2 – Demetre

 

 

It was night again. Hours had passed. The police had come and gone. But Jorge, his scraggly beard itching with the New Mexico heat, didn't move. Hadn't moved since closing himself away behind the bookcase. The previous master of the house had shown him its secret.

 Hide here when the police come. No one will find you.

 No one had.

 Though hours earlier the sheriff had come sniffing around, trailed by some tall black narc named Demetre.

 "It has to be here," the black cop said in a crisp Eastern accent.

"We traced it this far and there were lots of loose drugs downstairs."

 "Well, it ain't there now," the sheriff mumbled. "They either did it all or it went on its way."

 The black cop stared straight at the bookcase, his eyes squinting as if studying the very hole out of which Jorge peeked. Had the cop seen Jorge running up here? Had the open suitcases left a trail of loose drugs up the stairs?

 He shook his head. "Not even this gluttonous lot could have eaten all that dope," he mumbled, taking a step towards the bookcase, his marred face coming into focus, a criss-cross scar pale against the black skin in the shape of an X. It made him look cruel.  And it was larger than usual shipment. Maybe the last."

 "You think they were on to you?" the fat sheriff asked, fingering through the notebook on the desk-- the house diary in which Jorge recorded household events. He'd marked the shipment's arrival. But the sheriff lost interest and closed the book.

 "It's possible," Demetre said, squinting at the bookshelf, eye level with Jorge's peep hole. "The Denver people are pretty smart. This interstate transport system proves it. But I don't think they would have sent anything down the pipeline if they knew it could be traced back."

 "What then?"

 Demetre slid out one of the books. Jorge stumbled back, nearly knocking the suitcase of drugs from the shelf behind him. "I think this was meant as a payoff."

 "For who and for what?"

 The book teetered on the black man's palm. "For someone to keep quiet. There were a few dead bodies in Denver back a month or so ago. They had Buckingham's touch all over them."

 "Buckingham?" the cop said, looking up, fat hand flat on the desk blotter, thumb hooked beneath it for a peek under. "You mean there's actually such a person?"

 "There was," Demetre said, staring at the book in his hand. "I tracked him a few times. Rumors say he's come West again. He's a clever devil and dangerous-- more than a match for local police."

 "Even you?"

 Demetre grinned. The skin around the scar tightened into a horrid mask of wrinkled black flesh. "I haven't caught him yet."

 Another cop knocked at the door, dressed in the sandy uniform of the state police. "They're all out," he said.

 "Good," Demetre said. "Post a car on the road until the fingerprint people get here. I don't want things disturbed."

 "Yes sir," the trooper said and left.

 "Could the shipment have slipped out through our ring of cars?" the sheriff asked as he lowered himself into the desk chair with a sigh. "Could this Buckingham have gotten it out?"

 "If anyone could, he could."

 "Was he here?"

 Demetre shrugged and put the book down flat on the ledge of the bookshelf. Slanting sunlight from the window caught its gold lettering. "I don't know. I've never seen him. And I don't know anyone who has. But there's one important detail missing."

 "What's that?"

 "Dead bodies," Demetre said and sighed, then led the sheriff out and down the stairs, the thud of their feet the last sound Jorge heard until the finger print men. After that, silence.

 Even then, Jorge waited, picturing the black man sitting in the dark room waiting for Jorge to come out, as if he had smelled Jorge's sweat through the bookcase. Jorge even thought he heard the front door open once and close, long after other sounds had ceased.

 Finally, he decided it was paranoia and slid back the metal bolt.

The heavy door opened outward with a loud groan. The sound carried through the house but was answered only by the sound of the distant city and traffic moving in and out of it along the highway.

 The flashlight beam caught Jorge full in the face and staggered him back, his hands waving to relieve the blindness.

 "Where is it?" a harsh voice asked from behind the light. Jorge could not see a face but knew the voice from somewhere despite the attempt at disguise. Demetre? Jorge couldn't tell.

 "Wh-What?" Jorge stuttered.

 "Don't play games with me," the voice said again, as the light came closer and something blunt struck Jorge. Pain erupted from his stomach, bowing him forward.

 "Where is it?" the voice asked again, this time closer, this time, the smell of weak cologne reminding Jorge of someone—someone who...

 Another blow. This one to the head. Jorge's head snapped aside, temple hitting the shelf.

 "I-I don't know where it is," Jorge said, the guide lines for the house master echoing loudly in his head: Never betray the package!

Never!

 "Liar! Is it in there?"

 "No, really, the cops must have taken it. That Demetre guy must have...."

 "Demetre?" the voice hissed. "Here?"

 "He was here with the others," Jorge said, sensing doubt in the stranger. Maybe even fear. "He must have taken the thing."

 "Damn!"

 Jorge never did feel the bullet which struck him in the face. He saw only the flash of the pistol muzzle, then darkness.

 

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