IV
Quickly and quietly, I removed my pants and slid off the stern of the Sniper into the clear turquoise sea. Below me, purple sea fans stood out black against the white sand depths. I didn’t need a mask. In the SEALS I had become more fish than man.
I took a good deep bite of summer air, then noiselessly swam beneath my boat to the stern of Billy Mack’s. As I had guessed, the prop was gone, the driveshaft bent.
I surfaced by the diver’s deck, mounted at water level. I could still hear the guy yelling for the poor little dead blond pirate. Testing every movement, every motion, for noise, I pulled myself up onto Billy’s boat and slid across the bleached teak deck on my belly.
I could see him plainly now. He was poised on the foredeck, leaning over the storm railing, trying to peer into the cabin where his friend has disappeared. He held the .357 Auto Mag at ready. His back was to me: a huge guy, taller than I, almost as broad through the shoulders, and much heavier.
“Charlie! Goddam, Charlie, we gotta get our asses outta here!”
I wanted him to yell. Every time he opened his mouth, I was three feet closer.
“Mister man, you better let that boy outta there, hear? I’ll come over there an’ blow your white ass off with this here gun, I will!”
The tendency is to leap at someone you want to take from behind. That’s the way the amateurs do it; the makers of gaudy western shoot-’em-ups. But I didn’t leap. Too much chance of making a mistake, missing your target. And I had done it too many times before.
I could have whispered into his ear before I took him. But I didn’t. I grabbed him around the neck with my left arm and, with my right, jabbed my knife a safe half inch into the soft underbelly of his chin.
“Drop it, asshole!”
Oh, he was strong. Awesome. But not awesome enough. The pistol exploded harmlessly. Whamwham-wham.
“Do I not yet have your attention, asshole?”
I kneed him at the base of the spine and let the knife slide in half an inch farther. I knew that he could now feel the point beneath the base of his tongue.
“Drop it!”
He half-threw the .357 into the blue water. I pulled the knife out of his chin and held it beneath his Adam’s apple.
“You ’bout cut my goddam tongue out, cap’in!” He frothed black fresh blood as he spoke. “You ain’t gonna kill me, are you, cap’in?”
“This boat we’re standing on—you killed the guy who owned it, didn’t you? Tell me the truth, asshole, or you’re dead where you stand!”
“Yeah! But I didn’t want ta. Had orders, cap’in. Told us ta go out an’ get a boat, so that’s wha’ we did.”
“Who’s ‘they’?”
“Men up ta Cuda Key, that’s who. Never really met ’em. They just give orders, tells me what ta do, and I do it.”
“The guy you killed was my best friend. His name was Billy Mack. And it was the biggest mistake of your life, asshole.”
He half moaned, “Oh Jesus, cap’in. Shoot me if ya have to, but please don’ cut my goddam throat out.”
“That’s what you did to Billy!”
“Just tryin’ to make a livin’, cap’in!”
I shoved the stench of him away from me. Sometimes I think Mark Twain was right. The human race is just too pathetic for words. He whirled back to face me, spitting blood. And I thought, what kind of animal is it who will murder for a few dollars? And then I realized: wasn’t that what I was doing in Vietnam?
Okay, so I was a murderer, too. But there it was kill or be killed. And here, I would make sure it was the same; an indulgence of my own frail morality.
“All right, asshole, give it your best shot. Billy never had a chance. You do. Kill me or I’ll cut your throat.”
He was no longer the shuffling, humble Negro. He was black and fierce; huge nostrils flared; a trapped animal.
“Big mistake you just made, white boy. Big mistake!” I saw him look past my shoulder, as if there were someone behind me. But I would have none of that.
“Shoot ’em, Mr. Benjamin! Why’nt ya shoot ’em?” And still he looked behind me, black eyes widening as if in some terrible realization. It was the oldest trick in the world.
I was crouched and ready when he swung at me, the huge fist whooshing past my ear. And I caught the fist as if it were a fastball and squeezed it, feeling fingers crush beneath my grip, twisted the right arm around behind him, lifting him high off the foredeck of the boat, hearing the shoulder explode within the socket.
He shrieked with pain, face contorted with horror. And my Randall knife was already traveling on its flat, swift arc. It razored through his neck as if it were composed of cheese, snapping his head back in rhythmic convulsions of blood, spurt-spurt-spurting, mixing with the blood of Billy Mack, now dried black in the hot August sun. In his wide eyes, there was a dreadful expression of serenity. And I watched his lungs deflate and life evaporate, as if he were a lanced toy balloon.
Okay, Billy Mack. You died a very, very nasty death. But their deaths were nastier. They knew that it was coming. I saw the horror in their eyes.
And that’s when I felt the cold muzzle of a .45-caliber service automatic being jammed into my back.
So the big black guy hadn’t been using some simpleminded ploy. There had been someone behind me.
Three guys. Not two—as Nels had told me.
And I knew that I was dead.
He was good. He prodded me in the back with the weapon, then moved away to a safe distance. Such a little thing, but, as with any profession of skill—such as in the profession of war and killing—an expert can tell a lot from very, very little. This guy wouldn’t be the pushover the other two had been.
“Would you mind very much, Captain MacMorgan, if I asked you to toss that handsome Randall knife of yours into the water? No, in front of you. Right off the bow. That’s right. Seems a shame, doesn’t it—to waste a knife of that quality. But I’m afraid it’s necessary.”
I tossed the knife ahead of me, watching it flutter, then tumble through the clear water. A big barracuda, seeing the flash of silver, was on it in an instant. But the barracuda stopped short when it realized it wasn’t a fish; drifting backward, stiletto-shaped and menacing.
I had heard that voice before, but where? There was an odd silkiness to it; kind of voice you might expect to hear pounding away at you over the radio. Buy our toilet tissue, or buy our dish soap, because it’s the very, very best, new and improved, etc. etc. All words enunciated just right; the voice projected and deadly, deadly self-assured.
Where had I heard it before?
“If you will be so kind, Captain MacMorgan—no, don’t turn around—let’s move to the aft deck. That’s right, walk backward, slow and easy. You see, I know what you are thinking right now. You’re measuring distances, considering odds, wondering what the possibilities of surviving are if you dive into the water or, perhaps, even try to leap over onto your own boat. You see, Dusky MacMorgan, I’ve always been smarter than you. And better. Much better. Always.”
And then I knew.
He backed me to the fighting deck, then had me lie belly-down, my feet to the stern rail, the forward hull of Ernie’s Honor safely behind him.
I looked up then and saw the man I knew I would see; the man I had known for so short a time and hated so much, long, long ago in Vietnam.
Benjamin Ellsworth. Lieutenant Benjamin Ellsworth.
A college boy who loved weapons. ROTC ace, then lieutenant j.g. And, when the good officers started getting killed off in those first unpublicized years in Nam, he came to be our OIC. Oh, how he swaggered. And primped. And browbeat. Very military. Very superior. And very much a coward.
It didn’t take us long to find out. All our group ever wanted was a mission—and we had plenty of them. Before he came. Afterward, none. Not one. He always found a way to slide us out of them. When men who are trained to fight have no enemy, they end up fighting themselves. And that’s what happened with us. We got sloppy. We began to bitch and quarrel like spoiled children. Morale had never been worse. And still he swaggered, springing surprise inspections when we should have been carrying out surprise attacks.
So, one night I went to his hooch. Alone. He sat beneath the light of a Coleman lantern cleaning that ivory-handled .45 of his. He affected irritation at being interrupted by a lowly seaman—SEAL or not.
“What is it, MacMorgan?”
“May I speak plainly, sir?”
“If you can manage, MacMorgan.”
So I told him. Told him everything. Told him about the bickering, the crumbling morale. And he was outraged.
“Are you attempting to tell me how to command? Why, you stupid boot, I spent four years in college learning my job.” He glowered at me. “I know all about you, MacMorgan. Circus orphan. The tough guy everybody likes. Well, let me tell you something, swabbie—I don’t like you. Not even a little bit. In fact, I think you’re one of the most stupid human beings I’ve ever met!” He shuffled through some papers on his desk as if looking for my file. “My God, you didn’t even graduate from high school—and you’re trying to tell me? If that wasn’t so absurd it would be funny!”
“May I still speak plainly, sir?”
“Yes!”
“The men think you’re a coward, sir. And I agree. I think you’re yellow.”
He started to get up out of his chair, then thought better of it. He jammed a cartridge into his ivory-handled automatic.
“Get out of here, MacMorgan! I don’t ever want to see that baby face of yours in my quarters again!”
“If Lieutenant Ellsworth would be willing to take his blouse off and step outside, perhaps we could settle this like men.”
He had pointed the .45 at me then. “Get out of here, MacMorgan. I don’t have anything to prove to trash like you. I’ll be running this man’s Navy when you’re sweeping up bars for a living.”
So this was the guy who stood above me now, probably that same .45 automatic pointed at my head. He hadn’t lasted long in the Navy. Ass-kissing and brown-nosing will only take you so high. Not long after we finally got rid of him, we heard he had gotten mixed up in the black market somehow. They said he was getting rich. They said Lieutenant Ellsworth could get you anything, absolutely anything, you wanted. And even later, I heard that he had resigned his commission under hazy circumstances.
“Hah! I see you finally recognize me, MacMorgan!”
I looked up at him. The angular, ferret face had aged considerably. But the build was the same: just under six feet tall, lean and wiry, the way an English professor might look if he did a little weight lifting. Jet-black hair, thin girlish lips, hands that looked as if they were made to shuffle papers.
“Yeah, I recognize you, Ellsworth.”
He sneered at me. “You know, it amuses me to think that I will be the one to kill you. I could have shot you when you suckered poor Charlie into your cabin. Or when, in typically and absurdly heroic style, you gave Big Bart a chance. I could have shot you so easily. I was right behind you, you know.” He gave a weird little laugh. “But frankly, I wanted to see who was going to win. I was very impressed, the way you handled Bart. Almost proud, in a strange sort of way. Bart was a good man—not like Charlie. Charlie was pathetic. But, the same as in the Navy, you have to work with so many pathetic people in this business. So I was glad I didn’t shoot you—then. I wanted to have a chance to have a little chat.” He chuckled again. “You see, Seaman Mack—what was his first name again? Billy, yes. Well, Mr. Billy Mack didn’t have much time for conversation. You always liked killing, didn’t you, MacMorgan? Always gung-ho, ready for a fight? Well, you would have enjoyed seeing the way Big Bart killed your little friend. He flopped around on the deck like a fish. Blood just everywhere—that’s right, MacMorgan, try to get up. Try to jump me. You’re just stupid enough to try it.”
“You’re crazy, Ellsworth. You’re crazy and you’re a coward.”
“Yeah, I’m crazy. Crazy like a fox. Crazy and rich. I want you to tell me one last thing before I put a bullet through your brain. Did poor little Charlie tell you anything about our . . . our little operation when you had him down below?”
“He told me everything.”
He had lifted his gun, ready to fire. He looked at me in shrewd appraisal. “I’ve always been much too smart for you, MacMorgan. Had poor Charlie told you anything at all, you would have lied. You would have said he told you nothing. But it doesn’t matter, MacMorgan. You’re about to pay for calling me yellow back in Vietnam—”
“Hold it!”
It was the woman. Mrs. Johnson. She stood on the port walkway of Billy Mack’s boat, my Russian AK-47 in her hands, pointing it awkwardly at Lieutenant Benjamin Ellsworth. She did look fine: denim shirt flapping slightly in the light August breeze, breasts full and firm beneath, blond hair looking gold in the sunlight. Ah, she was a brave one. A good one. I could imagine her teddy-bear husband whimpering down below. And I thought: If I’m going to die, it’s at least nice to go with someone as brave as her in my mind; someone to replace the awful, bottomless insanity of Ellsworth.
Because I was going to die. And so was she. And so was her husband.
At a glance, Ellsworth saw what I saw. He laughed loudly. “Mrs. MacMorgan, it’s nice of you to try to save your husband—but you’ve forgotten one thing. You’ve forgotten to arm your weapon.”
It was true. That ugly crescent cartridge clip was missing.
The lovely face fell, horrified. She looked to me for confirmation. I nodded. And mustered up a brave wink; a wink because I wanted her to go out with at least a little hope, and because I was so, so sorry that blind bad luck had caused them to charter the boat of Billy Mack’s best friend, this one awful August day.
“Come on down and join us, Mrs. MacMorgan. I’d like to get a closer look at the woman stupid enough to marry this droll human being who lies before me.”
“She’s not my wife, Ellsworth! Let her go. She doesn’t know a damn thing.”
“Sure, sure, MacMorgan. I’m surprised you found such a pretty lady, frankly.”
The woman stood beside him now, shrunken, slack, as if she were in shock.
“But you know, it’s hard to see how pretty you are with all those clothes on.”
“Don’t!”
He leveled the gun at me again. “Don’t move again, MacMorgan. Don’t lift a finger, or you’ll watch her die.”
Her lips were trembling, her entire body shaking. Ellsworth reached up with his left hand, still watching me, and ripped her shirt open. Buttons skittered over the teak deck. She was braless beneath the shirt; brown cones of breast pointed skyward.
“Lisa-lee! Lisa-lee, what’s going on out there?”
Lisa-lee—so that was her first name.
Ellsworth raised his eyebrows. “Ah, so we’re about to have another guest, huh?”
Her husband peeked around the cabin wall, then ducked back in, like a turtle.
Ellsworth smiled. “Well, maybe this will bring our frightened friend out. Get down on your knees, woman!”
As she dropped to her knees, facing Ellsworth, he pulled the shirt off her. Her skin glistened in the sun. I knew what he wanted her to do. And I hated the thought of it. Slowly, his eyes darting from me to her, from her back to me, he unzipped his pants. And that’s when I decided. I decided I would force him to shoot. It didn’t matter. He would kill me anyway. And just as I was about to leap at him, hoping I would at least get my hands on his throat before he shot me down, Lisa-lee Johnson, that pallid, terrified woman, reached back and gave him such a fist to the groin that had it been his heart it would have killed him.
It didn’t kill him, of course. But he howled. And, with me already in motion, I was on him before he even had time to shoot. Like a linebacker nailing a little tailback, I hit him with such force that his neck jerked back with a loud pop and the gun flew out of his hand into the water. I hoped I hadn’t killed him. I wanted to hurt him, to punish him. I wanted him to live—for a while.
He wasn’t dead. He started up at me, and when he did I kicked him full in the face. He lay there choking on his own teeth, and then he turned an awful face toward us. “They’ll get you for this, MacMorgan. You’ll pay for this, you silly naive bastard!”
Lisa-lee Johnson held close to me, trembling, feeling very small.
“Lisa-lee, go back to my boat. Back to the cabin. Get some clothes on.”
“You’re not going to kill him!”
“What?”
She sagged against me, her arms holding me. She was crying, tears dripping down onto her bare breasts. “I can’t take any more, Dusky. I can’t listen to another scream. Please, oh please, Dusky, let the police have him. He’ll be imprisoned. Or go to the electric chair. Please!”
Gently, I pushed her away from me. I was the madman, now. Oh, I was going to kill him, all right. Lieutenant Benjamin Ellsworth was about to die with the hands of a trashy high-school-dropout circus orphan at his throat. Oh yes, I would kill him. And make it last as long as I could.
I jerked him to his feet, slapping him to make sure he was conscious. And just when I got my hands around his throat, just as his eyes started to bug, that’s when the Coast Guard jet helicopter came roaring over. They were screaming at me over the PA system. And Lisa-lee, with her tiny hands, was trying to pry my huge ones away from the throat of Ellsworth.
“They’ll try you for murder, Dusky. Think of your wife, for God’s sake. They’ll arrest you!”
So the Coast Guard carted Lieutenant Benjamin Ellsworth away, his bloody face smirking, his promise still ringing in my ears: “They’ll get you for this. You’ll pay. . . . ”
But they would arrest him for murder. And try him. And send him to prison. Or the electric chair. Because this is the United States of America. Home of the brave, land of the free. Where judges are fearless in their application of the law. Where lawyers are servants of the public, battling for what is right. Where justice is blind, blind, blind.
Sure it is.
Absolutely.
No doubt about it.
Right. . . .
