The Alpha Deception (26 page)

Chapter 24

THE TRAWLER RODE
the waves listlessly, protesting each bit of speed McCracken requested of it with a rumble that led him to ease back on the throttle. He stood on the exposed bridge in the morning winds, steering for the Moroccan port of Tangier en route to Marrakesh and the shadowy El Tan.

With Washington no longer supporting his quest, and in fact probably pursuing him, he decided it would be safer not to make a continuous journey by air from country to country. Customs details would accumulate on a man of McCracken’s description traveling from Athens, where his enemies in Washington now knew he had been. A rental car and then a boat were the safest and fastest means to flee Spain and reach Morocco. He almost fell asleep at the wheel several times before reaching a port in Tarifa on the Strait of Gibraltar. Arriving there at the peak of darkness in the early morning hours of Sunday, he was able to steal the trawler and set out to sea.

Through the long hours he had only his thoughts for company, and the company wasn’t pleasant. Fatigue, and lingering injuries courtesy of the Minotaur, added to his anguish. He felt confused, no longer sure what exactly he was after. He had started out on the trail of Atragon, hoping it would bring him to T.C.’s murderer. Natalya brought Raskowski into the picture and the trails separated. And yet he had continued on his probably hopeless quest. Why?

The question had plagued him throughout the long voyage and in the end he supposed the answer was that there were millions of people, innocent people like T.C., who might die if he failed. He knew he could just walk away and let the world take its chances. His arrangements were made: There was plenty of money in discreet Caribbean banks. But then the buffer he formed between the masses and the fools who ruled them would be gone and, no matter how hard he tried not to, he could not help but feel for the people who were as much victims of the fools’ decisions as he was. He was still fueled by T.C.’s senseless murder. But he realized that she could be best avenged by stopping Raskowski from killing millions of others like her.

He docked at Tangier just past noon, abandoned the trawler, and made his way to the airport where flights for Marrakesh left regularly. The terminal was jammed, though, and it was nearly two hours later before he squeezed on to an eighteen-passenger turboprop plane.

Upon arriving in Marrakesh, McCracken took a cab from the airport to Djema El Fna Square, center of activity in the city’s ancient sector. Since it closed at nightfall, his major concern all day had been that he wouldn’t make it in time and would waste the entire night as a result. But he arrived with an hour to spare and set about locating Abidir the snake charmer.

The square was a haunt for both tourists and locals. The merchants screamed prices that were four times too high, screamed as if to drown each other out. Bargaining had become an art here at Djema El Fna, the merchants enjoying it as much as the tourists. They sold their wares from the backs of horse-drawn carriages or beneath canopied shops set up in the morning and occasionally toppled by the wind. They knew only as much of a given language as served them, always the conversion tables for francs and dollars. To listen to their claims, they made up a uniformly generous lot whose children frequently went to bed hungry due to the generosity of their fathers’ merchant souls.

Blaine walked among the shops and stands. Distinct sections of the square were reserved for storytellers, acrobats, fire-eaters and sidewalk musicians who left large tins about in which passersby might deposit money for the “free” entertainment.

Abidir’s spot turned out to be separate from the other snake charmers, down a small side street lined with shops already closed for the day. The charmer sat stubbornly on, as if to arouse the pathos of those passing by to gaze at a blind man who could not tell the time of day. A cobra dangled around his neck and an empty silver cup sat before him.

Blaine approached and saw that both Abidir’s eyes were covered by black patches. Those parts of his face left exposed by his cap showed ancient skin, dried and wrinkled, scarred by both age and the elements. The eyes of his cobra twitched as Blaine stepped before him and blocked out the sun.

“Test your courage, my good man,” the blind man offered. “Pet the snake for a few pennies. For a few more, I’ll play a tune and have him do a dance.”

“You knew I was a man.”

“The blind see much when they’re careful about it. I can sense much about you from this wretched frame I’m stuck in. A brave one you are, you might pet the snake near its fangs.”

McCracken dropped a pair of coins into the cup. “I would have dropped bills but the sound might not have caught your attention.”

“You’d be surprised, my friend. Enough of your American bills and I’ll change the snake into a woman for your pleasure.”

“It’s information I’m after. I’m looking for a man who calls himself El Tan.”

Abidir’s expression remained the same. The cobra stirred briefly on his shoulder. “I know no such man.”

“I heard different.”

“You heard wrong.”

“I’m prepared to pay.”

“Only if you don’t mind receiving nothing in return.”

“What a pity… .”

McCracken was in motion very fast, lunging behind Abidir and grabbing for the snake. He used the beast to drag the charmer backwards behind the cover of his wagon. Then he pulled the snake tighter, using it the way he would a rope.

“Don’t worry,” Blaine soothed, “I won’t hurt him any more than whatever drug you’ve got him on.”

“I can’t …
breathe
!”

“You can talk. That’s good enough.”

“Please, you can’t rob me. I’m just a poor blind man. Have compassion!”

McCracken felt the tranquilized snake make a futile effort to free itself. “You’re no more blind than I am. But you
will
be, unless you talk. Where can I find El Tan?”

The snake charmer gagged for air. “I can’t direct you without the proper signal. It would mean my—”

McCracken shut off more of his wind. “This should do… .” Finally he let the pressure up and Abidir slumped over, gasping.

The snake charmer caught the breath Blaine allowed him and gave up his resistance. “Le Club Miramar. Pass a note to the dancer Tara with El Tan’s name written on it. She will take care of the rest.”

Le Club Miramar, Blaine learned upon entering, featured exotic dancing all day long. Exotic in Marrakesh might have been referred to as topless back in America. Add to that a bit of sexually explicit posturing thrown in for good measure and you have the definition of “exotic.”

The club was located in the modern section of the city, but the streets nonetheless maintained a flavor similar to that of the market square. The bargaining proved just as intense and the crowds almost as numerous even at night.

He arrived at Le Club Miramar in time to snare a front-row seat for Tara’s performance. She stepped onstage to the applause of the audience, dressed in a green bodysuit that looked like the skin of a snake. Blaine recalled Abidir and his drugged cobra and wondered if the connection might have been intentional. Intentional or not, it lasted only as long as Tara’s snake suit stayed wrapped round her body, which was not long at all. She peeled it off in great reptilean strips, much to the delight of the audience, which was composed half of locals and half of tourists, all of whom were eager for a chance to slide currency into Tara’s G-string, which before long was the last bit of clothing she wore. The more money, the longer Tara would stay before the customer. One customer paid enough to have his entire head swallowed in the radiant beauty’s giant breasts.

At last Tara made it over to McCracken and gazed at him as if genuinely interested. He leaned a bit forward over the stage to slide an American bill into place, making sure Tara saw the note sandwiched within it. The dancer nodded slightly, eyes telling him to stay where he was.

Blaine waited through her set and that of another dancer. The next approached him early in her routine and eyed McCracken seductively. He took the hint and came forward to slip her the standard gratuity. She. grasped his hand tenderly, and drew his face to hers. While kissing him, she passed a note into his left hand. He completed the kiss without even acknowledging the presence of the paper. He gazed at it only when the dancer had parted from him and he was certain all other eyes were fixed upon her. It was a cocktail napkin with an address printed upon it:

Dar es Salaam, Derb Raid Jerdid ….

And beneath that, in English:

Table five in three hours … .

McCracken rose from his seat, and another eager patron took his place before he even had a chance to slide the chair back under the counter.

Three hours later to the minute, Blaine entered the Dar es Salaam restaurant, which featured authentic Moroccan cuisine such as
couscous
and
pastilla.
The dinner rush had long wound down and the maître d’, dressed in formal robes, approached him straightaway.

Blaine interpreted the bulge of his eyes as disdain for the ruffled appearance the long day had given him, but those same eyes froze when Blaine produced the note directing him to table five. Without further hesitation, the maître d’ led him to a private booth in the rear of the restaurant. He pulled back a curtain and beckoned Blaine to enter. This done, the curtain was drawn closed again. Behind it was a semicircular booth designed to accommodate four or five people and Blaine slid into it.

Minutes later he caught the sound of footsteps approaching before a shadow reached up for the curtain.

“Mind if I sit down?” asked an older, graying man with a British accent.

“Sorry. This booth’s reserved.”

“So I was told,” the Brit came back, pushing his disheveled hair from his forehead. He stepped into the private booth and drew the curtain behind him.

Blaine tensed. “I have a meeting here.”

“Yes, with the infamous El Tan. Well, ease up, old boy. You’re looking at him.”

The Brit sat down across from McCracken in the booth. He was wearing a loose-fitting, crinkled beige suit stained by sweat at the underarms. His shirt was yellowed white and his beard as much from yesterday as today. His eyes were dull and listless. He breathed heavily.

“The name’s Professor Gavin Clive,” the older man told Blaine. “The El Tan business is just a cover. Keeps people off my back when I don’t want them there, eh?” He pulled a pocket flask from his suit jacket and poured part of its contents into the empty water glass before him. “Never been one to trast what someone else pours for me. You read me, sport?” A sip and a pause. “You buying or selling?”

“Depends on how you answer a few questions.”

Professor Clive stopped the water glass halfway to his mouth and gazed at him knowingly. “One of those, eh? Yes, I suspected this latest business would bring your kind out of the woodwork.”

“And just what is my kind?”

“Fixer, repairman; what’s in a name anyway?” Clive finished and sipped from the glass. “Don’t care much, either.” He started coughing and kept at it until his face purpled. The spasm over, he lifted the glass back to his mouth in a trembling hand and drained whatever contents hadn’t slid over the sides. “The liver’s gone, lungs too. Cancer and plenty more eating them away. I’ve got six months. The last two won’t be pleasant.”

“I haven’t come here to kill you.”

Professor Clive looked almost disappointed. He sighed loudly. “I guess Sadim probably knows letting me live is a greater punishment for my sins.”

“Sadim?”

“The man behind what I suspect you’re after. The man I’ve been fronting for. It’s what I do, old chap. Front for other people. Got no identity of my own I care to talk about much. Used to, though.” Clive refilled his glass and held it up to the booth’s dim light in order to stare at the brownish liquid reflectively. “A college professor, would you believe it? Specializing in artifacts and gems. Did favors for people, appraisals. Lost my job teaching and went into it full-time. Began fronting for people who didn’t want their identities made public. Lost my identity in theirs. It worked for a while.”

“But not anymore.”

“Maybe the cancer started it, I’m not sure. I tell you, you look back on your life at my age it’d be nice to be able to take something out. Me, well, all the withdrawals been made already.” He started on his second glass and gazed warmly across the table. “You’re an easy man to talk to. Hell of a tiling, since I gotta figure you got your own problems.” Clive took three more hefty sips. “Along with a pretty good notion of what brought you here. It’s in your eyes, old boy, the uncertainty. And the fear.”

“Atragon,” Blaine muttered.

“Sorry, didn’t get that.”

“Atragon. The name given to certain crystals with inexplicable powers and properties.”

Clive nodded. “You reached me through the same channels as the others. They’ve been inactive for months now. But this is my ‘post’ as they say and I decided to see you for curiosity’s sake, knowing the kind of man you’d be. These crystals have changed you, that much I can tell.”

Blaine started to speak, then stopped.

Clive’s whiskey-stained voice turned distant. “Can’t deny it, can you? Everyone who comes into contact with the crystals says the same thing. There’s death in them, has been ever since they were discovered. Everyone who’s ever gotten close has died.”

McCracken thought of T.C., and his stare was telling.

“Been that way for thousands of years, old chap.”

“I didn’t come here to learn about curses, Professor, and if you really want to help me, you’d—”

“I didn’t come here to teach you about them. But I’d be selling you short if I didn’t try to persuade you to abandon whatever quest you’re on.”

“It’s too late for that,” Blaine said almost bitterly. “There’s a madman out there, and these crystals might be the only way to stop him.”

Clive nodded knowingly, the glass an extension of his hand now. “It always seems to come down to that. History runs in circles, and the circles keep repeating.” His eyes sharpened. “The crystals aren’t your answer. Stay away from them.”