“Where are we going?” asked Ms. Reynolds.
“Just go over,” I told her. “You’ll see.”
“They’ll catch us out here,” she insisted. “There’s no cover.”
“With everything you’ve seen so far, you don’t think I’m prepared?”
She probably made a face, or maybe she gave me the finger—it was too dark to see. In any event, she grabbed hold of the ladder and started upward.
As I said, it was too dark to see, or I would have thoroughly enjoyed the view.
I hustled after her. The others had jumped from the top, but I’d sustained enough bruises for the day—I twisted around and hung down, narrowing some of the distance to the ground. It was still a hell of a fall, and I probably would have rebounded into the wall if Shotgun hadn’t materialized to grab me.
He had his usual big grin on his face and automatic weapon in hand. The Carl Gustav was on a strap across his back.
“They’re sending a Jeep to run around the perimeter,” said Junior over the radio. “Coming at you from the north.”
“That’s mine!” shouted Shotgun. “Hot shit.”
He sprinted in the direction of the perimeter road. I told Tex to go cover him.
“Junior, where’s our ride?” I asked.
“Less than two minutes away,” he said. “You should hear him soon.”
The next thing I heard was the roar of a missile shredding through steel—Shotgun had launched the Gustav at the Jeep, incinerating it. There was a short burst of automatic weapons fire, obviously from Shotgun and clearly meant only for show—no way anyone in the vehicle could have survived the initial blast.
A moment later, I heard the sound of a helicopter sweeping in from the northwest. Chester was back with our ride.
* * *
Remember that old saying about how no battle plan survives contact with the enemy? It’s actually a bit of an exaggeration, since most plans do survive, they’re just ignored.
Still, planning is critical, since it tells you what to do if the situation goes well, and if it goes to hell.
Plus, if you didn’t have a plan to begin with, you wouldn’t know when you were completely screwed.
Our main plan in this case had been to go out the front door, unless things got crazy. In that case, we would move swiftly to Plan B, which we were more or less following from the moment the flash bang exploded. Plan B called for us to effect our retreat with the help of my pal Chet Arthur, who was now skimming over the ground toward us in a Robinson R44 helicopter.
The R44 is a bigger helicopter than the R22 or Beta II he’d flown me around in the day before. But it’s not that much bigger: it has four places rather than two, and that includes the pilot’s seat. Aware that it was the biggest helicopter he could access, I’d studied the weight requirements and obstacles where he had to land, determining that we could just squeeze aboard.
The problem with that plan was that we now had two more bodies to stuff into the helicopter—Melissa’s and de Sarcena’s. And while I’m sure I could have gotten either Shotgun or Mongoose to let Melissa Reynolds sit on his lap, there was no way the helicopter could lift even her extra weight.
Chet informed me of this with his pilot’s calm drawl.
“There are too freaking many of you, goddamnit!” he yelled, exuding the patient professionalism that has long endeared him to me. “I told you this afternoon, this is a small helicopter and the engine’s already down-rated. I can’t take off with anything more than nine hundred freaking pounds.”
There may have been a few more terms of endearment and colorful adjectives in his pronouncement, but you get the message.
“It’s OK,” I started to tell him, but Chet cut me off.
“We gotta go. There are a hundred guys on their way here. I saw them on the infrared coming in.”
“Chet, you’re exaggerating. I doubt there’s more than fifty or sixty.”
“I can’t clear the freaking second fence with all of you,” he shouted. “Someone’s gonna have to stay behind.”
“I’ll put a slug in the dipshit’s brain and leave him,” yelled Mongoose, taking out his gun and pointing it at de Sarcena.
It was a possible solution, but having come so far with de Sarcena I was loath to leave him. And even if I did dump him, the weight calculations had been pretty close; as light as Melissa was, she still might tip the balance.
“Put him in the helo,” I told Mongoose. I started backing away before he or the others could object. “Make sure he stays out of it. But keep him alive. We may be able to use him. Melissa, get in the front with Chet. Shotgun, you’re with me! Keep that gun loaded.”
PART TWO
Perfect order is the forerunner of perfect horror.
—CARLOS FUENTES, NOVELIST
I
A flare shot up from the north side of the compound and ignited as we ran. The burning magnesium and sodium nitrate illuminated everything before us.
I was about two feet from the torso of a body that had been thrown out of the Jeep Shotgun had blown up earlier. It was a gruesome sight, even in the dark, yet somehow I couldn’t muster any sympathy.
“Come on, keep moving,” I told Shotgun. “Keep that big head of yours down.”
An M16 lay on the ground behind the Jeep. I grabbed it. The gun was loaded, with a second mag taped to the engaged magazine.
We were on the west side of the mansion, on a gravel road that ran between the wall surrounding the inner yard and the perimeter fences. The latter were closely spaced, and topped with razor wire. I suspected that there were mines beyond them, if not in the four or five feet sandwiched in the middle.
We were easy pickings where we were. Either we had to go through the outer fence, or back into the heart of de Sarcena’s stronghold.
I always go for the heart.
“We need to get back over the wall,” I told Shotgun.
“We’re going back?”
“Temporarily. I’ll give you a boost.”
“You’re going to boost me?”
“I won’t be able to pull you up,” I told him, taking a knee near the wall. “So you go first.”
Shotgun paused, went down in a three-point stance, then ran at me like a high jumper eyeing a new Olympic record. He put his Size XXX boot in my back and launched himself upward, snagging the wall with his fingers and pulling himself to the top of the stones.
Let the record show that Shotgun is one heavy SOB. Every vertebrae in my back cracked; I won’t need to go to the chiropractor for quite a while.
Rising, I backed to the fence and then sprinted toward the wall. I managed to get just high enough to grab Shotgun’s outstretched hands. He jerked me topside, scraping the crap out of my face in the process: exfoliation on the cheap.
We hopped down on the other side of the wall and began running. The flare was still burning, throwing long, flickering fingers of white light on the ground. Some sort of truck pulled up near the front of the mansion to my right. Figures with guns ran in front of its headlights, throwing ominous shadows in our direction.
With everything that had happened, the guests would be in a panic and trying to escape. If the security people let them—unlikely, admittedly—our best chance would be to join the flood and run out across the road with them. Otherwise, we would have to scurry around the grounds long enough for Chet to drop off a few passengers and return.
As we ran toward the building, I saw a figure coming down the set of stone stairs to our immediate right. The figure was slim, with legs that flowed.
I grabbed Shotgun before he could fire at her.
“Wait here for me,” I told him, pushing him to the ground.
I trotted toward the figure, who stepped into a sliver of light—it was more gray than white, but there was enough illumination that I could see she had a set of night-vision binoculars held to her face. She walked toward me with a quick pace, raising her arm.
I froze. I thought she must be waving to one of de
Sarcena’s goons, telling them where I was. By the time I realized she was signaling me, she was only a few yards away.
It was the woman I’d seen in the Salon of Peace after stealing the money.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“Come. There’s no time—hurry.”
“Why?” I asked.
“I’ll explain when there’s time. Quickly—before the dogs.”
Did she say dogs? On cue, I heard the baying and barking of a dozen rottweilers charging from the back of the property.
I whistled to Shotgun. He trotted from his hiding spot, joining us as we headed for the stairs.
“Where exactly are we going?” he asked.
Our guide shushed him.
“Be quiet now. I’ll explain. There is a passage. I’ll help you. Then you will help me.”
* * *
Maybe my company’s new motto ought to be: send us your damsels in distress.
I will say one thing—the quality of distressed damsels is definitely on the upswing.
* * *
As she pulled open the door, I had to make an instant decision—trust her, or not?
I took the Ronald Reagan option: trust, but verify. As she started to take a step inside, I gently pushed her out of the way, moving to my right, gun ready. Shotgun came right behind me—together we could have wasted half of de Sarcena’s crew.
It wasn’t necessary. The hall, lit by dim emergency lights, was empty.
“Just making sure,” I told our guide.
“It’s all right.” She clutched a small bit of her evening gown and held it up to make it easier to walk. Her high heels clicked as she strode ahead. “Come on. The passage is this way.”
We followed down a narrow hall. This was another of the servant passages, and while it wasn’t exactly narrow or dank, it was nowhere near as fancy as the ones in the main part of the building. The stucco walls were painted a neutral white, and the floor was serviceable ceramic. No doubt they washed up quickly—a plus for the cleaning crew if we needed to shoot someone.
Our guide paused when she came to a steel panel door. She motioned with her hand for us to stay back, then opened it. Raising the night binos to her eyes again—they looked like Yukon Night Rangers, but don’t hold me to it—she peered down the passage, scanning it before stepping back and waving us forward.
We entered another hallway, this one unlit and so dark that we had to stay close behind our guide. I put my hand on her shoulder and let her lead me to a staircase at the far end of the passage.
“Watch your step,” she told me as we started to descend.
This was easier said than done in the dark. Once or twice I stumbled as we walked down what seemed to be one of the longest staircases in the western hemisphere. The stairs were narrow and rickety, made of wood or some reasonable facsimile. Shotgun was a few treads behind me. If he lost his balance, we’d all tumble like bowling pins.
Suddenly the passage filled with light. The string of overhead bulbs had just come on; power had been restored to the mansion.
“Must have an emergency generator,” mumbled Shotgun as we continued downward.
“Or maybe somebody didn’t use enough explosive,” I told him.
“Impossible.”
We reached the bottom after another fifty or sixty steps. The cellar around us smelled of cement dust and mold.
“This way, quickly,” said our guide, pointing across the open floor.
She took us through a door on the near wall. This led to a passage with a dirt floor. We were in some sort of tunnel that ran beneath the grounds; the sides were made of stone and unglazed bricks. Timbers lined the ceiling. Another string of small lightbulbs ran along the right side of the passage. There was a gentle but definite slope upward.
We went about two hundred yards, maybe a little more, before reaching a set of concrete steps upward. At the top was a wooden trapdoor.
“They may be waiting for you there,” said our guide, stopping.
“Fine time to tell me that.”
“I’ll look if you want.”
I grabbed her arm and gently tugged her back down the steps.
“It’s all right,” I told her. “I’m going first. Shotgun, kill a few of the lights—I don’t want to leak any light when I crack the panel. And don’t shoot it,” I added, not sure that he wouldn’t take it as a challenge.
“Gotcha, boss.”
“What’s your name?” I asked the woman. “And why are you helping us?”
“I’ll give you the details later. There’s no sense telling you now.”
“You expect us to be caught?”
“I’m not sure what to expect.”
“Your English is pretty good,” I told her.
“It should be. I was born in Michigan.”
Actually, those two facts didn’t necessarily correlate, but I let it pass.
“What’s your name?” I asked.
“Veronica.”
“I’m Dick.”
“I know who you are. I recognized you yesterday.” She didn’t sound like much of a fan, exactly.
As soon as Shotgun dimmed the lights, I pushed the trapdoor open. The area around us was pitch-black.
I took Veronica’s night glasses and looked around. We had come up in a small building with machinery. It appeared empty, so I squeezed out onto the floor, crawling snake-style away from the trapdoor.
Further inspection revealed that the building was a pump house, with large machinery for increasing the pressure of well water before sending it up to the house. The squat, rectangular building featured a roof only a little taller than shoulder high.
“We’re just outside the razor wire,” Veronica whispered behind me. “But the garage for the vehicles is about twenty yards away. I’m not sure which way it is,” she added. “I’m a little turned around.”
I poked my head out the door. I spotted part of the garage to the left of us. I also saw the shadows of at least half a dozen men, most with rifles, walking in the headlights and floods in front of the building.
“Dick, can you talk?” whispered Junior over the radio.
“Yes. Can you see where we are?”
“I have your location but I don’t have video,” he told me. “Their system doesn’t go out that far. Chet just dropped Mongoose and the others off. He’s heading back. Where should I have him meet you?”
“Beyond the razor fence.”
“Between the wall and the fence?”
“No, the far side of the wire. There are too many goons running around back here. If they see the helicopter, they’re likely to shoot it down.”
“That minefield is close to a hundred yards deep. How the hell are you going to get through it?”
“Walking wasn’t what I had in mind.”
* * *
Most of us don’t give a lot of thought to mines as a military weapon. When we do, we tend to think of them as defensive weapons, and underhanded ones at that—it’s really no fair getting blown up by something below snake level, is it?
But mines have played an important role in many battles. If you’re into some heavy thinking, study the Battle of El Alamein (the August 1942 contest, though mines played a role in the first battle as well) and consider how that might have gone without strategically placed mines.
And really, if you’re fighting fair in a war, you’re fighting stupid. What was it Patton said? The object of war isn’t to die for your country. It’s to make the other dumb bastard die for his country.
I wasn’t intending to die myself. I have a healthy respect for mines, and I hoped de Sarcena’s men would as well. And if they didn’t—well, the mines might settle that score on their own.
Minefields are generally only a problem if you don’t know where the mines are. I figured that if we knew where the mines were here, we could tiptoe between them and grab our helicopter ride.
When they’re laid out by hand, minefields come in a discernible pattern. The reason is sim
ple: the person who put them down wants to be able to recover them in a reasonable amount of time without risking his neck. He also wants to be able to guide someone across the mines without them risking their neck. Or feet, as the case may be.
During our earlier adventure, I recognized that the jailers had used a simple grid pattern where the mines were laid out in rows seemingly different distances apart, but all in parallel. (I say seemingly, because they would have actually been measured from a specific landmark, and then sited along the row according to a predetermined set of angles. But without doing a bunch of mental trigonometry, the mines would seem random to anyone walking through the field. And frankly, while I love tangents, I was never very good with sines and cosines.) So all I had to do here was find four mines, establishing the rows, and proceed.
My first hope was that the glasses were powerful enough to pick up the mines at close range. They weren’t, not completely. They worked for the first mine, which I spotted a few feet from me on the right. I marked it with a handkerchief. The next was considerably harder; I literally nosed along on the ground, hunting with the glasses and my knife before spotting the slight mound at last.
That should have tipped me off that it was going to be harder than I thought, but I’m nothing if not stubborn. After a couple of false positives, I finally detected the mine that formed the parallel line with the first one. It took a little less time, though at least as much sweat to find the fourth.
I stood up and mentally marked out the rest of the lane. It ran northeast from the house at about twenty-five degrees.
I went back to Veronica and told her how much I appreciated her help and wished her luck in the future. I did this with a heartfelt kiss on the lips.
“I’m going to hold on to the glasses if you don’t mind,” I told her. “Thanks for everything. If I can ever do anything for you, let me know.”
“That’s OK,” she said.
We were about three steps into the minefield when I looked back and saw that she was behind Shotgun.
“Where are you going?” I asked her.
“I’m leaving with you. They’ll kill me if they find out that I helped you. And you just said you would help me. I plan to collect.”
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