"Twisted Path" - читать интересную книгу автора (Pendleton Don)

11

Bolan and Stone stood near a wall of the prison yard. Stone continued to chatter, explaining the intricacies of life in Lurigancho.

Cigarettes were the standard medium of exchange, except for certain of the guards who demanded cash on a regular basis. There was a set fee for various services within the prison, from laundry to sexual favors. Food, clothing, furniture, even prostitutes could be obtained from the outside for a small amount of hard currency.

"It's livable, Blanski, as long as you keep your wits and can get hold of a little cash. The guards will beat you badly if you can't afford to pay off. I've seen prisoners beaten to death, the rifle butts rising and falling as though the guards were pounding corn. The corruption goes right to the top, so no one lifts a finger. Of course, there are rats among the prisoners here like anywhere else. Not real ones. Those are considered quite a delicacy when lightly fried, so you don't see too many, barring a few in breeding colonies that some prisoners keep. I mean the two-legged kind. And it looks like we're going to get a visit from King Rat right now."

Five men were ambling along the edge of the yard in their direction. The prisoners lining the wall and soccer field moved to let the group pass freely.

Anyone who was a little slow was shoved aside by two toughs who were the point men for the small party.

"That's Raimondo," Stone explained. "He controls the drug trade within the prison, and as such he's rich and powerful among our little community. Don't try to interfere with his operations. That's another way to get killed in here. A couple of other cons have been knifed or had their necks broken this year, either because they were dealing themselves, or just because Raimondo didn't like them. People try to stay on his good side."

"Don't the prison guards maintain any sort of control?"

Stone snorted his contempt. "Violence and kickbacks are the way of life here. Sure, you can have whatever comforts you can pay for, but only the strong survive to enjoy them. If madness doesn't get you, disease or violence will. As for the guards, as long as they get their payments, they don't care if we beat or kill one another right under their noses. They seem to regard us as a separate species, not really human at all. If you get into trouble, you'll get no help from them. If you cause trouble with another prisoner, they won't intervene, either." Bolan stored away the data for later use.

Stone was proving to be a gold mine of information, just as he had hoped. Some of that information might prove handy right now.

The advancing party bore down on Bolan.

Three of the men were clearly the muscle, mottled with scars and broken teeth that showed long histories of hand-to-hand combat. The leader was dressed in a freshly washed and pressed prison uniform, with a silver cigarette case protruding from the shirt pocket. Gold flashed from wrist and throat.

Slim and self-confident, he seemed oblivious to his surroundings, acting as though he were strolling the grounds of his own private garden.

Bolan had to look hard at the fifth member of the party. Small, delicate features had been enhanced with makeup and a blond wig, transforming a male prisoner into a very convincing simulation of a woman. A flower-patterned dress and high heels completed the illusion. The transvestite smiled broadly at Bolan.

Raimondo halted by Stone and Bolan, his henchmen forming a protective circle. Smaller than the hardmen who ringed him, the drug lord radiated a sinister menace that a lesser man would have found intimidating. Flat black eyes sparkled under heavy brows as Raimondo examined Bolan, trying to stare him down.

Bolan wasn't budging an inch and returned the thug's gaze, the warrior's steely look skewering the crime boss until the guy looked away.

"So, you are Blanski, the new prisoner." Raimondo's tone was icy, although a quaver betrayed his annoyance at losing face in his first confrontation with the new inmate. Raimondo struggled to regain the initiative.

Word traveled fast in the prison community, Bolan thought. Either that or Raimondo had had advance warning of his arrival.

Raimondo ignored Stone as he addressed Bolan. He waved a hand casually, encompassing the entire massive structure. "All this you see about you is mine."

With a pompous opening line like that, Bolan figured the drug boss was preparing a lecture about how great and powerful he was. Bolan was in no mood to listen to the guy rant about his own self-importance.

"I thought it belonged to the government of Peru," Bolan drawled.

Raimondo halted, his mouth open, as he was preparing to continue delivering his speech. His eyes glittered with a cold, reptilian dislike. He took a pace closer to Bolan, eyeballing the big man as he snarled, "The outside may belong to the government, but what happens inside, I control. The other convicts obey me, Raimondo." He thumped himself on the chest for emphasis. "You are as much my prisoner as the government's."

Bolan wasn't about to take any crap from a petty criminal. He rocketed his fist into the vermin's jaw, sending Raimondo sprawling onto his backside.

Sitting up in the dust and holding his chin, Raimondo shook his fist in Bolan's face, rattling the gold chains at wrist and throat.

"Listen, you smart ass gringo, I run this prison. And I'll make sure that you don't forget it." He barked a command at the three hardmen.

The two nearest hitters charged, while the third held back to look for opportunities.

Bolan knew that a single man, properly trained, was more effective than any two or three hoodlums in a brawl. He stepped to his left as Stone scrambled out of the way of the bruisers.

As one of the men rocketed by, Bolan stuck out a foot and tripped him. As the guy fell to the ground, Bolan crunched a power-packed blow to the point of his chin, dropping the enforcer like a stunned ox.

The second man halted with a shout of rage as he found his outstretched arms empty of prey. The guy weighed about three hundred pounds, and Bolan guessed that his method of fighting was to flop on top of his opponents to crush resistance with his massive bulk.

The pig eyes focused on Bolan, and with another shout, the fat man trundled forward like a maddened bull, heavy arms seeking to lay a bear hug on Bolan.

The soldier waited impassively by the prison wall as the other man built up speed. At the last instant, Bolan dodged under a flailing arm and reappeared behind the thug. With a mighty shove the Executioner propelled the tub of lard into the wall.

The hitter dropped on his belly, leaving a red streak down the rough stone from where his head had made contact.

A crowd of prisoners had gathered to watch the brawl. They were silent, which told Bolan that Raimondo and his men were not liked enough for the other prisoners to cheer them on. At the same time, the drug lord was obviously feared, since nobody had the guts to root openly for Bolan.

The last tough advanced to take his turn. He reminded Bolan of a gorilla, of medium height but broad and deep cheated, with long arms and shoulders as thick as small tree trunks. He grinned through chipped teeth as he pulled a switchblade from his pocket. Raimondo stood impassively behind, a tight smile on his face, anticipating the sight of Bolan's blood.

The knife flashed in the morning sunlight. The crowd murmured, the excited sound that a mob gets when violence is on display, a diversion to pass the weary time.

This player knew his business, advancing slowly with the knife held loosely and pointed upward.

Careful, restrained movements tested Bolan's reactions without allowing a countermove.

The warrior backed around the circle of prisoners, staying well away from the crowd, his main worry that someone might extend a foot to trip him up. If Bolan slipped, he wouldn't just be beaten, he'd be carved up like a jigsaw puzzle.

He feinted to the side, but the knifeman turned in response, his lightning speed belying his squat bulk. Bolan kept his eyes on the knife, knowing that it was possible to fake an opponent out with the eyes or hands.

Bolan pretended to miss his footing, his left foot sliding along the dirt. The knifeman stepped in, his blade flashing toward his opponent's exposed throat.

The Executioner shot forward, his left arm grabbing for the knife hand, while his right balled into a fist for a shattering blow to the larynx.

But this guy was no fool. He hadn't committed himself as much as Bolan had thought, and he danced back out of reach. As Bolan's fingers closed on air, the knife slashed through his left sleeve, the point carving a small trickle of blood along his forearm.

The knifeman was grinning, thinking that he had won.

Bolan knew it was time to try some tricks of his own.

He recognized the grin for what it was, and decided to let the guy think that he controlled the situation. It might make him sloppy next time and give the warrior a split-second advantage, which would be enough.

The bulky Peruvian danced back and forth, performing a little ballet as he edged Bolan around the ring of faces. He feinted twice, flashing the knife at Bolan's eyes. The knife flashed a third time, but as the warrior jerked his head away, he saw the killer flip the knife into his left hand with a flick of the wrist. This time, instead of pulling back, the hardman stretched forward, his right hand still waving as a decoy, the left hand guiding the blade to Bolan's heart.

The Executioner struck hard, his right arm smashing the knife hand aside as he stepped into the advancing con. His left arm shot forward, palm outward. The heel of his hand connected with the tough's oversize nose, flattening the flesh and driving the nose bone like a projectile back into the brain case.

The knife went spinning as the dead fingers relaxed and the hardguy crashed into the dirt.

The crowd exploded into clapping and roared its approval. Almost everyone then drifted back to the entertainment of the soccer game, which had continued uninterrupted. One inmate placed the knife in Bolan's hand before he wandered off, the spoils given to the victor. Bolan folded it away after wiping it on the dead man's pants, pleased to not be empty-handed any longer.

Raimondo shook his fist at Bolan, although he had retreated well out of the Executioner's range.

"Don't think that this is over, Blanski. You're a dead man." The two other enforcers had recovered and were backing him up, one of them with a sticky red bloodstain on the crown of his head.

"Listen, Raimondo. If I have any trouble, I'll see you about it. Personally."

With a last glare, Raimondo turned away and led his shrunken party back to their quarters. As they moved off, the transvestite looked back and winked at Bolan.

Stone approached Bolan, his admiration showing on his face. "Well, Blanski, I'm glad to see that you're still alive. You certainly have a remarkable way with people. I bet you took that course 'How to win friends and influence people'!"

Bolan chuckled, and he and Stone wandered off to explore the rest of the prison. Two guards arrived to remove the remains of the con, like a dead gladiator being dragged from the arena. Neither paid Bolan any attention.

One area that Stone pointed out interested Bolan a great deal. It was a set of barracks around a second small yard, almost a separate wing, which Stone explained held prisoners associated with the Shining Path. At present there were about three dozen of the terrorists in the compound.

"They keep to themselves almost exclusively," Stone explained, "maintaining an almost monastic kind of existence. They spend the days in silence, except for what are like prayer meetings when they sing revolutionary songs and chant political slogans. The guards leave them pretty much alone. In 1986 there were about 125 of them before they staged a mutiny. The government attacked with rockets and antitank missiles and killed every one. That was a very bad time. The prison ran with blood."

An idea popped into Bolan's head, a way of getting out and yet accomplishing what he had set out to do. "Do you have any contacts among them?"

"Well, yes, as a matter of fact I do. But they are very secretive and have little to do with anyone who is not a member of their group, so I wouldn't expect much."

"Do what you can to arrange a meeting between me and their headman, will you?"

Stone considered the matter. He had only known this man for a few hours, but something in Blanski's gruff but straightforward manner had impressed him.

Blanski was the sort of man who inspired confidence, a natural leader. He appeared to be one of the strong silent types that Stone had admired in the movies, another Gary Cooper or Clint Eastwood. He was falling under the big man's spell.

"Sure thing, Blanski. I'll see what I can do."

The next two days passed slowly as Bolan waited for a response from the leader of the Shining Path, an Indian who called himself Libertad.

Bolan pressed Stone to find out what was happening, and why there was a delay. Stone urged Bolan to leave matters to their own time. Any further inquiries would only arouse the suspicions of the terrorists, never a very trusting group at the best of times.

Steeling himself to wait, Bolan examined the possible avenues of escape. The direct route over the wall didn't seem very promising. Eight towers perched atop a thirty-foot wall, each manned with two alert guards with machine guns.

Razor wire ran along the wall between the towers.

At night, spotlights traversed the yard, while lights illuminated the walls. It would require a full-scale assault to break out against heavy opposition. For one man alone, an attempt to go over the wall would probably be suicidal.

A second possibility would be to get out the main-door. As a start, that would mean getting into the administrative area from the prison compound. There was only one way in, down a long corridor heavily guarded at both ends. Except for unusual circumstances, only the older and more trusted prisoners went in there to work as servants to the guards and in areas such as the laundry. It would be a long time, if ever, before Bolan received that "privilege." An honor that Bolan would gladly do without.

There were variations on the plans that involved more subtle approaches a little sleight of hand, a few heavily greased palms, a sudden break under lucky circumstances. All of those possibilities involved more time, luck and money than he had available.

The heat of midday had ended the soccer game temporarily as prisoners scrambled to find a small patch of cool earth. Bolan and Stone had taken a choice spot in a corner of the prison yard. Other prisoners moved away at the big man's advance. As the two prisoners discussed methods of escape, Stone was pessimistic about the outcome. Bribery was out. One prisoner had escaped seven years ago by paying off several of the guards. In the aftermath, those who had been directly involved found themselves prisoners in other jails.

Many of the remaining guards had been fired.

No one at Lurigancho was anxious for a repeat performance.

"What about feigning death and being smuggled out as a corpse?" Bolan was willing to consider any option at this point.

"Impossible." Stone shook his head in discouragement. "Some clever prisoner tried that years ago. Now they make sure that a corpse is really dead by cutting off its head before they bury it outside the prison. No one tries to escape that way any longer."

Bolan was beginning to regret not trying a break earlier, before he arrived at the prison. It looked as if he was in for a longer stay than he had anticipated. The whole Peruvian mission was turning into a disaster. Someone had been a step ahead of him every inch of the way.

The warrior was going to find out who the mystery person was. As soon as he got out of this hole.

Raimondo held court on the opposite side of the compound. The kingpin had avoided Bolan for the past two days, carefully placing as much distance as possible between them. The occasional hate-filled glares Bolan intercepted told him that Raimondo certainly held a grudge.

The dealer's pride couldn't stomach being defeated, and Bolan guessed that he burned with anger when the other prisoners snickered at his bruised enforcers.

The soldier was way ahead of Raimondo on points, and everyone in the prison knew it. But Bolan read the guy as the kind who would always use a pawn to make the dangerous moves. The big man kept an eye on every move the other prisoners made, watched his back at all times. Except for Stone, Bolan distrusted the other inmates.

The warrior suspected there would be another confrontation soon, but in the meantime he was willing to lie low and not attract attention from the guards.

He didn't want to be particularly noticeable as he tried to figure a way out of the pen.

Stone was an enigma still. The old prisoner had refused to share his background. But Bolan noticed that in spite of his seeming weakness, the other prisoners treated the aging con with a courtesy that bordered on fear. This reaction was particularly noticeable in the Indians, who often refused even to look him in the eye.

Just then a man approached, giving the news that Libertad would see Bolan in an hour.

Bolan sat back to review his plans for the meeting, just as he would have checked his firepower before a hit. This might be his only chance to score some information from the Shining Path, and the only weapon he could use was his brain.

He had better make sure it was loaded.

Bolan strode between two brawny Indians, who stood, arms crossed, at the head of the corridor that led deep into the prison, into the pavilion controlled by the Shining Path. They pretended not to notice his passage. He marched down a corridor similar to those in the main section of the prison. However, here each of the cells held only a bare cot, a small chest, a desk and a lamp. None was screened, and all were empty. Several were scored with bullet holes.

The residents were gathered in an inner courtyard, facing toward a massive thirty-foot banner, which showed a bespectacled, round-faced man in a jacket and open shirt towering above a vast army of peasants carrying rifles and pitchforks. In his left hand he grasped a book written by Marx, while the right held a red banner inscribed with the Communist crossed hammer and sickle.

Below the banner a tall man with a hatchet nose conducted the other captured guerrillas in revolutionary songs.

"The masses roar, the Andes shake," burst from three dozen throats. "We will transform the dingy dungeons into shining trenches of combat."

Bolan noticed that there were no guards in sight.

Blackened walls pockmarked with hundreds of large and small craters in the stone confirmed that this area had seen some heavy combat.

He waited, watching the crowd as they shouted their slogans. There was no lack of fanaticism among these terrorists. Their eyes glowed with the burning light of true believers. In the name of twisted principles, these men justified every crime conceivable. For every objection, there was a ready answer to be found in the writings of their leader, Gonzalo.

These men no longer needed a conscience, no longer had room for one. Killing and dying had been reduced to a simple rule: follow orders for the greater good of the cause.

This fanaticism made them extremely dangerous. Killers hired for a paycheck would run if there was a way out. The Shining Path would embrace the chance to die as a noble sacrifice.

Bolan planned to give a lot of them that chance.

He had never understood this willingness to suspend thinking and judgment, to live by a formula. He lived large, and if he broke some of society's rules, well so be it. Bolan answered to no other man, and he had no need to be forgiven. He lived by a stiff moral code, but it was his own, not something that he had read in a book, or that someone else had told him to believe in.

The Executioner was prepared to kill or to die.

For his own reasons.

The chanting ended, and the leader hopped off the platform and walked across the hard-packed earth to Bolan. The followers dispersed in silence.

"I am Libertad. Why did you wish to see me?"

A hard man, Bolan judged, as he scrutinized the Peruvian. Libertad seemed accustomed to giving orders and not wasting time on small talk.

"I have something for the Shining Path. Weapons. Cases and cases of American arms."

"What concern are weapons to us here, inside this prison? I can do nothing about anything you might have for sale." Bolan recognised interest in the tall Indian by the way in which the other man stiffened slightly at the mention of the arms.

Bolan continued, adopting the manner he thought would be appropriate to a tough death dealer interested in profit alone. "I'm sure you have some means of communicating back and forth with your superiors outside. You can tell them that I can supply all their needs in future. The down payment is a load that another merchant called Carrillo was going to deliver. His plans have changed, and he won't be doing any further business with you. So I'll deliver in his place, and as a special introductory offer, it will only be half the normal price."

"That does not sound reasonable, a capitalist such as yourself taking a low price. What is this shipment? What do you have to gain?" Libertad was testing him, wary of entrapment.

"Your boss will know all about the delivery, and I'll bet he's already made plans for it. I'm sure there will be some disappointed faces if it doesn't turn up. And it won't without me." The soldier watched Libertad for any sign of reaction, but the man was inscrutable. "As for the price, let's just say I got the merchandise at a very big discount. Besides, there's one catch I haven't mentioned. You have to find some way to get me out of here. Either I deliver the arms personally or you don't get them at all." Bolan tried to look nonchalant as Libertad considered. This was the trickiest part of his sell job.

If the Shining Path balked at this, he was on his own, and no further ahead than he had been before.

Libertad had no intention of handing Bolan an easy victory. "Why should we deal with you at all? There must be hundreds of other possible suppliers anxious to sell us what we wish. Anyway, getting you out is impossible."

The warrior was sure he had the terrorist hooked. The only problem was to haggle over the price. "In case you think otherwise, you don't find black market arms dealers in the telephone book. Besides, you've already paid for part of the shipment in advance."

"Still, getting you out would be a service worth a reward."

"Now that you mention it, I'm prepared to agree. Two cases of SAW machine guns as a bonus."

"Ten. With ammunition."

Bolan rubbed his chin as though mulling over the terms. He was willing to promise anything, since he didn't intend to deliver a single bullet.

"Agreed." Bolan sighed.

Libertad still tried to sound as if he wasn't buying any of it. "How do I know that you have the weapons at all?"

"Simple," Bolan said, reaching for a piece of paper in his back pocket. "Go to this address and follow these instructions. In return you will get a case of M-16's. Besides, when I go with them to pick up the remainder, if I'm fooling you, then you can have me killed."

Bolan could imagine what Libertad was thinking.

A perfect opportunity to grab the guns without paying. No trouble. And no witnesses. Right now Bolan was hoping that Kline had followed his instructions to the letter. If he had, there would be a specially prepared case of M-16's waiting and everything would be cool. Otherwise.

"I cannot decide this alone. Your information must be verified and a decision made by other parties. It may take several days." Libertad took the paper.

Bolan smiled to himself. He had no doubt what the answer would be. Trapped in prison, these Shining Path guerrillas were of no value. If anything they were an embarrassment and a liability as a potential source of information leaks. Dead, they were martyrs. Bolan believed that their leaders would sacrifice them all if there was the slightest possible benefit to be gained.

He would know soon enough.

The Executioner left, content with the seeds of self-destruction he had sown among the Shining Path.

Now all he had to do was wait for them to ripen.

Bolan reentered the main prison courtyard and found himself in the middle of a firestorm.

"There he is!" an angry voice screamed, pointing an accusing finger at Bolan.

The big man had no idea what was going on, but it spelled trouble in capital letters. A group of inmates was advancing on him, shaking their fists.

Several cons were yelling "thief" as they approached.

Bolan moved back to the wall, protecting himself from assault from the rear. Now he was ringed by shouting prisoners, although they all kept beyond the range of a lightning strike from the big man's fists, remembering the fight of a few days ago.

Bolan saw Raimondo's grinning face on the outer fringes of the crowd. He would bet that the prison boss was behind what was going down. A score to be settled later.

Right now he could either try to break through the rowdy mob, or wait it out and fight off attacks where he stood. He couldn't afford to lose his cool, not when he was outnumbered forty to one.

A rock sailed in from his left, delivering a solid blow to his shoulder, hard enough to bruise. A second from another quarter whistled by his ear.

That settled it. If he stayed where he was, he would be cut to pieces by flying stone.

Bolan charged, and Raimondo's grin vanished as the Executioner parted the crowd and headed right for him, menace blazing from his eyes. The kingpin scrambled like a pursued quarterback as Bolan plowed into his enforcers with the force of a defensive tackle.

He put his head down and aimed between two toughs, a shoulder taking each one in the chest. They dropped beside him as Bolan's hands stretched for Raimondo's throat.

They came up a few inches short as grasping hands pulled his legs out from under him and Bolan crashed on top of a con. He kicked viciously, feeling the satisfying snap of bone under his boot, and the clutching paws relaxed.

Bolan scrambled to his knees, searching for Raimondo, who had evidently left the yard while he was able.

A foot caught Bolan in the stomach, and the air whooshed out of him. The milling mob had regained its courage now that the big man was downed, and jostled around him, raining kicks indiscriminately while they chanted, "Thief, thief." Bolan tried to rise once, twice, but each time a savage blow toppled him to the ground. He ached everywhere, but attempted as best he could to protect his head from the brutal assault.

Through the gathering fog in his brain, he heard what sounded like Stone shouting. The words rang faintly in his ears as if they were coming from deep underground. The black vortex around him began to spin wildly, breaking into fantastically colored constellations of blinking lights that extinguished themselves with a roar as he fell over a cliff into total darkness.

Bolan awoke with a start, a stifled scream emerging as a gasp.

"Nasty dreams, Blanski? Well, have some of this." Stone gave the weakened man a cup of something hot that smelled and looked like boiled cow dung, while he wiped the beaded sweat from Bolan's forehead.

Bolan was too tired to resist, downing the foul mixture while he held his breath.

"I expect it'll be a day or two before you're up and around again. You'll be sore for a lot longer than that, though. It's a good thing that you're all muscle, or those ruffians would have done you some serious damage. As it is, the worst you got was two cracked ribs, a mass of bruises and a severe bump on the head, probably with a mild concussion."

"What happened?"

"While you were in with Libertad, I was called in for a chat with the warden. Meaningless, really. He didn't have anything to say. When I got back to the yard, I saw that you were in need of some assistance. So I helped out and got you back here. That was a few hours ago."

Even in his fuzzy condition, Bolan recognized that Stone was leaving out something. While he thought about what question to ask next, he fell asleep again.

"Good morning, Blanski. Time for your potion again." Stone held out another cup of his noxious brew.

"What is that stuff?" Bolan was feeling less agreeable this time about drinking the evil-smelling liquid, although he certainly felt no ill effects.

"I don't want to explain it, and I'm sure that you would rather not know. Just take my word for it, it will do you good."

Bolan downed the mixture reluctantly, trying not to taste it.

"For your information, Blanski, this is a very potent native medicine known only to the natives of the altiplano, the high Andes regions."

"I can see why it never caught on."

"Ah, Blanski, somehow I had expected you to have a more open mind. The natives know remarkable things, if we would let them teach us."

"How is it that you are familiar with native medicines?" Bolan had been curious about Stone since they had met. His manners and bearing didn't identify him as one of the criminals or lowlifes whom Bolan was acquainted with.

"I was a university professor in the States, specialising in native medicine and witchcraft. Before I came to Peru, of course." That explained a lot to Bolan, but not why his companion was in prison. Almost as though he read Bolan's thought, Stone continued to fill in his background. "I was doing some field work in the province of Ayacucho about eight years ago. Rather foolishly, as it turned out, because that is the primary base of the Shining Path. They were just starting to make a nuisance of themselves back then. The region was placed under a state of emergency. Because I was educated, American and in the wrong place, I was connected to the left-wing revolutionaries, and so here I am. There were protests and appeals ongoing, but the last I heard of those was about four years ago. Looking on the bright side, I only have another twelve years on my sentence." Stone couldn't hide the bitterness in his voice. Bolan recognised that he wasn't the only victim of a bad conviction. "I'll never forget the man who sent me here. A Lieutenant Colonel Palma. That's where I met Libertad and many of his people, although he had another name then. I developed a certain sympathy for their cause, if not for their methods, while I lived in the region. We have maintained a loose contact since he arrived in the prison."

"So that's how you were able to get me a meeting with him." Bolan hadn't realized how fortunate he had been being paired with Stone.

"I have treated him and his men since they arrived. He was pleased to be able to return a favor."

Bolan turned to a more immediate question. The aches and pains that plagued him were a continuous reminder of yesterday's beating.

"What was all that about yesterday? I think they were accusing me of being a thief."

"Absolutely right. While you were away and I was diverted, someone, probably one of Raimondo's men, sneaked in and planted a stolen lighter under your mattress. Clumsy, but effective, since the prisoners despise a thief. Then, when the loss was discovered, another helpful prisoner claimed to have noticed you in the vicinity of the robbed man's quarters. A search turned up the evidence, and you were convicted in absentia."

It had been effective, all right. It had almost gotten him killed. Next time he might not be so lucky. There was more to the situation than first met the eye, Bolan was sure. It was no coincidence that Stone had been in the warden's of flee and away from his cell. The only puzzle was whether Raimondo had enough influence to get the warden to cooperate, or whether someone else was pulling the strings.

With the way the dice had been tumbling, Bolan would have bet on the latter.

"I'm curious about one thing, Stone. How did you stop them from killing me? I can't see you fighting them off single-handedly." Bolan smiled, to take the edge off in case Stone felt insulted.

"Blanski, you are looking at one of the very few brujos in Peru. A brujo is a caster of spells and can work almost unimaginable evil. He can cause melancholy, blindness, sickness and death. I told you once that the Peruvians were a very superstitious people. When I first arrived, one of the other prisoners gave me some trouble. I cursed him, using my knowledge of witchcraft. He was so terrified that he missed his footing running away from me, fell down some stairs and broke his neck. Since then, the Peruvians have taken it into their heads that I am a sorcerer, and none of them wish to cross me. So when I intervened, they let me have you. Now that it's clear that you are under my protection, I don't think there will be a repetition of yesterday's incident."

Bolan had already decided that. As soon as he was back in fighting form, he would hand Raimondo his head.

"As for the vile elixirs that I have been preparing for you, the Indians have a great deal of knowledge concerning herbs and roots and their medicinal properties. Thanks to a few pungent roots, you'll be as good as new." Bolan vowed that Raimondo would need more than a few roots by the time he was fished with him.