by Ted Bell
Hawke went to the first of the two ambulances and climbed behind the wheel. The key, as he’d prayed, was in the ignition. He twisted the key, and the motor coughed to life. He craned around to see into the darkened rear bay of the vehicle.
China and Brock were carefully loading the sleeping prince into the red-and-white ambulance. Stoke was up front with Hawke, riding shotgun but with the big M-60 7.62mm machine gun in his hands instead of a Purdey twelve bore.
China reached forward and tapped Hawke’s shoulder.
“Gurney’s secure. We’re ready to roll back here, boss,” she said, earning a smile from Hawke at that first use of his nickname. “Harry and I will stay back here with Henry and monitor his vitals. I checked his oxygen. Not great, but sustainable. Pulse, seventy-two.”
Stoke had also given his M79 rocket launcher to Brock in the rear just in case anyone on Devil’s Island thought it might be a really good idea to get on the ambulance’s tail and start shooting at them. Hawke told Harry to just blow out the bloody rear window and open fire if anyone got too close for comfort.
“Just put a damn round through it, Mr. Brock, and fire away. Stoke and I will do the same from up front.”
CHAPTER 64
Devil’s Island, the Bahamas
Present Day
Ten minutes into their escape via ambulance, Brock shouted up to the front seat, “I got three bogies on our six, boss! Motorcycles. Armed guards like the gang who set our jeeps on fire back there!”
Hawke glanced back at the situation. The three bikes were running side by side and gaining. He said, “Lure them in a little closer before you blow the window. Then let it rip! If one manages to get past you to either side, Stoke and I will deal with them. Got it?”
“Aye-aye, Skipper!”
Stoke had turned around in his seat to watch the speeding bikes closing in on them.
He said, “Okay, Harry, doing good, buddy. Let ’em come. The closer, the better. Get them inside fifty yards and then shower those bastards with glass! You go first for the guy in the middle. Then the two on the outside. Like the boss said, if they get past you, we’ll deal with it up here.”
Five seconds later, the interior of the ambulance was rocked by the massive and deafening concussion of the big gun, and the shattering of the glass window.
The cyclists tried desperately to veer away, but they’d foolishly gotten way too close.
Brock sighted in on the middle rider’s collarbone and literally blew him and his bike right off the damn highway and into a deep ditch. Then he swung for the guy on the right and did the same thing. The guy to his left, no fool, had instantly accelerated fiercely ahead. When he got abreast of the passenger-side window and got a good look down the mouth of the big black barrel and the big man with his finger on the trigger, it was the fearsome look in that man’s eyes that would be the last thing that went through his mind.
Stoke took the shot, pulled the trigger. The cyclist literally disintegrated before his eyes and then any trace of him vanished.
Ten long minutes passed before Brock shouted from the rear, “Bogie on our six, Stoke! Two cats in one of the fifty-cal jeeps!”
“Lure ’em in, brotha! Then take the mofos out for good!”
“Roger that!” Harry said, and five minutes later the jeep had closed to within twenty-five yards. “Say your prayers, assholes!” Stoke heard Brock say a second before the M79 roared fire and the jeep was lifted into the air by the powerful rocket and began cartwheeling backward end over end into the boggy swamp now on their left. Stoke caught a tangy whiff of salt air wafting up from the swamp. They were getting close. The sea loomed out there in the dark.
An hour later, with no more unpleasant interruptions, they finally reached the bay and turned right onto the sandy path that ran down to the water. Hawke was relieved to see the stern of the Wally boat still sticking out of the thick mangroves. He braked to a stop, and he and Stoke climbed out of the ambulance. Stoke pulled open the wide rear door and peered inside.
“How’s he doing?” he asked China.
“Doing pretty well, Stoke, I think, considering all the excitement we had back here on that wild ride. His vitals are all holding steady. He finally said something. He asked for water. He drank a lot. He’s terribly dehydrated.”
Hawke said, “Let’s get him in that boat and get the heck out of here, Harry. I’ll help you carry the stretcher. You see that sky out yonder?”
Harry looked up.
* * *
—
Out there on the eastern rim of the world, all along that fine line where sea meets sky, a blazing red-orange disk heralded dawn’s imminent arrival. They’d timed it just right. By the time the Chinese PLA soldiers arrived at the infirmary to take the prince, they’d be long gone.
The speeding Wally boat scratched a frothing white wake across the pink mirror of the bay. Hawke was staring at the radar screen, and he didn’t like what he saw one bit.
They’d picked up one of the missile frigates, and it was gaining on them. He shoved the throttles forward, firewalling them, and cried out to Stoke, “Battle stations! Stoke, you and Mr. Brock get on the stern and secure yourselves in tight. I might be taking some very high-speed evasion turns here in a few minutes. We’ve got one of the missile frigates on our ass. Get the M-Sixty and the M-Seventy-nine battle ready. Concentrate your fire on the bridge. They’re closing on us now! Fire when ready!”
Geysers of white water began arising all around the speeding Wally. The missile frigate was sighting in on them with the big foredeck cannon. Hawke put the boat into a series of tight turns starboard and port, never staying on either course for longer than fifteen seconds. . . .
He looked over his shoulder and saw how much ground the big cruiser had gained . . . not good.
“Mr. Brock, take out their bridge deck. Pump as many rockets into it as you can before they get lucky and sink us with that bloody bow gun!”
Hawke heard the successions of explosions before he saw them. When he looked over the stern, he saw nothing but flames licking up from the Chinese missile frigate. The ship was not only afire, but wallowing and clearly rudderless now. The bridge and probably all the officers inside were but a memory. The mere idea that a little speedboat might be capable of such withering firepower had clearly never occurred to the Chinese skipper.
Hawke called out, “Good on you, Mr. Brock! Mr. Jones! Nice shooting!”
At the helm, Hawke finally relaxed and allowed himself a private smile. It was time to start thinking about the future. He could see it all now. . . .
As soon as he boarded his plane in Nassau, he’d put a call through to Sir David Trulove at MI6 in London and give him the good news. Sir David in turn would then put a call straight through to Buckingham Palace, thus putting a buoyant smile on the face of the Queen of England.
He could hear the conversation playing in his head.
“Lord Alexander Hawke has just called from Nassau, Your Majesty,” Trulove would say to Her Royal Majesty.
“Yes?”
“He has asked me to inform Her Royal Majesty that her grandson Prince Henry is now safe and in Bermuda to recuperate at King Edward VII Hospital for a few days on his way home to his grandmother! He’s been dangerously unwell for a time. But the good news is, Hawke got to him in the nick of time. And Hawke assures us that the prince is going to make a speedy recovery now that he’s in good hands. He’ll be fine.”
How did Shakespeare put it? Oh, yes, Hawke remembered:
All’s well that ends well.
CHAPTER 65
Meissen, Germany
February 1942
It had begun to snow. Rather heavily, in fact. Ian Fleming was flat on his back on the sharp-edged cinders between the railroad ties and steel rails. He was under the massive locomotive, using his torchlight and peering upward, inspecting the underc
arriage, looking for the perfect spot to stow the first of the two A devices. These were the ones that detonated instantly upon contact. It was a tricky business, to be sure.
He had considered stowing them somewhere in the cab, but it quickly became apparent that wouldn’t work. Instead he had to find a more suitable placement for the devices. Fortunately, this was hardly the first time he’d placed a bomb in the bowels of an enemy train. He’d become quite adept at this stuff. Just last week he’d blown up a Hamburg bridge just as three Nazi staff cars carrying twelve Waffen-SS officers were fast approaching with their convertible tops down. The drivers had all jammed on the brakes but they were going far too fast, and the trio of big Grosser Mercedes had plunged hundreds of feet down into a rocky gorge.
Their screams had echoed up to him almost all the way down.
Ian had left Hawke up in the cab just in case another rail-yard detective or nosy Nazi showed up and wanted to play cops and robbers. To that end, he’d made sure Hawke had the right weapon for this work. Prior to leaving his flat in Mayfair, he’d chosen his best handgun, the Webley Mk VI, and fitted it out with a sound suppressor. Silent but deadly.
Ian, quite justifiably, was worried that when the railroad guard whom Hawke had shot failed to return from his yard shift, others would come looking for him. Hopefully, the dead man had been on the early part of his shift and not at the tail end of it. If a search party was sent out to find the dead, they’d see the two Norton motorcycles and that would be the end of this mission, not to mention the Grand Finale for him and Commander Hawke.
Hawke lit another cigarette and kept up his pacing inside the cab, his eyes searching the yard for any signs of movement or an approaching automobile. A job made a good deal more difficult because of the thick and all-encompassing ground fog. This kind of fog, a pea-soup fog, had killed people in London in 1814. They had suffocated.
Suddenly, Ian was shouting up to him from beneath the train in muffled tones. “Hawke, can you hear me, old man? Could you come down here for a second if you’re not frightfully busy?”
Hawke stuck the Webley into the waistband of his thick gabardine britches and descended the steel steps to the ground. He bent down and saw Fleming with a huge smile on his face.
“Found the perfect place to hide these two little Christmas packages, Commander. Bend down. I’ll show you.”
Hawke dropped to his knees and bent down to have a look. Ian was at the most forward part of the huge steam engine.
“See this?” Ian said, shining his torch on what, to Hawke’s eyes, was just a mechanical jumble.
“Where?” he said.
“Maybe where I’m pointing the torch?”
“Yeah, I see it. Looks like some kind of a shelf.”
“Well, it isn’t. It’s a bloody cowcatcher. Or at least it’s the brace for the one mounted at the front of this beast. They’re designed to sweep away any stray creatures standing on the track, not at all sure where they are, when suddenly an oncoming train locomotive slams into a small herd of cows from behind. The cowcatcher enables the crew to push cattle or other creatures to either side of the tracks without stopping the train or harming the animals.”
“And the reason you’re so fascinated with this particular cowcatcher is?”
“It’s bloody well perfect! It’s the perfect spot to hide our two impact detonator devices. The placement ensures that the first thing the locomotive hits will cause two hellish simultaneous explosions and blow a massive hole in whatever it hits, thus triggering the two secondary devices stowed higher up a few moments afterward. I’m going to place the two secondary devices directly up under the cab’s floor. Just for the blunt aftershock it will deliver to our German pals in Berlin.”
“You should do this stuff for a living, Fleming,” Hawke said mildly.
“I already do.” Fleming laughed. “Pity I’m not getting rich. Better get back up in the cab and keep a weather eye out, Alex. This would be a very bad time to be distracted by gunfire and mad Rottweilers gnawing at one’s ankles. Oh, and one more thing. I’m done with all the blankets. Wrap yourself up in them and try to find someplace to stay warm and moderately comfortable. I’ll take the graveyard shift and wake you when I’m done down here. At least an hour before first light.”
“Ian, I’m sure this is a foolish question, but do you know even how to start up one of these iron beasts?”
“Not really. But we’ll have an engineer showing up for work soon to handle that. To refresh your memory, here’s how I see it. We pull guns on the poor sod when he arrives inside the cab with his lunch pail and you will tell him in German to do exactly what we say. He fires up the steam engine as directed. I tell him to slowly advance the throttle to ten kilometers per hour. That’s when, on my signal, you will leap from the cab, using the tuck-and-roll technique I taught you to avoid injury. You’ll need to hit the ground running first, as I told you, in order to avoid a face-plant into those jagged cinders. That would play hell with your rosy complexion.”
“So far, so bad. Then what, pray tell?”
“Leave that to me. Your job will be over. I’m still searching for a way to advance the throttle wide open after we’ve both bailed out. But certainly not while I’m still inside the cab. Not until we’re both safely on the ground and running for our bikes and racing like two bats out of hell to get back to the barn.”
* * *
—
When Fleming had finished mounting all four devices securely beneath the locomotive’s undercarriage, he brushed himself off and mounted the steps up into the cab. Hawke had found a fold-down bunk and covered it with the blankets. He was sleeping like a baby, but snoring loudly and mumbling something in his sleep.
Ian bent his head down and put his mouth close to Hawke’s right ear so Hawke could hear him.
“Rise and shine, m’lord!” he said brightly.
Hawke’s eyes popped open. “Wha? Whassat? No. I don’t know! Whass that tuck-and-roll idea again?”
Fleming smiled, plucked the Webley from Hawke’s hand, climbed up onto the engineer’s stool, lit another cigarette, and struggled to keep his eyes open.
He must not have succeeded.
In what seemed like a split second, Ian sat bolt upright. A tin lunch pail had been flung up into the cab from below and was now rattling around in the small space, bouncing merrily toward his feet and making a racket loud enough to wake the dead. But the noise didn’t wake Blackie Hawke, who was probably still having nightmares about tucking and rolling from a speeding locomotive.
Ian had the revolver in the inside pocket of his leather bomber jacket. He kept his hand in his pocket and waited. A second later, he saw a beefy little darling coming up the steps and into the cab, a dead stogie jammed in the left side of his mouth. “Wie geht’s, mein Herr?” Ian said, completely exhausting his German vocabulary in four words. And then he reached over and shook Hawke awake.
“Wha?” Hawke said, sitting bolt upright and clearly not knowing where he was.
“You’ve got a visitor, Commander! Sigfried! Say hello to him.”
“Who the hell is he?” a drowsy Hawke said, pulling the blankets round his shoulders.
“Damned if I know,” Fleming said with a smile. “Limited German vocabulary, you know. But you’re fluent in Nazi. Tell him we’re not going to hurt him. We just need a favor. It’ll be worth a thousand deutschmarks to him if he helps us. Tell him we’re the new owners of this locomotive, but we don’t know how to start it.”
Hawke smiled at the guy and repeated in German what Ian had said. Then the two of them were off to the races in that unlovely language, where even saying “I love you” (“Ich liebe dich!”) sounds like “I’m going to kill you!”
“What’s he saying now?” Fleming asked.
“Thinking it over. He says he’ll help us start the damn thing, but he wants his money first.”
“Wouldn’t you know it? Son of a bitch,” Ian said, pulling out the Webley so Fritzie could get a good look at it. “Tell him this is his money. Tell him he’s out of options. He either helps us out, or I pay him in installments, one bullet at a time.”
Hawke told the German engineer what Fleming had said, and his eyes went wide.
“Blackie, do you see that metal handhold on the instrument panel, just below the windscreen?”
“Yes. What about it?”
“Here’s some rope. Tie his hands with it and then secure the bitter end to the handhold. Give him enough rope that he’s able to remain standing no more than a foot from that throttle lever.”
After it was done, Hawke said, “Now what?”
“Tell Fritz to fire this monster up. Now, preferably.”
Fritz did it without hesitation. He was clearly petrified.
“Okay, done. And next?” Hawke said.
“Tell him to advance the throttle. Slowly. Get this behemoth rolling. No faster than ten kilometers per hour. A fraction more and I put a bullet in the back of his head. Stress that last point.”
The big locomotive didn’t overcome inertia very easily, but soon they steamed out of the yard proper and proceeded down the tracks in the middle of the high street of the picturesque village. They crossed over an ancient bridge over the Elbe, and suddenly they were in the open with rolling meadows deep with new fallen snow. This had been Ian’s late-night brainstorm. Hawke had no idea how to tuck and roll from a moving locomotive. But Ian had informed him that now, the snow all round was so soft and deep, he couldn’t possibly hurt himself.
The engineer had his eyes locked on the tracks. He didn’t want any trouble with these two English lunatics.
Ian motioned for Blackie to join him seated on the pull-down bunk covered with blankets.
“All right, old chap,” Ian said. “All the marbles right now. You ready?”