David Gilman - The Devil's breath

Max tried to settle his breathing, but there was another feeling now, a physical pain which he knew was fear. Mr. Peterson was on his cell phone and half turned his back as Max saw him. Max kept his head, not giving in to the impulse to stare at him; instead, he let his gaze sweep across the crowd in case Peterson used his peripheral vision to watch him. Peterson. He liked him. He was a great teacher. And there he was, part of the conspiracy to track Max down and kill him.

The check-in clerk called Max forward, which snapped his mind back into gear. Max handed his passport and boarding pass across the desk, but the crawling in his stomach wouldn’t go away. Mr. Peterson had been at the school for only a few months. He would have known Max’s daily schedule and he was probably the one who searched his room. Who was paying Peterson to betray him? Max didn’t have time to think about it. “Oh, this is an economy ticket.” The check-in clerk smiled.

Max knew that, of course. He was gambling that, if he played ignorant, the cheerful-looking woman would check him in anyway. “I’m really sorry. I didn’t know.” He grimaced. “I’ve never been on a big plane before,” he lied.

She quickly tapped her fingers on the computer keyboard. “Oh, that’s all right. I’ll check you in here. I bet you’re really excited.”

Max nodded enthusiastically.

“Any luggage?” she asked as she gazed at the screen.

“No, just my backpack.”

She asked him a few security questions and then packaged his passport and boarding pass together. “I’ve given you a window seat. Enjoy the flight.” She pointed down the hall. “Security and departure’s down there. Have a really nice time in Canada, Mr. Lawrence.”

Max thanked her and turned away. Peterson was still there, but he’d moved a bit further down the concourse. He must have been satisfied that Max was on his way to Pearson Airport, Toronto, to stay with his new guardian, Jack Ellerman, because he snapped his cell shut and turned on his heel, his job done. Max felt a sense of relief, but he still had to get on that plane for South Africa without being spotted. There might be others in the terminal looking for him.

The Toronto plane left at 21.30. The Virgin check-in desk for Johannesburg was in the A Zone, and that plane left at 20.05 and they were already boarding. Max had to get to the gate in time, and if he didn’t do it in the next fifteen minutes his whole plan would be ruined. He quickened his pace, dodging through the crowd, and then he saw another boy about his age. He too wore cargo pants, a sweat top, trainers and a lightweight fleece. His hair was a bit longer than Max’s and his shoulders weren’t as broad-Max had done a lot of white-water canoeing in the swirling waters of the River Dart and that had built up his arms and back muscles-and although Max had never seen this boy before, the orange-colored fleece identified him.

The other boy’s eyes were looking at the crowd ahead of him and then they locked on Max. The boy changed his small rucksack to the other shoulder and as they drew level each nudged the other’s shoulder. It was barely a couple of seconds of contact but in that time, and with a mumbled, “Sorry, mate,” they passed each other. And in those moments, Martin Lawrence, the son of one of Farentino’s clients, exchanged the passport and boarding pass for those in Max’s hand. Martin was happy to get a free trip to Canada-snowboarding was great at this time of year. Max now had his own passport and ticket for South Africa that Martin Lawrence had used to book him onto the South African flight. The two boys looked very similar, close enough not to cause any suspicion from a busy check-in clerk.

So far, so good. In eleven hours he would land in South Africa and be a lot closer to finding out what had happened to his father. It had been a grueling twenty-four hours and he wouldn’t care what movie they were showing on the flight. What he needed was sleep.

Outside the terminal, Peterson waited a few moments as a car approached the pickup area. iPod Man and Smart Bag Woman were inside. Peterson climbed in. “He’s on the Toronto plane. Let’s go.”

As the car edged slowly into the night traffic, an Airbus 343 bound for Johannesburg roared down the runway. Max, settled in his seat and wrapped in a lightweight airline blanket, saw London’s lights shimmer below him, a seabed of diamonds. He was asleep by the time the plane gained its cruising altitude, and as the ground slipped away, dreams were already troubling his exhausted mind. Juggled images of a hostile environment in an unknown country vied with a deep-rooted sense of dread about the forbidding desert fortress, Skeleton Rock.

Adrenaline had scoured Max’s body over the past twenty-four hours, putting him in an almost constant state of physical alertness as his mind responded to the “fight or flight” hormones banging through his system. Despite the fatigue, he had slept badly. Unfolding thoughts of his father and the responsibility Max now carried excited and scared him.

Farentino had painted only a fairly broad picture of what his father did, but nevertheless it explained where his father’s strength and courage came from. How did a graduate scientist end up fighting pirates and ambushing smugglers of endangered species? Or hacking his way through impenetrable jungles to find the source of a rare plant that could cure desperately ill people without letting the huge, profit-making drug companies exploit it?

Tom Gordon’s own sense of adventure helped, but the government had trained him. He wasn’t a spy, but his job came close to it-and in some ways what he did may have been more risky. He took on dangerous people who flouted international law. He had been field-trained by the best and, given the incident with the pirates off the coast of Africa and the way his dad had dealt with them, Max had an idea Special Forces might have been involved in that training. His father had a privileged “go anywhere” freedom, checking on rogue countries to see whether they were breaking or contravening international law. He met Max’s mother in South America when she was researching the damage caused to the environment by illegal logging in the rain forests. Within a couple of years they realized that governments around the world were often turning a blind eye to major illegal scientific and ecological issues. Trade agreements and mutual interests corrupted everyone.

His parents’ integrity made them not only important contacts but also many enemies. They challenged big business, brought executives to trial and forced many illegal companies that endangered the environment to close. Mention the names Tom and Helen Gordon to anyone in science and ecology, and the brave, pioneering troubleshooters were quietly acknowledged as being fearless. Anyone threatening the well-being of the earth with dangerous activities was their target. But eventually Tom and Helen resigned from government service because politics interfered with their work. They joined a small but dedicated group of people, privately funded, who moved across international borders, helping those who wanted to make a positive contribution while exposing and bringing to court those whose greed caused misery.

???

Max quickly made his way through Johannesburg International Airport. He moved swiftly down the concourse, past planes on the apron, their nose cones almost pressing against the terminal building-big, fat geese masquerading as peacocks, their brightly painted tail fins flared out behind them.

The first thing he had to do was contact Sayid and warn him about Mr. Peterson. Flipping open his cell phone, he waited as it connected to the local server and then he began texting. Thinking of Sayid brought the time frame into focus. Was it only yesterday he had left his school and taken the train to London and put this whole plan into action?