Lara sat at a table, smoking a cigarette, drinking a gimlet. Harriet made her way back from a dance to sit with her, a drunken grin on her face.
"I assume you heard the good news."
"Yes, Ma'am," said Lara smiling. "It'll be an honor to be your first officer."
"It's an honor to have a first officer," laughed Harriet.
"Do you think the crew will have a problem with two women in command?"
"Not if I have anything to say about it."
"Good."
They watched the dance floor. "Have they said anything about our orders, Ma'am" asked Lara.
"No, they haven't. I don't get them until the day before we leave."
Good, thought Lara. They didn't cock that one up.
"Probably a patrol."
"I hope so," smiled Harriet. "It's the beginning of the war. Think of the hundreds of Spanish prizes out there."
Lara nodded, feigning excitement.
"At the same time," said Harriet. The grin disappeared, "over the past few days, I've been going over and over what happened to us out there. We were set up."
Lara nodded again.
"I don't like it. They must have been after that professor, but it means that they know about our orders. To some extent they must know about our ship movement. Our plans. It makes me nervous."
"Me too, Ma'am," said Lara. She didn't have to feign anything that time.
"Looks like Marr has reeled one in," said Harriet changing the subject. David was dancing with the governor's daughter for the third waltz in a row.
Lara was silent.
"I don't know how he does it," said Harriet.
"Neither do I."
The way she said it gave Harriet pause. Could Lara really be attracted to David? Lara always struck her as a bit asexual, an emotionless creature interested only in her duty to the Navy.
"Ummm," said Harriet, "Did the two of you have a relationship on the Dakota?" She was embarrassed to ask, but if there was a relationship between two of her officers, she wanted to know about it.
"What?" said Lara surprised. She inwardly cursed herself for losing her cool. "Of course not."
Harriet shrugged, "He's not a bad looking man. A bit juvenile."
"More than just a bit."
"The Navy frowns on fraternization between officers."
"Ma'am," Lara said, "there's nothing between us."
"My view is less strict than that of the Navy's, but if there is fraternization, I want to know about it."
"I understand," said Lara, "but there really is nothing there."
Harriet was now certain that there was.
David woke in a haze. He savored the brief instance of wakefulness before he would be forced to remember where he was.
He looked around.
There was a plump, Chinese girl next to him snoring. She was naked.
Deja vu.
He got up, got dressed, and looked at his pocket watch. Two am. He was in a hotel. He thanked God that he was not in the Governor's mansion, for an escape from there would be much more difficult.
David padded quietly down the hall, and out the hotel into the star lit night. The streets were completely empty. The heat of the day had dissipated and the local palms were swaying gently in the wind. He walked for about ten minutes, trying to get his bearings so that he could return to his hotel. There were no carriages for rent at this time of night, and there wasn't a soul about. He figured his best bet was to head towards the area that serviced the port barracks, The Curve. It was named after the main boulevard that ran through a district of restaurants, taverns, casinos, and brothels. It was an area that he had gotten to know quite well over the past several nights. It was situated as close as legally allowed to the docks and was easy to spot because one could always make out the lights from the ships floating in port.
Several times, he thought he heard footsteps behind him, but it was difficult to tell with the sound of the wind. In general, his moods slanted towards depression rather than paranoia, but the memory of the explosion back in Illinois was still fresh in his mind. He quickened his step.
Footsteps.
He looked behind him. Nothing. He was completely alone. It was a dog in an alleyway. His heart raced.
As he neared the docks, he relaxed a little. He started to feel like a fool. He heard music and laughing, songs and girls giggling, and others sounds of sailors on leave. Behind him he heard hooves and the rattling of a carriage. He turned and stepped to the side of the road to let it pass.
It slowed.
Two men climbed out of the carriage. The driver jumped down too, holding a map.
"Evening, sir," said the driver, "Might you know of a nearby hotel?"
"I...."
As he began to speak, the two men who had been riding in the carriage grabbed his arms. They were very large. Their movements were quick, and from a distance, they may have looked like old friends, putting their arms around a buddy. But in David's position, there was no ambiguity as to what they were about.
"Perhaps you can join us and show us the way."
They dragged him towards the carriage. David yelled, kicked, and struggled, but they held him fast. The men were too strong.
A pistol shot.
One of the men fell with a yelp. The other immediately had him in a bear hug, still trying to get him into the carriage.
Another pistol shot. His other captor fell to his knee, releasing him. The man scrambled into the back of the carriage
"Mierda!"
"Take him!"
"No, no, vamanos!"
One of the men was dead. David fell to the ground to duck from any other shots. He saw a figure coming from the shadows.
Lara. He scrambled up. At the sound of the pistol shots, sailors were beginning to come out of a nearby restaurant to investigate.
The carriage sped away through the sandy streets.
"Thank God!" said David.
"We need to get out of here," said Lara. "They might be back, and I don't want to have to stick around and explain this to anyone."
"What are you talking about?" exclaimed David. "We've got to report this to the police."
She gave him a look.
"But, we can't just..."
"Think quick," she said. "There'll be a crowd here soon."
She turned and slipped into an ally.
"Goddamnit!" he said.
He followed her through the shadows of an alley until they hit a small arterial street. They walked in silence, moving as quickly as possible. David had to fight the urge to sprint down the street screaming for help, but Lara restrained him. She was cool, calm, and collected. Soon they were on The Curve. They slipped into a tavern filled with sailors. They took a table in the back.
"Two whiskeys," said David, having to yell to be heard over the crowd. "Make them doubles."
"You can't go back to your hotel," said Lara once they'd gotten their drinks.
His heart was still racing, and it felt strange to be sitting in a bar having a drink so soon after an attempted kidnapping and the shooting of two men. But, they had to look as though nothing out of the ordinary had happened.
David nodded. After a bit of silence, he said, "I don't think I got a chance to thank you back there."
She nodded.
"How did you happen to be there?"
She shrugged. "I met someone at the party, so I was up late. I heard your shouts and ran over to investigate. You were lucky that I showed up when I did."
This did not compute, but David didn't push it. For having just killed a man, she was far too calm. She looked as though she were having a drink after a tough day at work. What was going on in there? He knew so little about her.
"What about that body?"
"It's a sad fact of life that plenty of sailors die near the docks under mysterious circumstances. The police don't pull out their ace inspectors for these kinds of things. Trust me. I'm sure it'll be chalked up to a bar room brawl.
"
Besides," she continued, "I'm not going to shed a tear for a Spanish kidnapper. Don't kid yourself. That's who they were. They got your buddy Waterhouse, and it's not a stretch to think they might want their hands on you."
"I know."
"The safest thing for you tonight is to sleep in the marine barracks. You'll need to start carrying your service pistol."
He nodded. He no longer had a choice about not being involved.
The square was crowded, which was exactly what Rodriguez wanted.
Women in long dresses were walking through the sandy square, holding delicate umbrellas to ward away the noon sun. Merchants and innkeepers stood outside their storefronts chatting amongst themselves and with their customers. Children played in the large stone fountain in the center of the square.
He waited on the bench.
Once he saw the contact, he stood up, walked into the cathedral in the square, and sat in the pew for half an hour. After he had left money in the offering plate, he left the church, almost crossing himself. It was a stupid and potentially fatal error. He must be getting tired.
He had noticed that his heart really wasn't in his work these days. It should have been a time of excitement. With a war going on, there were ample opportunities for advancement. But the fire was fading. He knew he was the best, and he couldn't imagine what a promotion would really hold for him. A desk job? Consulting on operations from New Madrid? At the end of that road lay a pension and an early heart attack.
He walked towards the sea docks.
He decided that he was probably just depressed about the failed extraction. It was supposed to have been straightforward. He had thought the main difficulty would have been the aftermath. David Marr was a minor celebrity after his escape from the Dakota, and surely his American counterparts would have scrambled to find him. That would have meant somehow getting him off planet or simply killing him. The latter option was the easiest to implement, but it was the method of last resort.
He sighed. Things hadn't worked out, of course. Now it would be even more difficult to catch him, and if Marr was not taken, they'd lose whatever advantage they had gained by taking Waterhouse and his Engine.
He eventually arrived at his boat. It was a small motorboat, with a mini-steam engine that was meant to look like a fishing craft. He looked around. No one. His boat was docked in a place that didn't get much foot traffic. Besides, all the other fishing boats were out for the day.
She was waiting inside, dressed like a local fishermen.
"Do you know how dangerous this is for me?" asked Lara.
"I do," said Rodriguez, "so it should give you an idea of how important it is that we meet."
He pulled out a pistol from the inside of his suit. He was a short man, balding, with a stocky build. He was missing an ear, but this was partly hidden by a bowler hat.
"Careful," said Suarez as she eyed the gun. "Don't you want an explanation?"
"If I didn't, you'd be dead."
"Taking Marr that way was stupid," she said quickly. "You were supposed to tell me about any operations involving him."
"That information was a... how do you Americans say?...was on a need to know basis."
The gun hadn't moved.
"Taking him out would have brought the Americans down on you."
"We'd planned for that."
"Well, I hadn't!" she snapped. "If they get you, they get me, and I'm not going to hang for treason."
"So for this, you killed one of my men? What am I supposed to think?"
"I had no choice."
"Choices, amiga, are the only thing we do have in life. You still haven't given me a reason not to shoot you."
"Marr won't be a problem," she said. "I've been ordered to intercept Waterhouse's transport. Marr's coming with me. I can take care of him then, and then there's no mess."
"The norteamericanos know about the transport?"
She nodded.
This was a new development. A leak. There might as well be a speaking tube between American and Spanish intelligence.
"This will have to be dealt with. Waterhouse and his engine are critical to winning this war."
"Of that, I have no doubt," she continued, "but this information should show my good faith."
Rodriguez lowered his pistol. He looked out to sea. He didn't trust her. This in itself was not a problem. One didn't last long trusting people in this business. There was something about her that he disliked, a coldness, a detachment that he found chilling. This was not unusual among agents, but for her, there didn't seem to be even a small inkling of emotion. It also made him nervous that she refused to take payment for any information she gave him.
They had sent an agent to feel her out when she was stationed in D.C. He was a diplomat at the Spanish embassy. Tall. Handsome. They struck up a conversation at a bar, and had started talking politics. Then the conversation moved towards more intimate topics. A relationship started. She had always believed that the Emperor had American Latinos' best interests at heart, but his agent had fertilized this idea, sharing his own story of poverty and loss, and how he had risen through the ranks of the diplomatic corp, which was only made possible by the meritocracy installed by the Emperor. It was all nonsense of course, but it hadn't taken much to convince her that she should help the Spanish government.
That was when she was introduced to Rodriguez. She had told him that she hated the gringos and their prejudice towards Latinos and blacks. She believed in the Emperor's vision of universal equality. At least that's what she claimed. It made him nervous. Money was a predictable motivator. He understood it. Ideas, on the other hand, made people do strange things. As a precaution, he had pictures taken of her that first night with his agent. Blackmail wasn't necessary at this point, but better safe than sorry.
"Your ship must be stopped," said Rodriguez.
"It was your gamble."
"It was not my gamble," he grunted, "It was some admiral's. Are you certain about this? I've heard nothing from la mujer."
La mujer was the codename for his other contact. This agent was highly placed.
"Certain enough that I'm packing my bags," she said.
"And if you deal with Marr on this voyage, there's a mess for you, correct?
"It'll be an accident."
"Maybe you can seduce him," said Rodriguez. "And then when the opportunity arises..." It would not be the first time that Rodriguez had used her in this way."
"Leave the planning to me."
"Alright," he said, "but you must do something for me. There's the problem of Marr and the problem of the transport. The transport must not be taken. Maybe a series of accidents can slow down this ship of yours."
"No more attempts on Marr."
He thought about this. If he agreed, Marr would leave planet, and there was no assurance that he would be dealt with. He did not completely trust Suarez. If he took care of Marr here, he could sleep easy. Suarez would be upset, but what would be the loss? She was not that highly placed in the American agency, and she was reaching the end of her usefulness. She would get over it, and if not, well...
"Alright," he said with a smile, "no more attempts."
"Breathe," said Lara. "Pull the trigger as you exhale."
David missed the target by at least a mile.
He had asked for her help in learning how to defend himself, so she'd brought him to a beach to practice. They had rented two horses for the day and had ridden an hour before reaching the edges of the jungle that surrounded the city. It was a beautiful tropical locale and they were close to several high end resorts. The area was known for an enormous crater that was about a mile wide. It was filled with a shallow lake containing bacteria that phosphoresced a bluish color that was unlike anything else in the galaxy. They had taken a path off the main road to get to a beach on the lake. Despite the natural beauty of the spot, there was no one else around.
Lara had set up two of their drinking bottles on rocks and David was firing at them from about fift
y feet away. So far the bottles were having a good day.
"Your hands are shaking and you're not really aiming."
"I don't like guns."
She didn't respond. She took the gun. She fired twice, shattering both bottles. She set up two more.
"So how did you get to be such a great shot?"
"Los Gatos."
"In Austin?"
She nodded.
Austin was the first off-planet state to join the union. It was a continent on New Madrid that was a little bit larger than Europe and was connected to a larger land mass called Los Estrellas, which along with the rest of New Madrid, was occupied by the Spanish. As the only American territory on a mostly Spanish planet, its entrance into the union in the 1970s had been meant to send a clear signal: this was American land and it was going to stay that way.
Austin was frontier country, the climate was mostly desert, mountains, and open prairie and the individuals who eked out a living from its land where refugees from other planets. They tended to be people who were drifters. People who had left lives on other planets because those lives weren't worth all that much. Land was free if you were willing to work it, and the government needed warm bodies to keep out both Spanish migrants and the Spanish military. Los Gatos was one of Austin's larger towns. It was famous as a meat-packing town, processing cattle from across the continent.
"You grew up there?"
"I did."
"Were you there for your whole life?"
"Most of it."
There was silence for a while as David thought about what to say next.
"You're not much for conversation are you?"
She shrugged. He had started to like her quite a bit more since their first encounter. It went beyond the fact that she had saved his life.
"Most conversations aren't particularly interesting."
"I can see why you might think that."
She smirked, "Yes, I grew up on New Madrid. From there, most people say, 'I never met someone actually from New Madrid' or 'Were you a cowgirl?' Everyone says exactly the same thing."
The Gold Engine (The Gold Chronicles) Page 10
