the Hunted (1977) (8 page)

She was to make sure there was always ice.

"Mr. Bandy please," Tali said. "Would you tel
l me what they want?"

"What do you think?" He went over to th
e couch and sat very low and relaxed, his hea d against the cushion, looking up at her.

"I don't know. I'm asking you."

"They want to kill him," Mel said. "You understand that much?"

She didn't understand that or anything. Why?

Who are they? What is Mr. Rosen, or Mr. Ross? After doing things for him for three years--being paid one thousand pounds a week as his "assistant," a s he called her--she realized that she knew nothin g about the man. He wasn't a retired American businessman. He was hiding. And these people wanted to kill him. Why?

But Mr. Bandy avoided questions. He said, "Yo
u did all right. I liked that about the Scotch being a present. See, they've been watching, we know tha t now, and they're going to keep watching. So wha t do we do about it?"

"You told them he might have left Israel," Tal
i said.

"It's possible. But I don't think he'd go righ
t away, knowing his money was due on the twentysixth."

"But why do they want to kill him? Who ar
e they?"

"I'm gonna give him five days. If I don't hea
r from him by then I'm gonna pack up and g o home."

"Why are they watching us?"

"But if he does call, then we're gonna have to b
e ready with a pretty cute idea. You hungry?"

"What?"

"Call room service and get me . . . I think som
e roast chicken, baked potato, something they can'
t fuck up. Bottle of chilled wine. Ask them what kin d of pastries they've got. Torte or a Napoleon, yo u know, something like that."

She didn't understand Mr. Bandy at all. H
e should be afraid or worried, or at least show som e anxiety. But he wasn't worried. He was hungry.

THE MAN SEEMED TO DISAPPEAR. He was walkin
g along, up ahead on the wide sidewalk between th e buildings and the trees that were spaced along th e street, and then he was gone.

It was Dizengoff Street, but ten blocks from th
e Dizengoff that was the heart of Tel Aviv--a carnival midway of cafes with sidewalk tables, pizza joints, ice-cream stands, and the movie theaters o n the Circle. Up at this end, Dizengoff had a few cafe s and small stores, but it was quiet and apartmenthouse residential, without the stream of people on the sidewalk. That's why Rashad couldn't figur e out how he'd lost the man. There were only a fe w other people on the street; it was five-thirty in th e afternoon.

He came to about where the man had been:
a storefront, a place that looked like it had gone ou t of business, boarded up and the boards painted red.

Except the metal street numbers looked new. 275.

Rashad heard the music before he opened th
e door. Something familiar--yeah, Barry Manilo w trying to get that feeling. Rashad knew he was going to be surprised. But stepping from a near-empty street into a crowded pub, into a hum of voices an d music, also brought him a good feeling, a feeling o f pleasure. All the people sitting in booths and at a long row of tables and two deep at the bar--wher e the guy he'd been following was reaching over a shoulder to take a drink from the barmaid-Rashad liked it right away. A place where everybody was friendly and talked and where the new guy in town could ask dumb questions. A sign ove r the bar--tacked up over some of the snapshots tha t were on display and notes that had been pinne d there--said happy hour--drinks 1/2 price. A n eighborhood saloon in a city where you coul d count the no-shit beer-and-whiskey establishment s on one hand without using the thumb. But no nam e outside.

He'd save asking it. He made his way throug
h the Happy Hour crowd toward the bar. Mostl y Americans, it looked like. Young dudes in spor t shirts or work clothes. American-looking girls, too , dressed for the office, and a few Israeli groupies i n tank tops and jeans. There was an English accent, a friendly Limey sound coming from a gutty-lookin g little guy wearing a hard-hat. He seemed popular , everybody saying things to him. There was a blac k guy at the corner where the tight little bar made a turn. Rashad kept moving--he didn't need a brother today--finally getting next to the guy he'
d been following and saying, "How's a man supposed to get a drink in here?"

Davis glanced at him. "What do you want?"

"Scotch'd be fine."

Davis raised his voice a couple of levels. "Chris
, a Scotch here."

The girl behind the bar said, "You changing
, Dave?"

"For this gentleman here."

"Oh, right."

Another Limey accent, Rashad thought. Man,
a real barmaid, showing her goodies in the blouse a s she bent over to pop the tops off some beers.

But talking to the guy named Dave he found ou
t Chris was Australian. The other barmaid, Lillian--
w ho was also very friendly and knew everybody'
s name--was Israeli. The gutty little guy in the hardhat was Norman, who was from London and owned the place that had no name outside but inside was Norman's Bar, The Tavern. Dave was Sergeant Dave Davis, on Marine security guar d duty at the U
. S
. Embassy. There were a dart boar d and a slot machine in the next room, where th e cases of Maccabee and Gold Star were stacked up.

During Happy Hour there were free hors d'oeuvre
s and new potatoes baked in their skins. The barmaids also fixed beans and franks and pizza in a closet kitchen off the bar. And in the toilet, after hi s third Scotch, Rashad stared at an inscriptio n scrawled on the wall that said, "Fuck Kilroy. The cobrahookie's been here." Yes sir, it was a serviceman'sworking man's bar. Loud but very friendly.

"Kamal Rashad," Davis said. "Like Karee
m Abdul-Jabbar, huh?"

"Yeah, you hear of the famous ones," Rasha
d said. "Maybe Elijah Muhammad, the Messenger.

But how about Wallace Muhammad? I belong t
o the Wali Muhammad Mosque Number One in Detroit."

"I guess I don't know anything about th
e Moslem religion," Davis said. He wasn't sure h e wanted to stand here talking about it, either.

"What I believe, mainly, is one thing," Rasha
d said. "If you take one step toward Allah, he'll tak e two steps toward you." He sipped his Scotch. "It'
s a good arrangement and can keep you from fucking up on your way to heaven. How long you say you been in, sixteen years?"

"April twentieth," Davis said.

"And now you don't know whether to stay in o
r get out."

"I'm getting out," Davis said. "What I don'
t know is what I'm gonna do."

Rashad tried an approach; see if the rednec
k United States Marine sipping his glass of Jim Bea m would follow along. "I don't imagine you able t o put much money aside, being in the service."

"Not at two bucks a drink most places."

"Or have a chance to moonlight at some job
, make a little extra."

"I guess I never looked at money as a problem,"

Davis said.

"Some guys, I understand, they get into deal
s where they take stuff out of a country with them t o make some bread. You understand what I'm saying?"

"What've you got," Davis said, "hash? Yo
u want me to put a few kilos in my footlocker?"

"Yeah, I understand they get next to a man goin
g home, pack it in with his personal shit. Man goin g home from the U
. S
. Embassy look even better."

"What've you got?" Davis said.

"Excuse me, my man, but have I said I was dealing anything?"

Davis waited, leaning against the bar, the tw
o girls behind him busy, chattering away with customers.

"But say a person did want to ship something,"

Rashad said. "How would he know if this Unite
d States Marine could handle it? Tell if he had the experience or not?"

"He wouldn't. Excuse me a minute, my man,"

Davis said. He moved off in the direction of the toilet, talking to people on the way.

Rashad fooled around Norman's for seven and
a half hours drinking Scotch, trying to get close to th e Marine: getting into it again with him--trying t o get the Marine to say if he was dealing with somebody or had something going on delivering goods that made him some money--learning one thin g interesting, that the Marine was going on a tri p tomorrow--but people kept coming up to the Marine or the Marine would see somebody and say excuse me a minute and be gone for a while.

The place was like a club, everybody friendl
y and knowing one another. Rashad talked to a heavy blonde girl from the British Embassy wh o undid a couple of buttons on his shirt and move d her hand over his chest while they talked. Peopl e would leave, the place would nearly clear out; the n they'd come back and it would be crowded again.

Norman took off his hardhat and showed hi
m the nineteen stitches in the crown of his head wher e he'd been hit by the drunken Israeli whom he'
d asked to leave and who had come back in with a piece of lumber from the construction site on th e corner. Norman had the piece of lumber over th e bar. He said the Israeli had sobered up but was stil l in Assuta Hospital. They talked about how com e Irish people drank and Jews didn't--except for th e guy in Assuta. Scotches kept appearing in front o f Rashad. Chris would say it's on Norman or it's o n Dave or somebody else. Rashad promised a man h e couldn't understand he'd visit him in Wales, in a town he couldn't pronounce. Rashad wasn't eve n sure where Wales was.

The Marine introduced him to another Marine
, a skinny dark-haired sergeant from the U
. S
. Consulate in Jerusalem, Raymond something, a Mexican name, and he watched them standing shoulder to shoulder at the bar, their Adam's apples going u p and down as they drank their pints of dark. Davi s would switch from whiskey to beer. Listening t o him and the Marine from Jerusalem it sounded lik e they were arguing, the way they talked to eac h other. The Marine from Jerusalem handed Davis a set of car keys. He said no, he hadn't brought hi s shotgun along. Was he supposed to? How was h e supposed to know Davis wanted it? Davis said because he'd told him. How was he supposed to shoot any birds without a shotgun? The Marin e from Jerusalem said bullshit he'd told him. H
e hadn't told him nothing about a shotgun. Norma n came along. He said, "All you want's a shotgun?

What else you need? Shells?" Norman had
a Krieghoff over-and-under Davis could use, a threethousand-dollar German beauty you barely had to aim. Norman motioned to Chris to set up a round , took his Campari and soda, and moved off again , adjusting his hardhat.

Rashad got next to Davis again. "You say yo
u going on a trip tomorrow?"

"About ten days."

"Where you going?"

"I don't know. South, I guess."

"What you need the shotgun for?"

"Birds. Do some bird shooting."

And maybe it was for something else he calle
d "bird shooting." Maybe he needed a shotgun alon g for protection. Rashad said, "I wouldn't mind seeing the countryside down there. Whereabouts south?"

But the Marine was bullshitting with the Mexican Marine again. Rashad hit his arm and said, "Hey, you want to go get something to eat?" Davi s said they were going to get some Chinese later on.

Rashad lost twenty pounds (three dollars) in th
e slot machine. He lost a hundred pounds throwin g darts to one of the Canadian U
. N
. soldiers he'd me t in the Hilton bar the night before--the asshol e slapping him on the back and grinning as if the y were a couple of old, old friends.

Rashad sat down in a booth. Young Israel
i chicks with long hair would look over at him, th e way he was lounging against the wall with one le g up on the bench. The goddamn guy from Wales h e couldn't understand, speaking English as if it wer e a foreign language, came over with two drinks an d started talking to him again while Davis and th e Marine from Jerusalem kept yelling at each othe r and laughing.

A skinny young guy--looked like a street hustler--
c ame in. Israeli, or maybe Arab. Rashad wasn'
t sure which, but the skinny guy looked familiar. Bi g high-heeled funny-shoes and a cheap fake-leathe r jacket. He went over to Davis--everybody wen t over to him at one time or another--and had a Coca-Cola while he told Davis something, a lon g story, Davis listening and finally nodding and saying something. One minute laughing, clowning around with the Marine from Jerusalem. The nex t minute quiet, serious, not showing any of the Ji m Beam in him while he listened to the skinny Arablooking kid. Rashad couldn't remember where he had seen him before. It didn't matter. The skinn y kid left and Davis went on drinking.