Assignment to Disaster (14 page)

"When will he be back?"

"Tomorrow. Are you all right?"

"So far."

"Swayney has blown all his fuses. He thinks you sold out for the girl. He says Calvin Padgett was a traitor."

"That's all wrong," Durell said. "You believe me, don't you?"

"Of course. But what are you going to do?"

"I'm heading for home. I'll have to see McFee personally. But there isn't much time. Keep trying to contact him, will you? The project has to be delayed. No fireworks for the Fourth, do you understand?"

"I've got it, but…"

The phone clicked sharply.

There was a brief silence.

"Did you hear that, Sam?" Hazel asked.

"You're being tapped. So long."

"Oh, Lordie. They'll trace you."

"I won't be here more than five minutes."

He hung up. He was sweating again as he returned to the plane.

Flight.

Deirdre slept. She looked sweet and tired and defenseless. Durell fretted. He watched Feener put on the headphones and listen intently, and he moved forward to join the pilot.

"What does it sound like?"

Feener shook his head. "Not good. The weather front runs west to east, just north of us. Pretty clear all along the Gulf coast, though."

"Are they still looking for us?"

"More than before," Feener said, nodding.

"What about that Olsen? Do you trust him?"

"He asked a lot of questions I didn't like. No, I'd say I don't trust him."

"Is he apt to check on you?"

"Could be. Where are we headed for now, Mr. Durell?"

Durell thought about it. "You're heading for the Delta, right? Is there another field like Olsen's there?"

Feener consulted a map spread on his thin knees. "About thirty miles south of New Orleans. It's only three hours away. A guy named Jamie runs a charter service there. I don't know him."

"We'll put down there. Maybe by then we can cut north."

"I've been thinking about Willie, Mr. Durell."

"You're doing the right thing," Durell said.

"I dunno. I mean, maybe they shot him long ago. He was doing a job and doing it right. Maybe he wouldn't have wanted me to work with these people like I did. But suppose they kill him because of tonight?"

"He knew the risk when he dropped into China."

"Yeah. He was crazy for it." Feener bit his lip. "The port engine don't sound so good. Maybe we better try Jamie's, at that. And maybe I belong in a federal pen. Maybe they'll really ream me when this is all over."

"I'll take care of that. Let's try for Jamie's field."

Durell got up and went back to the seat beside Deirdre. She was awake. Her gray eyes were clear and warm. She smiled and turned to face him and looked at him with an intent gravity.

"What is it?" he asked.

"Nothing. Everything."

"Riddles?"

"I feel good. Why should I feel good? Calvin is dead and we're in terrible trouble. But somehow I feel it will be all right."

"You know what your brother John is, don't you?"

"He's like a stranger. Yes, I know."

"Will you help me turn him in?"

"Yes. For Calvin's sake." She paused. "I don't want to talk about it. I've been thinking of you. The way you looked when you saw me in that barn. When you first came in, you looked terrible. It was frightening. Then you saw me and you changed."

"I was worried about you. I thought they had killed you."

"And it mattered that much?"

"That's a leading question."

"I feel as if I've known you forever, Sam. It's strange. There was a boy, once. He was killed in Korea. I never stopped thinking about him, and I didn't want any more of that. It hurt too much when I lost him. It was a nightmare. But now I feel better about it. You made me feel better. I think I was turning into a spinster and rejecting the world, and now I don't feel like a spinster at all." She looked away from him and flushed. "Do you understand?"

"Yes."

"Do you feel it, too?"

"Yes."

"Say it, Sam."

"No."

She kissed him. Her mouth was soft and fragile and warm and clinging. "I don't care. I saw how you looked at me in that barn. It's enough for now."

There was no rain now, but Feener had trouble locating the field. The port engine was erratic. Twice he swept down the torrential reach of the Mississippi, checking landmarks, his young freckled face one vast scowl as he consulted the map on his knee. Durell tried to remember when he had been back to the bayous last. Four years? Maybe five. No matter. It was after midnight, and the third of July had begun.

Lights flickered at last to the left, a definite pattern that blinked twice and then shone steadily. Feener banked the plane that way. He looked worried. He circled several times. He shook his head. "We got another two hours' fuel. You think we ought to try this, Mr. Durell? I don't know this Jamie. I don't like the way Olsen acted. But that port motor needs looking at."

"We might as well find out the worst right now," Durell said.

The port motor banged and shot out a streamer of flame and Feener suddenly snapped off switches with quick, precise motions. His face was white. The flame spurted farther toward the tail, then abruptly died. The prop stopped spinning. The plane dipped, slued, steadied on one engine.

"No choice," Feener said.

"Let's go down. We're lucky."

They landed smoothly. The field was simply a cleared area on the edge of a dark bayou, surrounded by towering live oaks and water on three sides. There was no hangar. To the left, dimly visible under the makeshift field lights, was a fishing camp of half a dozen rickety shacks, with a pier and several pirogues tied up to the shore. The night was thick with humid heat. The familiar noises of swamp and bayou edged in upon the sluggish air when Feener cut the motor.

Nobody came to greet them.

The floodlights blinked and went out. Darkness swooped over the field except for the dim lights shining in one wooden shack that was larger than the others, presumably the proprietor's house. Feener got out of the plane and Durell helped Deirdre down. Something splashed in the bayou fifty feet away. The Spanish moss on the oaks made a dark, heavy curtain all around them. There was a smell of mud and decay and stagnant water in the torpid air.

The field was empty, dark. Metal cooled on the plane with sharp crackling noises. Nobody showed up.

"You better stay here while I look," Feener muttered.

The pilot walked toward the lighted cabin before Durell could object. His thin figure was briefly outlined against the rectangle of an open doorway, then was gone.

Durell waited.

The bayou chuckled, groaned, clacked, gurgled.

The single shot ripped everything apart.

It was followed by a high thin scream, and then Feener's shout. "Run! That bastard Olsen…"

Durell grabbed Deirdre's hand and they ran. He had no choice of direction. They ran toward the black, glimmering edge of the bayou. Two shots slammed after them. Nothing came near. Then another. Durell heard the whine and slap of air against his head as if someone had boxed his ear, and he grabbed Deirdre and slid recklessly down the embankment toward the dock where the pirogues were tied up. Someone shouted from the cabins. Durell looked at Deirdre's startled white face. "All right?"

She nodded. "Yes."

"Get in the pirogue."

"But Feener…"

"Gone. Get in!" he said harshly.

She moved carefully onto the rickety dock. Footsteps grated, pounded across the field toward the edge of the
chenière.
Quick, careful, crafty. Durell tried to guess how many men there were. Four. Maybe five. He had his gun ready, but the three shots that had slammed after them came from a rifle. He thought of Olsen's hostile attitude. The network had been alerted to look for them. He made himself breathe deeply and regularly. He listened. There were soft whisperings, a curse, a muffled order.

"Durell!"

A strange voice, harsh in the still swamp, shattering the hot dark night. The pirogue bumped the sagging dock behind him, but he did not look back at Deirdre.

"Come out of there, Durell! We can talk business!"

He felt a moment's despair. He had covered more than a thousand miles, but the telephone wires had sung their siren warning far ahead of him. Soft laughter came from the shadowed field. Abruptly the rifle crashed and mud jumped only inches from his leg. Deirdre called softly from the pirogue. Durell slid down to the dock and ran along it as she pulled the narrow boat into the reeds along shore. The pirogue rocked perilously as he threw himself in. A handgun crashed, and water stung his face. Then he had a paddle in his hand and he drove the needleshaped craft hard, with competent, remembered strokes, through the reeds parallel to the embankment. Clearing the dock, he saw the knees of old cypress trees and swung that way, and when the ghostly roots formed a web around him he picked up his gun and looked back. A dim shape stood on the dock, rifle leveled. He fired. The man screamed and fell into the water.

Deirdre whispered, "No, Sam. No!"

"They want to kill us," he grated. The words were rust in his throat. Blood hammered in him. The pirogue floated easily among the massive cypress roots. They thrust up from the black water like drowning hands.

Her voice was calm. "Do you know where we are?"

"A rough idea. Not far from where I was raised. Twenty miles, perhaps."

"We'll have to hide for the night. There's nothing else we can do. Tomorrow we can figure out what to do."

He looked at her gratefully. She was calm. She gave him a steadying strength. When he picked up the paddle, she leaned toward him in the pirogue, smiling, and her lips brushed his.

"I love you, Sam."

He had been paddling for only a few minutes when he heard the motorboat behind them. The channel was choked with reeds, overhung with moss that trailed on the surface of the water. The tortuous passage twisted away from the narrow end of the bayou. Insects sang, hummed, fed upon them. The pulse of the boat motor wakened flat echoes through the hot, misted darkness. Now the quick flicker of a spotlight probed the swamp. It passed overhead and sliced through the trees and the black shapes of three sleeping buzzards stirred and took off with a giant thrashing of angry wings. Deirdre shuddered. Durell drove the pirogue ahead with hard strokes. Sweat ran down his face and down his chest and belly.

Light suddenly flickered on the water beside them, and a man shouted. A narrow opening appeared to the right and Durell took the chance that the watery slot was not a dead end. He twisted the boat into it. Foliage and moss fell like a curtain behind them.

The narrow channel widened into a shallow pond where even the pirogue scraped bottom. Water hyacinth choked the way and Deirdre leaned forward over the prow and tore the vegetation aside with her hands. It was hard, sweaty, gasping work. It was incredibly hot. The pond yielded to another channel, another slough, another pond. Durell looked back. The light was gone. The beat of the motor was only a faint pulse through the dark mist. He stopped paddling.

"We'd better rest. They can't follow us now."

Without the faint stir of air created by their passage, the heat closed in like a heavy fog. Durell looked at the luminous dial of his watch. It was two o'clock in the morning. He felt the heavy weight of exhaustion upon him. Then he was startled as the pirogue rocked and Deirdre slid impulsively between his knees and her arms came around his waist. Her hair was disheveled and plucked at by trailing vines, and he felt the soft richness of her body against him and a stirring began, deep inside him.

"We're not lost, are we?" she asked.

"We'll do better in the daylight. Don't be afraid."

"I'm not," she said. "Not when I'm with you."

Insects settled on them in thick swarms, now that the pirogue was motionless. He knew that by morning they might be half maddened by their bites. Backward, there was nothing except darkness and the faint luminescence of secret channels like fingers prodding at the hummocks of soggy land. Pursuit had ended.

He began paddling again to leave the insects behind. A dark mass loomed ahead, blacker than their surroundings. It was an old Indian mound, one of hundreds scattered through the delta country. Tall oaks were limned against the misty sky on the flattened top of the island. Durell grounded the pirogue on an old shell beach that once might have been the outermost reach of the delta.

"If there's a spring on top," he said, "we'll stay for the night."

He helped Deirdre up the embankment. There was fresh water. They drank quickly of the surprisingly clear, cold stream that bubbled up in a pool between the gloomy oaks. All about them in the dark, the life of the swamp was expressed in clicks and small shrieks and hummings and the occasional deeper grunt of a wild pig.

Deirdre was pale in the dim night. "Can they find us here?"

"Not likely. And we'll only blunder about in circles if we go on now."

"Good. Then we're safe."

"For tonight," Durell said.

"Tonight can be a lifetime for us," she said quietly. "I want to make it so, Sam."

He leaned toward her and folded her in his arms. There was wild beauty to her that made her look primitive and elemental. Her mouth was open, lips glistening. He held her tighter and felt her body tremble, pressed tightly against his. Their kiss was slow and searching and hungry. For just a moment, then, he thought of Lew Osbourn and Sidonie, but that was in another place and another time, and he knew that the girl in his arms was more important to him than anything else he had ever known.

Desire mounted, shook them both, became a storm that could not be denied as they came together in the darkness of the swamp that teemed and seethed with noisy life.