Night of Knives

by Jon Evans

  * * *

  One hour falls past, and then a second, and then a third.

  The cappuccino is excellent. The peoplewatching is interesting. The movie theatre, supermarket, fast-food restaurant, ice-cream stall and Internet café in the mall are refreshing and enticing. But as time trickles onwards, and Lovemore fails to reappear, a numb dread begins to take root in Veronica's gut and then to spread.

  After the fourth hour she can no longer tell herself and Jacob that Lovemore has merely been delayed, that everything in Africa takes longer than you think, that he has just been held up. She is forced to begin to wonder what they can possibly do if he does not come back at all. They have ten US dollars and nowhere else to go.

  As the fifth hour begins, she dares to say it: "He's not coming back. They got him."

  Erid nods wordlessly.

  "What do we do now?"

  He shakes his head ruefully. "I've only got one idea left."

  Chapter 34

  Harare International Airport is a gleaming white elephant, an empty edifice of marble floors overseen by fading posters of Zimbabwe's various tourist destinations and the Big Five safari animals. The woman at the British Airways ticket window looks very bored. Jacob waits nervously while his Bank of Montreal MasterCard is processed, but to his great relief the woman returns to the window with two airline tickets.

  Their plan is almost pathetically simple. Their last ten dollars bought them a taxi ride to the airport. British Airways flies overnight to Heathrow. Their status as Interpol fugitives will doubtless lead to detainment by British Immigration, but that's a chance they're willing to take. At least they'll be out of Africa and back in civilization. Arrest might even be a good thing; the light of publicity will shine on their trumped-up accusations of homicide, and may even reveal the truth. Their notoriety as former Congo hostages won't hurt either.

  All they have to do is get past Zimbabwe Immigration and onto the plane. It's possible that their names have already been flagged, that they will be arrested for Interpol's sake - but the more Jacob thinks about it, the less likely that seems. Zimbabwe isn't exactly a poster-child member of the international community. There's a good chance they don't even receive Interpol alerts. And even if they are arrested by Mugabe's police, even that isn't worst-case; they are, after all, bizarre as it still seems, trying to save Mugabe's life.

  Armed with their tickets, they walk through the cavernous arrivals hall to a small outdoor observation platform above the runway. There is no one else sitting at the wrought-iron tables and chairs. They have just enough money left to order a single Coke from the girl behind the small snack bar. Jacob hopes there isn't a departure tax.

  They sits and look out on the runway. Jacob's heart convulses when he sees a black army helicopter in the distance – but it is flying away from them. He supposes its presence is normal, this is a military airbase too. It occurs to him that back in Canada today is Remembrance Day.

  The only other craft in sight is a narrow white 727 parked next to the runway. After a moment a slow smile spreads across Jacob's face. He knows this legendary airplane, he remembers reading about its story with great interest: it once carried sixty South African mercenaries who stopped here a few years ago to pick up weapons from Zimbabwean co-conspirators, en route to foment a coup in oil-rich Equatorial Guinea. The mercenaries were captured, arrested, jailed, and eventually deported; the airplane remains in legal limbo. Jacob is oddly comforted by this reminder that he and Veronica aren't the only Harare Airport passengers to have been in dire and melodramatic straits.

  The glass doors that lead into the airport open. When Jacob sees the man who murdered Derek step out of those doors, followed by several armed and uniformed soldiers and then Athanase the interahamwe leader himself, he thinks at first that this has to be some kind of nightmare, a terrible dream-vision, can't possibly be reality. He and Veronica stay seated, frozen by the sheer impossibility of this horror, as the soldiers and casually dressed interahamwe surround them.

  "Jacob Rockel," Athanase says, smiling thinly. "Veronica Kelly. We meet again. Enchantée pour le deuxieme fois."

  * * *

  There is nowhere to go. Even if there was, Jacob is too stunned to move. One of the soldiers goes behind him, grabs his arms and pulls them behind his back. Jacob does not resist as his wrists are handcuffed. All he can do is grunt with disbelief. Beside him Veronica too is shackled. Both are grabbed by their throats and dragged to their feet. The snack-bar girl watches with appalled fascination.

  The world goes dark and Jacob feels fabric against his face. A hood, his head has been covered. Blind and handcuffed and helpless, he is dragged along the airport's smooth marble floors, then out into the open air again.

  "Up," a soft voice commands, pushing him forwards. Jacob barks his shin against the vehicle in front of him before he understands and steps upwards. Once inside he is shoved down into some kind of bench. A van, he guesses, with facing benches in the back. The engine is already running. He doesn't know where Veronica is. The doors clank shut and the van begins to move. They don't go far. Jacob's handcuffs are very tight and by the time the van comes to a halt his hands and fingers are already beginning to prickle.

  "Veronica," he gasps.

  "I'm here." Her voice too is weak and quavering

  "No talking!" someone orders.

  Jacob doesn't doubt that rule will be brutally enforced. He remains silent as the van doors open. A soldier grabs a fistful of his shirt and drags him outside, down onto concrete again. He is walked for a short distance to a wobbly set of steps. Jacob nearly overbalanced and falls as he climbs them. He smells oil and metal. Then he is shoved onto another bench and straps are fastened around his waist and belt.

  "Now you are mine," Athanase croons into Jacob's ear. "This time we will not let you go."

  An engine starts up, a very loud engine, and the bench he sat on begins to shake and vibrate as the noise around him grows to earsplitting levels, and a huge wind begins to blow. He understands what is happening, it has happened to him before, to him and Veronica both, in the Congo. They are on a helicopter. His stomach lurches as they lift off.

  Then a strong and wiry hand is on Jacob's throat, squeezing it shut. He fights for air, struggles to escape the fingers that grip like a vice, but he can't move, the handcuffs and safety straps hold him securely. His lungs sour and burn until it feels like they are filled with acid, he needs to breathe more than he has ever needed anything before, but it is still impossible. Jacob feels himself beginning to slip away from the world. Then the hand releases and Jacob begins to suck in air again, in long, choking, rattling gasps.

  "Only imagine what we will do to you now," Athanase shouts into Jacob's ear. "Only anticipate."

  * * *

  Jacob breathes deeply, tries to steady himself, tries to seal off all his fear, all emotion, and cage it deep inside his skull, bury it like radioactive waste and face their coming doom with cold resolve. It doesn't work. He's so frightened he's nauseous. He finds himself hoping for the helicopter to crash. A fiery death would surely be miles better than whatever awaits them at their destination. At least it would be quick and painless, and would consume Athanase and the man who killed Derek as well.

  The tone of the helicopter's engine changes. Jacob's stomach lurches with trepidation, and then with sickening motion, as the helicopter sinks from the sky. Its skids suddenly re-encounter the ground, and after a few dancing thumps they are earthbound again.

  The engine is switched off. Someone undoes Jacob's safety straps and pulls off his hood. The sudden light is blinding and Jacob has to squint. At first all he can see is the black interior of the aircraft, and Veronica's pale face as she steps off it into the grass that surrounds them. Then he registers the building looming above the grassy helipad.

  It's no military base: it is some kind of elegant hotel, reminiscent of the one in Victoria Falls. The main building, two wings in the shape of a shallow V with a circular hub between,
nestles in the shadow of a huge overhanging cliff. The circular driveway leading up to the main entrance encompasses a swimming pool and croquet field. A few other buildings are scattered around like satellites.

  Jacob expected some kind of secret military prison, not a luxury hotel. Maybe Gorokwe can't be sure of his support on a base. Meaning he doesn't have much popular support among the military, which in turn explains why he is shooting down Mugabe rather than storming his presidential abode. But it doesn't really matter where they have been taken. The outcome will be the same. Jacob can't imagine any plausible future in which he escapes Gorokwe's custody alive.

  He is pulled from the bench and propelled out of the helicopter, onto the grass, towards the hotel. His hands, constricted by the too-tight handcuffs, have gone almost completely numb, are little more than dead lumps of flesh attached to the rest of his body. Athanase and Veronica climb to a stone-floored patio, and then inside through a set of double glass doors, to wide red-carpeted stairs. Jacob follows, pushed along by the man who killed Derek. The uniformed soldiers stay by the helipad.

  He feels like a death row prisoner marching towards the electric chair. Every step, every sight is a major event as they climb the stairs and walk along a plushly decorated hallway, to a doorway with a plaque that announces, surreally, that the Queen Mother once stayed in this room.

  When Jacob sees who is waiting for them within he wonders for a moment if he is dreaming.

  * * *

  The high-ceilinged room is decorated with spindly wooden furniture, expensive but old. A huge window opens onto a stone balcony, beyond which lies a glorious view of a golf course nestled amid rolling hills and shining rivers. Jacob doesn't know the big, powerfully built black man in a suit standing restless by the window, nor the short, barrel-chested white man with thinning hair lounging uncomfortably on the sofa in khaki slacks and vest. But he knows the young, pretty blonde woman in jeans sitting between them.

  "Susan?" he blurts, startled out of paralyzing fear by sheer amazement.

  She looks sadly at him and Veronica, and slowly, Jacob begins to understand.

  "This wasn't supposed to happen," Susan says. "None of it was. I'm sorry." She pauses. "No, I'm not. I regret it. Nobody was supposed to get hurt except Michael and Diane, and they deserved it. I regret anybody else got hurt. But I'm not sorry. We're trying to save lives here, millions of lives, two whole countries. I regret that people like you keep getting in the way. But we can't let you stop us."

  Jacob looks over to Veronica. She does not even seem to be listening. Instead her gaze is fixed on the man on the couch. Jacob deduces that must be her ex-husband. Danton DeWitt. And the man by the window who looks like a heavyweight boxer -

  "General Gorokwe, I presume?" Jacob guesses.

  He smiles absently, as if addressed by a child. "Very good."

  Jacob shakes his head, as if to dislodge loose pieces of thought within. He looks back to Susan. "What did Michael and Diane do?"

  "The so-called philanthropists?" Her voice drips sarcastic rage. "Where to begin? Those orphanages they funded were like fundamentalist slave camps. They were such good Christians that they bribed officials to destroy whole shipping containers of condoms that had already gone to Uganda. God knows how many thousand people got AIDS as a result. What happened to them was too good for them."

  "Right. And how about what happened to Derek?" Jacob feels a futile fury begin to burn within him. "Let me guess. He came to you at the camp and started asking questions about the smuggling going on there. Not knowing you were part of it, because who would ever guess that looking at a pretty blonde girl like you, right? And then, what, you invited him to come to Bwindi? Or just planted the idea? And you made sure there were slots available in Michael and Diane's gorilla group. Then when you grabbed us you made it look like they were going to rape you, just so we wouldn't suspect anything."

  Susan smiles thinly. "Actually Patrice was taking me outside to give me better food. I was quite annoyed with you all for saving me."

  "Yeah? You hid it well. But of course you're an actress, aren't you. And a lot better than you admitted. Shit, you deserve an Oscar. No wonder we got out so easy, with you to lead the way. Then we show up at the refugee camp and say hi, we take a few pictures of buddy here," he indicates Derek's muscled killer Casimir, "taking custody of your shiny new missiles, and the very next day, Prester is tortured to death and we're fugitives from justice. I should have fucking known."

  "Like she says, we regret it," Danton says. He sounds angry. "But you were warned often enough to leave well enough alone."

  "Listen to yourself," Veronica spits out. "'Leave well enough alone.' How many people have you killed already? How many? Elijah and the guards, Michael, Diane, Derek, Prester. How many more we don't know about? How many murdered?"

  Danton shakes his head. "Wrong question. How many more will die here if Mugabe doesn't go? Haven't you seen what's happened to this country? It's starving. It's dying. We're saving it. And I'm sorry, but you can't change the world without hurting someone. I wish you could, but that's the choice you have to make, to make a real difference. Someone always suffers from change. You have to choose to shed a little blood in order to save a lot."

  "Right," Jacob says. He nods at Athanase and Casimir. "And that's why you're working with these two. Because they're the experts on blood. On fucking genocide."

  "What would you rather have?" Susan asks. "Them in the Congo, killing and destabilizing, where there's already four million dead in the civil war, or in quiet exile here in Zimbabwe after Gorokwe takes over?"

  "Oh. Oh, I see. Of course. That's what's in it for them. You're their retirement package. Athanase here is wanted for crimes against humanity and you're his fucking pension plan. You have to play nice with him or he'll tell the whole world everything about you, so if you win, you'll put him and his people up in a nice little villa here for as long as he wants. He committed a fucking holocaust and you're putting him out to pasture."

  "What now?" Veronica asks, looking directly at Danton. "What are you going to do to us?"

  A long silence hangs over the room; long enough for Jacob's rage to begin to dissipate.

  "Nobody's going to touch you. I promise you that," Danton says to Veronica. "But I can't say the same about your boyfriend."

  Jacob swallows. He feels very cold.

  Danton stands and walks over to Jacob. "You need to tell us where your evidence is."

  "I don't have any."

  "Not on you, no. You gave your CD to Lysander, and he gave it to us." Jacob winces. "But you have more, don't you? Backed up online. I'm sure you do, you must, you're a technical professional. Ready to be sent out automatically if you don't log in to a certain web site, maybe? A dead man's switch?"

  "No," Jacob lies. "Nothing like that."

  "You really need to tell us the truth now," Danton warns. "We're not playing games. We can't afford to. You're going to tell us. The easy way or the hard. Up to you."

  Jacob stares into Danton's face, then looks at their other enemies, at Gorokwe, Susan, Athanase, Casimir. He thinks of the little girl at the ruined farm. He thinks of Derek on that airstrip in the Congo, remembers how his best friend's head rolled forward from his body after Casimir's third and final stroke of the panga. He remembers holding Veronica close in the Ruwenzori Traveller's Inn.

  Jacob makes a decision, takes a deep breath. "There's nothing to tell."

  Danton and Susan look dismayed. Gorokwe and Casimir look indifferent.

  Athanase smiles, showing his teeth, and croons, "On va voir." Meaning, we shall see.

  The last Jacob sees of Veronica is her stricken, alarmed face as Athanase and Casimir drag him out of the room where the Queen Mother once slept.

  * * *

  Jacob is shivering as if with malaria, he feels like he is about to lose control of all his body, too weak from fear to struggle as they half-drag him to the end of a long corridor. He knows what's going to happen. But he also
knows that the result will be the same regardless. They will kill him. Probably Veronica too, but definitely him. He knows too much. He will die here in this hotel. The only thing left is to not tell them anything - because Danton is right about his dead man's switch.

  He tries to tell himself it doesn't matter how he dies.

  The room at the end of the hall smells vile. There is something big and bloody hanging from its ceiling. It takes Jacob a moment to recognize it as a human form. The man's wrists are tied to a rope dangling from a hook in the ceiling originally intended for a light. The ankles are attached so a similar but longer rope, so that the man hangs diagonally over the bed, at something like a forty-five degree angle. Blood oozes from burn-blackened flesh all over the body, a Rorschach-like stain has formed on the beige carpet beneath. The man's face and genitals have been almost entirely burnt away. Jacob can see the bone of the eyesockets.

  Athanase picks up a bloodstained steak knife from the bed and sticks it into the body, as if impaling a piece of meat on his plate. It is not until the man wriggles a little, and a rattling breath emerges from his throat, that Jacob realizes he is still alive. Then he sees, and recognizes, the clothes piled in the corner of the room. Jacob wants to scream but can't breathe, can't move, can barely stand.

  "Tu lui connais, je crois," Athanase says conversationally. "Ici c'est Lysander."

  "No," Jacob moans.

  Athanase produces a Zippo lighter much like Veronica's, idly flicks open and ignites it, then claps it shut again. He smiles. "He was a strong man, but he told me everything. You are not strong. Perhaps you would like now to reconsider your silence."

  Jacob closes his eyes. "There's nothing to tell."

  "Bon," Athanase says. He sounds genuinely pleased. "Casimir, tue-le et descend-le. On va recommencer avec le Canadien."

  Jacob opens his eyes and watches Casimir strangle Lysander, or what is left of Lysander, with his own belt. It seems a mercy. The dead man is lowered to the ground, and removed from his bonds. Then Casimir turns to Jacob.