The Informationist: A Thriller (27 page)

Elbows to the spongy ground, they moved deeper into the bush. Munroe had a guess as to where they were, but only a guess, and when she was certain there was no way to be seen from the banks, she rolled to the side and motioned for Beyard to lead. The unmistakable hiss of a Gaboon viper sounded not far from her head. She remained motionless and after what seemed an eternity cautiously rolled back. The snake’s venom could kill in fifteen minutes, and civilization was a hell of a lot farther than that.

A staccato of gunfire sounded from the way they’d come, and then silence. They crawled forward a foot at a time, listening and then moving again. If the soldiers had followed them into the gully, they had not found the area where they’d entered the bush; all sounds of pursuit had
moved in other directions. Another round of gunfire disturbed the canopy, farther away than the previous burst and far enough in the distance that no voices could be heard.

They moved from their stomachs to a crouch and, as they covered distance and the silence deepened, to a full walk. And then thirst and time became the enemies.

It would have been different during the rains, when red clay mud would ooze through their clothes, into their hair, across their faces, and would sting when it mixed with sweat and dripped into their eyes and the taste of it filled their mouths. It would have coated their skin and worked as camouflage and kept the biting insects at bay. And the rain that transmogrified the clay into mud would have been plentiful and easily quenched their thirst. But the rains had begun to dissipate weeks ago.

At some point in the hours of the nocturnal morning, when the silence was deepest, when the calls of the night jungle had stilled, and before the predawn awakening, they made it back to the guesthouse. They’d utilized the dirt road for the last kilometer, hanging tight to the edge in case they needed to disappear into the foliage. They had maneuvered past one checkpoint, the typical ragtag group of warriors, several of them drunk and passed out, the others half dozing. Beyond that, no sign of military.

Their thirst was nearly unbearable, and by the light of a near-full moon they maneuvered skillfully through the kitchen to water. They drank in rapid gulps, water dribbling down their faces streaking the grime and dirt, a strange form of war paint, and when Munroe could drink no more, she searched for a paper clip, wire, anything she could use to open the handcuff lock or work as a shim. She found nothing. Those were items so familiar in the West, that other world.

Beyard left for the bedroom and then returned, cuffs off, and placed a key in her palm. She released the lock. “Thanks,” she said, and in one drawn-out movement slapped the mud-crusted cuffs around his wrists and pulled the pistol out of the small of her back.

She leveled it at his head.

B
eyard’s eyes found hers, and even in the dark it was evident that his face registered shock.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

His words came in a garbled, half-choked whisper that held no control or calm.

“I don’t want to kill you,” Munroe said, “but I’ll blow your fucking head right off if I have to.” She kicked a chair toward him. “Sit.”

He did as he was told, and it was clear that he did it out of confusion and an attempt to understand rather than because of any genuine fear. She pulled the penlight from her pocket, aimed it at his right eye, and stood in front of him just beyond his reach. “I consider you a personal and strategic threat,” she said. “I’m tired, hungry, and mad as hell, so don’t try my patience. I want answers, and I want the truth, even if you think it’ll piss me off. I haven’t got time to waste, and lies, distortions, and half-truths will only cause this to end with you dead and me gone.”

Beyard squinted at the light and shifted away from it. “I’ve never lied to you,” he said.

“There have been omissions,” she said. “Do you take me for an idiot?”

She waited for a moment, allowed silence to fill the room, and studied
his eyes and the shifting tension of his face for the invisible cues that would betray his deception. “When was the last time you spoke with Boniface?”

The corners of Beyard’s mouth twitched slightly, and he turned his head to the side. He took a shallow breath, and in the split second it took for him to bring his eyes straight at her, her suspicions were confirmed.

“If this is about Akambe,” Beyard said, “I’m speechless.”

“Answer the fucking question.”

“About two weeks ago.”

“He told you that I was heading to Malabo.”

Bravado shifted to discomfort. There was a pregnant pause. “Yes.”

“He gave you pictures, didn’t he? You sent people to follow me, to watch my movements.”

A deep inhalation and then, “Yes.”

“And you had me drugged and taken out to the boat to be killed.”

“No.”

The tightness in his face and inflection in his voice said truth; she raised the weapon as if to fire and said, “You’re lying.”

“Vanessa, I swear it,” he said. “I had nothing to do with what happened to you on the boat. When I spoke with Boniface, he told me he’d worked papers for you and that you were moving in the direction of Malabo. At first I felt only anger—I wanted to hurt you. And then I was curious, wanted to know what you were like, why you were here, what you were doing. I was afraid to see you personally, didn’t know how I would react. So I had you followed.”

Munroe shook her head slowly. “ ‘Misplaced trust can be a dangerous thing,’ ” she said. “Those words meant something, though I didn’t know it at the time. All this while, at any point, you could have told me—given me the information I needed to make the connection—and you didn’t. And now twice in the past week I’ve been taken at gunpoint by the same group of men, and you’re the only connection between those events,” she said. “They never asked to see my ID, never even got a good look at me. Explain that.”

“I’m as puzzled and confused by it as you are,” he said. “What? You think I planned that? Pretend I’m about to get my own head blown off right beside you? What a fucking stratagem that would have been.
It wasn’t just you almost killed out there today. At this point I want answers almost as badly as you do.”

“What about Malabo?” she said. “Your bumbling idiots disappeared right before I was dragged off.”

“It was coincidence,” he said. “I swear, I had nothing to do with that. No matter how angry I was with you—to kill you? No, Vanessa, I could not do that.” He paused and looked at her with a sly smile. “I’ve known what you are capable of. If I hated you that much, I would have done the job myself, made sure it was done properly—not hired some half-assed group of fuckups to do it for me.” He paused, and when Munroe said nothing, he continued. “When I heard that you had purchased tickets for Bata, I told my guys to pack up shop and to notify me when you’d left town. It was only the next day, when you weren’t on that plane, that I knew something had happened—what exactly was anybody’s guess. Among the possibilities was that you’d gone to the GEASA office as a ruse and that your true destination was somewhere else.”

Munroe stepped closer and, standing directly in front of him, pressed the muzzle of the gun under his chin and forced his head back. She moved behind him, tracing the weapon against his neck as she went. His eyes followed, although his head did not move. She continued until the muzzle was at the base of his skull and she stood an arm’s length behind him.

“Emily Burbank,” she said. “How much of the information that you’ve fed me is accurate?”

“I have never lied to you,” he said. “What would be the point in that?”

“You did see her three years ago in Bata?”

“Yes.”

“The information given to us by Salim and supposedly said by the other two friends of yours—was it genuine?”

“All true as far as I know. I had an idea that they might have seen the girl. That’s why we went there.”

At the tail end of the explanation, Munroe heard the inaudible, words that shouldn’t be. She took a deep breath and for a brief second tilted her head toward the ceiling. “Francisco,” she said, her voice soft and singsong, “I can smell the omission, taste it, touch it. What are you not telling me?”

He was silent.

“I need to get moving, so say what you’re going to say. Or don’t.” She punched his head forward with the gun. “Whether you live or die—your choice.”

He sighed. It was a deep breath, and in the exhale came the sound of defeat by the inevitable, finality, as if by whatever he was to say next he executed his own death and was willing to accept it as it was. “When I saw the girl in Bata three years ago,” he said, “I recognized the men she was with. I know who they are and where to find them.”

In a silent scream, Munroe clenched her teeth and kicked the back of the chair, nearly knocking him out of it. “You fucking almost got us killed,” she hissed. “For nothing! Goddamn it, Francisco, you knew! What the hell could the point of today possibly have been? You fucking knew!”

“I wanted to be sure the information I had was up-to-date.”

The explanation wasn’t right, it didn’t fit. Even with her judgment clouded by fury, she knew it.

“That’s bullshit!” she said. Then she took a deep breath and, monotone, in a near whisper, said, “I’d love to kiss you right now, stroke your hair and tell you how sorry I am to have to do this.” She moved one carefully placed foot at a time until she was once again standing in front of him. “You’ve meant more to me than any other person I know,” she said, and raised the gun to his forehead. “Good-bye, Francisco.”

His voice cracked, and in a half scream he yelled, “Wait!” And then, just above a whisper, “Goddamn it, Vanessa, what the hell do I have to do to prove to you that I’m telling the truth?”

“You haven’t told me all,” she said. “Killing you is a matter of self-preservation, Francisco. A necessary evil. No offense. I’m sure you’d do the same if the roles were reversed.”

He let out a long breath and then lowered his eyes. “How long is the assignment going to last?” he asked. “Two weeks, maybe three. Get in, get out, easy, simple. Well, maybe not as easy now, but I didn’t have a gauge on that this morning. When the assignment is over, what happens to you? You go back to your world, and I stay in mine. I have you only for as long as this project continues.” His eyes met hers, challenging.
“Given that scenario, why don’t you give me a reason not to go into Bata?”

However pathetic, it was the truth she’d needed to snap events into focus. She moved the light out of his eyes and shut it off. “That is the most lame-assed crap excuse I’ve heard in my life.” She flipped the safety and with a shove returned the gun to the small of her back. “What the hell were you thinking? You of all people should know better than to make tactical decisions based on emotion.” She took his wrists and released the cuffs. “Consider this payback for locking me in the cell on the ship.”

He sat still on the chair and stared at her, rubbing his wrists where the handcuffs had been. “Even a grand master makes a mistake now and then,” he said. He looked up. “I don’t know whether to kiss you or smack you.”

She crossed her arms and stared. “I swear, Francisco, if I find that you’ve double-crossed me, you’re a dead man. I will hunt you down, and there is nothing you or any one of your men could do to keep me from fulfilling that vow.”

“I’ll admit I haven’t been completely straight,” he said. “I should have told you about tracking you in Malabo, and I shouldn’t have withheld information about the girl, but beyond that I’ve done nothing to sabotage your work. I don’t give a shit about your assignment or this girl that you’re trying to find, but I do want you alive, and I’d like you with me for as long as possible. Is that good enough for you?”

“For now.”

“And you might as well know that I haven’t been able to get in contact with one of my guys since the night you were shot. He’s possibly one of the two passing your photo around Bata, although I swear I have nothing to do with that.” Beyard continued to rub his wrists. “Were you really going to kill me?”

“I don’t know. At the least I would have left you here and taken the boat to Cameroon.”

She moved across the house toward the bathroom, and he followed. Her fingers ran along the doorframe until she found a grip. Beyard stood behind and remained silent while she separated the segment from the wall, pulled the container from its hiding place, and slid the belt out.

“How would you take the boat?” he asked. “You don’t have the key.”

She strapped the belt around her waist and tucked it under her pants. “I wouldn’t need one any more than you would,” she said. “But even so, I could get it if I wanted.” She looked off in the distance toward the main house. “It’s in there.”

“Antonia doesn’t know where it is.”

“She knows which rooms you frequent the most, and thanks to you”—Munroe knocked on the wood in her hands and then shoved the frame back into place—“I know where to look.”

Beyard opened his mouth to say something, and stopped. He nodded in the direction of the main house. “Let’s go.”

I
N THEIR ABSENCE
the cig had been refueled, and it carried enough additional fuel in storage to make the trip twice. The noise of the engine shattered the silence, and Beyard guided the boat away from its mooring. When they were on open water, he placed a small box in Munroe’s hand. “Truce,” he said. “A gesture of goodwill—without it I’m lost from my ship, and I’m giving it to you because I trust you and hope that you trust me. When you activate it, we’ll get our coordinates and George will know we’re on our way in.”

To the east the color of the sky had shifted from star-studded black to deepest blue. By the time they coasted alongside the trawler, the sun had fully climbed into its arc across the sky. On the deck Wheal nodded at Munroe and grasped Beyard’s hand with both of his. “Didn’t expect you back so soon,” he said.

Beyard reached for a hose that lay curled against a wall a few feet away. “We ran into a few problems,” he said, and cranked the tap, hosing himself off, shoes, clothes, and all, the force of the water carrying with it the mud and gunk of the previous twenty hours. Dripping wet, he handed the hose to Munroe, and to Wheal he said, “We’ll be up in the wheelhouse in ten minutes. Will you meet us there?”