Elixir

by Davis Bunn

  He heard the cries of other patients echoing behind him, which only propelled him faster. He took the same stairs as the attacker, assuming that the man would have had an escape route mapped out in advance. The concrete stairs ended at a metal door that was latched open by a coat hanger wrapped around the outside railing. Taylor heard shouts in the distance but did not turn to look. He bounded down the outside stairs and headed away from the lights and the noise. He raced down a fetid alley, took a turn, crossed a street, ran down another passage, and another. He was forced to halt there and lean against a dirty wall. His ribs and lower body ached horribly from the attacker’s fists.

  Sirens sounded in the distance. Taylor pushed himself off the wall and began limping away from the noise.

  chapter 15

  TAYLOR FOUND AN OPEN CAFÉ BY THE OLD TRAIN station and hunkered into a corner. He was sore and tired, but not particularly sleepy. From his booth he watched night people come and go. Most were taciturn and scarred by life, hard-voiced women and men bearing a week’s stubble, their eyes gouged by rough living and uneven regimes. The bartender greeted many with casual familiarity. A few revelers arrived and tried to lighten the mood, but soon slunk away. Taylor nursed a coffee and tried to find a position that did not cause his bruises to ache more than they already did.

  His thoughts moved in fruitless circles. Images flitted through his brain, of the attack and the surf and the rifleman, back and forth without real purpose. Taylor found that he could hear the cop’s voice very clearly. It fitted well into the night and the café and the patrons. The detective droned in Taylor’s head, asking all the same questions as before. Then he began to ask new questions. Directing Taylor’s thoughts toward specific issues. Ones he could answer, and then those he could not. Yet in response to the tight cop-style questions, Taylor found that the mysteries began to segment themselves, re-forming into components small enough for him to inspect.

  He could not see an overall pattern. He did not know the final answer. But by the time dawn began to compete with the streetlights outside the café windows, Taylor knew what he needed to do next.

  He walked to the bar and asked, “Do you speak English?”

  The bartender pursed his lips and shook his head apologetically.

  Taylor pulled five twenty-dollar bills from his pocket. “Can you change this?”

  Biarritz was a tourist city. The bartender swept up the money, punched numbers into a calculator, and counted out a stack of euros. Taylor left one bill on the counter. “Telephone to America?”

  The bartender nodded and converted the bill to coins. He used a pen to write out the international dialing code on a napkin. Then he pointed Taylor toward the hall leading to the kitchen.

  Taylor checked the clock above the coffee machine. Five o’clock French time was eleven at night in Maryland. The bartender was laying out little baskets of fresh croissants and circular containers of hard-boiled eggs. Taylor took one of each and asked, “Can I have an espresso?”

  His stomach rebelled against the prospect of more coffee. But he wanted to be fully alert for this conversation. Eating only heightened his aches and fatigue. And his doubts. He desperately needed to trust this woman.

  He walked back and dialed Allison’s home. When she answered, he said, “I hope this is a good time, because I need whatever you’ve got for me.”

  “It’s the perfect time,” she replied. “I think I’m being watched at the office.”

  “This is absolutely not good news, Allison.”

  “Do you want what I have or not?”

  “Yes. But not if it means getting you hurt.” Even so, Taylor found his concerns eased by her own tight tone. This was not the sound of a woman playing both sides. “What do you have?”

  “Geneco Labs, remember them?”

  “Revell’s newest acquisition. Besides us.”

  “Right. They’re about to complete stage-three trials with a new drug. They have kept everything confined to their lab and one wing of a neighboring university’s teaching hospital. Very hush-hush. But word is leaking out. The whole company is buzzing. It wasn’t hard to catch rumors. It was hard to find two that matched. But I think I have it now.”

  “Allison, I don’t like this at all.”

  “I don’t know what’s real right now, okay? But Gowers was down four times yesterday, asking if I’d spoken to you, what I knew.”

  “He knows we’ve been talking.”

  “Seems that way. Do you want the rest?”

  “Yes.”

  “Geneco Labs is working on a new painkiller. A derivative of one of their top-selling anesthesias, reformulated as a tablet. It’s supposed to be almost as strong as morphine. It has shown to be effective against migraines, cancer pain, heart ailments, severe back injuries, the list just goes on and on. Apparently the side effects are minimal.”

  “It isn’t habit forming?”

  “According to what my pet techies have discovered, there are no addictive qualities at all. Revell is using its muscle to push for OTC approval.”

  The largest segment of over-the-counter drug sales was pain relief. If Revell had a handle on a new painkiller, one able to handle chronic pains without side effects or addiction, they could corner the market.

  “What about the standard warnings—fatigue, blurred vision, impaired thinking?”

  “Apparently this product is completely problem free. You take it, your pain goes away. Six hours later, you dose up again. End of story.”

  “They’ll make a fortune.”

  “They need to. Apparently Geneco Labs knew exactly what they had on their hands, and they held out for the moon. They have stripped Revell right down to the bones.”

  He had what he needed. He knew this in his gut. What precisely it all meant, he couldn’t say. Not yet. But that would come.

  “Allison, I want you to take that vacation.”

  “I told you—”

  “Listen to me. You’ve done a tremendous job here. But I need to know you’re safe before I can go forward with this.”

  “What if you need me?”

  Something in the tone lodged deep inside his chest. “Allison, you are a real friend.”

  Allison instantly sensed the change. “I’d like to be. That and more.”

  “I want you to think about your daughter. What would she do if something happened to you?”

  “All right. If you really think I should, I’ll go.”

  “Don’t contact the office until you’re somewhere safe. Tell them your daughter had an emergency.”

  “You’ll call me?”

  “Yes. All right.”

  “In two days. Otherwise I’ll worry myself to death.”

  “Sure. Allison . . .”

  “What?”

  “Thank you. For everything.”

  Taylor hung up the phone. He took several breaths and refocused upon the strengthening day. Then he dug the paper from his pocket and placed the next call.

  “OUI, ALLÔ?”

  “Mrs. Dupin, this is Taylor Knox. I stopped by your house a couple of days ago.”

  “It is very early, Monsieur.”

  “I know. I waited as long . . . is your husband back?”

  “He is in the mountains. I explained this.”

  “I’m sorry, I don’t know how . . .” He swallowed hard. “Mrs. Dupin, I think your husband may be in danger.”

  “Comment?”

  “Is there some way you could get word to him? Tell him some people are tracking Kirra Revell. If she is with him, tell her to leave now. They tried to kill me last night.”

  There was only silence on the other end. Taylor added, “This is very real, Mrs. Dupin.”

  “Where are you speaking from?”

  “That doesn’t—”

  “Please to tell me, Monsieur.”

  He read the café’s name off the license framed by the kitchen door. “Bistro de la Gare, in Biarritz.”

  “Remain where you are.”

&nb
sp; “But—”

  “Do as I say, Monsieur. À bientôt.”

  chapter 16

  A HALF-HOUR LATER, THREE YOUNG MEN ENTERED the café. Two remained by the door as the third greeted the bartender then moved straight for Taylor. “You are the man who called my mother?”

  “Yes.” He started to rise but was halted by a slight hand motion by the young man.

  “Your name?”

  “Taylor Knox.”

  He was shorter than Taylor, dark and lean and hard as corded iron. “Last night you ran from the hospital and left your gun?”

  “It wasn’t mine. But yes, I took off after somebody tried to shoot me.”

  “So you bring troubles into my land and my family. Why is this?”

  The words were softly veiled, but Taylor could feel tension radiating from the man. “I’m not sure yet. But I’m beginning to work it out.”

  “Perhaps you should go and never return.” Compressed energy turned softly sibilant words into a deadly threat. “Perhaps you should never have come.”

  “They would have found her some other way. It was only a matter of time.”

  “Ah. Now you are speaking of Kirra, yes?”

  The simple word, the easy manner, the glitter deep in the black gaze—something struck Taylor with the force of absolute certainty. This man was in love with Kirra. “Yes.”

  “You brought them to her, so now they kill you?”

  “They try. They must assume the search is almost over and they don’t need me anymore.”

  “Maybe you are the threat and not them. Perhaps I should do the work for them. Maybe then we will all be left in peace, yes?”

  “No. I’m not the threat here.”

  “But I think you are. I think you are a danger to me, to my family, and to Kirra. So tell me now why I should believe you.”

  This much he had worked out in advance of the young man’s arrival. “There were two men who traveled with me from England. Surfers. The police think they fled to Spain.”

  “You wish to find them?”

  “If I can, I’m pretty sure they can confirm what’s going on here.”

  Reluctantly the Frenchman conceded, “There are three places in Spain very famous for big waves. All of them are in the Basque country.”

  “These two men were with me at Guethary three days ago.”

  “I can ask my friends. Their names?”

  “Kenny Dean, an Englishman. Red Harris, an American.” He described them both. “They’re driving a white Ford Econoline van with British plates. I don’t remember the entire number, but it started with the letter E.”

  The young man walked to the bar and returned with a pad and pen. “You will write down their names and this van.” He took the paper and walked to where his friends stood by the door. One accepted the note, cast a dark look in Taylor’s direction, then departed.

  The young man pulled out a cell phone, punched in a number, and began talking at length. He was clearly arguing with someone.

  Finally he slapped the phone shut and stalked back. “We go.”

  “Where?”

  “No questions.” He was openly angry. “Perhaps you wish to have more discussions with the police? No? Bon. Then you stand and you walk and we go. Now.”

  THEY TOOK HIM TO AS REMOTE A LOCATION AS COULD BE found in a land crowded by sunshine and tourists and good French flavors. A steep-sided valley grew from the Basque farmlands, where gentle hills grew steadily more vertical and funneled into a tight-fisted wedge. A mixed orchard of pears and apples occupied the final segment of level ground. Nestled back against the rockface were six shacks, occupied only at harvesttime. The tree limbs had been plucked clean and the air was thick with perfume from remnants spilled upon the ground. A clean wind blew down from the heights, bearing the chill of semipermanent snow and a winter yet to come.

  The young man’s name was Inyakie, and he was Basque to his bones. Taylor recognized the same hidden depths he had known in many of his parents’ generation, another race too stubborn to ever give in willingly to the march of so-called progress. Inyakie only spoke with Taylor because he was ordered to do so. Taylor assumed the instructions had come from his mother. On their journey to the hideaway, they stopped by the Dupin farm. The old woman had inspected Taylor somberly from her front doorstep, ignoring her son’s tirades and arm sweeps as he gathered up provisions. Taylor had waved his thanks before the car pulled back down the drive. The woman responded by returning to her home and shutting the door.

  The cabin was clean enough and utterly bare. There was a kerosene lantern, a box of matches, a chair, a single bed, a pitcher, a cup, a plate, a knife, a spoon. A tiny waterfall delivered ice-cold water from the heights. A latrine stood at the orchard’s far end.

  Taylor slept through the afternoon and much of the night. He awoke ravenous and so sore every movement brought agony. His ribs and kidneys ached where the attacker had pounded him. His head thudded at three different spots. One shoulder hurt so he wondered if his collarbone had suffered a hairline fracture. Even his legs remained weak from tearing down the Biarritz streets.

  They had left him a basket of food: a wedge of white sheep’s cheese and home-baked bread and apple spread and an onion so sweet he could gnaw on it like fruit. When he was filled to bursting, he cut off the lantern and drew the chair out front of the cabin. He wrapped himself in the blankets and stared out at the night. A pair of nighthawks circled far overhead, singing their cry to the dark earth. The wind was mostly blocked from his perch, but he could hear how the orchard’s other side was wrenched by a rising storm.

  Sometime before dawn he returned to his bed, as prepared for rest as he could ever be. The gathering storm sang him to sleep.

  chapter 17

  HE WAS AWAKENED BY FOOTSTEPS. TAYLOR TUM-bled from the bed. Inyakie pushed open the cabin door and observed him wincing as he rose upright. “You are wounded?”

  “Just bruised.”

  Inyakie carried another basket of provisions in one hand and a clay pitcher in the other. He set down the food, tore the wrapping off the top of the pitcher, then poured a cupful. “Drink.”

  “What is it?”

  “I told you. No questions. Drink.”

  Inyakie pretended not to be watching as Taylor took a tentative sip. But when Taylor jerked in surprise, the young Frenchman leaned back against the wall to observe openly. “Drink it all.”

  Taylor did so. It was not effervescent. But it felt as though bubbles cascaded over his tongue and rolled down his throat. A sense of brightness and well-being spread out through his frame.

  Inyakie filled the cup a second time. “Again.”

  He did as he was told, but more slowly. There was little flavor, just that of any herbal brew. Gradually the pain in his head and limbs began to diminish. Taylor was observing himself intently now. He detected no side effects, no dullness, no rising fatigue. The pains were not eradicated, as was the intent of most modern medicines. They did not completely vanish. Instead, they eased back to a point where they really did not matter so much anymore.

  Inyakie pulled a tin from his pocket, unscrewed the top, and dabbed some onto a cloth. He passed it over. “Bathe your wounds.”

  Taylor smelled the cloth. The odor was very intense yet not unpleasant, a distillation of what he had been drinking. Inyakie watched but did not object as he touched the cloth to the tip of his tongue. His tongue went completely numb. The lack of sensation spread to the inside of his mouth with his saliva. Taylor dabbed the spots on his head, lifted his shirt, and gingerly passed the cloth over his kidneys and collarbone and lower ribs. Gradually the pain diminished to a mere afterthought.

  “This elixir aids the healing as well as reduces pain?”

  “I told you, no questions.”

  But there was no question anymore. “This is what Kirra was after. Why she came.”

  Black fire shot from Inyakie’s gaze. “I do not like the sound of her name in your mouth.”

  Taylor
nodded slowly. Oh yes. He knew.

  Inyakie called out the open doorway. The same man who had guarded the café’s door entered the cabin, his hands full of clothes that he dumped on the chair. Inyakie said, “Dress in these. Bring the food. We must hurry.”

  “Why?”

  This time he chose to answer. “We have found your two friends.”

  THEY TOOK A SMUGGLER’S ROUTE INTO SPAIN. TAYLOR wore the local clothing of white collarless shirt, oversized Basque beret, red kerchief, and black drawstring canvas pants. They traveled in a worker’s van the color of dried mud. The van was stacked with boards and surf gear. Neither Inyakie nor his stocky companion spoke to Taylor. The road was scarcely more than a gravel track. Stretches had been paved, but so long ago the asphalt was ground by time and weather to grassy rubble. A misty rain drifted in the windless air. They wound through an increasingly high pass, through forests of wild cherry and alpine fir so ancient they formed a solid canopy overhead. Twice they confronted other vehicles careening straight toward them. Both times they pulled so close to the edge rocks tumbled over the cliffside. The two men in the front seats seemed utterly unconcerned by the closeness of oblivion. Instead they leaned out the window and traded jolly insults with the passersby, speaking in a rough-hewn tongue that could only have been Basque.

  Taylor found that he did not mind the isolation. There was much to think over and digest. Certainly the temptation was there to hate the man before him, one who would gladly feed him to the uniformed lions. Yet time after time his mind returned to Brother Jonah’s final words. The restricted path. The narrow way.

  When they emerged from the woodlands, they passed through a veil of cloud and rain and emerged into brilliant sunlight. They crossed a highland valley beneath a blue-black sky. Through the open windows spun an icy fragrance that made a mockery of lowland life. The van jounced and bounded over a heavily rutted track. To either side, cattle lowed. A pair of stone huts stood upon a rise, from which the occupants could survey the entire vale. A man appeared in one doorway and shouted something lost to the distance and the cattle. A word from Inyakie and the driver swerved off the track and headed for the cabin.