Old Poison

by Joan Francis

  Seeing me looking at him, he whirled and headed for the door. “Put her out and keep her that way until you get her loaded. Don’t fuck this one up.”

  The two Venezulanos were already moving in my direction, and I was in no shape to offer much resistance. In short order I found myself on the cot being forced to swallow some vile-tasting liquid. The taste triggered another memory flash. Oh, yeah, I remembered this stuff. They had given me some after they bandaged my head. I turned on my side and felt very smug because I had managed to keep some of their knockout juice in my cheek. I remember letting it run out onto the canvas beneath my head, but that was the last thing I remembered.

  * * * * *

  TWENTY-FOUR

  The headache was much better, and I didn’t want to do anything to disturb that, so instead of trying to sit up, I had been quietly noting changes in my surroundings. My conclusion was that I must be in a different room. There was no longer light from under the door. The bed I was on had a wood frame with a foam mattress. On the wall where there should be a window, I could see only some tiny holes. I knew it was daytime because sunlight streamed in though the holes in shafts filled with dancing dust motes. Even so, it was much darker than the other room.

  There was a loud noise. Sounded like a diesel truck but was too close for that. Sounded like it was right inside the house. Smelled like a diesel too. What the hell were they running?

  Sitting up on the edge of the bed, I could make out the outline of a night stand and lamp. I felt all around the lamp base until I found a switch. As I turned the round rheostat switch, the light grew, and I could see that my lamp was actually a battery-powered camping lantern.

  I was in some sort of small rectangular storeroom. There was a bed, a box that served as a night stand, and a porta-potty. All the walls were lined with boxes. On one end the boxes went to the ceiling, looked like they were stacked several rows deep, and had some sort of cargo net over them. All the rest of the walls had boxes stacked about five feet high. Where was the door? A momentary panic gripped me, but I pushed the claustrophobic thoughts aside.

  I focused on the bottle of water and the Excedrin sitting beside the lamp, hard evidence that someone cared about my comfort. It wouldn’t be the guy who wanted to kill me. I remembered the words of the fellow giving orders. “They want her to arrive healthy and in one piece.” But arrive where and how?

  A chill went down my spine as I had a terrible suspicion of how. Picking up the lantern, I walked to the end of the room for a closer inspection of the line running vertically down the center. “Oh God, please no.” That line was where the doors met, doors at the end of a cargo container. “Shit!”

  I set the lamp down and began moving the two rows of boxes stacked in front of the doors. Noticing that they were filled with bottled water and canned food, I hoped they hadn’t put all this here for my use. There was enough for a journey to Mars. Boxes out of the way, I examined the doors. With mounting panic I found there was no handle, no catch, no release of any kind. Whatever opening mechanism the damn thing had was on the outside. Resorting to frantic and irrational force, I threw myself at the doors, jarring my whole body and starting my head hurting all over again. No amount of shoving and pushing budged them.

  Retrieving the lantern, I sat back down on the bed, then almost at once stood up again. Trying not to panic, I began checking the boxes, making a mental inventory. The box that served as a night stand was filled with extra batteries for the lantern. The boxes along the wall held sanitary bags for the porta-potty, toilet paper, plastic silverware, a can opener, paper plates, and dozens of boxes of water and food. Quite a picnic basket. Did they use this container for smuggling people in and out on a regular basis, or was this all for me? How long did they intend to keep me in here?

  I took slow, relaxing breaths, trying to keep my mind clear of the fear that had started me trembling and threatened to overpower my thought process. I chanted my own personal litany: “Emotion floods the intellect, emotion floods the intellect.”

  I had to focus on something that would keep my mind working. Mentally, I began writing a report, trying to think of all the details, addresses and numbers, names and descriptions, but my mind kept drifting back to the fear of being in tiny closed places. Then my breath would come short and shallow and I would start to tremble again.

  A door slammed and the engine noise altered. That was a diesel I was hearing, and my little home was attached to it. I leaped up and pulled down a couple boxes from the wall with the tiny holes. Now I realized what they were. My friend Barbara, who is a U.S. Custom’s inspector, told me that sometimes they drill holes through the metal walls of the containers or “cans” as she calls them, in order to check for false walls. Sometimes the drill comes out with white powder on the bit.

  Climbing the boxes like steps, I made my way up to where I could see out through the holes. The truck and trailer were parked in the boatyard. No point yelling for help here. They would learn I was awake and knock me out again. Judging by the shadows around the junk in the yard, it was just after noon. Well, now I knew what it was that was to arrive at noon. This was one time I found little joy in satisfying my curiosity.

  I was hyperventilating. Had to focus. The boxes behind the cargo net. What’s in them? I unhooked the net and began lifting the lids on the file boxes and searching through the papers. At first I was hopeful because they were all Morpho files, but as I rifled through box after box it became apparent that there was no smoking gun here. These were all ordinary personnel files: hires, fires, medical claims, et cetera. It seemed totally weird to find them here, but at the time I couldn’t concentrate well enough to even hazard a guess as to why these papers were here.

  Gears shifted. As the truck began to move, I left the files and returned to my window seat on the boxes. Peering out the tiny portholes, I watched for recognizable landmarks and tried to keep some sense of direction. When I recognized the route, the fear seemed to start in the pit of my stomach and seep like a drug through my body, paralyzing both physical movement and mental reason. By the time we reached the shipping dock, I was in full panic, unable to think of anything but the scene I had watched the day before. The cranes had loaded the containers aboard, not only filling the hold, but stacking them row upon row on deck. All I could think about was the fact that I would be entombed, buried with containers on top, bottom, and all sides.

  Would there be air? How long would the ship be at sea? How sick would I get? Since earliest memory I have been claustrophobic. Hell, I almost panic pulling a turtleneck sweater over my head. How could I stand being buried alive? All the supplies that my captors had so thoughtfully left for my journey would mean nothing. When the crane slammed down container after container on top of me, I would simply go mad.

  As the truck came to a stop, I curled into a fetal position on the top row of boxes and lay so still I barely breathed. Part of my brain was numb and the part that worked drifted in strange directions, making no attempt to deal with my current situation. The word “nimwat” took shape in my thoughts, and I tried to remember what it meant. Oh yes, it was the creature in the Martian Diary that got frightened and curled up in a ball, just as Antia had done. I giggled insanely as I considered the irony: Antia terrified of open space, me terrified of closed space. Antia survived because they blindfolded her so she couldn’t see the vastness. Some member of my internal board who hadn’t totally lost her wits reached out and switched off the lantern.

  At the same moment there was a loud metal on metal sound. The container I was in rose and lurched, tossing me and several boxes to the floor. Sitting on the floor among the fallen boxes, I saw a large patch of light coming from the wall where the boxes had been. Hope revived my paralyzed brain and I began tearing madly at the rest of the boxes.

  There was a long gash in the metal wall of the container, crescent shaped, running more than a foot down the side of the wall. At the bottom was a hole about the size of my fist. I kicked at the opening but foun
d that despite the gash, the wall was quite substantial. Peering out of the hole, I could see the metal legs of the crane, a huge stack of containers, and people walking around the dock.

  Turning on the lantern again, I grabbed a couple cans of beans and began pounding on the wall and yelling out the hole. I screamed until I was hoarse but no one seemed to hear me. One guy walked right past the crane, and though I pounded and yelled as loudly as I could, he kept right on going without ever looking up. The noise from the ships, the cranes, and other machinery on the dock drowned out my yells.

  Despite the setback, I was now determined to keep my wits. If they couldn’t hear me, I would have to make them see me, and I would have to do it fast. The crane, which had been stationary for several moments, was now turning. I could see the dark hull of the ship and the waiting gantry crane at the other end of the dock. This mobile crane would carry the container to the gantry crane and the gantry would lift it up and move it out over the ship, then settle it down into place. If they got me that far, I would be signed on for the whole cruise.

  I tore boxes open, looking for something to signal with. I shoved a small can of fruit juice through the hole and watched it hit the asphalt unnoticed. Two more, same results. I took one of the porta-potty bags and poked it partway through the hole, attached a second, then a third and fourth. A longshoreman with a clipboard was checking containers, but she wasn’t seeing my signal. Color! After pulling off my windbreaker with its sea-green and bright yellow colors, I attached it by a sleeve to my signal and shoved it through the hole. The woman with the clipboard finished her scribbling and looked away. In desperation I tied three more bags to my signal so it dangled down from the container like a great kite tail.

  As the crane rolled slowly past the longshoreman’s position, I was watching out the gash in the wall, pounding with my bean cans and yelling. The kite tail floated past, almost touching her head. Her mouth fell open and she did a classic double-take. She signaled the operator to bring the crane to a stop, and then walked over to take a closer look. From directly beneath the container she could hear my yells for help, and I could hear her welcome words.

  “Hold on, I’ll have the door open in a minute.”

  * * * * *

  TWENTY-FIVE

  The crane set my container down gently on the dock, and the longshoreman broke the seal and opened the doors. I must have looked a sight because her facial expression changed from concerned to shocked, and her first words were, “I’ll call Customs, and they can get you to a doctor.”

  “Please, wait. I don’t need a doctor right now. When you call Customs, please, ask for Barbara Donald. Tell her that Diana Hunter needs to talk with her.”

  She looked doubtful.

  “I’m an investigator, but I have no ID on me, and she knows me personally. It will save a lot of time if you can get hold of her.”

  “I’ll try, but I can’t guarantee she’ll be available. It might take a while. You sure you don’t need a doctor?”

  “No, I’m okay.” I would have liked to continue browsing through the file boxes, but the longshoreman locked up the container doors and escorted me to the office, where one of her coworkers kept an eye on me. While I waited for Barbara to be located and dispatched, I tried to make sense of what I had seen in the container and what had happened to me. Despite the brevity of my search, I had made one interesting discovery. All those personnel records were from the office in Paso Nuevo. That was the plant where Evelyn Lilac had staged her protest against Blue Morpho and their experimental fuel. Why were they in a cargo container that was used to smuggle people out of the country? Given time I might be able to find some answer, maybe a mysterious illness caused by the experimental process, or maybe the silencing of insider whistle blowers. Now I wouldn’t have the opportunity to find out.

  In less than an hour a uniformed customs inspector entered the office, but it was not Barbara Donald. Instead it was a grim-faced young man determined to maintain that attitude of control that law enforcement professionals like to call presence. He whipped out a notepad and began asking questions.

  “Look, I’m sorry, but please call Barbara Donald and tell her Diana Hunter is here. She is the only one I will talk to.”

  Another blue uniform came through the door, and a familiar voice said, “Hello, Diana.”

  I looked up to see Barbara with a confused look on her face. I smiled at the young man and said, “Boy, you guys really work fast, thanks.” He almost smiled before he caught himself.

  Barbara smiled. “Scott, I’d like you to meet Diana Hunter, private investigator. Diana, this is Scott Johns.” She examined my various wounds and bruises and shook her head. “We better have a doctor look at you. What the heck got hold of your neck?”

  “A bull mastiff, but how about I tell you on the way to White’s Boatyard? The guys who tried to send me on this all-expense paid cruise are living there. Not only can you charge them with trying to Shanghai me, but you can get one up on an arrogant, chauvinist FBI agent in Arizona who has a murder case he can’t solve.”

  She managed to maintain what might have been interpreted as a thin smile while she eyeballed me and considered my request. “Sounds like you need to talk with the police.”

  “By the time we finish talking, these guys could be on their way back to Venezuela. I think I was their last task here. They are probably also here illegally, so you could get them on that charge too. FBI and INS points.”

  A knowing look passed between Barbara and Scott, and Barbara asked, “These guys were Venezuelans?”

  “Yes, why?”

  “Describe them.”

  “Both about five foot eight, maybe a hundred and forty pounds, swarthy, dark haired, one had hair down past his ears and a beard, the other one had short hair and was clean shaven. Why?”

  “You better come with us, Diana.” With no further explanation, she loaded Scott and me into a car and drove around the harbor to the LAPD building on B Street. Having known and worked with Barbara for several years, I just kept my mouth shut and waited to see what official little surprise she had for me. In the quiet of the car I put my head back and closed my eyes. As current reality displaced the fear and adrenaline of the last twenty hours, I began to tremble and realized I should not have been so macho about seeing a doctor.

  Inside the LAPD station Barbara spoke briefly to a sergeant. Then we waited. Her only explanation was that they were setting up a lineup. In a few minutes I was ushered into a darkened room. Through the one-way glass I saw five guys standing in a row. To my amazement there stood my two Venezolano captors. For the second time in an hour, I looked at Barbara and Scott and said, “Boy, you guys really do work fast.”

  Barbara gave me a self-satisfied smile and said, “That’s what Sergeant Lewis said too.”

  After making the ID I waited outside with Barbara. “How did you do that? You must have had those guys before I got to the dock.”

  “When your call came in, we were here turning them over to the LAPD for temporary detainment until a number of things could be checked out. They had driven into the dock area at high speed, just ahead of a CHP car and tried to get aboard that ship before the chippie could grab them. He was faster than they were. Customs got called in to go aboard and check with the captain to verify their claims that they were members of his crew. He said they were, but couldn’t produce the paperwork to prove it. In the meantime the CHP had determined that the car they were driving was an Avis rental registered to a woman.”

  “Was the woman who rented it named Clara Shimmerhorn?”

  She first looked surprised, then as she processed it, suspicious. “Yes, Diana. Someone you know, perhaps?”

  “We’re, ah, acquainted, but I really wouldn’t like to try to explain that to the LAPD right now, if we can avoid it.”

  She looked at me for several seconds, evaluation ending in disapproval. “If you were legitimately working undercover, the alias shouldn’t be hard to explain, should it?”
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br />   “Okay, message understood.”

  My headache was coming back and I was exhausted. “Barbara, do you have anything for a headache?”

  She took a close look at me and her “officer in charge” expression dissolved into one of friendship. “Will you give us a formal statement on these guys?”

  “Of course.”

  “Wait here a minute and I’ll see if I can set it up for later in the day. You do look like hell.”

  “Thanks! The bull mastiff doesn’t look too hot either.

  * * * * *

  TWENTY-SIX

  I didn’t want to talk until I’d had time to organize my thoughts, so on the way to Barbara’s I put my head back and pretended to go to sleep. It didn’t take a lot of pretending.

  It had always been my policy to turn over criminal information to the proper authorities so they could do their jobs of arrest and prosecution. That left me to do the type of work I do best, and earned me the respect and cooperation of the authorities I dealt with. In this case, however, I had done everything wrong from the get-go. Top of the list was the fact that I hadn’t reported the bike trail incident to Special Agent Camas. He was going to want my license for that one. Now, how was I going to give the police information to charge the Venezolanos and connect them to Evelyn’s murder without getting myself in more trouble? Which truth to admit to, and which lie to stick to? Ah, what a tangled web we weave . . .