by George Wier
“What the hell is that?” Willett asked, pointing.
“French-Apache combination gun,” Dane said. He hefted it and handed it to Willett, who turned it over in his hands. The handle was brass knuckles and instead of a barrel a five-inch blade protruded, on either side of which were twin dark holes.
“It’s a knife, brass knuckles and a two-shot pistol,” Dane said.
“Okay,” I said. “I’ll take it.” Willett smiled oddly and furrowed his eyebrows, then handed it to me. “Don’t stab yourself.”
“It comes with a holster,” Dane said. He opened a kitchen cabinet and fished out a small holster. “Here. Strap this on your belt, Bill.”
Five minutes later, we had all the guns we were taking with us checked for load, and our pockets bulging with spare ammunition, just in case it was needed.
I recalled very nearly freezing earlier in the day, and decided I needed a little something to keep me warm. I excused myself, ducked outside to my car, opened the trunk and removed a leather bomber jacket I had bought for myself during the summer when it was on sale, but hadn’t yet worn. I donned it and stuck my hands in the pocket and then found the small bottle of cognac I had bought right after getting the jacket. I popped the cork and took a drink, letting the smooth fire run down to fill cold and empty places. I transferred my small handful of bullets to my right jacket pocket.
I almost put the bottle back but then thought better of it and put it in the breast pocket. I fished under the spare tire and found the one item I had actually come outside for, and felt better when I had it tucked into the back of my belt.
Back inside Willett and Dane were still in conference.
“How’re we going to get to the Monroe spread?” Willett asked. “The road doesn’t go past my house, and I don’t relish walking through the swamp over there.”
“By boat, of course,” Dane replied.
*****
I didn’t relish the thought of going out on Caddo Lake at night. Willett and Dane, however, didn’t seem to think anything of it at all.
Dane kept two boats at the marina. He and Willett talked it over briefly while I stood there on the narrow boardwalk. The choices were between a large, high speed bass boat and a small outboard motor craft not dissimilar to Willett’s except that it was longer.
“That one,” Willett said, indicating the outboard.
“Okay,” Dane replied. “What else do we need?”
“Uh...” Willett began, “do you have any electrical wire? Like a spool? I’ve already got plenty of batteries.”
“No wire,” Dane said. “Sorry.”
“That’s alright. Probably we won't need to blow anything up anyway.”
*****
Caddo Cold.
The moment I stepped into Dane’s boat the words came into my head. I had been on Willett’s boat on Caddo Lake when I had first heard them.
Willett and Dane were chattering.
“You know that T.J. Jackson won the Mexican-American War with one cannon,” Willett said.
“Yeah, but a 12-volt battery and a wad of putty is no cannon.”
I tuned them out and listened to the lake.
There was a cold breeze blowing from nowhere to nowhere else. Water lapped at the pilings of the marina with small slapping sounds. The moon had finally risen into the sky almost directly overhead, and a thin, ghostly sliver of cloud passed in front of it. It was cold. We were cold, and yet I felt very much alive. My scalp tingled and there was an electric taste on my tongue.
Caddo Cold.
The words came again. The first time Willett had spoken those words, my first thought was that he was going to tell me of some cold-snap that had occurred a long time ago. My second thought was that it sounded like a brand of beer, but his face had been too serious for anything like that.
The boat motor sputtered into life and we were away, gliding across the black water and into the night.
Willett held Dane's flashlight over his head, its bright beam spearing the darkness ahead. When we came to open water I could make out make out lights, far away and faint―fishermen out late doing what they must love more than anything. I couldn’t see any other reason to be out on such a cold night.
There had been a time in my own life when I was ready to walk away from everything, buy a small trailer and head for the nearest national forest. But then Julie and the kids had come along and that dream had to be tabled for some future date. Probably never.
I listened to the drone of the motor and felt the biting cold and thought dark thoughts.
One image kept winnowing its way in and out of my thoughts: old and callused fingers holding a small knife blade to a piece of wood, chipping away at it, turning it ever so slowly into something recognizable―a chess piece.
Holt and chess sets.
Why had Holt run away from Caddo Lake all those years ago? And why had he stayed away so long?
When will it stop, Bill? Holt had asked. At the time he’d been asking himself that question. He hadn’t been really asking me―I had no illusions on that score. Sure, I had been there on the other end of the phone line, but I might as well not have been. It was a question borne of unending pain and futility.
And why had he come back?
But I thought I knew the answer to that one, even as I asked it of myself. He’d come back because running away hadn’t worked. He had returned because of the futility of it. Holt had been looking for an out. For an end.
One other question bothered me. Why the chess set that was a map? Had he done it purposefully? Or had someone or something else guided his hand?
For twenty minutes we were an island of dim light moving through a dark void, much the way I imagine it would be were we traversing the void between the stars in a spaceship. It was a cold and lonely ride. A man falling in this water would perish within thirty minutes if there was no rescue. The water would feel like a thousand sharp knives until the skin and flesh began to numb. And by then it would be too late.
I banished the thought from my head. Sometimes I get useless thoughts like that.
The motor slackened and I turned to see Willett pointing his flashlight to our right.
The boat slowed and turned and the light picked up the trunks of cypress knees sticking up out of the water. We were turning back toward the unseen shoreline hidden behind a forest of cypress.
*****
The passage of the cypress woods at night was a slow-going affair.
Willett was making his way by feel, guiding Dane with an occasional “left” and a “now right”. I couldn’t see how it was possible, even with the flashlight. Any given tree or clump of trees looked like any other to me, but I supposed that a man who had spent his life on the lake might be able to negotiate the cypress groves on even the darkest of nights. Willett had made a remark about the cypress groves during our previous trip. He’d said: “There are islands on Caddo Lake, and then there are trees in the water. All you’ve got to do is know which is which.” And that made all kinds of sense.
It felt like another half-hour had passed. My wrist watch was unreadable in the night, so I had no way of knowing for sure how long it took.
We all saw it at the same time: a dim glow through the trees a few hundred yards ahead.
Willett clicked off the flashlight.
Dane killed the motor and I heard the clunking sound of wood against metal behind me. Dane and Willett were divvying up the oars. It was time to row.
The glow ahead brightened slowly as the trees gave way before us to an island of bright light with the intervening trees casting eerie, broad bars of shadow.
We ran softly aground behind the broad, dark shape of an ancient cypress tree. Willett stepped out into the water with the faintest of splashes and pulled us into the weeds.
Dane and I stepped out carefully in full shadow and onto soggy earth.
Fifty yards ahead there were five bright beacons of light bathing a futuristic-looking travel trailer.
“Mobile lab,” I whispered. “I’ve never seen anything like that.”
“Yep,” Willett whispered back.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
“Any ideas, fellas, now would be the time,” Willett said.
“We’re going in there,” I said.
“Wait a minute,” Willett whispered. “I want to check it out. There may be guards. You fellas stay here. I’ll be back in a bit.”
“Don’t do anything stupid,” Dane said.
“Who? Me?” Willett responded as he stepped away from the tree and into the water beside the boat. He moved silently into another patch of shadow and was gone.
“That guy scares me,” Dane said, his voice as soft as a sigh.
“Yeah,” I agreed. “But I like him.”
*****
The wait was interminable. I could hear air bubbles coming up around my shoes as I stood on spongy earth in the night. The hulking form of Dane was less than a foot behind me and I could hear his breathing.
Two figures in black emerged from behind the trailer and into the pool of bright light. One stepped around the end facing us, and the other went towards the opposite end. They moved through the light quickly and disappeared again into shadow.
“There’s at least two,” Dane breathed. “I wonder if Willett saw them.”
“Shhh,” I admonished in a whisper. “I’m sure he did.”
There was a sharp cry from the blackness and loud splashes.
“Damn,” Dane cursed under his breath.
The sounds were unmistakable. Some kind of fight was ongoing.
There was a cry of pain that was cut short. So far there had been no bursts of gunfire.
The sounds of struggle subsided. Then there were faint splashes moving our way.
Again, we waited.
I could have leaped out of my skin when Dane jumped behind me.
“Ai!” Dane exclaimed.
“It’s me,” Willett’s voice said.
“Kee-rist!” Dane said through gritting teeth. “Don’t do that. Almost gave me a heart attack.” Dane stepped into the light for a moment and stared at the black space beside me containing Willett’s presence.
“What the hell did you do over there?” he asked.
“The two fellows who came out of the RV are out cold,” Willett said. “They didn’t like me being there. They won’t be bothering anybody for awhile.”
“Were they armed?” I asked.
“Yeah,” Willett said. “But not any longer.”
“What’re we waiting for, then?” Dane said, and pulled his gun from his belt.
“Fine,” I said. “Let’s go.”
*****
I had no illusions that what we were about to do would be easy. We moved from the shadow of the cypress and into light surrounding the travel trailer.
The windows of the over-sized coach shed pale, electric blue lighting from inside, but the windows along the side were blacked completely out.
We slogged across the spongy yet freshly mown grass and past one of the upright light tripods. I stepped up the first tier of the collapsible steps.
“Here goes nothing,” I whispered.
I grasped the doorknob and it turned easily in my hand.
I stepped inside with Willett and Dane on my heels.
*****
Inside the mobile laboratory there was a loud hum of a compressor, hidden somewhere, and the sound of rushing air.
I expected a room full of people. Instead there was only Holt Gatlin and another man, who was seated in a swivel chair. The man nearly came unhinged when I entered with Dane and Willett on my heels, each of us with a gun in his hand.
Willett and Dane moved to either side of me, their own guns brandished.
Holt was sitting up in a chair opposite the man I took to be General Todd.
“He’s not armed,” Holt said.
I put my gun back in its holster with some reluctance. Willett followed suit, but Dane kept his in his hand.
“And you would be?” I asked the man opposite Holt.
“Rutger Todd, United States Army, retired.”
“Thought so,” I said.
“It looks like we have enough people here for a good Bridge Tournament,” Willett stated.
“Or chess,” I added.
“I had some men out there,” Todd said. “They were well-paid to guard me.”
“Oh,” Willett said. “I had a bit of a tussle with them. I won, took their guns away from them and threw them in the lake.”
“Really,” Todd said. “Don’t that beat all.”
“General, do you have any objection to turning Holt Gatlin loose?” I asked.
“No objection here,” General Todd stated.
“Nor here,” Holt replied, quietly.
“Can you walk, Holt?” I asked him.
“With some pain,” he said.
“That’s okay. You won’t have to walk far.”
“Just a minute,” General Todd stood up slowly.
“Talk,” I said, “but make it brief.”
“You should probably know what this is about, Mr. Travis, before you go rushing off again.”
At the sound of my name I felt a knot begin to form in my stomach.
“I want to know how you know who I am,” I said.
“That’s easy,” General Todd said. “I’ve been monitoring Dunross’s communications.” He gestured toward an elaborate setup of computer equipment at a small workstation along one wall of the trailer. “I still don’t know who he’s working for, other than a first name, but your name has come up a couple of times.”
“Dunross is working for Pierce Gatlin,” I said.
“No. That’s not right. Pierce is Holt’s nephew,” Todd said. “I believe that Dunross and Pierce Gatlin did team up. I gathered they had common interests at some point, but not the same goal. So far I’ve had too many people trying to stop me from getting this mission done. That includes you, Travis.”
“That was your voice on the bullhorn in the lake, wasn’t it?” I asked.
“It sure was.”
“What’s the name?” Willett asked. “The person Dunross is working for?”
“Someone named Chuck, which I take it means Charles, if it’s not a made-up name.”
“Hmm,” I murmured. “General Todd, just what is your mission?”
“It’s an honorable one, I assure you, and I’ll be happy to tell you all about it. But right before you fellows walked in here, Mr. Gatlin was about to tell me all about what he saw in 1960. You might be interested in hearing it as well.”
“Fine,” I said. “But first, I want to know why you took Holt away from Dr. Carr. Where is Dr. Carr, anyway?”
“He’s been escorted back home. He’s no longer needed.”
“Why did you need him, anyway?” Willett asked.
Rutger Todd sat back in his chair and crossed his hands over his stomach.
“Dr. Carr was convinced Holt was a walking serum for something that has been called Caddo Cold. But there’s nothing wrong with Holt.”
“Of course there is,” Willett said. “I mean, something isn’t right. Just this morning he was in a hospital with a broken leg and all bandaged up. I saw the x-rays myself.”
“Faked,” General Todd said. “They weren’t his x-rays. Holt Gatlin was never seriously injured, other than being knocked out cold. He has a good-sized bump on his head for his troubles. Other than that, he’s fine. I needed some time with him alone, so I needed him out of commission for awhile. That’s why the fake injuries and the order to transport him out of the hospital to... somewhere else.”
“You’ve got a hell of a lot of resources,” I said.
“I sure do,” Todd admitted. “What I’ve got is good friends who are still on active duty, and I’ve got my retirement. That’s about it. But now, things have grown complicated.”
“What about all that stuff about Caddo Cold?” I asked. “It sure seemed like Dr. Carr believed what he was saying, even
though he didn’t have anybody else convinced.”
“I made it all up to make sure no one else would go near the plane wreckage,” Todd said. “I’ve been feeding Dr. Carr a long line of bull for the better part of his life.”
“Why?” Willett asked.
“Because...”
“The mission,” I said.
“That’s right,” Holt said. “The General just told me what it was. And I believe him. He wants nothing more than to recover the bodies on that island and bring them back for proper identification and burial.”
“That’s a lot of trickery for something so righteous,” Willett stated. “But there’s a whole lot that’s not right about the story. I mean, there are holes in it I could drive a Mack truck through.”
“I know,” Todd said. “I started improvising on this whole thing a very long time ago. Hell, I used to be good at it.”
“It’s awfully difficult,” I began, “for a liar to start telling the truth.”
“Let me explain,” Todd said. “There never was a Caddo Cold.”
“What do you mean?” Willett asked. “There is a collection of graves in our local cemetery that tell a different story, including the graves of my parents.”
“I know,” Todd said. “And I’m sorry about that. I truly am. But there was never any virus or bacteria. I did wonder about that myself when I began my own investigation of the crash. The Army wouldn’t give me any information. I wasn’t cleared for it, even though it was my men on that plane. ‘Need to know’, and all the bullshit. But since my retirement, most of the information has been declassified. I was given a bunch of disinformation about a top secret project to develop some kind of alien type of virus. But since then I’ve gotten to the truth of the whole matter. What you refer to as Caddo Cold was one of the Army’s early attempts to produce an effective nerve gas. The plane that crashed in the bayou had two canisters of it. One was marked K11 and the other marked Q17. Apparently, those canisters were destroyed in the crash. The nerve gas escaped and a number of people died.”
