Call Down Thunder Page 8

  ‘But you’ll help us.’

  ‘All right, I will, but if you wan’ my help, you finish sortin this place for me. I got business comin here.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Police,’ he grunted. ‘Who you think? One thing to run a few boats cross the border; something else to slap down a coastguard helicopter. The “man” is goin to be ragin when he come here, he goin to burn down everythin’ ’less I or Calde can give him reason not to.’

  ‘You pay him?’

  ‘Of course I pay. How you think I keep this business. This is the way it is.’

  ‘They won’t burn down the village!’ Reve said, suddenly worried. ‘That señor, he spoke to a captain—’

  ‘The captain he got in his pocket maybe keep Señor Moro safe and clean, but he not goin to worry ’bout what happen here—’

  ‘But Señor Moro is the one! We didn’t do anythin, just unload the boats . . .’

  Theon gave a humorless laugh and then his attention was caught by a flicker of movement up on the highway. He sounded more resigned than irritable now. ‘Here they come.’

  Reve could see them now too, coming down from the highway, snaking and bumping down the track, past the first straggle of huts, then past Calde’s stone house and his workshops. Three Jeeps. They didn’t look like they were in a hurry.

  Theon moved to the door. ‘If police don’t mess with what we got, I fix you ride on the truck tomorrow, early start. Tell your sister – that truck don’ wait around while she makes a sand garden.’

  ‘OK.’

  ‘I’ll give you a place I know where you can stay, an’ I’ll tell you how to find that man you want to see, but you be careful – he’ll skin you ’less you got something to give him. Let me think ’bout it. But right now, you finish up in here, then you stay out the back. If you hear a name get given by Calde to the police, you slip out and run to that man’s place, and you tell his family that the police comin for him. Give them time to get out the way. Maybe save something.’

  ‘You think this what Calde gonna do?’

  ‘Maybe.’

  Reve wondered where a man could run to in Rinconda. Then he thought, who would Calde give up to the police to save his own skin? He’d pick someone he didn’t like, someone who didn’t give him respect. ‘What if Tomas get named?’

  Theon took off his wire glasses and wiped them on his shirt tail. ‘Tomas take his chance . . . Don’t look at me like that, Reve. I don’t know what goin happen here. I just do what I can.’

  Three jeeps. Twelve policemen. Black uniforms, black helmets, black glasses, expressionless faces. A black-back hog was rooting round the cement-block shack opposite, pulling at a loose end of the plastic the family had used to roof their place.

  Theon went out on to his front porch. Reve noticed the way he rubbed his hands down the legs of his cotton trousers as if he was nervous but his voice was easy, as if the policeman was an old customer. ‘Lieutenant,’ he said, ‘you have a long drive from the city. Can I give you coffee, something to eat?’

  A young woman’s face appeared in the doorway of the shack opposite and then pulled back quickly. The hog grunted, tore off a strip of the plastic and trotted off trailing it behind him.

  The lieutenant nodded. ‘Coffee, Theon.’

  Theon clicked his fingers and Reve stepped back into the kitchen and put water on the stove. He took the notes Theon had given him and added them to the money he had in the canvas bag. He put the bag up on a shelf by the back door, where he could collect it later. He moved back to the kitchen doorway so he could see and listen.

  ‘Calde here already?’ the officer asked.

  ‘On his way.’

  ‘We have business.’

  ‘Of course.’

  The officer stepped down from the Jeep and then addressed the rest of his squad. ‘You know what you have to do,’ he said. His driver nodded and raised his hand, signalling the others to roll on after him, and then the Jeeps slowly moved off down towards the pier.

  The officer slapped the dust from his uniform and came up into the cantina and took off his peaked police cap.

  Reve took a step back and the policeman noticing him, said, ‘You, make the coffee strong and sweet. This boy work for you, Theon?’ He unbuttoned his jacket and sat down. ‘You are making good money, then, eh.’

  ‘Nothing change so much, lieutenant. You see for yourself. This is a poor place.’

  ‘But you still have business.’

  ‘An’ you get paid.’

  The lieutenant gave a short laugh. ‘Not enough to pay for a helicopter! You know how much one of them thing cost? More than you’re worth, more than this village, hundred village like this. What happen last night is on TV news already. You see that?’ Theon shook his head. ‘Big mess. And someone has to pay. Minister telephone the captain, captain telephone me, and here I am.’

  Reve placed the coffee in front of him.

  The lieutenant’s hair, like his uniform, his glasses and his boots, was shiny black. It was a little curly and oiled tight to his head. It smelt of something sweet and sickly. Reve could see the bevelled line in his hair where his police cap had pinched. He was not so old, this lieutenant, but how old do you have to be to become an important man, like an officer in the police? Reve didn’t know.

  The lieutenant leaned forward and sipped the sweetened coffee. ‘You have something for me?’ he asked Theon.

  ‘Of course.’ Theon gestured to Reve, and Reve slipped into the back kitchen, but he left the door slightly ajar.

  He saw Theon pull an envelope from his back pocket and put it on the table and the lieutenant touching it with his forefinger, raising the flap enough to see the notes inside. He didn’t bother to count them, but he leaned forward and began to talk to Theon in a low voice and Theon listened closely, nodding from time to time.

  At that moment there was a sudden burst of shouting in the distance, down by the pier and then the flat crack of a pistol shot. Reve felt a thump in his chest: LoJo wouldn’t do something stupid. No. Nor Tomas, not with policemen. Not this early in the day, not without a bellyful of rum.

  The lieutenant didn’t even look up. ‘The round-up, hey,’ he said. ‘Always someone needs a little persuasion.’ Theon nodded, but Reve saw the signal he made, held out behind him, the palm flattened, telling him clearly not to go anywhere, not yet.

  Then Calde walked into the cantina, in a clean blue button shirt and white cotton canvas trousers, looking like he was dressed for a wedding, except for the long panga knife he had hanging from his waist. He always carried that. Always liked to have something he could threaten with.

  Reve was surprised to see the lieutenant stand to shake Calde’s hand. Maybe Calde did more business with him than Theon. Even so, when Calde pulled a grubby envelope from his trouser pocket, the officer checked just as he had with Theon’s payment.

  ‘You think we pay you enough?’ Calde said bluntly, sitting down beside the lieutenant.

  The lieutenant shrugged. ‘We leave this place alone, unless you bring attention to yourself. What happened last night that was “calling attention”.’

  ‘Coastguard never fly this way. Never at night. Why they do that all of a sudden? You tell me that, lieutenant.’

  The lieutenant shook his head. ‘Maybe you got someone here who’s looking to spike your business. Someone who telephoned, gave information. I don’t know.’

  Calde looked at Theon. ‘You hear anything?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘A’right,’ said Calde. ‘Maybe we got an informer, a squeal-pig. We can root him out. But what goin happen now?’

  The lieutenant tapped his finger on the table. ‘We rough the place up a little and we pull in some of the village, four or five will do. Take them up to the Castle.’ He shrugged. ‘This is for the newspaper and for TV, so everyone can watch it all on the news. It doesn’t matter who they are. We hold them for a while and then, when the fuss has died down, we can let them go. I want one name, one
man who we can say is the one who shot down the chopper. A head on a plate. The one who take the rap for it all. You got someone you can give me?’

  Calde looked at Theon and then back at the lieutenant. ‘And you don’t touch my business, or Theon’s here?’

  Theon said, ‘What if we got no one to give?’

  ‘Of course,’ continued the lieutenant, ‘if you got no one to give me, I can take down the whole village. You want me to do that? My men all ready. Make good headlines, Theon: ELITE POLICE SQUAD BURNS DRUG VILLAGE. Good pictures . . .’

  Reve imagined the shacks burning, Arella blindly stumbling down on to the track, Ciele and her baby. Where would they all go? And the boats, would they burn them too?

  Calde leaned forward. ‘All right, we’ll do business, but if we do, you must give us the name of the informer we got in this place.’

  ‘If we hear, we’ll tell you.’

  ‘All right,’ Calde said again. ‘We got someone you can have. How about a beer, Theon?’

  Theon poured two beers. ‘Who you givin?’ he asked.

  Calde leaned back. ‘The Boxer pushin his luck last night.’

  Reve, watching from the doorway, kept very still.

  ‘You got the run of this place, but you leave Tomas out of your reckonin,’ said Theon.

  Calde shrugged. ‘All right, but you keep him in line, eh.’ He sipped his beer and then wiped his lips. ‘How about Pelo?’

  ‘You sure ’bout that?’ Theon’s face was a mask.

  ‘Why not? He take one of the boats back down to Paraloca.’ He turned towards the policeman. ‘You can pick him up when he come across the border. Easy. You want to make a show here, you mess his place. You want to make an arrest, arrest his woman. No, do me a favour . . .’ He leaned forward and lowered his voice. Reve couldn’t hear what he said, but the lieutenant laughed and he knew the laugh was bad, bad for Pelo, and for Ciele and for LoJo and the little baby girl, Mayash. It was all bad.

  ‘You’re a dog, Calde. What do you think, Theon? You think this man’s a dog.’

  ‘He’s a dog,’ Theon said.

  Reve knew he should run, right now, and tell Ciele, but he didn’t move. Theon would say something to stop this. He was sure he would.

  The policeman laughed again and Calde laughed too. It was the ugliest sound Reve had ever heard. Only one thing uglier – and that was Theon not saying anything. Calde rapped on the table for another beer and Theon pushed his chair back and then seeing Reve, he abruptly signalled him to bring over the jug.

  When Calde saw Reve carrying the beer his little pig eyes fixed on him and he said, ‘What’s Tomas’s runaround doing here, Theon?’

  ‘Working,’ Theon said. He nodded to Reve and Reve put the jug on the table, but as he did so Calde grabbed his wrist and pulled Reve towards him.

  ‘You one of these sneak rats?’ he said. His breath smelt of onion and Theon’s beer. ‘My nephew complain about you, you and your sister. What you say, runaround? You got a tongue in your head?’

  ‘Leave him, Calde. What you playin? He nothing to you.’

  Calde ignored Theon. Calde was the power in the village; Calde would do what he liked even with this policeman sitting here. ‘You open your mouth ’bout what you hear,’ he said to Reve, his pig eyes staring straight into Reve’s, ‘and I’ll cut your tongue!’ He let go Reve’s wrist and gave him a push.

  Reve staggered back a couple of steps but he didn’t scuttle off back to the kitchen as perhaps Calde expected. Instead, breathing heavily, he glared at Calde. Calde, however, leaned back in his chair. ‘Why you bother with this boy, Theon?’ he said. ‘Even his mother didn’t want him.’

  Reve didn’t mean to say anything. He really didn’t, but this man made him so angry: ‘Pelo done you nothin but favour!’ he blurted. ‘And you do this! Pig. Everyone think you’re the pig—’

  Before Calde could react Theon was up and out of his chair and had Reve’s T-shirt knotted in his fist. ‘You mind what you say in my place, hey! I tell you stay in the back and do your work, tha’s what you do!’

  He smacked Reve hard round the face and shovelled him through the door into the kitchen and then out into the backyard, kicking the outer door shut behind him with his heel and pushing Reve so hard he sprawled down on to his knees. ‘What you think you playin at?’ shouted Theon. ‘Hey!’

  Reve was more startled and angry than hurt. Theon had never raised a hand to him, never raised his voice.

  He pushed himself upright and took a breath before turning round to face this Theon he didn’t know.

  To his surprise, though, there was no more shouting. Theon had his finger up, warning him to stay silent. ‘Go tell Ciele to get out of her place,’ he whispered, ‘before the police get there. Go!’

  ‘And Pelo?’

  ‘I get him word.’

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Reve sprinted down the side of the cantina. Theon had hit him so hard his teeth buzzed and his eyes were all watered up. He should have kept his mouth shut. He shouldn’t have spoken.

  He turned right, threading his way fast through the tight cluster of shacks and sheds that sprawled back from the main track. The cracks and slips between the huts were tight and dark, like a slice of night had got tangled up there; the wider spaces were splashed with white sunlight. It was hot already.

  Theon’s was only three hundred metres from Pelo’s place, but it was hard not to get caught in wire or trip on rubbish. But he moved fast all the same, twisting this way and that, ignoring dogs and pigs, pushing himself, fretting that he would be too late, that the lieutenant had already called his men up from the pier. Frightened that Calde himself would come down looking for him, wanting to cut out his tongue. Why had he shouted at Calde? He never shouted, not ever – not at Tomas, not at Hevez, not in all his life.

  He was a fool. He tried not to be, but he was.

  Pelo’s hut was much the same as Tomas’s. A little bigger maybe, raised up from the sandy ground and patched together with planks of salty wood, scraps of tin and black plastic. Pelo had made a little porch at the front, facing the track, and also one at the back. That’s where Ciele was sitting, her baby on her lap. And Tomas was standing beside her, head bent talking. He looked serious. There was no sign of LoJo. He’d be down at the skiff most likely.

  ‘Hey!’ Reve called. ‘Ciele, you got to come out o’ here.’ She looked up, surprised, startled by his voice coming out of the darkness. ‘Get what thing you can. Tomas we got hardly no time. This place not safe . . .’

  ‘Reve,’ she said, ‘what you doin?’ She looked like some queen to Reve, like Mi tried to look sometimes. Just sitting there, holding her baby. But Reve could hear the strain in her voice. ‘This my place. Nothin stirring me.’

  Tomas put his hand on her shoulder. Tomas didn’t hardly talk to anyone other than Arella, and here he was like Ciele was almost family to him. Ciele didn’t seem to be minding.

  ‘What you know, Reve?’ Tomas said. ‘Thought you gone fishing when I rose up. LoJo gone looking for you. We got police stampin down on the wall, herding people up.’

  ‘I been at Theon’s.’ Hurriedly Reve told them what Calde had said; how he’d sold out Pelo. ‘You got to leave,’ he said to Ciele. ‘Theon said to tell you. Calde given up Pelo’s name. They comin to wreck this place. Hurt you too, Ciele, if they find you here.’

  ‘Cos I turned him down flat, called him a pig,’ she said bitterly. ‘Told him find some other woman.’ She stood up. ‘I don’t got any place to go, Tomas.’

  She held the baby tight to her breast.

  They heard the roar of a Jeep’s engine gunning down the track; the screech of brakes, the shouted command and then a gun butt hammering on the door.

  ‘Ciele! Move quick. Give the baby to Reve and get down there with him. Reve take them out to your sister. You’ll be out of the way there,’ Tomas said to her. ‘I’ll save what I can.’

  Reve held out his hands. Ciele hesitated and then passed over the ba
by, little Mayash. She mewled once and then settled against Reve’s shoulder. She felt so tiny. Like a bird.

  Tomas hustled Ciele down from the porch and then stepped back into the shack as the front door crashed open. ‘Hey,’ Reve heard him saying. ‘This the home of Pelo the fisherman. You got business here I can help you with?’ He sounded calm and steady, as though having police beating on your door was no thing to get strange about. He was just doing what any fisherman does, finding his way through the storm.

  ‘I got to see what’s happenin!’ said Ciele.

  From inside they could hear raised voices and the smash of things being broken.

  Ciele made to go back up into the shack, but Reve tugged at her arm with his free hand. ‘Come. Come with me.’ He stepped back into the shadow and pulled her after him. ‘They got nothin on him.’ He tucked the baby close to him, sniffing her forehead as he threaded his way through the dark maze of this back end of the village, wrapping his arms round her little body, trying to protect her as he pushed his way through bits of wire and fencing. At the edge of the field he stopped. ‘We cut across here. You want to take Mayash now? You OK, running with her? I’ll carry her if you like.’

  Ciele held out her arms.

  They ran through dry maize, heading at an angle away from the village and down to the shore.

  They found Mi standing up on the roof of her Beetle, staring towards the village. ‘Ciele!’ she said, swivelling round when she heard them coming in from the field behind. ‘Ciele, you got Mayash. Reve! What happen there? I see fire an’ smoke in the village . . .’

  Trickly black smoke, plastic and wood. Somebody’s place turning to ash.