Bitten

by K. L. Nappier

  Max leaned his forearm on the table. "We don't, remember? We told you to stay in the city. What you should be doing is looking after your plane. What if somebody strips the Wren down?"

  "You're the ones who told me she'd be comfy cozy in that boat house."

  "The idea was for you to enjoy a little of Santiago without feeling like you had to guard her day and night, not take off across the damn country. How're you going to check on the Wren 'way the hell out here? This republic's run by a two-bit dictator, Mezz, just how trustworthy you think a dock master's gonna be?"

  Mezz went sullen and slumped down in his chair. "What's the point in travel without a little adventure? Just wanted to spy out a country I never trucked through before ..."

  "Hey, guess what? Adventure has a down side to it."

  "Max, come on ..." David interrupted.

  Max leaned back. No sooner had he gotten that off his chest, than he felt guilty. It was his and David's fault, after all, that the kid was sitting here in Imbert. They had put him too much at ease about the Mellow Wren , and they had felt the pinch of time too painfully, thanks to the delays they had run into in the Bahamas: a couple for weather and one waiting on fuel. As soon as Mezz had insisted on coming along, what they should have done was pretend to settle into a little lodge in Santiago, spent the afternoon getting the kid drunk, then stolen away by nightfall while he was passed out.

  Instead, Mezz had slid into the backseat with Max as David spoke with Ricardo in the front. While the three of them started arguing in English about him staying, Ricardo had pulled away from the dock, the blast from his radio leading the way. They had let it go at that, torn between the kid's welfare and the waxing of the moon.

  Antony returned with three glasses and a beer bottle twice the size of any served in the U.S. Max watched the struggle on Mezz's face. He glowered at his glass while David poured. He was worried about the Mellow Wren , now, even though he was trying not to show it. When he didn't take a drink right away, Max tried patching things up.

  "Look ... Mezz ... Sorry. Your plane's gonna be fine. That's the whole point of giving the dock master a taste of the bribe and holding the rest until we get back. He sure as hell knows he won't get the rest if he lets anything happen to her. Besides, as far as he knows, we're all still in the city and can check on the Wren . Really, the Dominicans have a good rep, even if their presidente is a bastard."

  Mezz eyed Max a moment, then David, then grabbed his beer. He took a long drink, licked his lips and said. "He just called you 'Max.'"

  Shit . "It's my nickname."

  "You only use it in this country? Didn't hear him call you that on the long haul down here."

  "All right," David conceded. "His name's Max and mine's David. Our assumed names are just a precaution, Mezz. Our work is sensitive."

  "Makes me wonder what else I should 'assume' besides your names." He took another drink and asked, "So what's next?"

  "Next we look for a place to stay while we track someone down," David replied.

  Mezz, leaning his chair on its back legs, gave the little town a once-over. "So where you figure the inn is?"

  "I doubt there is one," David replied. "Not in an outpost like this. We're probably going to have to room with a family. Probably more than one, since there's three of us. Either that or ..." He shrugged, gave Max a look and a wry smile. Max chuckled.

  "Come on, man, you're jackin' me around too much."

  "Or we rent three cots at the local brothel," Max said.

  "At the what ?"

  "The brothel. It's a place where you -"

  "I know what it is, man. Ohh ... I dig ... you're still jackin' with me."

  "No, we're not."

  Mezz snorted. "Bullshit, pops. A dump like this has a cathouse, but no motel? You peg me as real dim bulb, don't you?"

  "No joking," Max replied. " Imbert's a stopover between two larger towns. It'll have a cathouse. And probably a cockfighting ring. But no nice, tidy little motel. Didn't you see that little gang of women lounging around the building on the east end?"

  "Naw, man. Seriously." Mezz put his glass to his lips and looked eastward, then began to look worried. "Seriously? This is bible?"

  "As bible as a heart attack."

  David was more inclined to give the kid a break than Max. "We buy the cots, not the services," he said. "The women will double up elsewhere or stay with family for the night."

  "But ... but what if they ... you know ... what if they want to stay?"

  Max grinned. "Don't worry, they'll barter."

  David chuckled, finished his beer, then made arrangements with the storekeeper to keep their luggage and trunk secure in the store's pantry. Mezz looked as though he felt a little dizzy. Max figured it was probably time to let him off the hook.

  "Easy does it, kid. This is just how it's done sometimes. The chicas won't bother you. It's the madam you'll need to haggle with --"

  "Cut it out, man ..."

  Max clapped Mezz on the back. "Okay, okay. We'll go on over in a couple of minutes so you can see for yourself. Get a better feel ..."

  "Yeah, very funny, pops."

  Antony, who had been waiting for an opening, asked if his customers would like something to eat.

  " No, gracias, se?or " David replied, " pero, dónde está el correo ?"

  Antony pointed to himself and smiled. " Soy el correo ."

  "Cut me some slack on the Spanish, would ya?" Mezz pleaded to Max.

  "David asked where to find the post office. Seems we're already there. Looks like this guy's the town grocer, restauranteur and postmaster."

  David set down his glass and, as he fished the Stonehill envelope from his back pocket, he asked the storekeeper, " ¿Usted conoce a esta se?ora? Tenemos noticias de su familia en los Estados Unidos. ¿Puede usted decirnos donde encontrarla?"

  "He's asking if he knows where to find a certain woman that can help us with our research. He's telling him we have news from her family in the U.S."

  "So do you?" Mezz asked.

  Max shook his head as he took another drink, then said, "It's just to assure him we don't mean to make any trouble for the lady."

  "So do you?" Mezz asked again, and just when Max was about to tell him not to be a sap, the look on Antony's face stopped them all cold.

  " Dios Mío ," he prayed in a near whisper. He handed the envelope back slowly. " Lo siento. Esta mujer vivió en una aldea peque?a llamada Luperón. Pero ... ella está muerta ahora ... junto con sus ni?os ."

  Max and David looked at each other, sickened in spite of the fact they knew something like this had to have already happened.

  Frustrated, Mezz snapped, "What is it, man, what?"

  "She's dead," David replied. "And all her children with her."

  Mezz stopped his glass in mid arc and slowly set it down. David finally put the envelope back in his pocket and said, " Esa s son noticias terribles. Debemos ir a su hogar, de modo que podamos volver y explicar a su familia lo sucedido ."

  Max leaned toward Mezz and translated in a low voice: "He said this is terrible news. He said we'd like to visit her home before going back to the U.S. to tell her family."

  Antony looked uncomfortable about it but replied, " Claro ," and Max translated as the storekeeper continued:

  "He said he understands. There's two buses that make stops here during their runs. The smaller one allows people to get from Luperón to here, then it continues to Puerto Plata. Or if they're going the opposite direction, they can catch the larger one that comes through on its north-south run between Puerto Plata and Santiago. Luperón's the one we want. We can catch it later today, making its late afternoon run back to the town, or just after sunrise tomorrow morning."

  Antony had begun to go back in his store, but stopped. When he turned back to them, he looked even more troubled. " Se?ores ..."

  "¿ Sí? "

  He hesitated, rubbing his palms together. Then he began to speak rapidly, so much so that Max had trouble following him
. David, too, apparently, because he urged Antony to slow down.

  He was imploring them to reconsider. Please reconsider. Their course was not a wise one. Don't go, he was saying. Don't go to Luperón. No good would come of it. Simply tell the woman's family in America that she and her children died of disease. Luperón was nothing now but sorrow and death.

  " ¿Por que? " Max asked. " ¿Que encontraremos allí? " Why? What will we find there?

  The storekeeper looked away almost irritably. When he turned to them again, his eyes were fierce. "Chupacabra," he hissed.

  * * *

  Sunset cast a soft light on little Imbert, but it couldn't soften Max and David's mood. They were sitting with Mezz at one of the three tables under the brothel's tin-roofed veranda, picking at the stew that the madam, Se?ora Mari, had set before them. Behind them, a thin, elderly man plucked out a tune on his mandolin. The town's three prostitutes were leaned back in rickety chairs, chatting and sipping dark rum.

  It was long past time to say what needed to be said. Max dropped his spoon in the stew and looked at Mezz.

  "Tomorrow," he said, "both the bus that runs to Luperón and the one that goes to Santiago come through not long after daybreak."

  Mezz put his own spoon down. "I know what you're thinking ..."

  "And we know what you're thinking. You can't come with us."

  "Why not?"

  David said, "This isn't a lark anymore. We were honest with you about what the storekeeper told us. Things have taken a turn. Our work is sensitive and it's risky. Risky, as in dangerous."

  "Mrs. Gillis didn't raise a coward--"

  "We're not being clear enough? This isn't about you being brave," Max said. "It's about you being in the way. We can't do our business with you underfoot. You don't understand anything about it, and that can get us all killed."

  "I don't buy your cruel hype for a second, jack. You're watchin' out for my back. I'm gonna do likewise for you."

  "We don't want you looking out for our backs and we don't want you in our business," David said. "Go back to your plane and do what we've paid you to do. We are not your friends, Mezz, we're your customers."

  Mezz leaned back, his face stony. "I don't believe a word -"

  "Do we look like we give a shit what you believe?" Max snapped.

  Even in the low light, he could see the kid's face flush. Mezz pushed away from the table. "Yeah. Sure," he said, his voice brittle. "Copasetic, dads. It's your grease in my kick so I'll go back to work. See ya in Santiago."

  He grabbed one of the grandes off the table and marched off. Max waited to make sure he was well away before slumping forward. "Shit," he said, propping his elbows on the table. He rubbed his face.

  "We'll make it up to him when we get back," David said reassuringly, but Max knew David was thinking what both of them always thought just before a hunt:

  If we get back .

  Chapter Nine

  Imbert , República Dominicana

  Spring, 1950

  Dawn. Second Quarter Moon.

  Birdsong and dawn seeped through the shuttered window and woke Mezz. His room was between Max and David's, the dividing walls just rows of thin planks cannibalized from some abandoned hut. He heard them yawn and scratch and get off of their creaky cots. He could see their movements through the gaps.

  When they tapped on his door, then peered in, he pretended he was still asleep.

  He stayed put until the rattle and growl of an overworked bus came into town. He heard Max yakking a question in Spanish and recognized the word Luperón in his question. The driver yelled over the rattling engine, " Sí ," and then Mezz jumped off the cot to open his shutters. He leaned out the window in time to watch the ass end of the bus heading west. With no other passengers, it was easy to glimpse Max and David sitting inside, 'way too tall to be locals.

  Mezz smiled to himself, smug and sure they'd bought his act last night. Not that Max and David hadn't put on a good show themselves. What they had said to him, and the way they said it, had enough sting to make him start wondering, after he'd drained that grande. But by the time his beer buzz wore off, he was back to being certain they'd just been jackin' with him.

  No matter how evil they pretended to be, he knew they were good jims. No way to really hide a heart. It just comes through. Mezz liked them and, anyway, he wasn't about to get this close to an adventure, a real killer-diller, then turn tail and run. He didn't know exactly what it was they were up to, but it was one wild truck, he was certain, since they were so worried about Mezz's hide. There must be bandidos skulking behind every tree, where they were going. Sons of bitches that would slaughter a whole family. Max and David would need all the help they could get.

  So his plan was to cool his heels in Imbert, see if they showed back up on the late bus or not. If it was "not," he was going to be on that Luperón ride himself at daybreak. Once he was there and they'd got their bitchin' out of their system, they'd be glad for the extra set of hands.

  He dressed, ate the soup that Se?ora Mari served for breakfast and sipped strong coffee sweetened with condensed milk. When Flora, the prettiest of the lot, sauntered in, yawning from wherever it was she had spent the night, he passed the time flirting with her. Wow, it was sexy , man, gammin' to a chick when neither understood a word the other was saying. Had to be all in the eyes and body groove. He got even braver, copped a feel, kissed her ear, then lost his nerve. He tipped her and Se?ora Mari and went back to his room, rubbing his crotch.

  The sun was just a little past its zenith when, sipping a peque?a sized beer at the storekeeper's, Mezz heard the Dominican blair of a car radio. It preceded an old Hudson Eight skidding into town. Just like Mezz's driver the day before, this one stopped the car in front of Antony's store and shut down. The paying customer leaned over the back of the driver's seat and, as he handed the driver a slip of paper, told him in English, "Ask that man if he knows where I can find this person."

  To Mezz's surprise, the driver looked right at him and yammered in Spanish.

  Mezz said, "No, jack, I'm American."

  The fellow in the back of the car leaned toward his open window. His looks took Mezz by surprise. Enough so, he asked stupidly, "You American, too?"

  The man smirked, took a long drag off his cigarette and said, "Yeah. Me, too."

  By now, Antony had come out and was talking with the driver. When he was handed the paper, Antony glanced sharply at Mezz, then pushed the paper back at the driver as though it had turned rotten and stinking in his hand. He spoke rapidly in Spanish, but Mezz picked up one word: Luperón.

  The driver turned to his rider and started to translate, but Mezz interrupted as he clambered to his feet. "Hey, man, you goin' to Luperón?"

  The rider eyed Mezz a long moment, then asked his driver, "Is Luperón where we need to go?"

  "Yes, but the storekeeper say -"

  "Jack! I'm headed that way myself. How's about we split the fare?"

  The rider shook his head and took another drag. "Not interested."

  "Aw, come on, man, I got a couple friends I gotta meet there and the next bus won't truck that way 'til dawn tomorrow."

  "I said I'm not interested."

  "Look, I'll grease the whole ride from here to there. All on me, jack, whatdiya say. Cop a fellow Yank a break, huh?"

  It was as though something clicked on behind the passenger's eyes. "You said you have a couple of friends there? American, too?"

  "Red, white and blue, man. Or, at least, red 'n' white." Mezz grinned at his own joke, even if the clyde he was talking to wouldn't be able to get it.

  The man sat back, staring straight ahead for a moment, then came back to the car window. "Well ... tell you what ... yeah ... sure. Why not?" He opened the back door and scooted over.

  "Righteous. Righteous! Thanks a lot, man. Wait just one sec, okay? My gear's stashed inside, won't take a minute ..."

  Antony was right behind him, barking in Spanish all the way as Mezz ran in to snatch up his r
uck sack and the clyde kept it up all the way back out. Not even a fat tip shut him up. His yap was still flapping as Mezz hopped into the back of the car and they left him in the dust.

  Mezz looked at his fellow passenger and thrust out his hand. "Thanks again, jack," he said, raising his voice over the car's radio. "And I meant what I said. I'm greasin' this ride the rest of the way."

  The man switched his cigarette over to his left and accepted the hand shake. "If you insist," he shouted back.

  "Where'd you come in from, jack?"

  "From Puerto Plata. How about yourself?"

  "Flew my bird in to Santiago. Gotta good-sized lake there that takes small and medium cargo flights. Easy Street, y'know? Less tubs to dodge and calmer water than a seaport landing."

  The man took a long drag off the cig. "Really. You're a private pilot? You have a plane?"

  "A beauty, man, she's a cool beat queen."

  "Sounds nice. These friends you're meeting ... they hired you to fly them here?"

  "All the way in and back out again. Hey, I'm sorry, man, rude of me not to do an intro." He held his hand out once again. "I'm Mezz."

  The man smiled and accepted the second handshake. "Well, Mezz, I'm glad to meet you. Call me Art. "

  "Man, it is something , you comin' along when you did. Imagine the luck!"

  "Yeah," the man replied. "Imagine."

  Chapter Ten

  Luperón , República Dominicana

  Spring, 1950

  Midmorning. Second Quarter Moon.

  Luperón was about the size of Imbert. But, while Imbert was set at a crossroads between two growing cities, Luperón was a fishing village with a little harbor enclosed by three sides of hill country. True to its Spanish roots Luperón centered around a tree-lined plaza central fringed by a dozen or so buildings.

  The bus driver stopped in front of the plaza, where forty or more people were waiting, heavy with luggage, goats and chickens. They didn't have the look of day trippers or traders going into Puerto Plata or Santiago to buy and sell goods. Their faces were grim; half appeared to be entire families. These were people leaving permanently, burdened with their dearest possessions.