Colin Harrison: Afterburn

"Couple hundred bucks an ounce usually," said Morris.

"You can get it cheaper," observed Tommy.

"Not in a restaurant."

"Even the cheap stuff is expensive," Morris told Tony. "Most people don't know the difference."

"Yeah… Why do I want that?" Tony was saying. "It's not like the airport, exactly… You have to have an examiner to know if it's any good… I'll take something I can dump in Chinatown, something I can sell to anybody…"

"Cameras?" cried Charlie. "The guy has Japanese cameras."

"Cameras I'll take," Tony said into the phone. "I need it by eleven. What? That's what I said-we'll do that. A load of new cameras

… We can break it up… Five million is less than wholesale, probably. You call here at ten forty-five and we'll send a-What?… Your mother will be-no. No. Soon as you give me that piece of paper, you little bitch, then we square everything." He grunted and pulled a piece of licorice out of his pocket. "She's smart, that one, smartest I ever saw. I'm making a profit off this." He handed the phone to Charlie. "She's going to get that bill of lading for a container of new Nikon cameras and bring that here. She's a smart girl, Charles."

"Listen to me," Christina said to Charlie now. "Did you write down the number of the spot-buyer guy?"

"Yes."

"Scribble it out."

He looked at his piece of paper. "Why?"

"Just do it."

"Okay." He did.

"Do you remember the name?" she asked.

"Bob somebody."

"He can't send a guy to get me this way," she said.

"Oh," replied Charlie, not necessarily following her logic. "What do I do now?"

"Tell me your banker's name."

"Ted Fullman. Citibank."

"Call him," Christina said, "and say I'll call with the particulars, which I will. It's a three-party transaction. I get this now. They show me the bill of lading, which has the description of the load and the number of the container. All containers have numbers. The bill of lading is a transferable document of ownership. It has to be transferable, because the container goes from seller to shipper to maybe another buyer, another shipper, and so on. It's probably been transferred a couple of times already at this point. Sometimes it's altered, but this guy is reputable. I'm not saying the cameras aren't stolen, just that the cameras are in the container. The money gets wired from the bank to the spot-market agent, the agent gives me the bill of lading, and I give the bill of lading to Tony. He's free to pick up the cameras at that point."

"I think I got that."

"So call your banker, Charlie. Say my name is Sally."

"Okay." He was too tired to understand all of it. When she hung up, he called Ted back. "You get the cash from my broker?"

"Yes," said Ted. "Now what?"

"My representative, whose name is Sally, will call you and tell you where to send the letter of credit. I'm sorry about all this confusion, Ted."

"What's the deal, Charlie?"

"Oh hell, Ted, you're going to think I'm crazy." He tried to sound jovial. "I got a great price on a load of… caviar. It's a distressed situation. The mark-up is huge and I've already got a buyer."

Ted chuckled. "You're always a gambler there, Charlie. We'll get the letter delivered and then wire the funds after they call."

"Great," he breathed, barely able to keep energy in his voice. "Thanks, Ted. Thanks a bunch. She'll-Sally-will call. Thanks."

Tony was shaking his head. "No way is that girl going to show up with a bill of lading here that's worth five million dollars. All she has to do is have them change the name to her and then she's got it and then she can sell it to someone else. I been down there in those freight warehouses. They can do some funny stuff down there."

"So?" asked Morris.

"So we find out from Charles what the hell she just told him. We watch the place and get her right as she comes out."

Charlie's phone rang again. Tony answered it. "Yes, sweetheart, he's still here. He's fine. Now, when you get the bill of lading, I don't want you to call this number, I want you to call this other one." He read from a piece of paper. "That one. Then we'll work out the pickup. Don't try any of your little tricks, either." He hung up. "This is my backup. She calls that number, Peck's guys have her location in under ten seconds, even if it's a cell phone. Then they call us, and we go and they try to keep her on the line." He leaned forward and put his hand on the epidural drip, pinching the tube experimentally. "That's our backup if Charles here doesn't do something nice for us now."

Morris turned to Charlie. "You going to tell us?"

"What?"

"The name of the guy that's selling the cameras."

"I don't know it." They wanted the location, he understood. "She just gave me the phone number."

"What's the number, then?"

He looked at his scribbled piece of paper and stiffened. "She told me to cross it out."

Tony and Morris looked at each other in silence. Then Morris shook his head in disgust. "This girl is slick."

Now I'm expendable, Charlie realized. They can kill me right now and they lose nothing.

"No disrespect, Tony," said Morris, "but your backup plan won't work if she doesn't call that other number."

"She'll call it," Tony said. "If she wants her mother to be-"

"Wait," Morris said.

"What?" asked Tony.

"He remembers the fucking number!" said Morris, eager now, pointing at Charlie. "Look at him!"

He didn't-not for the life of him did he remember the number. But if he pretended to remember it, he realized with sudden clarity, then they'd torture him for it, they'd keep him alive. Maybe long enough to get out of this, go kiss Ellie.

"He knows the number," Morris yelled, lips wet. "I can see it in his face!"

"He's protecting her," said Tommy.

"You shouldn't do that," warned Morris. "Why would you do that?"

"Why anything?" Charlie said.

"Is that your explanation?" screamed Morris. "Is that all you can say?"

He took a deep breath. What could they do to him in a few hours? He'd lasted three months in the hands of the North Vietnamese.

"You going to tell us?"

"No."

Morris looked disbelievingly at the other men, happy to be insulted, then back at Charlie. "You understand that I have exposed your spinal nerve back here?"

"I understand that," Charlie answered. "I understand the whole situation."

Now Tony rose out of his chair slowly, like a man being called to dinner, and stepped forward, concern in his eyes. "Tell us the phone number, Mr. Ravich. It'd be better, you know?"

"I can't," Charlie said.

"You're saying we have to torture it out of you?" asked Tony.

Every minute longer that I live, Charlie thought, gives me a chance for another. He turned his head as far as he could and looked Morris in the eye, confident of his hatred for the man. "I'm saying that, yes."

Morris nodded coldly. "Then it's showtime," he said.

He yanked the needle out of Charlie's back.

He felt nothing. No one spoke. Morris checked his watch. Still nothing. I'm okay, thought Charlie.

Then, flaming up his spine, came a red ganglion of pain that frayed outward in searing, incomprehensible complexity-and when he arched his back in shocked torment, the pulsing hot bud at the base of his spine bloomed again while simultaneously reappearing within itself, detonation within florid detonation. "Oh, God," he screamed, "God, God, God."

The men held him down and Morris took a pair of pliers from the toolbox. He ripped something from Charlie's spinal column. The pain became hallucinatory-icy worms writhed in one foot, his anus spasmed. "Jesus," he screamed. "Jesus, please!"

Someone grabbed his hand. He opened his eyes.

Morris, smiling at the great good humor of life, pressed a bloody steel screw into Charlie's quivering palm. "Bone atrophy," he explained. "This was getting loose."