The Retaliators

by Donald Hamilton

  "We're trying to find a nice, comfortable place in which to wait for somebody to come and kill us," I said.

  "I'm sorry I asked."

  "You'll be glad we spent a little time looking when the fireworks start," I said. "This is your private cozy womb right here. I'll take the last one we inspected, back over there."

  I was pulling off my shirt as I spoke. It was one of the loose cotton garments I'd picked up in Ensenada as more, suited to the lowland climate of Baja than the heavy wool number I'd worn for Santa Fe and the high country farther north. This was a picturesque shirt such as they turn out for the tourists, blue with red embroidery, veddy, veddy native indeed. No native would have been caught dead in it, but I'd figured, with my well-broken-in jeans, it had made pretty good tourist camouflage. Now I arranged it carefully among the bushes a couple of yards from Clarissa's natural foxhole, showing just a glint of blue from a distance, I hoped.

  "Okay, that's me," I said. "I'm lying in wait for them there, understand? I'm a real sneaky type, and I've circled around to watch my back trail—you can see it down there in the sand, the track we made before we turned. Of course, they're smarties too, and they'll be expecting an ambush; but just so they don't slip up and overlook me, I want you to shake that bush over there a bit, every two or three minutes. No more often and not hard. Don't overdo it and don't reach up too high and expose yourself. If there's shooting, just hunker down and stay perfectly still. Don't do anything more, no matter how bright it may seem to you at the time. Just stay under cover. I'll get back to you, I promise. Do you think you can manage all that?"

  "Yes, but what makes you so sure somebody—"

  "Hell, you saw the tracks," I said.

  "So there's a car ahead of us. Isn't that what you expected?"

  "No. Ramón was supposed to cover from behind and make sure we weren't followed. Then he was supposed to come in after us."

  "A camper or fisherman?"

  "Batting around the boondocks in the dark?"

  "How do you know he came in the dark?"

  "He cut the mud too close and almost got stuck; he wouldn't have made that mistake with good visibility. But he intended to leave tracks for me to see. Otherwise he'd have parked somewhere else and slipped in on foot. That means, probably, that there was a gun on us when we drove up to that little lagoon. He didn't shoot because nailing a guy inside a car isn't quite surefire. He was hoping I'd get out to take a look, so he could take me in the open while I was making like Tracker Helm, the human bloodhound. Then I swung the truck around fast and drove where he hadn't expected so all he could get was you, and he didn't want you, particularly."

  "Gee," she said, "Thanks awfully. Well, I always wanted to see a superspy in action, but it still seems pretty vague to me. After all, we haven't heard or seen a sign of life since we arrived."

  "Don't worry about the signs of life, Mrs. O," I said. "It's the signs of death that concern us. Remember, keep down. Never mind if all hell breaks loose. Stay down. Now assume the position and let's see how much protection you have...."

  I left her lying there in the sand, and made my way to my own vantage point about fifty yards back towards the ocean, the direction from which I expected them to come unless they got very fancy indeed. My shelter wasn't as good as Clarissa's, but I hoped I wouldn't need it as badly. I checked my watch. Twenty minutes had passed since we'd left the carryall. Well, their ambush had failed; their quarry was alerted; they wouldn't commence the pursuit without a council of war. Then they'd move slowly, cautiously, first making sure there was nobody left around my truck to take them from behind. After all, if they knew anything, they knew they were after carnivorous game that had been known to bite back. If all I'd wanted was to get clear safely, I'd simply have motored to hell out of there across country. I didn't think the fact would have escaped them.

  Another twenty minutes passed before I heard one. They were taking their time. I didn't blame them. That brushy, knobby, sandy coastal landscape was great ambush country. At last, watching the place where Clarissa's tracks and mine, just blurred depressions in the sand, crossed a little ridge to the right before swinging down below me, I saw a dark head lift cautiously among the scraggly bushes. The face was quite dark, also. It wasn't Ernemann unless he'd used a lot of hair dye and makeup, and what would be the point of a disguise here?

  The range was too long for a certain revolver shot, and I had to make sure of my target. After all, Ramón could conceivably have changed the signals without telling me and driven in ahead. It would have been a stupid, dangerous thing for him to do, and I didn't really think he'd pull such a jackass stunt, but I didn't want to take even a remote risk of burning down some honest Mexican agents by mistake. I saw my man draw back, and I saw the brush stir slightly as he started to move my way.

  This was the tracker. There would be at least one flanker, I figured, covering him from one side or the other as he worked out the trail. Maybe I was flattering myself a bit, but I didn't figure anybody would send just one man to do a job on a gent from a known specialist outfit like ours. Then I had the flanker spotted, too, or one of them; he was coming right up the slot from the ocean towards my private dune. The tracker had stopped abruptly. He had it now; the bush that moved in the dead calm of early morning, the little touch of cheerful blue in the bleak desert....

  He gave me no more worries about identity. He simply hurled himself aside and, prone, sent a prolonged burst from his machine pistol into the patch of brush over there. Probably he thought that I'd kicked the bush by mistake as I braced myself to shoot—that he was saving his own life by firing first. I hoped Clarissa was following instructions for a change and keeping her head down. The bullets sprayed a lot of sand around over there, and it looked as if I'd have to break out another of my new shirts when I got back to the hotel. He had that one pretty well centered.

  It was a toss-up which way he'd go when he let up on the trigger, and I got the break. He came my way, crouching low and racing for a hollow that would cover him from Clarissa's direction. Lying above and behind him, I led him like a deer and dropped him nicely. At once, I rolled aside and let myself continue to roll down the sandy slope like a kid playing games on the beach, as all hell broke loose. The flanker was chewing up my recently vacated hilltop with another squirt gun. I hadn't really known he'd got behind me—I'd lost him for a couple of minutes while I was watching the other—but with him missing, it just hadn't seemed smart to hang around and admire my marksmanship.

  I picked myself up and ran around the dune and caught him coming off his own little hilltop back there, a smallish dark man, again no Ernemann. He tried to put on the brakes but the sand betrayed him. He sat down, sliding; and I fired twice and connected once, but the range was long and it wasn't a very good hit, just good enough to make him let go the chopper in a moment of shock. He made a stab to reclaim it, but realized he'd be dead in another second, and ran for cover instead, limping heavily. I tried for him twice and saw sand kick up short once and to the side once. Lousy. I could blame it on shortness of breath and uncertain footing, I suppose. The count was five. He turned and shot at me with some kind of a pistol, one-handed, like target practice, but he wasn't doing any better than I was. With five gone, my S & W was empty. By the time I'd hauled out the Colt I'd taken from Gregory Kotis in another country and another lifetime, I had no mark visible in that direction.

  Grimacing, I moved cautiously back around my dune, working upwards, to where I could see the first man again. He'd sprawled headlong when hit, gun way out ahead of him, but now he was curled up in a tight ball at the foot of the sandy slope and no weapon was in sight. Cute. I sat down and put my elbows on my knees and cocked the revolver and aimed carefully, two-handed; but when the hammer fell, the bullet hit the sand beside him, short. Either Kotis had never bothered to sight in his piece, or the BIS boys used a totally different sight picture from ours—of course, my mistake was in not checking the gun, but, not really expecting to use the borrowed p
iece I hadn't. When I got out of this, if I got out of it, I intended to mark my calendar with a new holiday: Incompetence Day.

  However, my near miss had stung my target into action. He was rearing up painfully, swinging the ugly little squirt gun my way. I used about eighteen inches of Kentucky windage—well, Kentucky elevation—to compensate for Kotis's peculiar sighting system. The shot was good, and I gave the guy another as he collapsed, just to make absolutely sure he didn't get up and bother the lady while I was gone.

  I would have liked to get his chopper, or the other one, but I didn't think I had that much time. I ran oceanwards, reloading both revolvers as I ran, a neat trick that cost me three dropped cartridges. There was blood on the sand ahead of me. I gambled that, wounded and alone, the fleeing man would give up his assassination project as a lost cause and head straight for his escape vehicle instead of pulling some kind of ambush, I gambled that nobody'd taken time to disable or booby-trap my carryall. I gambled that it was the biggest buggy around. I won the first two bets. Nobody shot at me as I raced heedlessly for the truck, and it started instantly and didn't blow up. I rammed the transfer case lever all the way forward, as the salesman had instructed, locking everything up tight for maximum traction. I backed out into the open, swung around, and headed down the telltale tire tracks that followed the north edge of the lagoon. When they curved back into the dunes, I followed them.

  My bullet had slowed my quarry. He hadn't quite made it to his transportation when my big 4WD truck came bouncing and crashing into sight. He threw a glance my way and scrambled frantically up a sandy slope towards a vehicle parked on the brushy ridge above; a spot selected, presumably, to overlook the lagoon and the road. I remembered that the far slope was quite steep. The car was one of the jazzy little 4x4 Ford products named after an unruly horse. I'd won my third bet. It was only about half the size of my three-ton tank. If a demolition derby ensued, I had the edge.

  The fleeing man reached his goal. I saw the door close; but I was already putting the carryall to the slope. Hell, if that little thing could make it, we could—I hoped. The long truck went roaring up there like a large dog clawing and scratching his way over a gate. Before the driver could get his motor started, my massive front bumper had caught the rear of his vehicle. There was a moment when I wondered if we had power and traction enough to do the job; but the carryall kept moving inexorably with everything screaming and grinding away, and bulldozed the Bronco right over the edge. I slammed to a stop on the ridge from which it had just departed and jumped out with my gun ready.

  The little boondocks Ford was sliding down the steep face of the dune below me. The driver still hadn't managed to get his motor started. As I watched, the rear end started to go right. It was only a slight angle at first, but it got greater. When the vehicle came almost crosswise to the slope it fell onto its right side, rolled over onto its top, flopped clear over onto its left side, and slid the rest of the way like that, stopping only when the slope flattened out towards the lagoon.

  After a little, the upper door opened and a hand with a gun emerged. My flanker friend climbed out—well, started to climb out. I was rested and ready, sitting up there comfortably with my elbows on my knees and both hands on the gun, my own gun. It was time I did a little respectable shooting for a change, and I did it.

  fifteen

  Ramón said, "It is not necessary to kill everyone, Señor Helm. We are tolerant; we do not require total annihilation. It is permitted to leave alive a small fraction of the population of Baja California.... You say there is another dead body inland? I presume you shot him in cold blood like this one. Just like target practice from the top of this little hill, very safe!"

  He wasn't very happy with me, maybe because, instead of scrambling down to him, I'd made him climb up the sandy ridge to me. I'd had my morning exercise; it was time he got his.

  "Safe," I said. "Sure. But not as safe as you, amigo, carefully waiting a couple of miles away for the shooting to stop. You were supposed to be covering me, remember?"

  I wasn't very happy with him, either. Down below us, his driver was investigating the capsized Bronco and the dead man draped over the side of it. Nearby stood the staff car in which they'd just arrived, a big, boxy, four-wheel-drive station wagon of Japanese manufacture: Toyota's answer to the larger Land Rover. It had a whip antenna indicating two-way radio communications.

  I said, "Two men with choppers, and me with a couple of little one-hand guns, and you're complaining because I made sure of the bastards? What the hell do you think this is, anyway, some kind of a sporting event? They did their best to kill me. They had their chance. Just because they muffed it, was I supposed to turn them loose to try again? That guy inland, for instance—he totally ruined a perfectly good shirt he thought was me, and he may actually have got Mrs. O'Hearn, I didn't have time to check. Just how much does a guy have to do to earn a quick, rough departure around here, anyway?"

  Ramón didn't reply directly. "That is another thing," he said. "The magnificent Señora O'Hearn. Why did you bring her? It was not in the instructions—"

  "You didn't say not to, and she wanted to come. I have a hunch she changed her mind a little while ago, but that's her problem, not yours." I drew a long breath. "Tell your boy to stop right there, Ramón."

  "What?"

  "Your driver. He's coming this way. I don't want him any closer."

  "But I do not understand—"

  I said harshly, "You understand all right. Why are you so concerned about two dead killers? I've seen you act pretty cold-blooded about a number of stiffs in the past; why do these upset you so? Could it be that these well-armed gents waiting for me here were good friends of yours.... I mean it! One step more and the crap hits the propeller! Stop him now!"

  Ramón looked at me hard. Then he made a small gesture with his hand. The man who'd started climbing towards us stopped moving. Then we stood there for a while. A small breeze had come up. Off to the right, the wide expanse of Laguna de la Muerte was visible at last, beyond a few more dunes and a wide, flat, grayish beach that looked to be more mud than sand. It looked bleak and hostile, the Lagoon of Death, and I wondered who'd died to name it. Probably some poor, damned sailors or fishermen. Well, we were keeping right up with the old tradition.

  "You had better say what you are thinking." Ramón spoke very softly. "It is better in the open. Por favor."

  I said, "I am thinking that some very fancy explanations are in order, Señor Solana-Ruiz. I run into a deadfall. I fight my way out of it. And my good friend and professional associate, who set up the rendezvous, who promised to protect me, comes roaring up after it's all over and raises hell with me for hurting those two poor little innocent would-be murderers.... Goddamn it, Ramón, keep your boy still!" I let my hand come to rest on the Smith and Wesson in my waistband. "Or, hell, let him come. Call in the Rurales. Call in the army and the navy. Go ahead, damn you. It's your game; you set it up. Second quarter coming up. Blow the goddamn whistle and let's play ball, only you won't live to see who wins.... Ah, hell!"

  I drew another long, shaky breath. It was reaction, I guess. It hits that way sometimes. Ramón smiled faintly and turned his head.

  "Amado," he called. "Dos cervezas. Pronto."

  The man below turned and made his way to the Toyota, reached inside, and started back with a bottle in each hand. Ramón looked at me.

  "Shall I let him approach, now?"

  "Oh, hell, yes," I said. "The more the merrier. The closer he comes, the easier I can shoot him. But you've probably got that beer poisoned, anyway."

  "Do you really think I would send you into a trap?"

  "Cut it out," I said. "Let's not be childish. I know damned well you'd send me into a trap if it suited your purposes. I'd do the same for you." When he didn't speak, I went on: "Give me a reasonable alternative. Who else is there? Nobody. Neither of those dead men resembles Ernemann in any way except in their preference for automatic firepower. Well, he could have sent them,
sure, but how would he know where? The girl asked the question a while ago. I kind of brushed her off, but it's a damned good question. You're the only one who knew I was coming here. Those boys didn't follow me in. They'd been told where to make their ambush. They were here before dawn, waiting for me."

  The driver had made it over the rim. He was a swarthy, tough-looking individual with the short legs, and the big shoulders and chest, of a moderately hairless gorilla. The glance he threw me wasn't friendly. He held out a beer to Ramón.

  "If you will excuse me," Ramón said, taking the bottle. He put it to his lips and drank, and gave it to me. "So. If there is poison, we die together."

  "Salud y pesetas," I said, taking a swig. "I'm still waiting to hear whose chopper-types those were if they weren't yours."

  "Perhaps Amado found something on the body that will throw light on the subject." He spoke to the dark-faced driver, who took a wallet from his shirt pocket and passed it over. Ramón flipped it open, and glanced at me, and held it out. "Does that help, amigo?"

  I took the open wallet and looked at the ID card displayed under a neat plastic window. It indicated that the late owner had been a gent by the name of John Ferdinand Ortiz, a special operative of the Bureau of Internal Security of the United States Department of...

  "One of Euler's boys!" I said, whistling softly. "Wandering through foreign lands with a homicidal friend and two very illegal automatic weapons. I don't believe it! Andrew must have flipped. Who does he think he is, the CIA?"

  "You bluffed Señor Euler at the border, remember?" Ramón said. "You made him let you through; you made him look foolish. That is something some men never forgive."

  I sighed. "One apology coming up. After you tell me how they knew enough to be here at the right spot at the right time."

  Ramón threw a glance inland. "I think you know the answer, Matthew."