Dan Fesperman - The Double Game

“Damned snoop,” she said. She pointed to a large set of footprints in the mud at the base of the wall. She looked up at me and smiled crookedly.

“If I didn’t know better, I’d say he might be your babysitter.”

“Babysitter?”

She eyed me closely.

“They must think you’re worth quite a lot if they’re going to that much trouble, don’t you think?”

“Unless he’s here because he’s after me. Or after you.”

She laughed.

“Heavens,” she said. “If that were the case, then we’d all be dead or tied up in someone’s trunk by now.”

She stooped. The footprints were beneath the eaves, so they were fairly well sheltered from the downpour.

“Well, the shoes aren’t of a Russian make, I can tell you that,” she said. “Although I suppose half the Oligarchs and their henchmen wear nothing but Italian loafers these days. All the same, he’ll be gone by now.”

“How can you be sure?” Litzi asked.

“I heard a car pulling away earlier, just before we buzzed you on the intercom.”

I looked inquiringly at Litzi, who shook her head. I hadn’t heard anything, either.

“Even with my old ears, when you live alone out in a place like this you learn to notice just about everything.”

“Would you like us to stay the night with you?” I asked.

Humphries made a face.

“The cook is here. I can wake him in a pinch. Besides, I’m not prepared for company. There aren’t even sheets on the guest beds.”

“We can manage without them,” Litzi said.

“No. No. Whoever it was didn’t come for me. And when the quarry leaves, the problem will leave with it.”

She smiled, but I said nothing as the rain dripped off my jacket.

“The two of you should be getting on. That bridge you crossed on the way in, five clicks from here? It often floods in rain like this. Getting washed into a creek would be a pretty unsatisfactory way to shake surveillance, don’t you think?”

We went back inside just long enough to drop off the rain gear. As we said good-bye I couldn’t help but notice that Humphries looked thoroughly invigorated. Even if she had to stay up half the night with the shotgun propped against the bed, she was enjoying herself.

“Watch yourself,” she said before shutting the door. “If not for your own sake, then because you’re doing this for all the rest of us who are no longer in the game.”

We ran to the car, cranked the engine, and began rolling back through the muck toward Prague.

We were silent all the way up the narrow drive, keeping an eye out for anything that might jump out at us from the darkness. I was shivering from the cold and wet as we turned onto the smooth track of the rural highway, but the heater and the thrum of the tires on the blacktop soon calmed us. The creek was high, as Humphries had warned, but it wasn’t yet flooding. Litzi smelled of hay, manure, and warm horseflesh, a comforting combination.

“How were the horses?”

“Beautiful. She has a good eye for them.”

“Well, I knew the Viennese loved horses, but I never knew that applied to you.”

“It happened after I knew you.”

“You told her it was when you were a girl.”

“It’s complicated.”

I let it go.

“Who do you think was snooping around?” she asked.

“The mullet, maybe? Or maybe someone checking up on us. Like she said, if he’d wanted to harm us he probably would’ve done it. It certainly would have been a convenient place to finish us off.”

“Are we being fools?”

“Probably. Maybe that’s part of what makes it interesting. Humphries obviously thought it was a blast.”

“She does have spirit, even if she’s a bitch. I hope she had useful information.”

I briefed her on the basics but didn’t mention my dad’s involvement with the polygraph in Belgrade. I wasn’t even sure how to ask him about it. Considering the timing, I was already uneasy about all the possibilities.

“What’s wrong?” Litzi asked.

“I’m tired.”

A midget-sized Opel with the dimmest of taillights was just ahead, barely visible in the rain. I braked and began looking for a way to pass, but we had reached a curvy section through a forest. A quarter mile later a big truck lumbered up on our rear, headlights blazing, horn sounding.

“What the fuck?”

I had to flip down the mirror to get the glare out of my face. I beeped at the car ahead of us, but it beetled onward. The truck lurched up within inches of our bumper.

“What’s he doing!” Litzi shouted. “Do you think-?”

“I don’t know! But there’s nothing we can do about it now.”

The Opel’s brake lights winked as we approached another curve, and I nearly rear-ended it. The truck responded with a groan and shudder, air brakes snorting as the damn thing actually tapped us, which nearly sent us sprawling, like a Chihuahua getting a love tap from a buffalo. I held tightly to the wheel as the Mercedes shimmied, then stabilized. The truck’s headlights flooded the car.

“Who do you think it is?” I asked.

“Just drive,” Litzi said. She looked pale and haggard in the glow of the dashboard light. We were too old for this. The truck bore down with another burst of acceleration, its engine throbbing in our ears. Just ahead on the right I spotted a gap in the trees-a small turnout, big enough for us but not the truck-and at the last second I wrenched the wheel right, hooking the tires off the shoulder into a slurry of wet gravel.

The truck blasted its horn in passing, heading off into the night after the hapless Opel. The Mercedes ground to a halt. I was exhausted. Litzi hugged herself and exhaled slowly.

“So maybe he was just an asshole,” she said. “Your average lorry driver.”

“Plenty of them to go around.”

After a few seconds I tried turning back onto the road, but could only spin the front wheels in the mush.

“Shit!”

“We’re stuck?”

I tried rocking the car back and forth between first gear and reverse, the way you do in the snow, but the tires only dug deeper. I shut off the engine and slumped in my seat in the sudden quiet.

“I’ll have to dig us out. Right now I’m too tired to try.”

“Why don’t we rest awhile.” She put a hand to my cheek. “It’s probably the safest spot for miles.”

The road was empty and quiet, and the rain had slackened to a drizzle. Drops from overhanging pines pinged on the roof like a distant drumroll, a martial lullaby. Litzi lowered her seat and curled up facing me. I opened the windows a fraction for fresh air, and instantly smelled the resin of the pines. Then I lowered my own seat and stretched out as best I could. I was almost instantly asleep.

An hour or so later I awakened to voices and the steady tapping of water on the roof. A flashlight beam veered into the car, and I sat up with a start, stiff and disoriented. Voices were speaking Czech, but the windows were fogged. I rubbed a hand on the windshield and saw a police car canted in front of us, blocking our way, not that we were capable of moving. Looking over my shoulder I saw a second police car wedged behind us. A cop was training his flashlight on our German tags. There was a sharp knock on the driver’s side window, which awakened Litzi.

“What’s happening?” she said groggily.

“Cops.” I rolled down the window.

The policeman leaned down, smelling strongly of aftershave. He said something in Czech that I couldn’t understand, so I answered in English.

“Sorry, I don’t speak your language.”

He sighed, then consulted with the other one, who took his place at the window.

“Your documents, please.”

I fished out my passport and D.C. driver’s license, hoping that was all he’d want. He inspected them carefully, then leaned down again.