The Music of the Machine (The Book of Terwilliger 2)

by Michael Stiles

  It wasn’t entirely clear to her how the record promoter figured into the picture. All she knew was that Lester Myles made a deal with the promoter, the promoter met with the local radio station management, and in a few weeks the Ooey Gooey Lovin’ song would be in high rotation at every station in the greater Denver area. All without attracting the attention of the government for running afoul of Payola laws. Lester had all kinds of methods for slipping past the limitations of the law. This was just one of them.

  They could have mailed the single with a check and saved a lot of time. Postage was cheap. But Lester Myles was old-fashioned. He wanted these things done in person. “Crustoff is a dirty old man,” Eileen Powers had explained matter-of-factly as she had given Sarah her marching orders. “If we send a pretty young gal like yourself to close the deal, it’s as good as done. He’ll take you out to dinner, make a few gross remarks, and then you won’t have to see him again. Don’t worry,” she had added in response to the look that must have crossed Sarah’s face at that point. “Just dinner. We always make it clear to the Crustoffs of the world that our employees are not to be physically touched under any circumstances.”

  This had been a small relief, but only a small one. Sarah had been nervous about this meeting for days, and was looking forward to being done with it. And now…

  “I’m supposed to fly to San Francisco tomorrow morning,” she told Crustoff’s secretary, knowing it would do no good. There was nothing you could say to a woman who wore bifocals and her hair in a bun.

  The secretary arched her painted-on eyebrows and shrugged in a way that suggested that she could not care less about Sarah’s problems. “Shall I pencil you in for next Wednesday?” she asked.

  “Pencil me in,” Sarah sighed. She really was not feeling well at all, and this conversation was not helping. If her stomach still felt this way tomorrow, she didn’t know if she could even get on a plane. She wished she were home with Ed. How long had it been since she’d seen him?

  Two weeks. Maybe three; it was hard to keep count. She had been back in New York exactly twice since starting this job. The last time was the previous weekend, and Ed had been in Virginia again, trying to extract information from that stupid old FBI man. Not that she would have spoken to Ed if he’d been there; he still hadn’t apologized for what he had said about her new employer. She would stop the silent treatment as soon as he acknowledged that he’d been wrong to say it.

  The fact that he’d been right was what made it all the worse. She really did know nothing about the company she was working for. She had never met her own boss, had no idea what kind of person he was. The travel had seemed exciting at first, but had quickly become grueling. She was lonely.

  And now this Crustoff man was standing her up, after she’d flown across the country to meet with him. She opened her mouth to give the secretary a piece of her mind. But then she stopped herself, just in time. Yelling wouldn’t do any good. She wouldn’t give the woman the satisfaction of seeing her lose her temper. Sarah snapped her mouth shut with an audible click, picked up her leather folio, and walked to the door with her head held high.

  “Have a lovely day,” said the woman, positively dripping with contempt. Sarah smiled sweetly and gave her the finger.

  She walked five blocks to her hotel. It was not the best accommodation that Denver had to offer, but it was clean and there were no roaches. It had occurred to her that Perla Jenkins lived somewhere nearby, and Sarah had considered calling her. But her stay was a short one and there would not be much time to socialize. Besides, she wasn’t feeling up to hanging out anyway. Instead she lay on the bed in her room with a warm washcloth on her forehead. It didn’t help. After a while she got up and placed a long-distance call to the office in New York.

  “Sarah, I’m so glad you called.” Eileen’s voice was brisk and businesslike as usual. “How are you doing? Everything all right?”

  I feel like I’m going to puke, she thought, but it didn’t seem very professional to share such details with Eileen. “Just fine,” she said. Eileen always asked how she was doing, and Sarah always lied.

  “Good. Willard Crustoff’s office called a little while ago. Your meeting is cancelled.”

  “I just found out.”

  “Ah,” said Eileen. “Sorry. You’re still on for Frisco tomorrow, right?”

  She sighed and rubbed her temples. “Sure.”

  “If we can get you another meeting with Crustoff, I might have you stay the weekend in San Fran and head back to Denver early next week. Are you up for that?”

  Sarah tried not to groan, but she felt too lousy not to.

  “Things will quiet down in a few weeks,” Eileen said. “Mr. Myles was making all these trips himself since the last girl quit. You’re really saving him a lot of trouble.”

  “That’s good,” Sarah replied. “I wouldn’t want him to go to a lot of trouble.”

  There was a long silence on the line. “Sarah, we’ve been through this already.”

  “I know. I signed up for this.”

  “You did.”

  “Well, maybe that was a mistake.”

  “Sarah, I know this isn’t easy on you. But you really are catching on wonderfully here. Mr. Myles is proud of you.”

  Just hearing his name made her anger rise up. “He’s proud of me, is he? Who the hell is this Lester Myles person, anyway? How come I’ve never met him?” She was starting to sound just like Ed.

  “I’ve told you, he’s very busy.”

  “Busy, my ass. He could at least meet me once if he’s going to send me all over the damn country. He could give me a damn call, just once.”

  She could hear Eileen’s frustration at the other end of the line. “I can let him know that you want to talk to him.”

  “Great,” said Sarah. “Let him know. And you can also let him know that if I don’t hear from him today, I quit!”

  “Don’t quit.”

  “I will!” She was fed up, and didn’t mind if Eileen knew it. “I’ll fly back to New York, and I’ll give you back your stupid box of records, and I’ll… I’ll find another job.” That was a rather lame finish, but she couldn’t think of anything better.

  “Sarah, don’t quit.” The frustration had disappeared from Eileen’s voice, replaced by a quiet urgency. “I know it doesn’t seem like it right now, but the work you’re doing is extremely important.”

  Sarah snorted. “Important for Ron Nightfinger, maybe. Not for me.”

  “For you, too. Please, just promise me you’ll stick with it a while longer. I’ll put a call in to Mr. Myles and let him know that he needs to call you.”

  “Well, all right.” She wasn’t satisfied, but what else could she say?

  “We do appreciate all you’ve been doing. I know it’s been hard on you. Just hang in there until you hear from Mr. Myles, okay?”

  There wasn’t much else to talk about. They finished the call and hung up. Sarah stared at the phone for a long time. Then she picked up the receiver. She had not intended to talk to him until he apologized, but she was willing to set that aside. Just this once. “Be home,” she whispered as she dialed the number to the apartment in New York. She needed to talk to him, more than ever. Was he in New York or Virginia today? She couldn’t remember.

  The phone rang four times. Five, then six. After the tenth ring she gave up and dropped the receiver back on its cradle. Her stomach was feeling worse again, and now she was dizzy too.

  “I just want to go home,” she said to the empty hotel room.

  11

  Blueberry and the Weasel Coffee

  “It’s time to go,” Lester said over the radio. “No more putting it off.”

  Danny had been dreading this ever since Les had told him he would have to leave the radio behind. Where Danny was going, Les had said, he couldn’t take the radio. For several days since then, he’d been delaying the inevitable. “I don’t know if I can do it,” Danny said. He didn’t even know what Les wanted him to do next�
�Les had been stingy with the details—but he knew how lonely he’d been since getting separated from Blair and Plotkin. The radio was his only contact with the outside world, and the thought of leaving it behind was terrifying.

  “Tuffy wuffy,” replied Les. “Do it anyway.”

  While setting up the radio the day before, Danny had heard a rattling noise inside the transceiver that had been rather concerning. He had opened up the case to find that the inside of the radio had been damaged by a stray piece of shrapnel, probably as far back as the mortar attack at Lieutenant Lonnie’s LZ. The shrapnel was still in there, a twisted piece of metal that had passed right through the outer casing and destroyed the circuits inside. Some of the wires had melted. The radio had been inoperable ever since Danny had started using it. But that didn’t stop him from calling Les that night.

  “The radio’s broken,” Danny told him.

  “Don’t worry about the radio,” said Les. “You’ve got work to do. This next stage is very important to get right.”

  It seemed to Danny that he was missing the point. “I mean, it’s really broken. All the insides are messed up. If the radio’s broken, then there’s no way I can be talking to you right now.”

  The receiver suddenly went quiet. No sound came out, not even static. Danny waited half a minute, then keyed the talk button again. “Hello?”

  There was only silence.

  He tried once more. “Hello? Les? Lester?”

  “Sorry, man,” Les said at last. “I was just fooling with you.”

  “Goddamn… Son of a…” Danny sputtered a few expletive-laden sentence fragments, then said, “Don’t do that!”

  He could hear Les laughing. “Sorry, pal. Made you nervous, didn’t I?”

  “Shut up.”

  “Don’t ask me about the radio anymore. I don’t know crap about electronics. Are you ready for the next step?”

  Danny ran his hand through his hair. It was growing in thicker and hadn’t been washed in a long time. “I guess I’m ready,” he said.

  “Good man. Nice work with that truck, by the way. That was a good show.”

  Danny didn’t want to think about what had happened with the truck. While exploring the area, Danny had stumbled upon a well-traveled dirt roadway that cut through the jungle, at least fifteen feet wide. The canopy of leaves was unbroken overhead, turning the road into a tunnel through the deep green foliage. He’d stepped right out into the middle of the road before realizing it was there. That had been the first surprise. The second surprise had come when he’d turned to his right and found a truck parked about fifty feet away.

  He was about to turn and retreat back into the forest when he heard a shout. Two men were standing next to the truck; one of them had spotted him and was walking over, his feet squelching in the mud. Danny wanted to reach behind his back to draw his gun, but he made himself wait for the man to come closer. Dressed in the clothes he’d borrowed from the man at the cave, he hoped these men wouldn’t identify him as a foreigner as long as he didn’t speak.

  “Anh co the giup toi day xe nay khong?” said the Vietnamese man. He barely got the words out before breaking into a rattling cough that kept him from saying anything more.

  Danny tugged on his own earlobe and shook his head. Maybe they would believe that he was deaf. If not, he would have to improvise.

  The man recovered from his coughing fit and started walking back toward the truck, beckoning for Danny to follow. Danny kept his distance, but followed as directed. The truck was a military-style cargo vehicle with a large bed covered in green canvas. As he came closer he could see that it was stuck firmly in the mud. The man who had approached Danny said something to the other one, who clambered into the driver’s seat and started the engine.

  Danny followed the first man around to the back of the truck. The Vietnamese man pointed to the back bumper and mimed a pushing motion. He wanted Danny to help push the vehicle free of the mud. Danny nodded and put his hands on the back corner of the truck while the coughing man prepared to push from the other side. The driver hit the gas and mud sprayed everywhere, covering Danny from head to toe and getting into his mouth and eyes. “Stop!” he shouted. The mud kept coming, so he yelled louder. “Cool it!”

  The engine went silent. The coughing man was looking at Danny warily. Did the man understand English? Danny didn’t wait to find out. He drew his weapon and shot him in the head.

  The driver got out of the truck and came around to investigate. He didn’t even have time to cry out before Danny put two rounds into his chest. Then Danny slipped back into the forest and waited some distance away to see if anyone else would come. No one did. The drone of the insects started up again. After ten minutes, he went back to the truck and hopped into the rear cargo area to see what was back there.

  The truck was full of wooden crates. He used his knife to pry one open, then another. There were weapons inside. Guns, ammunition, mines, grenades. All Soviet-made. Enough to arm a hundred Viet Cong guerillas for weeks. There were containers of diesel fuel, mechanics’ tools for repairing heavy equipment, and in one crate he found a stack of leaflets printed in Vietnamese characters. It looked like recruitment propaganda.

  He picked through the equipment for anything he could use. After a few minutes he had carried away a number of useful items, which he piled in a hidden spot nearby at the side of the road. Almost as an afterthought, he took a half-dozen Claymores and deployed them in a random pattern on the road. Then he doused the inside of the truck thoroughly with diesel. Hopping out the back, he pulled the pins from two grenades and tossed both into the back of the truck, then ran off into the cover of the trees as fast as he could go.

  The truck did not explode as expected. It burst into flames with a low-pitched whoof. The explosions came a moment later, when all the explosive materiel began to ignite. What followed was a rather spectacular private fireworks show that must have been heard many miles away.

  When it was done, the remains of the truck burned fiercely and poured a thick column of black smoke into the overcast sky. The smoke would lead others to investigate, so Danny hiked back to his cave to grab a bite to eat.

  “So,” Les said over the radio, bringing Danny back to the present. “That ville over west of here, the one you’ve been borrowing food from. I need you to go down there again tonight.”

  Danny nodded. “Okay.” He had been making occasional trips into a nearby village, about two miles away, for food and a few supplies. The only people living there were elderly famers and their wives, along with a few women and children. Danny guessed that the men had gone off to fight. “What then?”

  “I don’t want to give it away,” Les said slyly. “That’d ruin the fun for you. You’re going to be spending some time there, though, so hide your stuff good and leave everything here except the clothes on your back. No guns, no radio.”

  “You’re asking a lot,” Danny observed.

  “I always ask a lot,” said Les.

  “What do you mean, ‘spending some time’? How much time are we talking?”

  Les hesitated to answer. “Hard to say. You’re on your own for a while. You’ll know what to do next when the time comes.”

  “I’ll know what to do?” This sounded crazy even to Danny, who had been having conversations with a broken radio for weeks.

  “You will. And you’re not gonna like it.”

  “Great.” He drank some water and contemplated what Les was asking him to do. “You’d tell me if I was going to die, wouldn’t you?”

  “Oh, you’ll die,” came the reply. “Many times. But you’ll be fine.”

  “That doesn’t make any sense.”

  “Just remember,” Les said, “you have to go in. When you’re wondering whether you have to, that’s your answer.”

  “I have to go in?”

  “Yup.”

  That was all Les had to say on the subject. So, at 2200 hours, Danny stowed all his gear in the deep cranny at the back of the cave. It p
ained him to leave his weapons behind. Once everything was well hidden, he set up his booby-traps again and left the cave, taking one canteen with him in spite of Lester’s instructions.

  It was growing dark, and the rain had started up again. Danny was soon thoroughly soaked as he walked down into the valley to the west of his cave. After the first half-mile his chest started to ache. After another half a mile, he grew so tired that he had to sit down for a few minutes. His head began aching and he started to feel dizzy.

  As he approached the village, he found himself missing his x-ray vision more than ever. As a child growing up in New York, his ability to read people’s minds had been a fun game to play—a way to make his sister freak out. As a teenager, it had become a survival mechanism. Being on the skinny side, he’d always been the target of the teenaged lunch-money muggers who roamed the halls of his school. His ability had been crucial at that age. Although he had still managed to get beaten up as often as not, he always had the last laugh. He’d learned that mind-reading was a useful tool in exacting revenge through public humiliation. Nothing deterred a bully like airing every single dirty secret he wanted hidden.

  With his ability gone, he felt more vulnerable than ever before. Viet Cong murderers could be hiding behind the next tree, waiting to ambush him, and he wouldn’t know it until he walked right into them. He crossed the muddy road about a mile south of where he’d blown up the truck, and wondered if anyone had discovered the remains of the vehicle and its operators. If they had, would they be hunting him? Not in this rain, he decided. But if they haven’t found it already, they will soon.

  Breathing grew more difficult as he walked. The humidity didn’t help; it felt like the wet air was smothering him, filling his lungs with moisture. And it was hot in spite of the rain, even this late in the evening. He stopped to cool himself off and drink some water, and within a few minutes he was shivering uncontrollably. How had it turned so cold in such a short time?

  He knew the way to the village by heart, even in the dark, so it caught him by surprise when he found himself knee deep in the middle of a rice paddy that he’d never seen before. His feet kept getting stuck firmly in the mud. It took several minutes to get free and make his way to dry land, which was only marginally drier than the flooded paddy. The effort made him dizzy, so he lay down on the ground and passed out.