Manhunt Is My Mission

by Stephen Marlowe

  “What do you think he’s planning for your father if you think he’ll take out his revenge on an innocent child?”

  “He wouldn’t dare hurt my father. We’re going to take Mahmoud with us. That’s final.”

  It wasn’t just Mahmoud’s fate that was bothering Samia, I realized. If she made a point about taking Mahmoud with us, she could almost convince herself that her father’s life wasn’t in danger. And that was what she refused to face—the fact that the man she’d loved for four years could have been planning her father’s death. Not that her self-deception would help Falcon Pasha. If Capehart was right, any delay might be fatal to the General.

  “We don’t dare waste a minute,” Capehart said.

  “We’re not going without Mahmoud.”

  “Your father—”

  I went to the door. “Cut it out, both of you. I’ll get Mahmoud. You’re making a big thing out of it. The boy came with me; Colonel Azam knows that, doesn’t he? Stop worrying.”

  But after Samia told me exactly where Galib lived, I took Dr. Capehart outside and said: “Give me half an hour. No more. If I’m not back, club the girl on the head if you have to, but drive her to Shughur City.”

  “Then I take it you’re beginning to realize how important what happens here in Motamar is.”

  “The only thing I realize is that if they recognized her when she went back there, Samia’s own life is in danger.”

  “Then why go for the boy?”

  “You have to live with yourself, don’t you? Isn’t that why you came to Motamar?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “Samia came here to find her lover. He knocked her for an emotional loop. She found a helpless child instead.”

  Dr. Capehart frowned, not getting it.

  “She’s got to live with herself too,” I said. Then I started down the hill.

  4

  I COULD HAVE TAKEN off my shoes and gone in like a second-story man.

  I could have pulled my gun and made like a commando.

  I did neither. What I did was barge right up to a soldier sitting on a rock in front of the house with a rifle across his knees and demand belligerently: “Where’s Azam?”

  “Effendi?” he said. He sounded startled.

  “Azam. Colonel Galib Azam,” I said loudly and petulantly. “I want to see Colonel Azam. Right now!”

  The soldier jerked to his feet. He poked the muzzle of his rifle against the small of my back and marched me to the door. I didn’t wait for him to knock or give the password or whatever the hell he was going to do. I rapped smartly on the door with the knuckles of my right hand and shouted:

  “Azam! I know you’re in there.”

  A servant in a burnoose opened the door. “Where’s Azam?” I shouted. “He can hear me, can’t he? He’s not deaf, is he?”

  He wasn’t deaf. I heard footsteps inside the house.

  Then a tall man in the khaki Legion uniform appeared behind the servant. In the light of a torch burning in a niche high on the whitewashed wall inside the door, his face looked ruddy. He was my height, which is six-one, and my weight, which is one-ninety. He had curly black hair and a handsome hawk-nosed face as wide at the jaw as it was at the temples. My mouth felt dry. He looked as easy to bluff as a tarantula.

  “Colonel Azam?” I said.

  “I’m Galib Azam. You’re the American who brought Samia Falcon here from the Shughur Road this afternoon, aren’t you?” His English was good. He flashed large white teeth at me in a big smile.

  I didn’t smile back. “If Miss Falcon told you about me, then that makes this easier,” I said stiffly.

  “Will you come in?” he said.

  “No,” I said aggressively. “Why should I? I can say what I have to say right here,” I shouted.

  His smile had become slightly patronizing. That was good: I was banking on Samia having judged him correctly. Samia was the teenaged kid of four years ago, with her teenager’s crush on him. He couldn’t see her as the woman she had become. Marrying her just suited him. And me? I was the loud, not-too-subtle, not-too-bright American who thought he owned the world.

  “All right,” Colonel Azam said. “If you can say what you have to say right here, say it.”

  “Well, you can’t blame me for wanting to raise the roof,” I said petulantly. “Can you?”

  The patronizing smile was a little forced now. “Get to the point, won’t you?” Colonel Azam said.

  “Sure. I flew four thousand miles to bring Dr. Turner Capehart home. I’m a private detective,” I said self-righteously, as if I thought private detectives are one cut above Motamar Legion colonels. “I work in Washington. That’s the capital of the United States, Colonel.” I hoped I wasn’t troweling it on too thick.

  Galib Azam smirked. “I know where Washington is.”

  “You better hope to hell you do. I’ve had senators for clients, Colonel. I’m on first-name terms with two members of the Foreign Affairs Committee, a Democrat and a Republican.”

  “I congratulate you.”

  “Do you know who Dr. Capehart’s brother is?”

  “The Ambassador to San Marino?” he asked with a perfectly straight face. He was beginning to enjoy himself. It wasn’t often he bumped into an American like me. It wasn’t often anyone did.

  “The Under-Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare,” I said indignantly. “I thought everyone in the civilized world knew that.”

  “Well, I know it now. Thank you for the information.”

  “The Secretary hired me to bring his brother home. I don’t like to name-drop, Colonel. I just thought I’d tell you who’s behind me.”

  “And?”

  “Don’t act so innocent. You know damned well Dr. Capehart said he wouldn’t come.”

  “I know it now.”

  “I know how you Asiatics do things,” I shouted. “That man’s been brainwashed. You won’t get away with it, Colonel Galib.”

  “Colonel Azam,” he corrected me. “What did Dr. Capehart tell you?”

  “That he’s staying in Motamar as long as you’ll have him. Those words were obviously put into his mouth. Obviously.”

  “What do you expect me to do about it?”

  “Order him out of the country if you have to. That man is coming home with me,” I insisted.

  Colonel Azam gave me another patronizing smile. “Don’t you think he ought to be allowed to make up his own mind?”

  “That’s just it,” I said. “You’re stalling.”

  “Let’s both talk to Dr. Capehart about it,” he suggested.

  I got a sick smile on my face. “You mean now?”

  “Fine. Now.”

  “Well, gee, Colonel,” I said sheepishly, “the fact is—I mean I can sort of run away with myself sometimes—I had a little argument with Dr. Capehart about his staying here. He wouldn’t want to talk to me now.”

  “He wouldn’t?”

  “Well, the fact is, he said I could sleep in his house tonight, but he wants me out of there in the morning. I guess we didn’t hit it off so good together.”

  “Then exactly what is it you want me to do?”

  “He won’t be so upset in the morning. I want you to see him with me in the morning.”

  “Very well. I will.” Colonel Azam started to shut the door.

  “Just hold on a minute,” I said, petulant again. “I want to go on record as saying he was brainwashed.”

  “You already have.”

  “You haven’t pulled the wool over my eyes. He was brainwashed. That’s what I’m going to tell his brother.”

  “If you’re going to, you’re going to.”

  He started to shut the door again.

  “And I don’t want that kid spending the night here,” I said.

  “You mean Mahmoud?”

  “You know damn well I mean Mahmoud. I’m going to take him to the Red Cross in Shughur City in the morning. For your sake I hope Dr. Capehart is with us.”

  “Then leave
the boy alone until morning. He’s asleep. Miss Falcon left him here.”

  “Oh no you don’t,” I said. “He’s coming back to Dr. Capehart’s house with me tonight. We found him lying in the dust on the road. He may need a doctor.” I added: “An American doctor.”

  “Let him sleep,” Colonel Azam said, exasperated.

  “I said he’s coming with me. If you don’t give him up, I’ll see Miss Falcon about it. Right now.”

  “She’s tired. She’s sleeping too.”

  That meant Samia hadn’t been recognized on her return here. I said: “Inside?”

  “No. At her father’s.”

  “Where is it? She’s just as responsible for the boy as I am. She’ll tell you to let me take him to Dr. Capehart.” We stared at each other. What was going through his mind, I hoped, was the fact that he didn’t want an American with a brain the size of a sweet pea and a mouth the size of New York harbor bothering Samia Falcon now. He shrugged finally and said something to the servant in the burnoose. The man’s sandaled feet whispered down the hall. A few minutes later he came back with Mahmoud, his little head nodding, bundled in a robe.

  “I congratulate Dr. Capehart’s brother on his choice of an agent,” Colonel Azam said. “You are a very stubborn man.” His smile was faintly mocking.

  “You’ll see how stubborn in the morning at Dr. Capehart’s,” I promised, and got out of there with Mahmoud.

  5

  ALL NIGHT THE refugees milled about the walls of Shughur City.

  It took us a half-hour to get there in Dr. Capehart’s old Ford, and three hours to await our turn at the Qasr Tabuk gate. King Khalil’s Scourge of Allah troops had ringed the gate with steel—a dozen heavy tanks, their 88’s leveled at point-blank range. One big Sherman squatted on its treads outside the ring, its turret rotating slowly, the muzzle of the 88 pointing first at the crowd of refugees streaming in, then at the gate itself, then at the dark silhouettes of the Shughur Hills.

  You had to run a gauntlet of two check-points: one outside the gate staffed by Scourge of Allah troops in their green uniforms; the other inside the gate staffed by Falcon Pasha’s Motamar Legion rebels in their khakis. There was a confused clamor of sound—motors racing in the hot night, carts creaking, voices shouting. Dust rose like smoke in the glare of the floodlights the Scourge of Allah directed at the gate. Once a jet swooped low, its exhaust blasting the night with sound.

  We lined up behind a dusty Citroën and waited. Mahmoud was sleeping on Samia’s lap in the back of the Ford. I sat up front with Dr. Capehart.

  “Now do you understand why I can’t leave?” he asked me. “It’s normally a city of two hundred thousand. There are nine gates, and refugees coming in from the south through most of them. By morning three hundred thousand people will be jamming the streets between the city wall and the harbor, almost half of them homeless, most of them starving, louse-ridden and exhausted. If a plague doesn’t break out, it will be a miracle.”

  I nodded, but I was thinking of something else. I said: “King Khalil knows what he’s doing.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Let enough refugees pour into Shughur City and the Legion won’t be able to put up much of a defense. Khalil will be trading their lives for a military victory.”

  Dr. Capehart shook his head. “Khalil wouldn’t do that. El Thamad might, but not Khalil.”

  I didn’t want to argue with him. El Thamad had no reason to turn a hundred thousand refugees loose in Shughur City, not if he was planning to murder the King and take over the country himself. Maybe, I thought, El Thamad was going through the motions because Khalil had flown to Shughur City. Maybe he’d go on being Khalil’s hatchetman if the assassination plot failed. Like so many despots, King Khalil was loved by many of his people. He was a Fatimite with a family tree that probably went halfway back to Noah’s Ark, and El Thamad hadn’t even been born in Motamar. Or maybe, I went on thinking, that was why El Thamad needed Galib Azam. The Legion colonel came from an old Motamar family; with Khalil dead, the people might rally around him, and there was nothing to stop El Thamad from calling the shots with Galib Azam as his mouthpiece.

  Which left no place in any possible political set-up for Samia’s father.

  If Khalil lived and triumphed, Falcon Pasha would face a firing squad as the leader of the rebellious Legion.

  If Khalil died, Falcon Pasha would make a convenient patsy as the ringleader of the assassination plot.

  I turned around and looked at Samia. Mahmoud had stirred in his sleep. She was crooning to him. If she realized a two-edged sword dangled over her father’s head, she didn’t show it. She almost looked happy.

  Dr. Capehart put the Ford in gear and we lurched forward a few yards. Just then one of the spotlights swung around and glared on the Citroën ahead of us. Four soldiers trotted over to it. Two men and a woman got out, looking scared. The older of the two argued with one of the soldiers. The soldier hit him with brutal indifference on the side of his head. His knees buckling, he crashed back against the fender of the Citroën. The soldier shot him, casually, and then leaned in through the gaping front door of the car and straightened with a ring of keys in his hand.

  He went around to the trunk. The woman made a run for it. One of the soldiers tripped her.

  Then the trunk-lid had opened. In the trunk were a dozen rifles. They looked new. Their barrels were still covered with Cosmolene.

  The woman got to her feet. When she saw that the trunk had been opened, she tried to run again. I felt my fists clenching. I could do nothing. The woman took three running steps. She was wearing Western-style clothing with a tight skirt that hampered her movements. The soldier who had tripped her yanked a revolver from his belt.

  I opened the door on my side of the Ford. “Hold it,” Dr. Capehart warned me. “You can’t do anything.” His fingers closed on my shoulder.

  The soldier fired twice and the woman folded and went down. Her younger companion just stood by and watched. His time had come, and he knew it. He had a look half of ingratiation and half of terror on his face. He began to talk. He babbled, waving his hands. His eyes were drawn like magnets to the crowds milling about the line of cars. You could see What he was thinking: if he reached the mob he could lose himself in it. Still babbling, he edged sideways away from the Citroen.

  One of the soldiers had a rifle. When he had enough room he grasped the barrel and swung it with all his might. The heavy stock smashed the man’s skull. He crumpled and didn’t get up.

  The soldier with the keys locked the trunk, then backed and filed the car until he could drive it out of line. Trying to advance it a few more yards, Dr. Capehart stalled the Ford. His hands were shaking.

  “Slip over,” I said. “I’ll drive.”

  Samia was crying softly. Mahmoud still slept.

  If they executed gun-runners so summarily, I thought, what would they do to us if they knew why we had come to Shughur City?

  As we drove the last few agonizing yards to the check-point, I told Samia: “If they ask you anything, you don’t speak Arabic. Just English.”

  “Yes. All right.”

  A mud-brick arch loomed over us. The overheated engine of the Ford thundered under it. Three green-clad Scourge of Allah soldiers stood on either side of the archway. Beyond it, shining in our headlight beams, was a tangle of barbed wire. A single narrow lane barely wide enough for a car led through it. On either side, caught in the wire, were two enormous portraits. One showed King Khalil on a white Arabian stallion. The other showed El Thamad in his Scourge of Allah uniform.

  It was an old revolutionists’ trick. It was always done and it never did any good. When the government troops attacked through the Qasr Tabuk gate, they’d have to fire first oh pictures of their leaders.

  I tried to make out the Legion check-point on the other side of the barbed wire. I couldn’t. Here under the arch of the gate it seemed like a very polite civil war, with a boundary of barbed wire laid between the contend
ing forces and recognized by both of them. When the flow of refugees slowed to a trickle, I wondered how long it would take the Scourge of Allah tanks to roll over the barbed wire entanglement.

  We’ll know in the morning, I thought. And then I thought, if we live to see morning.

  They were spot-checking maybe one vehicle in ten at the gate. They had no time to check more, not if they wanted to choke the city with refugees.

  We waited for the soldiers to wave us on. We’d had to come this way; Shughur City was walled on three sides and opened on the Mediterranean on the fourth.

  “What do you think?” Dr. Capehart asked me.

  I shrugged. The Ford was idling laboriously in neutral. The soldiers just stood there, watching us. I put the Ford in first gear.

  One of the soldiers marched in front of the headlights and held his rifle at port arms.

  Another came to the window and barked something at me in Arabic.

  “Sorry,” I said. “We’re Americans. I don’t understand you.”

  “Americans?” He looked noncommittal.

  “That’s right.”

  He called another soldier over. This one was a short, stocky, scowling man who needed a shave. “You have passports?”

  “Sure,” I said, fumbling for mine. I thought, all they have to do is see the name on Samia’s passport. I felt the weight of the Magnum in its shoulder holster. I showed my green American passport, opened at the page of the Motamar visa.

  “Yours please, effendi,” the soldier told Dr. Capehart. If he recognized Capehart’s name? It wasn’t any secret that Capehart had treated Colonel Azam, and anyone in the green-twill uniform of the Scourge of Allah would get a medal for putting a bullet through Galib Azam’s head.

  He returned Dr. Capehart’s passport. The name meant nothing to him.

  “Now the woman’s,” he said. My palms were clammy. The back of my neck felt stiff.