Foreign Enemies and Traitors (79 page)

Their contact arrived in the mid-afternoon.
  They heard three distinct clangs of metal on metal, a pause, and then two more.  The fugitives had changed to their civilian outer garments.  Their packs and weapons had been made ready for a swift departure hours before.  Boone said, “I have to go outside now.  They have to see me first, or they’ll just take off.  That’s how this is done here.”  He was wearing jeans and his long parka with the commercial hunting camo pattern, concealing his combat vest.  He left the trailer and disappeared back through the metal fence around the junkyard.  Five minutes later, he returned. 

“Okay, everybody grab your stuff.  This is it.  Our ride is up by the front of the junkyard in the bus shed.  Tony, you’re staying here.  This is your lucky day, LT; you’re going to be traded for some of our own prisoners.  Just relax and wait, somebody else will be along to collect you.”  The lieutenant’s hands were bound securely to the steel-framed arms of the kitchen chair with clothesline; his knees and ankles were tied to the legs.  Boone stuck a wide X of gray duct tape over his mouth and draped a blue pillowcase over his head and shoulders.  “Sit tight, LT.  Just a little while longer here, and then you’ll be moved to a better safehouse.  You’ll stay there until your transfer can be arranged.”

Boone guided them through the stacked rows of junk vehicles to a barn-sized gray sheet-metal building.  The junkyard gave every appearance of having been abandoned.  If anybody was around the acres of old cars and trucks, they were staying completely out of sight and were making no sound.  Boone told Carson and Doug that their contact was going to move the humvee to a better hiding place, somewhere else around the junkyard.  How it would be disposed of after that, he didn’t explain, and they didn’t ask.

Their next ride was parked inside a metal shed big enough to hold several trucks or buses.  Most of the building was taken up with shelves and tables loaded with alternators, car batteries, tires and other resalable items.  In the open space in the middle was a medium-sized flatbed stake-side truck, loaded with old household appliances and workshop machinery.  The truck looked to be at least thirty years old; the cab had once been painted olive drab.  Military surplus.  A man entered the shed through a back door about ten minutes later.  Their nameless driver was a scrappy-looking fifty-something wearing green thermal coveralls.  He had thick curly black hair running to gray, and a few days of gray stubble beard.  The man was thick through the middle but solid, like a retired prizefighter.  He was a few inches shorter than Carson and Dolan, but in every other way he was an imposing physical figure.  No names or greetings were exchanged between any of the four men.  On the faded green doors of the truck, “Dewey O. Liebermann, Tool and Salvage LLC” was hand-stenciled in white letters.  Their driver seemed to size up the three fugitives presented before him. 

“Well, at least two of you aren’t frikkin’ giants.  My hidden compartment can only fit two regular-size people, if your gear and weapons are going in with you.”  He pointed to Phil Carson and Doug Dolan.  “That’ll be you two.”              

“We could hide inside your load,” suggested Doug.  “I could fit in that freezer, if there’s an air hole.  Or if I keep the door cracked open.”

“Not a good idea, son.  Soldiers and police almost always spot-check the cargo.  It makes them feel like they’re doing their job.  It’s the obvious place, so I never, ever hide anything there.  No, you’re going to have to squeeze into a little space under the cargo deck.  You can’t even see it from the outside; it’s sort of an optical illusion.  From the sides, it looks like there’s only five inches of steel support frames under the bed, but it widens out to eight in the middle.  The wooden cargo deck over it is fake too.  It’s carved out in the middle, and that gives almost another three inches.  You have to shimmy in from underneath, and you’ll have to unload some of your packs to flatten them out.” 

The driver looked Boone up and down.  He said, “But that still leaves you with nowhere to hide.  Hey, I’ve got it: you can be my idiot nephew today, the one that I bring along for heavy lifting.  They might accept that you’ve got no papers if you’re retarded.  Hey, big fella, you ever do any acting?  Think you can make out like you’re a moron?  Maybe deaf and dumb?”

 Boone stared straight ahead, as if he had not heard.

“That’s perfect; you’ll ride up front with me.  Okay, you two, in you go.  Get under there, climb up over the drive shaft and slide in on your bellies like reptiles.  Shove your packs and weapons in first.  You can’t turn over once you’re inside, so decide now if you like it on your back or your stomach.  You’ve got six feet by six feet by ten inches high in the middle.  It’ll work.  That’s it, put your stuff in first, and then climb up there and get comfy.  Damn, that reminds me—did I ever get that exhaust leak fixed?  Oh well, I guess I’ll know when it’s time to let you out.”

After a few minutes of effort, Carson and Dolan were finally sealed into the smuggling compartment with the weapons and gear.  Boone and the driver climbed up into the cab through both doors, grinned at one another, and shook hands warmly.

“Sergeant Gersham!  Damn, it’s good to see a familiar face!”

“Stick with Dewey.  Get used to using my cover name, in case we’re stopped and questioned.  On the way up, we’ll go over my legend, but hopefully you won’t be expected to say anything at the checkpoints.  Just act like the big lumbering retard that you are, and you’ll do fine.  Your hair is perfect—right out of
Deliverance
.  Your cousins in Georgia would be
so
proud.  Just be yourself.  In other words, act normal.”

“I should be able to manage that.  So, what’s up with the ‘Dewey O. Liebermann’?  I mean, aren’t you taking a chance with that?  You were always a wise-ass, but come on,
D.O.L.
?”  Boone was referring to the initials of the Special Forces motto, “De Oppresso Liber,” to liberate from oppression.

The driver laughed and said, “Hey, you need a sense of humor in this business.”  He didn’t specify whether he was referring to the tool and salvage business, or the espionage and guerrilla warfare business.  “Do you remember when I left active duty for a couple of years in the nineties?  Well, I didn’t really leave the service.  That was Agency business the whole time.  Anything else you heard was a lie, part of my cover for leaving the Army.  They needed somebody with my languages and my, ah…other unique skills at The Agency.”

“Christians In Action.”

“Yep, you got it,
goyim
.  South of the border, they call it
La Cia
.”

“What do you speak, Arabic and Hebrew?”

“And Greek, and Turkish.  And Farsi, also known as ‘Arabic for complete idiots.’  Oh, and French, Spanish and Italian, but they hardly count.  Plus I can fake a few more.”

“Weren’t you raised over there somewhere?”

The driver backed the truck out of the shed, turned in a small parking area, and pulled onto State Road 13 heading north.  Carson glanced at the rear view mirror extending out from his side of the cab: someone unseen was already closing the big doors to the metal building.

“My father worked for a shipping agency, and I mostly grew up between Athens and Alexandria.  Then he worked for APL, the American President Line.  I was a regular Mediterranean shipping line brat.  I spent most of my early years on the docks and on ships.  Languages became one of my hobbies.  I collected them like postage stamps.  I’ve got the knack; I can’t explain it.  They say I’m a savant, a human sponge for languages.”

“If you don’t mind my asking, with that kind of background, why didn’t you go to college and become an officer?”

“Same reason as you, asshole.  It just wasn’t me.  I was born to be a shooter, not a pencil-whipper.  And who says I didn’t go to college?”

“But what about the D.O.L. on the truck?” asked Boone.  “There must be thousands of people around Fort Campbell that’ll look at that name and wonder about the initials.”

“You caught that right away, huh?  I guess you’re smarter than you look.  Well, Dewey Liebermann wouldn’t be my first choice if I were choosing a new alias now, that’s for sure, but I’m kind of stuck with it.  Here’s how it happened.  While I was working for the Agency, they sent me to some, ah,
interesting
schools.  One course covered creating identities from scratch.  ‘Working legends,’ they call them.  I made a few on the side, just for the hell of it.  Outside class, on my own, using what I learned.  One of them was Dewey Liebermann.  I thought it was kind of funny at the time.  It was the only one of my homemade legends that I kept up over the years.  I always figured I might wind up on the run someday, and a new ID would be a good thing to have on the shelf.  Anyway, Dewey Liebermann had the best backstops and paper trail.”

“But who needs to know Dewey Liebermann’s middle initial? You could at least drop the ‘O’ on the truck.”

“Now, what fun would that be?” said the driver.  “Anyway, the people who ‘get it,’ I don’t have to worry about.  And the people I worry about won’t get it in a million years.”

“Sergeant—”  Boone pronounced the rank the Army way, without the ‘g.’  “Sar’nt.”

“Stick with ‘Dewey.’  Get used to saying it, in case we’re stopped and your deaf-and-dumb act doesn’t hold up.  I’ve been out for seven years, and you probably outrank me by now anyway.”

“Okay, ‘Dewey.’  What happened to our prisoner, back in the trailer?  The Legion lieutenant.  After we left.”

The driver sighed, grimaced and slowly shook his head.  “I was afraid you were going to ask.  I won’t bullshit you, Boone.  Yeah, I shot him.  Well, what did you expect, leaving him like that?  He was too hot, he was radioactive as hell.  He might have led to my whole network being rolled up and wiped out.  It’s shaky enough as it is, without taking chances.  People’s lives are at stake, and they depend on me.  Anyway, I’ve got nobody in this area who could have looked after him, and I sure couldn’t just let him go.  Don’t worry, there won’t be any blowback.  Your hummer and the lieutenant are both going to disappear.  I do have somebody who can at least take care of that for me.  By tonight, that hummer and the lieutenant will be gone from the planet.  Poof—erased.  There won’t be a screw or a fingernail left.  Guaranteed.”

The road had almost no traffic as it wound up and down gentle rural hills.  On a straight section, the driver pulled an unlabeled pint bottle of clear liquid from the map pocket in his door.  “I pass these out to guards at checkpoints.  The Mexican troops understand
la mordida
.  You know, friendly little bribes.  Being a loveable drunk is part of my
schtick
.  How can a friendly drunk have evil intentions?  They could give a shit less about my drinking and driving—hell, that’s a Mexican tradition.  It’s just an act anyway…sort of.  Yeah, they’re always glad to see Dewey Liebermann’s truck coming—the bottles are small enough to slip into the leg pockets of their uniforms.  And that’s no accident.” 

He unscrewed the cap and took a deep pull of the local corn whisky.  “You know, Boone, I’m glad I didn’t have time to get to know your lieutenant.  I did it quick.  He didn’t see it coming, and I didn’t have time to think about it too much.  I was leading him from the trailer with a rope leash tied to his hands.  He thought he was going back to the hummer.  That’s what I told him.  I told him I kept the sack on his head because I didn’t want him to see me, so he couldn’t identify me later.  That gave him some hope, right at the end.  Anyway, thanks for leaving him with a sack over his head.  I don’t need another one visiting me at oh-dark-thirty.  I’ve already got too goddamn many ghosts running around my head as it is.”  The curly-haired driver took another drink.

“How was he, on his way out?”  Boone asked this in a hushed voice, staring ahead at the pastoral countryside.  The last traces of snow were almost gone, except for a few north-facing slopes.

The driver sighed again, exhaling slowly.  “Oh, he was almost sobbing, kind of choking up, but he couldn’t talk since you left him gagged.  I think he cheered up just a little right at the end, when I told him why I didn’t want him seeing my face.  I hope so.  But the truth is…I didn’t want to see
his
face.”  The driver took another swig of the corn liquor, looked out the left window, and handed the bottle across to his passenger without turning to face him.

Boone took his own long drink of the burning liquid.  After coughing and clearing his throat, he said, “I didn’t mean to stick that job on you.  I would have done it myself, but the young guy in the back had a big problem with the idea.  Doug’s okay, but he’s touchy about shooting prisoners.  He’s sensitive that way.  He actually wanted me to let the lieutenant go.  Just let him go, if he promised to leave Tennessee and go home to Texas.  Can you imagine?  Doug has a good heart…too good for this kind of work.  He’s just a draftee, an engineering soldier from Fort Leonard Wood.  He never wanted any of this.  I picked him up as a stray after the second earthquake.  He does his best, he really does.  He went through some seriously bad shit after the quakes, and, well, I thought it would be good if he could believe that the lieutenant was going to be kept alive.  He’ll sleep better, thinking that.  That’s worth something, right?  Why put this heavy shit on him?  So thanks for taking care of it for me.” 

Boone took another long drink, the burning whisky gurgling down, leaving the pint more than half empty.  “Sar’nt…this part of it is something that I really hate.  I don’t mind killing them in anger, hell, I enjoy it sometimes, and I’ll admit it.  You should have seen us last night; man, we just tore them up!  But I hate getting to know them first.  Up close, face to face, that’s the worst.  Sometimes it’s hard for me not to just get drunk and stay drunk, with some of the things I remember.  Mannville, oh my God…that’s going to stick with me.  Here, you better put this shit away.”  He handed the pint bottle back to the driver.

“Boone, I understand, completely.  But it’s hard enough just staying alive in this business, without the added complication of prisoners.  How did you guys wind up taking a prisoner anyway?”