Kirk Russell - Redback

They stopped at the last outbuilding on the plateau, about fifty yards from where he was, close enough to hear their voices. Stoval unlocked a heavy barn door and slid it open. With Trocca’s help he dragged out Chole or Chole’s body, it was hard to tell if he was alive until they got him to the rear of the Range Rover. There, Trocca kicked him until Chole struggled to his feet. He wore both hand and ankle cuffs and fell several times before they got him loaded in the back. He’d probably been in the cold shed all night, and he was injured. Marquez saw the bruising on his face.

Stoval slammed the rear door shut and they drove out the track across the plateau and dropped down into the trees and were gone from sight. Marquez tried his cell again. He hurried into the main house and tried the phones, but got a busy signal rather than a dial tone and guessed there was a code to call out. He went back outside, looked at the tire tracks running in the dirty snow and started to follow them. At first he walked, and then as he thought more about what they were doing with Chole he started to run.

Twelve foot high chain link gates to the penned enclosure were latched closed, but not locked. Marquez went through and then followed the four-wheel drive track down through Scotch broom and across an icy stream. The road climbed through trees. It reached a clearing and Marquez panted hard as he knelt down. He glimpsed the back of the Range Rover, heard Stoval and Trocca talking. He skirted brush, catching his breath as he caught view of Trocca holding a gun and Stoval leaning over Chole. He could also see the long run of high fence dropping toward a canyon and how trees and brush were cleared away from it, and the electrified strands running at the top. Transistors on the fence hummed and he finally understood.

In the clearing Stoval looped a chain around the cuffs that held Chole’s ankles and then ran the chain through an iron hoop staked to the ground. The chain clinked and somewhere in the distance he heard the cry of an animal. Soon after came the low whooping of hyena.

Hyenas wouldn’t leave anything behind, not even bones if they were hungry enough, and Stoval probably made sure they got hungry enough. They must be hungry if they were this bold. They were circling, closing. They seemed to frighten General Trocca whose voice carried as he encouraged Stoval to finish and to stop talking to Chole. Stoval bent over Chole, probably describing what was going to happen.

Marquez moved toward the hyenas and a break in the brush. He wanted to get through that opening before the animals spread out more. The opening allowed him to blindside them. Trocca faced the hyenas whooping in the brush straight ahead of them and Stoval’s back was to Marquez as he charged into the clearing.

From the look on his face as he wheeled, Trocca expected a hyena. He got off two shots and missed with both before Marquez slammed into him, tearing the gun out of his hand and battering his throat with an elbow. Trocca went down gagging and Marquez’s momentum carried him stumbling on to Stoval. Stoval pulled a knife. He lunged upward with it and with luck Marquez blocked it with the rifle. Then he knocked the knife loose and swept the gun stock across Stoval’s face. He knocked him down, then knocked him out and found the keys in his coat. He dragged a struggling Trocca over, freed Chole’s legs and hooked up Trocca to the ankle cuffs that had held Chole.

He got Chole to his feet as Stoval stirred and Marquez took the chance of getting Chole to the Range Rover before going back for Stoval. Chole’s face was a mess and he was having trouble breathing. Marquez got him closer to the Range Rover then had to leave him as Stoval retrieved the knife and stood. When that happened Marquez quickly picked up the rifle.

‘Drop the knife.’

Stoval didn’t answer and then did something Marquez never saw coming. He moved sideways to Trocca, leaned and slashed open one side of Trocca’s throat. Blood spurted onto Trocca’s face and into the dirt. Trocca’s hand rose to his neck and he spasmed and his body jerked as Stoval ran toward the brush and Marquez swung the rifle and sighted on Stoval. The shot was easy, but he didn’t pull the trigger. He saw Trocca’s blood sprayed over Stoval’s pant legs, and blood dripping off Stoval’s face where the blow from the gun stock had opened his cheek. He thought about it and let Stoval push into the brush, watched him disappear.

Trocca bled out before the first hyenas showed themselves. A big female crept into the clearing as Marquez got a seatbelt on Chole. At his feet as he shut the door and started back around the Range Rover was a shard of yellow bone that could be human. He stooped, picked it up, and dropped it in the Range Rover. He started the engine. Chole needed medical help and soon. He saw the hyenas reach Trocca’s body but he couldn’t do anything about that or go after Stoval yet. Chole’s breath was ragged. His lips were not only split and swollen, but blue from cold. His nose and front teeth were broken. He wasn’t far from going into shock.

Before Marquez drove away, he locked the gate. The Range Rover rocked as they bounced back down the rough road to the stream. Chole made sounds about needing water and Marquez got him water and then drove on. Several ribs were badly broken and Chole moaned as they bounced through potholes. Up on the plateau, he lost consciousness. He said ‘ Mi amigo ’ and then closed his eyes, and when Marquez reached over and felt for a pulse what was there was erratic.

Now, as he hit the paved road he drove hard. He called Verandas on the way into Bariloche and Verandas met him at the clinic. Two doctors were waiting. They worked on Chole as Marquez and Verandas walked out on to the cold street. The snow on the mountains looked very bright and clean as they talked over what to do next.

‘He’s not going over the fence,’ Marquez said. ‘It’s electrified.’

‘What about the gate?’

‘He went the other way, but maybe he knows another way out.’

Marquez doubted there was another way out. He looked over at Verandas and added, ‘I heard something in the distance as I was locking the gate. I’m not sure what it was, but not all of the hyenas were with Trocca. We need to get the police chief here to go back out there with us and you’ve got to get to two computers in a study. There are two steel doors with reinforced glass and when I tapped on the walls there’s metal there too. I don’t know how you’re going to get through, but I think everything is in those computers. None of the buildings were locked. Not a single door except for that study. I’ll go down to the pen with the police but you’ve got to figure a way to reach those computers. Can you do that?’

‘I’m more worried about the encryption. This guy has the money for the best.’

The police arrived but didn’t want to go anywhere until they had interviewed Chole. It was another hour and a half before Chole was able to say what had happened. He showed the police chief a dart hole in his right side under his ribs. Stoval had shot him there last night and his best guess was that the dart had an animal tranquilizer. He didn’t remember the ride or getting to the house. He came to in a shed with his ankles and wrists in cuffs, and Stoval prodding his face with a stick. He’d lost three teeth. He had five broken ribs. Every bone in his left hand was broken.

He looked at Marquez as he told the police chief, ‘I told him I was going to arrest him for killing two condors. I told him I had proof.’

‘Where did you get it?’

Chole nodded toward Marquez.

They drove back out there in two police vehicles, Marquez and Verandas riding with the chief and another officer. The chief rode in the front seat and the officer drove as they got up on the plateau. As they came alongside the main house the chief turned and said, ‘You wait here.’