Battle Cry

by Don Pendleton

  On this night, with any luck at all, the little boat would save his life.

  Macauley still had no idea who was responsible for the attack on his home, or any of the other recent incidents. It galled him, but if he escaped—when he escaped—there would be time to puzzle over it and mount his own investigation, while solicitors defused the ticking bomb of charges that police were bound to file against him.

  He had explanations already in place for everything. A recognized eccentric in the grand British tradition, he would cheerfully admit his gullible participation in a treasure hunt. Of course, he didn’t know the men he’d hired to run the operation were suspected terrorists who’d bring their urban war from Glasgow to his very doorstep. It was the responsibility of law enforcement to identify such men and take them out of circulation.

  As for Jurgen Dengler, certainly he’d known the man had fought for Germany, some sixty years past. So had countless others, including some revered postwar statesmen. Again, if Dengler was a hunted Nazi criminal, why wasn’t he arrested at his home in Switzerland? Why was he free to travel throughout Europe unimpeded? No one could reasonably ask Macauley to usurp the role of Interpol or Scotland Yard in tracking fugitives.

  The treasure? Why, of course he’d planned to let the rightful owners have their due, but how could he proceed when unknown saboteurs had wrecked his exploration vessel and submersible? If someone else wanted to raise the U-boat, they were welcome to it, by all means.

  But first, escape.

  “Where are we going?” Gibson asked him, voice raised to be heard over the speedboat’s twin engines.

  “Inverness Marina,” Macauley said. “I’ve a berth there, fifteen minutes from the airport.”

  “And from there?” Gibson prodded.

  “I haven’t decided,” Macauley replied. Thinking to himself that Gibson wouldn’t be going with him.

  It was time to sever all unhealthy ties, for his own good. In fact, it would be helpful if the TIF commander tumbled overboard—perhaps as they were passing Urquhart Castle, where the loch was deepest.

  Rest in peace—or pieces, as the case might be.

  THE WATER BAILIFF’S Chris-Craft Launch was built for chasing speeders on the loch and overtaking poachers who were anxious to avoid arrest. Once Bolan had shifted the officer’s body and settled in the driver’s seat, he found it easy to control, with a satisfying kick from its Mercury 260-horsepower engine.

  Given Macauley’s speed and lead time, Bolan wasn’t sure that he could overtake the runners, but he could certainly keep them in sight, close the gap and hope for a shot with the Steyr AUG.

  No speedboat ever made could outrun bullets.

  “I never thought about a third boat,” Beacher said.

  “Neither did I,” Bolan admitted. “Nothing we can do about it now, but try to get in range.”

  “And then?”

  “You take the wheel and hold it steady, while I try to slow them.”

  “Kill them, you mean,” she said.

  He didn’t answer. There was no more to be said.

  “And if we can’t, what then?” she pressed.

  “Follow and find out where they’re going. Take them on the dock, wherever. One way or another,” Bolan said, “it ends tonight.”

  They raced on through the darkness, tracking Macauley’s wake by moonlight, chasing the noise of his speedboat’s engines. They were still northbound and well out toward the middle of the loch, instead of following the eastern shore. Bolan took for granted that Macauley knew where he was going, that he might’ve called ahead to have a car and extra shooters waiting on arrival.

  Drumnadrochit? Inverness? The chances of escaping would be better from the larger city, with its high-speed motorways and an international airport nearby. If a private plane or charter flight was standing by, Macauley could be out of Scotland by the time police began to look for him in earnest.

  If he lived that long.

  But they were getting closer, the noise from Macauley’s twin engines loud in Bolan’s ears. Three hundred yards and closing. Did the runners even know that he was coming up behind them, running without lights?

  “Be ready for the wheel,” Bolan said, as he kept the throttle open, running up Macauley’s wake. “It won’t be long, now.”

  “Ready when you are,” Beacher replied above their engine’s roar.

  Bolan was on the verge of rising from his seat, lifting the Steyr and surrendering control of the vessel, when something happened up ahead. He registered a burst of moonlit spray, and then Macauley’s speeding boat was airborne, rising almost vertically before its hull exploded, shards of fiberglass filling the air like shrapnel.

  Bolan throttled back, holding enough speed to prevent his boat from stalling, as the remnants of Macauley’s craft came splashing back into the loch. Its engine swamped and sank at once, while other wreckage lingered on the surface, swirling, slowly going down.

  Beacher switched on the spotlight, swept the water with its brilliant beam in search of swimmers, finding none. Bolan circled the area, saw nothing to explain the leading boat’s dramatic self-destruction. Had it struck a wave? A floating log that went down with the wreckage?

  Something else?

  “There’s nothing left,” Beacher said moments later.

  Grim-faced, Bolan turned the launch around and headed south.

  Epilogue

  “What about Dengler?” Bolan asked Beacher. She’d spent most of the early morning with police milling around Macauley manor and its grounds, returning to the lodge with a weary air and looking miffed to find Bolan napping on the big four-poster.

  With the Beretta 93-R close beside him, just in case.

  “They found his wheelchair,” she replied, while making coffee for herself. “Bloodstained, but no sign of the man himself, so far. My guess, he crossed Macauley somehow or the laird decided not to share his booty. They’ll be bringing in cadaver dogs later today. He’ll be around the property somewhere.”

  “Maybe together with the ghillie,” Bolan said.

  “Unless they buried him at sea,” Beacher replied.

  BBC Scotland had the early news on television: mayhem at Loch Ness, details and video to follow. The police were not releasing any names so far, but the news reader floated speculation of involvement by the Tartan Independence Front. Already, there were rumblings of a parliamentary investigation into homegrown terrorism and the proper methods of suppressing it.

  In reality, the hard decisions were never made in public, by committee. Action sprang out of necessity—and if conducted properly, it ceased when clear and present danger was eliminated.

  For the moment, anyway.

  “What do they think about Macauley’s accident?” Bolan inquired.

  “For now, the party line is that his boat collided with a floating log, maybe a wave,” Beacher replied. “It’s John Cobb all over again.”

  “And his reason for running?” Bolan asked.

  “The fight at his house,” Beacher said. “They’re not prepared to say he was a part of it, just yet. Perhaps a target of the TIF because he spurned demands for financing.”

  “That’s rich.”

  “He’s rich. Or was, at least. It goes against our grain to bruise aristocratic toes.”

  “Even when they have feet of clay?”

  “Don’t worry,” Beacher said, sipping her coffee. “The truth will come out over time. Well, most of it. Dengler’s involvement will delight the tabloids, once it leaks. Our part will be submerged by the Official Secrets Act.”

  “Just like Macauley in the loch,” Bolan observed.

  “They’ll likely never find him,” Colleen said. “Or Gibson. You know what they say about Loch Ness keeping its dead.”

&n
bsp; “The cold water,” Bolan said.

  “Or something.”

  “Right. Still time for breakfast,” he remarked, “before we hit the road.”

  “I have some people coming up,” Beacher replied. “I’ll ride back to London with them.”

  He nodded. “So, no appetite after last night?”

  “I wouldn’t say that,” she replied. “But they serve breakfast until nine, and checkout is at noon. I thought…”

  “What?” Bolan asked.

  “That maybe we should both go back to bed.”

  Why not? Respites from death were few and far between in Bolan’s world. Why shouldn’t two consenting soldiers find a little comfort in the wake of battle, with a victory in hand?

  “Suits me,” he said. And smiled.

  * * * * *

  ISBN: 9781459219724

  Copyright © 2012 by Worldwide Library

  Special thanks and acknowledgment to Michael Newton for his contribution to this work.

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