily revealed to Keven who the father was. As though it were an important secret. But each time she’d named someone different and, anyway, to Keven they were only names. Keven was convinced the mother didn’t know, hadn’t ever really known the father. An impulsive, passionate moment between two first-name-only strangers who immediately afterward had gone separate ways. Keven imagined that was the truth of it. And she was the result, thank you very much. She wasn’t bitter about it. Her compensating philosophy was that being “a child of passion” was something most people couldn’t claim. It even sounded more sensitive.