Kingdom of Darkness

by Andy McDermott

  Eddie whirled, but found Vargas’s pistol pointed at him. He froze, helpless, as Santos hit Zane again, following it with a kick to his abdomen. The Mossad agent curled up in agony.

  Santos turned his gun on the other prisoner. ‘Now you, English. Right hand behind your back.’

  ‘Get fucked,’ Eddie growled.

  The automatic did not waver. ‘Do it, or I shoot you.’ Vargas was prepared to fire; his boss was actively looking forward to doing so. Eddie had no choice. More handcuffs clamped painfully hard around his wrists.

  Santos examined them, then smiled.

  Even knowing the attack was coming, Eddie could do nothing to counter it. Searing pain exploded in his skull as the gun hit him. He crumpled against the wall, trying to dodge the inevitable kick.

  He failed. The cop’s boot slammed into his stomach. Eddie doubled up, a sickening dizziness overwhelming him as he gasped for air.

  Santos indicated Zane. ‘Put him in my car,’ he told his men. ‘I will take him to the Enklave. The other one . . .’ A cruel smile. ‘Take him to the cemetery.’

  Miranda regarded him first with confusion, then dismay. ‘But – but that is not what we do.’

  ‘He is not leaving town,’ said Santos. ‘Ever.’

  Miranda started to protest, but his words were cut off as Santos slammed him against the bars. ‘That is twice in one day you have challenged me! Do not do it three times, or you will join him!’ His fingers closed around Miranda’s windpipe. ‘Do you understand?’

  All the terrified cop could do was nod. Santos blew smoke into his face, then released him. ‘Good. Now, do as I say.’

  Vargas and the quivering Miranda dragged Zane from the cell. Santos watched them go, then took a long drag on his cigar. ‘Just you and me now, eh, English?’

  ‘Fuckin’ wonderful,’ Eddie rasped. ‘So this is how you treat tourists? No wonder that hotel was empty.’

  Santos chuckled. ‘We usually run visitors out of town. It is strange, we always find drugs on them, even the respectable ones! But they pay their, ah, “fine” and go, and never come back. You, though . . .’ His expression turned stony. ‘You came looking for the wrong people, English. When someone does not want to be found, they are willing to pay to make sure nobody does find them.’

  ‘You know they’re fucking Nazis, right?’ said Eddie. ‘Escaped war criminals?’

  A dismissive huff, smoke wafting across the cell. ‘Perón and then El Proceso were happy for them to be here. They want the same thing – strength and power. And I believe that also. Argentina would be much better with a strong government again. Maybe we do not have that in the whole country . . . but we do have it here. Lago Amargo is my town, English. And I will not let you or anyone else take it from me.’

  Vargas reappeared and spoke to him. The corrupt cop nodded, then addressed Eddie once more. ‘Time to go. Your friend wants to see the Enklave, so now he will. As for you, our graveyard is not very beautiful, but you should make the most of it. It is the last place you will see.’ He started for the door – then whipped back around to kick his prisoner hard in the chest. ‘Goodbye, English.’ He walked out, leaving Eddie paralysed by pain.

  Vargas and Miranda hauled the Englishman from the cell. They took him outside and shoved him into the back of an elderly Chevrolet police car. Eddie glimpsed a few onlookers before his head was pushed down, but no one moved to help him.

  Miranda took the wheel, Vargas pointing his gun at Eddie. ‘You make trouble, I shoot you,’ he snarled as the car set off.

  ‘We should not be doing this,’ said Miranda. ‘This is wrong! We have never killed anyone before.’

  Vargas responded in irate Spanish. ‘Yes, he attacked us,’ Miranda continued, ‘but we were going to arrest them for no reason! El Jefe did not even try to hide drugs on them.’

  The young cop’s continued use of English was both confusing and angering his companion. ‘Hable en español, pendejo!’ he barked. Miranda gave Eddie an apologetic glance, but caved in, the argument continuing in Spanish.

  The car headed into the hills overlooking the little town. Somewhere up there was the graveyard, in which Eddie would become the latest nameless resident.

  Zane was also going into the hills, but along a different route. He had been dumped in the trunk of Santos’s own car, a half-decade-old Mercedes that nevertheless was probably the newest and most luxurious vehicle in the region. After several minutes of jolting along rough tracks, the car stopped. He squinted as the trunk lid opened and dust hit his eyes. ‘Get out,’ ordered Santos, dragging him on to the stony ground.

  They were on what had once been the lake’s shore, the water now just a shimmering line in the distance beyond a flat pan of exposed silt. Zane made out indistinct tracks on the surface – had an aircraft landed on the dry lake?

  Closer by were the weathered remains of a jetty, the wood and stone structure extending out from the old shoreline. The rusted lines of a narrow-gauge railroad track ran to it. He turned his head to follow them, seeing that they led up the rising slope to a tall metal gate, high barbed-wire fences extending into the distance on each side.

  The gate was open. An old Jeep was parked just outside, two men walking from it towards the new arrivals.

  One was a young blond man whom Zane didn’t recognise. But the other was all too familiar.

  Rasche.

  Cruel glee crept on to the Nazi’s face at the sight of the handcuffed captive. ‘I saw you in Egypt,’ he said. ‘You killed some of my men.’

  ‘And I suppose you’re going to kill me,’ Zane replied, fighting to control his tension.

  ‘In time. But only after you have told us everything we want to know.’

  Zane pushed out his chest in defiance. ‘I won’t tell you anything.’

  Rasche smiled coldly. ‘Many have said that to me in the past. They were all mistaken. You will be no different, kleiner Jude.’

  ‘Lech lehizdayen.’

  The insult produced only mocking amusement. ‘Many have said that to me too. It is anatomically impossible, I am afraid. But we shall see what is possible with your anatomy. I have seen Jews turned into all sorts of useful things.’

  With a roar of fury, Zane jumped up – only to be pistol-whipped back down by Santos. Rasche stepped hard on the fallen man’s neck until vertebrae crackled. ‘The Final Solution did not stop in 1945,’ he said. ‘It was only . . . paused. We shall start it again, soon enough. Perhaps you will even have the honour of being the first of its new victims.’

  Zane choked out each word. ‘You’ll be . . . dead . . . before then.’

  The Nazi let out a muted laugh. ‘Not by you.’ He drew something from inside his coat.

  Not a gun. An SS dagger, a silver skull on its hilt. He stepped back, bent down – and stabbed it into Zane’s thigh. The Israeli screamed.

  ‘Leitz told me that the man I killed in Alexandria was your friend,’ said Rasche, voice low and gloating. ‘Benjamin Falk, a Mossad Nazi-hunter.’ He twisted the blade, blood running down Zane’s leg. ‘I was aiming at you, but one dead Jew is much like another.’ A last jab, Zane crying out again, then he withdrew the knife. ‘Do not worry – you will join him soon enough.’ He kicked the writhing man, then turned away.

  His companion yanked Zane up, jamming a gun into his back and pushing him to the Jeep. ‘What about the other man who was with him?’ Rasche asked Santos.

  The Argentinian savoured a mouthful of cigar smoke before replying. ‘If he isn’t dead already, he will be soon.’

  Miranda halted the car. Vargas got out and opened the rear door. ‘Move.’

  Eddie was pulled out to find himself on a hillside about a mile from the town. The wind had picked up, pale dust swirling up the slope from the dry lake bed.

  Vargas turned him around – revealing the c
emetery.

  The plot was dotted with stunted, twisted trees between the graves. Far in the past, the inhabitants of Lago Amargo had had money to spare on the dead, small tombs and angelic statues standing amongst the gravestones. But the town’s decline over time was easy to see; the markers became smaller, plainer, before stone finally gave way to simple wooden crosses.

  ‘This is wrong!’ Miranda protested. ‘We are not murderers!’

  ‘Shut up,’ said Vargas. He pointed at a nearby mound of dirt, dusty tools lying beside it. ‘Get the shovel.’

  The young cop threw up his hands. ‘I want no part of this.’

  ‘Cobarde,’ muttered Vargas. ‘You, English. Get it.’

  Eddie’s arms were still cuffed behind his back. ‘How, with my fucking mouth?’

  The cop made an exasperated sound. He spoke to Miranda, but the other man shook his head. ‘Don’t try anything,’ said Vargas as he poked his gun against Eddie’s back and fumbled for the handcuff key. He tried to push it into the hole on the left bracelet, metal clinking on metal before it found its home. He turned it, and the cuff came loose. ‘Okay, you’re going to dig—’

  Eddie twisted at the waist, using his left elbow to slam the gun away from his body as his right arm whisked around to deliver a punch to Vargas’s face. ‘Dig this!’

  It wasn’t as solid a blow as he had hoped, but it was enough to unbalance the Argentinian. Eddie shoulder-barged him, knocking him down.

  But the cop still had his gun – and was already recovering. The Yorkshireman ran for the nearest row of gravestones. If he could get behind them, he would have at least partial cover . . .

  Too slow. ‘Bastardo!’ Vargas shouted as he scrambled upright and took aim—

  A shot – but it went wide. Eddie glanced back as he reached the first of the markers to see that Miranda had grabbed his partner’s arm. Vargas broke free – then clubbed the smaller man with his gun. Miranda fell against the car.

  Eddie bent low and kept running, squinting as more gritty dust blew up the hillside. He swerved around a statue, intending to use it as a shield, but instead had to make a running jump as he almost fell into an open hole behind it, mud and a rusty shovel at the bottom of the half-dug old grave. He swore as he regained his balance on the other side, then hurried on. The next decent cover was a gnarled tree. He ran for it—

  Dried bark exploded just behind the Englishman as he reached safety. The pursuing cop fired again, but struck nothing.

  Vargas was not a skilled shooter, then; the chances of hitting a small target with a handgun while running were minuscule, but he had still taken the shot, driven by anger and testosterone. He had a second magazine on his belt, though, so playing cat and mouse until he ran out of ammo wasn’t an option. Eddie knew that his only hope of survival was to take the Argentinian down – but how?

  He turned into the gritty wind. Lower down the slope, a small, blocky mausoleum stood about thirty yards distant. A plan came to him. Risky, and it depended on Vargas acting on instinct rather than logic, but it was all he had . . .

  Eddie broke cover and ran. Grave markers blurred past. A shot, then another, lead striking stone behind him. Fifteen yards, ten – but the whipcrack of a third shot snapped past barely a foot in his wake. Vargas had got smart and stopped, gun in both hands for greater accuracy. Five yards, but Eddie knew that the next round would be on target—

  He threw himself into a dive, thumping down in the dirt just short of the structure. A bullet seared above him. Vargas adjusted his aim and fired again – but hit only soil as Eddie scrambled behind the mausoleum.

  Panting, the Englishman jumped up and grabbed a foot-long hunk of stone that had broken from the wall. The cop would take at most twenty seconds to reach the little tomb. Would he go around its right side, or the left? Vargas was right-handed, so coming from that side, rounding the obstacle anticlockwise, would give him the most advantageous positioning; he could lead with his gun as he circled. But doing so would also mean he was facing into the dusty wind at the first corner . . .

  Eddie couldn’t cover both sides of the tomb simultaneously. He had to make a choice, now. He heard the cop approaching, the gear on his belt rattling. Which way would he go?

  The Englishman went to the left side, gambling that the enraged Vargas would follow his natural instincts and protect his vision.

  Pressing his back against the weathered wall, he held the stone like a baseball bat, ready to swing. The footsteps slowed, the Argentinian uncertain which side to take . . .

  Left.

  Eddie waited, arms tensed. Boots crunched on gravel. The gun’s muzzle came into view, Vargas leaning forward to see what was around the corner—

  The chunk of stone smashed against his head.

  Vargas staggered backwards. The gun went off – but the bullet hit the tomb, ricocheting away. Eddie threw the stone at the other man’s chest. The Argentinian fell on his back.

  Eddie was about to dive for the weapon, but instantly changed his plan when he saw it was pointing almost at him – and Vargas still had his finger on the trigger. Instead he darted for the nearest row of gravestones. These were as old as the mausoleum, moss-scabbed stone teeth giving him a degree of protection.

  But not much. Vargas shrieked breathless abuse as he ran, firing a couple of wild shots from the ground.

  The old tree was just ahead. Eddie swerved to put it between his back and Vargas’s gun as he raced towards the car. It would keep him out of the cop’s sight for a few seconds, but could he turn that to his advantage?

  Yes.

  Another change of course as he angled to retrace his own steps – and jumped down into the open grave.

  The hole was four feet at its deepest, the edges crumbling. Eddie backed against the grave’s end, holding his breath as he listened for Vargas. Angry gasping reached him as the cop lumbered up the hill . . . then slowed as he found he had lost sight of his target.

  Eddie tensed. He knew he could never have reached the car before Vargas spotted him – but did Vargas realise that? If the cop thought the Englishman had gone for the vehicle, then he had a chance. If not . . .

  Vargas set off again, the jangle of his equipment growing louder. How close was he? Eddie couldn’t judge – and didn’t dare raise his head to look. All he knew was that each step was bringing his adversary nearer, nearer . . .

  And past.

  The noise receded. Eddie cautiously peered out. Vargas had passed about twenty feet away, a large neighbouring gravestone blocking the hole from his view. His back was now to the Yorkshireman as he advanced on the car – but it wouldn’t be long before he realised his prey was not there.

  Eddie picked up the rusty spade and climbed out, moving up behind Vargas. The Argentinian stopped, head cocked, listening. Eddie slipped closer.

  The cop turned—

  The shovel’s rusted head came down on his hand like an axe, the dull clang of metal accompanied by a snap of bone. Vargas screamed, the gun falling from his broken fingers. Eddie swung the spade again – and blood and broken teeth sprayed from the Argentinian’s mouth as the flat of the blade hit him in the face.

  He dropped the shovel and forced the cop into a headlock, then dragged him to the open grave and threw him in. ‘You’re fucking lucky I’m not burying you in there,’ he said, kicking loose dirt on to him. Vargas curled up in fear. The Englishman retrieved the gun, then returned to the police car.

  Miranda was slumped against it. He looked up as Eddie approached. ‘Where – where is Vargas?’

  ‘In a grave. Don’t worry, he’s not dead,’ Eddie added as he saw the shock on the young man’s face. ‘He just wishes he was. He won’t be causing any trouble for a while, though.’ He looked at the settlement below, then his gaze snapped back to Miranda. ‘Question is . . . what about you?’

  Th
e wind had picked up by the time Santos returned to town, dust from the dry lake billowing across the streets. Squinting even behind his mirrored sunglasses, he was about to head into the police station when the frantic bleat of a car horn reached him. He peered into the haze. It was the car in which Vargas and Miranda had taken the Englishman to the graveyard – but now only one man was inside.

  The vehicle skidded to a halt. ‘What is it?’ Santos demanded as the frightened Miranda jumped out. ‘Where is Vargas?’

  ‘The – the Englishman,’ Miranda stammered. ‘He got loose and beat the crap out of Vargas! He was gonna do the same to me, but I got away. But he’s coming, he’s coming for you! He’s got a gun – he said he’s going to kill you!’

  ‘Like hell,’ Santos growled. He stared towards the hills, but the dust obscured all detail. ‘Did you come straight from the graveyard?’ Miranda nodded. ‘Then he can’t have got far. We can stop him before he even reaches the edge of town.’

  Miranda’s arrival had drawn attention, people coming out of nearby buildings. Silva emerged from the hotel and jogged to the two cops. ‘What’s going on?’ he called, worried.

  ‘That English asshole’s still causing trouble,’ Santos replied, before hurrying into the station. He returned carrying a rifle with a telescopic sight.

  Silva’s eyes widened. ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Taking care of a problem.’ Santos slapped a magazine into the Remington’s receiver and drew back the bolt.

  ‘But what if someone comes looking for him? What if they tell the federal police or the gendarmerie that he was here?’

  ‘You’ve done well out of our town’s little secret,’ the police chief growled. ‘Now it’s time for you to help keep it.’

  Silva glanced around nervously. More people – including his daughter – were watching. ‘You can’t just kill him!’ he said in a strained whisper. ‘You said you were only going to kick them out of town!’