As the jungle enveloped him, he lost any reference for finding direction. The sound of the dogs became his only clue. Fearful of accidentally backtracking into the teeth of the searchers, he kept a careful ear out for their barking.
The jungle came alive at night with a concert of strange hoots, calls, and cries. Pitt kept his sharp stick in one hand in case the cries came not from a bird or frog but from a jaguar or caiman.
The noises helped take Pitt’s mind off his fatigue. Without Zhou’s water and protein bar, he might have collapsed, but the minimal nourishment kept him going. Fatigue oozed from his bones, making every step painful. Being unused to the hot, steamy environment only added to his lethargy. Tempted to stop and lie down, he thought of Giordino and the other prisoners, and his feet kept moving.
Though his clothes had dried after his earlier swim, now they were soaked from endless sweat. He prayed for rain, knowing it would help him elude the trackers. But the normally reliable Panamanian skies failed to cooperate, offering nothing more than an occasional drizzle.
He slipped on a patch of mud, then pulled himself onto a tree stump and rested. The darkness also seemed to have slowed the trackers. A distant barking told him he still held a comfortable lead, but he soon spied a faint glow through the foliage from the searcher’s lights.
Pitt dragged himself to his feet and pressed on into the gauntlet of unseen branches. Hour by hour, the night wore on in a cycle of plodding, tripping, and stumbling through the jungle. Always, the din of dogs overshadowed the jungle’s other sounds.
Moving like a zombie, Pitt staggered through a grove of bamboo—then took a step and felt only air. He collapsed over the lip of a narrow ravine, tumbling headfirst down a grassy hill and into a small stream. He sat there for several minutes, the cool water washing away the pain of his bruises and lacerations. Overhead, a seam of twinkling stars provided a faint but welcome light.
The water would give him the chance to escape the pursuing dogs. After refilling Zhou’s canteen, he shuffled down the center of the creek. The water seldom came past his knees, but it was deep enough to mask his tracks. With the starlight, he found the going easier, even as he slipped and fell in the streambed. He followed it for what felt like miles but was in fact only a few hundred yards.
Reaching a low bank, he hobbled up the stream’s opposite bank and entered a grove of kapok trees. A low branch beckoned, and he shimmied onto it and rested.
The jungle had quieted, and he heard few noises except the stream. He no longer detected the chase dogs, giving him hope that he had finally given them the slip. As he leaned against the trunk, he realized the pursuit had been almost as taxing mentally as it was physically.
He was fighting the urge to sleep when he heard a rustling in the bushes across the stream. He looked over his shoulder as a yellow glow bounced through the foliage. He froze as the silhouette of a large dog materialized above the far stream bank, sniffing the ground.
Pitt cursed his bad luck. Following the streambed, he had inadvertently reversed his track and traveled toward his pursuers.
The German shepherd gave no indication it saw or smelled Pitt. He held perfectly still in the tree, not even breathing. The yellow glow grew brighter until a gunman with a flashlight emerged from a thicket and called to the dog. It turned to its trainer and began to follow, but not before letting out a growl.
Ten feet from Pitt, a roar erupted like a lion in an electric chair. Pitt nearly flew off the branch but caught himself as the gunman’s flashlight scanned the tree. The light found a furry black-and-brown creature perched a little above Pitt. It was a howler monkey, and it let out a second raucous cry before hopping onto another branch and scurrying away from the light.
Pitt sat frozen at the edge of the flashlight’s beam as the dog barked wildly. The beam wavered, then bounced back to capture Pitt dead center. Pitt dropped from the branch and hustled through the grove of trees. A second later, a burst of gunfire chewed up the kapok tree’s now empty branch.
The jungle fell still as the echo from the gunfire receded. Then the landscape erupted in squawks and cries as a thousand animals fled the scene. Pitt headed the pack, scrambling through the maze of foliage with his hands outstretched. The first rays of dawn were creasing the sky, aiding his run. And run he did.
The German shepherd had been sent to follow but hesitated at crossing the stream, giving Pitt an extra head start. But the shepherd found a narrow place to cross the stream and resumed pursuit. Its incessant barking allowed Pitt to gauge the dog’s steady approach. Although tired itself from the nightlong chase, the shepherd kept coming.
Pitt had little energy left for an extended sprint. He knew he couldn’t outrun the dog, but if he could separate it from its handler, he might have a chance. The question was whether he had enough left in him to fight the dog.
The barking grew closer, and Pitt decided it was time to turn and fight. He realized he’d left his sharp stick by the tree when he fled. As he scoured the ground for a new weapon, he overlooked a low tree branch and ran face-first into it. The blow knocked him flat to the ground. As he lay there dazed, he heard the barking approach. But he also heard a metallic clacking that seemed to vibrate through the earth.
On instinct alone, he crawled forward, past the tree and up a small mound. The sound grew louder. He fought his pain and peeked over the mound.
In the dim light he saw a train—not twenty feet away. He shook off the thought it was a mirage and staggered to his feet. The train was real, all right, crawling through a narrow cut in the jungle, pulling flatbed cars loaded with shipping container after shipping container.
Pitt stumbled toward the tracks as the shepherd crested the mound and sighted him. With a renewed fury, the dog sprinted after Pitt as he staggered on rubber legs for the train.
A half-loaded flatcar was passing by, and Pitt dove for it. His torso hit the bed, and he clawed forward as the dog attacked. The German shepherd leaped and clamped its jaws onto his dangling right foot.
Pitt rolled onto the flatbed as the dog hung from his foot in midair. Pulling Zhou’s canteen from his neck, he flung it at the dog. The canteen struck its snout, and the shepherd whimpered and let go. But a moment after falling to the gravel beside the rails, the shepherd regained its senses and chased after Pitt’s flatbed. For a quarter mile, the dog ran alongside it, snarling and leaping but unable to jump aboard. Then the train crossed a ravine over a narrow trestle, and the dog was forced to give up. Pitt waved farewell to it as it barked and howled in frustration at the vanishing train. Crawling across the flatbed car, Pitt then curled up next to a rusty container, closed his eyes, and promptly fell asleep.
63
THE SLOW-MOVING FREIGHT TRAIN JOLTED TO A stop, awakening its lone passenger. Stretched out on one of its flatbeds, Pitt pried open his eyes under a bright morning sun.
The Panama Railway train had reached its terminus at a rail yard in the port of Balboa. Near the Pacific entrance to the Panama Canal, and just a few miles south of Panama City, Balboa was the key transit point for shipping across the isthmus. Pitt jumped off the flatbed car and found himself surrounded by a steel jungle. Mountains of multicolored shipping containers were stacked in every direction. He looked down a long line of rail cars to see a gantry crane positioned over the tracks and workers beginning to off-load the ubiquitous containers.
Standing near the end of the train, Pitt followed the tracks out of the rail yard, figuring the odds were high that the local rail authorities would treat him as a vagrant. Exiting the yard, he climbed a rusty chain-link fence and found himself in a neighborhood of aged warehouses. A half block away, he noticed a small building with a handful of cars parked out front. It was a run-down bar that catered to the local dockhands. A faded sign proclaimed it El Gato Negro, complemented by a painting of a black cat with crossed-out eyes.
Pitt walked into the dim bar, garnering stares from the few early-morning customers already warming the barstools. Pitt approached the
bartender, then caught a glimpse of himself in a large mirror behind the bar. The sight nearly frightened him.
It was the image of a tired, emaciated man with a bruised and bloodied face, wearing soiled, shredded, and equally bloodied clothes. He looked like a man returned from the dead.
“El teléfono?” Pitt asked.
The bartender looked at Pitt as if he’d landed from Mars, then pointed to a corner next to the restroom. Pitt ambled over and was relieved to find a battered pay phone. Though all but extinct in America, the venerable pay phone lived on around the world, sometimes in the most unlikely of places.
Reaching an English-speaking operator who balked only momentarily at his request to make a collect call to Washington, D.C., Pitt soon heard the line ringing. Rudi Gunn’s voice jumped an octave after hearing Pitt say hello.
“You and Al are safe?”
“Not exactly.” Pitt quickly explained the Adelaide’s hijacking, their arrival at the Panama facility, and his escape.
“Panama,” Gunn said. “We had calls into the Panama Canal Authority to look out for the Adelaide.”
“They changed her name at sea. Probably had phony papers already prepared. Bolcke’s facility is somewhere in the middle of the Canal Zone, so he probably has inside support at the locks.”
“Did you say Bolcke?”
“Yes, Edward Bolcke. An old Austrian mining engineer who runs the camp of horrors. I was told he’s a major player in the market for rare earth elements.”
“He was one of our few leads in your abduction,” Gunn said. “He owns a ship called the Salzburg that was sighted near the Adelaide around the time of her disappearance.”
“Probably the same ship that bumped off the Tasmanian Star before it made an appearance in Chile. And maybe the Cuttlefish, too. Apparently she’s armed with some sort of microwave device that proves lethal.”
“Bolcke may have an operation in Madagascar as well,” Gunn said. “I’ll get the ball rolling with the Pentagon to go after Al and the others. It sounds like a joint military operation with Panama security forces is in order.”
“Listen, Rudi, we’ve got a really narrow window.” Pitt described his encounter with the Chinese agent Zhou and his plan to destroy the facility. Glancing at his Doxa dive watch, he said, “We’ve got less than five hours to get Al and the others out of there before the fireworks go off.”
“That’s a tall order.”
“Call Sandecker and pull out all the stops.”
“I’ll do what I can. Where are you now?”
“A bar called the Black Cat, somewhere near the Pacific rail terminus.”
“Stay put. I’ll have someone you know pick you up within the hour.”
“Thanks, Rudi.”
Pitt felt the fatigue of his escape fade away, replaced with a renewed energy for the task still at hand. Saving Giordino and the others was all that mattered. He walked back to the bar, and the bartender waved him to an empty stool. He slid onto the seat to find, served up in front of him, a full shot glass containing a clear liquor. Beside the glass was a pair of long-handled bolt cutters.
Pitt put his hands to his neck and felt the steel collar. He had forgotten it was still there. He looked at the bartender, who returned his gaze and nodded.
“Muchas gracias, amigo,” Pitt said, reaching for the shot glass and firing back the contents. A popular local spirit called Seco Herrerano, it burned with the sweet taste of rum. He set the glass down, reached for the bolt cutters, and smiled at the bartender.
“Who says a black cat brings bad luck?”
64
ARE YOU SURE WE’RE IN THE RIGHT PLACE?”
Dirk shot his sister an annoyed look. “Since they aren’t fond of posting street signs around here, the answer would be no.”
He swerved around a stalled truck filled with plantains and accelerated the rental car along the congested road. Since landing at Tocumen International Airport that morning, they had been crisscrossing Panama City, first checking into their hotel, then visiting the mineral brokerage headquarters of Habsburg Industries. It was a tiny, rented storefront office that was closed and appeared little used. The owner of a bakery next door confirmed it was seldom open. Dirk and Summer were beginning to think their trip to Panama was wasted when they received a call from Gunn that their father was alive and waiting at the edge of town.
They passed a sign welcoming them to the district of Balboa, and Dirk knew they were on the right track. He followed a pair of semi-trucks that he assumed were headed to the port facility, then turned down a dirt side road when the port entry gates appeared.
Three blocks down the road, Summer spotted the sign with the black cat.
Dirk barely had the car in park when Summer leaped out and ran inside the bar, ignoring its unsavory appearance. She almost didn’t recognize her father, seated at the bar in ragged clothes eating an empanada. He was equally shocked to see both his children.
“Dad, let’s get you to a hospital,” Summer said.
Pitt shook his head. “No time. We’ll need to coordinate with the Panamanian military to rescue Al and the others.”
Dirk looked at the assorted bar patrons, who all stared at the out-of-place Americans. “Dad, how about we discuss this in the car?”
“Fair enough,” Pitt said. He looked at the empty shot glass and plate of food. “Do you have any local currency?”
Dirk opened his wallet. “I’m told our greenbacks are the preferred currency in Panama.”
Pitt pulled a hundred-dollar bill from his son’s wallet and gave it to the bartender, then shook hands with him.
“That was two days’ worth of per diem,” Dirk said as they walked out of the bar.
Pitt gave him a wink. “Put it on your expense report.”
Dirk studied a road map before they took off down the rut-filled road.
“What has Rudi arranged with the Panamanians to get into Bolcke’s facility?” Pitt asked.
“Rudi’s pulling his hair out,” Summer said. “He called us three times on the way over. As you probably know, Panama has no standing army in the wake of Manuel Noriega’s removal. Paramilitary groups within the Panamanian Public Forces are willing to conduct a joint raid with a U.S. team, but only after they review the evidence and make adequate preparations for a tactical assault. Nobody expects a task force to be assembled within forty-eight hours.”
Dirk looked to his father. “You think Al and the others may be at risk sooner?”
Pitt explained his encounter with Zhou. “Once those charges go off, I expect Bolcke’s forces to execute all the prisoners and hide their remains. Do we have any U.S. forces that can go in solo?”
Dirk shook his head. “Special Ops forces out of the Southern Command are our best bet. They’ve been put on alert but are still ten hours away. Rudi said the only presence nearby he’s been able to find is a Navy ship out in the Pacific headed for the canal.”
After traveling just a short distance across Balboa, Dirk drove up a hill to a large, ornate building that overlooked the port district and the canal. A sign on the manicured lawn proclaiming it the PANAMA CANAL AUTHORITY ADMINISTRATION BUILDING.
“The Authority is responsible for security of the canal and the adjacent Canal Zone,” Summer said. “Rudi says they are our only hope for an immediate response.”
Inside the building, Pitt’s appearance drew stares from the staff and visitors. A receptionist escorted them to the office of the director of Canal Security, a poised man named Madrid who wore a thin mustache. He gave Pitt second and third looks as he introduced himself. “I have been advised of the urgent nature of your visit. Your Vice President is a very persuasive gentleman,” he said, shocked to have received a personal call.
“Lives are at stake, and time is short,” Pitt said.
“I’ll call our nurse, and get you some fresh clothes, while we talk.”
Madrid led them into his office, which had an oversized map of the canal on one wall. A man in fatigues wa
s studying some aerial photographs at a table.
“May I introduce Commander Alvarez. He heads our field security operations and will be leading your rescue operation.”
They joined him at the table, where Pitt described his abduction and the operation at Bolcke’s hidden facility.
“We’ve pulled the Habsburg’s company transit records and have found an odd pattern of canal crossings,” Madrid said.
“Their ships enter at one end,” Pitt said, “and don’t exit the other until days later.”
“Exactly correct.”
“They are delivering purchased or stolen raw ore at the facility and then shipping out the refined product.”
Madrid nodded with a pained look. “The passage of commercial ships through the canal is a tightly controlled operation. They apparently have assistance from the pilots, and perhaps our own locks personnel, to make such transits without attracting attention.”
“There’s a lot of money involved with their product,” Pitt said. “They can afford substantial bribes.”
“Mr. Pitt, can you show us where the facility is located?” Alvarez asked.
Pitt walked to the map and tracked the Panama Canal Railway line that ran near the canal’s eastern edge.
“I can only guess that I caught the rail line somewhere in this area.” He pointed to a remote area off Gatun Lake, about thirty miles from Panama City. “The facility would be somewhere between the canal and the rail line.”
Alvarez rifled through a folder and pulled out a packet of color aerial photographs.
“This would be the approximate region.” He examined each photo closely before passing it around the table. The photos showed swaths of dense jungle that occasionally bordered Gatun Lake. A few pictures showed the Panama Railway line cutting through the jungle, but none gave any sign of Bolcke’s facility. They pored through forty photos as skepticism grew on Madrid’s face.
“Wait a second,” Summer said. “Pass that last photo back.”
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