The Extraordinary Adventures of Alfred Kropp (Alfred Kropp 1)

He slowed down to a leisurely eighty and, coming up on a huge fire, I saw we were at a private airstrip. There was some kind of wreckage burning on the runway.

Bennacio pulled into an access road that led directly to the airstrip. Three guys were standing at the end of it, next to a tan Chevy Suburban, wearing long brown robes like the one Bennacio wore the first time we met.

“I thought you were the last knight,” I said.

“I am,” he said. “And I believe I have told you, Alfred, that the Sword has many friends.”

He stopped the car and we got out. A light, freezing rain was falling. I could hear the ocean and taste the salt on my tongue. Bennacio left the headlights on and we gathered in front of the car. The air seemed to sparkle as the light danced in the tiny droplets of rain.

One of the guys came toward Bennacio. They kissed each other on both cheeks, and then the guy gave him a big hug and looked at me.

“Cabiri, this is Kropp,” Bennacio said.

“He is a Friend?” Cabiri asked, studying me.

“A Friend and a Wielder.”

“Indeed! Then he is my friend,” Cabiri said, and he kissed both my cheeks and wrapped me in the same tight bear hug.

He turned to Bennacio. “We had a little trouble, as you can see.” He nodded toward the burning wreckage. “They came on foot, apparently, and that took us by surprise. We expected an aerial assault. They used this.”

He nodded to one of the guys standing behind him. He was toting what looked like an oversized bazooka, but I figured it was probably a rocket launcher.

“Derieux?” Bennacio asked.

“He was inside the plane, Lord Bennacio.”

Bennacio closed his eyes. I saw the other two brown-robed guys staring at me and I looked away.

“Diabli!” Bennacio muttered. “Did they escape?”

Cabiri smiled grimly. He jerked his head toward the burning plane. “Come, I will show you.”

We followed him across the tarmac, past the twisted, burning husk of the plane, where the rain hissed and spat and smoke billowed upward, to the other side of the airstrip. Three men in black robes lay there faceup, staring blankly straight up into the rain. Bennacio pulled the hoods away from their faces and studied each one for a long time. He gestured toward the one lying in the middle, the biggest of the three, with a large, flattened nose and black slits for eyes.

“This is Kaczmarczyk,” he said. “The other two I do not recognize.”

Cabiri turned his head and spat. “Local fishermen, I suspect, recruited by Kaczmarczyk.”

“Perhaps.” Bennacio turned from the bodies and stared at the burning plane, and the light of the fire danced in his gray eyes.

“We cannot stay here, Bennacio,” Cabiri said. “More will come when Kaczmarczyk fails to report. Many more, I fear, than the four of us can manage.” Actually, five of us stood there, but I guess Cabiri wasn’t counting me. “Come, my house is not far from here. You may rest and we will decide our course.”

“Our pilot Derieux is dead,” Bennacio said. “Even if we can find another plane, we have no one to fly it.”

Cabiri placed one of his large hands on Bennacio’s shoulder. “Come, Lord Bennacio,” he said softly. His eyes were filled with tears, though his tone was jovial. “A hot meal, a warm bed, and things will look brighter in the morning.”

He glanced at the other two guys. “And there is someone who would very much like to see you.”

27

We left the bodies lying there. Bennacio covered the faces of the men he did not recognize, but left Kaczmarczyk’s exposed to the rain. I wasn’t sure why, but thought maybe he was getting at something symbolical.

We climbed into the Suburban. We left the Jaguar sitting on the runway and nobody said anything about it.

Bennacio, me, and the guy with the bazooka, Jules, sat in the back of the Suburban, with Cabiri and the other brown-robed guy, Milo, up front. Jules had a funny smell, like black liquorish, and a very long nose with a turned-under tip. Milo had long blond hair that he wore in a ponytail, and piercing blue eyes, like Windimar’s. Thinking of Windimar reminded me of the painful fact that I wasn’t Windimar, but Alfred Kropp, and I had no business hanging with these bazooka-wielding warriors.

We drove in silence for a few minutes, then Cabiri said, “The outsiders stormed Mogart’s keep in Játiva yesterday. Of course, they found nothing.”