by Ted Bell
Every night during that first month, Ian Fleming and Blackie Hawke served as barmen, using the hotel’s front desk as their make-do bar. One of the commados, who fancied himself as something of an artist, had painted a huge red tomahawk on the pine wall behind the bar. It reminded Fleming of the bloodred hammer and sickle painted on the wall of the bar at King’s College, Cambridge.
All the lads were enjoying themselves at day’s end, and the two commanders had noticed that there were more than a few local lovelies who’d begun to frequent the joint in ever-increasing numbers. Rule of nature, Fleming said to Hawke. Girls go where the boys are.
No argument there.
After a pub supper, compliments of the retired chef at the pub on the corner, the Old Silent, the two new comrades in arms would leave the lads to their own devices and adjourn back to the warehouse and discuss progress so far and what remained to be done. They worked into the wee hours every night.
Fleming, a man with a mighty work ethic who’d never spared the midnight oil, was nearing completion of the design and construction of the explosive devices. Individual commandos would be placing them inside the cabs of the locomotives.
The total package consisted of two plain matte black metal boxes, slightly larger than a man’s shoebox but small enough to fit one inside each of the detachable leather saddlebags that the Deutschesbund Post & Courier Patrol motorcycles were now being fitted with. All the bikes were identical, with large red numerals on the dark green fuel tanks of the Norton 16H and the standard sidecars removed and replaced with the requisite saddlebags.
Hawke found Fleming bent over his workbench, a cigarette clenched between his teeth, puffing furiously, and sat down to have a smoke and watch the mad genius, the one they called “the Detonator” at his work.
“Hullo, Fleming,” he said. “Having fun?”
“Actually, I am,” Fleming said. “Discovered at an early age that there was nothing I enjoyed quite so much as blowing things up. I started with mailboxes, actually. Worked my way up to Nazi Panzer tank factories.”
“Using TNT as the primary explosive, I assume?” Hawke had no basis for his assumption, but he had no wish to appear wholly ignorant of the matters at hand.
Ian looked up, shook his head, and replied, “Hardly. What you’re looking at here is Torpex. Torpex is a secondary explosive fifty percent more powerful than TNT by mass. Torpex comprises forty-two percent RDX, a nitrogen explosive, forty percent TNT, trinitrotoluene, a chemical explosive, and eighteen percent powdered aluminum. Got all that?”
“Maybe. Run it by me one more time. Did you say that Torpex comprises forty-two percent RDX? Did I get that right?”
“Smart-ass. Hand me that box up there on the shelf marked ‘detonators.’ Think you can handle that?”
“I can try. Is this the one?”
“Quite right. Notice the word ‘detonators’ stenciled in red on the box lid?”
“Hmm, didn’t see that. . . .”
“You know, Hawke, I think if I had a little less help from you right now, I might be finished with this part by morning. If you want to help, round up some of the lads and start unpacking all those boxes in the hotel dining room.”
“Wondered about those. What are they?”
“Deutschesbund Courier and Post Patrol uniforms for the commandos. Should be about twenty-five of them. Leather helmets and goggles and riding boots. Picture-perfect Deutsch Reisebüro travel ID cards and cash in German marks. The bigger boxes are Webley and Scott sidearms, ammo, et cetera. We’re just about wrapping up this process here. Spoke to Admiral Godfrey early this morning and told him that we are very near completion of this phase of the training.”
“The lads are ready when you are, Ian. I can vouch for them. They’ve done double duty during this intensive training period. We’re good to go!”
“A week from today. On the Saturday. That’s what I’m going to tell Blinker. I think we should inform the lads, don’t you?”
“Absolutely. I’ll do it.”
“Can you afford to take a few days off, Blackie? I need you to nail something down for me.”
“Say the word. I’m yours to command.”
“We’ve chosen the drop site now. Not surprisingly the one with the abandoned barn in the middle of an empty field.”
“Good choice. That’s where all the courier bikes will assemble?”
“Correct. They’re going to start assembling there every night over the weekend. I’ve given your contact information to my lead chap in country. Code name Valkyrie. Your code name will be Braveheart. You will liaise with Valkyrie and keep me informed as to progress on that front. Agreeable?”
“Absolutely.”
“I’d very much appreciate it if you could get on the suitcase radio set in my room tonight. Inform Valkyrie about everything he needs to know. Tell him you want to hear from him at least once every day until we arrive on the drop site.”
Hawke nodded in the affirmative. “You’re doing yeoman’s duty here, Ian, and I feel that I’m of little help. . . .”
“Blackie, don’t be silly, old boy. This is my part, not yours. Your part comes when the shooting starts. This is just chemistry. Any public school science professor could do this. By the way, so you know, the two explosive devices are connected electrically. The A device is triggered by an impact detonator. And that explosion automatically triggers a ripple effect explosion of the B device. Massive explosive power. Cataclysmic, I daresay.”
“And all twenty devices explode simultaneously?” Hawke said. “That will shake Berlin to its core!” Hawke had come to despise Germany. He could stomach the sickness that had seized the entire country and put it on a path to total destruction by the Allies.
“Hmm,” Fleming said, “I think that was your original intention, was it not? To set the explosions just across the Reichsstrasse from the Nazi headquarters, the Reichstag building?”
Hawke just laughed. All this verbal fencing with a man of Fleming’s keen wit and superb intellect was taking a toll on his nerves.
Jousting with seriously quick minds, like Ian Fleming endured growing up with his brother, Peter, always made him feel as if he were just a step off the beat. But someday, Fleming knew in his very gut that he would show them all how it was done.
All of them.
CHAPTER 49
Devil’s Island, the Bahamas
Present Day
Hawke and Stokely, dressed in khakis, were both awash in sweat. The hot and humid tropical air seemed very close. Hawke felt hemmed in by so much dense foliage and the nearness of so many massive trees towering overhead. Oppressive. It was also rather dark beneath the thick green canopy high above, which did not admit much sunlight at all. Nothing else moved. Even the birds and the butterflies seemed to have been warned off.
One species that did not get the memo? Mosquitoes.
Like the terrorist camp he’d uncovered in the Amazon jungles, the green canopy here provided the enemy with total invulnerability when it came to spy planes or spy satellites overhead. You could find them only by spending weeks or months searching in a massive jungle.
After moving through the jungle at a good clip for another twenty minutes, Hawke, looking through a gap in the dense foliage ahead, saw a metal fence with the sun glinting off the wire. It looked to be about twelve feet high, topped with coils of gleaming barbed wire.
He looked at Stoke and said, “You got this, brother?”
“Oh, yeah,” his old friend said, “got this one in spades!”
Stoke reached inside his battle jacket and withdrew a pair of wire cutters. Dropping to his knees beside the hurricane fence, he quickly and expertly cut a three-sided flap at ground level, about three feet square, which, when lifted, would allow them to wiggle through on their bellies. Once they were safely inside, Stoke lowered the flap to its original position. Unless you
were really looking hard, there was no sign of the flap at all.
A no-man’s-land of about fifteen feet separated the first fence from an inner one. This second barrier was an almost exact match for the outer one with a significant exception—it was emitting a loud gunning sound.
It was definitely electrified. To the tune of ten thousand volts, if you believed what all the yellow warning signs said.
“Bet you ten bucks they got guard dogs running around and around inside there. . . .”
“Yeah,” Hawke said. “Well, they’re not here now. So, you in the mood to disable the electric one? I’d find that helpful. . . . Cut us another flap in this one, Stoke.”
“Yeah, yeah, be cool. First we got to locate one of the positive terminals on the second fence, see if it’s powered by an AC outlet or a large battery bank, either one. You’ll know it when you see it. I suggest you go thataway and I’ll go thisaway. First one to find it gives a signal, yeah?”
“Yeah. Let’s get started,” Hawke said, and started moving left between the two fence lines leading through the jungle.
Ten minutes later, he’d located what was obviously an electrical junction box hidden inside a large growth of weeds inside no-man’s-land. It was five feet long and about three feet high, a third of the way up the secondary fence.
He stood up and whistled three times, summoning Stoke to his position. Stoke appeared three minutes later, on the run.
“Whatcha got, boss?”
“Looks like some kind of junction box to me. Hard to see in all those thick weeds. But definitely electric, I should think.”
“Where is it?” Stoke asked, looking around.
“Inside, in the middle of this patch of weeds. They hid it obviously.”
Stoke, dropping to his knees in the dirt, said, “Tell me this ain’t that gizmo plant that guy used as toilet paper and then shot himself dead,” Stoke said.
Hawke said, “Sure, Stoke. This ain’t that gizmo plant that guy used as toilet paper and then shot himself dead.”
“Thank you,” Stokely said, and used both hands to pry the weeds apart. They’d overgrown whatever was hiding in there, and he’d have to cut them away to get at it. “Oh, yeah. That’s what I’m talkin’ about, right there. How the hell did you find it?”
“With my right foot. I was walking through these weeds, just in case somebody decided to hide something in there. What is it?”
Stoke was still slashing away at the weeds with his assault knife, finally revealing a large rectangular matte black metal box, about three feet wide and roughly four feet high.
“Either ion batteries or an alternating current connection, pumping out some serious voltage. Help me lift off this cover. . . .”
Hawke did and Stoke said, “Okay, we cool. It’s AC. All we got to do now is unwrap the red wire from around that positive terminal right there. . . .”
“What’s this ‘we’ business. You’re the expert of this sort of thing. You do it.”
“’Course I’ll do it. You might find the process shocking.”
“Not funny. Disconnect this thing, and let’s get moving.
Stoke had a pair of rubber-covered pliers made of high-carbon steel. He got hold of the bitter end of the red wire wrapped tightly around the terminal. Slowly, and with extreme caution, he began to unwind the wire until it was free from any contact with the power source.
“Okay, we’re good here. Lemme go make us a flap in that formerly electrified fence.”
“You’re sure it’s been disabled?”
Stoke looked up at Hawke and smiled. “How much you know about electricity?”
Hawke replied, “Just the basic fundamentals. You push the switch up, it goes on. You push it down, it goes off. Pretty straightforward stuff, to be honest. Any schoolboy knows it.”
“Yeah, ’bout what I figured. Yes, I’m sure you’re not going to get electrified, boss man. Jeez, I got to lead you around by the hand sometimes. Let’s get the hell out of here!”
CHAPTER 50
Devil’s Island, the Bahamas
Present Day
The ground beneath their feet had begun a gradual rise upward, and Hawke realized there was going to be an elevated position waiting for them at the top. Ten minutes later, they were still beneath the green canopy, but standing atop a sizable hill. He and Stoke were able to remain hidden but still get a view below. From up here, by parting the big banana leaves a bit, they had a reasonably good glimpse of the hidden world of Devil’s Island below them.
They found themselves looking down upon a sight that mystified both of them.
“Holy shit and Shinola!” Stoke said under his breath.
“That about sums it up,” Hawke said, having a very hard time believing his eyes.
In the middle of a jungle, in a happy, sunny part of the world overrun with tourists just out to have a good time, in a location just a few hours from Miami, he had stumbled upon what looked like nothing else so much as a World War Two POW camp. It was massive. Surrounded by both barbed wire and electric fences. At each of the four corners stood identical watchtowers with guards armed with machine guns and giant searchlights silhouetted against a thin slice of sky.
There was some kind of parade ground or exercise yard in the foreground and then rows upon rows of identical barracks stretching away into the distance. They were built of dark wood on a brick base with slanting roofs formed from sheets of corrugated iron.
The long rectangular buildings had windows designed deliberately to provide no view either in or out. The buildings were set in straight lines, each marked with a large single letter painted white, exactly like the ones you’d find at a POW camp.
“What do you think it is, boss?” Stoke asked.
“Quite possibly a reeducation camp for political enemies, dissidents, whoever they don’t like. These things are all over Western China. A network of ‘centers’ dedicated to ‘transformation through education’ or ‘counterextremism education.’”
“Okay, I know about those. But why would they put one here?”
“An excellent question that deserves a good answer. Unfortunately, I’ve not got one at the moment,” Hawke said. “But tens of thousands are locked up in new ones like this, thought-control camps with barbed wire, bombproof surfaces, reinforced doors, guard rooms.”
“You don’t think they threw the prince in there, do you?”
“It crossed my mind, yes.”
“Be tough to get him out of there.”
“Yeah. That’s why we have friends like Thunder and Lightning down in Belize.”
“Got that right.”
Directly below their position was the main entrance, with a series of concrete barriers and a large security block, probably staffed with round-the-clock guards and a security force. Hawke could see a lane emerging from the jungle, eventually leading to the entrance. Just inside was a wide concrete area. Parked in multiple rows were jeeps upon jeeps. The jeeps were dark green Willys MBs with Bren guns and ammo boxes mounted in the back.
Hawke fished the Minox subminiature camera from one of the pockets in his vest and snapped off a dozen or so shots of the compound to send to Brick Kelly when he got back to the hotel. He nodded at Stokely. There was little to be gained by staying.
The two of them turned to leave and made a troublesome discovery.
They were no longer alone.
Three men, all dressed in khaki, stood facing them, machine guns in hand. They had emerged soundlessly from the jungle thicket and crept up on them while they were watching the compound below. Hawke wondered if they had heard their footsteps on the jungle floor, or if by disconnecting the power source of the electric fence, they had inadvertently triggered alarms down in the security block.
Hawke knew that to allow themselves to be taken down to the mind-control camp operation might well be the
end for both of them. The guards would never let them get out alive.
Hawke looked at the distance separating him from the guards. They were clearly professional, keeping the correct distance. But he and Stoke had long held a prearranged plan for uncomfortable moments like this one. The code word “lost” was a signal to Stoke that, damn the torpedoes, they were charging the enemy.
“Hands in the air!” the fat one in the center shouted.
Stoke and Hawke slowly complied, waiting for the signal.
“What are you doing here?” the one on the left demanded.
Hawke smiled at him. Then, talking out of the side of his mouth, he said to Stoke, “Get ready. . . .”
“Keep your hands in the air,” Fatboy said. “You will come with us.”
The leader—a squat, flat-faced fellow whose cheeks bore the horrific scars of bouts with acne—had a radio transmitter. He lifted it to his mouth and was met with a hiss of static.
Stoke said, through clenched teeth, “Boss, we let these dudes take us inside that compound down there? It’s all over. . . .”
Hawke nodded. He knew he had to take these three thugs out before they called for backup. There were three machine guns pointed point-blank at the two of them. The odds were hopelessly stacked against them.
The muzzle of the leader’s machine gun rose; then there were three black eyes pointing at Hawke’s head, daring him to make a move, any kind of move. It was now or never.
They weren’t buying what Hawke was selling.
“We got lost, damn you!” Hawke shouted at Fatboy with a sidewise glance at Stokely. “That’s the bloody truth! We’re lost!”