Battle Cry

by Don Pendleton

“I know that look,” Dengler said, leering from his wheelchair. “I’ve seen it before. You remind me of Field Marshal Göring.”

  “I’m nothing like him!” Macauley snapped.

  “Oh, no? Great men of great appetite, ja? What separates you, then?”

  “If you have to ask, you wouldn’t understand,” Macauley said.

  “Perhaps I understand enough,” Dengler replied. “You hate England and use me as a weapon to punish them, eh? If you had lived during the war, you would have kissed der Führer’s ass and pledged allegiance to the Reich against your monarch.”

  Macauley felt a sudden surge of anger, barely understood what he was doing as he grasped the decorative candlestick, an ancient thing of heavy brass. Dengler was smirking at him as he turned, but the expression on his wizened face transformed itself into a mask of shock, then fear, as he picked out the weapon in Macauley’s fist.

  The first blow may have cracked the German’s skull. He should have been dead by the fourth or fifth, but still Macauley kept on swinging. Eight, nine, ten times with the two-foot candlestick, until its base was dripping crimson and his tweed jacket was deeply stained.

  He rang for Bruce then, waited for his butler to survey the scene and said, “Fetch Mr. Wallace and his lads. They need to dig another hole.”

  BOLAN SWAM SOUTHWARD from the headland where the River Foyers spilled into the loch, its mouth divided by a wedge-shaped island. He felt buoyant in the cloudy water, even with the submachine gun strapped across his chest and the two limpet mines trailing beside him in a fishnet bag. At thirty feet below the surface, swimming in Loch Ness was much like crawling at the bottom of a coal mine, but without the scrapes to hands and knees.

  He used the flashlight sparingly, to keep track of the shoreline on his left and thus avoid veering off course. In terms of distance, Bolan knew approximately how fast he was swimming—say one mile an hour with the load he carried, and his pace of kicking with the swim fins. Call it twenty minutes for a quarter mile.

  As Bolan swam, he thought about the fish inhabiting Loch Ness. The only two that posed a threat of any kind to divers were the pike, voracious ambush predators, and European eels, reported to exceed six feet in length. Both could deliver painful bites, but Bolan knew of no cases where either had attacked a diver. If they did, he had the KA-BAR lashed to his right thigh, where he could reach it easily.

  If he still had an arm.

  Though he was keeping track of time, Macauley’s dock and boathouse almost took him by surprise. Bolan picked out the DeepScan first, his flashlight beam sliding along its hull, before he found the boathouse braced on pillars jutting outward from the rocky shore. As he’d expected, it was open from below, allowing any craft it housed to stay afloat.

  Bolan removed the first mine from its pocket in the fishnet bag. It was a limpet charge, equipped with magnets on the back and strips of powerful adhesive for a backup, if the target vessel’s hull was made of fiberglass. It was a British model, obviously, meaning that its plastic charge weighed four kilograms. Attached six feet below the waterline, it was designed to blow a yard-wide hole in any ship’s unarmored hull.

  Bolan took his time placing the charge, avoiding any clank of contact in case there was someone aboard. He pressed a button to arm the mine’s remote-control detonator, then swam off toward the boathouse.

  Entering blind through the structure’s open floor was risky. A gunman on watch there, sitting in darkness, could fire through the neoprene hood of his dry suit before Bolan knew he’d been spotted. He lingered outside for a moment, therefore, with his flashlight extinguished, watching for lights from within while he listened for any stray sounds that the water might carry.

  Nothing.

  At last, still without surfacing, he approached Macauley’s submersible. Its hull felt rough, even through Bolan’s gloves. But it was definitely metal, and he placed the other limpet mine up near the nose, where he felt lights attached, and other kinds of gear that he supposed were used for salvage missions.

  When the second mine was armed, he ducked out of the boathouse, used his flashlight long enough to orient himself, then began the quarter-mile return trip to the north. Beacher would be waiting for him, hopefully without a nosy local resident or constable to keep her company, but just in case, he was prepared with a diversion.

  Bolan found a place to surface, slipped the small remote-control device out of a pouch that held it on his weight belt and armed it with the flick of a switch. A small red light glowed in his palm, obscured by the loch’s murky water.

  Would the signal reach its destination?

  Only one way to find out.

  He keyed the detonator, and the double blast echoed across Loch Ness an instant later. Gazing southward through his dive mask, breathing bottled air, Bolan couldn’t see a fireball, since the charges both exploded underwater. There was no great waterspout to see in darkness, either, but the sound was adequate to tell him that his mission was successful.

  This part of it, anyway.

  He hadn’t stopped Macauley yet, but that came next.

  The Executioner was blitzing on.

  Chapter 15

  The DeepScan had not sunk, exactly, since its mooring ropes still bound it to the dock, but it had rolled to starboard, taking water through a great wound in its hull, and settled there. It didn’t take an engineer to know that if the lines were cut, the research vessel would be gone in minutes flat.

  The three-man submarine, likewise, was moored inside the boathouse, but with one line at the bow. Therefore, as it had filled with water, it had settled to the stern, straining its line. Only the rounded nose was still above water, its spotlights and spindly mechanical arms making the crippled boat resemble some freak from the depths washed ashore by the tide.

  “How likely is it that the blasts won’t be reported?” Gibson asked.

  Macauley seethed with fury, standing next to Gibson on his private dock, flanked by a pair of soldiers from the TIF. “I call the chances slim to none,” he answered through clenched teeth. “We heard them well enough inside the house up there. Sound carries on the water.”

  “At least the boathouse wasn’t damaged,” Gibson said. “Whoever comes, maybe they’ll only see the DeepScan.”

  “Which is bloody bad enough,” Macauley answered. “But you won’t win any races taking them for idiots. The water bailiff knows his job, and we’ll have CID back here by morning. Mark my words.”

  “No problem, with the cover story,” Gibson said. “We’ve got those threats on file, against the monster hunt. That crazy witch from Perth who cursed the DeepScan, and the Barrhead tree huggers. The police can chase them around.”

  “While we do what, pray tell? Take up collections for a new submersible? Maybe your witch can conjure up a suitable replacement?”

  “I just meant—”

  “Stop trying to console me, damn it! This has set us back immeasurably.”

  Looking abashed, Gibson replied, “They missed the speedboat, anyhow.”

  That much was true. The saboteurs had overlooked his Spencer Runabout, moored in the boathouse with the little submarine, attacking only vessels earmarked for the salvage job.

  Which meant…

  “They had to know,” Macauley said.

  Gibson looked confused. “What do you mean?”

  “About the U-boat,” Macauley said. “You and I know that it wasn’t monster lovers or environmentalists who did this. Someone else knows what we’re doing here.”

  “Don’t look at me,” Gibson replied. After a glance to the left and right, he leaned closer and said, “I haven’t even told my men.”

  “But Wallace knows.”

  “Of course he knows, but Graham—”

  “Where’s he gotten off to, by the way
? It’s all of two miles down to Fort Augustus. Is he staying overnight and just forgot to call?”

  “You know I sent him in to look around for strangers,” Gibson said.

  “And do you think they have a mob of tourists on the street, this time of night? For Christ’s sake, man! They roll the bloody sidewalks up at sundown.”

  “I can send someone to look for him,” Gibson said.

  “No! I lose another car each time you send one of your people out to sniff around. We’ll all soon be afoot, at this rate.”

  “Graham won’t run out on us,” Gibson protested. “We’ve been friends since we were kids.”

  “Then something’s happened to him. Like the others,” Macauley said.

  “Jaysus,” Gibson muttered. “What if it’s the old kraut’s buddies, then?”

  “Dengler? He’s dead, if you’ve forgotten.”

  “I’ve forgotten nothin’,” Gibson said. “But what if he’s been playin’ us along this whole time? Usin’ you to bring his goodies up for Scotland, all the while waitin’ to steal ’em back again.”

  “And who’s done this?” Macauley asked him, nodding toward the DeepScan. “Who killed your two men at Boleskine House, and Ewan in my own backyard? Have you seen any ancient Germans hobbling around with little Nazi banners hanging from their walkers?”

  “He could afford a crop of young ones,” Gibson said. “It’s not like all the fascists in the world are pensioners, ya know.”

  “All right. Send one man into town, in your car. Look for my Mercedes first, then Wallace. Have him call if he finds anything, then come directly back.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “With no goddamn delays,” Macauley said.

  He had a feeling that they might need every gun available, and soon.

  SOMEONE HAD FOUND the makeshift gate cut in Macauley’s fence and made an effort to repair it, using wire and solder until new chain link could be installed. Rather than waste time on the old flap, Bolan cut a new one twenty feet farther along the fence and wriggled through, then held it open for Beacher.

  Their time was tight. Instead of waiting for police to come and go, Bolan had opted for a follow-up within the hour, rushing through a change from his dry suit and diving gear to dark clothes for the final penetration of Macauley’s property. Beacher was carrying the Spectre SMG, bone-dry when Bolan took it from its plastic wrap after his swim, with extra magazines weighting her pockets. He had the Steyr AUG and his Beretta, with the last of his L-109 grenades clipped to his belt.

  The soldier had gambled that the action on Macauley’s private dock would have most of the men assigned to keep the grounds secure. Bolan had never managed to secure a head count for the home team, but his best guess made it ten to twelve men overall. Importing more might have sparked gossip in the local pubs and over backyard fences, ultimately getting back to the police.

  Say twelve, then, minus three. If there were fewer hardmen on the property, so much the better. And if he’d underestimated? Then he would simply have to hit them that much harder in the time available.

  The grounds were dark, the footing tricky, but a blaze of lights from the mansion kept him and Beacher on course. Bolan’s priority, job one, was cutting off his enemy’s retreat. He didn’t want them hopping into cars and racing off to Inverness or Timbuktu before he had a chance to deal with them.

  No exit from the killing ground this time.

  His list of targets was a relatively short one: Alastair Macauley, Fergus Gibson, Jurgen Dengler. Anyone in their employ who stood against him was fair game, but those were the top three. Eliminate them, and the fishing expedition at Loch Ness was done—at least until word got around and someone from the government showed up to claim the prize.

  Three hundred yards and closing to the big house, still no guards in sight. Bolan was angling off toward the four-car garage, two sedans parked out in front of it, when a man emerged from the house and angled toward the nearest of the cars. Keys jangled in his hand as he approached, then taillights winked on a Honda Accord as he opened the locks remotely.

  No one leaves.

  Bolan shifted the Steyr to his left hand, drawing the silenced Beretta with his right. He sprinted toward the stranger in the driveway, footsteps muffled on thick grass but audible. The stranger turned with a pinched expression on his face, his free hand drifting underneath his windbreaker.

  Bolan squeezed off a double-tap from thirty feet and put him down, the dead man’s legs collapsing under him. Beacher closed the gap as Bolan reached the Honda, slowing, stepping around the corpse as he moved on to the garage.

  Step one: deny the enemy mobility.

  Bolan opened a side door to the long garage and stepped inside.

  FERGUS GIBSON TRIED Graham Wallace’s cell phone again, heard it ring four times, then switch over to voice mail. He snapped his phone shut, cutting off the message that he knew by heart.

  “I’m busy at the moment. If you wanna leave a number—”

  “Stupid bastard!” Gibson muttered, feeling guilty even as he said it. Wallace wouldn’t simply take off in Macauley’s Benz and leave them hanging, would he? After all that they’d been through together since they were a pair of snot-nosed kids running the streets. Something had to have happened, but—

  The floor shuddered beneath him, as a hellacious bang rattled the walls and windows. Wallace heard glass break somewhere in the mansion, couldn’t place it and didn’t frankly give a damn. He had to find out what was happening, before—

  Another blast, then, louder than the first, as if a string of giant firecrackers was going off outside. Recognizing the general direction from which the blasts had come from, he rushed through the house to find a window facing on the driveway and garage. When Wallace did find one, it was shattered, and he saw the reason why.

  The two cars Gibson and his men had driven to Macauley’s place when they began the DeepScan operation were in flames. A body lay beside one of them, likely Dickie Cameron, whom he had told to look for Wallace down in Fort Augustus. Dead, with his trousers burning, not a twitch to show he felt it. And beyond the blasted cars, Macauley’s long garage was blazing like a bonfire, fueled by gasoline from the laird’s Mercedes-Benz collection. What was left of it, that was.

  Wallace quickly realized that aside from the dead ghillie’s little Honda motorcycle, he and his crew were officially on foot.

  He glimpsed a shadow, someone running on the far side of the leaping flames—or was it two people? Wallace couldn’t be sure. For all he knew, an army could be circling the mansion as he stood there, gaping at the damage they’d already done.

  It was time to move.

  Wallace drew his pistol, a Heckler & Koch P2000, and held it ready against any threat as he went looking for Macauley. The old man had snapped with Dengler, but that was one grave-digging Wallace had been pleased to supervise. The animated mummy had repulsed him personally, and the thought of handing off one-quarter of the treasure to a Nazi prick was galling. Never mind where all that loot had come from in the first place. It was finders keepers, and he thought an old man on his last legs—or without them, in the German’s case—should have been happy with the table scraps.

  No time to think about that, though, as he heard the rattle of gunfire from outside the manor house. Nine men remaining to him on the property—no, eight, with Cameron down—and Gibson started shouting for them, calling them from every nook and cranny in the mansion.

  Some, he knew, were already outside, beyond his reach unless he stepped into the shooting gallery. How many might be dead or dying at that very moment he could not surmise. But every man that he could gather, every hand that he could arm, would be an asset.

  Macauley kept a stash of weapons hidden in his trophy room, behind a cabinet displaying his approved and licensed guns. Tucked
out of sight were something like a dozen automatic rifles and as many handguns, laid by with emergencies in mind, and ample ammunition for a standoff with the police, if it came to that.

  But these weren’t coppers raiding the grounds on this night. The men and women with badges didn’t creep around and blow up cars—at least, not before announcing themselves. So it was someone else, not planning to arrest Macauley or his visitors.

  It was a killing situation.

  Starting this second.

  BEACHER SQUEEZED OFF a short burst from the submachine gun Cooper had loaned her. She heard spent casings tinkle on the driveway’s pavement but saw her target drop and roll to cover at the southeast corner of the house. A miss and three or four rounds wasted, then.

  When Cooper had started blowing up the cars outside Macauley’s house, it brought four gunmen rushing to investigate the racket. Beacher had expected more and was relieved by the small turnout at a glance, until the shooting started. After that, it was a scramble to survive and drop the only kind of targets that really mattered.

  The kind that shot back.

  The four shooters she’d seen so far were not familiar to her. TIF, most likely, but no sign of Gibson or the laird. And if the bosses were inside, it stood to reason that they had to have other gunmen with them, for security. At least one bodyguard apiece, more likely two or three. She and Cooper would never know, unless they managed to eliminate the first four without getting tagged themselves.

  Beacher knew there was no such thing as “just a flesh wound,” when it came to gunfire. Hollywood writers portrayed action heroes leaping around like Olympic gymnasts with slugs in their shoulders, but that was a ripe crock of shite, she thought. Even a simple dislocation of the shoulder could be crippling; never mind a bullet ripping through the muscles, bones and tendons there.

  She moved to keep a burning car between herself and the gunman her last shots had missed. Flames wouldn’t stop bullets, but they could hide her while spoiling her adversary’s night vision, hopefully giving Beacher a small edge. Meanwhile, the heat was baking her face, while the smell of burned flesh on the man Cooper had shot turned her stomach.