HONKY IN THE WOODPILE Read online

  “Ah… Well, he said you wanted something for a love-charm, to get back a man who’d left you.”

  When in doubt, tell the truth. It’s easier to remember later what you actually said.

  “What?” she erupted, eyes flashing. “Why, that—that king liar of a family of liars! Did you believe him?”

  “Frankly, no.”

  “That’s good, at least,” she muttered, and a moment later her rage evaporated like hoarfrost in sunlight and she was smiling at me. “No matter, in any case. He is a person of no importance as well as of no morals. What brings the señor to Cayachupo, may I ask?”

  “I was brought over with a group of visitors. From Lastilas. But I don’t like their company, so I wandered off on my own.”

  “We have more of those today, have we?” She looked as though she were about to spit. “The ones who walk into people’s homes, hoping to catch you without clothes! Oh, yes, many of them do that, pull back the curtain at the door, poke their heads in, laugh when you tell them to get out… But you say you do not like them?”

  “I couldn’t stand them any longer. So—ah—well, when I spotted your geraba, I thought I’d come and take a closer look at it I hope you don’t mind.”

  “Mind? Why should we mind, so long as you are not one of those inquisitive dogs you left behind? Are they white?”

  “Ah… Yes, except for one other person.”

  “I could have guessed,” she sighed. “It seems they do not believe we too are human beings, but only curious beasts to be stared at like the creatures in a zoo… So you are interested in the geraba, señor?”

  “Very much. I never saw anything like it before.”

  “Do you wish to see inside?”

  I hesitated. I wasn’t sure it would be politic to say yes. The old man on the step was glaring at me with his one eye, and the men playing dice under the tree had broken off their game and were also staring at me.

  “I show you,” she said firmly. “Then you will know the real reason why I was in Brascoso trying to buy certain things. Come!”

  She seized my arm and led me directly towards the door. Nervously, I went along.

  The old man cried out and jumped to his feet, nearly spilling the contents of his cloth. I caught a glimpse of some of them; they looked as though a long time ago they had belonged to a variety of animals, now extremely dead. But my companion snapped at him and pushed me past.

  “Pay no attention to him,” she muttered. “Because he will not die or yield his power, it is bad here in Cayachupo. Bad to have a priest who is weak and stupid! Ah, when I—when I am in charge, it will be different!”

  “In charge?” I echoed, blinking in the sudden gloom of the geraba’s interior. She had pushed the door to, and most of the windows had been broken and replaced with crudely-nailed shutters, so scarcely any of the bright sunlight filtered in. But now she was fumbling on a shelf, and there followed the rasp of a kitchen match being struck to light a candle.

  I looked around as its flame sprang up. Once, obviously, this little church had had pews arranged in conventional manner, choir-stalls, and so forth. Now the whole center of it had been cleared, and we stood on a pattern grooved in the floor and filled in with contrasting colors: spirals, stars, wavy parallel lines, and once again the symbols I’d seen on the exterior. The pews had been moved back against the walls. There was still an altar at the far end, but the candle-glow didn’t reach far enough for me to make out details.

  An acrid scent attacked my nostrils, which I vaguely recalled having run across before, but I didn’t have time to worry about identifying it because the girl was answering my question.

  “Oh, yes!” Proudly. “I am a zachea, the very child of my mother who was the greatest zachea there ever was on the whole island. She taught me all she knew before she died, and I am learning many new things myself.”

  That made the strange word clear from its context. It must mean something like “wise-woman”, or even “witch”.

  Well, chalk up another first. I’d never before been shown over a magical shrine by a witch.

  “Look all you like,” she said, holding the candle aloft and moving it slowly around. “You will see, but you will not understand. Some of us are frightened to have such things seen by strangers. I say that showing them to people who do not understand is not important. At their harbor the Americans have big ships, very modern, very powerful. If a fisherman sees one go by his boat, does that make weak the guns on that ship?”

  That abruptly convinced me that I was dealing with one of the most intuitively intelligent people I’d ever run across.

  I said, probing, “May I ask—can you read?”

  “Of course!” For an instant I was afraid I’d offended her. But then she added with a reassuringly childish giggle: “Well—a little!”

  “Did you ever go to school?”

  “No. Here on Aragon very few children go to school. But it doesn’t matter. My mother taught me well.”

  I pondered for a few seconds. Then, although I knew it was risky, without asking permission I walked towards the altar. She accompanied me, looking scornful.

  The front of the altar was decked with a row of plaited-straw masks in brilliant colors, with sharp fish-teeth in their gaping mouths and eyes made of mother-of-pearl. More hung on the walls behind and at either side, together with spears, rusty old swords and cutlasses, and many little clay models of parts of the body. I knew what those must be: thank-offerings for recovery from illness.

  But in the center of its top, in the place of honor, was a large color photograph of Don Amedeo. It was surrounded by knives: chipped old ones, shining new ones with plastic handles, even a pocket-knife with two blades each opened halfway and both points turned towards the picture.

  “Our president,” the girl said ironically.

  “But you hope not for long,” I said.

  There was an absolute dead pause, during which an alarming succession of emotions chased one another across her face. It was plain she’d realized I wasn’t so completely ignorant of the principles of badoan as she’d assumed.

  But before she could say anything more, the door was flung wide and there in the opening stood the old man shouting angrily, with the dice-players at his back, patently determined to drive me out of this sacred place in short order. And after what I’d just said I doubted whether this young zachea would be either able or willing to talk them out of the idea.

  Very slowly I reached in my hip pocket. I don’t often carry a pocket-knife since the time they jailed me in Johannesburg for possessing one—which they called a concealed weapon, same as those bastards Hargreaves and Hooper more recently in London—but as a matter of principle I’d reclaimed the one belonging to the skinhead who’d tried to stab Fierro and kept it by me as a souvenir. Now I opened its blade carefully, making sure it glinted in the light of the girl’s candle, and laid that too on the altar with the point aimed at the photograph.

  She gazed at me in astonishment for a second, and unexpectedly broke into a broad grin.

  I smiled back, thanked her loudly for her courtesy, and headed for the door with an air of exaggerated unconcern. Actually I was quaking, because the old man was still jabbering with rage. However, the dice-players had seen what I’d done and were bewildered by it. I smiled at them as well, the skin of my face feeling as though it had turned to dry crackly paper that might tear with the movement of its muscles, and they stood aside uncertainly to let me out. I thanked them sunnily as I went by.

  I glanced back once, from the head of the alleyway I’d come up, and the girl was arguing with the old man at the top of her voice. And seemed to be winning.

  I was still trembling a little when I regained the beach and found Moril pacing up and down anxiously while the rest of the party boarded the launch.

  “Sorry!” I called as I hurried to join him. “Didn’t mean to keep you waiting. Just went to take a few more pictures.” Patting my camera. “You’re absolutely right—this
is a very quaint little town, and I got some terrific shots.”

  He gave me a suspicious glower, but after a moment he relaxed.

  “I was afraid you would make us delay the boat to hunt for you—but no matter, you’re safely back.” Ushering me aboard ahead of him. “I should have warned you, I guess, that we ought not to spend too long here, because when we return to Grand Madrugada we have a particular treat to round off your day. As I promised, you shall witness a badoan ceremony.”

  “But I thought you said it was here on Aragon that one finds the most authentic badoan?” I countered.

  “It is not a question of authenticity,” he said stonily. “One must see it where it is not taken too seriously any more. Here, or on the further out-islands—such as Galejo where the fishermen still offer salt and beer to the sea before the night’s voyage—it would be difficult and maybe even dangerous for an outsider to attempt to witness badoan. More to the point, perhaps, it would strike him as rather dull. We will go to a place where the most is made of badoan as a spectacle.”

  “Fine,” I said. “Whatever you say. You’ve done me proud up to now.”

  Although maybe not quite in the way you intended…

  When we returned to the car, Tom and Jerry jumped out to greet us. While the latter held the door for me, the former whispered at some length in Moril’s ear, then handed him the radiophone.

  “Excuse me, señor,” he said. “A matter has come up to be attended to at once.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  Watching, I learned that this was not in fact a public radiophone service, but a private one, no doubt for Sabatano use only. But I couldn’t hear what was being said to him, and he responded only with grunts, his face impassive.

  At last he handed the receiver back to the driver and joined me in the back seat with another apology for the delay.

  “That’s all right,” I said, and added politely, “No problems, I hope?”

  “No, no problems.”

  And off we went back to Brascoso. It was not until we had crossed the Ocean Bridge again that he said mildly, “By the way, señor, if you are thinking of making a run for it, remember first that this is an island, and second that all three of us are armed.”

  FOURTEEN

  “What?” I snapped, rounding on him. “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “Your game is over, señor.” As courteously as before, in the same gentle tone. “You were fortunately recognized by an American friend of ours, who is aware of your acquaintance with the terrorist Ponza. Take my advice and co-operate. You may get away with nothing worse than deportation. We can afford to be lenient since we destroyed Juan Bautiz’.”

  “But—!”

  “No buts!” With sudden fierceness. He snapped his fingers, and the passenger Jerry twisted around in the front seat, producing his gun and resting its barrel on the seat-back lined up squarely with my belly.

  There were no formalities like being taken to a police station, cautioned, charged and allowed to contact a lawyer. This was done Sabatano-style.

  We raced back into the center of Brascoso at high speed, the driver leaning on his horn and expecting everyone else to get out of his way. Once somebody took his time over doing so, and even glowered at us, but Jerry raised his gun and fired a shot into the air, and he promptly ran up on the sidewalk to make room.

  I was just sitting there. I couldn’t see any future in arguing.

  We rushed past the street leading to the Valencia, over the tenuous border between Old and New Brascoso, and about three or four blocks further on made a sharp left, the tires squealing, and shot up a steep narrow road, not much more than an alleyway and poorly lighted. Night had fallen during the return journey.

  Then we made a right and came to an abrupt halt in a dead end, the car’s nose inches from a pile of overfull garbage cans, with more garbage in a pile beside them. In the hot evening air the rotting mess stank like a sewer. Here there was another car waiting in shadow, facing the opposite way.

  From its back window a flashlight beam lanced out and caught me directly in the face, blinding me.

  “That’s him,” said Gilbert’s voice. “I thought so.”

  Immediately, the other car started up with a roar and pulled away, barely clearing the Mercedes as it turned down the hill. Meantime, keeping his gun carefully on me, Jerry had opened the door and waved me out.

  “Señor, this will inform you of our attitudes to people who come here pretending to be what they are not,” Moril said, and produced his own gun.

  The moment my feet were on the ground, Tom and Jerry closed on me and grasped my wrists with their free hands. They were too strong for me to break both their grips at once. Besides, Moril had come around in front of me.

  “You’re crazy!” I fumed. “Who was that madman in the other car? Is it his word you’re taking? You must be out of your minds! I want the British consul—”

  Moril cracked me across the chin with the barrel of his pistol. “In Madrugada,” he said, always in the same soft tone but now with deadly menace, like the warning hiss of a snake, “what the Sabatanos say is right… is right. In any case I doubt that the British would help you. You’re not liked by them any more, are you?”

  True—but how the hell did he know? Gilbert must have slandered me very effectively.

  Smiling, he turned away and opened a rough wooden door, badly made but thick and strong, set in the solid stone wall of the nearest building. This whole alley was surrounded with stone walls, high and windowless; we must, I realized, be in one of the oldest parts of the city, perhaps dating back to the original Spanish settlement.

  Beyond the door was a flight of worn grey steps leading down into a dank passageway lit by fly-specked yellow bulbs no stronger than twenty watts. The air reeked of stale urine. Doors—perhaps a dozen were visible before the passage made a sharp turn out of sight—could indicate only one thing: cells.

  They threw me down the steps just as I decided to go quietly. I was furious with myself, and terribly conscious of letting Fierro down, and bang! Tossed forward like a sack of potatoes.

  Spinning around in a crouch, ready to beat them one after another to a pulp for that, I found all three guns levelled at me.

  “That way,” Moril said, still smiling.

  They put me in the third cell from the end. It had no window, just a barred square gap in the door at head height, a sort of gutter in the floor leading to a six-inch hole beneath which I could hear water trickling to serve as a toilet, and a pile of rags. Wet. Before they left me they removed practically everything except my clothes: my camera, my binoculars, my dark glasses, my watch, my billfold…

  The thought crossed my mind that some white governments—the Greeks and South Africans, for instance—could take lessons in thoroughness from these blacks.

  But it didn’t seem really worth being proud of.

  When the echo of their footsteps had died away, I grew gradually aware of noise. More exactly, music, punctuated now and then by loud voices. At first I assumed there was a guard on duty somewhere, whiling away the time with a radio, and then I realized it was coming from overhead, not from along the passage.

  Abruptly the few fragments of Brascoso’s geography I’d so far learned clicked together in my head, like the first scraps of a jigsaw puzzle assembled with a vast hole in the middle but enough to show the overall pattern. That street, on the left a few blocks past my hotel…

  “The fucking bastard!” I said aloud. Because I knew where I was. Under the Cinema Coloseo; under the slave-auction block so proudly set in the floor of its lobby.

  I took a deep breath. I’d come to Madrugada without a cause of my own, to carry out a simple job for a man I admired. Now, suddenly, I did have my own cause here.

  All right, I said silently. It you hadn’t done this—it you a black man hadn’t put me a black man in cells meant for slaves, you might have got away with kicking me out. Now you’re not going to. You’ll pay for thi
s, Don José Moril, and if I have to pull Madrugada down around your ears, if the traitor I’m looking for, and Gilbert Quentin, and President Porfiroso, and the whole damned country go smash…

  So much the better.

  Which was all very fine and large, and I was shaking not so much with anger as with a sense of insult, which bites far deeper and doesn’t fog the mind so badly—

  But how?

  Moril had been correct in saying that the British wouldn’t be inclined to help me. There’d been a change of government since I kicked Alec Shywater’s ass for him, and even the veneer of humanitarianism which the last lot had kept up was being steadily eroded. There were plenty of influential people in London, both in and out of Parliament, who’d be glad if I disappeared without trace in Brascoso. The Russians had felt the same a few years ago, and in fact they’d tried once or twice to see me into a premature grave, but in the end apparently they’d come around to accepting the principle, “The enemy of my enemy is my friend,” and were content to let me go on raising hell in the hope they might exploit the results. Fat chance—their PR is so bad.

  I’d seen and talked to five of Fierro’s prime suspects, all except the lawyer, Latanores. But one of them might be the traitor; I didn’t know whether Fierro’s message had yet arrived to provide me with credentials, and if it hadn’t those who weren’t would have no reason to help me. Why should they tangle with the Sabatanos for the sake of a perfect stranger?

  That left Dolly, and a weaker straw no drowning man ever had to clutch at. I’d woken this morning almost frightened at the idea I might have been duped by a pretty girl with a smooth tongue. The American friend Moril had referred to was, I now knew, Gilbert, but he might not have recognized me during the brief moment while our cars passed each other—he might have been told about me by his wife…

  I wrote little scenarios in my head, leaning back against the clammy stone wall because I didn’t want to sit on the filthy floor or the sodden rags until I absolutely had to. I imagined Gilbert recognizing me, and telling Dolly, or not telling her, so that eventually she would become worried and make inquiries about me, either sooner or later, and then I switched to imagining that she had told him about me—and so on.