by Jackson, Gil
Sitting in random groups of disorder, swigging from bottles, smoking rocket-shaped panatelas, playing guitars badly and singing even worse; with an entourage of women in various stages of dress and un-, some couples were not bothering to put themselves out of sight of others for their fornication’s, much to the pleasure shown by the raucous laughter at their exhibitionism by the ragged arsed audience; and it was clear to David, Frederik Spannocs was not at home and getting in would be a pushover — if Ty Colsson could drag himself away.
Ty Colsson was not thinking the thoughts that David assumed he was. He had not managed to stay alive in the hostile environment that he sometimes operated by misreading what was before his eyes. He never underestimated the subtleness employed by the secret services of the world in the art of subterfuge: it had become essential learning in the sophisticated world of the spymaster. And he, well-versed in its techniques neither trusted nor gave in to pre-conceived ideas no matter the shabbiness of the actors to create an illusion of a false sense of a security. Know your enemy was the benchmark by which every successful general operated and if he didn’t, his army was dead. David had it. But unlike him, he didn’t have to put himself at risk of being tortured or shot if he made a mistake.
David agreed they lie-up until darkness when they would have a fighting chance of breaking through what passed as security.
By midnight — and after the Ramirez had had their fill of drink, women and dancing; when all that was left was sleep — David and Ty made their way into the parameters of the compound — the snoring from security the only noise in an otherwise quiet night which seemed to make them more cautious. Frozen into silhouettes against the side of the house a faint buzz like a humming-bird could be heard in the distance. Their worst fears were soon realised the Ramirez were being woken by the sound.
A helicopter directly overhead. Headlights slung underneath its belly picked out the area dropping a shining cylinder. There was hardly a choke from David before he held the last breath that he had taken in and dropping to the ground, but not before recognising the plane as one of their own. The sleeping bandits never had a chance, they made to wake and run but only succeeded in making things worse coughing unconscious in minutes.
Ty managed to get his jacket over his head before the vesicant hit the ground. David seeing him and realising what was happening reacted by doing the same. From his prone position in the dirt he saw a door of an outbuilding and kicked out his boot forcing it open. Pulling Ty he dragged him in slamming the door shut. The helicopter was still overhead raining more cylinders. The Ramirez were taking the brunt of it; most were dead or dying; tiny screams and violent choking could be heard but they didn’t last long.
The plane having delivered its cargo moved off into the night sky leaving the two of them to cough violently, until they also succumbed and fell unconscious.
Daylight came: the air had cleared, Ty and David moved. David got up first and looked out the window onto the open ground of Spannocs’s house. To his horror more helicopters came over the trees of the jungle. They were low and six in formation. Machine guns began shooting up the ground, spraying bullets among the dead Mexicans and with a wider view began opening up their target zone, the dust from the shells hitting the ground and coming straight for the outbuilding they had sought shelter. David could see from the size of the munitions that their safety could no longer be assured.
* * *
Lomax had misgivings of a different kind. He had telephoned the Ops. Director to find out what had gone wrong? and been told that the helicopters that he had ordered to be sent in to pick up David Weinberg had been attacked on the ground, their pilots’ shot, and the planes taken. The grey telephone rang, for the second time in more years than anyone could remember, was to inform him that two operatives had been killed on active service in Mexico. There was nothing further. The telephone went dead.
* * *
‘Charlie! It’s Franklin Lomax. Sorry to get you out of bed. I’ve news. I’m afraid it’s not good.’
Charlie replaced the telephone. Mortified he had been persuaded by Lomax to leave the passing on of the information to next of kin to his people. What were the CIA thinking sending helicopter gun ships into an area to break up bandits for the Mexican government knowing that they had their own operatives working in the interior?
* * *
The outbuilding was in ruins, exposing them; and backs uppermost; their hands over their heads among the rubble; there was no question that they had not been seen; miraculously the helicopters moved off. David subconsciously moved his legs to order. Ty got up and part dragging and part shouting to get him to run. They stumbled and fell got up and breaking cover ran on towards the house before the helicopters’ changed their minds and decided on a re-run. They hovered back and forth, spraying bullets all around, but not in their direction, then, turning on a dime in the sky; and to David’s relief — ‘They’ve fucked off!’
Miraculously, apart from scratches and tears, they were both still alive and with a single mind got up and dived through a door that had previously been blown open with the ferocity of a tornado right in front of them. And with its hinges still intact they slammed it shut. The sound of it echoed around the interior of the marble building that they found themselves in.
Ty Colsson shouted at him before breaking into another coughing fit. ‘So much for a covert night time operation; whose side did you say you were on?’
David ignored him: he was having problems with his own breathing. Coughed loudly said, ‘Well at least you won’t have to take out Ramirez now; and can you please keep the noise down.’
‘Why? You’ve brought the Marine band with you.’ He shouted the words. They echoed up and off the large ceilings and walls and came back twice the sound they started.
‘All right, all right, no need to prosecute the obvious,’ David said. ‘Hey! Where are my clothes? – What am I doing in these rags? And more to the point, why are you dressed like an out of work bandit?’
‘Our clothes are on two of those poor bastards out there, I thought we could do with a change of wardrobe. Were they ours, or were they ours?’ Ty said annoyed, adding, ‘What did you say you were working on, because if you didn’t I’d sure like to know now? ... perhaps before one of us dies. That was CIA decals on the side of those helicopters I saw?’
‘Since when does your CIA mark their planes?’ David said.
‘I don’t know, you tell me.’
‘It could be you they’re after.’
‘Be some credit to your mother. Unless you’ve forgotten there’s not the little matter of this being my working territory. And I’ve never been got at before. Whereas, your people know where you are. I suggest you’ve got a mole.’
‘All right, I’m sorry.’
‘Don’t mention it. But might I remind you again that it was me that saved our arses last night, at least these clothes haven’t been riddled with 30mm machine gun bullets; I know those helicopters had CIA markings, and lest ye forget may I also remind you that I work for them, didn’t know about them. They’d hardly take me out, would they?’
‘I’m sorry, what more do you want me to say?’ David said waving a hand to quieten his temperament, ‘In any case, we’re here now, and by the look of it we’ve got the house to ourselves, might as well take advantage.’ He smiled.
‘Oh, thanks. Whose advantage are we talking of here, ‘Because from where I’m standing it sure isn’t mine. As far as I can see you’re one step from hell and likely to take anyone with you that’s holding your hand at the time. Look!’ Ty said taking his hand and making to leap off something high, ‘one, two, three, jump, take my
point—?’
The words scarce left his lips when a horrifying scream from below floor level was heard. They looked at each other and shuddered.
Ty spoke first: ‘What the fuck was that?
David walked to a door by the side of a flight of stairs, threw it open and peered in. A flight of steps w
ent down into the gloom. To his relief Ty Colsson was beside him; granted, not holding his hand, but there all the same. ‘That! Sounded like a child screaming!’
Ty looked at him. ‘Come on!’
He might be an agent of law but he suffered the same emotions as any other person; and being shit scared — some of the time — went with the territory. The difference was, his training would not allow him to walk away; his training told him that the bogey-man was only in his head.
Ty Colsson suffered the same cross, overcame it and made his move. ‘Let’s get on with it.’ He found a light switch which barely illuminated the stairs and pushed past David. ‘We’re in real trouble if Frederik Spannocs shows up now, you know that don’t you?’
David chased after him down into the gloom. ‘We can always say we’re looking for a room for the night.’
Single-filing down the stairs it became apparent that the single light-bulb that illuminated the passage at the top of the stairs was not going to help them for long. The stairs went from a straight flight to a wind and were much longer than they imagined. Ty switched on a hand torch and looked closely at their surroundings. Neither spoke, for it was clear from both of them that they were going deeper into the ground. The damp was becoming foul in their throats. The walls green and slippery were a breeding ground for God knew what: they continued. When the walls gave way to a veranda they realised that they were looking down into vast space below. Ty shone his torch into the gloom moving it to and fro. ‘Nothing!’
But David saw more than that. Below, three people with masks on. A goat, a clown, and a bloodhound.
He hissed at Ty: ‘Switch it off!’
Ty turned on him. ‘What?’
Ty’s torch beam went through the gloom but could see nothing.
‘Down there. Don’t you see?’
Moving onto a stage area, the torch beam acting as a prompt for what followed next. A woman appeared accompanied by a child attached to a leash. The child appeared to be wearing a wedding dress. The bloodhound became agitated. Ty’s torch flickered, and went out as two men burst in amid a cry of something or other and a fight began to break out. A clap of thunder, a flash of lightning. Except it wasn’t a flash it stayed longer than that, long enough for David to see an apparition glide out of one wall, across the room, and through another. About three feet in height, with no legs. Several feet off the ground it came with a clicking sound, followed by an explosion of glass, and shouting and fighting before it all went quiet.
David found himself among it. No longer on the balcony looking down but alongside a youngish man. He was prostrate between two chairs and had apparently stopped breathing. If he had it would be too late for what he had to do now. But he would attempt it anyway. Laying the man onto his back, David, his knees on the floor against the man’s head started to use Silvester-Brotsch resuscitation.
Pulling the man’s fully extended arms towards him closing them onto his chest he repeated the action for five minutes or so before the man coughed and opened his eyes. David stood up and looked down. The man got up and walked straight through him.
* * *
The next voice was Ty’s and David found himself back on the balcony. ‘What’s the matter!?’ he asked trying to shake him from a hypnotic state. ‘David snap out of it, what’s wrong?’
‘Didn’t you see?’
‘See what, there’s nothing to see, what! Did you see ... Paul? You couldn’t have seen him, the two of them are already dead.’
‘No. Not Paul! People down there — detective police officers. And those creatures. You had your torch on them, my life am I going mad?...’
He was shaking uncontrollably.
‘Take it easy,’ Ty whispered, ‘You haven’t been anywhere, you’ve been with me all the time ...’
‘You saw them, Ty? You must have done. I was down there, damn you. With them.’
‘David, so help me, you’ve been here all the time, I didn’t see anything.’
‘You had a torch on them, there was an explosion of light, you didn’t see that?’
But all Ty could do was shake his head. He shone the torch again and looked below. Nothing.
‘What creatures did you see, police officers?’
David looked at him.
‘Creatures! Went right through that fucking wall. A woman, in white, a shrouded figure in a light black dress of some kind. It came right through that wall.’ He was pointing exaggeratingly. ‘Right across, and out through the other side. You didn’t see that?’
Ty shook his head.
Had he been dreaming? And someone was something else. She had pointed a finger at him and he burst into flames.
‘What did you say, Paul ... being dead?’
‘I should have told you. When I went to check, you know, what I said, about Paul being cremated. Well he hadn’t been. The bodies of Paul: both of them, were in the morgue. One dead from a kung fu assault, the other from being blown up. I was sworn to secrecy about what I had seen by a government official from the SSO name of....’
David’s mouth dropped open and the blood drained from his face. He lost control of his legs. Ty pulled him to his feet and dragged him back up the spiral of endless steps; out of the building, and to his relief daylight and dead bandits.
When all was clear, the man impersonating General Balsal, lying on the ground of a battle-strewn enclosure that surrounded Spannocs’s home opened his eyes. Seeing no one about, he smiled to himself, stood up, took off the military coat covered in mock medals, took off the bullet proof protective vest and threw it to the ground. He looked around further to satisfy himself that he was unseen, removed his wig and several layers of theatrical hair from his face. He went over to the headless body of General Pablo Wilhelm Balsal and laid the military coat over the man putting the cheroot back in his mouth; kicked the man’s head across the compound. He picked up a radio-telephone and called: ‘SSO. Sullivan!... Send a chopper.... We’re done here.’
PART TWO
CHAPTER 14 – 1950
David received a letter of reply from J. Edgar Hoover or rather a secretary on his behalf after inquiring about Georgos’s story of the possible involvement of Spannocs and Tony Di Sotto. It said that Mr. Hoover sends his regards to a valued member of the FBI, especially Frank Weinberg’s son; was pleased with his safe return and hoped him a speedy recovery; but had not the time to deal with him personally. However, as to his investigations of Ocean International and in particular Frederik Spannocs: they were to be at an end. As to the matter of Frederik Spannocs being the possible Marco Giuseppi (according to Agent Charlie O’Hare); wanted for child abuses dating from the 1920s; the records office of the FBI were in possession of a death certificate as to the latter’s status; that he was confident was genuine and that recorded his birth the first of April 1890; died eighth of November, 1921. Further: that Ocean International headed by its chief executive Frederik Spannocs, was a successful company that was good for employment, good for America, and could ill afford to be investigated by the Bureau on nothing more than scant information.
Although, he did go on to say: he was interested in any information on cults such that Professor Angus Paul had belonged and that could be gathered and passed to relevant sections. He was aware that Professor Angus Paul had gone missing and that he also had information that he was likely drowned while diving. Also that Paul had something on Spannocs based on information, but was largely ignored because of its half-cocked supernatural nature (which could never be the subject of an FBI investigation), which had to be recorded but would not be followed up for reasons stated; also that the CIA had a file on him (Angus Paul) for likely Nazi sympathies during the war. As for him, he did not want any of his agents stepping on toes that were true fitted in the boot of American citizenship. A standard, unpunctuated last paragraph had been inserted:
I shall expect a report from you on whatever else you may have that could be useful to the Bureau and wish to caution you that no attempt to detain or a
rrest any employers or employees or agents of Ocean International shall be made by either yourself or any other agent and furthermore should it be necessary to direct undeveloped leads to other field officers they be accompanied by appropriate advice as to these instructions and the discreet nature of your interests into child abuse slavery and murder.
The punctuation returned.
Once again, you’re co-operation with other enforcement agencies; and the help that you afforded the government of Mexico has not gone unnoticed. The disbandment of a dangerous gang of gun-runners and criminals amidst a defoliation programme by the authorities against the wood wasp can only add to the courage you showed in an otherwise dangerous situation. We look forward to a rapid recovery and a likewise early return to duty.
Regards JEH
pp Clyde Tolson
Associate Director.
* * *
‘Good for America. My arse!’ Charlie continued reading. Finishing he looked up at David. ‘What did you expect from him, to admit that there’s a probable cover-up? He’s not going to say that if he knows it. That goes on all the time. JEH’s straight enough. Likely a bit strange, orientation-wise. Straight enough for all that. He bides his time till one of you goes out on a limb and brings in the evidence.’
‘And the letter?’
‘Standard. Still he’s given you permission to look into cults, that’s plenty enough.’
‘And Ocean?... I can’t do anything about them.’
‘You’ve the answer to that one.’
‘What’d you mean?’
‘Gerry Duke, that his name? — your betrayal to the IR? You’re looking into Ocean’s possible tax evasion. They owe a favour to the FBI.’
Charlie looked at him, a smile on his lips. He could see David working his way between the lines of the letter from Hoover and ignoring them.
‘Out of curiosity, why would the CIA be in Mexico, Charlie?’
