by John Moralee
A sudden thought: could lizards swim?
They were amphibians, weren’t they?
He jumped out of the bath. With wet hands, he carried his clothes into the bedroom. At least he knew there was only one in there.
Or were there more under the bed?
A hundred lizards with small sharp teeth.
A thousand.
Holden watched the floor as he dressed. A lizard crossed the bathroom floor and paused to look at him before continuing.
They were getting bolder.
He pulled on his alligator boots last of all, then he opened his suitcase, which was on the bed.
He was glad to see the money was still there,.
He had considered using the hotel’s safe, but that wouldn’t have been wise. It wasn’t as if he could declare the money. He’d slept with the suitcase, just to keep it safe. He didn’t want to leave it in the hotel room; the hotel staff could be the thieving type. He counted out half, putting it into his smaller briefcase. The rest he kept in the suitcase. After checking under the bed and seeing just the one lizard, he slid the suitcase underneath. Two lizards watched from the bathroom. He closed the bathroom door, just to keep them out. Then he left the room, leaving the DO NOT DISTURB sign hanging on the doorknob.
*
Gakak’s Bar faced the beach in one direction and faced the steaming jungle in the other. Like the rest of the town, it was touristy. The town seemed to be in a phase of rapid expansion; he could hear the distant roar of chain saws cutting down trees. Holden arrived half an hour early. He bought a scotch and settled on a wooden chair under a white parasol next to the crystal clear pool. The briefcase was on his lap. There was a thick airport paperback in his hands, the latest Tom Clancy novel he was using to keep his hands busy. He didn’t read; he was watching the other customers, afraid of thieves and muggers and junkie whores. (He’d been reading a James Ellroy novel on the plane. He’d figured he needed to know how the criminals that he would be dealing with thought. It had made his acutely paranoid.) It would be just his luck for someone to rob him of the five million before he traded it.
A big black man was drinking a beer, blinking slowly. He looked the criminal type. Some sunburned Germans, their red skins flaking off in large white curls, played some kind of card game under the shade of a palm tree. They looked the criminal type. A few attractive women tanned themselves by the pool. They looked the criminal type. If he looked at anyone for long enough he could convince himself they were bad. He wanted to cool down, relax. The swimming pool was empty and inviting, but he forced himself still. Soon, the scotch sweated out of his pores under the harsh white sunlight, and he was rubbing his neck where the sun had caught it during the short walk there. Ten minutes of this sun is enough, he reckoned. It’s baking me like a bean.
There was a lizard hiding under a German’s chair.
Same type as in the hotel.
Bigger, though.
About half a metre long, this one.
It was matching the red bricks. Its skin was like dark red leather. The four stubby legs had feet with gnarled toes and long nails, good for embedding deep into tough tree bark, good for climbing and probably hanging upside down. That thought made him squint up at the parasol. Sure enough, there was a smaller lizard fastened to the underside.
They were everywhere.
“Hot, eh?”
A black man patted his shoulder. Holden saw himself reflected in the man’s sunglasses. It was the man he’d seen drinking. The man had arrived even earlier than he had.
“Hot, yes.”
“I am Mr Tarundi.”
“Mr Holden.”
They shook hands.
“We make business. I have a car waiting,” the man said. It was a white Rolls-Royce limousine, parked across the road. The paintwork gleamed like a mirror. The windows were black. “I will take you to see the merchandise, if you will come this way.”
Holden didn’t want to enter the Rolls-Royce. Any car with black windows was bad news. “I thought we were going to talk here.” Out in the open. Where it’s safe.
“You do want to see the product?”
“Yes,” he said, regretting his weakness. He did have to see the merchandise, he knew. It wasn’t just skins he was buying; there were other illegal rare animal bones to see. He had to make sure what he was buying was what he was supposed to be getting, not dog and rat bones. He got up; his legs prickling with the change of blood flow. The back of his cotton slacks were damp with perspiration. He hoped Tarundi wouldn’t notice. He held the briefcase tight, dumping the novel on the table for someone else to read. As he walked over to the Rolls-Royce, he could not help but think he was in way over his head. The sudden realisation that these were criminals - real criminals - only hit him when the rear door opened, and he saw the three other guys. They were huge. And he was small and carrying five million pounds. Gold flashed in one man’s mouth. The second had a ragged scar he obviously didn’t get shaving. The third looked like a boxer; his neck merging with his head with no distinction. He was someone Mike Tyson would avoid at all costs. When Holden ducked his head to slide in opposite them, he glimpsed a gun handle tucked into one man’s belt.
Tarundi joined him in the back, then the door was closed. Holden felt uncomfortable surrounded by four large black men. At home he didn’t even know any black people. In Hong Kong, he was a giant among midgets. In Africa, he was a midget among giants. He grinned, trying to disguise his fear.
“This is Elu, Manani and Saru.”
“Hi,” he said.
They did not reply.
The limo moved off, and they left the bar behind. The limo headed away from the sea towards the bright green jungle on a dirt road that cut through the bulging vegetation. There were no other vehicles. The road was extremely poor, pock-marked and dotted with stones. No one talked.
He thought of the ten million pounds.
Some very powerful Triad guys had lent him the money. He was to act as the middleman in a smuggling operation, a world apart from his normal employment. He was to arrange a shipment of rare animal bones for a Chinese trawler to pick up in the port in three days time. Back in China, the bones would be a valuable commodity, used in fertility potions and other weird practices. Weight for weight, many were more valuable than heroin or diamonds.
As the journey continued in silence, he tried to convince himself what he was doing was legitimate.
Until July 1997, Holden had been an £150,000-a-year accountant for the Wei Shu Bank of Hong Kong. His job had vanished as soon as the Chinese took over the island, leaving him with serious financial debts, but a friendly Hong Kong businessman he’d worked with had offered him some new work, if he wanted to take a risk. A one-time deal worth £2,000,000. Import-export. Not drugs, Mr Lee had said. Holden had said “yes” before he realised the man was connected to the Triads.
It was too late to back out by that point. It was then explained to him that there were some African traders of exotic wildlife who wouldn’t deal directly with the Triads because they didn’t trust them. A white man would provide the necessary kudos for a new venture between the Chinese and Africa criminals. He would be paid handsomely for smoothing the relationship with a small trial run (the Triad considered £10,000,000 a small figure). Holden knew he was an expendable person the Triad wouldn’t mind losing, if the deal collapsed. (It kept him awake at night, thinking that.)
The Triad was keeping his wife watched until the transaction was completed. If anything went wrong Mai Li would be killed, and Holden would be killed if he showed up anywhere.
This one criminal act would get him out of debt, and mean he could live a comfortable life. No more accountancy. He was stepping up in the world, whether he liked it or not.
But his expendability was something always on his mind.
The car turned off the road, and continued its trek up a smooth mud track. Overhanging tree branches scraped against the roof, making Tarundi swear something in Swahili. He didn�
��t want his nice new car ruining.
Ahead, in a clearing, a dozen corrugated-iron huts looked as if they’d been there twenty years. Dark green vines and bloody rust made them merge with the surrounding jungle. There were three black Kawasaki bikes leaning against one. A man with an AK47 - the weapon of choice among elephant poachers - guarded the largest hut.
The Rolls-Royce stopped. When the doors opened, the jungle heat rolled over Holden. Sweating, he followed the men into the hut. The hut was filled with animals furs stacked up to the ceiling: lion, tiger, zebra, monkey, giraffe. Snakeskins took up another area and rhino horns a third. There was a small wooden table covered with rows and rows of tiny bones - many Chinese medicines used them as a powder. It was a sobering place to be, thousands of animals had been killed for so little. He hated himself for being a part of it.
He measure and weighed several bones against the details stored in his memory.
They were what his employer wanted.
“You like?” Tarundi said.
“I like.”
“You pay all now.”
“The agreement was half now, half when I it is in the ship.”
“No, all now.”
“What?”
“I only have half on me.” He opened the briefcase. “See?”
The black men looked at each other. Tarundi produced a gun from his jacket. “Do you see?”
“Yes, yes. Jesus. Look, I’ll go back to the hotel and -”
“No, you’ll stay here until we have all the money. My friends will collect it. Now, where is it? Is it in the safe?”
“No. It’s under my bed. Here’s the key to the room. Number 79.”
Tarundi tossed the key to Elu. Elu and Manani and Saru exited the hut, and moments later their bikes powered up. The bikes sped off, their engines sounding like thunder.
“Sit,” Tarundi said.
He sat.
Tarundi lit a cigarette, offering him another. Holden accepted. “Why are you doing this?”
“You could be ripping us off, Mr Holden. We don’t know you. Maybe five million is all you have, eh?”
“No. I wouldn’t try anything.”
“We’ll see. We wait here. If what you say is true, we let you go. We deliver merchandise. If not -” (He pretended to shoot him with his fingers) “- you stay.”
“What if your men take off with the money?”
“They won’t. Two men could make a deal, but three never. They’ll be back in three hours, the time it takes to go there and back.”
Three hours. A life sentence.
He had to hope Tarundi knew his men as well as he said he did.
“You play cards, Mr Holden?”
“Some games. Poker. Whist. Bridge.”
“We play poker to fill the time, eh?”
Holden looked at the gun, now resting on the table. What choice did he have? “Yes, of course.”
Tarundi dealt the cards, smiling.
*
After three hours the three men had not returned. Tarundi did not seem worried, but then he had won all of Holden’s loose money - about five hundred pounds. Holden had let him win, to keep him happy. Holden was a far better card player than he let on. But his generosity seemed to make no difference to the man’s mood, for suddenly he stopped smiling and scowled at his watch. “They are late.”
After waiting another twenty minutes, Tarundi ordered Holden to stand up. Holden thought he was going to be shot immediately, but the poacher directed him outside. The guard came to attention as they appeared. Tarundi stamped on a lizard, grinding the creature into the earth. A sticky residue, like glue, fastened to his shoe. He swore. Holden was disgusted.
“Miguel,” Tarundi said, “no sign of them?”
“No, sir.”
Tarundi pressed the gun to Holden’s chin. “Do your Chinese partners have people at the hotel?”
“No.” None he knew about, anyway. “No, just me.”
“Okay, I believe you.” The gun was removed, but he kept it in his hand.
Gasping, Holden touched his chin, feeling where the cold metal had been pressed. “You don’t think they have taken the money, do you?”
“Of course not,” Tarundi said, his eyes betraying his words. He believed it. “Miguel, get Raul off his feet. I want driving to the city.”
Miguel crossed the clearing, knocking on a door. Raul, the chauffeur, lumbered out of the hut, pulling on his jacket. His fly was undone. Holden heard female laughter behind him. Raul tugged up his fly, then got behind the wheel.
They were soon on the road again - Holden, Tarundi, Miguel and Raul. Tarundi was in the back with Miguel, who kept a gun in his ribs.
The journey back into the town lasted a third of the time of the outward journey - Raul drove like a madman, never using the brake, never stopping, never slowing. He crushed dozens of lizards under the Rolls-Royces wheels. Holden clung onto his seat each time they took a bend.
They arrived at the hotel at dusk. The jungle was strangely silent, as though everything was settling down for a night’s sleep. Tarundi pointed at the bikes parked across the street. Would the men have left them if they going to rip off their boss? Somehow, he doubted it. But he didn’t know what it meant, either. Tarundi and Miguel walked Holden to the hotel. Holden noticed Raul looked relieved to be left in the car: there was something wrong with the whole atmosphere of the place. There were no people on the street, not even sitting in the shade of the bars and cafes, which always had a few customers until the late evening. Holden did not have time to think about what that meant as he was pushed forward.
The hotel lobby was dark and cool, nobody around. They moved directly to the elevator. Miguel pushed Holden into it while his boss punched the button. The doors opened at the right floor. A startled lizard the length of a pencil skittered out of their way as they approached Holden’s room.
The DO NOT DISTURB sign was hanging from the door, but it was also ajar. Tarundi motioned with his head for Miguel to go in. The man hid his nervousness behind his gun. He formed a stance he must have seen in a cop movie - two hands on his gun, legs spread apart ready to kick, jump or run. Miguel pressed his boot against the door and pushed it wide. The room was full of purple shadows. The last dregs of sunlight shimmered through the window, flickering into darkness. He went in.
“There’s no one here, boss.” Click. Click. “The light won’t come on.”
Holden was about to step forward when Tarundi stopped him.
“Wait,” Tarundi said quietly to Holden. Louder: “Miguel, check out the bathroom.”
There was almost no light in the hallway now. Holden wondered if the sun went down faster at the equator; it certainly seemed like it. He could hear Miguel shuffling about in the room, but he could not see him. The purple shadows had turned to midnight blue.
The bathroom door slammed.
“Miguel?” Tarundi said. His voice was a high-pitched whisper.
So he knows there’s something wrong, too. He’s scared.
Miguel did not reply to his boss.
“MIGUEL?”
Nothing.
Tarundi looked up and down the hallway. Apart from the lizard they’d startled, it was deathly silent. The lizard was making a slithering sound with its tongue. Holden imagined it was the sound a snail would make as it made its trail amplified a million times. Under normal circumstances it would have been inaudible, but now it was incredibly loud. Tarundi, wiping sweat out of his eyes, nudged Holden. “Get yourself in there.”
Holden held his breath when he stepped into the dark room. There was the black shape of the bed, total blackness beneath his feet. Some light crept through the bathroom door, just enough to make out there was no one hiding in this room, unless they were behind the bed. He could feel the movement of lizards. Something walked over his shoes.
Tarundi entered. He stayed in the doorway. “Open the bathroom door, Mr Holden.”
“Why me?”
“I have the gun.”
&n
bsp; Holden reached the door. There was movement behind it; he could tell by the shifting shadows along the jamb. Perhaps the three men sent earlier had captured Miguel as he went in and were now waiting for them to make the same mistake. Perhaps that was it. This meant that if he so much as touched that door, he was a dead man. They’d just blast him through the wood. Cheap hotel doors offered no protection against AK47s. But he had to do it - Tarundi could kill him just as easily. Holden tried what Miguel had done with the first door; he tried pushing it with his foot. It didn’t move. It was closed. He grasped the handle. He turned it. The door creaked. It swung open.
Miguel was standing in the middle of the bathroom. A long loop of leathery rope was around his neck. As Holden stared, it tightened. Miguel was already dead, but the pressure exerted by the rope made his eyes press out like eggs. Holden looked up at the ceiling. It wasn’t a rope, he realised. It was the tail of the biggest lizard he’d seen. It was nearly as wide as the door, easily as long as the bathroom floor. It was using the two walls at the far corner as supports, much like a rock-climber would use an angular rock face to wedge in with his feet and hands. Its head was touching the floor, but its tail curled around at the level of the ceiling. The lizard looked as if it were doing a bizarre handstand, with the tail hanging down like a scorpion’s. It casually tossed Miguel’s body into a corner. Thousands of smaller lizards were crawling over the huge lizard, over the ceiling, across the floor, up and down the walls, perched on the bath, swimming in the toilet. Many were feasting on the three bodies beside the sink. So that was where the men had got to.
And he would be next.
Holden stepped backward - right into the barrel of Tarundi’s gun. “What is it?” the man said. He still had not seen. Holden stayed silent. Tarundi knocked Holden aside and approached the door.
“Mig ... Jesus, what the -”
It was fast.
The tail whipped down and sideways like a samurai sword. It struck Tarundi’s head and slammed it into the doorway, leaving a dent in the plaster. Tarundi’s nose shattered in a hail of bone and blood. Then he was yanked off his feet and dragged into the bathroom. There was no way Holden could help the guy, even if he’d wanted. Tarundi got off a few shots, but the bullets didn’t get through the lizard’s skin. He lost the gun when he was pounded against the wall. “Jesus! Help! God! No!” The lizard was slamming him into one wall, then the other, then the other. His screams didn’t last long. All Holden could do was close the door, muffling the moans. He felt sorry for the man, but not a lot. After a minute, it was quiet in there.
