“If you do, Zapilote will have you shot on the spot. My organization will continue to work without me and he will lose the election. Because of your stupidity. Is that what you want?” He stood there, club raised, trembling, lusting to beat my brains out, but knowing that if he did that he might very well be dead as well. In the end he had to lower it. I nodded approval.
“That’s better. We will now go to see the General-President so I can tell him of a compromise plan that I am sure will please him.” “What is it?” “You will discover that if he permits your presence during our discussion. Call him.” Oliveira was neatly impaled on the horns of a dilemma, and I enjoyed watching him twitch there. He wanted to kill me, or at least to maim me-but he didn’t dare. What I had said about Zapilote was true. In the end he realized that and stamped out of the room, I dropped back into the chair and looked gloomily at the bruises that were beginning to appear on my body and tried not to think what I was going to feel like when the neocain wore off. There was a suspicious soft spot on the side of my chest where a rib or two was broken. It was then that I decided that something really loathsome had to happen to Colonel Oliveira before this affair was through. While I was brooding over his fate he returhed with a squad of soldiers.
I was hauled to my feet. The soldiers formed a solid wall around me as we marched off down the hall, up a stairway, very tiring, and through a number of anterooms to face a pair of large gilt doors. It had armed guards, weapons ready, stationed on each side. We were getting close to the holy of holies. The doors swung wide, my personal bodyguards pushed me forward, staying so close that I had to peek over their shoulders to assure myself that we were indeed in the Presence. The General-President squatted in a chair like a loathsome toad, his bandy arms resting on an immense desk.
“Tell me about this person,” Zapilote said. Still as frogmouthed and ugly as the first time I had met him. If he recognized me as a beardless Harapo he wasn’t letting on.
“He gave his name as General James diGriz,” Oliveira said. “And claims to represent an organization named POOPI...” “I’ll have you shot if you are trying to make bad jokes!” “No, please, it is true your excellency!” I enjoyed watching the colonel sweat and tremble. “There must be some truth in what he says. This Paramilitary Organization of Political Investieation that he talks about could exist. Without a rioiiht hp in an ofiplanet agent. He came here first some months ago disguised as a tourist, to make contact with a traitor organization in Puerto Azul. I had him deported before he could cause any more trouble. He has since returned here illegally and is very high up in the Harapo organization that is causing us... some little problems...” “I will kill Harapo. Hang him. With his own intestines!” “Yes, all of the traitors, every one of them, lots of intestines!” Oliveira slavered. “Guts galore...” “Close your mouth, Oliveira, or you’ll be first.” There was a crackling sound as Oliveira slammed his mouth shut. I think he broke a tooth. Zapilote was glaring at me now, his beady red eyes trying to burn holds through me. “So you work for Harapo. You cause me all kinds of troubles. Now, before I kill you, tell me why you came here.” “To make an agreement with you...” “I do not deal with traitors. Take him out and shoot him.” The soldiers closed in, seizing me. It wasn’t going quite as I had planned. “Wait!” I shouted. “Listen to me first. Would I have come here, alone and unarmed without a reason? That would be suicide. I came here in order to tell you...” What? I hadn’t the slightest idea. But he was listening. What I had to tell him had to be important. What would interest him? What does a paranoid dictator care about? Paranoia! “I have come to tell you that there is a traitor very close to you. Plotting against you.” “Who?” I had his attention now. He was on his feet, leaning across the desk. “Mrmtrmbimble...” I mumbled. “What?” “Shall I speak his name aloud, here? With these men listening?” “Speak up? Who is it? Tell me!” he frothed, coming around the desk, “I’ll tell you,” I said, bending my knees and tensing my muscles. “Someone very close to you who wants to kill you...” And as I spoke the words I hurled myself forward. Smashing into the guards who stood between us, knocking them aside. Staggering with the weight of the chains, dragging my arms up. My outstretched hands could barely reach his face; one fingernail brushed his skin.
Then the blows struck my head and body, driving me to the ground where the soldiers began to kick me. I was only vaguely aware of Oliveira stopping them, bending over and dragging me to my feet. Soldiers held me tightly; I could barely breathe. Oliveira had his pistol out and the cold muzzle was pushed between my eyes.
“Speak!” he commanded. “One last time before I blow your brains out. Who wants to kill the General-President?” “I do,” I said hoarsely through my bruised throat. “I want to kill him and I have just done so. Don’t you see that scratch on his face, the drops of blood?” Zapilote raised his hand to his cheek and touched it, then looked at the red stain on his fingers.
“You searched me!” I shouted, “But you did not find the weapon. This nail, this fingernail, cut to a point. And coated with four-hour virus. Zapilote has been infected and will be dead within that time. You’re dead now. old man. Dead!”
Chapter 24
As you can well imagine, that made quite an impression on everyone present. Particularly Zapilote. His parchment skin went even whiter and he staggered back clutching at his face. You would think that after having lived for over two centuries he would have had enough of it. He hadn’t. He must have got into the habit. I spoke sharply now, too well aware of the gun against my head.
“You’re dead Zapilote-if you don’t get the antidote in time. Now get this idiot with the gun away from me!” Zapilote staggered forward and reached up to seize Oliveira’s ear, twisting it savagely as he hauled the man aside. The colonel shrieked and dropped the gun-which luckily didn’t go off-and clapped his hands to the now-bloody ear. Zapilote shouldered him aside and stood before me.
“Get him on his knees!” Zapilote ordered, and the soldiers kicked me in the legs and forced me down. He stood before me, glaring down, while his breath rich with garlic and heartburn washed over me. “What about the antidote?” he breathed redolently.
“Only I know where it is. If you receive the injection within three hours you will live. The virus that is now spreading through your bloodstream is unknown on this planet. Your doctors cannot help you. By now you should be feeling the first symptoms of the infection. You have a fever. It will keep rising until your brain is destroyed by its heat. Your fingers are-now beginning to tingle. Soon they will be paralyzed and this paralysis will spread to your entire body...” He screamed a shrill, old man’s scream. Raising his shaking hand to his face, bringing the tremulous fingers away wet with perspiration. Then he screeched again and staggeredtwo soldiers seized him before he could fall and half-carried him to his chair behind the oversize desk.
“Tell these men to release me,” I ordered. “They will take 134 these chains off me and then they will leave. The creature Oliveira will stay in order to carry out your commands. Issue your orders.” Zapilote’s voice quavered as he spoke. “The chains dropped away and I dragged myself to a chair and dropped into it. Oliveira stood, dazed, his hands still over his torn ear.
“Here are your instructions, Oliveira. You will get on the telephone at once and issue orders to release the prisoner you captured last night. The prisoner will not be harmed. He will be taken to Harapo’s suit at the Hotel Gran Parajero in Puerto Azul. When he is safely there he will be given a phone number that will connect directly with this office. When I have received a phone call from him that I find satisfactory we will discuss the antidote. The longer you delay...” “Do it!” Zapilote screeched. He turned to me as Oliveira worked frantically at the phone. “The antidote, where is it? I am burning up.” “You won’t die for over three hours yet. Though you will be very sick. The antidote is nearby. It will be delivered when a message is telephoned. That message will not be sent until I am safely out of here.” “Who are you?” “Your destiny, old man. Your nemesis. The power that will bring you low. Now send for my clothes so I won’t have to waste any of your lifetime later on. See, Oliveira is off the phone. Order him to take care of it.” “How can I believe that you will do this, that you will send the antidote?” “You can’t. But you have no other choice, do you? Now issue the orders.” The entire operation took almost two hours. Two hours in which Zapilote almost sank into a coma due to his rising fever. Two doctors kept his temperature down with antipyretics. But they could not stop the paralysis of his extremities. All sensation and control was now gone from his hands and feet. He screeched weakly when the phone finally rang and I bent to pick it up.