“ID?” one asked, a buck-toothed older man with salt and pepper hair. “Where are you going?”
Baltasar handed over a country ID and met their eyes. “All the way.”
“Germany? What is your business there?”
Salt And Pepper talked whilst the other man ran his ID through a portable scanner. His eyes reflected flashing images on a computer screen. Baltasar made sure he didn’t look at him.
“No business. I am just sightseeing.” Baltasar spoke perfect Greek, English and German, but made it barely passable.
Standard questions came at him steadily, questions he was well prepared to answer. He endured it all to remain unnoticed.
Finally came the search.
Two more men with wands and wandering hands. He removed his shoes and socks. They patted him all over; and of course had no idea they were looking for a map. This was the real reason the museum had been demolished. The map was concealed inside the rucksack, inside a plastic pouch, inside a sheaf of tourist guides and other similar maps of ancient European sites. Some had been aged to look similar, as collectible tourist maps often were these days. Only an expert could tell the difference.
The cops leafed through the bag, worn out and fazed from all they had done and all they had yet to do that day. They found the pack of leaflets, flicked through them and found nothing untoward. They weren’t looking for leaflets. With a shrug Baltasar was sent back to the bus and another interminable wait.
Time wasted. He ought to inform the master. The ten hour mark passed. Baltasar became irritated for the first time since they stopped. The master shouldn’t be made to wait like this. Was there a way to hurry it along? Not without drawing attention to himself.
Baltasar would endure the wait because his masters told him this was the only way; just as he’d helped rob and ruin the museum, just as he’d committed a thousand treacherous acts before… and would again.
CHAPTER SIX
Guy Bodie ached, not just his body, but mind and soul. Bruises were fleeting, but damage collected over a lifetime gradually became a hanging, immovable weight. The world had not been good to him until recently, and he felt the world owed him at least one favor.
No sign of it here though, in this place, at this time. The old man that’d helped him out with the shiv was gone, replaced by a family of four. Bodie spent a little time searching, but there was no sign of the old timer. He veered away from the scene of last night’s battle, staying mobile and taking little rest.
Occasionally he smelled himself, and the scent was on the verge of over-ripe. What was normally skin shaven within a millimeter of fresh blood had started to sprout around his face. Bodie had expected some kind of contact — even if his team had started off ignorant, surely they would have tracked him down by now.
Has something happened to them?
Impossible to say, so best not let it cloud the issues at hand. Bodie didn’t mind the loneliness — growing up he’d welcomed and sought it — but in here it was a death sentence. The few Europeans he’d found either wouldn’t speak to him or didn’t understand him. Of those — one Englishman only repeated what, earlier, an American had told him.
“Get away from me, man. They got you marked. They got you spotted. They takin’ you outa here in pieces, man, so best make your peace.”
Bodie would have preferred a little help, and would have returned such a favor, but good friends were hard to find. Impossible, actually. He was the prison jinx. The unwashed. Might as well have leprosy. Those he stepped close to either gave him the dead eye or shuffled away depending on their outlook.
Bodie managed to buy food though, and water. He figured the cash would last another day. The dog eat dog environment of prison told him he should steal more; but he had long since stopped committing crimes that left victims in his wake.
That was why he’d quit being a criminal, a clever but guilt-ridden thief, and turned to victimless crime.
It struck him again now, as the sun blazed hard on top of his head. A day long ago when he’d been forced to confront the woman he robbed — seen the fear, passion and despair in her eyes and etched in every line upon her face — the depth of it had told him right then that it was not worth it. More succinctly than any prison stretch would ever do.
Observe your victims, see what you put them through.
Alone was good, but Bodie somehow then started to build a family. In conflict, unlikely, contradictory, but something that promised a new depth. Often, he enjoyed working with the team and sharing their camaraderie more than he enjoyed the job they were on, and the outcome.
A bit of introspection here? Was he expecting to die?
In truth, the odds weren’t good. But Bodie possessed resources most people couldn’t reach. There was always a way to even the odds. He purchased bottled water and energy food, found some shade from the beating sun. He found a place to rest and watched everything, attuned to the surroundings. A young woman passed by, dragging her young son by the hand, clothes dirty and eyes blank as if they already knew they would never leave this place. Bodie knew the Mexican cartels ran most of the prisons in this country, even used them to train new soldiers and fill the ranks.
Bribery and crime on a massive scale. But still, it worked for them. Youths sauntered past without noticing him under the shadow cast by the wooden lee rising above him. He was well tucked away. He heard them talking, cursing, laughing. A watchtower rose over all, its guard stuck in one position, mirror-sunglasses glinting. The prison was loud, vertiginous noise swelling at every high wall. It stank too, of rotten vegetables and litter, of sweat and dirt, of blood recently spilled. Bodie sensed it all; staying still and quiet, knowing a wall at your back was about the best you could hope for in a place like this.
His mentor, a man named Jack Pantera and Bodie’s role model, trained him well after Bodie made an effort to hit the illicit straight-and-narrow. There were many ways to make illegal money, it seemed, without bringing harm to innocent people. Jack Pantera was a master of one, and pulled Bodie into his fold, teaching him all he knew.
That was years ago. Now, Bodie used everything he’d been taught and everything he’d learned since to stay alert and alive. The afternoon was waning, but that just meant it was time for more of the crazies to come out. By far, the worse kind of animal in here was the nocturnal kind.
Fights broke out to the right; he only saw the dust caused by their scuffling feet. Women talked to the left, kids running around their ankles. Two gunshots rang out; unnoticed by the majority. Bodie’s position included a direct line of sight to the long, narrow street that led to the big boss’s residence. In an hour of study he saw nothing openly move, but noticed glints at the windows, curtains moving in unnatural fashion and dark shadows shifting — enough to mark out at least a dozen watchers. At the far end — the actual house — all was cast in shadow, barred windows impenetrable, steel doors untouchable. Nothing moved inside the glass or on the balconies; nothing moved around the roof. Bodie sighed with a touch of frustration.
Questions beset him like a deadly plague.
Maybe he could ask the seven guys heading his way right now with purpose in their gait.
Sighing, he rose, walked forward a few steps, still with the building at his back and the shade covering his face and body.
“Hey guys, I have a question. Who the hell put me here, and why am I here?”
The leader, a man with so many facial tattoos he looked blue, slowed. “You don’t know?”
Bodie shrugged.
Laughter came from the hole between the tattoos. “Ah, that is great. Just great. The big, bad thief, best of the best we’re told, stands clueless, as uninformed as the public, ignorant as a lamb on its way to slaughter. I—”