A Soft Barren Aftershock

by F. Paul Wilson

  Doubt wriggled in his gut. What if the runner had pulled a double reverse? If so, he was already out of reach . . . as good as home free.

  “Getting close,” Cramer said. “See him yet?”

  “No.”

  “Still coming right at us. Think he knows we’re here?”

  “He knows. He’s got infrared too.”

  “Yeah, well, he ain’t acting like it. Maybe we should turn the running—”

  And then a dazzling flash of lightning to the south and Henriques saw it. A Hutch 686.

  He let out a whoop of triumph. “It’s him! We got him!”

  “I see him!” Cramer called. “But he’s coming right at us. Is he crazy?”

  “No, he’s not crazy. And he’s not going to hit us. Bring us about. We got us a chase!”

  Cramer stood frozen at the wheel. “He’s gonna ram us!”

  “Shit!”

  Henriques grabbed the spotlight, thumbed the switch and swiveled it toward the oncoming boat. He picked up the charging bow, the flying spray, almost on top of them, and goddamn if it didn’t look like the bastard was really going to ram them.

  Henriques braced himself as Cramer shouted incoherently and ducked behind the console. But at the last minute the runner swerved and flashed past to starboard, sending a wave of wake over the gunwale.

  “After him!” Henriques screamed. “After him, goddamn it!”

  Cramer was pushing on the throttle, yanking on the wheel, bringing them around. But the ankle-deep seawater sloshing back and forth in the cockpit slowed her response. The bilge pumps were overwhelmed at the moment, but they’d catch up. The VMA would be planing out again soon. That cute little maneuver had given the runner a head start, but it wouldn’t matter. Henriques had him now. Didn’t even have to catch him. Just follow him back to whatever dock he called home.

  Terry caught himself looking over his shoulder. A reflex. Nothing to see in that mess of rain and wind. He cursed Henriques for not chasing one of the decoys. The guy seemed to read his mind. Well, why not? They were both Conchs.

  Terry had only one trick left up his sleeve. If that didn’t work . . .

  Then what? Sink the Terryfied? What good would that do? The ATF would just haul her up, find out who she belonged to, and then camp outside his door.

  Face it: He doesn’t fall for this last one, I’m screwed.

  And being a Conch, it was a damn good chance Henriques wouldn’t.

  Terry spotted the breakers of the barrier reef ahead. Lightning helped him get his bearings and he headed for the channel. As soon as he cut through, the swells shrank by half and he picked up speed. Now was his one chance to increase the distance between Henriques and himself. If he could get close enough to shore, pull in near the parking lot of one of the waterside restaurants or nightspots, maybe he could merge his infrared tag with the heat from the cars and the kitchen.

  And what would that do besides delay the inevitable? Henriques would—

  A bolt of lightning slashed down at a mangrove keylet to starboard, starkly illuminating the area with a flash of cold brilliance. Terry saw the water, the rain, the mangrove clumps, and something else . . . something that gut-punched him and froze his hands on the wheel.

  “Christ!”

  Just off the port bow and roaring toward him, a swirling, writhing column of white stretching into the darkness above, throwing up a furious cloud of foam and spray as it snaked back and forth across the surface of the water.

  He’d seen plenty of waterspouts before. Couldn’t spend a single season in the Keys without getting used to them, but he’d never—never—been this close to one. Never wanted to be. Waterspout . . . such an innocuous name. Damn thing was a tornado. That white frothy look was seawater spinning at two or three hundred miles an hour. Just brushing its hem would wreck the boat and send him flying. Catching the full brunt of the vortex would tear the Terryfied and its captain to pieces.

  The hungry maw slithered his way across the surface, sucking up seawater and everything it contained, like Mrs. God’s vacuum hose. Somewhere downwind it would rain salt water and fish—and maybe pieces of a certain Conch and his boat if he didn’t do something fast.

  It lunged toward him, its growing roar thundering like a fully-loaded navy cargo jet lifting off from Boca Chica, drowning out his own engine.

  Terry shook off the paralysis and yanked the wheel hard to starboard. For a heartbeat he was sure he’d acted too late. He screamed into a night that had become all noise and water. The boat lurched, the port side lifted, spray drenched him, big hard drops peppering him like rounds from an Uzi. He thought he was going over.

  And then Terryfied righted herself and the raging, swirling ghostly bulk was dodging past the stern, ten, then twenty feet from the transom. He saw it swerve back the other way before it was swallowed by the night and the rain. It seemed to be zigzagging down the channel. Maybe it liked the deeper water. Maybe it was trapped in the rut, in the groove . . . he didn’t know.

  One thing he did know: If not for that lightning flash he’d be dead.

  Would Henriques be so lucky? With the waterspout heading south along the channel and Henriques charging north at full throttle, the ATF could be minus one boat and two men in a minute or so.

  Saved by a waterspout. Who’d ever believe it? No witness except Henriques, and he’d be . . . fish food.

  Terry turned and stared behind him. Nothing but rain and dark. No sign of Henriques’s running lights. Which meant the waterspout was probably between them . . . heading right for Henriques.

  “Shit.”

  He reached for the Very pistol. He knew he was going to regret this.

  “Mother of God!” Cramer shouted.

  Henriques saw it too.

  One instant everything was black, the next the sky was blazing red from the emergency flare sailing through the rain. And silhouetted against the burning glow was something dark and massive, directly in their path.

  Henriques reached past Cramer and yanked the wheel hard to port, hard enough to nearly capsize them. The tower of water roared past like a runaway freight train, leaving them stalled and shaken but in one piece. Henriques watched it retreat, pink now in the fading glow of the flare.

  He turned and scanned the water to the north while Cramer shook and sputtered.

  “You see that? You ever see anything like that? Damn near killed us! Hadn’t been for that flare, we’d be goners!”

  Henriques concentrated on the area around the lighted channel marker dead ahead. Something about that marker . . .

  “There he is!” he shouted as he spotted a pale flash of wake. “Get him!”

  “You gotta be kidding!” Cramer said. “He just saved our asses!”

  “And I’ll be sure to thank him when he’s caught. Now after him, dammit!”

  Cramer grumbled, started the engine, and turned east. He gunned it but Henriques could tell his heart wasn’t in it.

  And he had to admit, some of the fight had gone out of him as well.

  Why had the runner warned them? That baffled him. These guys were scum, running stolen or pilfered medical supplies out to the rich folks on their luxury hospital ships when there was barely enough to go around on shore. Yet the guy had queered his only chance of escape by sending up a warning flare.

  I don’t get it.

  But Henriques couldn’t let that stop him. He couldn’t turn his head and pretend he didn’t see, couldn’t allow himself to be bought off with a flare. He’d seen payoffs all his life—cops, judges, mayors, and plenty Conchs among them. But Pepe Henriques wasn’t joining that crowd.

  The rain was letting up, ceiling lifting, visibility improving. Good. Where were they? He spotted the lights on the three radio towers, which put them off Sugarloaf. So where was the runner heading? Bow Channel, maybe? That would put him into Cudjo Bay. Lots of folks lived on Cudjo Bay. And one of them just might be a runner.

  He retrieved his field glasses and kept them trained on the fleeing
boat as it followed the channel. Didn’t have much choice. Neither of them did. Tide was out and even with the storm there wasn’t enough water to risk running outside the channel, even with the shallow draw of an impeller craft. As they got closer to civilization the channel would be better marked, electric lights and all . . .

  Electric lights.

  He snapped the glasses down but it was too late. Cramer was hauling ass past the red light marker, keeping it to starboard.

  “NO!” Henriques shouted and lunged for the wheel, but too late.

  The hull hit coral and ground to a halt, slamming the two of them against the console. The intakes sucked sand and debris, choked, and cut out.

  Silence, except for Cramer’s cursing.

  “God damn! God-damn-God-damn-God-damn-God damn! Where’s the fucking channel?”

  “You’re out of it,” Henriques said softly, wondering at how calm he felt.

  “I took the goddamn marker to starboard!”

  Henriques nodded in the darkness, hiding his chagrin. He shouldn’t have been so focused on the runner’s boat. Should have been taking in the whole scene. Cramer hadn’t grown up on these waters. Like every seaman, he knew the three R’s: RED-RIGHT-RETURN. Keep the red markers on your right when returning to port. But Cramer couldn’t know that this marker was supposed to be green. Only a Conch would know. Somebody had changed the lens. And Henriques knew who.

  He felt like an idiot but couldn’t help smiling in the dark. He’d been had but good. There’d be another time, but this round went to the runner.

  He reached for the Very pistol.

  “What the hell?”

  The flare took Terry by surprise. What was Henriques up to? The bastard had been chasing him full throttle since dodging that waterspout, and now he was sending up a flare. It wouldn’t throw enough light to make any difference in the chase, and if he needed help, he had a radio.

  Then Terry realized it had come from somewhere in the vicinity of the channel marker he’d tampered with. He pumped a fist into the air. Henriques was stuck and he was letting his prey know it. Why? Payback for Terry’s earlier flare? Maybe. That was all the break he’d ever get from Henriques, he guessed.

  He’d take it.

  Terry eased up on the throttle and sagged back in the chair. His knees felt a little weak. He was safe. But that had been close. Too damn close.

  He cruised toward Cudjo, wondering if this was a sign that he should find another line of work. With Henriques out there, and maybe a few more like him joining the hunt, only a matter of time before they identified him. Might even catch him on the way out with a hold full of contraband. Then it’d be the slammer . . . hard time in a fed lock-up. Quitting now would be the smart thing.

  Right. Someday, but not yet. A couple more runs, then he’d think about it some more.

  And maybe someday after he was out of this, he and Henriques would run into each other in a bar and Terry would buy that Conch a Red Stripe and they’d laugh about these chases.

  Terry thought about that a minute.

  Nah.

  That only happened in movies.

  He gunned his boat toward home.

  ARYANS AND ABSINTHE

  Today it takes 40,000 marks to buy a single US dollar.

  —Volkischer Beobachter, May 4, 1923

  Ernst Drexler found the strangest things entertaining. That was how he always phrased it: entertaining. Even inflation could be entertaining, he said.

  Karl Stehr remembered seeing Ernst around the Berlin art venues for months before he actually met him. He stood out in that perennially scruffy crowd with his neatly pressed suit and vest, starched collar and tie, soft hat either on his head or under his arm, and his distinctive silver-headed cane wrapped in black rhinoceros hide. His black hair swept back sleek as linoleum from his high forehead; the bright blue eyes that framed his aquiline nose were never still, always darting about under his dark eyebrows; thin lips, a strong chin, and tanned skin, even in winter, completed the picture. Karl guessed Ernst to be in his mid-thirties, but his mien was that of someone older.

  For weeks at a time he would seem to be everywhere, and never at a loss for something to say. At the Paul Klee show where Klee’s latest, “The Twittering Machine,” had been on exhibition, Karl had overheard his sarcastic comment that Klee had joined the Bauhaus not a moment too soon. Ernst was always at the right places: at the opening of Dr. Mabuse, der Spieler, at the cast party for that Czech play R.U.R., and at the secret screenings of Murnau’s Nosferatu, to name just a few.

  And then he’d be nowhere. He’d disappear for weeks or a month without a word to anyone. When he returned he would pick up just where he’d left off, as if there’d been no hiatus. And when he was in town he all but lived at the Romanisches Cafe where nightly he would wander among the tables, glass in hand, a meandering focus of raillery and bavardage, dropping dry, witty, acerbic comments on art and literature like ripe fruit. No one seemed to remember who first introduced him to the cafe. He more or less insinuated himself into the regulars on his own. After a while it seemed he had always been there. Everyone knew Ernst but no one knew him well. His persona was a strange mixture of accessibility and aloofness that Karl found intriguing.

  They began their friendship on a cool Saturday evening in the spring. Karl had closed his bookshop early and wandered down Budapesterstrasse to the Romanisches. It occupied the corner at Tauentzien across from the Gedachtniskirche: large for a cafe, with a roomy sidewalk area and a spacious interior for use on inclement days and during the colder seasons.

  Karl had situated himself under the awning, his knickered legs resting on the empty chair next to him; he sipped an aperitif among the blossoming flower boxes as he reread Siddhartha. At the sound of clacking high heels he’d glance up and watch the “new look” women as they trooped past in pairs and trios with their clinging dresses fluttering about their knees and their smooth tight caps pulled down over their bobbed hair, their red lips, mascaraed eyes, and coats trimmed in fluffy fur snuggled around their necks.

  Karl loved Berlin. He’d been infatuated with the city since his first sight of it when his father had brought him here before the war; two years ago, on his twentieth birthday, he’d dropped out of the university to carry on an extended affair with her. His lover was the center of the art world, of the new freedoms. You could be what you wanted here: a free thinker, a free lover, a communist, even a fascist; men could dress like women and women could dress like men. No limits. All the new movements in music, the arts, the cinema, and the theater had their roots here. Every time he turned around he found a new marvel.

  Night was upon Karl’s mistress when Ernst Drexler stopped by the table and introduced himself.

  “We’ve not formally met,” he said, thrusting out his hand. “Your name is Stehr, I believe. Come join me at my table. There are a number of things I wish to discuss with you.”

  Karl wondered what things this man more than ten years his senior could wish to discuss, but since he had no other plans for the evening, he went along.

  The usual crowd was in attendance at the Romanisches that night. Lately it had become the purlieu of Berlin bohemia—all the artists, writers, journalists, critics, composers, editors, directors, scripters, and anyone else who had anything to do with the avant garde of German arts, plus the girlfriends, the boyfriends, the mere hangers-on. Some sat rooted in place, others roved ceaselessly from table to table. Smoke undulated in a muslin layer above a gallimaufry of scraggly beards, stringy manes, bobbed hair framing black-rimmed eyes, homburgs, berets, monocles, pince-nez, foot-long cigarette holders, baggy sweaters, dark stockings, period attire ranging from the Hellenic to the pre-Raphaelite.

  “I saw you at Siegfried the other night,” Ernst said as they reached his table in a dim rear corner, out of the peristaltic flow. Ernst took the seat against the wall where he could watch the room; he left the other for Karl. “What do you think of Lang’s latest?”

  “Very Germanic
,” Karl said as he took his seat and reluctantly turned his back to the room. He was a people watcher.

  Ernst laughed. “How diplomatic! But how true. Deceit, betrayal, and backstabbing—in both the figurative and literal sense. Germanic indeed. Hardly Neue Sachlichkeit, though.”

  “I think New Realism was the furthest thing from Lang’s mind. Now, Die Strasse, on the other hand—”

  “Neue Sachlichkeit will soon join Expressionism in the mausoleum of movements. And good riddance. It is shit.”

  “Kunst ist Scheisse?” Karl said, smiling. “Dada is the deadest of them all.”

  Ernst laughed again. “My, you are sharp, Karl. That’s why I wanted to talk to you. You’re very bright. You’re one of the few people in this room who will be able to appreciate my new entertainment.”

  “Really? And what is that?”

  “Inflation.”

  Before Karl could ask what he meant, Ernst flagged down a passing waiter.

  “The usual for me, Freddy, and—?” He pointed to Karl, who ordered a schnapps.

  “Inflation? Never heard of it. A new card game?”

  Ernst smiled. “No, no. It’s played with money.”

  “Of course. But how—”

  “It’s played with real money in the real world. It’s quite entertaining. I’ve been playing it since the New Year.”

  Freddy soon delivered Karl’s schnapps. For Ernst he brought an empty stemmed glass, a sweaty carafe of chilled water, and a small bowl of sugar cubes. Karl watched fascinated as Ernst pulled a silver flask from his breast pocket and unscrewed the top. He poured three fingers of clear green liquid into the glass, then returned the flask to his coat. Next he produced a slotted spoon, placed a sugar cube in its bowl, and held it over the glass. Then he dribbled water from the carafe, letting it flow over the cube and into the glass to mix with the green liquid . . . which began to turn a pale yellow.

  “Absinthe!” Karl whispered.