His classmates had spilled out from behind the front of the float and stood gaping at them: Eddie Cortes in the blue-and-gold marching band’s jacket, Trudy Lamarre in her tiny shimmering skirt, Vernon and Wheeler in their Boy Scouts browns, and Ruddy Kissel in store-bought western gear.
“Did everyone hear McCauley’s story?” Major Arm-bruster said, smiling. “Your friend here has got quite an imagination.” And all at once, just like Shubin in the diner, the major burst out laughing.
Offended, Jake squinted at the laughing major. He did not take Jake seriously at all. For the head of security at the air force base, laughing was hardly the way to treat such important matters. At least Shubin, a Communist and the enemy of the United States, took Jake seriously enough to want to kill him.
The major’s rollicking laughter was so catching that even though Jake’s classmates had no idea what was supposed to be funny, they were now laughing, too—not simply laughing, but trying to laugh harder than the next kid just to show off before the handsome major.
“We got no time for this, bud,” Jake said, turning to Duane, but Duane, too, doubling over and holding his belly and shaking, was laughing hard, so hard that it was easy to tell he was only pretending to be laughing.
43
Jake’s mother worked for a fellow named Hoover, who was in the window shades business—blinds, drapes, shutters—stuff you could not see through. She had often talked about keeping Hoover’s files in order and managing reports, but it was so boring that Jake had never paid attention. At home, she kept her office number penciled on the hallway wall beside the telephone in case of an emergency, but there were never any emergencies worth worrying her about, and Jake, who once had memorized the number, had forgotten it by now. He had neither visited Hoover’s workshop—who would want to watch blinds being made?—nor ever wondered where the workshop was located, but once, his mother had mentioned that when she went to work she had always parked her Chevy on Fourth below Broadway. Figuring the workshop must be somewhere near there, Jake hobbled down Fourth Avenue, scanning both sides of the street for any sign with Hoover’s name on it.
The thought of seeing his mother made Jake uneasy. Since she had let Shubin move into his dad’s attic, she had been acting strangely, as if she had learned some secret but had refused to share it with Jake. Of course he knew by now what that secret was. Shubin must have told her that Jake’s father was alive and coming back. But why would she keep from Jake such important and wonderful news? Was she not allowed to tell Jake about his father? Was she afraid of Shubin? No, she did not seem to be afraid of him at all. She had tried harder to please Shubin than she had ever tried to please her own son.
Jake waited on the corner for the bus to bounce by, then crossed the street, walking as fast as his bad leg would carry him, turning his head this way and that and reading the shop signs. A barbershop, a laundry, a shoe repair, a garage across the street, but no Hoover anywhere. His ankle was hurting, probably swelling again.
He tried to imagine Hoover’s workshop. The floor would be covered in wood shavings and sawdust, and it would be stuffy in there and noisy from the shrill of a circular saw. Hoover would be working the saw, splitting lumber into narrow planks to make window shutters, and Jake would have to shout to his mother over the noise of the saw. Hoover would glance at them every now and then, eavesdropping, probably angry that Mrs. McCauley had a visitor in the middle of the busy day. Jake imagined his mother’s pale and tear-stained face after he had revealed the truth to her about Shubin. How ashamed she would probably feel for all the harm she had done to Jake. Hoover, no doubt, would stare at his mother crying, while Jake would stand there, proud that he had proved his mother wrong.
Jake grimaced, not from the pain in his ankle, but from the embarrassing scene he had imagined. It seemed so phony. He did not want his mother to be ashamed in front of that nosy Hoover and he did not want his mother to cry.
He hobbled for some time looking under his feet, feeling sad about his poor mother, and sad about himself, and sad about his father, who was out there somewhere not even suspecting that his life was in danger. When he crossed Eighteenth Street, the word Hoover floated up in his mind, and he realized that he had just missed what he was looking for. He wheeled around and retraced his steps.
Half a block up Fourth Avenue, on the east side of the street, he halted before a storefront, or what used to be a storefront. A sheet of crumbling plywood boarded shattered windows, the splintered door was nailed behind a pair of crisscrossed two-by-fours, and above it, sagging off the wall, a sign so sun-bleached that Jake could barely make it out: HOOVER BLINDS, SHADES, CURTAINS & SHUTTERS MADE TO ORDER.
Hoover must have moved his workshop to a new location and his mother had forgotten to tell him, or she had told him but Jake had forgotten to listen. Dumbfounded, he stood in the hard glare of the blazing sun, gaping at the boarded-up storefront. He did not like the look of that storefront. He did not like the look of it at all. His skin prickled from the heavy static air that crackled with electricity. He shuffled from one foot to the other, unnerved from some eerie expectation, but what he was expecting, he could not tell. That same feeling that nagged at him before, the feeling that much worse things were yet to come, had suddenly returned and overwhelmed him.
A slanted shadow slid across the storefront. As Jake turned to look at the approaching figure, a bright white light flashed inside his head. The gritty sidewalk swung at him and smacked him in the face. Then someone switched off the sun.
44
When Jake’s vision came back, it came back slowly. For a long time, he felt as if he were straining to see through a thick layer of fog. When the fog finally cleared, he saw the riveted aluminum walls curving over him and thought that he was inside the cockpit of a bomber. He looked around for the flight deck with the control wheel and the throttles, but what he saw instead was the cramped interior of an aluminum camper trailer.
The left side of his face was throbbing with pain. He tried to rub at his temple, but could not lift his arm. A thick rope twined around his arms, chest, thighs, and shins bound him to the folding chair.
He tried to scoot the chair forward but lost his balance and nearly tipped it over. He stopped moving and cautiously looked around. Beside him, on a table coated with buckling Formica, the half-eaten remains of some unknown fowl stabbed with cigarette butts was spread-eagled over greasy butcher paper. Overcome with nausea, he quickly looked away.
Drained beer bottles, discarded articles of clothing, and empty food cans moldy-green inside landscaped the trailer’s floor. He breathed in a familiar sick-sweet smell and, glancing to his right, saw a set of gold-plated dentures submerged underwater inside a grimy glass. He gasped and, straining at the ropes, rocked side to side, desperate to free himself.
Three rapid knocks on the window behind his back made him stop rocking and cautiously look over his shoulder. Outside the window, Agent Bader, with his nose pressed against the dusty glass, was staring at him. Jake stared back. Bader’s right hand came into view gripping a small revolver. He pressed its stocky muzzle against his lips, ordering Jake to be quiet, and ducked out of sight.
The floor swayed under Jake’s chair, the trailer shuddered, the door banged open, and Bull lumbered in, bowing the massive ball of his head to fit below the door frame. When he turned to lock the door, Jake glimpsed rust-colored water sloshing inside the plastic bucket held in Bull’s hand. The armpits of Bull’s crumpled shirt were stained with dark sweat patches, and his trousers bagged down loose and greasy over his behind. Under his right back pocket, Jake could distinctly make out the shape of a handgun. The door clicked shut, and Bull’s enormous body swung around. Jake closed his eyes.
The trailer swayed like a boat on stormy swells under Bull’s heavy footfalls. When the sickening motion stopped, Jake heard Bull wheezing beside him. Afraid to raise his eyelids, he was waiting for what would happen next. Suddenly a waterfall drenched his head and shoulders. He gasped and shi
vered and opened his eyes.
Bull flipped the empty water bucket, placed it close to Jake’s chair, and carefully lowered his hefty bulk onto the bucket’s bottom. His toothless gums smacked together. “Gve strshet” came out of his mouth, spraying Jake’s face with saliva.
Jake wagged his head to shake water off his face. “What?” he said. “I don’t speak Russian, sir.”
Grunting, Bull leaned across him, fished his golden dentures out of the glass, shook off the water droplets, carefully set the dentures over his gums, and clacked his phony teeth together, testing. “Give Stratojet,” he said.
“What’s a Stratojet?”
“No lie me. Give.”
“What are you trying to … Your English is a little … I’m sorry, sir, I don’t understand.”
“I kill you.”
That Jake understood. He blinked a couple of times to hold back tears. “You don’t have to do that, sir.”
“Kill your mama?”
“No, no, no, sir. Please don’t do that!”
“Kill your papa?”
Jake paused, searching Bull’s bloated face. “You don’t know where my father is.”
Bull seemed surprised. “How not? No give Stratojet, kill him today.”
“Today?”
“Give Stratojet,” Bull growled, impatient. “Give it. Give it.”
Bull’s face with two small slick oily puddles he had for eyes hung so close, it was impossible to look at him. “I don’t know what that Stratojet thing is, sir,” Jake said, staring down at his knees. “I’m sorry.”
Bull leaned over him and lifted the glass that used to hold his dentures and splashed the water into Jake’s face. Jake did not move and, letting the water run down his face, bit his lower lip to keep himself from crying. Bull muttered something in Russian and brought the glass down on the Formica table with such force that it shattered to pieces. He yelped and stuck his bloodied fingers into his mouth.
“I no trust you,” he said, sucking on his fingers. “In America no trust persons. All lie. No trust him! Need cover, he say. Come customer, he say. Good cover customer. Give me flags and what you call? To go up?”
“To go up? Steps?”
“No. No. Go up.” Bull took his fingers out of his mouth and first with one hand and then with the other clawed at the air.
“Climbing? Climbing a ladder?”
Bull nodded. “Larder.”
“You mean those pictures Shubin gave you? Men hanging flags for the parade?”
“He say they stop you, you have cover. Regular customer. Give snapshots.”
Jake watched Bull for a moment, thinking. “In case you get arrested leaving Shubin’s place, you have regular snapshots in the envelope, right? As if you snapped them yourself and brought the film in to be developed? Nothing top secret?”
Bull glared at him in suspicion.
“There was a picture of me, too,” Jake remembered. “I didn’t want him to take it!”
Bull spat in disgust. “What I do with you? No need you.”
“Right! Right!” Jake said in encouragement. “You don’t need me.”
“Need Stratojet,” Bull grunted, bending over his potbelly. “Gives no Stratojet.” He took off his left shoe and shoved it in front of Jake’s face. “It he gives!”
“He gave you footwear, sir?” Jake said, lifting his nose away from the stench of the shoe.
“Footvear?”
Bull swung the shoe over his shoulder, as if about to thump Jake on the head. Jake lunged away. The chair keeled over. Bull brought the shoe down, slamming it against the table. Jake crashed to the floor. Something smacked against the wall, bounced off, and clomped beside Jake’s nose. He shifted his eyes to the leather heel detached from Bull’s shoe. The leather inside the heel was carved out to fit a tiny black cartridge with twin chambers. Duane was right. They did have secret compartments in their shoes. The cartridge with the pictures that Shubin took of the major’s folder was hidden inside the heel of Bull’s stinky shoe.
Bull snatched the heel from under Jake’s nose, plucked the cartridge out of the slot with the crook of his bloodied finger, and banged it hard against the table.
“It he gives!” Bull growled. “Send to boss, he say. Is good. But how to know is real?” He blinked at Jake and added in a low tone, “No real, boss kills me.”
“Oh. Oh. I see,” Jake said from the floor. “Shubin takes the pictures and gives you the film cartridge, and you ship it to your boss, and if it’s not real, your boss would kill you, right?” He waited for Bull to answer, and then added, “But what do you mean real, though? Real what?”
“You has real Stratojet! Was in pants! I look. Not in pants!”
“What?” Jake said, horrified. “You looked in my pants?”
“Where Stratojet?” Bull growled. “Give it!”
“You mean the actual folder Shubin was taking pictures of? The one that was in Duane’s dad’s car? The blue top secret?” Jake looked up at Bull, trying to squeeze a smile out of his trembling lips. “Why didn’t you say so in the first place, sir? You don’t have to keep me here. I’m no use to you, sir. Could you untie the ropes, please? The folder’s gone.”
“No give Stratojet?”
“I’m telling you, sir. It’s gone. I don’t have it, sir.”
“Okay,” Bull said. “Kill you now.”
Bull rose heavily and kicked the water bucket out of the way. Jake glanced toward the window, hoping to see Bader with his gun. He was not there.
When Bull squatted beside him on his massive haunches, Jake’s eyes darted from the window toward Bull’s thick, stubby fingers, bleeding from the shattered glass, and watched in horror as they closed around his neck.
45
Bull’s thumbs kneaded the front of Jake’s throat, feeling for something, found it, and began pressing down on his windpipe, first lightly, then harder and harder. Jake shut his eyes, his body crumpling under the steady pressure of Bull’s thick fingers. Swooning, he remembered staring at Bull’s white arm glowing in the sun when he drove up in his truck to El Matador. His arm looked like an exotic jungle snake, and Jake remembered feeling a cramp in his throat, imagining being strangled in its slimy coils. And so it had come to be. Bull was strangling him.
Somewhere very far away, a voice was shouting. Jake could not grasp the meaning of the words and he stopped trying. He was convinced that he was dead already. He did not feel any pain, not in his throat, nor anywhere in his body. He opened his eyes and, seeing that Bull’s fingers were no longer around his throat, looked up, expecting to find himself elsewhere, someplace better than Bull’s filthy trailer.
“Put ’em up!” someone shouted. “Step away from the boy!”
Jake’s eyes darted toward the voice, but Bull’s feet were blocking his view. Jake was still on the floor in the trailer, and Bull’s feet, his left missing a shoe, were inches from Jake’s face. He looked at Bull’s sock, gray like Shubin’s but very dirty, slumped down his massive ankle. A big toe with a curled yellow nail was jutting out through the hole in the sock. The stench wafting off that sock and off that toe was unbearable.
“Keep ’em up!” Jake heard the voice he thought he recognized. “Come out!”
Bull’s feet pivoted away, and as he shuffled toward the door, Jake looked up at Bull’s saggy trousers, his sweaty back, and his arms in the air with spread bloody fingers. In an instant before Bull’s enormous body blocked the open door, Jake caught a glimpse of Agent Bambach aiming a tommy gun from the threshold of the trailer.
“Keep moving,” Bambach shouted. “No fooling—I’ll shoot.”
Bull nodded, took another shuffling step forward, and then in a single rapid motion, he kicked the door shut with his socked foot, yanked the handgun out of his back pocket, and fired through the door.
What happened next Jake could only guess because from the moment Bull’s gun went off, Jake’s eyes were shut. But what he heard was this: the tommy gun barking in bursts of threes, th
e bullets slugging the walls, shattering glass, single gunshots popping from the direction of the window, shouting and heavy stomping, and when at last the trailer suddenly ceased rocking, Jake heard someone yelling outside, “Bust his tires!” and the tommy gun went back to work. Then there were revved-up engines, squealing tires, more gunfire, and a rumble of many vehicles receding in the distance. And after that was silence.
Jake waited for a long time to open his eyes. When he did, he saw himself bound to the tipped-over chair on the floor covered with shards of broken glass. He thought of pushing himself toward the door, but he kept still instead, lying quietly and watching gun smoke swirling prettily in pins of sunlight streaming through the bullet holes above him.
He heard a motorcar speeding toward the trailer, the sound of the brakes, and while the engine was left running, the floor below him swayed as someone rushed up the trailer’s steps. Kathy Lubeck, the young woman from the photography store, entered swiftly and kneeled beside him.
“Oh, you poor baby!” She touched his neck, then looked at the blood on the tips of her fingers. “Why did they wait so long? We told them he might hurt you.”
“Blood’s not mine, ma’am.”
“Not yours?” she said. “Phew, that’s a relief.”
Out of nowhere, a knife blade flashed in her hand, and Jake lurched away from her in fright.
“Just going to cut the ropes, Jake, okay?”
“I don’t get it,” Jake said, watching her sawing at the ropes with the blade. “I thought you and Shubin were—”
“Our people are coming to get you, Jake. Won’t take a minute, I promise.” She sliced through the ropes that held his feet. “We’ll take care of you; just stay put.”
And then he was free and the next moment she was gone. He heard the vehicle speeding away outside and after a while, he sat up, cautiously touching his neck where Bull’s thumbs had nearly strangled him. He took a deep breath, rolled up to his feet, and, holding himself with care, hobbled to the door. He halted in the doorway and, leaning against the door frame, stood still for a while, watching the desert sun beginning to set.
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