Metzger's Dog (15 page)

“Yes, that’s true.”

“Yeah, it’s really a good thing,” he went on, “because I’ve been thinking. This definitely is an old horse path. What if it leads back to the ranch house?”

“That would be annoying.”

“It’d ruin my day.”

K
EPLER SAT IN THE RENTED
C
HEVROLET
on the shoulder of the highway, three hundred yards past the park entrance. He had folded his jacket into a thick pad on the sill of the window to hold the foregrip of the rifle. There was nothing esoteric about this kind of shooting. It was all a matter of adequate preparation; keeping your pulse rate low, and making deliberate, economical movements.

The Mannlicher Model ST rifle’s clip held only three of the thick, heavy cartridges, so it wasn’t a question of squeezing off a few rounds to get the feel of things. He knew he wouldn’t need to. All he had to do was hit something. The Winchester .458 Magnum steel-jacketed five-hundred-grain bullet would still be traveling at well over fifteen hundred feet per second when it arrived. When it got there it would still easily pierce a car door. Kepler stared into the eyepiece of the Weaver T-25 scope. The entrance to the park drive was a strange, circular scene that consisted of only about twenty feet of glittering green leaves and bristling grass, all supernaturally bright and clear because of the scope’s optics, but from this distance silent, like a world seen through a closed window.

He held the crosshairs on a dandelion for a few seconds, then slowly moved down the stem and across to a rock on the drive at the entrance. He would have to use the time after the shot and before the report of the rifle reached their ears to recover from the vicious recoil, chamber the next round with the bolt, and aim again.

He rested the rifle on the windowsill and watched the traffic on the highway. Already there were cars that must have come from the baseball fields and picnic groves on the other side of the park. When he heard the airplane engines he knew something must be wrong. There was supposed to be only one airplane, and it sounded like more. A few seconds later he saw Chinese Gordon’s van pass him, going toward Sunset in the midst of a line of small foreign cars. He thought of signaling, but something else caught his eye. Already cars were streaming out of the park, much faster than he’d expected. He stared through the telescopic sight at the faces of the drivers, but their expressions didn’t seem to show alarm or even worry. The third one out was laughing, and the girl next to him leaned over to kiss his cheek as he skidded around the curve. They weren’t running from something, he decided. They were just idiots. Still, there should be only one airplane.

Kepler held the crosshairs on a level a few inches below the side window of the next car, and he left them there after the car whisked past. Something was wrong, and if there was a trap, this was where it would have to be. Then he saw it. A dark blue sedan pulled up beside the highway, then drifted slowly across the park entrance. Inside were four men wearing sportcoats and tinted glasses. Two got out, and one of them opened the hood of the car and stood looking down at the engine.

Almost immediately Kepler heard the faint honking of the distant cars trapped in the park. Overhead he could see four airplanes circling and swooping over the field. There were only a few choices, and none of them seemed to fit. With the elephant gun he could immobilize the car, but he couldn’t move it. Something had to change, and there was only one way to do it. He emptied his lungs halfway and lined up the crosshairs on the man standing in front of the car. He wished he’d brought something smaller. There wouldn’t be much left of this man’s chest. He couldn’t even aim low and just take a leg off, or the slug might pass through and into the engine. But when the others saw it they’d move as fast as they could, and that meant the car would be out of the way.

He grasped the stock and started to squeeze the trigger, then remembered. It would be smart to have his own engine running before he did it, even if it shook the car a little. All he had to do was hit any part of the man, and he’d be such a gruesome sight the others would drive over his body to get out of there. Kepler turned around in the seat and reached for the key, but as he did, he looked through the windshield and smiled.

Through the woods beside the road a yellow Volkswagen was bouncing along slowly, making its laborious and choppy progress over roots and stones and ruts, the weeds parting at its bumper. As it reached the highway it flashed its headlights at him and he laughed aloud. He reached over to click the safety catch on the rifle and muttered, “Gentlemen, start your engines.”

C
HINESE
G
ORDON WATCHED THE LINE
of small, bright cars rocking on the curves of Sunset Boulevard toward the canyons. He cursed himself for what he was doing. Kepler would give him another lecture on urban commando operational procedure. Nobody was supposed to change plans in the middle, no matter what happened. Now he was parked in front of the Seven-Eleven on one of the busiest corners of Los Angeles, with his motor running and his eyes on the rearview mirror.

He had to hope that at least one of the cars had gotten out. He hoped that Margaret had gotten out. It was different for Immelmann and Kepler. He knew that was a lie, too. The whole thing stank so much it didn’t matter who couldn’t get out of it, but the thought of Margaret in danger made him feel frantic. It wasn’t his fault, he was the only one capable of firing the gun in the van. Margaret and Immelmann had to be the ones to take out the money. It wasn’t his fault. Yes, it was his fault.

If only one of the cars made it out. If only Margaret made it to the highway. He watched the line of foreign cars sputtering at the traffic light. Maybe the thing to do was create a diversion. It would be easy to line up the van with the gas station across the street and make this corner look like a war zone, but not yet, not while there was still a chance they’d made it the easy way.

Finally he saw the yellow Volkswagen drive up to the intersection and swing into a right turn. Behind it was Kepler’s rented car. Kepler was drumming his fingers on the steering wheel to some inaudible rhythm of the car radio. Chinese Gordon pulled the van out onto the street two cars behind him and followed.

Chinese Gordon was in a better mood now. He sang a verse of “Let My People Go” as he drove along, his eyes flickering upward to the rearview mirror every few seconds to search for the wrong kind of car with the wrong kind of passengers. He knew that in his present mood some part of him was wishing for it, so it wouldn’t happen. He hoped Margaret hadn’t taken too many chances to pick up the sacks they’d dropped from the airplane. As soon as he’d seen the second airplane he’d given up any thought that the sacks contained money. These people couldn’t be trusted, it was as simple as that. He hoped the others wouldn’t be too disappointed, but there was no getting around the fact that some things just didn’t come easily. Chinese Gordon resolved to say that to them, if necessary, and any other platitudes that seemed likely to raise their spirits and ease the strains to come. As he drove the smooth, winding highway, he reflected on the enormity of human folly. He had always considered himself a reasonable man, and he’d offered these people a chance to buy him out safely for a sum that must be petty cash for them. This time he was going to demonstrate that a few of his other choices had big, sharp teeth.

22
                  
The Deputy Director paced near the door of the conference room, a distant, solitary figure dwarfed by the vast maps on the walls above him.

At the end of the table Goldschmidt whispered to Porterfield, “We both said it wouldn’t work. Do you think it would be more polite to be somewhere far away while they go through with it and he finds out for himself?”

Porterfield shook his head slowly and watched the Deputy Director. “We might learn something by accident if we pay attention.”

“You mean from watching Generalissimo Pines pacing in his bunker?”

“Of course not. From the reports of the field people.”

“Then we might as well make it interesting. I say they never show up at the drop. Is a hundred dollars okay with you?”

“My hundred says they show up at the drop and get away clean with the sacks.”

“All right. What happens if Pines and the Director get lucky and pick up one or two of them?”

“Fair is fair. We give all the money to Pines.”

Kearns leaned forward from across the table. “Do you mind if I get in on this?”

“Not at all,” said Goldschmidt. “What’s your pleasure?”

“I say the Los Angeles police arrest somebody in the field crew and Racine has to go bail for him.”

“Very likely,” Goldschmidt snorted. “I wish I’d taken that possibility myself. You know, of course, that if anything in this farcical operation works, Pines will win a handsome sum without betting anything?”

Porterfield yawned. “That’s the best part of the game. If he doesn’t get all of them and every copy of the papers, he’ll lose his job—”

“Not relevant,” Kearns interrupted. “He’ll go back to the Mister Food Corporation and make five times as much.”

Porterfield continued, “No, I don’t think he’ll go back there. If he loses his job, he’ll also lose his bodyguards.”

K
EPLER POPPED THE TOP
of a beer can and took a gulp. “There’s not a whole lot of point to doing this.”

“I suppose not,” Margaret said, shrugging. “I’m a little bit curious, though, aren’t you? We did go to an awful lot of trouble.”

“So did they, and they’ve been at this a lot longer than we have. It’s probably four bags full of rabid weasels.”

Chinese Gordon said, “We have to open them, and it has to be now. If there’s a transmitter inside, we can’t take the bags home.”

“Agreed,” said Immelmann. “Let’s get to it and then out of here.” He kicked one of the bags and then took a folding knife out of his pocket and began to slit the stitching on the bag’s lower seam carefully, squinting to see that the blade didn’t penetrate too deeply.

Kepler swallowed more beer and said, “It’s a strange fact of life that there are people who look intelligent, and others who don’t.” He stared at the green hillside across the road.

Immelmann peered into the bag, then reached inside. “Hello. What have we here?” He handed the bag to Chinese Gordon and began to work on the second bag.

Chinese Gordon disappeared into the back of the van. When he didn’t return, Margaret followed. “Well? What is it? Will it blow up?” she asked.

Chinese Gordon sat cross-legged inside, the empty bag beside him. He was frowning, but he shook his head.

“Then what is it?”

Immelmann was staring into the second bag. “There’s some money. Hundred-dollar bills.”

“What else?”

“Newspaper. More cut-up newspaper than we’ll ever need.”

W
HEN
M
ARGARET AWOKE IN THE MORNING
, Chinese Gordon was sitting in his bathrobe at the kitchen table with his hands folded. He appeared to be studying Doctor Henry Metzger, who was lying on the table beside Chinese Gordon’s coffee cup. Margaret walked up behind Chinese Gordon and kissed the top of his head.

“Nice,” he said. She petted Doctor Henry Metzger’s head, and the cat’s eyes narrowed slightly in acknowledgment. At Chinese Gordon’s feet the huge dog lay on its side, the long, pink tongue draped along its jowl.

“How long have you been up?”

“Don’t know. A long time.”

“All three of you?”

“More or less.”

“Please don’t be cranky.”

“We’re not cranky.”

Two hours later Margaret left for the market. When she returned, Chinese Gordon was in exactly the same position. The dog raised its head for a moment and stared at her, then lowered it. When Margaret crossed Chinese Gordon’s field of vision, he smiled.

Margaret spent the afternoon in the bedroom. For a time she read three magazines she’d bought in the supermarket, and then she fell asleep. When consciousness returned, the first thing she saw was Chinese Gordon, still in the kitchen, staring at his cat, the weak, yellow light of the waning sun falling across the table.

Margaret got up and walked into the kitchen. She put her hands on Chinese Gordon’s hunched shoulders and said, “Chinese, why are you doing this? It’s okay to be disappointed, but you can’t become a catatonic.”

Chinese Gordon shook his head. “I’m not.”

“What are you doing?”

“I’m thinking.”

“What are you thinking?”

“I’ll tell you when I’ve thought it.”

“Can’t I help you?”

“Sure.”

Margaret sat down across the kitchen table and waited. Beneath the table the dog shifted his ponderous body and lay across her bare feet. His fur was warm, and she could feel his heart beating.

Margaret watched the electric clock on the wall behind Chinese Gordon. After ten minutes she said, “It would help if I knew what we were thinking about.”

He reached across the table and held her hand. “I’m trying to decide what to do next.”

“You could forget the whole thing. We don’t really need the money. With what you got from Grijalvas we can do pretty well. We’re probably lucky. We even got another ten thousand they had to wrap the newspapers in.”

“The problem is that I am not finished. I feel a strong urge to get these people for what they tried to do to us. I’m not satisfied.”

“Then you could go through with the threat. Publish the papers.”

“It doesn’t feel right, somehow.”

“It does have the distinct advantage that we can do it without getting killed.”

“That’s not enough. It has to feel right.”

“Then read the Donahue papers.”

“What about them?”

“Read Appendix Twenty-three.”

23
                  
It was a small red brick façade in the middle of a block of stores that sold antiques and gentlemen’s furnishings. Its lattice windows differed from the others because the brass and wood and leather inside were partly obscured by fresh flowers. The door was a narrow maple slab with a single small window cut into it at shoulder height, and a brass plate that said, “The New Haven: Members and Their Guests.”

As Porterfield opened the door and entered, the hostess looked down into the open menu she cradled in her arms as a singer holds music. Her broad, plain face seemed to contract as she looked at him, and then she opened her mouth too wide to say, “This way, please” so quietly. He followed her down a corridor paneled with dark, gleaming wood, the Oriental runner on the floor slipping slightly with each step.

The room was small and contained one round table broad enough for a dozen people, but only two straight-backed chairs, and a bottle of white wine in a silver ice bucket.

“Hello, Ben,” the Director called, bobbing forward from the fireplace across the room. Porterfield counted the steps—six—and the Director took another to catch up with his outstretched hand. “Glad you were able to make it.”

“Nice to see you,” said Porterfield. He submitted to the handshake, the Director’s left hand grasping his forearm at the same time.

“Have you been here before?”

“I don’t belong.”

The Director hesitated, then said, “It’s about as secluded as things get unless you leave town. I get pretty bogged down in the office. I don’t think I’ve eaten anything but commissary food in three weeks, so this is my lunch out.”

“It’s good of you to share it with me.”

“I invited you for a chance to pick your brain in private, I’m afraid. It’s time to turn to the old guard.”

Porterfield nodded.

“I’ll be completely open with you, Ben. I made some decisions that didn’t work out. In my own defense I’ll have to add that I didn’t take the Donahue matter away from you and give it to someone else, I took it on myself. It seemed to me that it was too big and too crucial to delegate. There are big issues at stake here.”

“What do you want me to do?”

“At the moment I want advice. You know where we stand. How do you suggest we get to safe ground?” He poured two glasses of the white wine and handed one to Porterfield.

Porterfield answered without a pause. “You have the same two problems you had a week ago—how to get rid of these people, and how to cut the Company’s losses if you don’t. At this stage I’d say the proportions have changed, and you ought to concentrate on cutting our losses.”

“In what way, exactly?”

“First I’d get our people out of countries mentioned in the papers. I told both Deputy Directors to do it, and it doesn’t seem to have made much impression. Maybe it will now. The second thing I’d do is get an appointment for a special briefing session with the President. Tell him everything so he can do something to save the friendly governments.”

The Director seemed to hold a sip of wine in his mouth for a long time, as though he couldn’t swallow it. At last he said, “That’s a little extreme.”

Porterfield shrugged. “All right.”

The Director leaned forward. “Well, isn’t it? I mean, think about it, Ben. This thing goes back twenty years or more, and what’s involved is devastating. And then the steps we’ve taken to contain this thing—no, if we can’t handle this ourselves, we’re lost. My God, Ben, I could end up in jail.”

“You asked me for my advice. That’s my advice. While you’re at it I’d also advise you to try again to see if you can pay these people off.”

The Director smiled. “That sounds a little more hopeful. What’s the strategy?”

“No strategy at all. No tricks, no traps. You give them a pile of money and hope for the best. Ten million dollars ought to be enough.”

The Director’s eyes seemed to water, and Porterfield watched him fluctuate between despair and anger. For the first time he appeared tired. He shook his head. “I can’t do that. I can’t. These people are criminals. Blackmailers.”

Porterfield sipped his wine. “I hope that’s all they are, because if they’re not, you’ve already used up just about all your options.”

“What you offer aren’t options. They’re consequences, just different kinds of defeat. What you’re saying is that there’s nothing I can do that will permit me to retain viable control of this adminis—agency.”

“If people in the Company start deciding that you’re a disaster, you won’t hear it from me. The President might ask you to sign a letter of resignation, but he won’t do more than that. It might be the best way out, because if you leave even a few agents in this mess, one of them is sure to come to see you.”

“That’s ridiculous. No Director has ever been placed in that position. Why you’d even suggest such a thing is beyond comprehension.”

Porterfield said, “I said it because if I were in Mexico City and knew you’d blown this, you’d already be history.”

A
PPENDIX XXIII
: The Seismological Disaster Preparedness Task Force.

Background: During the 1960s and 1970s the government of Mexico became increasingly interested in the possibility of using modern technology and organizational methods to respond to natural disasters. After the earthquake of December 23, 1972, in Managua, Nicaragua, the Chamber of Deputies authorized the expenditure of funds for a two-year study. On August 28, 1973, a major temblor occurred in central Mexico, killing 527 and leaving two hundred thousand homeless. The confessed inability of the government to respond quickly and effectively to the problem elicited additional support within the ruling Revolutionary Institutional Party (PRI) for the idea, and the project’s budget was doubled before it had begun. A geological institute was established at the University of Mexico and began collecting seismological data.

On February 4, 1976, the Guatemala earthquake killed an estimated 23,000 people and left approximately one million homeless. The proximity of this major earthquake combined with its extreme devastation prompted the introduction of several bills in the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies, all designed to contribute to the disaster-preparedness program, which was beginning to take on the character of a movement within the PRI.

On July 28, 1976, two major earthquakes destroyed the industrial city of Tangshan, China, causing an estimated eight hundred thousand deaths. Within three weeks the Mexican government transformed the former geological institute into a seismological disaster-preparedness project. As a matter of standing policy copies of these proposals were forwarded to the Central Intelligence Agency, which assigned several operatives to the project as observers and established client relationships with several others, including four geology professors, a civil defense official on temporary leave from the state of California, and an urban planning professor.

By 1977 the normal routing of projects concerning Mexico included the members of the ULTRA research team, who recognized immediately the potential value of active participation in the Mexican disaster-preparedness project. The possibility of understanding seismic disruptions well enough to predict them brought to mind the possibility of inducing them. Of more immediate concern, however, was that the Mexican government was now committed to exert its full powers to perform a realistic estimate of the nation’s susceptibility to a sudden and catastrophic event. Because of its size and importance, Mexico City was to be the inevitable subject of the most intensive studies.

Chinese Gordon rested his bare feet on the big dog’s warm side beneath the table and closed his eyes. “Am I supposed to read all of this?”

“Of course.” Margaret was in the bedroom.

“Did you read all of it?”

“Yes.”

“But I still have to?”

“Yes.”

Chinese Gordon lifted Doctor Henry Metzger from the box of papers, pulled another stack out, and set the cat back down. “It’s like a zoo in here.”

“Then take a bath.”

Chinese Gordon read on. Doctor Henry Metzger stared at him for a long time, the wide green eyes narrowing in infinitesimal gradients until at some point they closed. The dog, slumbering deeply, dreamed he lived on a great sunlit empty plain and that far in the distance his clear, sensitive eyes saw a shape he recognized as enemy. The shape was large and very dangerous, but that was part of the pleasure, and the big dog’s jaws began to grind in anticipation as he dreamed that he was taking great powerful leaps toward it, building up incredible speed. As the dog dreamed, Chinese Gordon heard it first give a little growl of joy, almost like a man’s laugh. Then Chinese Gordon felt the dog’s paws begin to quiver as the motor neurons received the tiny false messages to run. Chinese Gordon lifted up the corner of the tablecloth and watched the great black dog, flattened on its side like a frieze of an ancient nightmare creature. The dog’s thick neck muscles were clenched now, the head held forward in stiff eagerness. Chinese Gordon leaned down and whispered, “Go get it.” The dog’s legs began to move, his big paws churning at the invisible ground, the frantic dash bringing him closer and closer to his prey. Chinese Gordon watched the dog until the dream subsided and the dog seemed to sigh with pleasure. “Good boy,” he whispered. “You got it.”

Margaret stepped back from the door and waited until she heard Chinese Gordon take up the sheaf of papers again, then quietly climbed back onto the bed. She lit a cigarette and stared into the darkness. She exhaled and watched the smoke curl and fold and float upward into a shaft of light that came from the doorway. While she watched it, she smiled.

Mexico City consists of a densely populated central core surrounded by newer and less compact suburbs, to form a metropolitan area of approximately fourteen million inhabitants. The complex is precariously held together by a network of major traffic arteries, the most important being route 190, which runs southeast to Guatemala City; 85, which runs north to Laredo, Texas; 45, to El Paso, Texas; 15, which crosses the U.S. border south of Tucson; and 95, south to the coast at Acapulco. Each of these national roads passes through Mexico City and carries a portion of its daily commuter traffic. Of immediate concern to the experts of the Center for Disaster Preparedness was that any severe damage to the Distrito Federal would not only totally immobilize the capital itself but also disrupt mobile communication for the entire country. The situation is similar to that in the major metropolitan areas of the western United States such as Los Angeles, which contains the only major north-south routes as well as the western termini of the east-west routes carrying two-thirds of the interstate traffic.

Chinese Gordon picked up Doctor Henry Metzger and petted his head. Then he gave a short laugh. In the bedroom Margaret whispered to herself in the darkness, “Go get ’em.”