“Maybe it’s the two dead girls that trouble me.”
“They were in the wrong place at the wrong time, Jacob,” the Englishman said. “Believe me, it could have been much, much worse. The Ukrainian could’ve taken it into his head to kill the entire household from the scullery maid to the butler.”
Sensor smiled. “Would he have done that?”
“Yes, indeed, old chap. He’s done it before. A couple of years back in Italy . . .”
“I don’t think I want to hear this,” Sensor said.
“Wait, it’s quite funny in a droll sort of way,” Bickford-Scott said. “The Ukrainian put a bomb in the coffin of a deceased millionaire and blew up the entire funeral party gathered around the grave. It was lashing down rain that day, and seventeen people died with umbrellas in their hands.”
“Who was the target?” Sensor said, interested in spite of himself.
“The grieving young widow,” the Englishman said. “Apparently, she was the heir to the deceased’s fortune, but if she died the money would go to the dead man’s brother. The brother paid the Ukrainian to solve the little problem of the heiress’s continued existence. At least, that’s what the police thought, though they could never prove it.”
“Where was the brother when the bomb went off?” Sensor said.
“He claimed he got a flat tire and was late for the funeral,” Bickford-Scott said. “Now here’s the amusing part. Because of the power of the blast, the body of the dead millionaire landed intact on the roof of the St. Marie de Chagrin chapel a quarter-mile away from the cemetery. Poor chap had to be buried all over again.”
“With a lot fewer mourners,” Sensor said.
“Only his grateful brother,” Bickford-Scott said.
“So, even the Ukrainian is not infallible,” Sensor said.
“Indeed, it would seem that he’s not. He drastically underestimated the power of his own bomb, that’s for certain.”
Bickford-Scott rose from his chair and moved to the window, where he pulled the curtain aside and looked out on the shadowed front lawn and the white-painted summerhouse.
“We are fighting a war, Jacob,” he said. “A war against terrorism we have to win, using fair means or foul. Our good friend Vladimir Putin says that terrorism has no nationality or religion, and he’s right. It’s a festering wound, an enemy of humanity. Pyroterrorism is just its latest manifestation, and we can’t let it beat us.”
“Why is the UK a target? Your forests are small, nothing like ours,” Sensor said.
“All of Europe is a target, not just the UK,” the Englishman said. “But you’re correct, the United States is the main focus of this new breed of arson terrorists.”
“Then the sooner I get the Regulators up and running, the better,” Sensor said.
“Yes, time is of the essence,” Bickford-Scott said. “I trust that the men I’ll send you will help.”
“I’m sure they will,” Sensor said.
The Englishman let the curtain fall back into place. “One more word about Nikola Kraljevic, if I may. I wouldn’t let him lie too heavily on my conscience. He took a hand in the political game and lost. That’s all there is to it.”
“You understand that his problem with me had nothing to do with pyroterrorism,” Sensor said.
“I know that. But, my dear Jacob, open borders and terrorism go hand in hand. The twisted beliefs of Kraljevic and his kind have everything to do with pyroterrorism and every other kind of terrorism. You do see that, don’t you?”
Jacob Sensor nodded. “Yes, I see it. Of course, I see it.”
“Good. Now aren’t you glad you had the miserable son of a whore shot?” Sir Anthony Bickford-Scott said.
CHAPTER 22
The morning sun rose above the tree line and light reached the forest floor, filtered through the canopies of the gigantic Douglas firs, some of which stood three hundred feet tall.
As Ben Stevens and Bill Baxter walked the tree line, jays quarreled in the branches, and high above a bald eagle quartered the lemon-colored sky. The men had entered the Willamette National Forest just before dawn, but as yet they’d not spotted any deer.
Stevens and Baxter, good ol’ boy proprietors of Bill & Ben’s Tire and Auto Repair in Portland, were on a pre–hunting season scout, searching for the big bucks they hoped would fall to their rifles in six weeks or so. Their search had so far been disappointing.
But a grassy meadow about a hundred acres in extent, bordered by trees on three sides, revealed plenty of deer sign, and that gave the hunters hope.
“I guess they’re keeping to the trees,” Stevens said, a gray-haired man who’d hunted all his life. He wore an olive-green L.L.Bean field coat with a corduroy collar, camo hunting pants, and lace-up boots. He had a camo ball cap on his head, and a pair of binoculars hung on his chest.
“Seems like,” Baxter, a mirror image of his friend, allowed. “Well, we’ll keep looking. Bound to cross trails with some bucks eventually.”
The sheer size of the Willamette gave shy deer plenty of options for cover. The forest and wilderness areas covered 1,678,031 acres and included seven mountain peaks and the headwaters of the Willamette River. It was a vast land, breathtakingly beautiful and a haven of rest and relaxation for those who loved and understood it, but it held dangers for the ignorant and unwary.
Like most hunters, Stevens and Baxter were conservationists, and in their minds the Willamette was a piece of paradise that had accidentally fallen to earth in days gone by. And that may indeed have been the case.
The two men scouted the old-growth forest and then trekked into an open area where they crossed a stream and saw ahead of them a thick stand of cedar, hemlock, and white pine. Baxter used his field glasses to scan the trees, and then his gaze lingered on a track that paralleled the tree line.
“What do you see, Bill?” Stevens said. “You see a buck, huh?”
Baxter lowered the glasses. “No, I see people.”
“What kind of people?”
“Five, no six, men. What the hell are they doing?”
Stevens used his own binoculars. Then, his eyes still on the men, he said, “They could be hunters on the scout like us.”
“Or birdwatchers,” Baxter said. “Plenty of those around. Wait, one of them has a metal canister of some kind. What the heck is he using that for?”
“Beats me,” Stevens said. “Let’s go ask them if they’ve seen any big bucks in the area.”
* * *
Ben Stevens was immediately suspicious. Not a prejudiced man by nature, he did notice that the five young men looked dark and foreign, and the big white man called Norris seemed ill at ease, as though he felt guilty about something, like an overgrown kid with his fingers in the cookie jar.
And Stevens, who’d on several occasions met firefighters in the woods, recognized the cylinder for what it was . . . a drip torch, used to ignite controlled burns. He saw where the undergrowth had been scorched in a dozen different places, and his suspicions grew.
Bill Baxter on the other hand took Mike Norris and his acolytes at face value. “Seen any big bucks, have ye?” he said.
“No,” Norris said. “No, we haven’t.” His eyes were on Stevens. The man, dressed up in field jacket and camo pants, seemed uneasy. Was he armed?
“So, what are you doing with the drip torch?” Stevens said. “Kind of dangerous around the trees, ain’t it?”
“These young men are interested in forest conservation, and I’m showing them how firefighters light a controlled burn,” Norris said.
“You’re not firefighters,” Stevens said, and now Baxter stepped beside him, his face troubled.
“They’re actually interested in forestry management,” Norris said. “I’m teaching them the ropes.”
Stevens shook his head. “Not here, you’re not. You could set the whole damn forest ablaze.”
“Shows how damned ignorant you are,” Norris said, his quick anger flaring. “I said a controlled burn. Don’t y
ou understand plain English?”
“I understand that what you’re doing is not legal,” Stevens said. “Come with me and you can explain yourself to a ranger.”
“Go to hell and mind your own business,” Norris said.
Ben Stevens was a tough man and not one to suffer fools gladly . . . and he considered Norris a damned fool. His spine stiffened with a spiking anger, and he stepped to Norris. “Give me that goddamned drip torch,” he said. “Hand it over.”
It happened very quickly.
One of the young men drew a knife from a sheath at his waist. The blade glittered in the sun for a moment before he plunged it to the hilt into Stevens’s chest.
Time stood still . . . a second ticked past . . . then another . . .
“You goddamned . . .” Baxter yelled, his eyes wild. He reached into his pants pocket and drew a Bond Snake Slayer derringer. But before he could level the gun, the other youths were on him, knives flashing, biting deep. Baxter managed to stay on his feet for long moments until he finally fell, the front of his field jacket glistening scarlet with blood.
Mike Norris was horrified. Stunned. He stood rooted to the spot, his eyes seeing but unbelieving. “Oh, my God, what have you done?” he said.
The young men ignored that, and Dilshad Hakimi, their unofficial leader, said, “Take the bodies into the trees and cover them up. Do it now.”
The other four dragged the dead men into the pines, and Norris grabbed by the front of his shirt the man who’d given the orders and yelled, “Damn you! Damn you!”
“They would’ve given us away,” Hakimi said. “They had to be silenced.”
“You didn’t need to kill them,” Norris said. “There was no call for murder.”
“There was no other recourse,” the man said. “Now, take your hands off me or you’ll lose them.”
Somewhere in the trees a branch snapped, and a racked buck bounded out of the forest, crossed some open ground, and disappeared into a stand of cedar.
Norris staggered back, sat heavily on the ground and buried his face in his hands. “Oh, my God . . . Oh, my God” . . . saying it over and over again like a prayer.
When the other four returned, brushing off their hands, Hakimi said, “We must get out of here. Bring the drip torch.”
One of the men, the youngest of the five, looked at Norris with contempt. “Dilshad, what about the infidel?”
“Bring him.”
Norris was hauled to his feet, but he was in a state of complete collapse, and it took two of the young men to hold him upright. “What if we meet up with others?” one of them said.
“He drank too much whiskey too early,” Hakimi said. “We’re taking him home.”
“Our car is a distance away, and he’s a heavy man,” the youngest said.
“Ismail, that’s just one of the sacrifices you must make for the Prophet,” Hakimi said. “Do as I told you.”
“Pah,” one of the youngsters said. “He smells of alcohol.”
“He’s an infidel,” Hakimi said. “He smells of sin and corruption.”
CHAPTER 23
“How are you feeling?” Nasim Azar said. He held up an empty syringe. “You were very worked up, and I gave you a mild sedative.”
Mike Norris blinked, blinked again, and then said, “Where am I?”
“At the warehouse, in the living room of my apartment. You had a nasty shock.”
Norris gradually became aware of his surroundings. He sat in a wooden chair in a simply furnished room, its main feature a large casement window that offered a view of the Willamette River. The murmur of male voices came from somewhere close by, and a man laughed and then fell silent again.
Norris tried to gather his thoughts, then the memory of what had happened hit him with the force of a baseball bat. “The hunters . . .” he said.
“Yes, a great tragedy,” Azar said. “I am desolated.”
“Your boys murdered them,” Norris said. “Stabbed them to death. Both of them.”
“The men were eliminated because their deaths were necessary to our cause, Mr. Norris,” Azar said. “I regret the incident as much as you do.”
“Damn you, Azar,” Norris said. He tried to move but found he was bound to the chair with ropes. He tried to struggle free but could not move, his ankles and wrists tied with cruel tightness.
“The ropes are for your own good,” Azar said. “You’d had some kind of fit and were convulsing. I administered midazolam to ensure that you didn’t hurt yourself.”
“Damn you, Azar, cut me loose,” Norris said. “I’m going to the police.”
The man shook his head, his black eyes glittering. “No police. You’re in too deep, Mr. Norris, deep enough to be charged with an accessory to a double murder, and that means at least fifteen years to life in a federal prison. Do you really want the law to get involved?”
“Damn you, Azar, you’re a devil incarnate,” Norris said.
“No, Mr. Norris, I’m not a shaytan. The two hunters, nobodies, were necessary sacrifices in the war to deliver our nation from the horrors of the Scorching. Keep that thought uppermost in your mind. I will now leave you to think about what I’ve said.”
* * *
Nasim Azar stepped out of the door into a dressing area that connected to his bedroom. His five young men stood around yet another casement window, and with them was his bodyguard, Salman Assad, and a small, slender and insignificant-looking man with thinning blond hair and pale blue eyes. He was called the Ukrainian, and if he had any other name, Azar was not aware of it.
“Dilshad Hakimi, this was ill done,” Azar said.
“The infidels surprised us,” the young man said. “They gave us no choice.”
“The man Norris may be of no further use to us,” Azar said. “I think his mind is going.”
“He does not like the sight of blood,” Hakimi said.
“Did he teach you anything?”
“A little. We did not have much time.”
“Can you start a forest fire so that it will spread quickly to populated areas?” Azar said.
Without hesitation, Hakimi said, “Yes, I believe we can.”
“You believe you can? Answer my question. Can you start a major forest fire and direct its course to populated areas?”
“Yes, master, we can,” Hakimi said. “We can use the wind. The man Norris taught us that much.”
“He showed you how to harness the wind,” Azar said. “That is well. Were there cameras in the Willamette?”
“No, none that we could see,” Hakimi said. “Norris has done some research, and he says it could be years yet before a sufficient number of cameras are deployed. At the moment, the cameras are few in number and in any case their range is very short. There is talk of using ground-mounted heat monitors, but that is for the future.”
“Then the drones may be unnecessary,” Azar said. “That would be a good thing, less to carry into the forest.”
“If there are no cameras, we can start fires without the drones,” Hakimi said. Then, a plaintive tone in his voice, “Just give us the opportunity to try. Master, let me make something clear, and in this I also speak for the other brothers . . . we desire to be martyrs. We want to die for the holy cause of jihad. That is our fondest wish.”
Azar was so moved by this speech he pumped his fist in the air and yelled, “Allahu Akbar!” And the others joined in, except for the Ukrainian. He remained silent, and the sphinxlike expression on his face did not change.
* * *
“What are you boys celebrating?” Mike Norris said.
Nasim Azar shrugged. “Nothing of any importance. A birthday.”
“You’re a damned liar,” Norris said.
Azar’s mouth tightened. He backhanded Norris across the face, the crack of the blow like a pistol shot. He then shoved his face close to the other man’s until only an inch of space separated them. Azar’s eyes burned with fanaticism.
“You are correct, Mr. Norris, we did not cel
ebrate a birthday. We celebrated the willingness of my young men to strike a blow against the infidels and die bravely as warriors for the coming Caliphate.” Azar straightened up and said, “Does not that thrill you, as it does me?”
“I always took you for a damned traitor, Azar,” Norris said. “Now I know I was right.”
“Because I do not waver in my zeal to serve Allah?”
“The hell with Allah. You damned trash, I hate your guts,” Norris said.
“I offer you redemption and in return you offer only blasphemy,” Azar said.
“What the hell do you want from all this?” Norris said.
“Want? What my father and his father before me wanted . . . that the American presence, military and corporate, be withdrawn from Islamic soil. All American business interests in Muslim countries must be turned over, not to the governments of those nations, but to the Caliphate. A new Islamic order will soon unite Muslims everywhere and lead them to their God-given place of dominance on earth. If what it takes to accomplish this sacred goal are the deaths of every infidel on the planet, then so be it. Allah wills it. Allahu Akbar! ”
“You’re mad, Azar, stark, raving mad,” Norris said.
“Mad because I want to strike at the hearts of the Americans with fire?” Azar said. “Mad because I want them to feel the same pain that untold thousands of my people have felt at the loss of our children, not only to American guns and bombs, but to a satanic culture that seduces them away from the true tenets of Islam.” Azar shook his head. “No, my friend, it is you that is mad, not I.”
“I’ll stop you, Azar,” Norris said. “You and your kind.”
“Big talk from a man tied to a chair with midazolam in his veins,” Azar said. “Listen to reason, Norris, don’t fight me, join me. We’re teachers, you and I and we can use the Scorching to give our lessons. You can teach yours to the National Wildfire Service, and I will teach mine to the American nation. We must remain allies, not become enemies.”
“The National Wildfire Service . . .” Norris said, his face twisted as though the name was bitter gall on his tongue.
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