The Detonators (36 page)

“Breakfast! Who cares about food—”

Sanderson interrupted Molly’s shrill protest. “They generally come around seven in the morning, sir.”

I looked at my watch. “Well, it’s two a.m. now; that gives us time for a little sleep. But let’s figure out a few things first.”

“I couldn’t possibly sleep!” Molly drew a long, shuddery breath. “I’m sorry! I guess I wasn’t cut out to be a heroine. Ever since my… since Brennerman was k-killed like that… I thought I could take it, and I did for a while, but all this nightmare stuff is wearing me down! When do you think they’ll…”

“When will they blow us up?” I hesitated. “Well, I think the first general meeting of the Nassau conference is scheduled for the day after tomorrow, in the morning. I should think our friends here would wait until the delegates are all together in one place—I suppose the PNP will make some kind of a dramatic announcement to let them know the show is about to begin. Take over the PA system in the conference hall, or something. Which means we have a day to wait. They’ll probably feed us this morning, being kindly folks at heart, and maybe they’ll give us lunch; after that they’ll most likely be too busy getting themselves a safe distance away in their boats, maybe out at sea, maybe off in the farther islands. Upwind, of course. They’ll want to be able to set off their gadget by remote control when they get the radio word from Nassau that their audience is ready, without any risk of being hit by either the blast or the fallout. And why waste food on prisoners who won’t live long enough to digest it, anyway?”

“Do you
have
to say things like that?” Molly asked bitterly.

“Saying or not saying doesn’t change anything,” I said. “Now tell me how they bring the food. Is it the two men we’ve already seen; and how do they work it? If one’s carrying a tray, he can’t be holding a gun, too; does he leave it behind or does he sling it over his back or shoulder? Where does the other one usually cover him from?…” After I had it all straight, I said to Sanderson, “It’s too bad they saw you sitting up just now, but I suppose you’ve been vertical before, between relapses.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Well, you’re just about to have another bout of pitiful unconsciousness. When they come in, you’ll be lying there dead to the world; or maybe moaning and twitching a bit, if you think that’s more convincing. As for you…” I turned to the girl. “Are you subject to acute attacks of modesty, Mrs. Brennerman?”

She licked her lips. “I don’t understand. What do you want me to do?”

When I told her, she blushed bright red and couldn’t look at me for a little. Then she nodded bravely.

At six-thirty, I made the preparations. I laid out the props in artistic disarray on the floor of the cell, starting with the not very interesting part of the exhibit: one masculine shirt, mine. That was followed by the feminine display: one pair of not very clean white nylon panties, one pair of quite grimy white linen shorts, and one soiled blue T-shirt with a cutie-pie slogan across the front. There was no brassiere, which was too bad. A discarded bra, properly arranged, is always an attention-grabber, at least when you’re dealing with a male audience. Well, you can’t have everything.

The girl was sitting on the end of the cot nearest the door, watching me set the scene. Initially, she’d been very self-conscious about her nudity, but she was getting over it. I hadn’t realized what a fine body had been concealed by the prison-bedraggled clothes. It was a stronger and more generously feminine figure than some I’d seen lately, but the waist was slim enough that, nude, she gave no real impression of sturdiness or plumpness. The breasts were bold and lovely.

“Well?” Molly said, a little stiffly. “If you’re going to stare, you might at least say something nice.”

“You mean like: Wow!”

She grinned abruptly. “Something like that. A girl likes a little appreciation when she sacrifices her ladylike modesty… Matt?”

“Yes?”

“Are we… going to kill them?” Her grin had faded as quickly as it had come.

“Yes, ma’am. If they’ll let us. That’s the point of the exercise.”

“I’m not sure that I can.”

“That’s all right. It’s my specialty; leave it to me. Just keep your man busy long enough to let me get back from dealing with his partner, and I’ll take care of him. Between the two of you, you should be able to manage. How are you feeling, Ricardo?”

“I’m all right.” The boy lying on the far bed was, unlike me, a gentleman. He was keeping his eyes carefully averted from the naked girl sitting on the near bed so as not to embarrass her. “I’ll be all right,” he repeated firmly, so I knew he was feeling rocky and might leave us again at any moment.

I said to both, of them, “Remember, you’re not plugging for your Boy Scout merit badge in unarmed combat. Sportsmanship will get you nowhere. Smash his balls with your knee, dig his eye out with your thumb, chew his ear off with your teeth. Just keep him occupied and hurting while I dispose of the other one; and drop on the word… Here we go, they’re a little early this morning. Places, everybody!”

Somebody was unfastening and opening the deck hatch over the aft end of the passage outside. Ricardo turned his battered face to the wall and curled up in the fetal position, giving a practice groan. Molly let herself fall back onto her cot with her legs apart, dangling from the knees. As I knelt before her, I felt her hands in my hair, caressing me, pulling my head down… While the basic plan had been mine, the detailed execution was all hers. She’d pointed out that I’d be able to react much more quickly from a kneeling position before her than a prone position on top of her. So what about, instead of faking the act itself—my idea—letting us be caught indulging in a little mouthy foreplay preliminary to the main bout; what did I think? She’d been flushed and embarrassed as she’d proposed this strategy, but quite serious: if we were going to put on such a creepy, shameless, cold-blooded performance, we might as well do it right…

I’ll have to admit that my heart wasn’t in it—well, let’s call it heart. Actually, I was embarrassed. After all, I hardly knew the lady and wasn’t sure I really liked her. As I nuzzled her breasts and worked my way down her. abdomen toward the critical zone with suitable kisses and caresses, I had very little of the proper reaction, if you want to call it proper. I was too busy listening to the approaching footsteps resounding metallically outside and coming to a stop, listening to the scratching of somebody trying to find the keyhole and missing with his first try, listening to the click of the bolt and the creak of the old unlubricated hinges as the door swung open. Molly’s naked body arched passionately under my touch.

“Ah, don’t stop, don’t stop!” she moaned.

I wasn’t doing anything all that stimulating; but apparently the girl was a real trouper. I heard sudden coarse male laughter from the doorway. Heavy footsteps approached me from behind. A hand grabbed me by the shoulder and flung me aside. I let myself be flung, leaving the girl lying there totally exposed.

It was a comedy routine, really. They were grown men—I won’t say adults—but you’d have thought they’d never before seen a nude woman with her knees apart. A couple of real clowns. The one who’d pulled me away, the big blond one, just stood there gawking lecherously. The other one was having his look, too, licking his lips; and the payoff was that he was supposed to be covering the situation with his gun while the other man carried the food, but actually he had the machine pistol in one hand while the other hand was burdened with the tray his partner had wished off on him before hurrying forward to partake of the goodies on display. It was almost too easy. You’re supposed to let the ducks get a little ways off the water before you shoot them.

Then the big gent whose name I’d never learned took a step forward dazedly, like a man in a happy pornographic dream, and bent over the inviting lady on the bed—who instantly threw her bare arms around his neck, hauled his head down, and sank her nice white teeth into his ear. It was a pleasure to meet a girl who wasn’t too proud to accept suggestions. At the same time Ricardo landed on top of them. I was aware of all this only peripherally, because I’d scrambled up from where I’d been thrown and hurled myself at the dark little man called Jesperson.

The impact carried us both out the open door. Our breakfasts, whatever they might have been, went flying all over the passage outside. Jesperson lay half-stunned for a moment, having been thrown hard against the far wall. It was long enough for me, on top, to drive into his throat the little belt-buckle knife that had been overlooked when I’d been frisked earlier. I groped for the machine pistol with the other hand and found it.

There was a sudden end to farce; blood in large quantities has a way of washing the humor out of any situation. The last vestige of comedy vanished when, still trying instinctively to cling to his weapon even as his life pumped out from the severed carotid artery, the man beneath me managed to trigger off a burst, filling the small space with a brief madness of screaming lead.

I felt something rap me on the back of the head as I flattened myself beside the dying man—the dead man now, I saw, as I scrambled to my feet with the submachine gun in my hands. Blood was running down the back of my neck, maybe brains, too; but there was no time for investigation. I lunged back into our cell and saw that Ricardo was down. They were all on the floor; but the big man still had the naked girl firmly attached to him, her legs around his body, one arm firmly around his neck, her teeth still clamped in his ear, while her free hand worked busily at clawing his face to ribbons. There was blood running down her bare back from what looked like a knife-slash and was probably a graze from a ricochetting 9mm bullet.

“Drop!” I shouted. “Molly, get clear!”

She heard me through the haze of battle, released all holds, and rolled away. Confused, the big man came to his knees, half-blind with blood, his face a torn and gory mask. I hadn’t had time to figure out the weapon I held and switch it to the single-shot mode, if available. I simply hit the trigger briefly, and the gun stuttered three times, putting all three into the broad chest where, thank God, they stayed instead of penetrating to bounce and splatter against the steel wall behind him.

Well, maybe I could have been a great humanitarian and, having the drop on him, ripped up the bedding and tied him up alive for safekeeping; but while I was doing that, what else would have been happening? Even as it was, I was too late. With the gun in my hands, I dashed out the cell door and down the passage. I was reaching for the ladder when the deck hatch overhead was slammed shut by someone; I saw the clamps—dogs, I believe is the nautical word—rammed home, probably by Homer Allwyn himself. No sentimentalist he. He’d heard the shooting and guessed what was happening. He was containing the rebellion below, and to hell with his two men still down here.

I released the ladder and drew a long breath and felt the bloody back of my head. Something hard and sharp was embedded in my scalp. In didn’t feel fatal. I picked at it and pulled it out: a small, jagged scrap of bullet jacket. I threw it aside and looked down at the gun in my hands, a well-preserved German MP40 of World War II vintage, not as nicely made a firearm as the MP38 that preceded it, but much easier and cheaper to manufacture. It is an ugly beast. I’ve seen handsome rifles and truly lovely shotguns—the British make some real beauties—but I’ve never seen a good-looking machine pistol, although I’ll admit the old Thompson with the drum magazine had a certain brutal charm.

I frowned at the misshapen little killing machine I held, wondering if it was a clue. You’d have thought this well-heeled gang of world-savers would have equipped themselves with something more modern, say the ubiquitous Uzi; but they’d picked a well-tested and reliable, if elderly, piece of equipment, and maybe that was what counted. Or maybe it was just what happened to be available on the arms market the day they went shopping…

I awoke to the realization that there were still things to be done and I wasn’t doing them. Reaction, I guess. I checked the door at my elbow, the door to the main hold, where the big bang awaited the signal to blow this part of the Bahamas to radioactive hell. I discovered that there was a way of releasing the door clamps, dogs, whatever the nautical term may be, in emergencies, from the forward side, our side, with the proper tool to fit the hexagonal sockets. I saw the bracket that had held the tool tucked away behind the ladder leading up to the deck, but it was empty.

With sudden hope, I hurried back to the man whose throat I’d cut, remembering that there had been a cigarette-package-shaped bulge in the pocket of his khaki shirt. I got the cigarettes out gingerly, wiped my bloody fingers on his pants, and extracted the book of matches he had tucked inside the cellophane. I went forward and opened the heavy door at that end of the passage and used the matches to look inside. But Allwyn, or somebody, hadn’t missed any bets. There had been an emergency tool here, also; but while the bracket remained, that wrench, too, was gone. I determined that the only way out of this dark forward compartment filled with mysterious, decaying gear was back the way I’d come.

I returned to the body sprawled across the passage in a mess of blood and spilled food and excrement—he’d actually fired both barrels while dying, and the stench was overwhelming. I got two extra clips from the pouch on his belt. I retrieved my little knife, cleaned it, and returned it to its primary duty of helping to hold up my jeans. With the blade hidden inside the leather of the belt, it looked like a very ordinary buckle, as it was supposed to. Having taken care of the details out here, I stepped back into the cell, where the second dead man remained very dead. With three 9mm slugs in the chest there was no excuse for him not to. It’s not much of a cartridge for single-shot kills, but with multiple hits it will get the job done.

Molly was kneeling beside Ricardo Sanderson. She was fully dressed again, even to her shoes; and she’d already bled through her T-shirt back. That made two of us, after I’d pulled on my own shirt. Well, to hell with the gore.