A Nation of Mystics_Book II_The Tribe

by Pamela Johnson

  “Take a look at this.” His movement was like his voice, quick and confident. He opened a suitcase so that she could see the rectangular flat slabs stacked inside.

  “May I?” She knelt down to pick up a plastic bag, peeled the plastic from the sticky hash, and smelled.

  “I love good hash,” she told him, feeling its pliant quality. Julie was right. It was the freshest hash she’d ever seen. “And hash is only as good as the plant it comes from. Afghanistan has wonderful plants, I’m told. Short and bushy. Really different from the tall, lanky weeds I’ve seen in Mexico.”

  Bob was watching her carefully. “Julie, can you get that hash pipe for me? I’m not sure where I left it.”

  “Sure.” She closed the door behind her.

  “Look at this.” Kathy spoke almost to herself, scraping at the edge of the slab. “It’s so obvious that the resin’s collected with meticulous care. There’s very little leaf material left. Hardly any green matter at all.”

  “They get it that clean by silk-screening,” he told her.

  “I know,” she answered, looking up at him. “I like the Nepalese, too. It’s also hand rubbed, but because the farmers dust their hands with dirt first, it’s heavier. Weighs a bit more. Eventually, you wind up paying for resin mixed with dirt. But Nepalese is still better than Turkish or Moroccan. Or Pakistani with fat to bond the hash and increase the weight.”

  Surprised, Bob asked, “Where’d you learn how to make hash?”

  “From the University of California library system.” Kathy was still laughing at the expression on his face when Julie returned with the hash pipe. “My partner spent the summer perusing old texts in the library about hash manufacturing, some as long ago as the end of the last century. Together, we reconstructed a whole system of the development of hash processing. It’s fairly cross-cultural. You know, like the introduction of silk screening into the process was a Western influence. We’re thinking of writing up a small monograph.”

  Bob stood frozen, unsure how to respond.

  “I have to admit, though,” she added, “that reading isn’t nearly as interesting as being there. I envy you.” She blinked her eyes at him and smiled. “One of these years, when I can take the time, I’ll go to see those places for myself. Do you mind if I smoke some of this?”

  The question threw Bob back to life. “Here’s a chunk we’re smoking from. Julie, can I have that pipe?”

  Julie gave him the small hookah. “I told Kathy I had twenty-five pounds to distribute. She says she’ll take them all.”

  “Half our load—about a hundred pounds—goes to a brother in Berkeley who financed the trip. Will you have trouble getting rid of your share once he drops that much into the market?” he asked her.

  “I have my own network set up.” Kathy grinned, enjoying her first smoke in days. “A lot of my customers are from out of town. I won’t have any problems. Not with this.”

  “Then you owe me $22,500.” Bob smiled with her.

  Kathy reached for her bag. She had twenty-five grand in cash in a paper bag, neatly bundled stacks of hundred dollar bills. Instead of handing the money to Bob, she passed the bag to Julie, making it clear that this was Julie’s sale.

  Julie took the money, sat on the floor mattress, and started counting. When she reached the agreed upon price, she patted down the last of the bills. “That’s twenty-two five,” she announced.

  “Well then, let me get my suitcase. I left it in the living room.”

  As she opened the door to the hallway, she heard music again. Ravi Shankar at the Monterey Pop Festival. She was really high, and the raga touched her, made her wish she could sit down and continue to smoke and do yoga and forget everything else.

  Focus, she demanded.

  The suitcase was where she’d left it by the front door, but as she turned to walk back to the bedroom, she stopped. The record had just ended, and the room was once more quiet. Near the sliding glass doors, looking out over the canyon, a man stood with his back to the room. He was standing so still she hadn’t noticed him, and with the music as loud as it was, he obviously hadn’t heard her. Against the light coming through the window, his head was a glimmering outline of golden hair. He shifted his weight, turned slightly, his stance sure, and she could see his face, a look of absorbed concentration in his eyes. His body was beautiful—muscles in a well-fitted T-shirt, mustache above a full, sensual mouth, trimmed beard, hair halfway down his back.

  Here’s a man who’s in tune with his own sexuality, she mused. One who knows his own strength and revels in it. I wonder what he does? He’s no runner, that’s for sure. This man controls his own trip.

  Suddenly, sparked by the awareness from the smoke, time stopped. In one mind-blowing jolt, she understood that since Jim, the partners she’d picked were men she could control, moving in and out of their lives at whim.

  The thought stopped her, shook her, rooted her to the ground as she tried to understand, why? Just at the same moment, the man turned to her.

  Christian Brooks stood looking out from the sliding glass doors, stoned and sensitive. The view was one of deck and tall trees pressing against the house, but Christian was not looking at the trees; rather, he was staring at pictures of the past.

  Suddenly, he stirred uneasily. Someone was behind him. Uncomfortable, as if he’d revealed too much of himself, he turned abruptly to see a woman standing at the door, staring at him, her face a confusion of emotion. He stepped forward, taking her in from her bare feet up, stopping a few feet away.

  He looked past the flared jeans, silver and turquoise Concho belt, Mexican blouse, long dark hair, and red mouth—beyond outer illusion—and saw … embarrassment. Well, yes. She’d been caught snooping around his soul.

  But there was more to her. Something about the way she held her chin with assurance.

  He smiled.

  The energy that bounced between them was a physical force, so strong and palpable that he was reminded of the day he’d met Lisa.

  Kathy, adrift, could only smile with him, her breath shallow as his eyes looked into hers. She felt naked.

  “Brother,” she finally said softly. “I didn’t see you standing there when I first came into the room. I’m sorry to disturb you. You were deep in thought.”

  He moved closer, and she could smell the mixture of hash and incense in his clothing.

  “I must have been far away not to have noticed you. You called me back.”

  The voice was full of charm—intimate, making a connection with her that was frightening in its intensity. For an overpowering moment, she felt as if they had known each other for a very long time, that it would be perfectly reasonable for her to follow the thread of his energy and walk into his arms. She couldn’t move, could only fall into the depth of the eyes that held her, shocked at the strength of his mind, the intensity of the attraction, the magnetism of his body, the karma that had brought them together in this place at this moment, the knowing of something both new and old and meant to be.

  She wanted to ask where he had been—almost did—but caught herself, tightening her grip on the suitcase.

  Focus, came the maddening voice again.

  She looked toward the suitcase, breaking the cord that bound them.

  I have no time for a man, she reminded herself. And certainly not this one. The hash needs to be sold. Finals begin in four days.

  “I … uh … need to bring this suitcase to … uh … Bob,” she stammered, furious with herself.

  “Seems he needs a lot of suitcases these days.” Christian laughed, obvious delight in his voice. “Can I help you with that?”

  “I think I can manage. But thanks anyway.”

  “Your old man ask you to get the suitcase?”

  “Something like that.” She slid past him, making for the hallway and Bob’s room.

  “What’s your name?” he called.

  Stopped, she turned back to him. “Kathleen. Kathy.”

  “I’m Christian. Maybe I’ll
see you later?”

  “Perhaps.” Kathy nodded, then hurried toward the bedroom door.

  At the end of the hallway, she stopped, trembling slightly, took a deep breath, and opened the door.

  “Okay,” Bob said nonchalantly, stacking slabs. “Here you go. Twenty-five pounds. Julie, you want to take this money and put it away.”

  Kathy, still unsettled, concentrated on pulling out large plastic garbage bags from the suitcase. She began wrapping four or five pounds together in a bag, tightening the package with heavy duct tape to contain the smell.

  “Stay for dinner,” Bob told her after Julie had left the room. “We’re going to the Sunrise.”

  “I don’t think so. It’s so tempting, but I have to get right back. I need to finish a paper and study for exams.”

  “I’ve hardly had a chance to know you. I like to know the people I sell to.”

  “If I stay for dinner,” she tried explaining, “I won’t leave.”

  “That wouldn’t be so bad, eh?”

  “Julie’s invited me to Hawaii next week. I’ll be able to relax then.” Then she smiled, genuinely. “I would like to get to know you.”

  “Alright,” he answered, “if you’re determined to go. But before you leave, I have something for you.” He opened a trunk and pulled out a red, embroidered dress from Afghanistan. “Do you want to try it on?”

  “Oh, Bob! It’s beautiful! Thank you!” Kathy’s eyes sparkled in gratitude, and then she laughed. “But I can’t wear it back on the plane. It would be like waving a flag. I tell you what, I’ll bring it to Hawaii.”

  “I’d like to see you in it,” he said, stepping closer, holding it against her.

  Okay, she thought. I’ll play.

  “And you’ll just have to tell me how I can thank you.” She looked up and gazed innocently into his eyes.

  For a moment, there was silence as Bob realized his hand had been called.

  “I’m the one who should be grateful. Helping Julie at the birth is payment enough. Thanks for your friendship, sister.”

  He turned and started locking up suitcases and trunks.

  Getting eight stoned people ready for dinner and out of the house at the same time was no easy task. In the hustle just before leaving, Christian pulled Bob aside.

  “There was a girl here today. I thought she’d be joining us.”

  “She left.”

  “Who is she, anyway?”

  “One of Julie’s friends.”

  “From the beach?”

  “No, this one’s … different. You interested?”

  “Why’s she different?”

  “I don’t know. Haven’t figured it out yet. Like today, I gave her a dress. But when I tried to flirt with her a little, you know, get a little back, she called me on it. Jesus, it was embarrassin’. She’s goin’ to school at Berkeley. Started giving me a lecture on the history of hash making, if you can believe that. Me.”

  “She lives in Berkeley? Why’d she come down?”

  “To pick up Julie’s share of the hash.”

  “For who?”

  “For herself, man. Julie says she’s some hotshot lady weed dealer,”

  “Are you kidding? Cool.”

  Obviously annoyed by Christian’s persistence, Bob cried. “Jesus, Christian, the least you can do is let me have a chance at her first. Besides, you think she’s your style? I have a feeling she’s pretty independent. And don’t you have a broken heart for Lisa … and Amy … Anita … and half a dozen others.”

  “There’s something about her …”

  “Why don’t you tell me why you put so much into one woman at a time?” Bob demanded. “Can’t you see that a man chooses one good woman forever and plays with the rest?”

  “How about a phone number?” Christian insisted.

  “I don’t have it. You’d have to ask Julie. But I tell you what. Come to Hawaii next week and get it yourself. She’s joining us after exams next Wednesday.”

  MYLES

  HAMBURG, GERMANY

  SEPTEMBER 1968

  Myles took his usual post near the counter of the international customs inspection station in Hamburg, suitcase at his feet, the daily newspaper casually folded under his arm. His new gold-rimmed glasses reflected the airport lighting. Occasionally, he would give an almost imperceptible nod at someone in line, and a customs official would pull that person aside for questioning. He wasn’t especially happy to be wasting his time with this kind of work; in fact, it galled him to know that Supervisor Bremer had insisted he leave Berkeley and take up residence in Germany, on loan, Bremer had explained, to Interpol. Rather than the adventure he’d pictured the job as being, he was stuck in an airport for days on end, watching passengers disembark from planes coming from the East.

  No one paid the slightest attention to the thin, sandy-haired man leaning comfortably against the wall in jeans and a cotton long-sleeved shirt. His hair was neither too short nor too long, enabling him to mingle with the hippie scene or enter into the offices of the conservative German faculty. A chameleon, he blended into any surrounding, almost invisible.

  “It’s absolutely uncanny,” Jarman Bergman, head of German Interpol, said to Myles one afternoon in his office several weeks after Myles had arrived in West Germany. “This sense of yours to locate carriers.”

  Myles stood before Herr Bergman’s desk and smiled—an odd smile, not easily recognizable, but one that someone who knew Myles would have said spoke of his contempt. Really, his deductions in spotting smugglers were quite logical. The passengers who drew his attention came from the East and were young, eighteen to twenty-five years of age. The men often had hair that looked newly cut, too neat, too trimmed, without the lived-in look of even a couple of weeks. The backs of their necks were sometimes white in contrast to their tanned faces. Most had not been able to part with their mustaches. In customs, too much hair was suspect, but beyond customs, once on the street, not enough hair could be viewed with even more suspicion.

  The women who attracted his attention wore dresses or skirts instead of jeans. Often, they wore an article of clothing or a piece of jewelry with an ethnic flavor—Afghani vest or shirt, embroidered Indian blouse, silver Indian bracelet, sandals, perhaps even prayer beads. Their hair was sometimes disheveled, as if they’d just emerged from bed, a fact, Myles suspected, they were trying to suggest.

  At other times, Myles had to close his eyes in an effort to refrain from laughing aloud at attempts to look straight—coat and tie, women stumbling in unfamiliar high-heeled shoes, amateurish struggles with makeup.

  If the facade caught his attention, he looked at their gestures, the way they held themselves. Most smugglers were nervous, quiet, their eyes floating on nothing and everything, self-conscious; others were intense, agitated, talking about nothing, thinking to distract the customs officer. Either extreme and Myles had them. A few breezed by, but, Myles liked to think, not on his watch.

  Yet, before the nod, he would give his single concentrated attention to the eyes. By the eyes, he could tell the quantity of the load the person was smuggling. If they were sleepy, he classified them as unambitious dopers and dreamers who might have spent months building THC levels in their bodies, living in India, Nepal, or Afghanistan, where lodging, food, and hash were cheap. These were stoners, usually returning home with small quantities for sale or personal use. The other eyes were sharp, clear, and intelligent. The stone was still there, the softened edges, but also self-assurance, a sense of control. These were the carriers of between twenty and fifty pounds of hash, the smugglers Myles particularly looked to isolate.

  Of course, occasionally, a totally outrageous individual would emerge from an airplane, colorful pants and shirt, beads, bells, long hair and beard, the smell of hash still hovering on his clothing. These persons were strip searched routinely, and on the way to the inspection rooms, they would often swallow the small chunk they were bringing home to share. But small dose or large quantity, they went to jail.
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br />   At first, the guessing game had been fun—until Myles suggested any customs man could do what he’d been assigned to do, simply by learning the profiling techniques for this new generation of smugglers.

  “Yes, uncanny,” Herr Bergman said again, studying Myles. “Please, have a seat.”

  He looked down to the papers on his desk. “I have another assignment for you, Herr Corbet,” he said at last. “A memo has crossed my desk about a small pharmaceutical company in Amsterdam … Northern European Pharmaceuticals. The company ordered five kilograms of ergotamine … among other things …,” he said, reading items on a list. “This order was delivered by a major firm. Leipnetz. It may be that the small company is legitimate, yet … I think not. Get into Leipnetz. See what you can find out about the people who work there, what goes on in the offices. Take a look at the stockroom. Ask questions. See if someone—or perhaps more than one person—might be party to a drug conspiracy.”

  Myles’s interest picked up. After a few weeks of the airport routine, twenty hours a week, life had begun to dull even by his standards. He craved something with more challenge, more control, and greater decision-making responsibilities. He had even begun to ask why he had been sent to Germany if he was not to be useful. Was this a punishment of Bremer’s?

  “When you understand just what kind of security Leipnetz has … or hasn’t … then check out the new company. Northern European Pharmaceuticals. Let’s see … yes, it’s only been operating for eight months. And here … a second order for ergotamine.”

  Jarman Bergman passed him an envelope with instructions for the new assignment, along with letters of introduction and an airplane ticket. Myles glanced through it and asked a few questions, his old confidence back.

  “Herr Bergman,” he continued, determined to impress, “I’ve some ideas from the airport surveillance I’m doing. I’d like to share them with you, if you have a moment.”

  “Yes?” The gray eyes continued to study him.

  “I’m sure it’s obvious to you that many passing through customs without drugs are still involved in the drug trade. They make arrangements in the East and have couriers cross international borders for them.”