Guardian of Lies (34 page)

Nitikin checked the clock. They were closing in on nineteen minutes.

“Ready?”

Tomas nodded.

“Go ahead.”

The Colombian reached over with the tongs and aligned the base end of the projectile with the muzzle of the gun’s barrel. It passed through the opening until the neoprene gasket reached the muzzle. Tomas tried to force it. The tongs slipped on the slick, soft uranium.

“Don’t. Stop,” said Yakov.

Tomas eased off.

“Do you have it? Can you hold it?”

“
Sí
. I think so.”

The neoprene on the brass rings was designed to compress against the inside of the barrel. But as Yakov looked at it he realized that the first ring, toward the base of the projectile, was jammed in the muzzle at a slight angle.

“Do you think you can ease it out?” said Nitikin. He took hold of the tube of the barrel with both hands as Tomas tried to lift the projectile out. The tongs began to slip.

“Stop.” Nitikin was afraid that if Tomas lost his grip with the tongs, the projectile might come loose from its own weight and topple onto the anvil and the uranium target.

“Don’t push it, just hold it steady,” said Yakov. “Give me a moment to get the tool.”

The tool was a two-foot-long steel ramrod with a conically shaped concave tip. It was formed precisely to fit the bullet tip on the projectile.

As soon as Nitikin could grab the ramrod, he would be able to grasp the uranium bullet by its pointed end. Then he could use the leverage of the ramrod to line it up and push it with uniform pressure down the barrel. After that, he and Tomas could button up in less than thirty seconds, slip in the safety disk, and close the entire gun assembly inside its lead-lined bomb case. The case was designed to shield the radiation in the gun from the outer electronic components, including the detonator. Once the lead case was sealed, you could safely approach the bomb without protective gear.

Yakov scanned the hut quickly, turning his head and peering through the fogged lens of his hood searching for the ramrod. He didn’t see it. Then he remembered. He had handed it to one of Alim’s men that morning when they were setting up. He’d asked the interpreter to tell the man to carry it to the hut. The idiot hadn’t done it.

Nitikin looked through the window. He could see Alim down on one knee, the technician, the interpreter, and Alim’s cronies all huddled around him under the trees a hundred meters away. He grabbed the walkie-talkie, turned it on, and shouted into the mouthpiece, “The ramrod I handed to your man this morning. Where is it? We need it now!”

He watched through the window as the message was translated for Alim and his men. Afundi got to his feet, turned, and looked at one of them. The man turned up his palms, shrugged his shoulders, and shook his head. Then he suddenly turned his head to the right and pointed. Nitikin followed the trajectory of the man’s outstretched arm and finger to a tree perhaps thirty yards away. There against the trunk of the tree, propped up, was the two-foot-long steel ramrod.

“Get it now! Bring it here!” Yakov screamed into the walkie-talkie. He watched as Alim looked at the man and pointed toward the tree. The man shook his head. He took two steps backward, his hands held out, palms open. He was refusing to take the ramrod to the hut, afraid of the radiation.

“Hurry,” said Tomas. “I cannot hold it much longer.”

Nitikin watched in stark silence as Alim pulled something from his belt. There was a spray of red from the man’s head, followed a second later by the report of the shot as the man’s legs turned to rubber and he collapsed to the ground. Alim quickly turned the gun on one of his other followers. This time the man ran as fast as his legs could carry him to the tree, grabbed the ramrod, and raced toward the hut as if he were running an Olympic trial.

Yakov turned to Tomas. “Try and hold on. One moment. It’s coming.”

“Hurry!” cried Tomas.

Nitikin opened the door, struggled to run in the heavy lead suit and meet the man with the ramrod partway. He was maybe thirty feet from the hut when a loud hum and a brilliant cobalt flare enveloped him from behind. The man running toward him tried to shield his eyes from the flash with his free hand, but it was too late. Nitikin knew instantly that both Tomas and the man with the ramrod were dead. It was but a matter of time. He wondered if the lead suit and the distance he had put between himself and the device in the seconds before the dragon whipped its tail might have saved his own life.

Just before seven in the evening, Herman and I meet for dinner in the covered patio downstairs at the Sportsmens Lodge.

Herman has checked the public hallway outside our rooms. There was nothing emitting a signal, no listening devices or micro-cams installed, though Herman’s room was bugged and his phone tapped.

Herman brought with him the encrypted cellular phone. He’s found a place to hide it inside the wall behind an air-conditioning register over the bed in his room.

I spend a few minutes in a crowded section of the bar with one ear covered by my hand, the other pressed to the phone talking to Harry back in San Diego.

Harry tells me that he stopped in to see Katia at the hospital in the early afternoon. The sedation had worn off and, according to Harry, she seemed more alert. But still she did not communicate. Harry has found a local neurologist to examine her and perform the duties as treating physician. According to the doctor, Katia is suffering from severe depression in addition to the physical trauma. He explained that this was not unusual given all that she has been through. Harry tells me the doctor is treating her with antidepressant medication and that the marshal’s service is examining every pill and keeping a close eye on her through the hospital staff.

“Considering the fact that Templeton thinks you helped her plunge the knife into Pike, I suppose you can’t blame them,” says Harry.

“I know the phone is encrypted, but maybe we can find something a little less titillating for the government for you and me to talk about.”

“How about the items in question?” says Harry. He means Katia’s camera and the pictures from Colombia.

“Give us time. We just got here.”

“You said less than a week and you’d be back,” says Harry.

“I said I would try.”

“Did you call her mother’s cell phone?” I ask him.

“I did. I called twice this afternoon. I couldn’t understand the Spanish message, but it was the same as all the other times when I called. The message came on after one ring, which I am guessing means the phone is turned off. I’d say she’s not there. Where are you? It sounds like a party,” says Harry.

“I’m in the bar downstairs at the hotel.”

“I thought so. You owe me a vacation when you get back,” he says. “By the way, I’ve run into a snag with the nurse you wanted to hire. The hospital says the doctor’s fine, but they’re not sure about the nurse. They’re worried about liability. They say if she screws up and the patient suffers, they’re afraid the hospital may be on the hook.”

“What did you tell them?”

“I told them the nurse is just gonna hold Katia’s hand, talk to her in Spanish, and maybe slap the marshal once in a while. I promised them that she wouldn’t be dishing up any meds or doing any surgery, at least not right away.”

“And what did they say?”

“What does any hospital say? They have to check with the administrator who in turn will call the local legal brain trust, which means that by noon tomorrow we’ll be told that the nurse is out.”

“Stop with the negative brain waves,” I tell him. “We could always dress her up in civilian clothes and call her a relative. If the nurse won’t do it, we can find a Spanish-speaking female PI. We just want a warm body in the room, somebody to keep an eye on Katia.”

“Three shifts a day?” says Harry. “That’s a lot of relatives for somebody who’s in the country on a visa.”

“Yeah, well, it is Southern California, and we are only ten minutes from the border.”

“If I listen to you, Rhytag’s gonna have half the local nurses’ registry on ice with immigration within a week. Let me think about it,” says Harry.

“Where are you right now?” I ask.

“If you really want to know, I’m in my backyard standing under a tree in my underwear.”

“You’re kidding.”

“I wish I was. I tried to call you twice. Your phone was turned off. I was on the john when you called. I thought it best that I step outside since half the federal workforce is listening in every time I pass gas or flush the toilet.”

I tell him about the rooms being wired and the attempt by the feds to grab the phone at the airport.

“Don’t change the subject,” says Harry. “You’re still the one down there in a bar with all the squealing voices in the background, while I’m standing around my yard in boxer shorts.”

“I’m just telling you to keep an eye on your cell phone. They’ll snatch it if they can.”

“At the moment it’s tied to a string around my naked neck,” he says. “You know, the thought has crossed my mind that for the moment at least, I don’t need your help to send Rhytag up the flagpole. All I have to do is sit in the conference room and let them listen to one half of an encrypted telephone conversation. And I don’t need a phone to do it.”

“I understand. You’re not happy. I owe you big-time when I get back.”

“Don’t get me wrong,” he says. “I’m not trying to put any pressure on you. It’s just that if you’re not back here by next Tuesday, the FBI’s gonna be digging up your backyard with a backhoe looking for Nitikin’s bones in the barrel right next to the one holding Jimmy Hoffa. So if you treasure your tulips, you’ll be here.”

“What you’re saying is, don’t waste my time talking on the phone.”

“Right.”

“It’s been fun. Let’s do it again tomorrow night, same time, same place. Wear clothes,” I tell him.

“Leave your phone on,” says Harry.

I punch the button and the line goes dead. The last thing we need is a ringing telephone in the air-conditioning duct over Herman’s bed.

We finish dinner and trek back toward our rooms.

“Be sure and bring your set of picks.”

“Already got ’em,” says Herman. “In my pocket.”

“Ten o’clock sharp. Let’s put the phone back behind the register just in case we run into problems. It’ll be safer there.”

We split up just outside the door to my room. I kill twenty minutes running an empty shower, then leave the noise from the television on until nine thirty, when I turn off the lights and sit in the dark in the chair against the window, the curtains drawn. Every few minutes I check to see if there are any new vehicles parked on the small lane at the back of the hotel. I can see only part of the road, but there is almost no traffic on the narrow stretch of pavement that flanks the zoo. I hear a faint scratch like fingernails brushing the other side of the door to my room. I check my watch. It’s ten o’clock on the dot.

With my running shoes in one hand, I cross the hardwood floor in stocking feet and quietly turn the dead bolt, opening the door. Herman is outside in the hall, his back against the wall, leaning over tying the laces on his shoes.

I silently close the door behind me and join him against the wall, slipping the shoes on my feet.

Neither of us utters a word until we pass through the bar, go down the stairs toward the service area, and are out the door onto the street that borders the zoo.

Herman uses a small piece of duct tape to hold back the spring-loaded bolt on the lock, and then tapes a few thicker pieces onto the edge of the door to wedge it closed. He will have to use a knife to pry it open on the way back. The thick green wooden door has no handle on the outside.

We start to hoof it down the street.

“I hope you know where you’re going,” said Herman.

“I think I can find it.”

The written description given to me by Katia used the name of a local hospital three blocks away, Hospital Calderon Guardia, as the principal point of reference for finding houses or businesses in the area. The directions would lead you to the street where the house was located. Then it would describe the residence with particularity, such as “
casa blanca, segundo a la derecha,
” the white house, second on the right. It made perfectly good sense once you understood the system, though FedEx was out of luck on home delivery unless they could follow the trail of bread crumbs to your front door.

Half a block down, along the fence bordering the zoo, the thick overhead canopy of trees turned the lane into a dark tomb. By now the last streetlight is well behind us, above the green wooden door to the lodge. Ahead is nothing but blackness and the exotic sounds of the bush beyond the fence off to our left. Suddenly there is a guttural, low growl that is unmistakable, and not far off.

“When the woman at the counter said it wasn’t safe to walk at night, I thought she was talkin’ about the locals.” Herman is laughing. “Not some lion who’s gonna be pickin’ his teeth with my tibia because we took a wrong turn at the zoo.”

“Let’s hope he’s on the other side of the fence.”

Herman pulls a Mini Maglite from his pocket, twists the lens, and gives us a narrow beam of light on the pavement so we don’t break our necks.

“You think the light’s gonna scare him?”

“I hear they’re afraid of fire,” he says.

“Fire is a match. He’d swallow that like a Twinkie.”

“I’m not scared,” says Herman. “All I have to do is outrun you.”

“You can’t fool me. I saw your dinner—two steaks and four eggs. If that poor thing is out on the road, we both know who’s gonna get eaten and it won’t be me. All I want is the fur for the floor in front of my fireplace,” I tell him.

“Here we are arguing and it’s the FBI who’s in trouble,” he says. “How are they gonna explain how the two Americans they were tailing got eaten by a lion behind their hotel, one of them a lawyer, and they didn’t even get pictures?”

“You’re right. Maybe we should have just stepped out the front and asked them for a lift.”

“How do we know they won’t be waiting for us when we get to the house?”