Out on the Rim (21 page)
It was the Magellan Hotel's general manager, Antonio Imperial himself, who registered Booth Stallings at 5:41 P.M. on April Fools' Day, 1986. Noting that Stallings was not burdened with luggage of any kind, Imperial smiled and said, “Airline lose your bag, Mr. Stallings? They're very good at that.”
“A mix-up in Manila,” Stallings said, as he filled out the registration form. “Some friends are bringing it down.”
“Mr. Wu and Mr. Durant?” When he saw Stallings look up with the beginning of a frown, Imperial hurried on. “OtherguyâI mean, Mr. Overbyâchecked on all your reservations and, since Miss Blue's already here, I assumed Wu and Durant would be bringing your luggage down tomorrow.”
The frown was canceled and Stallings smiled slightly. “Known Otherguy long?”
“More than twenty years.”
“He changed much?”
“An interesting question. I'd have to say no, not really. He'sâwell, timeless, I suppose.” Imperial turned, took Stallings' room key from its slot, turned back, reached under the counter, and came up with a
small sealed clear plastic bag that contained a throwaway razor, a toothbrush, miniature tubes of shaving cream and toothpaste, and a small bottle of shampoo.
small sealed clear plastic bag that contained a throwaway razor, a toothbrush, miniature tubes of shaving cream and toothpaste, and a small bottle of shampoo.
“Our compliments,” Imperial said, placing the key and the plastic bag on the counter.
“Thanks very much,” Stallings said. “What room's Miss Blue in?”
“She's just next door to you, four twenty-six.” Imperial snapped his fingers, as if remembering something. He turned again, picked up a small stack of mail, thumbed through it, selected a letter and handed it to Stallings. “This arrived just before you did,” he said.
Stallings examined the envelope which was square, white and cheap. His name was printed in ink. Down in the lower left-hand corner, someone had written: “Hold for arrival.” Stallings shoved the letter down into a hip pocket, gathered up his room key and plastic bag, and started for the elevator.
“Like a bellman to show you up, Mr. Stallings?” Imperial asked.
Stallings turned back. “No, but you might send up a couple of cold beers.”
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It was only after the beer came, and he had drunk half of one bottle, that Booth Stallings took the letter from his hip pocket, held it up to the light, sniffed it, smelled nothing and finally tore it open.
On a single, once-folded sheet of cheap white paper, a precise hand had written:
Dear Booth,
Welcome back to Cebu. Someone we both know will call on you. Please do exactly as instructed.
Very truly yours,
Al
Still holding the letter, Stallings crossed to the room's window and raised the venetian blind. He reread the letter and then stared out at a red sun setting behind the Guadalupe Mountains, the same mountains in which Stallings and Alejandro Espiritu, the boy terrorists, had done much of their killing. Neither of you, he thought, ever really rid yourself of its fascination. The only difference is that you examined it and poked at it and wrote about it and made a living from it while Al, well, Al just kept on doing it.
Stallings watched what looked like a large Cessna come in for a landing at the old Cebu airport that was now used only by private planes. When his commercial flight from Manila had started its approach to Mactan Airport, Stallings at first thought he had boarded the wrong plane. But Mactan was Cebu's new airport. The one just down the road from the Magellan Hotel was the old one that he and Espiritu, from their vantage point in the mountains, had watched the Japanese military fly in and out of.
Just as the Cessna disappeared behind some trees, there was a knock at the door. Assuming it was either Georgia Blue or Overby, Stallings said, “Come in,” and continued to stare out at what was left of the brief tropical sunset. When the door opened and a gruff voice said, “Stallings?”âmaking it an accusatory questionâhe turned quickly and found himself staring at a tall old man in his mid-to-late sixties who wore a short-sleeved tan safari jacket with a great many pockets, all of them bulging, and a matching pair of slacks.
The old man had plumb-line posture, silky white hair, a rusted complexion, small blue eyes that needed trifocals and a mouth that obviously liked giving orders. Only the thin-lipped mouth with its pronounced overbite seemed vaguely familiar to Stallings.
“Don't remember me, do you?” the old man said in the gruff baritone that could have belonged to a thirty-year-old.
“No,” Stallings said. “Should I?”
“Name's Crouch. Vaughn Crouch. Except it was Major Crouch when you knew me.”
“Good Lord.”
“Finally got to be Colonel Crouch.”
“You sent us in.”
Crouch nodded. “You and Al Espiritu. I'm the guy.”
“What're youâ”
Crouch interrupted, as if he didn't have enough patience for fool questions. “I live here.”
“In Cebu.”
“Here in the goddamn Magellan. Put my thirty in and retired back in seventy-two. Been here ever since. It's cheap and if I need some part fixed, like the prostate, I can fly up to Clark or even back to Schofield in Hawaii and let the quacks there patch me up for free.” He raised his head slightly to study Stallings through the bottom lens of the trifocals. “You've changed some. Wouldn't've known you if I'd passed you on the street. You ready?”
“For what?”
“I remember you being kind of quick, Stallings. A little snotty maybe, but quick.” Crouch shook his head. “Can't stand dumb. I can put up with goddamn near anything but dumb.”
“Espiritu sent you.”
“He didn't send me,” Crouch said. “He asked. Can't say much for old Al's politics, but he's got a good tactical mind and always did. His fucked-up politics are his business.” Crouch paused. “Well, you ready or not?”
“Let's go,” Stallings said.
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The retired Colonel's car was a well-maintained ten-year-old yellow Volkswagen convertible that he drove, top down, with what Stallings quickly decided was far too much dash. The highway up into the mountains started off well enough, but soon disintegrated into broken pavement, patchy gravel, and finally into a twisting red dirt road that was not much more than a trail.
“Why retire here?” Stallings asked. “Why not Fort Sam in San Antonio?”
“With the rest of the old farts?” Crouch said, shaking his head and gearing the VW down for a curve. “I had three wars. Two bad and one good. I sure as shit wouldn't retire to Seoul or Saigonâeven if I couldâso with the wife dead and both kids either married or divorced, I figured what the hell, you like the Filipinos and always did, so you might as well go live there and see what the fuck happens.” He gave his head another shake, this time a satisfied one, and said, “It's sure been interesting.”
They drove on without speaking for minutes until Crouch said, “Al lent me that book you wrote.”
Stallings' reply was a noncommittal, “Oh.”
“I didn't agree with everything you claimed, but you sure got most of it right. So I don't guess I have to tell you that if you're doing a deal with Al, watch him. He's tricky.” Crouch glanced at Stallings. “But I expect you must've figured that out by now.”
“A long time ago,” Stallings said.
They drove on in more silence for what Stallings estimated to be three miles. That made the trip thus far about twelve milesâor not quite halfway across the island. Crouch came to a curve. In the VW's headlights it looked just like any other curve, but he slowed down to fifteen miles per hour, then to ten, and finally stopped.
“End of the line,” he said.
“What happens now?”
“You get out, stand around and admire the Southern Cross, if you've a mind to. Somebody'll come fetch you. It won't be long. They're out there somewhere, just waiting to make sure nobody followed us.”
“How do I get back?” Stallings said.
“Beats me.”
Stallings opened the door, stepped out of the Volkswagen, and looked down at Crouch. “Thanks for the ride.”
“Maybe someday you or Al might tell me what the fuck this is all about.”
Stallings only nodded.
“And maybe not,” Crouch said as he put the car into reverse, backed around and shot off down the rough mountain trail.
Stallings watched until the Volkswagen convertible disappeared around the curve. He decided that once again the grown-ups had sent him out on his own, just as if he had good sense. On the drive up he had remembered more vague details about his elderly chauffeur. In 1945, Crouch had been a twenty-six- or twenty-seven-year-old major, a war lover, and somebody who, before the war, had done more than just go to high school. He had either held down a job, or joined the CCC, or bummed around the country, or graduated from Michigan State or Texas A&M. Something anyway.
In 1945 that seven- or eight-year experience gap had seemed unbridgeable to Stallings. In 1986 it still seemed just as wide and just as deep. You'd better grow up fast, sonny, Stallings decided, or you'll slip from acute chronic adolescence into senility with nothing in between. He turned and looked up at the Southern Cross, only to discoverâwith a trace of surpriseâthat it, like himself, hadn't changed at all in forty-one years.
Stallings wasn't sure how long he stared up at the constellation before he heard them. It was at least five minutes, maybe ten, possibly fifteen. They came down the hill, stumbling and muttering in the dark, indifferent to the noise they made.
Stallings turned to watch their bobbing flashlights approach. He jumped when something hard was jammed into the small of his back by the one who had slipped up silently from behind.
“Please don't move, Mr. Stallings,” she said and he recognized the voice of the woman who called herself Carmen Espiritu.
“How've you been, Carmen?”
“Please don't talk either,” she said.
The ones who had muttered and stumbled their way down the hill turned out to be three in number. All were men, none more than thirty. While Carmen Espiritu kept the muzzle of her gun in Stallings' back, one of the men searched him with quick, expert hands.
“Nothing,” the man said.
She moved around in front of Stallings. With the help of the three flashlights he saw that she wore yet another semiautomatic pistol, a dark T-shirt, jeans and running shoes. The T-shirt advertised a cantina called Hussong's in Baja California.
“How's your health, Mr. Stallings?” she asked.
“Well, I sometimes get a mild touch of sciatica, but it comes and goes.”
“I mean can you walk three kilometers into the hills without us carrying you?”
“Sure. Why not?”
“Let's go.”
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In Booth Stallings' opinion, there was far too much up hill and not nearly enough down dale. But he was pleased by how well he kept up and surprised by how vividly he remembered the way he and Espiritu had once bounded up and down such trails like a couple of goats. Young goats.
They climbed for an hour and fifteen minutes before they stopped. One of the men imitated the cry of a bird whose species Stallings didn't even try to identify. After an answering bird cry, they crossed through a cornfield whose rustling stalks provided an effective early-warning alarm system.
Just beyond the cornfield was a large nipa hut of at least three or four rooms. It rested on poles that were the usual five or six feet high. Soft kerosene lamp light came from the hut's open windows and also from those of the three or four smaller nipa huts that made up the compound.
A man who wasn't very tall came through the large hut's main door and stood, staring down at Stallings as he emerged from the cornfield with Carmen Espiritu at his side.
“How've you been, Booth?” Alejandro Espiritu asked.
“Fine, Al,” Stallings said. “And you?”
After a warm handshake and a somewhat stiff embrace at the top of the bamboo stairs, Stallings followed Carmen and Alejandro Espiritu into the nipa hut, which was really more house than hut.
They came into a combination kitchen-living-and-dining-room. Food was being cooked over a charcoal brazier by a plump handsome woman in her fifties who wore bright red slacks. An old plank table had been set for two with glasses, plates, forks and spoons, but no knives, which many Filipinos seldom use, preferring to cut whatever needs to be cut with the edge of a spoon.
The living room area was furnished with four bentwood chairs and a matching couch. There were no pictures on the wall or rugs on the polished split bamboo floor. But music came from a small battery-powered Sony shortwave set that was softly playing something by the Rolling Stones. The woman in the red slacks left her cooking, went to the radio and turned up its volume slightly, placing her left ear close to the speaker. No one introduced the woman to Stallings.
Espiritu waved his guest to the bentwood couch and chose one of the matching chairs for himself. Carmen Espiritu stood nearby, leaning against a wall, her right hand down inside her woven fiber shoulder bag. It occurred to Stallings that only recently he had seen
someone else stand just like that, leaning against a wall, all coiled up and ready to spring. Durant, of course.
someone else stand just like that, leaning against a wall, all coiled up and ready to spring. Durant, of course.
“Care for a beer before we eat, Booth?” Espiritu asked.
Stallings said he would and the woman in the red slacks took a bottle of San Miguel from a plastic sack, opened it, crossed the room to Stallings, pausing at the table to pick up one of the two glasses. She handed the bottle and glass to Stallings without a word. He said thank you, but she only nodded and returned to the Sony radio where she glued her left ear back to the speaker.
Stallings carefully poured the warm beer into his glass, indicated the woman with a nod and asked, “Who's she?”
“My little sister,” Espiritu said with a smile. “Although not quite as little as she once was.”
The plump woman, ear still to the Sony's speaker, gave the right cheek of her buttocks a defiant smack and went on listening to Mick Jagger.
“And her?” Stallings asked, indicating Carmen Espiritu with another nod.
“Who did she say she was?”
“Your granddaughter.”
Espiritu giggled and smiled broadly. Stallings noticed that the smaller man's teeth looked absolutely perfect. If he's laid off the sugarcane all these years, Stallings thought, he probably hasn't got a filling in his head.
“Carmen lies as a matter of course,” Espiritu said. “She's my bride of six months.”
“The present Mrs. Espiritu,” Stallings said.
“The only Mrs. Espiritu.”
“Well, she certainly keeps busy,” Stallings said and drank some of his beer.
Espiritu smiled at his wife. “She's also very ambitious, aren't you, Carmen?”
“I do my part.”
Espiritu turned to Stallings. “Who used to say that, âWe Do Our Part'?”
“The Blue Eagle,” Stallings said. “Roosevelt's NRA.”
“Price fixing was its purpose, wasn't it?” Before Stallings could reply or comment, Espiritu went on. “You're certainly looking well, Booth. Stayed skinny and even grew a little more, didn't you?”
“Half an inch.”
“I didn't,” Espiritu said with another giggle. “As you must've noticed.”
What Stallings had noticed most was the slight tremor in Espiritu's left hand. When the tremor threatened to turn into a shake, Espiritu clutched the left hand with his right. And if the teeth were perfect, or nearly so at sixty-two, Stallings found Espiritu's complexion too sallow and the black eyes too dull.
But the rest of him seems okay, Stallings decided, although it's hard to tell with that white shirt buttoned up to the neck and those sleeves down over his thumbs. He also wondered why Espiritu kept the balled-up handkerchief in his left hand. But when the hand trembled its way up to the left corner of the mouth and mopped away the trace of saliva, Stallings thought he had his answer.
After another swallow of warm beer, Stallings smiled almost gently at Espiritu and asked, “When'd you have it, Alâthe stroke?”
“Still very observant, aren't you?”
“When?”
“Months ago.”
“I'm sorry.”
“No need to be. I'm quite recovered and the prognosis is good.” He smiled, dismissing the subject. “Shall we eat?”
Dinner was broiled lapu-lapu, the inevitable rice and a large bowl of fruit. Stallings ate everything set before him; Espiritu only a small portion of rice and a banana. Neither of the women joined the men at table. The plump sister continued to listen to the radio and Carmen
Espiritu continued to stand throughout the meal, her right hand down inside the fiber shoulder bag.
Espiritu continued to stand throughout the meal, her right hand down inside the fiber shoulder bag.
“I suppose you were surprised to see old Major Crouch,” Espiritu said as he peeled his banana. “Colonel Crouch, actually, retired.”
“Very surprised.”
“He's grown garrulous, as I suppose we all do. I sometimes think the old tend to talk mostly about the past because there's so much of it. And so little future. My wife finds the past boring, don't you, Carmen?”
“I find it largely irrelevant,” she said.
“What was it Santayana said?” Espiritu asked. “âThose whoâ'”
Carmen Espiritu interrupted the familiar quotation. “Santayana was an ass.”
Espiritu smiled at Stallings. “A woman of strong opinions, especially about history. Anything that happened before she was born is irrelevant. As for her politics ⦔ He shrugged, still smiling at Stallings. “What do you do for politics these days, Booth?”
“I do without.”
“Really? After all those years of studying what you insist on calling terrorism?”
“Terrorism's just a shorthand term.”
“Yes, but for what?”
“It's like pornography, Al. Everybody knows it when they see it, but they can't agree on a definition.”
“Like to hear mine?”
“Sure.”
“Politics by extreme intimidation.”
Stallings grunted. “Needs a little work.”
“I thought it rather good. Maybe we can discuss it further in the morning.”
“In the morning?” Stallings said. “Where?”
“Here, of course. Right after we discuss the five million. We are
going to talk about that, aren't we? Or we could talk about the money now, and my definition over breakfast.”
going to talk about that, aren't we? Or we could talk about the money now, and my definition over breakfast.”
Stallings leaned back in his chair with a bleak smile. “I'm your hostage, huh?” He looked at Carmen Espiritu. “Or hers.”
“Yes,” Espiritu said. “I believe you are.”
Carmen Espiritu came away from the wall, looking at her watch. “That took long enough,” she told her husband and turned to Stallings. “I'm leaving now, Mr. Stallings. Our people surround and protect the compound, so please don't go wandering off.”
After Stallings nodded, she turned to her husband. “Expect me when you see me.”
“As always,” he said.
Carmen Espiritu turned and left the room. Twisting around in his chair, Stallings watched her leave through the front entrance. When he turned back he was surprised to find Espiritu's plump sister also gone.
A long silence followed, raising a barrier between the two men. Stallings leaned forward, elbows on the table, and broke the silence, if not the barrier, with a recommendation he made in the form of a question.
“What if we just took off, Al?”
“It's quite simple,” Espiritu replied. “You'd be shot.”
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As far as Otherguy Overby could determine, his rented gray Toyota was parked just where the voice on the phone had told him to park it: 19.3 kilometers from the Magellan Hotel at a curve on the dirt road that led up into the mountains.
Overby also knew he was on time, but he checked his watch anyway. It was two minutes before midnight. The five-shot Smith & Wesson Chief's Special he had bought for US$500 from a buy-and-sell man on Pier Three was tucked beneath his right thigh.
Because all the Toyota windows were open, Overby could hear
them off to his right as they stumbled and cursed their way down the mountain trail. Overby was certain no self-respecting freedom fighters, terrorists, guerrillas or whatever the fuck they were would make that much noise or shine their flashlights around like that.
them off to his right as they stumbled and cursed their way down the mountain trail. Overby was certain no self-respecting freedom fighters, terrorists, guerrillas or whatever the fuck they were would make that much noise or shine their flashlights around like that.
So he turned his head to the left, just enough for his peripheral vision to become useful. He also removed the five-shot revolver from beneath his thigh and folded his arms across his chest. The pistol, now in his right hand, was pointing at the open left window.
When Carmen Espiritu materialized at the window, Overby wiggled the revolver a little, just to make sure she saw it. “Put both hands on the windowsill, Carmen.”
She hesitated, as if calculating long odds, and then put her hands on the sill.
“Call 'em off,” Overby said.
She whistled two loud sharp trills. The flashlights went off. Overby switched on the Toyota's headlights, flicking them up to high beam. The headlights illuminated three young men twenty feet away at the edge of the dirt road. Each was armed with what looked like an M-16. Each raised a hand to shield his eyes from the headlights' glare.
“I'm going to slide over into the passenger seat, Carmen,” Overby said in a quiet conversational tone, “and you're going to get in behind the wheel. Okay?”
She nodded.
“But before you do,” Overby said, “drop that shoulder bag on the back seat. Gently.”
Carmen Espiritu took the bag from her shoulder and dropped it through the window onto the back seat. After opening the front door, she slipped behind the Toyota's steering wheel.
“How long will those guys hold still like that?” Overby asked.
“Until I tell them to move,” she said. “But if you dim the headlights, they'll sit down.”
Overby dimmed the headlights and the three men with the M-16s sat down on the dirt road and lit cigarettes.
“I went looking for Booth tonight at the Magellan and found the old Colonel,” Overby said. “Colonel Crouch. Guess what he told me after a couple of drinks?”
“I don't care to guess,” she said.
“He told me he'd dropped Booth off about an hour after sunset right here at this very spot where you called and told me to be at midnight. So here I am and here you are and my question, I suppose, is where the hell's old Booth?”
“With my husband.”
“Really.”
“Yes.”
“Let me ask a real dumb question, Carmen. Is your husband alive?”
“That is a stupid question.”
“Well, it's just that the only Espiritu anybody's heard from in the flesh is Mrs. Espiritu, and I was just wondering if Mr. Espiritu is alive, dead or maybe in a coma.”
“He's quite well.”
“Good. And he's planning to hang on to Booth for a while?”
“Yes.”
Overby nodded approvingly. “A hostage, huh?”
“Stallings is insurance,” she said. “His other use is to convince my husband of the money's ⦠legitimacy.”
“Jesus, lady. Buy-off money's always a bastard.”
“Convince him of the money's existence, not its genealogy. My husband suspects this could be a very elaborate trick to lure him to Hong Kong where there'll be no money and he'll find himself just another penniless exile.”
“I like the way his mind works,” Overby said. “When was this deal first dangled in front of him?”
“Less than a month ago.”
“And he nibbled, but insisted on Stallings as the go-between.”
“Yes.”
“Who approached him?”
“I won't answer that, Mr. Overby.”
Overby grinned. “Don't blame you. If you did, then I'd know what you know.”
“How soon do you need to see my husband?” she asked.
“Tomorrow at the latest. And you'll have to get Stallings out of the way for an hour or two so your husband and I can be alone.”
She nodded. “Be back here at three tomorrow afternoon and I'll take you to him.” She smiled for the first time. “But don't expect me to leave you alone with him, Mr. Overby.”
Overby returned her smile. “I didn't think that for a second.”
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