The Marco Effect

31

He saw shadows everywhere as the bus passed the Palads cinema where not long before he’d come close to losing his life. Men loitering at pedestrian crossings. Men standing inactive in the milling crowds. Men who were just there.

You’re getting paranoid, Marco, he told himself, trying to straighten his shoulders on the seat farthest back. Not everyone was after him, surely?

As the bus slowed and eased past Tivoli’s side entrance opposite the central station, he noticed a group of men in fierce discussion. Though he recognized none of them, it made him feel anxious. Cut it out, he urged himself. Just one more stop, then we’re down behind Tivoli and I’ll be safe.

He ducked down slightly in his seat all the same, keeping an eye on the flock of men as the bus pulled in to the stop. Apart from two who were black, they looked like Eastern Europeans. Bony men who appeared used to living the hard life.

Marco kept an eye on the front of the bus to see who got on. They all seemed peaceful enough.

He heaved a sigh of relief, feeling the battering his body had taken earlier in the day. He ached, and yet he was thankful. He was still alive, wasn’t he?

The bus had just started up again when he sensed a shadow moving fast on the pavement. Someone just missed the bus, was his first thought, as he looked out and saw a young black guy in a green basketball jersey staring up straight into his face as the bus pulled away.

Marco turned in his seat and saw him give chase like a hunting dog with an easy, loping stride, too fast by half.

Immediately Marco got to his feet, all his senses on alert as he moved to the exit. Fortunately the light was green as the bus turned down Tietgensgade, putting distance between him and the jackal behind.

He jumped off at the Glyptotek art museum and crossed the street behind the bus, weaving between the honking cars. The black guy had already rounded the corner farther back and was halfway toward him. Marco fumbled in his pocket and produced a couple of banknotes, then hobbled as fast as he could in the direction of the amusement park’s rear entrance.

And then he froze as he read the sign: THIS ENTRANCE CLOSED FOR REPAIRS.

He looked up and saw his pursuer closing in at the same time as he sensed a sudden turmoil of flashing blue lights on the opposite corner of H. C. Andersens Boulevard. Apparently a patrol car had been waiting over by the Great China restaurant and had just launched itself across six lanes of traffic, straight toward him.

Now Marco was boxed in. If he tried to make a run for it toward Rådhuspladsen or the Langebro bridge in the opposite direction, his pursuer would catch up with him. If he tried to cross H. C. Andersens Boulevard he would run straight into the arms of the police. There was only one alternative left, and that was to clamber over the fence into Tivoli Gardens.

He leaped onto the fence just to the right of the closed gate where there was a post he could grab, and managed to wriggle over the top. Behind him he heard the patrol car screech to a halt on the bike path and saw his pursuer stop in his tracks. For once a police car with flashing blue lights was having a positive effect on his life.

Inside the amusement park, he glanced around to get his bearings, then opted for the steps that led past a carousel ride with animals in all shapes and sizes. He had seen one just like it in Italy but had never been on it. In fact, he had never seen a place like this, he thought, as he crisscrossed the system of pathways amid children on the roller coaster and the pirate ship, and the shrieks of delight when parents arrived with ice-cream. Marco felt a lump rise in his throat. Never had he felt so abandoned as in this pandemonium of happy faces and gaiety.

He saw more police cars appearing in the surrounding streets, but was sure they’d never catch him here because he knew the way behind the Pantomime Theatre and the restaurants to his building-site hideaway, which lay next to that corner of Tivoli. From there, climbing the lattice of steel girders and concrete was no problem, when your name was Marco.

–

The site was almost deserted. A few workmen were pottering about below, but up here where he sat his only company was the wind and his view across the city.

He felt like a hawk hovering unnoticed above the fields, eyes latching on to the slightest movement.

Now he knew how close they were. Just below, sniffing around for the smallest clue that might tell them how he had given them the slip and where he’d disappeared to. The police cars had gone now, but it wasn’t the police he feared the most.

It was the black guy. Not because of his inscrutable eyes or his athletic body and sure movements. What frightened him was that he couldn’t understand what a man like him was doing here.

He recalled having seen two young Africans by the steps of the central station. But when he closed his eyes and concentrated, he saw a black woman, too, standing behind them, keeping an eye on everything. It was like these were the ones in charge, while the other men seemed less resolute.

What were they all doing here in Copenhagen? That was the question. Who had put them on to him?

As far as he could see, it could hardly be Zola. He remembered clearly the time two Afro-American men had wanted to join the clan, back when they lived in Italy, and how nasty the verbal exchanges had become. No, black folks were not welcome in Zola’s world.

But who, then?

Marco picked up his book. He had read it many times by now, the one he had stolen from the family on the very first morning of his life as a fugitive. The words soothed him and even the name of the main character, Nicky, made him feel better. She was a strong-willed woman who held her own against superior force, despite her lack of physical strength. A woman who didn’t really belong to the society in which she lived, and yet…

He put the book down again and frowned.

The sounds from below were almost inaudible, which was precisely what sent a rush of adrenaline through his body. Construction sites, normally such a cacophony of sounds, were meant to fall silent when the day was done. No one was supposed to be there.

But someone was.

He went over to the elevator shaft, where he stood and listened intently. The sounds were still there, a bit louder now. Not regular footsteps, more like the squeak of moist fingers drawn across plastic.

They were here. He was certain of it.

If it was the Africans, he knew they were unlike any people he had previously been up against.

The sounds grew more distinct and were coming from two directions. One directly underneath the elevator shaft, the other by the stairwell. So now his exits were blocked.

He heard them speak. Was it French?

Glancing around he saw no immediate escape route, just a couple of obvious hiding places where they were bound to look straight away.

Why had he come all the way up here to the fourth floor? He was too high up to jump.

They can kill me here as easy as anything, but I’ll put up a good fight, he told himself, his body heating up and his breathing growing deeper.

The iron bar he picked up from the floor was heavy enough that no one could survive a well-aimed blow. He gripped it tightly in both hands, pointing it at the stairs like a Jedi’s light saber

He simply refused to cry now. The last thing he wanted was for these men with their ruthless faces to see him break down as they closed in on him. He wouldn’t allow them to see the effect Zola had on people when they turned against him. At least that was one thing these guys wouldn’t be able report back about when they were finished with him.

The first man to appear at the top of the stairs was not the one who had been running after the bus. Though Marco could see only his silhouette, the yellow T-shirt was unmistakable: Lakers 24, it read.

“Hello, kiddie,” the man said in a husky voice, in English. “Come here to me!”

He remained at a distance, waving Marco toward him. But Marco backed away toward the side of the building facing Vesterbrogade. The closer they were to the edge, the greater the chance of taking the guy with him in the fall. It was a maneuver he had already tried once that day.

Marco looked up. Behind the black man, Tivoli’s Ferris wheel with its candy-striped gondolas was rotating to the delighted cries of children and grown-ups alike. Before the wheel came to a halt he would probably die, and no one in the world would know who he was or what he might have become.

For all his resolve, the sorrow of this sudden realization prompted tears to well in his eyes.

“Poor boy!” said the young African. He had yet to produce a weapon, but Marco knew it was only a matter of time.

If he was lucky, he might be able to surprise him by making a dash for the elevator shaft and leaping into the void. Marco knew the second man was on the floor below, but if he let himself plunge to the next level down, then maybe somehow he might be able to save his skin. Maybe, somehow.

He took a step to the side, but his adversary read his thoughts and blocked his path.

There was nothing Marco could do now but watch and wait.

Not until only a few paces separated them did Marco see his face clearly. Despite the lines etched in it, he wasn’t much more than five or six years older than Marco. There was a scar across his nose, white and sharply defined, and his left eye was half shut. He looked like a warrior, and yet there was nothing aggressive or angry about his countenance. In fact, he seemed more like a carpenter needing only to hammer in the last nail of the day. Placid and unwavering, cold as ice.

And then he produced the knife.

Marco took two swipes at him with the bar, though he knew any moment now the African would raise his weapon above his head and send it hurtling into his chest. It was that kind of knife: short-handled, with a finger grip and razor-sharp double-edged blade.

If the iron rod hadn’t been so heavy, he would have launched it at him or tried to bat the knife aside in midair with a baseball swing. But Marco hadn’t the strength, and so he stepped up close to the edge and waited.

In what he believed would be his final seconds, he heard a car sound its horn emphatically at the junction below. But the sound didn’t come directly from the street, it was more like a distorted fanfare coming from right next to the spot where he was standing.

He turned his head and saw the top of the rubble chute assembled from sections of heavy-duty plastic tubing through which the builders dumped their debris into ground-level Dumpsters. Marco clenched his jaw and lunged to the side as he flung the iron bar at his enemy. It ricocheted against the concrete floor and struck the African on the shin. Then he grabbed the sides of the chute and vaulted in, feetfirst.

He heard the man’s curses as he slid away.

The sections of the chute telescoped into each other and every join slowed his descent a little. The son of a bitch wouldn’t catch him now, Marco decided, he was too big and would get stuck.

And then he heard the rumble above.

Oh, God, he managed to think, as falling chunks of rubble began pummeling his body. He’s going to get me. How’d he ever fit into this chute?

He caught a glimpse of light from the mouth of the chute below before landing in a corner of the Dumpster among discarded fiberglass and piles of plastic packaging materials.

He stared up at the rumbling chute as his skin began to itch from the fiberglass.

Thinking quickly, he lunged to the side of the Dumpster and grabbed a short plank with sharp nails protruding from the end. The moment the African emerged he would aim a blow at his head.

But his pursuer never made it through. Somewhere higher up he must have realized the chute was too narrow and a string of curses sounded through the duct like false notes from some arcane wind instrument.

Marco brushed the glassy slivers from his clothes and could hear someone running on the level above.

He vaulted out of the Dumpster, clambered over the fence and legged it across Rådhuspladsen, half blinded by the dust of fiberglass that stuck to his eyelashes, his throat and skin tormented by the stinging, itchy fiber.

Only when he reached the mouth of the pedestrianized Strøget did he dare glance back over his shoulder. And there on the pavement in front of the huge construction site stood a woman as wide as a door and as black as the night, following him with her eyes.

He forgot all about his bad leg and ran like hell.

By the time he reached Frederiksholm’s Canal and the Marble Bridge leading over to the equestrian grounds of the Danish parliament he was almost out of his mind from all the itching. His clothes felt fleecy from the insulation material, and the more he scratched the worse it got. He peered into the dark water of the canal and wondered if it might wash the glass splinters out of his clothes. Then he jumped down the steps to the jetty where small motorboats lay anchored and plunged in.

He took a couple of strokes with one arm, brushing at his clothes with the other. The water was cold but had a soothing effect.

A woman stopped on the bridge and asked if he was OK. He nodded and dived under the surface, removing a layer of millions of fibers. When he came up for air, a couple of young guys in suits stood laughing at him by the edge of the canal as one of them jabbed an index finger at his temple to indicate how totally mental they thought he was.

At the same moment Marco registered the man a couple of hundred meters away who was running in his direction.

Disappear, you two, Marco commanded silently, as his mirthful audience began pointing. But it was too late.

By now he could see the man running toward him was the one in the green basketball jersey. He had picked up Marco’s scent and was clearly considering his next move.

Now Marco was trapped, but as they climbed into their car the chuckleheads in the suits were oblivious of the fact that they had just hammered a nail into his coffin.

What could he do now? Nothing.

No matter which way he swam, the African would have no difficulty following him alongside the canal, and the moment he tried to get out of the water, this cheetah would sink its teeth into him. The way Marco saw it, his only chance was to conceal himself behind one of the moored boats and hope that darkness soon would fall.

He dived again, underneath the boats this time, drawing himself through the water to where the guy had just been standing. Most likely he would take the same stairs down to the boats as Marco had used, so he had to get out of sight quickly, swimming under as many boats and as far away as possible.

And if, against all odds, the guy took to the water himself, he would swim silently and cautiously under one boat at a time until he reached the bridge called Stormbroen, where he would try to clamber back onto dry land without being seen.

If he could emerge at a spot where there were a lot of people, he might still have a chance.

But the African did not take to the water. Instead, he jumped down on to the jetty, where he calmly proceeded from one mooring post to the next.

Marco heard how he took his time, pausing at every vessel, making sure Marco hadn’t climbed into one of them or was clinging to its side, or sending up bubbles of air from below the surface.

Slowly he approached, as the canal and its surroundings descended into darkness.

Finally he was but one boat away and once more Marco dove down, only to hear a splash behind him.

He swam a few frenzied strokes before surfacing to see the almost invisible face of a black man so close in the water that he turned immediately and swam as fast as he could.

For a moment, the distance between them increased, but then his strength ebbed away while his pursuer’s strokes remained strong and steady.

They heard the sightseeing boat at the same time as it returned to base from the open waters of the harbor. They both stopped swimming for a moment to assess the situation and see what they were up against.

The vessel was moving quickly, and its pointed bow was coming straight toward them. Summoning all his energy, Marco swam toward the bridge. Of its three stone arches, the one on the left was blocked by a speedboat, the two others were free.

If I try the right-hand arch, he’ll just follow me, Marco reasoned. He was exhausted now, his sodden clothes weighing him down. And if I go for the middle one, the sightseeing boat will run me down.

Instinctively he opted for the arch on the right, thinking he just might get through to the other side ahead of the boat and then alert the crew that he was in danger.

Even now, he knew intuitively that he was unlikely to get that far. Behind him he heard a forceful lunge that brought his pursuer close enough to pull Marco down under the surface before he had a chance to take in air. In spite of the darkness and the murky water, he could clearly see the whites of the man’s eyes. The man who was now drowning him in a violent embrace. He gasped, then his mouth closed and his legs started thrashing to bring him back to the surface as the sound of the boat’s motor and propeller churned louder and louder in his ears.

Then he managed to get an arm free. He twisted and turned, extricating himself from the African’s grasp just enough to thrust two rigid fingers into his eyes.

The man opened his mouth in a scream, releasing a mist of bubbles to the surface as Marco’s fingers gouged into his irises.

The combatants rose to the surface simultaneously like a pair of corks, the darker one momentarily blinded, Marco swimming with desperate strokes toward the middle arch of the bridge.

The boat was so close now that he could hear what its boozed-filled party of passengers were singing.

And then he heard a roar behind him and saw his pursuer thrashing through the water toward him, blood streaming from one of his eyes.

So Marco submerged again.

Underneath the surface he felt the blue hull of the boat plowing over him, and with a burst of strength propelled himself out to the boat’s other side, where his fingers grabbed hold of a thick braided rope that ran along the length of the vessel at the waterline.

He was jerked violently to the surface and heard himself scream involuntarily, though no one on board noticed.

Maybe it was for the best. Maybe the predator in the water on the other side of the boat thought he had been hit. Marco could only hope.

He allowed himself to be pulled through the water in the knowledge that he had got away.

For a brief moment he smiled as he saw the dark head bobbing far behind in the wake of the boat.

The question was, had he seen Marco as well?