John Abbott - Scimitar

“What gorgeous colors,” she said.

Each of the crayons was wrapped with a band the color of the crayon itself. The range covered the entire spectrum, modulating subtly from shade to shade of yellow, red, orange, blue, violet, purple, grey, brown — and green.

She thought suddenly of Sonny.

And just as quickly put him out of her mind.

Geoffrey put the glass of water on the end table beside the easy chair in which she was sitting. Perching himself on the ottoman in front of it, he said, “I think an undercoating of yellow, don’t you?” and chose from the tin the lightest of the three yellow shades. Dipping the crayon into the glass of water, he applied the tip gingerly to the flesh under her eye. She was still afraid he was going to drip this stuff all over her blouse.

“Listen,” she said, “would it be all right if we got a dish towel or something?”

“Of course,” he said, and went back out to the kitchen again.

“Inside the door under the sink,” she called.

“I’ve got it,” he called back, and returned to the living room. Like a beautician fussing over a client, he draped the towel over her shoulders, stepped back to look at the yellow undercoating he’d already applied, and went to work again.

It was clear from the start that this was to be an artistic creation. No mere application of makeup was this, oh no. Carefully choosing his shades — a bit of red, a bit of blue, a bit of violet — he painstakingly colored the skin, working slowly and carefully, putting down one crayon to pick up another, chatting all the while. He was telling her now about the visit he’d had today from a police lieutenant and two men he suspected were spooks...

“... though, Lord knows, neither of the two identified himself except to offer a name, which was probably false anyway. These cloak and dagger people give me a severe pain in the arse, forgive me, don’t they you?”

But she had stopped listening. The moment he’d mentioned a police lieutenant, her mind leaped back to Westhampton Beach and her last conversation with Detective Gregors. She hadn’t heard a word from him since. She wondered now if she should call him again. She didn’t want to make a pest of herself, but goddamn it, this was her mother !

“... impression they’re worried about President Bush.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, “what...?”

“These men who came to see me. Do you remember my telling you about the two murdered women? The first time we had lunch togeth...?”

Mention of murder caused her mind to leap to her mother again, and the awful possibility that something terrible had happened to her. She felt an uncontrollable urge to go to the telephone this very instant, and almost leaped out of the chair. But he was working so closely, concentrating so intently...

“... the green tattoos,” he said, and picked up a green crayon.

A green the color of a jungle glade in brilliant sunlight.

“Which they seem to think identifies some sort of Libyan intelligence group,” Geoffrey said, and dipped the green crayon into the glass of water. “The green scimitar,” he said.

“What?” she said.

“The tattoo on each of the women. A green scimitar.”

His face was not six inches from hers. The green crayon was in his hand. A green the color of the scimitar tattoo on Sonny Hemkar’s chest. Her eyes opened wide.

“A green what ?” she said, and the telephone rang.

She leaped out of the chair at once, almost knocking over the glass of water on the end table, rushing to the phone at the other end of the room, yanking the receiver from its cradle.

“Hello?” she said.

“Miss Randall, please.”

“This is she.”

“Detective Gregors, Westhampton Beach Police.”

But she had recognized his voice from his very first words.

“Yes, Mr. Gregors,” she said.

“We’ve got a pretty good composite on this guy your mother was with the other night, and I was wondering how we could get it to you. I could have it messengered, I suppose... you don’t have access to a fax machine, do you?”

“No, I... oh. Just a minute. Geoff!” she called. “Is there a fax machine at the consulate?”

“Yes, of course,” he said.

“Can you let me have the number, please?”

Ten minutes later, Geoffrey unlocked the door to the consulate office, punched the security code into the panel to the right of the door, and ushered her in. The fax machine was at the far end of the room, near Lucy Phipps’s desk. The fax from Detective Gregors was already sitting in the grey plastic receiving tray. Elita picked it up.

She was looking at a very crude drawing of Sonny Hemkar.

During the night, the body made sounds.

Rigor mortis setting in, tissues stiffening, the sounds of the dead. He shivered each time the body made another sound. He tried to catch some sleep, but the small insistent noises the body made kept waking him up from fitful slumber. He was afraid the body would rise up alive again, to slay him. He was afraid some of the sarin would somehow spill out of the sealed bottle and kill him. He was afraid they would find him here in the closet, force open the door, murder him like a trapped animal.

He must have dozed at last.

A new sound jerked him into startled wakefulness.

The lock. Someone trying to force a key into the jammed keyway. The key clicking, clicking, an effective burglar alarm.

A voice in Spanish.

“ Mierda! ”

Silence.

Reading the OUT OF ORDER sign.

Or trying to read it.

A heavy sigh outside the door.

Footsteps retreating.

He tapped the light button on his digital watch.

6:30 A.M.

He released the button. Beside him, the ranger’s body kept stiffening, whispering of death.

He tried to sleep again.

Hogan kept wondering who had hung the shiner on the girl.

The Turner kid from the British Consulate was telling him about yet another green scimitar tattoo, but all Hogan could think of was what a beautiful shiner the girl was wearing. Had the Turner kid been knocking her around? You could never tell with the quiet ones.

“On his chest,” the girl said now.

Elita Randall. Healthy-looking blond girl. Big blue eyes.

“On the left pectoral,” she said.

He wondered how she knew this, but he made no comment. He was suddenly reminded of the two women who’d contradictorily described a word tattooed on a man’s penis as SWAN and SASKATCHEWAN. Hogan was up to his ass in tattoos, and was beginning to wish he’d joined the Fire Department all those years ago. Besides, the two kids had been waiting for him when he’d got to work at a quarter to eight this morning, and he hadn’t even had his coffee yet.

“You want some coffee?” he asked. “I’ll send out for some coffee.”

“This is the man her mother was last seen with,” the Turner kid said.

“On Monday night,” the girl said.

“What’s his name?” Hogan said, and picked up the phone. “Harry,” he said into the receiver, “order me three cups of coffee, willya? And some cheese Danish. How do you like your coffee?” he asked.

“Regular,” the girl said.

“Black,” the Turner kid said.

“Sonny Hemkar,” the girl said. “His name.”

“Two regulars, one black,” Hogan said into the phone, and hung up. “How do you spell that last name?”

“H-E-M-K-A-R,” the girl said. “And his first name is Krishnan, the Sonny is just a nickname. K-R-I-S-H-N-A-N.”

Hogan was writing.

“What is he?” he asked. “Pakistani? Afghan? Something like that?” The guy probably drove a taxi; the city was full of camel jockeys these days.

“Indian,” the girl said. “Well, his father’s Indian. His mother’s British.”