Fatal Harvest

by Catherine Palmer

  “But—”

  “Please, come.” One of the women took Jill’s arm and urged her back into the room. The other shut the door and locked it from the inside.

  “Listen, I really did not call—”

  “God is good,” the woman said. She dropped the length of fabric that swathed her head.

  “It’s you!” Jill gasped, recognizing the guard from the minibus.

  “Keep quiet, please.” He placed a finger to his lips. “The guard may hear us. Here are your passports with the visas stamped inside. Here are tickets for the train to Rumbek. And this is a photograph of my family, my children. You will please look for them when you are in the refugee camp?”

  “Yes, of course!”

  “Quickly now…bring the man.”

  Her heart racing, Jill stepped out onto her balcony. “Cole!” She leaned over and took his hand as the tears spilled from her eyes once more. “God is good!”

  SIXTEEN

  “This is not going to work! I’m blond!” Jill blotted her cheeks with a wad of tissue Cole had brought her from the bathroom. “And I wish I could stop crying. This is ridiculous, and I’m just really so…so—” “Jill.” Cole set his hands on Jill’s shoulders as Daniel, the Christian driver of the minibus, wrapped his own white robe around her. “What’s upsetting you?

  “Well, you’re a man, and there’s no way you’ll pass for a woman. Besides, you’re twice as tall as Daniel.”

  “Not twice as tall. Maybe a head taller.”

  “But we have the visas now, so why can’t we just—”

  “Daniel explained that.” Cole couldn’t figure out why his curly-haired stalwart pillar of faith and hope was suddenly crumbling before him. “If we show the visas to the guard, he’ll wonder how we suddenly got them. And then we’ll have to head back to the airport and wade through a mess of red tape. And we could still be deported.”

  “I know, I know.” She sniffed loudly. “God has prepared this way for us. But everything is just so hard. Why does it have to be hard? Why can’t it be easy for once?”

  He sighed, hearing his own thoughts reflected in her words. “I guess we’re getting a graduate-level course in faith. At least I am.”

  She nodded, looking miserable in her white outfit. He wished he could scoop her up in his arms and hold her until every sorrow and fear crept out of their hearts. But this wasn’t the time or the place. They had only moments before they must escape from the hotel.

  “Please understand about this journey you make,” Daniel stated as he handed Cole the tickets. “In Sudan, the train from Khartoum to Wau in the south has been used many years for transporting soldiers, horses and supplies to military posts. This train also carried the mujahideen—tribal militiamen whose work is to create a security zone along the railway line. While traveling, the train stops often, and these mujahideen are permitted to plunder and raid villages in exchange for their protection of the railway.”

  “That’s barbaric,” Cole said.

  “It is the way of the Sudanese government. The mujahideen capture many villagers and sell them as slaves.”

  Cole turned to Jill in disbelief. She nodded, her eyes sad.

  “Recently,” Daniel continued, “the United Nations set up a humanitarian train convoy from Kosti to Wau. The World Food Programme operates this. You know it?”

  “The World Food Programme?” Cole repeated. “I’ve heard of it, I suppose.” He recalled snippets of TV commercials urging viewers to support hunger-relief foundations. He normally surfed right on past, uncomfortable with the images of skeletal children and their large, pleading eyes. Newspaper and magazine ads had the same effect on him. Seeing pathetic, naked babies holding up empty bowls, he turned the pages quickly.

  “These visas I get for you are diplomatic visas,” Daniel pointed out. He opened the two passports and displayed the newly inked stamps. “You must not board the military train. You must ride on the humanitarian train. You understand? As soon as you escape from this hotel, take off the robes. When you sit on the train, you must appear to be officials from a relief organization—the World Food Programme or I-FEED or some other. It may keep you safe from the mujahideen, who would wish to kidnap you for ransom.”

  “Kidnap us? This is unbelievable.”

  “Believe it. Now, here is the weapon I purchased for you,” Daniel went on. He lifted the towels out of his basket and presented Cole with a revolver. “It is old, and I could buy only these five bullets. After I obtained the train tickets and the visas, the money was not enough for a better gun. But it will shoot. I tested it.”

  Cole sighed. A rusty old handgun would hardly protect them from an Uzi or AK-47 carried by almost every adult male in this country, including the marauding mujahideen. But it was better than nothing. And it represented another great risk taken by the driver.

  “Thank you, Daniel,” Cole said softly. “You’ve been a great help to us.”

  “I help you because you have lost your son,” the African told him. “I understand this sadness. I help you because your son came to Sudan to feed my people. And I help you because I am a Christian.”

  “You’ve shown me a greater Christian love and sacrifice than I have seen in my own country, Daniel.”

  The man smiled. “After you find your son and take him safely to your house in America, you must return to Sudan and help us. You come to feed the people, and then you can tell them about Jesus. There are some Christians here, especially in the south. In Sudan, everyone is hungry for food, yes? But also for hope. Hungry for hope. You will help us, Cole Strong?”

  Cole squared his shoulders. “I’ll come back to Sudan,” he promised. He laid his hand on Daniel’s back. “I will feed your people with food and with hope in Jesus.”

  The sound of a loud sob drew his attention to Jill, who was sitting on the bed in her disguise. Cole studied her in dismay. He’d never been good at understanding women’s emotions, and Jill Pruitt’s were no exception. The only difference was that now he desperately cared to find out what was bothering her.

  He moved toward her, but Daniel stopped him. “We make you a Sudanese woman now, Cole Strong,” he said. His companion, Joseph, was unwrapping his own robes. “You must not walk upright. Bend down and turn your eyes away, very shy. Keep the face covered. This is the way of Muslim women in Sudan.”

  In moments, the men had swathed Cole in white robes. They slipped the pistol back under the stack of towels and handed the baskets of massage supplies to Cole and Jill.

  “Daniel, what will happen to you and Joseph?” Cole asked. “Before long, the guard will find you here in the room instead of us. What will he do to you?”

  “Aha.” From his pocket, Daniel produced three of Jill’s ten-dollar bills. “I save these for Ahmed. This is more than two months’ wages for a Sudanese man. Ahmed will release us, and then he will run to tell his employer how he was overpowered by fifteen men with guns and knives.”

  “Why don’t we just give Ahmed the money now?” Jill suggested.

  “He will never permit you to leave—even for a much greater sum than this. But if you have escaped already, he will take this bribe and make a story for his employer.”

  Cole shook the man’s hand. “May God bless you and reward you richly for your efforts. We will search for your children.”

  “God is good,” Daniel responded. He laid his hands on Cole and Jill. “In the name of Jesus Christ, may God be with you and keep you safe. May He lead you to your son in safety. May you honor your vow to return to Sudan and bring us hope. Amen. Go in peace.”

  Feeling a greater sense of God’s presence than he’d ever felt in a church service, Cole embraced the two Christian men who had risked so much on his behalf. Then he took Jill’s arms.

  “Stay close to me,” he whispered. “Don’t look at the guard. Don’t say a word.”

  He opened the door. Clutching their baskets, they stepped out into the hall.

  The guard spotted them and stood from his c
hair near the wall. “Kayf haa’lak?” he asked.

  “Keep moving,” Cole murmured against Jill’s ear. He hurried her down the hallway. “We’ll take the stairs.”

  “Eh?” the guard called after them. “Kayf haa’lak?”

  “Khal-las,” Jill said. “Ma’ Al-Salama.”

  They rounded the corner, pushed open the fire door, and fled down the emergency stairwell. At the ground floor, Cole paused. After removing the pistol, he took both baskets and set them against the wall. “What did the guard say to us?” he asked as he shoved the gun under his belt.

  “I’m not sure.” Jill was breathing hard from their rapid descent. “I think he was asking how the massage went. Or how we were doing. Something like that.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  “I just said we were finished.”

  He looked down into her pale face and couldn’t resist taking her into his arms. “Jill, we’re going to find Matt. I have faith.”

  At that her green eyes brimmed with tears again.

  Dismayed, he kissed her forehead. “Tell me what’s wrong. Please, Jill, I want to know.”

  “It’s that…that I…that you and I…” She grabbed the corner of her robe and wiped her cheeks. “We have to get out of here. Just never mind, okay?”

  She pulled away from his arms and pushed open the exit door of the Grand Holiday Villa Hotel. The heat and odor of Khartoum enveloped Cole as he followed her into the bright morning sunshine. Jill hurried ahead, her shoulders bent. He would never understand women, Cole realized. Never. But if there was one woman he would not stop trying to fathom, it was Jill Pruitt.

  A blast of artificially chill air greeted Vince Grant as he stepped into the lobby of the Grand Holiday Villa Hotel in Khartoum. Grateful, he paused and mopped his forehead with a white handkerchief. Just the short walk from the taxi to the front door had been enough to unnerve him.

  Khartoum was a disgusting city—filthy, disintegrating and swarming with miscreants. White-robed women hurried by, their heads low and their eyes down, as though they had committed some terrible crime—and they probably had. Men wandered the streets, their skinny arms and gaunt faces stark against their own white garments. Hollow-eyed, they stared at the Caucasian visitors. Vince tried to read what he saw in those dark eyes. Suspicion? Anger? Outright hatred? All of the above, he decided. And the children…they gathered in gangs, no doubt for the purpose of stealing from tourists. The country needed a good welfare system, Vince thought. Schools. And a thousand other things that any civilized nation would take for granted. But what could you expect from the Third World?

  “Did you get clearance for the Learjet, Harwood?” he asked as his security chief appeared in the lobby. The man had been on the phone during the ride from the airport, where they had been informed that because they had no visas, they would be detained at the hotel until Monday.

  “It’s not going to happen, sir.” Harwood was sweating. “Sudan has sixty-one airports, but only twelve with paved runways. The airport nearest the Rumbek refugee center is in the town of Juba.”

  “Then we’ll land in Juba.”

  “Juba is three hundred miles from Rumbek, and the road between them is full of potholes—practically impassable.”

  “I don’t care how far it is or how long it takes to get there,” Vince snapped. “Set it up, Harwood. Get us a Jeep or something.”

  “I’m sorry, sir, but we simply can’t take a Learjet 55 into Juba. The town has no electricity. Drought reduced their water supply, and the generators aren’t working. They’re obsolete anyway. Nobody’s got spare parts for anything in Sudan. We won’t have radio contact, and a night landing is out of the question. The pilot would have no way to locate the airport.”

  Harwood rubbed his temples as a guard approached. Uniformed and carrying an AK-47, he stood at attention before them. “I am Ali,” he announced. “You may not leave the hotel for tourism purposes.”

  “Tourism? We don’t give a—” Vince bit off an oath and returned to Harwood. “Get the CIA. Get the U.S. ambassador. Do whatever it takes. Check out trains, helicopters, anything that moves. I intend to leave this hotel before the sun sets, Harwood. Is that clear?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “And what about Karume? Why isn’t he answering his phone?”

  “I’m not sure, sir. The communications systems in Sudan are—”

  “Down? Broken? Out of spare parts? Tell me something I don’t know.”

  “Sir, I left three men at the airport working on the situation. I’m doing all I can to make this happen.” Harwood’s voice was tense. The veins in his neck stood out like snakes under his skin, and Vince knew he’d pushed his security man as far as he could.

  “I’m aware we’re in a tight spot here,” Vince said. “And I know you’re doing all you can. On the other hand, Harwood, we wouldn’t be stuck in the middle of Africa if you’d stopped the boy while he was still in New Mexico.”

  “I won’t deny that, sir. And as you know, we made every attempt—”

  “Fine, fine. And would you tell the manager to make this Rambo wannabe stop breathing down my neck?”

  “Yes, sir.” He glanced at Ali and his large machine gun. “Mr. Grant, I’d like to settle you here at the hotel and assure myself of your safety. Then I plan to return to the airport and find out what I have to do to get us out of Khartoum and on our way to Rumbek.”

  “That’s good, Harwood. You do that.”

  Vince settled into one of the silk-upholstered chairs near a large potted palm in the lobby. Ali took up a position three feet away and cradled his weapon. Vince sighed.

  He stared absently at Mack Harwood, who was speaking to the manager at the reception desk. His wife and children hadn’t crossed Vince’s mind since he’d left Chicago, but now he reflected that Cheryl would approve of this hotel—overtly luxurious and built to cater to the top echelon of the world’s wealthy. What a joke. It was like a Mercedes parked in a shantytown.

  Vince couldn’t deny that a hot shower and a decent meal would do him good. Maybe he could relax enough to take a nap, though he doubted it. He was no longer counting in days the time remaining until the merger. In a mere ninety-six hours, the deal would go down. How infuriating to be stalled by the bureaucracy of an impotent government in a barren wasteland of a country. But his aura of power and control would return soon enough.

  He had made up his mind to take care of a few things once he got back to Chicago. Agrimax needed a clean sweep—more thorough background checks of all employees and better technological security. Vince would put these things into place immediately.

  Most important, he would ax Harwood and replace him with someone who could do the job. Someone tougher. Someone he could trust to nip problems in the bud.

  The image of the boy, Matthew Strong, was imprinted on Vince’s brain. Harwood’s file contained six photographs lifted from various sources. Unlike Vince’s own son, who was handsome and athletic and who possessed his father’s gifts of charm and charisma, Matthew Strong could clearly be labeled a geek. A nerd. A loser. He had blue eyes and long, curly black hair that hung well below his ears, and he wore the same out-of-style tie in every photo. Acne-spotted, his long, thin face and his skin looked sallow.

  But it was the hint of self-satisfied piety in the boy’s eyes that haunted Vince at night when he tried to sleep. What a pleasure it would be to watch the light of holiness fade from those blue eyes. The little pest needed to be taught a lesson in the way the world worked. With murder and theft charges awaiting him, Matthew Strong would have many years to think about it as he read his Bible in a prison cell. And if he never made it safely back to the States, justice would be served.

  “I’m hungry, dude.” Seated on the hard ground, Billy leaned back against the mud wall of a hut at the edge of the makeshift refugee village. “I can’t believe those boys over there are playing soccer. All they’ve eaten for months is peanuts.”

  “And that sorghum junk.”
Matt licked his dry teeth. They felt sticky and gross. He turned his head toward his friend, who was sitting beside him in the scant shade of the hut’s thatched roof. Billy’s jeans were filthy, and his feet were covered with dust and bites from the tiny red ticks that peppered the grass. Two days before, in a small village they passed, Billy bought a pair of sandals made from the rubber tread of car tires. His sneakers had started rubbing blisters on his heels, but the sandals were worse.

  “How long since we left the boat?” Billy asked.

  “We crossed the border into Sudan on Friday. Today is…” Matt looked up at the sky and calculated. “Sunday. Sunday morning.”

  “If we were at home on a Sunday morning, we’d be in church. Our youth group would be in the fellowship center right now.”

  “Yeah. Eating doughnuts.”

  “Don’t remind me!” Billy groaned. “Dude, do you think that guy is really going to bring a bicycle?”

  Matt shook his head, feeling bummed. “I don’t think so. I bet he took our money to buy peanuts for his family. He’s not going to bring us a bicycle or anything else. I think we’re gonna have to walk to Rumbek.”

  “Walk?” Billy groaned again, louder this time. “I can’t walk. We walked for two whole days just to get to this village. And all we’ve had to eat ever since we got off the boat is peanuts.”

  “And that sorghum junk,” Matt reminded him. “I guess we ought to be thankful though. At least we have something to eat.”

  Billy gave a snort of disgust.

  “Well, it’s better than most of these people. Did you see that kid eating grass? Leaves, too.”

  “I’m gonna die,” Billy said. “I’m gonna totally keel over and die right here in this village in the middle of nowhere.”

  “You’re not gonna die.”

  “Yeah, I am. I’m so thirsty.” He grunted. “How can they play soccer? It’s blistering hot, and they only ate peanuts!”

  Matt rolled his head back around to face the open ground where barefoot boys kicked a ball that had long ago lost its leather covering. They laughed and ran back and forth, as though this game was the most fun they’d had in months. And it probably was. A few of them who spoke English had told Matt they had been soldiers until a couple of weeks ago. Soldiers! And they were younger than Billy and he.