Alex Berenson - The Night Ranger

The story stuck with Gwen in part because Granger had creeped her out so much. He had pockmarked skin and jet-black hair that she knew now must have been dyed. In September he treated her like everybody else. By June she couldn’t escape the way he looked at her. Fortunately, he didn’t try to touch her, never even said anything inappropriate. But his squinty blue eyes had stayed with her. Her first taste of unwanted male attention.

Granger lingered over the tale of the Johnsons. I want you all to understand the power of these mountains, he’d said. Gwen wasn’t impressed. Everybody in Montana knew that blizzards could hit the Bitterroots as early as in October. The Johnsons should have waited for spring. Instead, only the blind luck of a warm December saved them from their own stupidity. Otherwise they would have been sharpening axes like the Donners. What’s for dinner, honey?

Now Gwen knew what had happened to all the pioneers who hadn’t made it. One big mistake and then a couple small ones. For example, Let’s go to Lamu. Followed by Forget the main road . Just like that the wagons were stuck in axle-high drifts with the snow still coming. And all the Africans in the world couldn’t dig you out. Not in three days or weeks or years. Suddenly she was back in Granger’s class. She needed water, she was so thirsty. She raised her hand and said, I’ll do what you want if you just let me get a drink, whatever you want . He said, Wake up, but with a British accent. She tried to stand, only her hand was stuck in the desk—

She opened her eyes, but she was still in the dark. Nothing made sense. Then she remembered the hood. Strange to wake to darkness. Someone reached behind her neck. She twisted her head in panic. “Easy,” a man said, the same British accent she’d heard the night before. The drawstring loosened and the hood came up, the fabric rubbing her face—

And she saw. Until this moment, she hadn’t realized what a gift sight was. Even though all she saw was a windowless brick hut maybe twenty feet square, lit by a battery-powered lantern that barely cut though the dirt in the air. The hut was warming. It must be morning, so somehow she’d slept for several hours. A coat of dust covered her tongue. Her joints were stiff and cramped from the hours against the wall. She felt like she’d been stuck in the worst seat in coach on the longest flight of her life.

At least their kidnappers hadn’t split them up. The others already had their hoods off. Scott sat against the back wall, with a nasty purple bruise on his cheek from the beating he’d taken during the kidnapping. He caught her looking at him and winked. She thought she’d imagined it. Then he winked again. Had to prove how cool he was. A frat boy to the end. Gwen knew she should be furious with him. This trip had been his idea. Still she was glad to have him. She felt somehow that nothing too terrible could happen with him here.

Owen sat directly across from her. He smiled when he saw her looking, but the grin felt forced. Painted on, by the worst painter alive. She hoped he wouldn’t do anything dumb to prove that he wasn’t afraid. Hailey was closest, a couple feet to her left. She gave Gwen a half-nod, nothing more.

They were all held the same way, their right hands chained to posts set in the walls about eighteen inches above the mud floor. The chains were maybe four feet long, so they had some flexibility to move. They could even stand. And Gwen was relieved to see that the kidnappers had set bottles of water beside each of them, the big two-liter kind.

Still, the hut was miserable. A musky smell filled the room, not just sweat but something richer, murkier. She had noticed it in African men before. Pre-kidnapping Gwen would have wrinkled her nose and walked straight out. But new Gwen could already imagine a place worse than this. A shorter chain. A hood that never came off. Worst of all, being alone.

Finally, Gwen focused on her captor. As she’d guessed, he was a big man, six feet tall and heavy. Fine. And wearing a disguise, a full-face Joker mask. She understood that he didn’t want them to recognize him. But she couldn’t imagine why he’d chosen this particular mask. She wasn’t sure she wanted the answer, either.

“You see the water beside you,” he said. “Drink it carefully. It’s all you get for the day.”

“What about food?” Owen said.

Gwen didn’t know whether Owen had forgotten the warning about speaking or simply wanted to test its limits. Either way, he’d made a mistake. The Joker squatted beside Owen, grabbed the water bottle. And then carefully, deliberately, unscrewed the cap and stood and tipped the bottle over. Gwen couldn’t have imagined how closely she could focus on such a simple act. The stream of colorless liquid flexed thick and thin as it poured out of the bottle’s plastic mouth. Inside the container, air bubbles rose and popped. Gwen felt herself reaching with her free left hand for her own bottle, feeling its heft. Three days without water. Did that rule apply in a hut that would be a hundred degrees by the afternoon?

When the Joker stopped pouring, the bottle was still half-full. Owen shook his head, stared at the floor. The Joker set the bottle down. He seemed to smile behind his mask, though Gwen couldn’t be sure.

“You can live a long time without food. As my people will tell you. Months. Water is what you need. I hope I don’t have to explain again. No speaking unless spoken to. I’ll see you tomorrow. Don’t be late.” He laughed, a rich velvety sound, Oh-oh-oh, and walked out.

This man was enjoying himself, Gwen thought. He was performing, the surest sign of his power. He didn’t care that they hated him. He knew they would have to choke down their hate. She saw now: This was what it meant to be powerless. Something else, too: The refugees must feel this way all the time.

After a while they reached for their bottles, sipped in silence. Casually, Gwen checked out the guard. He sat beside the black blanket that covered the doorway on a cheap plastic chair that slumped under his weight. He was young and rangy and tough. Scott, with his pumped-up arms and thousand-crunches abs, might have had a chance against him. If Scott weren’t chained to the wall. If the guy didn’t have a pistol in his hip holster.

For the next three days, the hoods stayed off, and every morning they got two liters of water.

—

Then they made a mistake. Gwen made a mistake.

She was sure Sunglasses was asleep.

Three guards watched them in shifts. The overnight guard wore wraparound sunglasses and was the nastiest of the three. He didn’t speak, not even hello or good-bye. He didn’t like to be bothered about the bathroom. Maybe he was just angry that he’d drawn the overnight shift. Gwen called him Sunglasses. Not out loud, of course.

On that fourth day of captivity, Gwen decided she needed to talk to Hailey. They were all in the same room, and yet the others might as well have been a thousand miles away. So she held her pee the whole afternoon and evening. By the time Sunglasses came in, she couldn’t think about anything except how much she had to go. Sunglasses checked their chains, as the guards did each shift. Then he went to his chair and dimmed the electric lantern. Gwen closed her eyes and waited, counting to one thousand and back down. She was sure she would have fallen asleep if not for her aching bladder.

Finally, she opened her eyes. She felt wrung out and empty. When she moved her head, she saw streaks of red and white, like her brain couldn’t keep up with her eyes. She hadn’t known until now that she could be this tired and still be awake. The others were quiet. Gwen looked at Sunglasses. He slumped in his chair, legs kicked out, arms loose. His breathing was slow and deep. He was out.