The tall Uruguayan looked up from the peephole, a puzzled expression on his face. "Que pasa, Ramos?" he asked.
Manuel was mute with rage. He had to stop Renee and that Americano from getting away. Fortunately Manolito spoke almost no English. If he could stall him…
"Pepe," the Uruguayan said suddenly, making up his mind. "Vamanos! We go!"
Without a word, his partner sprang up and grabbed the ever-present suitcase. "Adios," Manolito said tight-lipped to Manuel.
They were almost to the door before Manuel could make up his mind. They couldn't leave him like this. He was spread too thin. He needed money, and now. If the police became involved there would be payments. Maybe he would even have to leave the country.
"No!" he snapped. "Leave it," he nodded at the suitcase, "and take the two women."
Curtly, Manolito said, "No!"
They were going out and there was nothing else Manuel could do. His hand came out of his pocket holding a long piece of ebony. His thumb moved slightly, there was a sharp snick of sound and six inches of tempered steel suddenly shone wickedly from Manuel's hand.
In two steps he was behind the tall Uruguayan. The knife flashed briefly in the dim light and Manolito stiffened, clawing at his back with his mouth gaping open in a voiceless scream.
Pepe turned, his face slowly registering shock at the sudden attack. "NO!" he cried. He threw his hands up in front of his face and Manuel lunged savagely, burying the knife to the hilt in his soft belly. Pepe put his hands to his stomach, dropping the suitcase. Then he lifted them before his face, awed at the crimson stain that bathed them.
Manuel jerked the knife out. A gout of blood hissed after it, splattering Manuel's clothes and face.
For a moment it seemed Pepe was going to say something as he stared into Manuel's eyes. Before he could get it out, however, his legs crumpled and he pitched face forward on the floor.
Manuel was trembling. He hadn't wanted to do it. The fools. Didn't they realize…? He shook his head and picked up the suitcase. Moving briskly he headed for the stairs, not quite running.
In the hallway, Alex was dragging Renee along behind him with one hand and using the other to pound on doors and scream, "Raid! Raid!" He hoped these sailors didn't know prostitution was legal in Mexico. It was the only hope they had.
Doors were popping open and half-dressed Americans began streaming out with screaming prostitutes dragging at them, confused, but determined to get their money before all else.
Through the milting crowd Alex could see the burly doorman working his way toward them. The confusion helped, but it wasn't enough. He dragged Renee deeper into the crowd and hauled her down on the sofa, temporarily out of sight.
Somewhere across the room a deep voice with a heavy Mexican accent was bellowing for calm. Subtly the mood of the crowd changed from panic to curiosity. Alex felt it, knew what it meant.
His fingers shook as he groped in his pocket until he found his cigarette lighter. Nobody was paying any attention to him. They were all looking in the direction the voice apparently was coming from.
Alex coaxed the flame and held it to the fringes of the material that covered the couch. At first it refused to burn. Then a brown spot appeared on one pink flower. Another. A tiny tongue of flame licked up. Alex started another spot and another. Then, grabbing Renee's hand, he dragged her after him to an overstuffed chair and repeated the maneuver.
Within seconds the smell of burning cotton dominated the room. Someone screamed, "Fire!" This time there was no hesitation. The mob was an animal with one motivation. Running over everything in its way, it plunged for the door.
The doorman was between them and the exit and, as Alex and Renee moved with the crowd, he eased along blocking their escape route.
Suddenly the heat of the couch reached a critical temperature and the whole thing burst into a crackling ball of flame. Those in back of the mob felt the heat. It was enough. With a wild scream they surged forward.
Alex and Renee started to follow and at that monument Manuel lurched down the stairs, suitcase in one hand, bloody knife in the other.
Manuel stopped, suddenly, realizing his luck. The opportunity was his to silence these witnesses against him. Silence the witness. The woman was still worth something.
Licking his lips, he advanced on the American keeping the knife in a constant motion to the left. Making a deadly little circle of steel in the air that was impossible to parry at the last moment when he finally lunged.
Manuel was an experienced knife fighter. The steel felt good in his hand. Of course, the suitcase hampered him but he wasn't going to put it down.
Carefully he advanced on Alex while Renee stood back, paralyzed by fright.
Alex searched his memory for remnants of his army training in unarmed combat. But that was a long time ago.
Manuel lunged and he leaped back, well clear of the knife, but Alex realized he was being backed into a corner. Desperately he looked for a way around the menacing knife, a way to stay clear. But Manuel was to wily, too smooth for that.
He lunged again and Alex felt something slice sharply across his arm. It stung when he pulled away a second too late.
"Manuel!"
Fran burst into the room screaming for the Mexican. She ran up to him oblivious of Alex and Renee. Her face was contorted with agony.
"Manuel," she cried. "Give me a shot, please, Manuel!"
The Mexican tried to shove her away with the suitcase as he advanced on Alex. But Fran slipped past it to grab at him.
He tried to shake free and started to turn, his knife poised to stab the frantic blonde, only Alex jumped out at him Manuel swiveled to meet the new challenge.
Fran was tearing at his pockets. Cigarettes and coins scattered on the floor around his feet. He tried to shake her loose again.
She cried out in triumph, holding the needle and the bottle. Trembling, the girl shoved the sharp tip into the membrane-covered bottle opening, drawing hack on the plunger until the hypodermic was full of a clear, colorless fluid.
Renee had moved up beside her.
Snatching the needle out of Fran's hands, she buried the point in Manuel's back and shoved the plunger an the way home in one smooth movement.
Manuel felt the sharp prick of the needle, not really aware of what it was that jolted him. The tip missed a vein, but slowly a numbness started spreading through his back. Euphoria overtook his muscles and left them slack and nerveless.
His knife began to weigh a ton, and gradually his hand sank lower and lower.
The gringo was moving away from him, in slow-motion, stepping around him. Desperately Manuel lunged. Rut the silver blade, alive now with the reflection of the roaring flames, went around the Americano. Manuel tried to saw at him, unsteadily, but his lunge carried him against the burning mush and wall.
He stared, fascinated, as the bright yellow flame crawled up the arm of his coat and leaped playfully at his face. He turned his head. The Americano was getting away.
Ignoring the lively little tonguelets that seemed to multiply by the dozens on his clothes, Manuel staggered after the Americano and the two women. He still dragged the suitcase, an inferno of red and yellow flame now.
His hand, plunged inside the flame to hold the handle, was wonderfully cool. Dully, Manuel wondered about that. It was one of those miracles his mother told him about. Si! That was it. A miracle in the house of angles.
Alex, dragging the two women out, hardly making a stir in the crowd that had gathered to watch the fire.
They were too busy watching something else. A man stumbled out after them, engulfed in flame. His hair was a torch, flames waved from his clothes. One hand held a suitcase that was nothing more than a ball of flame and the other held the silver glitter of a knife. Someone moaned, "My God!"
He stumbled and fell. Two sailors ran toward him in the sudden hush. One kicked the suitcase away from the blackened, shriveled claw that had once been a hand. The other threw dirt over the purple blistered flesh and ash-black cloth.
Another sailor, wearing the insignia of a hospital corpsman, knelt by the fallen Mexican's side.
"Is he alive?" someone asked.
The corpsman nodded. "I don't see how. But he's alive. The shock alone…"
In the distance the wail of ambulances and the clang of the fire-bell could be heard approaching.
Renee looked at Manuel's seared face, the hand that was burned meat, and turned away in horror, burying her face against Alex's shoulder.
Even Fran, suffering withdrawal, seemed sobered by the sight.
Alex knew the moment wouldn't last. Hurriedly, he bundled the girls away, before the police showed up and started asking questions.
After he got them dressed in his hotel room, there was only one detour before they reached the border.
They stopped the cab driver at a sleazy drug store and Alex went in and negotiated with the clerk for what seemed hours. When he came out he carefully divided the small box of capsules into two portions and gave each of the women one pile.
He helped them swallow the pills, despite their trembling hands, and prayed that he wasn't giving them a fatal dosage. It wasn't heroin by a long shot. But he hoped the substitute would hold them together until they got through customs.