Dead of Night df-12

by Randy Wayne White

  I saw that the barge carrying the drone helicopters was now moving away at speed, plowing a white wake.

  Drones that were used to spray pesticides?

  “They figured out a way to spread the parasites by air…”

  I turned from the window, looked at the woman, then stared out again.

  “What do they want from me?”

  “They think you know Dr. Applebee’s formula for destroying the parasites.”

  “Formula? There’s no formula…” I was looking at the barge.

  Drone crop dusters. Waterborne parasites. The connection was immediate. So was my self-recrimination.

  You should have anticipated this, Ford. Another screwup.

  I watched a huge man stumble off a boat. He was several hundred yards away, where the cut narrowed. The man helped the struggling pilot push the boat away again-it was too dangerous to leave it grounded among rocks. The heavy tide spun the vessel like a leaf, pushed it seaward, until the outboard’s propeller gained purchase.

  I recognized him: Ox-man, from Night’s Landing. The black hair and muscle, workman’s rough clothes-probably the guy shooting at me the night of the boat chase, firing as the woman drove.

  The man was carrying a gun in the crook of his arm, walking toward me. At first glance, the weapon looked to be a Kalashnikov, the classic AK-47 automatic rifle, judging from the folding wire stock, the scimitar shape of the magazine. Then I wasn’t so sure: the magazine looked too boxy, its barrel too short. Difficult to tell from that distance. Whatever the weapon was, the man was comfortable with it, no rush. He’d had some training.

  The woman was now near my feet. Recognizing the two Russians catalyzed a rush of images: the bulging eyes of a man hanging in a closet. The eyes of a friend, Frieda Matthews, widening as a speeding car bore down.

  “Who is in the boat? Can you see? Is it a big man who has hair like a bear?”

  My voice was hoarse, but stronger. “Your partner, you mean? Yes.”

  She touched her face to my ankle, a pathetic gesture. “Dear God, you’ve got to help me. You don’t know what Aleski does to women. Please don’t make me go through that. He rapes them, tortures them. I’ve seen him with women-”

  Something stopped her. Maybe the expression on my face.

  I moved my leg out of her reach. “Is that what he did to Dr. Matthews?”

  “Yes.”

  “You helped him.”

  She hesitated, her eyes not just looking at me, but also accessing. She showed no fear until I leaned, grabbed her blouse in both hands. I lifted the woman off the ground, as she said quickly, “Yes. I helped. I’m not going to lie. It was my job, but I didn’t want to hurt the woman. I had… feelings. I wanted it painless. But not him. That’s not Aleski’s way.”

  I held her there, face so close to mine that I felt the warmth of her breath, as she added, “I tried to help your friend. Just like I helped you. Marion Ford-I know who you are. I was with Russian Intelligence, the Federalnaya. Listen to me. Weren’t you ever ordered to do something you didn’t want to do?”

  My conscience translated her question accurately: Haven’t you killed a person you didn’t want to kill?

  A woman with pale, iceberg eyes. She wasn’t afraid now. Not of me. The man coming for us, yes. She feared him. But she’d evaluated me efficiently, used the knowledge like a weapon. She was trying to force a bond between us. Her expression wasn’t easily read, but there was a hint of triumph. Inexplicably, there was also disappointment. I’ve got you.

  Or so she thought.

  I lifted her higher, so that her face was above mine. “You killed Frieda. Who’d you get to kill Applebee?”

  “No one! I was surprised when I heard. He… he was a strange man. I think he fell a little in love, but knew I’d never go with him. He blamed the men here, what they were doing.”

  “Your smuggling operation.”

  “Yes.”

  “How many people are involved?”

  “Many! All over the states. At Tropicane Sugar, several. But only three behind it all: Dr. Stokes, Aleski, and a man named Luther Earl-he looks like a black Abraham Lincoln. They supply exotics to environmental idiots, anyone who’ll buy. The big plans, though-real biological sabotage-it’s just them. And they’re all still here.”

  When I didn’t respond, her glistening eyes narrowed. “Kill them if you want. I’ll help!”

  Her tone said, Don’t miss this opportunity.

  I lowered the woman to the ground, then let her drop. She managed to stay on her feet for a few seconds-a good athlete even with ankles taped. She did several quick ballerina steps on tiptoes before falling hard on tile.

  Her expression changed: surprise, a flash of anger. Her inexplicable disappointment had vanished.

  “Is everyone on the island armed?” I was watching Ox-man. Listened to her correct me: two islands, not one, a treacherous cut between. The man was a hundred yards away, head scanning. He appeared nervous now, holding his weapon at combat ready.

  “I kept all the guns locked in a safe, but then I stupidly gave Luther Earl permission”-she choked up, emotional-“I stupidly lost control. They’re armed. I’m sure they are. But Mr. Earl and Aleski, they’re the only ones you have to worry about. Maybe one other. Aleski’s cousin, Broz.”

  I stepped to the door that opened toward the bay. Locked. Hurried toward the opposite door.

  “Don’t open that!”

  I froze with my hand on the door’s handle.

  “That opens into a pit where they dug coral. It’s where we keep the snakes, the monkeys. I mentioned feeding time? Last night, when the place started going crazy, some idiot opened all the cages. That’s why the staff’s running away. You’d have to be insane to go out there without a weapon.”

  Her voice began to crack again-panic. “Please, help me get my legs free. Don’t leave me alone with Aleski. We can overpower him, then take his boat. No one can get across to the other island without a boat because of the current-”

  She stopped talking as I turned the handle and began to open the door slowly. “Lady, I’ll take my chances with the snakes.”

  “Why? I helped you.” “Because you’re right-I’m a pro. I think you’re a bad actress with an angle. I think you taped your own legs. And if I’m wrong-”

  I pushed the door wider, looked out: a rock pit that was gymnasium-sized, mossy coral walls, panes of shattered Plexiglas, retainer screening above ripped away.

  “-Lady, if I’m wrong, I hope you have better luck than Frieda. Or Jobe Applebee.”

  I took a moment to confirm that the door’s lock was not the sort that latched automatically. Then stepped into the pit.

  33

  The quarry floor was coral chips and ferns. Banana thickets and birds-of-paradise created scattered domes of shade. Otherwise, it was a rock crater with walls fifteen to twenty feet high, open to the sky now that the overhead screen had been torn away.

  The walls were vertical. There were calcium remains of limpets, brain corals, sea fans, vertebrates-evolution etched in limestone. They’d mined the stuff in blocks, so the walls were scarred with ridges where seeds of ficus and fern had rooted. There were cascading vines with umbrella-sized leaves.

  Along the wall to my left were shelves of wooden cages of varying size, some as big as small rooms. Each had a door or lid, usually Plexiglas. Most of the doors were open.

  Nearby was an enclosed cement circle, and a laboratory table, not unlike the table in my lab. Beneath a roof of corrugated plastic was an industrial-grade incubator, heating tubes suspended above.

  This was a place to hatch crawling creatures. A safe place to extract venom.

  A serpentarium.

  There were also larger enclosures made of wood and wire mesh. Tire swings hanging from chains; rotting banana peels on rock floor.

  Monkeys. They’d been freed, too.

  The woman hadn’t lied, as I’d suspected. I’d ignored her warning, and now I’d have to deal with i
t. It gave me a sick feeling in my stomach.

  The incubator was operational. A light was blinking near a row of gauges. I got close enough to see that, beneath the incubator’s opaque cover, were hundreds of eggs in open cartons.

  Some reptiles are protective of their nest. They use their tongues to wind-track eggs if they’ve been moved. This was not a place to linger.

  I walked to my right. Vines grew sunward on pitted rock. They looked strong enough to hold a man’s weight, and there were crevices for feet and fingers. I had to find a way out of the quarry, or soon face Ox-man, the Russian. Him and his rifle. Maybe him, his rifle, and the woman, too.

  Or worse.

  I reached, grabbed a vine, feeling its triangular edges, and began to pull myself up the wall, hand over hand. Got a few feet off the ground when the vine snapped. I landed butt-hard on gravel, dust and leaves raining down.

  Got to my feet, all senses firing. Stepped toward a neighboring vine. I was reaching to get a grip when I noticed a shadow moving through the high foilage. Stood for a moment, then backed away.

  Something alive was up there. It appeared as a descending darkness, thick as a man’s wrist, augering downward at a speed that created a barber-pole illusion. A wall of elephant’s ear leaves, from quarry lip to floor, rustled incrementally, syncronized with the shadow’s slow uncoiling. The expanse of trembling leaves suggested the shadow’s size. Twice as long as I am tall. Longer.

  In a pool of sunlight, I got a glimpse: green scales flexing as muscle undulated. A single black eye in a head the size of my fist.

  I became a statue, temples thumping.

  Ahead and to my left, there was unrelated activity. A second shadow, rustling. Ferns in the area were knee-high. I watched ferns parting in a pattern of serpentine switch-backs as something vectored toward me, ground level.

  For an instant, an image of the woman came to mind. Crawling after me over tile.

  I began retreating, eyes shifting from vines to moving ferns, until I reached the metal door. Searched blindly. Finally touched its handle. Tested. Felt the door begin to open. Second option, confirmed.

  My choices: snakes at feeding time, Russian with a gun.

  I’d shifted into crisis mode; began projecting, then rejecting, a rapid list of alternatives. My eyes drifted to the incubator. Paused. Remembered the words of an African friend: “They get aggressive. Deadly mean, if you’re near their nest.”

  I touched the door again. Not much of an escape route. But all I had.

  I hurried past the cages to the incubator. Opened the lid… then froze.

  Shit.

  A few paces away, a cobra sprouted from the ferns, skull ribs flattening its head like a mummy’s cowling, black eyes lasering. It leaned toward me, unhinged its mouth wide, and exhaled. There was a stink of rodents. Hiss does not describe the sound.

  The snake’s swaying head was chest-high. Ten or twelve feet of reptile. A king cobra.

  It was aware of me; unimpressed.

  In the banana thickets, other reptiles were stirring. On the quarry’s far wall, I noticed snakes exiting crevices. Beyond the swaying cobra, ferns had become animated.

  My body remained motionless as my hand moved. It reached without looking and found a carton of eggs. Felt to make certain the carton was full, took it. I began to back away, slowly at first, then turned to run… but stopped. Froze once again.

  To my right, shadow had touched earth. A hatchet-sized head lifted off gravel, tongue-testing the molecular content of air, a yard of its lichen-colored body visible. It was an African mamba, the genetic model of ascendency. I looked up. Saw its tail twitching twelve feet above among vines on the quarry wall.

  The snake’s head turreted in slow assessment. Swept past me. Paused. Turreted back. Paused once again, tongue probing for specifics. Head lifted another few inches, dusty eyes vague above zombie-stitched lips.

  A mammalian heart was beating.

  Mine.

  Behind me, near the top of the quarry, I heard a sudden thrashing among leaves; heard the gunshot crack of a tree limb breaking, then a shriek. I looked up in time to see a dark shape falling toward me. I thought it was a man, at first, because of the flailing arms.

  The Russian?

  I jumped and ducked, covering my head. Jumped again when it landed face-first a few yards away. The sound of a primate’s body impacting on earth is distinctive. A cavity containing lungs is percussive.

  A gorilla?

  The animal was the size of a teenager, big-shouldered, covered with hair. It groaned, stirred. Struggled to get to its knees. Collapsed and rolled, eyes open. It had a black elongated faced, and golden, human eyes.

  A chimpanzee.

  Its left arm, I noted, was grotesquely swollen. I looked up and saw a gray snake in the tree canopy. A black mamba. Not large.

  The chimp groaned once again, head turning as glazed eyes found me. Seemed to focus in recognition-a great sadness to be shared. Lifted its right arm, muscles beginning to spasm, and reached its hand out to me, index finger pointing.

  I’ve never felt such a combination of shock and fear. Unconsciously, I leaned toward the chimp, hand extended. Our fingers touched for a moment. Its skin was leathery, warm as my own. The hand fell as the chimpanzee shuddered, grunted, made a rattling sound of exhaustion. I watched its eyes dim, then close.

  Dead.

  I forced myself to step away, aware that a few more seconds of inattention could be fatal.

  The cobra had disappeared among ferns. Where?

  The head of the giant mamba was still visible. The rest of its body had arrived at ground level. The snake was moving in my direction.

  I pivoted, sprinted, lunged into the doorway.

  The woman was sitting, watching as I hurried to the window. She didn’t seem surprised that I’d returned.

  Ox-man was life-sized now; he would be opening the door within the next minute. He still held the weapon at combat ready-not an AK-47 but similar. The man was spooked; I could see that, too.

  Someone had let the animals out. He was aware.

  The woman kept her voice low. “Take the tape off my ankles and we’ll overpower him. Together.”

  I’d put the carton of eggs on the floor, was leaning over her. I began to rip away duct tape. Her lean calves were fuzzed with hair; thighs muscled. She didn’t flinch.

  When the tape was gone, the woman flexed her legs, stretched. “Help me up.”

  I shook my head. “Roll on your side and step through those handcuffs.”

  “What?” As if she had no idea what I meant.

  “Drop the act, lady. I don’t think you want to go out there with your hands behind your back.” I was pushing her legs into a fetal position, trying to position the cuffs. “You never jumped rope? Same concept, only the rope’s shorter.”

  She contracted into a ball and extended her arms. I helped her work one foot through, then the other. Lifted her by the elbow and she came to her feet, hands cuffed in front now. Tall woman, dark tan, body of an athlete.

  “My name’s Dasha. Not ‘lady.’”

  I said, “Then you’ll understand why I don’t shake hands,” as I took her by the shoulders and spun her body away.

  “Idiot. What are you doing? Aleski will kill-”

  I clamped my hand over her mouth, pulled her close. Held her in a bear hug until she stopped struggling. Took my hand away, and said into her ear. “I think you and your partner are setting me up. I’ll find out soon enough.”

  She turned, pale eyes searching for something. “No. I swear it. You can trust me.”

  I’d saved a section of tape. Turned her again, saying, “No, I can’t,” as I pressed the tape over her mouth and did a quick wrap. Put my lips close to her ear again. “If you don’t do what I tell you, we’re all going to die.”

  Outside, there was the scuff of footsteps on gravel.

  I picked up the carton of reptile eggs and steered the woman toward the quarry door. Took a deep breath,
then stepped out, pulling her along behind.

  The giant mamba had found the chimp. Even though it was too big for a meal, the snake was preoccupied with inspection. Its tongue stabbed the air, its head flattening cobralike, as it raised six feet of its body off the ground.

  The tape didn’t stop the woman from talking, only muffled her voice. She said something that sounded like, “Jesus Christ, are you crazy? Don’t make me do this.”

  She wasn’t acting now. She was hyperventilating, her eyes locked on the mamba only a few dozen yards away. I’d backed her against the bank of snake cages, which was to the left as you exited the door. She was the first thing Ox-man would see if he peeked out.

  I was tempted to say that I’d be crazier to let her, and her partner, go to work on me. Instead, I whispered, “Stick with the plan and you’ll be fine.” Then I hurried to the other side of the doorway. Flattened my back against the coral wall.

  The instructions I’d given her weren’t complicated, but I didn’t expect her to follow them. If she did, we both had a good chance of surviving this hell hole. If she didn’t, I had a plan for that, too.

  I could hear Ox-man inside the room. He was kicking rat cages, making sure we weren’t hidden among them. Yelling words in Russian that had the rhythm of profanity.

  Then silence.

  I’d stationed the woman at an angle a few yards from the door so that I had an unobstructed view of her. Hands cuffed, mouth taped, ankles crossed as if bound, she looked convincing-a comrade in distress. Her terrified fixation on the snake added to the effect.

  I pressed harder against the wall when I saw the door handle move. I watched the door open an inch… another inch. Could see the wire stock of the man’s weapon through the hinges. He saw the woman. I heard him speak-an exclamation of surprise, but also anger. I got the impression that he had a reason to be surprised-something in her expression, not only his tone.

  For an instant, Dasha looked at me, then looked away.

  I had the carton of reptile eggs palmed in my right hand. Had my left hand up and ready as the door opened wider. I expected the woman to pull the tape away and yell a warning to her partner. Nod in my direction, or at least use her eyes to tell the man that he was walking into a trap.