by David Cole
37
Kyle sat patiently against the window wall, seated cross-legged, reading a dog-eared paperback of the Lord of the Rings trilogy.
“About time!” Jo said. “About fucking time you came back.”
“I’ve been busy.”
“So have we.”
Kyle stood up, his thumb creasing the page he’d been reading.
“Right,” he said. “You ready to go?”
“I’m not.”
“Oh for Christ’s sake,” Jo exploded. “He’s all packed, got all the gear ready, bought all his guns and radios and things, arranged the vehicles, and we’re just waiting for you so the two of you can leave.”
Don shook his head at everything on the monitors.
“Can you work any computer magic to help me find the right place?”
“I might…I say again, I might have a way to pinpoint the kidnapper’s place. I won’t know until tonight at the earliest, probably not until tomorrow morning.”
“Pinpoint. That’s quite specific.”
“No reason to even tell you about it until I find out more.”
“Okay. Then I’m off.”
“Where?”
“I’ve got a team set up in Nogales, waiting for me with two brand-new Range Rovers and a lot of gear. We’ll spend the rest of the day going to that little town. Benjamin Hill. To the ranchito. Set up our base camp tonight, early light, start eliminating the sky islands. Will this be my ops center?”
“The fixed center. Yes. You’ll also have two people with equipment in a Range Rover, plus Laura with her satcom backup through her own gadgets.”
“How do you know about me?” he asked Don.
“Laura gave me your name last night. I looked up your accounts at Coots, couple of other places on the Strand.”
“Really?”
He was neither appalled or angry, just curious.
“You can do that, mate? Look into secret bank accounts? And I guess if you can do it in London, you can do it anywhere?”
“Almost.”
Kyle gave me a look of approval.
“So this is how you earn your money.”
“One of the ways. Yes.”
“What else?”
“Maybe we can talk about that another time,” Don said.
Without waiting for an answer, Kyle dropped his canvas carryall, unstrapping the cardboard tube lashed to its side. He looked around the room, and went to the biggest wall to begin removing the three prints hung there.
“Careful,” Don said. “Those prints cost me a lot of money.”
Outside of his laptop, his luggage, and his wheelchair, the prints were the only thing Don brought with him from Waukesha.
“Just animals, aren’t they?”
“James Audubon mammals, published by his son Victor. The print on the left is…gently, Kyle, don’t just drop it onto the floor. That’s from Audubon’s Quadruped series. One hundred fifty hand-colored lithographs, maybe the greatest work on American mammals from the nineteenth century.”
“Collect this stuff, mate?”
“Yes. Birds, mostly.”
“So what’s this crittur?”
“A raccoon.”
“Worth?” Kyle said, carefully placing the framed print on the sofa.
“Eighteen thousand. The middle print is an Eskimo dog. I once bid five thousand for one similar to that. Unframed. Didn’t get it.”
“What did you pay for this one?”
“Don’t ask. The third print is an Arctic fox.”
Kyle carefully removed all three prints from the wall and set them on the sofa. He popped the end cap off of the cardboard tube, took out a variety of topo and AAA maps, and started taping them to the wall with gray duct tape. Finished, he began collecting lamps from around the suite, replugging them into sockets near the wall, focusing the light onto the maps.
“Here’s the San Carlos area,” Kyle said.
With a red marker pen, he drew a circle around Guaymas.
“San Carlos,” Don said to himself. He hovered over his keyboard. “Laura. Can I show him that picture you gave me?”
“All right.”
Don called up the picture file. “I spent two weeks’ vacation here. A few years back.”
“That’s San Carlos?” Kyle said.
“Yup. Those two small mountains have a funky name. Goat tits.”
“Where’d you get this?” Kyle asked.
Don looked at me.
“An email intercept,” I said finally. “Maybe…maybe from the kidnappers.”
Kyle snorted.
“Not bloody likely the cartel would send out pictures of where they keep people they’ve kidnapped. But…sometimes…it’s a place they’ve got a connection with.”
We looked from the monitor back to the map.
“Here are half a dozen sky islands,” I said finally, “that Jack Zea says might be likely. She’s running that orthorectifying software.”
“Yeah. Whatever.” He drew red circles around six other locations, all of them inland at various spots in the Sonoran desert. “Targets of opportunity.”
Consulting a computer printout in one hand, he began numbering the circles.
I refocused a floor lamp to shine on the map, reading off what he’d circled. Three circles lay not too far south of Mexican 2, and west of Mexican 15, the main highway from Nogales down to Guaymas.
Sierra el Rajon
Sierra Santa Rosa
Sierra Potrero
Three circles lay farther south.
Sierra Batepito
Sierra Lopez
Sierra Jojoval
He cocked his left hand as though he were gripping a handgun, index finger out and crooked around the trigger. He rapped that knuckle on red number one.
Sierra el Rajon.
“We’ll start there?” I asked.
“We’ll start…here.”
He drew another red circle around the town of Benjamin Hill.
“Why not a bigger city? Say…Santa Ana?”
“’Cause a mate’s rigged up a rental of a small ranchito. Middle of nowhere. Less people likely to wonder about seven people and two Range Rovers.”
“Why do you want to start with the northernmost sky island?” Don asked.
“Because it’s the least likely.”
“Why waste our time?” Jo said. “Let’s go where it’s most likely.”
“Look at this map,” Kyle said patiently. “Look at all these places marked Sierra something or other. At least forty, fifty, I haven’t even counted them all. It could have been any one of them above…here.”
He drew a thick red line north of Hermosillo.
“Why?” Don asked.
“Because I think I ran about one hundred miles,” Jo said.
“Or less,” Kyle said. “Sierra el Rajon is barely thirty miles south of the border.”
“More,” she insisted. “I ran a lot longer than that.”
“Maybe. But you had no water, you were totally stressed out, you wanted to get to safety. Really, love, you have no idea how far you ran.”
She shook her head violently, like a Labrador retriever just emerging from a cold river. He touched her cheek, gently. She swatted his hand away, but kept silent.
“It’s midnight,” Kyle said. “Let’s all catch some sleep. Leave at first light.”
“Let’s leave now!” Jo said.
“Won’t have base camp set up until noon tomorrow. Take us that long to pack gear in Nogales, make sure all our permits are in order.”
“Take the master bedroom,” Don said. “All the way back. Take a whirlpool bath. There are clean terrycloth robes, there are—”
“Just make sure we leave early,” Jo said, disappearing down the hallway.
“Well,” Don said, “what else do we need to do?”
“You think we have a chance to find her cameraman?”
Kyle held up a hand. Wait. We heard water running into the whirlpool bath and a few minute
s later, heard the water jets start up.
“No, mate,” Kyle said flatly. “I figure he’s already dead and chopped to bits.”
“Chopped?” Don said with a mixture of distaste and horror.
“Tell him, Laura.”
“Tell me what?”
“It’s all about,” I said, “it’s…it’s a black market.”
“I thought we were dealing with kidnappers,” Don said carefully.
“We are.”
“Kidnapping involves people. Black markets involve…things.”
“Except…I think…” I saw comprehension stagger him.
“People are things,” he said. “People are…no, not if they’re alive. But if they’re dead, they’re…body parts?”
“Yes.”
“We’re talking about the black market in body parts?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know anything about it?” Kyle asked.
“Not in this hemisphere. In China, convicts who were executed were said to have their body parts sold. Eyes. Liver. Kidneys, heart, skin…even the bones.”
“So tell me, mate,” Kyle asked. “What you reckon my whole body’s worth?”
“Three hundred thousand dollars,” Don said without hesitation.
“But…how?”
“There was a big series in a Los Angeles newspaper. Sometime, months ago, really quite an exposé. But the whole story died out. Sorry. Died…bad word.”
“Good luck,” I said.
“Need a spot of that. When you said…pinpoint…are we talking something like satellite photos?”
“Maybe,” I said, watching Don’s surprised reaction. “Have you and Don exchanged cell numbers?”
“That. Radio frequencies too. Once we cross the border, cell phones work quite differently. I expect you know all about that. But to be safe, I’ve set up a shortwave radio link with Don. This will be Base. The ranchito will be Base One.”
“Just like the movie.”
“Except I’m not Russell Crowe.”
“Be careful.”
“I’m always careful. You, too.”
“Something I have to tell you. I know that you use guns. That you have guns, that you shoot them. But I want to thank you for never having a gun at any time I’ve ever seen you except in Nogales.”
“Got a thing about guns, then?”
“I just wanted to thank you.”
“You join me in Sonora, you’ll see guns. And more.”
“Satcom clearance?” Don asked. “I assumed you’ve been talking with that Gilbert woman. Are we going to tap into one of the government satellites?”
“Very complicated. They’re trying to get one to overfly the Sonoran desert. But somebody at NASA, I think, somebody somewhere has to okay it, a lot of other people have to okay it, then a roomful of people have to do the technical magic.”
“So we wait?”
“We wait for that, yes. She wants to work with me.”
“You’re saying…she wants to work with us.”
“Yes. Problem?”
“Plural. We’ve dodged the law pretty well. We’ve been lucky. Now you want to bring somebody to meet me. Nobody’s ever really seen me, before. Nobody’s hardly even talked to me. Do you trust her?”
“No…maybe.”
“Okay. I’ll get my traveling chair ready.”
“No. I want her to come here.”
“You’re just full of surprises. Why here?”
“Because, unless I’m wrong, she’s going to give us access to Carnivore.”
“Ah,” he said with delight. “Just one peek at it could be worth a lot to us. Tell me again just a bit of what she’s like.”
“Drives a silver Mercedes SL-600.”
“The V-12,” he said with delight.
“Whatever. Blond hair, sometimes red, she said. Spiky, she threatens to lower her head and ram people with it. Issey Miyake clothes, I think Blahnik shoes.”
“Pointy toes. Pointy hair. Is she all pointy pointy, trying to figure things out?”
“Five foot two, eyes of…green, I think. She handles GIS satcom stuff.”
We did this cabaret act to offset feelings of suspicion, to help make up our minds about deeper issues, to temporarily delay the moment of decision.
“Bring her on up,” Kyle said with anticipation, “so we can get on with it.”
“I’m not going with you,” I said.
“You’ve got to go.” Don was insistent.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because I can’t. I’ll stay here and help set things up.”
“Set what up?” Jo demanded from the hallway. “Why am I so fucking out of the loop here?”
“You’re not coming along,” Kyle said. “I made that clear to you.”
Jo gathered her bags of clothing and a briefcase.
“If you hear anything, call me.”
She left the suite, not even bothering to close the door.
“What’s that all about?” I asked.
“CNN contacted her this morning. She’s off to one of the Phoenix TV stations, going to be doing some live interviews. Coordinating. Results of the search, so on, so.”
“She was so keen to go along.”
“If I find the place,” Kyle said, “CNN will fly her down by spaceship. Now, where’s this wizard woman?”
“She’ll be here in five, ten minutes.”
“Well, I’m going to leave you two to your computer gizmos. Once I’m south of the border, I’ll contact you.”
“You leaving now?” I said. “Just like that?”
He hoisted his shoulder bags.
“Ryeghto.”
And he was gone.
“Before this woman comes,” Don said, “you’ve got to see this email message to you, sent to both of the email addresses you gave him.”
can we talk?
“He’s hooked,” I said. “Can you track this message?”
“I’ve already done it. He’s using an AOL account in the name of Stephen Dobbs. I didn’t know if you wanted to show this to the Michelle woman or not.”
“She’s got resources,” I said, uncertain. “She could send police to the address. Have you got an address?”
“In Los Angeles. But I’ve already run a check on the name. Stephen Dobbs was a plastic surgeon.”
“Was?”
“Burned alive in an automobile accident outside of Santa Barbara. But…and this is a very significant but…he was facing disbarment from practicing medicine because he was involved in illegal body parts. Selling them without clearing the sale through official organ donor channels.”
Body parts.
“He’s not dead,” I said.
“I don’t know about that. A passing motorist found the wreck, on fire, used a small fire extinguisher, got the flames out. Body was charred, car was not. They found fingerprints, all kinds of ID.”
“No,” I said firmly. “He’s still alive.”
“What if somebody was dead, but our guy is still alive?”
“Somebody switched bodies?”
“Some switched identities.”
“Run background checks on Stephen Dobbs, on his medical practice.”
“Already doing that,” Don said. “I’m also backtracking his life history.”
The intercom buzzer chimed.
“Here she is,” I said. “Do we tell her?”
“Up to you.”
Michelle was breathless, hair spikes flattened, as though she been absentmindedly brushing it back, like some people do when they’re thinking.
“This is Don Ralph,” I said when she first came into the suite. “Don, this is Michelle Gilbert.”
“This suite’s been leased to Kyle Callaghan,” she said, striding to Don’s wheelchair without hesitation. “I know about him. Rustic type, kidnap and rescue. Somehow, I don’t quite see you doing all that physical stuff. Glad to meet you.”
She opened a black calfskin briefcase, took out a single sheet of paper.
“Department of Justice,” she said. “Authorization for me to use Carnivore for an as-yet-unspecified task.”
Don read it carefully.
Don had already cranked up his most powerful workstation. He wheeled over to it as Michelle took some more paper from her briefcase. She set it beside his keyboard, pointed at a specific IP number.
“You’ve got to download some special software first,” she said.
He went to the site, saw that the screen was almost totally blank except for two files, which he started to download.
“How much do you two know about Carnivore?”
“Only what you people want us to know.”
“Which is?”
“Carnivore is a secret Internet snooping system,” I said. “You…I mean, the government, once you’ve authorized things, you can suck up everything that passes through major Internet nodes.”
“It’s ravenous,” she said. “Downside, it’s totally indiscriminate. Ninety-nine percent crap. What you’re downloading is software that is designed to isolate specific kinds of Internet traffic. Email, chat rooms, bulletin boards, websites…anything suspected of being used for criminal activity, Carnivore can suck up data.”
Don had installed the software and was quickly looking through the menus of each of the three programs. To make things easier, he reinstalled one of the programs on another computer, and I moved the two monitors close together.
“I see how this works,” Don said, studying the menus of the first program.
“But that’s not really what we want,” I added.
“All right.” Michelle took out another sheet of paper. “This is really really technical. I don’t understand hardly any of it. So, while we’re doing this stuff, if you can summarize, once in a while, please. It’s got to be a lot more useful than all the seminars and workshops I’ve gone to over the past two years.”
She pointed at the left monitor.
“How fast is your connection here?”
“Satellite feed. Broadband. About five hundred megabytes per second.”
“In that submenu…there, set it to capture data from the past ten minutes. All right. Put this IP address into that program.”
“That’s the IP address of the first digital photo you showed me.”
“Right. San Carlos marina.”