Chapter X

Don’t Ride With Anyone Running From the Police

Walking out to the front of the terminal I looked for yellow cars and held my hat down by my leg hoping no one saw me as a cowboy. It was over twenty minutes later a little yellow car pulled up to the curb and stopped in front of me. He motioned me in. "Senora, we are not safe here. Hurry."

I opened the door and slid in. "You Albert?"

He jammed the car into first and pressed the pedal to the floor. "Yes, and you are the famous Katrina McDonald who delivered Heater to Mr. Simon Pladure. You made the television news last night and all the newspapers this morning."

He almost rolled the car over as he took the corner from the airport to the main highway. "If I don't put some distance behind us you will be a guest at the President's Palace tonight and I will be in jail."

"No, I was a guest last night. I'm not going back tonight. I have work to do." I was positive I was going to turn down any offers for a second night.

He glanced in my direction as he whipped the Fiat around a slow moving truck in our lane. Horns honked, people shouted at each other as we left them behind. "You don't understand do you Miss McDonald? When you are invited to be a guest you don't have an option of accepting or refusing. Did you refuse to be a guest last night?"

"Well, I don't know. I was picked up by the soldiers and taken up to Simon's place and he invited me to spend the night." I was trying to decide if I had really stated I wanted to be with my plane?

He nodded as he passed another car. "You didn't have the opportunity to not go Miss McDonald. The soldiers had orders to pick you up and deliver you."

I shook my head. "No, they were surprised to know who they were talking to."

Now he shook his head. "What surprised them was how easy it was to find you. They figured they would have to drag you off the plane. You were in the terminal and all they had to do was lead you out to the truck."

That shocked me. "You're kidding aren't you?"

"How do you think I know so much about what went on last night? I'm a reporter. I found all this out last night while you were at that big party where you say you weren't kidnapped." He smiled as he took a furtive glance in my direction.

We made it out of the city and he was pushing the little Fiat for all it was worth. Albert's foot was making a depression in the floor where the gas pedal was. The speedometer was varying between seventy two and seventy nine Kilometers.

"Albert, I thought Leo said we were going to a ranch until I caught a flight?" The way we were headed didn't look like I would be back to catch any flights.

He shook his head as he dodged another car. "Miss McDonald, you still don't seem to understand. We won't be catching any planes. The police would have us before you finished signing in."

I was finally getting use to his speeding when he hit the brake and turned off the highway onto a dirt road. It was a two lane path and not really a road. I was in the air half the time as that little car bounced from rut to rut.

"Albert, do you mind? Slow down. You're going to kill us both."

"If I slow down we are both dead already. Look behind us."

Bracing myself between the dash and the seat I turned to look. All I could see was the dust we were raising. "What? I don't see anything."

"Wait, I think I saw a flash of light." I was sure of it as there was a second flash in that cloud of dust.

"Get down. That flash of light is them firing at us."

It took me a second to realize what he meant by them firing at us. I saw another flash in the dust cloud. I dropped down in the seat. "What do they want? Surely they can't be that serious about another party?"

"No, I'm afraid I got you in deeper than another party. They want to kill me and you are a throw away. Someone who happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. I'm sorry Miss McDonald."

There was a new sound as something solid hit the back of the car. "Was that a bullet?"

"Yes, keep your head down. It's only a little further."

"What?" I bobbed my head up to look out the window. A bullet put a hole in the back glass and the front one.

I sucked my head back down on my shoulders like a turtle. "Why are they shooting at us? Give them what they want. Nothing is worth this."

"Ah, you are mistaken. Some things are worth a life or two." He spun the wheel and the car slid sideways before it found traction and shot forward.

The other vehicle went by us in the cloud of dust. It sounded like hail as the little Fiat was riddled with bullets. Then it quit immediately.

Albert pulled up and stopped the car. "It's okay. They have been taken care of for the moment."

I eased my head up to take a look around. Dust was settling all around us since we had come to a stop. The other car was no where to be seen. "Where did they go?"

He leaned back in the seat and took a deep breath. "Over the edge. They never saw where the road ended and the canyon begin because of all the dust."

In shock I glanced at Albert. I couldn't believe he had killed them intentionally. I started to tell him how much of a beast I thought he was. The damp red on his right chest stopped me. "You're bleeding."

"Yes, I'm afraid I have been shot." He was breathing heavy now.

I pulled his shirt back and was looking at a dark red hole in the middle of a blood puddle. "You're bleeding profusely. I have to stop it or you are going to die right here. You have a first aid kit?"

He smiled as he shook his head. "Afraid not. I didn't pack a field hospital in the car."

"You have extra clothes? I need bandages." I looked in the back seat for any kind of clothes.

"Small suitcase in the boot. Never can tell when I might be gone for a couple days on a story."

I took his left hand and straightened his index finger. I pushed it up against the hole in his right shoulder. "Hold this for a second while I find that suitcase of yours."

His suitcase was where he said it should be. It also had some extra holes in it. I guess we were lucky he had it in the trunk of the car. Those clothes stopped some bullets that could have found their way up to us. I ripped up a couple shirts.

Opening the driver's door I eased Albert around in the seat. so I could put a padded dressing on the wound he had in the front and the back. The bullet had gone all the way through. "Easy Albert, I have to put a pressure pack on those wounds so they will stop bleeding."

He grimaced as I wrapped the binding around his chest to hold the pads in place. I could see tears in his eyes. "I know it hurts. You can scream if you want."

He gritted his teeth. "You act like you have done this before. Where did you learn to apply a field dressing?"

"I was raised on a farm. Animals get hurt and a vet isn't always handy. You learn to do the best you can. Can you walk around to the other side of the car? I don't know if I can carry you or not?" He was a tall man and I figured he weighed close to one ninety or there bouts.

Leaning on me Albert managed to walk around to the passenger side of the car. I took a good look at the back of the car as I walked back around to the driver's side. "We have holes all over, besides the windows being shot up. We need to go back to town and tell the police what happened."

Albert rolled his head from side to side. "No, we can't. Those guys at the bottom of the canyon were part of the police. The side you don't want to get mixed up with. You'll live longer if you figure out how it works down here. There are two sides to the police. Those who take your story, nod sympathetically, and forget you were there once you walk out the door. Those who listen to your story and then dispose of you if you are a threat to their business."

He looked at me to see if what he had told me registered. "We're a threat so we will die if they get their hands on us. Of course I got you in this mess when I picked you up and you have no idea why someone would want to kill you now."

"Let's go while I tell you a story. Back up the road about a kilometer you will find another road leading off to the north. Take it. Our friends might have called in while they were chasing us. In that case, more of their friends won't be far behind."

That was a prompting I didn't need to hear twice. In seconds I had the little car started and was backtracking up the path. I wouldn't call it a road. Every bump put Albert in pain but it couldn't be helped. As we bumped along in the little Fiat, Albert told me a story about taking some pictures.

He held onto the seat and talked as I bounced him down the road in the little Fiat. "It seems the police were trading drug dealers back to their friends for drugs. There was another situation at the same time the police and the military were swapping men and drugs. The police had picked up a man who had found some wreckage in the jungle. He had a box with him. Someone in the police showed it to someone in the army. The box was part of an encrypted decoder. It was what allowed our military to show up as friendly planes on the AWACs screen."

Albert looked out the window. "I was at the right place at the wrong time. I was working on a story about the military, police, and drug dealers. It seemed the Brazilian government was telling the US they were working on the drug problem. The only problem with their story is the police and military were murdering drunks and derelicts and passing them off as drug dealers. The real drug dealers were safe as money and drugs passed hands."

He reached down in his pocket and pulled out a thirty five milimeter film container. "I took some pictures at the military base where the deal on the decoder went down. I thought I was safe as no one saw me. I was outside the fence with a telephoto lens. Obviously I'm not as smart as I thought I was. Someone found out or maybe they didn't. This could be part of another plan where they wanted to kill me because I was chasing the drug trades."

He held the film container out to me. "Miss McDonald, I never intended to get you in a situation like this. I knew the death squad had a contract out on me. I didn’t imagine them closing in on me this fast. I thought I could pick you up and be gone before things turned ugly. However the one fact remains. They know or will soon know I picked you up, so your life is in danger too. Even if the men in the car didn't know who my passenger was, someone will find out I stopped at the airport and they will put two and two together. When they do, the name that will jump out is Miss McDonald."

I looked at the film container. "I don't want it. What would I do with it?"

"Deliver it to our government. They have to know their codes have been compromised." He dropped the film cartridge in my lap.

"I can't do that. I have no idea what I'm doing. I wouldn't know who to contact or what to say once I talked to someone." I was looking at the road in front of us which was changing into a goat path.

Slowing the car down I looked for a way forward but there wasn't any. "We have run out of road."

"I know. This is an old mining road. It has grown back up into a jungle. From here we walk." He opened the door and slid out groaning.

"Walk? Walk where? You aren't in any condition to be walking. Where are we supposed to walk to?" I slid out of the seat and studied the path ahead of us.

He pointed up the path. "It's about five miles that way. There is a mining shack. We get there and then we will wait for our ride."

"What ride? Who are we going to wait on?" This whole situation seemed absurd.

He looked at me for a second. "Back the car up and turn it toward the canyon. Put it in gear and let it roll over the edge. It will be hard to spot down in the canyon if they come up this way looking for it. I had just as soon they didn't know we went up this trail. If they are actively looking for us then we could still end up dead before our ride comes."

The questions could wait. The mention of dying wasn't something I wanted to see if it was going to come true. I backed the Fiat up. After pulling his suitcase out of the car I dropped it in gear, grabbed that film canister and rolled out the door. I watched as the little car bounced off down the hill picking up speed on its way to its doom. It sailed off the edge out into thin air, the nose dropping until it was upside down and disappeared from view. I waited for the crash but there wasn't any noise.

I started down the hill to see where it went when he shouted at me. "Let's go. We don't have that much time."

Hesitating, I stopped, turned and picked up his suitcase and caught up with him before he disappeared into the trees up the path. "You really think someone would shoot us if they caught us?"

"In a heartbeat. Again, I'm sorry Miss McDonald. You are too young to be learning about these kind of things. You value life. As Americans we think life is precious and shouldn't be wasted. Other societies don't set the same standards as us. They wouldn't give any more thought to killing either one of us then killing a rat or a snake. Life doesn't mean much to them. They kill someone every week. Maybe a lot of some ones so one more life doesn't matter to them."

We had gone over a mile before he stopped to rest. I checked the bandage. "You aren't going to get any better unless you stop and lie down. That wound isn't going to stop leaking blood as long as you're walking."

"Miss McDonald, I'm going to keep getting worse. Right now while the wound is fresh I'm okay. In four or five more hours my body is going to start manufacturing antibodies and I'm going to get a fever. I have one hope and that is to make that miner's shack before then. We are walking two to three miles an hour so in another hour and half we should be there."

He pointed at the suitcase I had been carrying. "What are you dragging that along for?"

"It has your clothes in it. I can use them for bandages."

"We don't need it. This is a do or die situation for me. We either get to the miner's shack and the ride or I die. Those clothes aren't going to help one way or another. Throw the suitcase away but make sure it's off the path. I don't want them finding it if they happen to track us this far." He stood up and started up off the path again.

Looking at the suitcase I thought about it before I set it down and opened it. I pulled a couple shirts out of it before I tossed it as far back into the woods as I could. I didn't care what he thought. I may need to change those bandages before his ride came.

He was already disappearing up that goat path through the trees when I looked up. "Hey, wait. I don't know the way."

He never looked back as I trotted up behind him. "Don't fall behind. I don't have the strength to nursemaid you. You get lost and I won't come back looking for you."

"Well, thanks a lot. I probably saved your life, you have jeopardized mine, and you won't come back for me if I get lost." I was watching his feet when he suddenly stopped and I ran into his back.

"Miss McDonald, for the ten thousandth time, I'm sorry for getting you into this. Understand your life and mine isn't worth what is on the film cassette you are carrying. There may be thousands or hundreds of thousands of lives in danger because of the secrets on that film. I'm hoping both of us make it out to tell our story. If we don't then I hope one of us makes it. Since you don't know the story, you get the film which will tell the story by itself. If I get out I will have to convince them I know what I'm saying without the film."

He wiggled his shoulder. "It's beginning to hurt really bad and also starting to tighten up. I can make the cabin if we don't have to stop for any more group discussions."

Once again he was off up the path and I was left standing there. I ran to catch up. "Albert, wait, Leonard said we would be safe once we reached the ranch. Is that where we are headed? To the ranch?"

"No, the ranch won't be safe now. They know your shipper Kevin and the ranch are connected. They will be waiting there for anyone to show up. You, me, it doesn't make any difference now. Miss McDonald, we are both dead if the police or the military get their hands on us."

I didn't like the sound of that dying Albert kept talking about. "Listen, as long as we have to be together, call me Jake. I don't think I can stomach one more Miss McDonald."

He shook his head. "Jake? What kind of a name is that? Is that a code name or what?"

"It's the name I've gone by all my life."

That stopped him. He turned to look me over. "You're pulling my leg?"

"No, daddy always wanted a son. I was the only child they were ever going to get so he called me Jake. I found out two things as I got older. I found out I wasn't a boy and Jake wasn't a girls name. By the time I learned about all these things it didn't make any difference. I liked the name. Until the past couple years no one besides my parents knew I wasn't a boy. Miss McDonald and Katrina aren't two names I'm very fond of. So if you don't mind, as long as we have to be together, call me Jake."

Albert nodded his head. "You got it Jake."

We made that cabin in a little over one more hour. From the looks of Albert he wasn't going much further. We were standing in the brush in front of the cabin. I was disappointed to no end. This wasn't what I had been thinking of when Albert mentioned cabin. This thing in front of me was caving in on itself it was so old and rotten. The room was mostly gone. Wild animals had been running in and out. For all I knew, one could still be in there.

I pointed toward the shack. "Is this it?"

"Un huh." He dropped down on the ground obviously spent.

My idea of a mining shack didn’t exactly match up with the rotting, sagging, run down decrepit mess I was looking at. I didn’t see any wires going to it indicating it had electricity or a telephone. As bad as our future looked before, what I was looking at in front of me shoved any hope I had about being rescued into a non event.

“Tell me you’re joking!”