Covenant

by Jeff Gulvin

  But he had no way of getting the information out. He had been hoping that Sidetrack would disband them again like he had done the last time, to give him enough time to contact Jean and feed her this new information. He would not tell Jean that Sidetrack was her son’s killer just yet, not until he was out and they could make their bust. It occurred to him then that he already had a lot on tape and maybe he could surface with what he had got. But these new thoughts about Martinez had really struck a chord. Here he was, thirty years after he last saw him, riding freight trains with the FTRA. He sat there, rolled a cigarette and reflected silently on the vagaries of life.

  Limpet squatted next to him. ‘You wanna shot?’ he asked and waved a bottle under Harrison’s nose.

  Harrison shook his head. ‘Too hot, man. Think I’ll stick to water.’

  ‘Damn open-topped cars.’ Limpet shaded his eyes from the sun. ‘Never jump an open-topped boxcar in the Texas summertime.’

  ‘You wanna tell Sidetrack,’ Harrison said.

  Limpet looked across to where Sidetrack was sipping mescal. ‘You know, I don’t think I’ll bother.’

  Harrison chuckled. Sidetrack’s demeanour had been less than pleasant today. ‘How long’s he been running this outfit?’

  ‘About five years. He ain’t a guy to fall out with. We got discipline squads, you know.’

  Harrison nodded. ‘You ever come up against them?’

  Limpet shook his head. ‘Always stuck close to the man over there. Never needed no goon squad on my ass.’

  ‘How often d’you see Whiskey Six?’ Harrison asked him.

  Limpet squinted into the sunlight. ‘I only saw him once in five years. He rolled into a freight yard on the Colorado/ New Mexico line one summer. It was me, Sidetrack and Hooch there. Ghost Town was visiting from California. He’s the dude that runs the Red Heads out west.’

  ‘How many of them are there?’

  ‘About five hundred, I guess.’

  ‘And they do the same stuff as us?’

  ‘Ship the guns and that, yeah.’ Limpet laughed then and tipped the whiskey bottle to his lips. ‘It’s a good living, Four-String. That’s for sure.’

  ‘Yeah? I ain’t seen any of it. When do we get paid?’

  Limpet laughed again. ‘You don’t, brother. You is on probation.’

  ‘How did I know you were gonna say that?’ Harrison leaned and spat. ‘Where did all this hardware come from in the first place?’

  Limpet shrugged. ‘I don’t ask no questions, man. That way, I don’t get told no lies and I can’t say anything to anybody I shouldn’t.’

  ‘Right on.’ Harrison leaned against the side of the boxcar as they crossed a wooden bridge, with the ravine falling into dirt, rock and hollowed-out holes one hundred feet below them. Sidetrack was dozing, his head bobbing. Limpet sat with his eyes closed and his legs pushed out, feet splayed before him. Both Carlsbad and Hooch were sleeping. Harrison stared into the flat Texas plains, watching dust devils rise here and there. Clouds were gathering over Mexico.

  The train slowed near the town of Morgan Mill and Sidetrack got up to take a piss.

  Harrison stood upwind of him and leaned on the doorjamb. ‘So, what’s happening, Sidetrack? Where we going now?’

  Sidetrack did not reply right away. He finished peeing, zipped up and spat into the wind. ‘Gimme a cigarette.’

  Harrison rolled him one and passed it over.

  ‘Gimme a light.’

  Harrison bit his lip, snapped a match on the back of his thigh and lit the cigarette. The wind took the match and he let it fall to the dust below.

  ‘We’re just cruising,’ Sidetrack said. ‘Just rolling for a while.’ He looked into Harrison’s eyes then. ‘Why, brother? You got something planned?’

  Harrison shook his head. ‘I was never one for just wandering, is all.’

  ‘Who said anything about wandering?’ Sidetrack spat threads of tobacco. ‘Nobody said anything about wandering. Wanderers, we ain’t.’

  Harrison nodded. ‘How long am I gonna be on probation?’ he asked.

  Sidetrack smiled wickedly, showing that long tooth. ‘As long as I say you are.’

  ‘And in the meantime I don’t get paid.’

  ‘You got that right.’

  Harrison looked him in the eye then. ‘Well, don’t take too long, big guy. I might just get bored.’

  He sat down cross-legged and took out his tobacco and papers. He looked up at Sidetrack again. ‘When this runs out, I’ll smoke yours.’

  Sidetrack laughed and sat down next to him. ‘If you need anything, alls you got to do is ask. It’s like I told you already, we’re family here.’

  They camped that night near Waco and Harrison thought about the stand-off with the Branch Davidians in 1993. The freight yard was big and low-walled, and they built a fire in the lee of two broken-down locomotives that sand and corrosion were taking over. Harrison ate dinner provided by Hooch and he sipped some of Limpet’s whiskey, and longed for the comfort of Jean Carey’s arms. The stars came out full that night; the Mexican cloud stayed south of them and the temperature dropped rapidly.

  Around midnight, Sidetrack made a call on his cellphone and spoke in a low voice. He glanced over at Harrison briefly. Harrison held his eye, then looked into the fire. Sidetrack came off the phone and put it away in his pack. Harrison made cigarettes, smoked and thought, then tucked himself in his bedroll and went to sleep.

  When he woke in the morning, Sidetrack was already up and talking again on the phone. Harrison built up the fire, boiled some coffee in the small tin pot and handed a cup to Sidetrack. The others were still asleep.

  Sidetrack cupped the coffee between both hands and blew on it. The steam rose through his fingers and he sipped, looking over the rim of the cup at Harrison. ‘We got business to do today,’ he said.

  ‘Where?’

  ‘East.’ Sidetrack took a roll of weathered railroad maps from his pack and spread them out in the dirt. ‘We gotta make the Saratoga yard by nightfall.’

  ‘Going back to Arkansas. What’s happening in Arkansas?’

  ‘Got an important meeting to attend.’ Sidetrack leered at him and Harrison cocked one eyebrow. ‘Don’t worry, Four-String. You been initiated already.’

  They rode all day, swapping three trains, heading northeast for the Arkansas State line. Sidetrack’s maps were good and he knew the southern railroads like the back of his hand. He knew which train would be along when, where the driver swap points were and what freight would be unloaded in what yard. Harrison stood in a rattling boxcar as they climbed north of Tyler once again. ‘We ain’t carrying no cargo, then,’ he said.

  Sidetrack shook his head. ‘We’re picking up later.’ He looked sideways at Harrison then. ‘Got to see some people here first.’

  Hooch was standing behind them both. ‘You gonna run us in some whores like you did that last time?’ he said.

  Sidetrack shook his head. ‘No whores, man. Not on this trip.’

  The train was not stopping at Saratoga, but rolling on to Hot Springs. Sidetrack led the way and they jumped off before they got to the yard. They watched the train thunder across the plains as they walked the final few hundred yards. Darkness had fallen and again the temperature was dropping. Above them, there was a perfectly cloudless sky, vast and purple. Harrison carried his banjo and walked between Hooch and Carlsbad.

  As they approached the yard, he could smell burning, and passing between two disused trucks, he saw the flickering flames of a fire. Eight men were seated round it, two slightly apart from the others. Harrison squinted in the firelight and could see both blue bandanas and red. The Highrollers and the Red Heads were in town; a gathering of the clans.

  Sidetrack walked round the fire and the two men seated together got up. One wore a red bandana and the other a blue. Sidetrack greeted both of them. ‘You got the call, too,’ he said.

  The two men looked at Harrison across the fire. ‘Oh yeah,’ the one with the red band
ana said. ‘We got the call.’

  ‘Looks like zero hour.’ Sidetrack beckoned Harrison over and laid a hand on his shoulder. Harrison was desperately aware of the wire. He looked into the drink-bruised faces of the two men.

  ‘Four-String,’ Sidetrack said. ‘This here is Ghost Town.’ He nodded to the Red Head. ‘And this guy’s from up north. We call him The Voyageur.’

  Harrison nodded, but said nothing. Sidetrack looked round at him and his eyes were cold and black. ‘Now go sit with the others. We got things to talk about.’

  Swann watched his fiancée down the Budweiser in one long swallow. She placed her glass on the hotel bar and nodded to the bartender for another. Her cellphone rang where she had laid it on the counter. ‘No peace for the wicked,’ Swann muttered and handed it to her.

  ‘Logan,’ she said, holding it to her ear.

  ‘There will be no more warnings. People will die and the responsibility will be yours.’

  She bit her lip. ‘Give it up, Fachida. You lost. We called your bluff. Your honour’s in tatters. You’re not fit to fight any more.’

  Swann was staring at her.

  She could hear Harada hiss the breath through his teeth. ‘I will make Oklahoma City look like a kindergarten party, Agent Logan. And the responsibility will be yours.’ The phone went dead then. Logan switched it off and lifted the fresh glass of beer to her lips.

  ‘What did he say?’ Swann asked her.

  ‘He obviously caught my little news broadcast. I think I’ve pissed him off.’

  They went back to 4th Street and passed the information to Kovalski. ‘No more warnings,’ he said. ‘That’s helpful.’ He looked at Swann. ‘Random strikes. You figure he’s got stuff already set up?’

  Swann nodded. ‘I think it’s likely. The way he’s operated so far.’

  Kovalski pursed his lips and exhaled slowly. ‘Maybe we’ll luck out on a lead.’

  Logan lifted her eyebrows. ‘Maybe I’ll make president.’

  The murder squad arrested Dylan Stoval as he came out of the shower at Eastcote. Patterson was already locked in a cell awaiting further interviews. Weir, as senior investigating officer, had agreed with Farrow that once the two men were formally charged, they would release them into his custody until the Home Secretary made his decision about who would prosecute them. Stoval was shampooing his scalp and singing a rap song when Weir, Webb, Carragher and Farrow turned up. They stood behind him in the shower block, and Webb folded his arms and waited for him to stop singing. Stoval twisted off the taps and turned. He stopped and stared, mouth falling open. Then the fear sparked in his eyes. Webb cautioned him and he got dressed.

  They drove him back to Paddington police station and sat him down in an interview room. Webb fixed him with a cold-eyed stare. ‘You made mistakes, Dylan,’ he said. ‘You were sloppy.’

  Stoval shook his head. ‘Sir, I have no idea what you’re talking about.’

  ‘You weren’t with Alton Patterson all that Saturday night.’

  ‘Yes, sir. I was.’

  ‘You’re a liar, Dylan.’ Weir shook his head at him.

  ‘No, sir.’

  Weir got up then. ‘We’ve got video footage of you coming through the barrier at Camden Town tube station.’

  Stoval stared at him.

  ‘We know exactly what’s been happening. Alton’s told us everything. We’ve got a witness who will pick both of you out as having been in the wine bar below Kibibi Simpson’s flat.’

  Stoval was staring beyond him to Farrow, whose features had darkened considerably.

  ‘Sir,’ Stoval said to him, but Farrow shook his head.

  ‘Quit lying, Stoval. You’re getting yourself in deeper and deeper. We already know all there is to know. We know about the stabbing. We know that you followed Sergeant Simpson. We know why you killed her.’ He nodded again. ‘We know all about the National Guard base at Wichita Falls and the rogue outfit down there. We know you’ve been stealing weapons and shipping them to Wichita Falls. We know that you read The Resister.’ He stopped then. ‘If I have my way, you’ll be court-martialled for all of this back in the States. That’s murder one and treason, soldier. I could have you executed.’

  Stoval’s eyes were wide.

  ‘What Mr Farrow’s saying, Dylan,’ Webb said more gently, ‘is that you might just have a choice.’

  ‘I want full information,’ Farrow went on. ‘I want your statement detailing everything you know. We’ve got it from Patterson and now I want it from you. If you do that, then maybe, just maybe, I won’t have your ass fried in the chair.’

  The phone call from London came into the Strategic Intelligence Operations Center and was transferred to Tom Kovalski’s office. Logan picked it up and then handed the phone to Swann. ‘It’s for you,’ she said. ‘London.’

  Swann took the phone from her. ‘Hello?’

  ‘Jack. It’s George Webb.’

  Swann sat down in Kovalski’s chair. ‘Hey, Webby. Long time no speak. How are you?’

  ‘Better now.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Because we solved the embassy murder.’

  ‘That was quick.’

  ‘Some of them are, Jack. We were dealing with amateurs and got lucky. The motive was blackmail.’

  He went on to tell Swann exactly what had happened and the fact that Kibibi Simpson had been murdered because she had stumbled across a weapons-pilfering racket that was centred on Wichita Falls. ‘Stuff goes missing all over the country, Jack,’ Webb told him. ‘We’ve got full statements from two marines, who have named names for the regional security officer. The chances are that we’ll let the US military try them in the States and they’ve been keen to make a deal. The Fed they sent over is compiling his report, but I wanted to let you know that the weapons have found their way to the militia groups. I’m not sure how, but there’s a lot of money involved, enough to get a marine sergeant murdered. We don’t know what’s at the back of it, but there seems to be some funding coming from neo-Nazi groups in Germany. You might want to pass that on.’

  ‘Thanks, Webby. We already know part of the militia angle. Listen, if you find anything else out, let me know, will you?’

  ‘Of course. The Nazi groups are new ones, you know, not Combat 18 or any of the others. We’ve got two names. The Shield Society’s one of them. The other is …’

  ‘Shield Society?’ Swann gripped the phone that bit harder.

  ‘You’ve heard of it?’

  ‘Yes, I have.’

  ‘The other’s the AMA. It apparently stands for American Militia Abroad.’

  ‘Thanks, George. Keep me posted.’ Swann hung up and looked at Logan. ‘Where’s Kovalski?’ he asked.

  ‘I’m here.’ Kovalski walked into the office, followed by Carmen McKensie and two other investigating agents.

  ‘He’s called twice,’ McKensie was saying to Kovalski. ‘Not here, but headquarters. He always asks to speak to the Director.’

  ‘Who does?’ Logan asked.

  ‘Some old nut from the airmen’s and soldiers’ home. We’ve checked him out with the staff there and he’s got a couple of marbles missing. He lost his legs in Korea and still can’t remember anything about it. Apparently, he relives the shock most days.’ She tapped her skull with a fingernail. ‘That’s not good for the grey matter.’

  ‘Tom,’ Swann said. ‘I’ve just had a call from George Webb. He’s on the murder squad in West London, been working the embassy stabbing with Agent Carragher.’ He related what Webb had told him and Kovalski’s frown grew deeper.

  ‘The Shield Society,’ Logan drew up her face. ‘Where are they based?’

  ‘Germany, somewhere,’ Swann said.

  Logan wagged her head. ‘That’s got to be more than just a coincidence.’

  ‘You mean Harada and the militia working together? That would be a weird alliance.’

  Kovalski rested the knuckles of one fist on his desk. ‘I’m gonna run these groups by the CIA,’ he said. ‘
Get the people over at Langley to check them out.’ He looked at Logan. ‘In the meantime, get this information about the military ordnance and The Resister down to New Orleans. Somehow, they’re gonna have to let Harrison know what’s going on.’

  Harrison was sitting cross-legged by the campfire, with the southerly wind at his back. He was rolling a cigarette, water on one side of him, and a whiskey bottle wrapped in brown paper on the other. Across the fire, Sidetrack sat next to The Voyageur and Ghost Town. The Voyageur’s voice was husky from too many cigarettes and Harrison had to bend out of the wind to hear him. ‘You got a special job,’ he hissed. ‘Whiskey blew in to South Dakota day before yesterday. Somebody’s got to make a pick-up and take it to West Virginia.’

  Silence. ‘The Southern Blacks?’ Sidetrack said.

  ‘Your turf, man.’

  ‘How come you got involved?’ Limpet asked him. ‘How come Whiskey didn’t call us hisself?’

  The Voyageur looked at the fire, ‘The man is laying low, brother. Word is we might have somebody watching us.’

  For a moment, nobody spoke. Harrison sat where he was, heart high in his chest, but he sucked on the cigarette and blew smoke from the side of his mouth. The Voyageur looked at Sidetrack. ‘The days are getting more dangerous, brother. We figured person to person. The fucking FBI can tap almost any phone they please.’ He looked at Harrison then. ‘You say you was in Angola?’