Corkscrew

by Ted Wood

  "Where've you come from? Where's the gang hiding out?"

  "They're at a house that's owned by a friend of Grandpa Corbett's. I'll take you there. You've got to come; they're hurting him."

  "Hurting your grandfather?"

  He shook his head impatiently. "No, not him, Andy. They're hurting Andy. They say he let the women go before they got the cabinet, and one of them says he let you get away on his machine."

  This made sense. They figured to be angry, and bikers don't sit around getting mad; they get even. But that didn't explain why the kid had come to see me. This was too pat. They were trying to get me back so they could take out their anger on me.

  "You're lying."

  "No, I'm not." He almost stamped his foot in vexation. "No. Why do you think I've come to see you? He needs help. Andy needs help. They'll kill him."

  "Why should I worry about what happens to a biker? Especially a biker who reported me on a phony violence charge and cost me my job?"

  He clenched his hands together desperately. "No, it's not like that. He isn't a biker. He's a policeman."

  "Sure," I said, and laughed. It was an act on my part. I had half expected the news, but not from this boy, not this way. Maybe it would come out in six months when whatever case Andy was investigating came to court. Then we would hear about his exploits, but he wouldn't have told this kid in the middle of a hectic night.

  "It's true." The boy's eyes were bright with tears. "Why don't you believe me?"

  "Because that gang is anxious to get hold of a certain file cabinet, and failing that, to get hold of me. This could all be a story to get me dashing off into a rendezvous where they could work me over."

  Suddenly the boy shook his head. "No, it's real. I just remembered. Andy told me to tell you 'Corkscrew.'"

  "Corkscrew? What the hell does that mean?"

  I heard the stairs creak behind me and turned to see Freda coming down, wearing a dressing gown my ex-wife had given me once for Christmas. She looked gorgeous, and the boy smiled at her and said, "Hello. I'm sorry to disturb you."

  "You," she said. Then to me, "He's one of them, Reid. He was there."

  "I'm not one of them," he said. "Didn't I make you a cup of coffee? Wasn't I polite all the time?"

  "Angelic," she said.

  Sam came up to the back door and barked once. I let him in. He had checked all around, and the area was clear. That meant the boy had come alone. But it didn't mean he wasn't trying to trap me. I ushered him into the kitchen and pointed to a chair. "Sit there," I told him, and picked up the phone.

  The OPP officer at the post in Parry Sound answered on the first ring. "Hi, Corporal. It's Reid Bennett at Murphy's Harbour. I have to talk to the senior officer on duty. Who is it?"

  "That'd be Inspector Anderson," he said, and I groaned. "Doesn't the sonofabitch ever go home? He was here last night to have me suspended."

  "It's his quick changeover. He went from day shift to nights. Sorry about that. And sorry about your suspension. Buncha crap if y'ask me."

  "Thanks. Well, I guess you'd better put me through, please."

  He told me to hold the line and it rang and Anderson picked it up. "Inspector Anderson."

  "Inspector, this is Reid Bennett. I've had a communication from the gang of bikers in the area."

  "Ah, Bennett. Yes, I've heard all about your exploits from Sergeant Kennedy. You've been warned, you know. You're suspended. You had no right to go interfering with those people."

  There was going to be more, but I cut him off. "I know all that. I'm ringing you to confirm what I believe to be a code word. It came from a biker who calls himself Andy. He wants me to go and help him. He's in trouble, and he sent the message 'Corkscrew.' I'm calling to ask you if that's a code word to identify a policeman."

  "That's official business," Anderson said. "You're not a policeman, you're a civilian. Can't you get that into your head?"

  "Listen, Inspector Anderson," I said slowly, "we can sort out our personal problems at a later time. Right now I am informing you, officially, in the presence of witnesses at this end, that I have received a message from a man I believe to be a cop and I know to be in deep trouble. He has given me the word 'Corkscrew.' All I want from you is confirmation if that is a code word being used currently in a biker investigation."

  I thought that would reach him, but instead he just raised his voice a notch and started repeating himself. I was not a policeman, and he couldn't discuss police business with me. I hung up on him and dialed the OPP number again. The same corporal answered.

  "Bennett here again," I told him. "I had no cooperation from your inspector. Get me the head of the biker squad. It's an emergency. I don't care if you have to get him out of the attorney general's office, the hospital, or an early grave, get him, it's vital."

  "Jesus, Reid. I'll do my best. Can I call you back?"

  "Call back to the police station here in five minutes. I'm heading down there. And thanks."

  Fred was staring at me, wide-eyed. "You're not going out again, surely to God?"

  "I have to. I'm sorry. Can you get dressed, please, honey. I want you down at the station while I'm out. You can't stay on your own."

  "Damn you," she said. "Damn you, Reid. Can't you ever stop? Can't you say you've done your job and quit?"

  "The job's not done. I'm sure this guy Andy is an undercover man, and if he is, they could kill him. And I owe him."

  "You owe him?" She put both hands on her hips, and the housecoat yawned at the thigh. The blond kid looked away, going red. "You owe him? Why's that, because he looked after your property, me?"

  "I don't have time for semantics, and I don't want to fight. You're not safe here with me gone. I'm asking you, please, come with us to the police station."

  She took down her fists from her sides. "And what if I say no?"

  "Don't do that, please, Fred. This is vital and time is important." I stood and waited, and after a few seconds she turned and walked back upstairs, planting her bare feet solidly on every tread.

  "You stay here," I told the boy. Then I told Sam, "Keep," just for insurance and followed Fred upstairs. She was dressing in blue jeans and a sweater. She had her bag on the bed, and as I dressed, she picked up her other clothes and stuffed them all inside. So she was leaving. I was sad to see it, but this was not the time for discussions. When I was dressed, I stuck the box of .38 shells in my pocket and reached for her bag. She held on to it angrily, and I held up my hands in surrender.

  I led the way downstairs and told Sam, "Easy," then said, "Okay, son, let's go." Fred's key ring was lying on the countertop in the kitchen, and I picked it up. "Come back for your car at daylight. That's only a couple of hours off," I told her, and she dropped her bag on the floor and glared at me.

  "Where do you get off thinking you can order me around?"

  "It's not an order; it's a precaution. They're out there on the highway. They could see your car leaving and follow you, and it's fifty miles down the highway to the first OPP post. You'd be at their mercy. Please. I know you're a feminist, but you're in danger."

  "It's me in danger, not you," she said.

  "If you're in danger, I'm in danger," I said, so softly that the kid didn't hear me. "Please, I'm begging you, wait at the station until daylight."

  She looked at me, and the anger dwindled in her face.

  "All right. Daylight."

  We drove to the station in my car, and I took them both inside. The uniformed man was on the telephone. He held it out to me without speaking, and I took it. "Reid Bennett."

  "Bennett, Positano here. You say you've got a code word?"

  "Yes, I think so. It comes from the kid who was running with the gang. He says they're working over a guy called Andy who helped the two women hostages. He told the kid to tell me 'Corkscrew.'"

  "Does the kid say where they are?"

  "It's a cottage near here. It belongs to a friend of his grandfather. That's the guy I was telling you about, the man
whose place was trashed. It was his boat used to dump the body of the victim."

  "How reliable is the kid?"

  "I don't know. He's young and he's flaky, but he came on his own, and he looks like he ran through the bush to get to me. What's this about?"

  He didn't answer for a long moment. Then he said, "You're right. It's a code word. It means worm your way in and pull the plug. That's not a biker, that's a Mountie from British Columbia."

  Chapter Nineteen

  "Well, the kid says he's in trouble. Here, speak to the boy yourself. His name is Reg Waters." I handed the phone over to the boy, and he took it, looking at me nervously. "That's Sergeant Positano of the OPP. Tell him what you know."

  The boy stumbled through the conversation while we listened. Everything he said first he had already told me, but at one point he started to blush. "That's not something I want to talk about," he said. "No, I just kind of met them when I was out in Vancouver." He was staring at the wall blindly, shutting us all out as he spoke, and at last he said, "All right," and handed me the phone. "He wants to speak to you again."

  "Bennett here."

  "How far from you is this cottage?"

  I turned to the boy. "How far is this place?"

  "Just up and across the highway, about a mile altogether. Less if you go through the bush."

  "About a mile, he says. How soon can you get there?"

  Positano sniffed. "That's the swine of it. I've got guys lined up ready to go, but they're in Gravenhurst. It's gonna take half an hour at least."

  "That could be stretching it," I said carefully. "Can't you call in some troops up here?"

  "That would take just as long, and they wouldn't be trained men, just highway officers." He paused again, and at last he put the question I'd been expecting, going around it gently. "What we need is a diversion, something to take their minds off Andy for half an hour, maybe forty minutes. Any ideas?"

  "Only one and I'm not sure it's a good one. Like I told you, I've been suspended by your Inspector Anderson."

  "Just doing his job," Positano said quickly. "The thing is, I know your record. You're a trained man; you could cook up enough noise there to keep them worried." Another pause. "I don't want you rushing the place; just make them think there's a mob outside."

  "You think that would do it? Hell, that might just get them suspicious enough to kill the poor bastard."

  "I couldn't ask you to do anything more." There, the big question. Did I owe Andy enough to go in after him?

  "He took care of the two women hostages, and he gave me his bike to get away on. That's enough for me. Don't say anything else."

  "Dammit, I'll see you get a medal."

  Sure, I thought. And how about seeing my girl didn't leave for Toronto without saying good-bye. "I'll settle for a bottle of Black Velvet when this is over. In the meantime, the officer here will give you the location of the place. I'll get the kid to stay here and explain it to him."

  "We're on our way. Thirty minutes," he promised. "Put the officer back on."

  I handed the phone back and took the boy by the shoulder. "All right, where are they?"

  "It's a big old cottage, a house, really. On the river. You get to it down the side road opposite the turning on the highway that leads in here."

  I walked through the counter and checked the shotgun. It was chained into the rack again, but before I could ask for the key, the OPP man turned, still talking into the phone, and wriggled it out of his pocket and tossed it to me. I unsnapped the lock and took the gun down. Fred gave a little gasp, but I ignored her, checking the load. Full magazine. That meant five rounds. I opened the drawer under the guns and took out the box of SSG shells. It was almost full, another twenty spares. Good, that gave me enough firepower to stay safe from a medium distance.

  "Who owns the cottage?" I asked the boy.

  "Mr. Bardell," he said, licking his lips nervously.

  "Good. I know the place you mean. How many rooms are there?"

  Fred came through the counter and took my arm.

  "Reid, you can't be serious." She wasn't angry anymore, just scared.

  I hugged her clumsily with one arm. "It's safe as a church. I just have to go outside and blaze away. That'll take their minds off hurting the guy who protected you."

  She burst into tears. "Don't go. You'll get hurt. Please don't."

  "Be back in an hour, just stay here with the officer." I squeezed her quickly with my left arm and then let go and touched the OPP man on the shoulder. "It's the first house on the right down the side road opposite the south turning into Murphy's Harbour. Big clapboard place, painted green. I'll leave my car a hundred yards this side of it. License 392 ADC, Chev. Got that?"

  "Yeah." He nodded and repeated the instruction into the phone. I hissed at Sam, and he fell into position, just behind my heel. "And keep these two people here. That's crucial."

  I winked at Fred, but she turned her face away, her back rigid. The OPP man said, "Will do."

  It seemed cooler outside. There was a light mist rising from the lake, leaking over the beach behind the station and up to the door, making a thin haze in front of my headlights as I started the car with Sam beside me. I paused to cock the shotgun, putting a round up the spout, then loaded one last round. Six in all, plus the others in the box. If I got a chance to load them. I wished I had my old M16 with its changeable magazines. That was the kind of firepower that held people's heads down.

  I drove quickly out to the highway and across and down the side road beside the narrow finger lake that the kid had called a river. It was a continuation of our waterway, leading out all the way to Georgian Bay on Lake Huron. By day it looked like a river, a hundred yards wide with cruisers heading up and down toward the highway bridge and under it to Murphy's Harbour Lock. I wondered if there would be a boat there. Probably. But there was a tricky patch of rocks at the mouth of the lake. Unless the bikers knew the area, they couldn't escape that way. And anyway, my job was not to keep them. Andy would have their names and descriptions. I just had to get in and stop them from working him over. I drove slowly, with my lights off, keeping my presence as secret as I could.

  I stopped the car where I'd promised, at a bend in the road a hundred yards short of the big old house. I could see lights inside but couldn't hear any noise except for the night noises of the bush. There was a narrow shoulder to the road, just a drainage ditch, then a fifty-yard-wide patch of trees between the road and the lake. I took to the shoulder, gun held ready, low across my body, Sam pacing at my heel.

  About thirty yards from the house I edged into the trees and moved quietly, stooping to feel for sticks that might crack under my feet. I was scared. This was as bad as patrol in enemy-held territory. There wouldn't be any booby traps, any trip wires connected to grenades, any pits filled with pungee sticks dipped in human excrement, but I was alone without the silent strength of the other guys in my old platoon. And there were a dozen thugs in that house. My breath was shallow, and I paused and sucked in a couple of deep gulps of air to calm me, then went on to the clearing that surrounded the old house.

  Bingo! There were bikes lined up beside it, all pointing out toward the roadway where the riders could run out and jump on and away at the first sign of trouble. Only I didn't think they would run. Not from one man, and there was no way of fooling them that I was part of a crowd. Or was there?

  I stopped among the trees, scanning the area carefully. If they were organized, they would have sentries posted. My eyes were accustomed to the darkness by now, and I couldn't see anyone close to the bikes. That's where a trained man would have been, low to the ground. But these weren't trained men. They were only cunning.

  Then I saw the giveaway. The tiny red glow of a cigarette as a man smoked carefully, shielding the butt inside the palm of his downturned hand, the way sailors smoke on watch when they think they can get away with it. He was at the base of the steps that led up to the veranda of the house. Bored, probably, wishing he coul
d be inside, just going through the motions of guarding the house. I sniffed and caught the faint whiff of marijuana. Good. He would be slow.

  To reach him I had to cross twenty open yards. But I didn't think he had company. That left me clear to move to my left, keeping in the trees until I was level with the rear of the house. Then I whispered to Sam to stay and crouched and ran on tiptoe to the wall of the house. Nobody stirred. I edged along the wall and came to the edge of the veranda, staying low.

  The marijuana smell was heavy. He had been smoking for a while, I figured. Then I heard him suck in a deep breath of smoke, saw the shielded glow of the butt brighten, lighting up the palm of his hand.

  I propped the gun against the step and waited fifteen seconds until the biker was concentrating on his joint, oblivious to anything else. Then I stepped out and chopped him solidly on the back of the neck. He grunted and lurched forward, and I grabbed him before he could fall and laid him face-up while I pressed my thumbs into the pulses on each side of his neck, up under the ear.

  It took only a few seconds. He stopped struggling and went limp. I stepped away from him, picking up the gun again and running softly to the motorbikes. I held the gun in the crook of my arm while I drew my pocketknife and went down the line of the bikes, slashing the rear tire on each one. Then I felt over the tops of the gas tanks, looking for one that wasn't locked. Most of them were, but at last I found one. I unscrewed it and put my knife away, digging in my pocket for matches. I came up with a book of them and then scraped around over the dry ground until I had a handful of dry grass. It filled the opening of the gas tank, and I shoved it down as far as I could without pushing it right inside, then lit a match, lit the grass, and set the open matchbook on top.

  It flared and I rolled away, nursing the shotgun and hissing to Sam. He bounded to me, and I stood up and ran for the back of the house as the flames burned away the plug of grass and flashed to the vapor from the tank. It blew up like a bomb as I dived behind the house. Shards of metal spanged against the wall closest to the bikes, and the inside of the house erupted in noise as men fell over one another to rush out, shouting and swearing.