Jungle Of Steel And Stone vk-2

by George C. Chesbro

  "I'm listening. What's this about millions?"

  "What's your name?"

  "Sloane," the man said after some hesitation.

  "All right, Sloane—"

  "You Kendry?"

  "First go up the block and tell your buddy that you have to take a crap or something. You have to come with me for a few minutes, and everything will be explained to you. If you try to tip off your buddy—if anyone tries to follow us in—you've blown it. Just keep thinking of what you could do with a few million dollars."

  "Okay," Sloane mumbled. "Don't go away."

  "Just remember to do exactly as I said."

  As Sloane walked away, Veil moved silently through the trees and underbrush on a parallel course. He listened to the exchange between the two gunmen, then moved back with Sloane.

  "I did it," Sloane said to the darkness beyond the wall. "What now?"

  "Throw your gun over the wall."

  "Hey, now, hold on a second!"

  "You don't want to do it, don't. I'm gone."

  "Okay!"

  "Keep your voice down. And move slowly. You're going to be a rich man if you keep your cool, Sloane, but you'd better make up your mind. You told your buddy you'd be back in ten minutes."

  Sloane withdrew his gun from its holster, tossed it over the wall.

  "Now you come over. Easy does it. Move off to your left."

  Sloane did as he was told. He'd gone about fifteen yards into the cemetery when Veil suddenly appeared in front of him. Sloane stopped walking and stared at the muzzle of his own gun, which was pointing at his chest.

  "You are Veil Kendry, aren't you?"

  "Yes."

  "Nagle talks a lot about you," Sloane said with a crooked smile. "I'm waiting to hear what you have to say, Kendry."

  "Don't be impatient. Keep moving to your left, but stay inside the trees. Watch how you walk. You attract any attention with those big feet of yours, and I disappear."

  * * *

  Sloane squinted in the smoky air and grunted. In the dim, flickering light of the small fire he could just make out the objects of Nagle's hunt. The woman and the African. The idol.

  "Here, catch," Veil said as he perfunctorily tossed the torn plastic bag at Sloane. Startled, the man juggled the bag in the semidarkness. White powder floated in the air, then slowly drifted down to the ground. "That's pure heroin. Check it out for yourself."

  Sloane's hand trembled as he put a thumb and forefinger through the tear in the plastic, pinched some powder, tasted it. "Jesus H. Christ," he murmured. "I can't believe you're throwing this shit around."

  "Good stuff?"

  "Good?" Sloane wore a slightly dazed expression on his face. "What's left in this bag is worth a fortune. I'd heard rumors that this guy was carrying around something big . . ."

  "I assume you'd know how to get rid of it?" Veil asked wryly.

  Sloane had begun to sweat. His eyes were teary from the smoke and he rubbed them. "A little bit at a time, over the years," he said in a dry, cracking voice. "Maybe. It's suicide to cross the big guys on something like this."

  "So? Like you said, you can spend the rest of your life selling it off in small bits. It sounds to me like a great way to beat inflation. On the other hand, they tell me that money is power. With the money you could get from the sale of that heroin, you might grow pretty big yourself."

  The man could not take his eyes off the bag in his hand. "If they caught me, they'd take me apart with a chain saw," he said distantly.

  "Getting big money means taking big risks, Sloane. You can always turn us in and collect a few thousand from your boss, can't you? You'll sleep better—but you'll also be making peanuts for the rest of your life while those 'big guys' jerk you around. Sooner or later small potatoes like you end up in jail, anyway. When you get canned for some penny-ante crime, you'll have plenty of opportunity to think about this opportunity you pissed away."

  Sloane finally looked up from the bag. His eyes were round and bright in the firelight. "What am I supposed to do for this?"

  "You've already earned what you're holding in your hand; you can walk out of here with it. Think of it as a down payment. There are two more bags like that one— bigger, because they're not torn. That bag's been dribbling for days."

  "Jesus."

  "Do as I ask and they're both yours."

  Sloane's eyes went back to the bag in his hand, then to the fine powder strewn on the ground around the glowing embers of the fire. "What do you want me to do?" he asked hoarsely.

  "What time do you get off?"

  "I was supposed to be relieved an hour and a half ago."

  "Then somebody may be there when you get back, so you'd better come up with a good story. First, we need a car. Rent one, don't steal it. Leave the car parked at the curb, on this side of the street, at the place where I spoke to you—or as close as you can without being spotted. Bring the keys and the rental slip to me, here."

  Sloane glanced at Toby, who had been partially hidden in shadow. The fire suddenly flared, and the gunman could see the K'ung's bandaged head. Toby's good eye, glowing red and yellow in the firelight, stared balefully back at Sloane, who shuddered.

  "Where are you going?" Sloane asked, still transfixed by Toby's unrelenting gaze.

  "That's not your concern."

  Sloane hefted the bag in his hand. "Dropping off a rented car doesn't seem like much to do for the fortune you're offering me," he said carefully.

  "I knew you were bright. There's more—and this is the exciting part. I don't want anyone to see the car, but I do want you to be seen. You find someone you know on watch, go up to him. Tell him you're all worked up and can't sleep. Say you want to hang around because you don't want to miss anything if it happens. Say whatever you please, but be sure you make it sound convincing."

  The man shook his head. "That's going to be tough to pull off."

  "Ah, but think of all the money you're going to get for a single performance," Veil said evenly. "After you've set that business up, you bring me the keys and the rental slip. You wander off maybe a half mile up the cemetery, then you start yelling and shooting. You've seen us. You keep it up until you've got everyone running to you. That will give us time to get to the car."

  "What am I supposed to say when they see you're not there?"

  "Use your imagination," Veil said coldly. "That's what you're getting paid for. Just tell them we ran up the cemetery."

  Sloane thought about it for a few moments, then nodded. His hands were shaking. "I'll do it. How will I get the rest of the heroin?"

  "I'll be carrying it with me when we leave. I'll leave the bags behind the wall at the precise place where you jumped over. When I'm certain you've done your job, I drop the bags. That's it. After we're gone, you can pick up the heroin anytime you like."

  "How do I know there are two other bags?" Sloane asked suspiciously.

  Veil took two steps to his left, reached down into the darkness, held up the bags.

  "How do I know you'll leave them like you say?"

  "You don't, but that bag you're holding in your hand should buy us a little good faith. You were happy with the one; I didn't even have to tell you about the other two. We have no use for the heroin, so there's no reason why we shouldn't leave it—assuming you do your job. On the other hand, we have to trust you completely, and you might well decide that a bag in the hand is worth two behind the wall. Ours is the greater risk."

  "All right," Sloane said sullenly.

  "Remember this, Sloan: If you try crossing us, I'll make sure you never keep the bag you've got. You'll be killed. The point is that we have to trust each other if all of us are going to get what we want. It's a straight deal. You set it up so that we can get away, and you become an instant millionaire; try to screw us, and there's no way you can get away with it."

  "I said I'd do it."

  Veil glanced at his watch. "I'll see you back here in a couple of hours."

  "I don't know if I can find
a car-rental place open at this time of night."

  "If you can't, it will be the most expensive car you never rented."

  "You have to give me back my gun. I need it in case someone decides to check."

  Veil took out his own gun and covered Sloane while he handed over the other man's revolver. Sloane slipped it back into his shoulder holster.

  "Where's Nagle keeping himself?"

  "I don't know," the gunman replied. "I've talked to him a couple of times on the phone, but I haven't seen him. One of the other guys said he thought he saw him cruising around in a car, but he couldn't be sure. Hell, we're all working with no money up front."

  "Then you're lucky I found you, aren't you?"

  "I'll be back as soon as I can."

  "Just keep thinking of those other two bags of heroin, Sloane."

  The gunman carefully placed the bag of heroin in the pocket of his jacket, then slipped out of the crypt. Reyna followed him, replacing the lock on the gate and again straightening out the grass as she retreated.

  * * *

  Veil heard Reyna's low whistle from the far end of the field of tombstones. It meant that Sloane was on his way back. Alone.

  Veil was standing just inside a dense stand of fir trees, fifty yards west of the mausoleum. Toby, the Nal-toon wrapped in his arms, lay unconscious at Veil's feet.

  Sloane came into view in the moonlight, walking quickly along the line of trees, heading toward the mausoleum. Reyna suddenly appeared from the shadows, stuck the gun Veil had given her into Sloane's ribs, then grabbed his arm and pulled him into the trees. A minute later they both emerged from the darkness of the fir stand.

  "Here are the keys," Sloane said nervously as he handed Veil a plastic key ring and a yellow rental slip. The night was cool, but the man's face glistened with sweat. "It's a new white Pontiac, and it's parked at the curb right where you told me."

  "You look jumpy," Veil said evenly. "Relax. Remember that the show's only half over. You have to go up the cemetery and make a lot of noise."

  Sloane blinked slowly, and his lips drew back to reveal broken, yellow teeth. "I need to have another bag before I do that."

  "No. That wasn't the agreement. With two bags you might feel that you're far enough ahead of the game to walk away. Do your job and you'll get the bags. They'll be where I said they'd be."

  "You got them with you?"

  "They're in a safe place. When I hear you start shooting and yelling, I'll get them and take them to the wall."

  "You'll get them now, Kendry!" Carl Nagle's voice, strangely hollow and tortured, washed over them like acid from the deep well of night.

  "Holy Mother of God," Sloane croaked as he clawed frantically for the gun in his shoulder holster.

  The explosive chatter of the submachine gun was deafening as the individual rounds blended into one jagged torrent of sound that reverberated off the massive tombstones and echoed in the darkness. Sloane's body was blown backward against a tree and momentarily pinned there by bullets; it jerked like a broken puppet, spouting blood from a dozen different places.

  Then the firing stopped, leaving only faint echoes as a counterpoint to the rasping sound of Sloane's pulped corpse sliding down the tree trunk to the ground.

  Carl Nagle walked unsteadily out from the trees, and suddenly the air was filled with the putrid, gagging odor of rotting flesh. As the huge man moved into the moonlight, Veil and Reyna could see that he held the Uzi braced in the crook of his left arm. There was thick, caked spittle on his cracked lips, and his eyes gleamed like lumps of banked coals in the puffed, waxy flesh of his face.

  Nagle's right arm had ballooned out of the sling that supported it; it jutted grotesquely from his body, like a deformed, rotting gourd that had somehow taken root in his shoulder. Suppurating, swollen to almost twice its normal size, the flesh of the arm was a flaking, blackish green. Streaks of crimson radiated from the bicep to the hand, and up through the neck.

  "Gas gangrene," Reyna murmured in horror.

  Nagle's eyes had turned mud-black with fever and madness. He chuckled insanely as he leaned back, aimed the muzzle of the gun just over their heads, and fired off a burst into the trees. Leaves and broken branches rained down on Reyna and Veil, who had taken the woman in his arms and was trying to shield her with his body.

  "The Lord is my shepherd," Reyna prayed. "I shall not want . . ."

  Reyna flowed out of Veil's arms, crumpling to the ground. There were confused shouts all around them as men tried to determine from which direction the shooting had come. Pistol shots cracked as men stumbled in the darkness, firing at shadows and each other. Sirens wailed.

  ". . . He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, He restoreth my soul . . ."

  "Listen to me, Nagle," Veil said carefully, his eyes fixed on the ribbed, black muzzle of the submachine gun pointed at his chest. "The cops are going to be here any minute."

  Nagle's laughter was high-pitched and chilling. "I am the cops!" he howled. "I'm already here!"

  Veil tensed slightly, but did not move. Nagle was six feet away, and Veil knew that it would take only a twitch of the man's finger to cut him in half.

  ". . . He prepareth a table before me . . ."

  Nagle coughed hard, then glanced over at Sloane's bloody corpse. "Stupid shit," he mumbled, his words blurred by pain and insanity. "You're all stupid shits. Didn't you think this idiot would be missed? I've had men watching the cemetery, but I've been watching them. Sloane was so nervous when he came out of here that I thought he was going to have a heart attack. Then he brings back a rented car. Stupid shit."

  "You're a dead man, Nagle," Veil said quietly. "You know it. This may be your last chance to do something decent. Stop the killing. If you believe you have a soul, take this opportunity to save it."

  "Fuck my soul," Nagle slurred, spittle dribbling from the corners of his mouth. "I'm gonna be all right, Kendry. You can't kill Carl Nagle with a lousy toy arrow. Where's the rest of the heroin?"

  "I'll give it to you if you put the gun down."

  ". . . Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil . . ."

  The muzzle of the gun swung down toward Reyna, held steady. "You give it to me now, Kendry, or I make the girl a few ounces heavier."

  ". . . Thy rod and Thy staff, they comfort me . . ."

  "Don't do it, Nagle!"

  Nagle's eyes and the gun barrel swung back toward Veil, and Reyna suddenly sprang to her feet. Shrieking, she leapt at Nagle, startling the man and causing the burst of fire from his gun to miss Veil. Then Reyna was on him, using both hands to pummel and claw at his gangrenous arm. Blood and pus spurted from the swollen, drumhead-tight flesh. Nagle's mouth dropped open, and he uttered a guttural, soaring, animal howl; the gun dropped to the ground, and he slowly toppled backward, his left arm groping in the air as if searching for some invisible rope that would hold him up. He ended up on his back, still howling and clawing at the air, as Reyna, screaming with mindless rage, methodically kicked at the rotting arm, bursting and shredding the putrefied flesh from the bone.

  With her screams wed to Nagle's in a horrible duet of insane rage and death, Reyna wheeled and picked up the submachine gun. She pointed the muzzle at Nagle's head and pulled the trigger. The gun chattered and kicked wildly, but Reyna kept her finger pressed on the trigger until the clip was empty and Nagle's head had been transformed into a pulpy mass that was spread over the ground, glistening in the moonlight.

  Veil tore the gun from Reyna's hands and threw it into the woods. "He's dead, Reyna!" he shouted, grabbing Reyna's arms and shaking her. "It's over! Stop it!"

  Reyna's mindless screeching gradually died down to a drawn-out moan. Her shoulders sagged, and she slumped against Veil's chest as a helicopter swooped overhead, bathing the field of tombstones in a white light that glittered off specks of marble and polished granite in the stone. The panicked gunfire in the night had stopped, but there were thrashing sounds all around them.
/>
  "I'd say it's just about time to move on, lady," Veil said quietly.

  "Oh, Veil, how can we?" Reyna sighed, her voice barely audible. "It's finished, but at least we tried the best we could."

  "It's not over till the fat lady sings, Reyna. Do you hear her?"

  Reyna stepped back and looked at Veil. Slowly her face broke into a crooked grin. "She may not be singing yet, but I surely do hear her clearing her throat."

  "Let's go," Veil said, lifting Toby in his arms. "You take the lead."

  Reyna picked up the Nal-toon. "Straight down the cemetery?"

  "It's too late to make it back to the mausoleum, so that seems as good a direction as any."

  With Reyna leading the way, Veil trotted through the stand of fir trees. Men moved in the darkness around them. Suddenly Reyna stopped, turned back, and frantically waved at him before diving into some underbrush. Veil stepped behind a tree just as two uniformed policemen, shining powerful flashlights, emerged from the trees to his right and walked over the spot where he had been. Their walkie-talkies crackled in the darkness.

  Veil hurried forward until he came abreast of Reyna. Both stepped behind another large tree as a portly policeman, red-faced and gasping for breath, ran past with his gun drawn. Reyna darted ahead, and Veil followed.

  Then they reached the end of the cemetery.

  Reyna, running a few paces ahead, abruptly stopped and stifled a cry. "Oh, no," she moaned as Veil came up beside her.

  Before them was the rolling, manicured expanse of a golf course on which scores of heavily armed police trotted forward like a phalanx of Roman legionnaires; flashlights bobbed up and down, boring holes in the night. There was no place left to run.

  Veil caught a movement out of the corner of his eye. He turned, saw Reyna place the Nal-toon on the ground. She pulled her T-shirt over her head, then slipped out of her jeans, underpants, and sneakers.

  "Put the sneakers on Toby," Reyna said breathlessly as she scooped up a handful of the loamy soil and began to darken her body. "Your jacket is big enough to cover the rest of him."

  Veil watched as Reyna wrapped her clothes around the Nal-toon and clutched the idol to her breast. "Reyna, you can't—"