(For Part XII click here)

In the clenched silence, the man in the window didn’t flinch, and Sylvia let the tension out of her gun arm.  She kept her eyes on his eyes — and her finger a slight squeeze away from killing him.  From the back seat, there were whimpering sounds of fear and the retching gag of someone throwing up.  Madison sat rigid, trying to control the tremble in her leg as she tightened her calf muscle to hold the brake and be ready to move.

“Madison, keep your arm low and take the money.  Stay back in the seat.  Don’t get in the line of fire,” Sylvia said in the same dead tone.  Then, in flawless Turkish …

“These are Karga’s women.  Karga.  He has made you a generous offer.  Take his money and let us pass.”

Sylvia was giving the man a way out, and he knew it.  For less than a second, he considered his options, then nodded without moving either of his hands.

“Madison, don’t give him the money yet.”  Sylvia said, and with her left hand pointed forward and back without moving her eyes.

The man spoke harshly and carefully waved his right hand.  The other man in front of the car lowered his gun and stepped back off the road, and the lights of the pickup truck brightened and began to recede.

“Arkadas?” Sylvia said, her eyes steady and her finger still on the trigger.

“Da.  Arkadas.” The man said grudgingly, moving his body slightly back.

“Give him the money, Maddy and drive away – slowly.  Just like it’s Mayfield Avenue.”

Madison handed the money through the window and took her foot off the brake.  The car crept forward and pulled away.  Sylvia watched the man on the road until they were past and turned in the seat to make sure the headlights weren’t following them.  They drove slowly, in hard silence — as if any sound would reconjure the demons.  When they were through the village, Sylvia flipped the safety on the gun and let her hand go limp into her lap.  She dropped the back of her head onto the seat and stared up with her eyes closed, breathing heavily through her mouth.

“Okay, girls!  It’s over.  Just a little further and we can all go home.  Go ahead, Maddy.  There’s nothing between us and the Black Sea — but careful, this isn’t a very good road.”

“Oh, my God!” Madison gasped. “Oh, my God!  Aaah!  What did you say to that guy?”

Sylvia exhaled and took her head off the seat.

“I told him,” Sylvia swallowed, “I told him … if he didn’t let us go, you weren’t going to take him to the Senior Prom.” And then she laughed.  And Madison laughed.  And the two women laughed like lunatics, uncontrollably, on and on, tears gathering in their eyes, hysterical with tension and relief.

“Oh, God, Maddy!” Sylvia said laughing, choking and fighting with the words, “Stop!  Stop!  Stop!  I’m gonna pee.”

Madison touched the brake and Sylvia jumped out, digging at the front of her jeans before she realized she still had the gun in her hand.  She tossed it back into the car, pulled her jeans down and leaned on the side of the car.

“Well, that’s not something you see every day,” Madison said, still laughing.

A little over an hour later, Sylvia directed Madison past a couple of travel trailers to a field of short grass, gravel and weeds.  They parked.  It was nearly dawn, with enough light to imagine the water from the salt smell in the air.  Sylvia opened her door and got out.  Then she opened the back door.

“That’s it.  We’re here.  Come on, girls.  It’s okay.  Everybody out.”

Madison turned the key off, opened her door and just sat there, without enough energy to move.  She could hear water over the scuffling in the back seat.  The girls stumbled out of the car like toys poured from a box.  A couple of them stood up, flexing their legs, but the others sat on the ground, barely conscious.  Sylvia reached into the back seat and retrieved a couple of empty water bottles.

“See that rock?” she said, pointing. “Right beside it, there’s a faucet out of the ground.  It’s good water.  Go drink and fill these for the other girls.  It’s okay: I’ll watch you.  Go ahead.”

Madison finally got out of the car and came around to Sylvia.  The light was brighter and she could see Sylvia, a vast expanse of water and the girls.

“What do we do now?”

“This place hasn’t changed in forty years,” Sylvia said. “We used to stop here and swim.  A half a million dollars worth of antibiotics in the trucks, and we went skinny dipping?  God!” Sylvia shook her head.

On the far horizon, a pencil-thin red line crawled toward them.  Ever so slowly, it widened and deepened as the two women, too empty to move, stood watching without really seeing – dumb to the beauty of it.  And then suddenly the sun full blossomed in front of them, and they had to turn away.  Sylvia squinted the light out of her eyes.

“Let the girls go down to the water and clean up, Maddy.  There’s a phone at that café.  I’m going to call Freddy to come and get us.”

Everything else was a blur.  Freddy and Teddy, one girl/five girls, Jennifer crying on her father’s shoulder, more tears, a few locals, some talk, useless talk. “Food?” “No, just sleep.” And finally a bed.

Both women slept most of the day, and after showers and a quick trip for a couple of shapeless dresses, they sat in the gathering darkness of a patio restaurant, alone with a bottle of wine.

“What do we do now?” Madison asked again.

“Nothing,” Sylvia said. “I’m done.  Freddy and Teddy can deal with it.  As far as I’m concerned, tomorrow we drive up to Varna and get a flight out of here.”

“If we can stand the smell.  It really stinks in that car.”

“We’ll keep the windows open.”

“What then?”

“I don’t know, Maddy.  Home?  Back to real life?”

“Are you really going to be able to do that?”

Sylvia lifted her glass and took a drink.

“That’s a question I’ve been trying not to answer.  What about you?  Senior Prom?”

“Probably not,” Madison chuckled.

It was her turn to drink.

“I was thinking – uh — maybe, I could just stay with you.”

“Hmmm.  Well … after your mother kills me and your father burns the corpse for a witch … it might work out.”

“I’m serious.  I’d go to school and everything, but — I just — I just can’t go back to being a kid.  You know exactly what I mean.  You’re the only one who does.”

“Yes, I know what you mean, Maddy, but ….” Sylvia hesitated.

Madison saw the opening and pushed it.

“That’s it.  You know.  You’ve been Mrs. Ferguson for a long time.  I’m just new at it, and I could use some help.  We could figure things out together.  And you’d have somebody to talk to.  Somebody who knows you’re a bad bitch with a gun.”

Madison leaned forward. “Were you really going to shoot that guy?”

“He thought so,” Sylvia drank again.

“See what I mean?  We can’t tell that story anywhere else.  I don’t think the girls at Mayfield Church Choir would appreciate the situation.”

“No, probably not,” Sylvia laughed. “Okay, I’ll tell you what.  We’ve got the rest of the summer, and if you still feel this way in August, I’ll see what I can do.  Now, let’s eat.  Stay away from the shkembe.”

Madison opened the menu.  She knew she’d won – this round.  She smiled to herself, and there was just the tiniest sparkle in her eyes.

— The End —

(For Part XI click here)

“Is this some kind of a hobbit bridge to like Middle Earth?” Madison asked.  “After this week, I wouldn’t be surprised.”

“Just say the magic words, Maddy,” Sylvia laughed. “No, there really is a bridge here.  Trust me: I’ve been on it a thousand times.  It’s just under the waterline.  That’s why you can’t see it.  The story I was told is that the Germans built several of these secretly in World War II for their tanks.  They camouflaged them, but ….  See the sparkly bits from the stars?  They’re moving around all over the place, but when the moon comes out, the bridge deck doesn’t reflect the stronger light, and they disappear.  The bridge looks black — no sparkly bits — but in the middle of the night, in the middle of nowhere … unless you know it’s here, you’ll never see it.  We just wait for the moon.  Slick, huh?”

“I trust you, but World War II was like 100 years ago.  It’s probably fallen apart by now.”

“N-o-o.  Smuggling didn’t stop just because I did.  The locals use these bridges all the time.  Over there,” Madison couldn’t see the gesture, “just on the other side, there’s a village.  Their bread and butter depends on this bridge.”

“Oh, boy!  Driving into a river in the middle of the night … Jeez, when you said badass, you weren’t kidding.”

“Relax, Maddy.  I’ve done this lots of times.  Come on!  Let’s talk about something else.  Tell me about your young man.  Grader?  Gator? What’s his name?”

“Graydon.  And he’s not my young man.  Actually, I don’t think he’s even a friend anymore.”

“Oh?”

“I’ve been thinking about it.  What’s a twenty-one-year-old college guy doing, hangin’ with a kid like me?”

“You’ve a very attractive young woman, Maddy.”

“Yeah, I know,” she said ruefully.  “But I’m in high school.  I’m not even a senior yet.  I’ve looked around these last few days, and man, I don’t know anything about anything … And I think he knows that.”

“God, I hope I haven’t made you cynical.”

“No, it’s just … things are a lot more complicated than I … How did you do it?  How did you figure things out?  You came here when you were my age.”

There was a serious pause.

“I talked to Cenk, and did the math.  You were like sixteen.”

“That’s just it.  I was young.  I didn’t figure anything out.  I thought I wanted to see the world.”

“And you did.”

“No, I didn’t.  All I saw was a whole lot of this.” Sylvia waved an invisible arm.  “I always meant to leave.  Get on a plane.  Find another cruise ship.  I always said to myself, ‘One more score, and then I’ll have enough money to do what I want.’  But I never did.  I always thought I needed just a little more.  Then when I was in Russia, just me, alone, I realized I didn’t want to see the world.  I wanted to be safe.  It finally dawned on me that I was addicted to the adrenaline because that’s what made me feel safe.  You can’t imagine how you feel when it’s over and you’ve got clean sheets and four walls between you and the nasty bastards of the world.  It’s such a high.  I – uh — can’t describe it.  But when I was trying to get out of Russia, the adrenaline never quit.  I overdosed … and … uh … I don’t know … uh …   Anyway, what I’m trying to say is nobody has it figured out, Maddy.  Nobody.  We all just do stuff because stuff keeps happening.”

“So what happens now?  Now that you’ve had a taste of it, again?”

Sylvia laughed.

“You’re a pretty smart girl for someone who isn’t even a senior yet.”

“You’ve been different ever since Freddy and Teddy.”

“Yeah, I suppose.  I don’t know.  I’m just like you, trying to figure things out.”

“I’ll tell you one thing: Senior Prom at Nathan Hale High is going to look pretty lame after this.”

“Try sitting through a company dinner with a bunch of sugary bankers’ wives, sucking up to you because of your husband.”

“Graydon’s taking financial planning,” Madison said laughing.

The two women laughed together.

“Holy shit, Sylvia!  Look!  There it is.”

And right in front of them, there was a faint black path across the river.

“Okay, Maddy.  Let’s go.  Are you sure you can do this?  I’ve driven it before.”

“Yeah, like fifty years ago.  Don’t worry.  Just guide me along.  I can handle it.”

They crept across the river with the headlights out.  Both women with their heads out the window, watching where the blackness ended.  On the other side, Madison switched the headlights on again and found the road.  They turned onto it and drove east, parallel to the river again.  What they didn’t see was the blacked-out pickup truck that pulled in behind them.  It kept its distance but kept their taillights in sight.

“Okay, there’s a village just ahead.  We need to be careful.  Try and keep an even pressure on the gas so the engine doesn’t race.  We want to be gone before they realize we’re not local.

But they didn’t get the chance.  Just before the first house, the pickup truck behind them raced forward and turned on its headlights.  In front of them, two men stepped into the road.  They both had assault rifles.

“Dammit!  Okay.  Okay.  It’s alright: they just want money.  Maddy, stop right in front of them, but don’t take the car out of gear.  Just keep your foot on the brake.  Roll down your window, and lean against the door– so they can’t see in the back seat.”

Sylvia turned her head slightly into the glare of the pickup lights.

“Girls, be very quiet, and don’t move.  There’s no problem: all they want is money.  We’ll pay them and get out of here, but don’t make a sound.”

One of the men raised his gun and walked around to Madison’s open window, while the other one idly pointed his at their windshield.

“Tovarishch.  Tovarishch.” Sylvia said, leaning towards the open window.

The man spoke rapidly, gesturing with his gun.

“Ne ponimayu?” Sylvia said, “Den’gi?  Money?  We have money.”

The man took his hand off the trigger guard and raised three fingers.

“Tree sousan.”

“Nyet!  No.  One thousand!  One thousand.  American dollars.  Tysyacha!”  Sylvia made a flat line with her hand.

“Why are you negotiating?”  Madison thought, the fear crawling through her stomach.

“Tree sousan!” The man shouted, pushing his fingers into Madison’s face. “Tree sousan, Euro!”

Sylvia pulled a stack of bills out of her bag.

“Nyet.  Two thousand.  Dve tysyachi.  Dva.  Finished.” She shook the bills in the air.

“Tree!”  The man pointed his finger, and Madison instinctively moved away.  Sylvia caught the movement in the man’s eyes and the flicker of recognition as he saw what was in the back seat.

“Okay.  Okay,” she said frantically.

Sylvia reached back as if to get more money, and in one fluid motion, she pulled Sinclair’s gun out of the back of her jeans. She pointed it directly at the man, her elbow slightly bent, and then, almost casually, she flicked the safety off with her thumb.

“Madison, get ready to hit the gas.” Sylvia’s voice was low and even and cold, and her eyes never wavered from the man in the window.

“If this guy doesn’t want our money, I’m going to shoot him in the face.  When I do, drive straight ahead, as fast as you can and don’t stop until I tell you.”

Sylvia shook the money again.  Out of the corner of her eye, Madison saw Sylvia smile ever so slightly and crinkle her eyes.  But this time, there was no sparkle.

(For Part X click here)

“Shit!” Sylvia said to no one in particular and the universe in general.

“I didn’t know which one was yours, but I wasn’t going to leave the rest, anyway.  They’re in bad shape – filthy, dehydrated, scared – they’re right on the edge.  I brought water and chocolate, but there wasn’t enough.”

Sylvia looked out into the night and back towards Sinclair’s car, trying to focus.  There were two neat bullet holes, just above the rear tire.

“Did anybody get killed?” she asked matter-of-factly.

“No idea.  Karga had his boys lay down some serious punishment when I was driving away, but I didn’t stop for a body count.  I imagine this place is going to explode tomorrow.”

“This is the second war I’ve caused.”

“Well, I gotta say you’re pretty good at it.”

They both gave a short, breathy laugh, trying to quiet the adrenaline rush.  Then they just stood there for a few vacant seconds.

“Okay, you know the roads.  Take your girl and I’ll follow you with the rest.  When we get to the border, we’ll improvise.”

“No,” Sylvia said, her mind clear and working. “We’ll stick to the original plan.  I wasn’t going to use the passports anyway, so one girl/ five girls, what’s the difference?  Your car’s the one they’re looking for.  You need to go back into town and dump it.”

“Plan A was the port.  They’ll be searching ships for hours.  I’m sure I can still make it.

Sylvia held up her index finger.  She reached into her bag, found her telephone and tapped it.  A couple of seconds later, her voice was suddenly frantic.

“Help!  I need help!  Zehra, you have to help me.  Madison’s gone.  She’s gone.  We were in the bazaar, and a man grabbed her.  You have to help me.  Call the police.  You have to send somebody.  You were supposed to take care of us.  Oh, my God!  What am I going to do?  Send somebody, please.  Hurry, I’m at the …”

Sylvia hung up, switched the phone to vibrate and handed it to Dreyfus.

“They’re probably listening to the police band.  That should add to the confusion.  Drop this on the street somewhere.”

Dreyfus smiled and took the phone.  He reached under his arm and pulled out a Beretta nine millimeter Tomcat and an extra magazine.

“You might need this,” he said, handing her the gun.  Sylvia took it and automatically tucked it into the back of her jeans. Then she pushed the second clip down her neckline and into the side of her bra.

“Are you going to be okay?”  Sylvia gestured with an open hand.

“Yeah, the Albanians and I know each other.  They’re not stupid enough to involve me in this – unless I force them to.  As long as I’m gone before they show up, we can still be friends.  It’s you and Karga they’re going to go after.”

“Can he win?”

“The Albanians are tough, but Karga’s a nasty piece of work – he’ll win.  Besides, the Russians don’t like publicity, so they might just chalk it up and walk away.”  Dreyfus shrugged: he didn’t believe it, either.

“Yeah, my money’s on Karga, too.  Okay, Maddy’s in the second row, closer to this end.”  Sylvia half pointed. “Give her the girls, and get the hell out of here.  I’m going to find some water.”

Dreyfus opened the door to the car.

“Good doing business with you.  Good luck.”

“Same to you, and if you could hit some traffic cameras on the way through, I’d really appreciate it.”

Dreyfus laughed and drove away.

Less than ten minutes later, Sylvia was back in the car with several bottles of water and they were pulling onto the highway.

“Okay, girls.  You’re safe now, but we have to get you out of here.  No, don’t drink the water so fast: it’ll make you sick.  Just stay down and do exactly what we tell you, okay?  It’s a couple of hours to the border, so try and get comfortable.”

Madison had put the seats down, so the girls lay in a tangled heap.  They looked like frightened little animals, huddled without their mothers, fear in their eyes and shivering.

“Stay with the traffic, Maddy, and stay in the right lane so we can use the shoulder if we have to.”

Madison laughed.

“Last winter, Mom wouldn’t let me go to the mall by myself.  Now I’m driving the getaway car.”

Sylvia laughed with her, and they rolled down the windows against the warm night and the nauseating smell from the back seat.  With the wind in their hair, they headed northwest to the Bulgarian border.

Two hours later, Dreyfus had abandoned his car — ironically, close to where the S.S. Delfini was still tied up to the dock.  As he walked away, he had to duck into a doorway as several sirens wailed past him.  He waited and then kept walking, wondering whether Emily would still be awake when he got back to the hotel.

Sylvia and Madison had turned off the highway some time before and were driving very slowly on a dirt and gravel road that ran parallel to the Rezovo River.  They had missed a grey stone marker in the dark, and it was several minutes before Sylvia realized they’d gone too far and they turned around.  Now they were inching their way forward with Sylvia’s head out the window.

“That’s it.  There.  Stop.  Turn the lights off, Maddy.” Sylvia turned her head towards the backseat.

“Okay, girls.  Nobody knows we’re here, so you’re safe now.  But you need to stay in the car until we get across the river.  Maddy and I are going to get out and find the crossing.  It might seem like a long time, but don’t worry.  Just stay here: I promise we’ll be back.”

Sylvia and Madison got out of the car.  Sylvia came around the front and found Madison’s hand in the pitch black.

“Wait for your eyes to adjust,” she said.

After a minute or two, Madison could make out shapes, but she couldn’t really see anything.  Sylvia led her away from the car towards the noise of the water, and after a couple of dozen tentative steps, she could see thousands of silver sparkles reflected from the million brilliant stars overhead.  They were at the border.

“This is where we’re going to cross.  It could take a while, so you might as well sit down.” Sylvia said.

“We’re going to cross here?  There’s no bridge.”

“There will be.  All we have to do is wait for the moon.”