Keith Thomson - Twice a Spy

On his heels, Charlie made out an opening in the fence about a hundred feet ahead, near the charter company offices. Just then he heard a staticky version of du Frongipanier’s shout, “ Il s visent le parking! ” The sound emanated from Drummond’s suit pants.

Surprised, Drummond shot a hand into his pocket, withdrew a walkie-talkie, and eyed it oddly. Its provenance was less of a mystery to Charlie: Relieving an unconscious security guard of his communication device was probably second nature to the lifelong spy.

“They’re headed for the parking lot,” Drummond said.

“Who?” asked Charlie.

“Us.” Drummond tapped the radio. He understood French-who knew?

“Well, good, we can get a car,” Charlie said. “Right?” Even at his murkiest, Drummond could, in seconds, snap open the ignition barrel on the underside of a steering column, pluck the proper two from the tangle of wires, touch them together, and bring an engine roaring to life.

Drummond pressed the walkie-talkie to an ear and relayed, “They’ve sent men to lock the gate leading to the parking lot, and all of the exits from the airport.”

Sirens erupted with the distinctive hee-haw of European emergency vehicles.

A pair of police cars were racing from the main terminal. Parked planes popped out of the darkness, alternately red and blue, reflecting the cars’ light bars.

“It sort of begs mentioning that there are planes everywhere,” Charlie shouted through the chaos. Last week Drummond had demonstrated that he could fly a helicopter. “Can you get a plane started?”

“Simple as flipping a toggle switch or two. But I’m not a licensed pilot.”

“Whatever. I’ll spring for the fine.”

“I mean, I barely know how to fly planes like these.”

“ Barely sounds pretty good right now.”

“I’m … I’m sorry, son …” As if to hide his shame, he looked away, fixing his gaze on the dark alley between two hangars.

Just as well, Charlie thought. Suffering a precipitous drop in lucidity, Drummond had crashed the helicopter last week.

Drummond perked up. “Now that is perfect!”

He pointed to a big vehicle parked in an alley. It looked part fire engine and part tugboat, or something a mad scientist might have created in an automotive junkyard. Its rectangular cargo hold flashed olive green in the bright light cast by a third police car rolling along the far side of the fence.

“Perfect for what?” Charlie asked. “Ramming the gate?”

“I think you’d need a tank to do that.” Drummond hurried toward the vehicle.

Charlie trailed him, thinking this was no kind of exit plan: If they managed to start the behemoth, the police cars would catch them in seconds.

Drummond darted to the front of the vehicle, which was shaped like a ship’s prow. Bold metallic letters on the grille proclaimed AMPHIBUS. Charlie guessed it was used for rescues when planes landed in the water, short of the runway.

Drummond grasped the driver’s door handle and tried to get into the cabin. The door didn’t budge. Charlie added his weight to the footlong handle. The creak of the hinges was masked by the sirens, fortunately.

Drummond dove upward, landing prone on the driver’s seat. He flipped onto his back, reached under the control panel, and went to work on the ignition barrel.

Usually he needed to find a way to pry loose the panel. With a nothing tap, this one clunked to the floor. A mass of wires spilled onto his face. Although they all appeared black in the dark alley, he somehow knew which two were the reds-or at least he appeared confident as he touched two ends together.

The engine hiccupped.

Then fell silent.

Maybe for the best, Charlie thought.

A patrol car crept even with the mouth of the alley.

Charlie resisted an impulse to dive out of sight. Even in the shadows, his sudden movement would have the effect of a signal flare on the policemen’s peripheral vision. So too would the contour of a man pressed flat against the side of a vehicle, but the Amphibus had a wild outcropping of tires, life rafts, and rescue devices. Charlie blended in.

The patrol car continued past.

A moment later Drummond tried the wires again, this time pressing the accelerator with his palm. The engine coughed, six or seven bursts, the intervals between them decreasing in duration and culminating in one pleasing grumble.

Drummond scrambled to the passenger side of a front bench larger than most couches. Charlie jumped in, taking the wheel. Despite the obvious antiquity of the vehicle and the sour stench of old seawater, the cabin was in pristine condition. Evidently the Amphibus hadn’t seen much action.

Perched at the edge of the bench, Charlie needed to stretch to keep hold of both the gear shift and the steering wheel. “So do you think we should try for a diversionary tactic? Or just gun it for the water-assuming this thing guns?”

Drummond made no reply.

Charlie looked over to find his father shaking his head as if to stave off sleep. Over the past week the experimental medication had slowed Drummond down in general, a function of the p25 protein booster’s beta-blocker component, which brought his metabolism to a crawl. The brief flight from the customs official seemed to have drained him.

“Any thoughts, Dad?”

With a forearm that seemed to weigh a hundred pounds, Drummond pointed ahead.

Customs official Maurice du Frongipanier strode around the corner and into the alley, eyes blazing with fury, revolver locked on Charlie.

The customs man took a deep breath and squeezed the trigger.

Charlie imagined that he heard the click over the clamor of sirens. A white muzzle flash lit the alley and the report drowned out all other sounds.

Like Drummond, Charlie ducked, not just beneath the window line but to the nonskid metal floor, his instincts overriding his awareness that even the monster’s metal plating offered little protection against a bullet traveling near the speed of sound.

The bullet drilled through the windshield, spider-webbing much of the surrounding glass and blasting shards against Charlie’s hands, which he was using to shield his head. The round continued its course through the vinyl seat just above Drummond’s head, disappearing through the door to the cargo hold.

With his raw left hand, Charlie punched the clutch, meanwhile ramming the gearshift into first and pressing the accelerator, sending the Amphibus lurching forward. He pounded the horn.

The customs official jumped, sending his subsequent shot high. It struck one of the spotlights on the vehicle’s roof. Orange fragments of glass bounced down Charlie’s window.

Emboldened by the sight of the official scurrying out of the way, Charlie sat up so that he was even with the wheel and stomped on the accelerator. The Amphibus chugged to seven or eight kilometers per hour.

Drummond rose too, heavy-lidded and irritable, as if he’d been rudely awoken.

“You okay?” Charlie asked.

Drummond grumbled. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“No reason.”

As the truck reached the end of the alley, something thudded against the passenger side of the cargo hold.

“I was afraid of that,” Drummond said, eyeing his side mirror.

Checking the mirror, Charlie saw du Frongipanier improbably clinging to one of the flotation devices dangling from the Amphibus.

“Hang on,” Charlie said. “Tight.”

Drummond braced himself against the control panel. Charlie crushed the brake pedal. The tires shrieked to a halt while the chassis and Charlie’s stomach hurtled onward.

The customs man ought to have been flung thirty feet ahead.

But he hung on and, what’s more, managed to point his revolver at the passenger window and line up Drummond’s head in his sights.