Night of Knives

by Jon Evans

  She waits a few moments; then she too feigns a slip and fall, a feint that nearly becomes the real thing, and uses her recovery to whisper the message to Jacob. She hopes he understood. She hardly needs to tell Jacob to slow down, his breath is already ragged, and the rope connecting their belts keeps tugging her back. She suspects Michael and Diane, further back, are in worse condition yet.

  The leader stops and turns to his captives, hand on the hilt of his panga. "Vite," he says angrily. "Fast. Fast."

  Veronica knows she shouldn't speed up, but sheer physical fear propels her. Derek alone ignores the angry exhortation, and she nearly bumps into him. The leader drops back, grabs Derek by the collar of his shirt, and pulls him along for a little while. Derek has to scramble to keep his feet. He is released with a warning look. At first he continues at this faster pace; then, by degrees, he begins to slow down again. Veronica follows his lead.

  After a while they are all told to stop. A man walks along the line of prisoners and pours a few swallows of water into the mouth of each from a big two-litre plastic bottle that once contained Coca-Cola. Then the march resumes. Her shoulders hurt, the rope is beginning to chafe her wrists, and she is helpless against the jungle's swarming, buzzing insects, her exposed skin is already mottled with itching bug bites.

  Soon they reach a wide and shallow stream. The pgymy leads them straight into the water and then uphill, along the stream. Veronica winces. She has read about this kind of thing in books. The water will wash their tracks out of this muddy streambed and make pursuit almost impossible, they won't even leave a scent to follow.

  Derek manages to reach into his back pocket with his bound hands and unearth his wallet. He slips and falls into the water - and in doing so, tosses his wallet into the shallows at the edge of the stream. Veronica's heart lifts. If rescuers find it they will at least know to go upstream. Derek bounces up quickly from his contrived fall, and looks down to the ground as he keeps walking, ignoring their captors' leader's one-eyed glare.

  A few minutes later, the other pygmy runs up alongside the chain of prisoners. This second pygmy holds Derek's dripping wallet. The one-eyed man takes it without even breaking stride, the second pygmy rushes back to his position at the back of the column, and Veronica groans aloud with dashed hope.

  They crest the ridge, and soon afterwards turn back to the right, heading west again. The sun is now high above them. Its light is mostly swallowed up by the canopy trees, but the heat is growing intense. Behind her Jacob is lurching more than walking, wheezing with every breath.

  The one-eyed leader rounds on them again. "Fast! Fast!"

  They speed up a little, but he still looks unhappy. Then, as they are traversing a particularly steep stretch, Jacob slips on something and falls. He slides far enough down the slope that Veronica and Susan, his neighbours in the human chain, are pulled to the ground, and Derek and Judy beyond nearly follow. Jacob lies gasping in a cluster of huge ferns until two of their captors pull him forcefully to his feet.

  The one-eyed man considers Jacob a moment, expressionless, then motions them all to continue. Jacob manages to stumble along further. It is Diane who falls next, second to last in the chain. She lies weeping in the mud, doesn't even try to get up. The one-eyed man stalks over to her.

  "Up," he commands. "Up!"

  "I can't." Diane looks up at her tormentor. Her face and bottle-blonde hair are smeared with mud and tears. Earlier Veronica thought she was maybe fifty. Now she looks older. "Please, for God's sake, I just can't."

  "Let her go," Michael says desperately. He too seems to have aged ten years in the last half hour. "You don't need her. Take me and let her go."

  The one-eyed man ignores him. He stoops towards Diane, grabs her bound wrists, and lifts. Veronica winces. Diane screams with new agony as her shoulders wrench in their sockets. Somehow she manages to scramble to her feet.

  "You see?" the leader says. His alien accent sounds half French, half African. "Yes you can. Yes you will."

  For a second Veronica crazily imagines him as a power-of-positive-thinking public speaker, and almost giggles. Then he starts to pull Diane's shirt off her.

  "No," Michael says, his eyes wide. "No, please, that's not necessary. We'll go fast. I promise."

  Again he is ignored. Diane's shirt is pulled up her waist, over her head, and back along her bound arms, revealing a pale, wrinkled body and a white sports bra. The one-eyed man's hand drops to his belt and draws out his panga.

  "No!" Michael starts forward - but another man, the one in the Tupac Shakur T-shirt, casually grabs Michael's arms from behind, holding him back, and then stoops, reaches between Michael's legs, and squeezes his testicles hard. Michael gasps, his body contorts like he has been shocked with a thousand volts. The man keeps squeezing and twisting, his face expressionless, a man doing an undesirable but necessary job. Michael drops to his knees, whimpering pathetically, writhing helplessly, lost in agony, his wife forgotten. His eyes are completely white, the pupils have rolled back into his head.

  Veronica stares with horror as the one-eyed man severs Diane's bra with his machete. Diane's weeping intensifies into a kind of breathless ululation. He replaces his panga and unfurls his whip, made of some kind of thick leather cut into a helical shape, like a stretched-out phone cord. Another of his men takes a position in front of Diane, forces her down onto her knees and forehead, then lifts up her arms as far as they will go, exposing her back. The whip whistles through the air and smacks into Diane's upper back. The impact doesn't sound that forceful, but it wrenches a howl of amazed agony from Diane's throat, a cry more animal than human. Her whole body arches and writhes, instinctively and futilely seeking escape, her legs scrabble feebly at the ground as the whip pulls back and immediately strikes again, catching the scream in Diane's throat, reducing it to a series of choking whimpers.

  Derek steps up behind Veronica, close enough to touch, and she starts with surprise. He murmurs, "On the front of my belt, there's a Leatherman. Try to get it and pass it back to me. Not now. We're being watched."

  Veronica turns and looks, sees the little leather pouch on Derek's belt, and the pygmy guide watching them carefully. She turns back in time to see Diane and Michael released. Michael crumples headfirst to the ground as if kowtowing. The one-eyed man coils up the whip, restores it to his belt loop, steps forward to the moaning, weeping heap that is Diane, grabs her by her hair and pulls her back upright. As she staggers to her feet Veronica momentarily sees that two red lines have been carved across her back. Both are already dripping blood along their length.

  "Fast," the leader warns her, "or I give you more. Ten, twenty, fifty. Fast."

  Diane, sobbing for breath, does not respond, but the one-eyed man seems satisfied. He nudges Michael's face with his muddy rubber boot and commands, "Up."

  Michael obeys with a moan. His lined face is wet with tears. The one-eyed man walks back up the chain of prisoners. He nods at Tom and Judy, as if with approval. He stops in front of Susan for a moment, grabs a handful of her blonde hair, carefully inspects her chiselled face. Susan is rigid with terror. After a moment the man smirks and moves on to Jacob.

  "Fast," he warns him.

  "Vite," Jacob agrees breathlessly. "J'ai compris."

  The one-eyed man raises his eyebrows. "Tu parles francais?"

  "Un peu."

  Veronica is next. She looks away as he approaches, but doesn't move. She tells herself, be nondescript, don't make him notice you, be the gray woman, the girl who isn't there. But when he reaches out to touch her face, she instinctively recoils, takes a step away. His expression darkens. He grabs a handful of her hair and twists so hard that she whimpers and tears fill her eyes. He pulls her head back savagely, traces the fingers of his other hand down her cheek. They feel like sandpaper. He is smiling. She sees to her horror that his incisors have been filed into sharp points, like a vampire.

  "Les sauvages Congolaise," Derek says scornfully. "Les betes d'Afrique. Vraiment, les Be
lges avaient raison."

  Immediately Veronica is released. The man spins towards Derek, finishes the movement by punching him in the stomach. Derek falls backwards to the ground, groaning loudly, crumpling into a ball. The one-eyed man stoops, grabs Derek's wrists, and pulls him painfully back to a standing position. Veronica knows he took that punch for her, spoke up as a distraction.

  "Je suis pas stupide," the one-eyed man warns him. "Je te vois." Then he turns to the others. "Fast. Fast, vous comprenez? You understand? We have no need of you all. You go fast now or you die."

  Chapter 3

  Jacob's scream is brief but bloodcurdling, a high-pitched wail torn from his throat. He fights for freedom, his whole body thrashing, his face a twisted animal mask, but the men on either side are too strong for him, they hold him down. The one-eyed man draws the whip back with a casual and graceful movement. Veronica closes her eyes tightly, she doesn't want to look. She is close enough to feel the slipstream as the whip snaps through the air. Jacob howls four more times.

  Then Derek says, sharply, "No!"

  Veronica opens her eyes. Jacob's head has been pulled back by one of the pygmies, and the one-eyed man has his panga to the lanky Canadian's throat, pressing hard enough that a blood trickles from the line of contact. Veronica knows it won't take much more force to puncture Jacob's jugular vein. Derek's every muscle is taut as he stands beside her, he looks like he wants to throw himself at the one-eyed man.

  "Please," Jacob gasps, his body perfectly still. "Please, no, don't kill me, please, I'll be fast, I won't fall down, I promise. Please, I swear to God, please, please."

  After a long moment one-eyed man withdraws the panga, leaving a thin line of blood behind. Reluctance is evident on his face. Jacob fights his way to his feet. Derek relaxes a little.

  "No more stops," the one-eyed man hisses.

  He angrily waves them onwards. The endless march resumes. Veronica trudges painfully onwards. She doesn't doubt the one-eyed man is now ready, even eager, to kill anyone who slows them down.

  Her shoulders are burning with agony, she is sure that by now they have actually been damaged. They aren't really walking that fast any more, they physically can't, but no matter how fast she inhales she just can't get enough oxygen, this air seems almost too thick and damp to breathe. A crippling headache has grown behind her eyes. At least the blisters that line her feet have finally gone numb.

  She doesn't want to die here. That is all she can focus on, the only thing that gives her strength. Maybe she will be killed when they reach their destination; maybe they will do things to her so terrible she will wish she had died on this march; but right now, it seems like the worst thing in the world, the most awful possible fate, to be murdered and left to rot here in this jungle.

  What worries her most are her legs. She can't help thinking about the time she witnessed the home stretch of the Los Angeles Marathon, saw runners collapse less than half a mile from the end of the race because their legs simply stopped working. She thinks she may not be far from that point. She is limping badly, her left leg is cramping painfully, and her right leg worries her even more. It doesn't exactly hurt, but she doesn't think it can physically last much longer. Soon it will buckle beneath her and she will no longer be capable of walking.

  At some point they stop for a water break. She can't remember how long it has been since the last one, time seems to have warped and melted like that famous Dali painting. She looks up and her heart wilts. Through the curtain of canopy trees she sees the sun directly above them, obscured by a few fast-moving clouds. It's only noon. She won't make it to nightfall, not even close. Beside her, Jacob looks even worse than she does, confused and dazed. His eyes seem to have lost the ability to focus.

  "I can't make it," Veronica says dully.

  Derek turns to her. Even he looks drained now, but his voice is still strong. "Yes you can. It won't be much further. We must be over the border by now. You'll be fine."

  She tries to laugh but it comes out as a whimper. "I sure don't feel fine."

  "You will be. I promise."

  She manages a sick caricature of a smile. "Thanks."

  "Breathe deep, into your belly. It helps."

  She nods and tries to follow his advice. After a few dozen inhalations it occurs to her that the water break should be over, the one-eyed man should be harrying them onwards. She looks around. Their abductors are staring warily into the sky, and there is a faint sound in the distance, odd yet familiar.

  "Helicopter," Derek breathes, and as he speaks, she too recognizes the growing whopwhopwhop.

  The one-eyed man issues a curt command. Someone grabs Veronica from behind and pushes her down. She doesn't need much encouragement to lie face-down, taking her weight from her tortured feet is bliss. The mud is smooth and damp on her cheek, the earth smells rich and full of life.

  The helicopter noise grows until it is directly overhead. Veronica wants to just stay where she is and rest, but she makes herself roll to her side and look up. The aircraft is flying low over the jungle, almost directly overhead, hanging in the sky like a huge white insect. The letters UN are written in blue on its side. She wonders if it is a regular flight from the peacekeeping mission in the Congo, or if it is searching for them. That's possible. Eight abducted Western tourists will be big news, worldwide headlines.

  She tries to hope, but she knows the helicopter won't see them. From above this jungle looks like an opaque sea of green. But it's at least a sign that maybe someone is trying to rescue them. Maybe a group of park guards and Ugandan soldiers is trying to follow their trail right now. Maybe the rescue mission has pygmies too. Maybe they'll be here any moment now. If only they could somehow signal the helicopter, start a fire or something. There is a cigarette lighter in the half-empty pack of Marlboro Lights in the side pocket of Veronica's cargo pants. She can feel the pack against her leg. She should have told Derek, he could have gotten it out, like he told her to get his Leatherman. But it's not like they could start a fire with these damp ferns and dripping vines anyways.

  The helicopter drifts across the sky. Its noise diminishes. After a few minutes the prisoners are dragged back to their feet. Veronica whimpers as she is forced to start walking again. Her legs and lungs feel a little stronger, but her headache has grown so vicious it's making her dizzy, and the blisters on her feet have come back to life and are singing with renewed agony. If only she had broken in her new hiking boots before coming to Africa. If only they had not been kidnapped.

  * * *

  Veronica has given up any hope of this journey ever ending, she focuses now only on getting through the next few steps, and then the next few, and then the next. She seems to be losing sensation in her legs, but that must be a good thing, because the sensation is mostly pain. Her shoulders keep getting worse, and she is starting to feel pins and needles in her hands. Worst of all is her thirst. They are never given enough water. The vicious pain behind her eyes is almost blinding now. She is vaguely aware this is probably from dehydration. Behind her Jacob is moaning with every breath.

  They stumble forward in a collective stupor. Veronica slips and falls several times on the uneven ground, all of them do, but they are all quick to get up as soon as possible. Even in the abyss of their exhaustion they know that tardiness will be met with torture or murder.

  Eventually she becomes vaguely aware of a noise like a sighing wind sweeping across the jungle. At first she thinks the drops of water on her face are windblown, but they keep coming, faster and harder, and when she looks up, she sees that the whole sky is dark and full of rain.

  It takes less than a minute for this rain to turn into a hammering tropical downpour, falling in thick ropes from the canopy trees, reducing the earth to muck. Veronica is grateful for it. She cranes her neck back and lets the delicious water drip down her throat, easing her thirst. Better yet, it is slowing their progress considerably, they move no faster than a crawl as they slip and stumble onwards through the rain and the
mud.

  Slowly her head begins to clear a little. Her drenched clothes chafe uncomfortably, and the wet rope on her arms is painful, a ring of blisters has erupted around her wrists. She realizes their abductors' sense of tense urgency has vanished; they are now laughing and joking with one another as they herd their captives onwards. Veronica moans with comprehension. No one will follow their trail across this melting earth; no helicopter can fly through this torrential storm. The rain has erased any chance of pursuit and rescue.

  Jacob falls again. It takes him some time to struggle back to his feet, with shaking muscles and unseeing eyes. Diane is still half-naked, her shirt still clumped around her wrists, she has been like that all day. She limps mindlessly onwards, her face blank, like she is no longer really here in any way that matters. Michael behind her stares out at the world as if all he can see is ghosts.

  The trail changes, becomes wide and flat and well-worn. The trees too are different, they are all the same kind now, peeling brown trunks from which clusters of enormous tear-shaped leaves erupt like frozen green fireworks. Furled purple flowers dangle obscenely from the tops of the trunks, and tight clumps of bananas hang beneath the leaves. A banana plantation. They have left the wild Impenetrable Forest and entered the settled lands of the eastern Congo. If it makes any sense to call this land of blood and bullets 'settled.'

  The rain begins to dissipate. Bolts of brilliant sunlight shine through rents in the dark clouds. The trail leads them up a steep ridge. They are allowed to climb it at their own slow pace, but they are not allowed to stop, and the gruelling ascent reduces Veronica to desperation; by the time she finally reaches the summit, she is groaning with every painful step, wobbling on both legs. At the top the one-eyed man calls a halt.

  Veronica blinks tears from her eyes and tries to catch her breath. The plantation ends at the ridgetop, and she can see westward for several miles, across undulating hills partitioned into a madman's checkerboard of brown and green, cultivated plots and stands of banana trees. None of the plots are large; this is subsistence farming. She sees a few figures moving in the distance, working the fields. In the distance a tin roof glitters in a shaft of sunlight. Much closer, on the downslope of the ridge, stands the most basic human structure she has ever seen, a misshapen one-person hut made of heaped mud and leaves.