Steve Martini - Guardian of Lies

The man is positioned outside one of the cubicles with the curtains drawn. As the doctor is talking to him, he looks our way and checks us out. He looks like he’s crowding fifty, a crew cut with a little moonshine on top, some middle-aged heft around the middle but with shoulders broad enough that you wouldn’t want to wrestle him. He is slowly chewing gum as he looks at us.

“Now who do you suppose he is?” says Harry. “Black Rockports resoled with inch-thick rubber soles and Cat’s Paw heels. And I thought they stopped making the Cat’s Paws years ago.”

“No, they just sold the company to the U.S. Marshals Service,” I tell him.

“You think he’s trying to go undercover?” says Harry.

“No, I’m thinking Rhytag may have already done that number.”

“Hmm?” says Harry.

“See if we can get a list of the names of the seventeen inmates killed on the bus, check it against courthouse records, criminal cases pending, or county sentences handed down. My guess is we’re either going to find one name from the bus that doesn’t have a matching courthouse file, or the coroner is suddenly going to come up one cadaver short in the head count.”

“Katia’s friend from the bus,” says Harry.

“Uh-huh.”

The doctor wiggles his finger and motions us to join him. He goes through the opening in the curtain, followed closely by Harry and then me. The marshal comes in behind us.

Harry starts to turn, about to get in his face to assert lawyer-client, but I tap him down low with my hand on his wrist and stop him. “Nothing confidential is happening here today,” I whisper as I nod toward the bed.

Katia is flat on her back. The cover sheet is drawn up to her chest. Her eyes are half open, with a glazed look, a combination of shock and the sedative. Her face is as white as the sheet. It’s clear that she will remember none of this in the days that follow.

I move slowly toward the bed and look down at her. She has not even the slightest resemblance to the vivacious, carefree woman I met that morning over the bin of bananas in Del Mar. In just under three months, the state has sucked the life out of her and left this shell in her place.

I touch her hand as it rests on top of the sheet. It is cold as ice. I pick it up and hold it between my hands, trying to warm it.

For an instant her eyelids flicker and her head rolls slightly this way as she struggles to look at me. But the drawn and lifeless expression on her face doesn’t change.

“I’m going to have to ask that you not do that,” says the marshal.

“Excuse me?” I look at him.

“Nobody but the doctors and hospital staff are allowed to touch her.”

“Says who?” says Harry.

“Says me.”

“We were told she was under sheriff’s custody,” I say.

“She is,” says the marshal.

“So where are you hiding your sheriff’s badge these days?” says Harry.

“We’re just helping out,” he says.

“If I might ask, on what legal authority? Where is the federal process?” I say. “The documentation for your presence here-”

“Gentlemen, I don’t want any arguments in here,” the doctor starts to cut me off.

“Doc, I apologize. You’re right. And I don’t want the marshal to misunderstand. I do not resent his presence. The problem is that neither my partner nor I understand what’s happening here, the reason for the federal presence.”

“Just doing my job,” says the marshal.

“I know. But if there’s a reason to believe that our client continues to be in danger, we would like to be informed as to what that danger is. Then by all means we want you here.”

“What we don’t want is to have you questioning or communicating with her unless one of us is present.” Harry glances at the marshal.

“I do my job. Right now that means watching her,” he says.

“That’s good. That’s fine,” says Harry. “As long as it doesn’t include pumping her full of scopolamine and listening to her dreams, we shouldn’t have any problems.”

“Harry, please,” I tell him.

“Sorry, nothing personal,” says Harry.

“It seems the presence of law enforcement makes you foam at the mouth,” says the marshal. “I understand. I have the same problem with lawyers.”

“Now that that’s settled,” I say, “Doctor, can I ask you a question?”

“Certainly.”

“Would you have any objection if we retain a separate physician, someone to serve as her personal doctor to confer with the staff here at the hospital and keep us apprised of her condition?”

“No. I’d have to check with the sheriff’s department. They have custody, but I can’t imagine there would be any problem.”

“Good. In that case we’ll retain a personal physician first thing tomorrow.”

“But I think we need to leave for now and let her rest,” says the doctor.

“Sure.” I slip Katia’s cold hand under the sheet. As I release it, her eyelids flicker once more as she looks at me. I take the other hand and place it under the sheet. I touch her forehead with my fingertips and lean down into her ear as I whisper, “Katia, we’ll be back. I promise you.”

“She can’t hear you,” said the doctor.

“I know. Hasta luego , Katia.”

At least the news from California was good. Alim read the handwritten translation in Farsi from the original computer e-mail printout. It had been sent in Spanish from San Diego that afternoon. Like all of the communications with the Mexican, the message was cryptic, but the code words were clear. The Russian’s granddaughter was dead-mission accomplished.

He lowered the paper and took a deep breath. There would be no trial. The investigations surrounding the American’s murder would end, and with them the fear that someone might trip over Katia Solaz’s family background.

So far they had managed to stanch the leak from the photographs and the fumbling interference from an aged American, probably one of Satan’s agents. Alim knew that without the assistance of the FARC rebels, none of this would have been possible. It was their intelligence source in Costa Rica who had first alerted them to Pike’s activities and the fact that he had the photographs as well as Nitikin’s granddaughter.

“Do you have any message to send back?” said the Farsi interpreter. They were in one of the small huts used by the FARC for communications. It was situated on a hillside under the dense jungle canopy.

“Yes. Give me a few moments to think.”

The interpreter had been sent over by Alim’s government, a necessity in the tower of babel that was the jungle hideaway. The man had been pulled from a university post because of his ability to speak Farsi and to teach Spanish. The skills were a combination of increasing importance, not only to Alim’s government but to others in the region as they probed for weaknesses in the armor, the southern soft underbelly of the Great Satan.

For the moment, Alim was walking a diplomatic tightrope. He could not afford to alienate the FARC, which had formed a trusting and loyal relationship with Nitikin. The Russian had lived with them in the jungle for decades. Still, each passing day saw Nitikin becoming more and more difficult to deal with. He continued in his refusal to assemble the device until his daughter was returned safely, under the protection of the FARC, to her home in Costa Rica. This was now becoming a problem, threatening to interrupt the time line for Alim’s mission. He could wait no longer. Fortunately the Mexican was now free for another assignment.

“Tell him we have another job, this time in San José, Costa Rica.”

The translator scribbled with a pencil on a pad.