by Jack Du Brul
Using a map clipped to his kneeboard, the Australian-born pilot cut across a number of the Rio Tuira’s twists, keeping the nimble chopper so close to the jungle canopy that Mercer could see monkeys howling at them from the tops of trees. Once, they startled a clutch of parrots that took off like a fleeing rainbow.
The constant whine of the helo’s turbine and the resonant thrum of the rotor blades made it impossible for Mercer to think beyond what his senses took in-the smell of sweat from so many people piled together, the feel of a metal bracket pressed against his spine, the aftertaste of a spicy lunch served at the safe house, the centrifugal sloshing of his body as the JetRanger swayed through the humid air.
He closed his eyes for what felt like a few seconds, and when he opened them again he could see that the day had gotten noticeably darker. It was always like this in the tropics, he knew. The sun did more than set; it raced for the horizon as if pursued by an eager night. He glanced at his TAG Heuer. 7:20. Bruneseau had timed their flight perfectly.
The forces on his body changed as the jet-powered helicopter began to slow. The river was off to their right about a quarter mile away, a darker wound in the dark jungle. Rene Bruneseau swept the stretch of water with an infrared monocular, looking for the telltale glow from a boat’s motor or a human body. Mercer could see him mouth something to the pilot over the helo’s comm system and the JetRanger crabbed sideways toward the Rio Tuira.
This was it. They were going in and suddenly Mercer’s mind filled again with all kinds of thoughts. His hands turned slick and his heart raged like a trapped animal. In a startling moment he realized it wasn’t fear infecting him. It was the anticipation he usually felt at the verge of answering some disturbing question. The reason Gary Barber’s corpse was mutilated and why he’d been attacked in Paris was waiting down in that jungle and he was eager to get it.
As soon as the helicopter scuttled out over the river and its blades whipped concentric circles into the calm black waters, the side door was thrown open and a Legionnaire yanked the lanyard that inflated the heavy raft at the same time it was shoved out the opening. The Zodiac expanded as it pinwheeled to the water, weighted so it landed bottom-side down with a wet smack. In the glow of a diffused landing light, the first trooper leaped the fifteen feet into the river next to the now fully inflated raft.
Bruneseau opened the copilot door and jumped, followed by a spill of the others, Lieutenant Foch taking the last slot in the deployment. As soon as Foch cleared the helicopter, the pilot doused his light, increased power, and banked the chopper back into the night. The entire maneuver had taken twenty seconds.
The fall from the JetRanger drove Mercer deep underwater. His boots sank into the silt bottom for a frantic moment until he kicked himself free. He broke the surface and cleared lukewarm water from his eyes. Two of the Legionnaires had already rolled themselves into the rubber boat and the others were clinging to its bulbous freeboard. He swam to them and was helped in by a powerful grip on his arm. Bruneseau grinned. “Piece of cake.”
Mercer guessed the French operative was relieved to be finally doing something after so many weeks of simply watching the Hatcherly container port. His plan to flush out Liu Yousheng by involving Mercer hadn’t worked the way he’d wanted, but at least this new avenue of investigation had been salvaged from that debacle. He seemed grateful.
“Piece of cake,” Mercer agreed. The jungle sang with insects, birds, and dozens of unnamed night creatures. The moon was a pale sliver glimpsed only at the right angle through the thick canopy.
The waterproof bags were hauled aboard and equipment was distributed. The combat harnesses the Legionnaires used incorporated rappelling rigs as well as a rescue harness in case they needed to be pulled out by fast-ropes from the helo. Mercer didn’t recall if the JetRanger was equipped with them or not.
Lauren noticed his interest in the rigs and answered his unspoken question. “I saw them when we loaded. If the pilot leaves off the cargo doors, two ropes can be dropped from a push button in the cockpit.”
“Let’s hope we don’t need them,” Mercer said as he made sure his borrowed Beretta was snug against his hip. The camera with its long lens went into a padded pack he swung onto his back.
Foch took up a position in the bow with night-vision goggles clamped over his eyes and the two enlisted soldiers began to paddle the Zodiac against the sluggish current. They couldn’t risk using an outboard motor because the sound would carry far beyond Foch’s vision. Bruneseau was at the transom, watching their wake for any craft that might overtake them. The last of the daylight had long since faded, leaving only a strip of stars above them in the otherwise infinite darkness. If not for the screech of animals and the chirps of insects, it was easy to imagine they were paddling through outer space.
Five miles into their trek, Lieutenant Foch made a quick hand gesture and the paddlers reacted instantly. He’d seen something through his goggles. They’d been traveling close to the right bank and at Foch’s signal they angled the raft closer to shore, holding their paddles inches from the river so that any water dripping from the blades wouldn’t make a sound. A ripple of tension washed through the team.
A minute later, a piragua, a native dugout canoe, glided out of the gloom upstream with two natives working the paddles as silently as ghosts. The Indians never paused from their steady rhythm and never saw the six armed people less than twenty feet from them. As quickly as they appeared, the natives vanished downstream again and the raiders let out their breaths. They waited several minutes before starting out again, just to make sure the canoe didn’t double back.
For four hours they moved against the current, each team member taking turns at the paddles. As a point of pride when their turn came up, Mercer and Lauren managed to eke out a faster pace than any of the others without compromising their stealth. An hour after taking the paddles, Foch placed a hand on Mercer’s arm to stop him from going on. Lauren paused as well. The lieutenant silently pointed to their right, where a tiny stream fed into the river. Mercer and Lauren obediently rowed them to the brook. Like Venetian gondoliers they used their paddles to pole them up the shallow stream. Five hundred yards into the jungle, a three-foot waterfall blocked any further progress.
“Good enough.” Foch spoke so quietly that even just a few feet away his words were more of an impression than a noise. “We’ll stash the boat here and head out on foot at dawn.”
“Where are we?” Lauren asked.
“According to my map and this”-he held up a GPS receiver-“we’re five miles below where the River of Ruin joins the Rio Tuira. I believe this stream is fed from water coming off the back side of the volcano.” He and Mercer had fixed the route during their earlier conversation.
In the few minutes it took to rig a mosquito netting all six people had become smorgasbords to countless stinging insects. Only the one soldier ordered to remain awake on guard duty seemed to care. The others were asleep in seconds.
Dawn was a half hour away when they were woken by their picket. They took ten minutes to take care of their bodies’ needs, refill their canteens with purified water, and give their weapons a final check before their march up the stream. The soldier who’d stayed awake all night would remain hidden with the Zodiac, his stomach filled with caffeine pills. Foch took point and the other soldier, a German named Hauer, had the drag slot. Keeping to the stream bank allowed them to move easier through the jungle and maintain a constant fifteen-yard separation without getting lost in the dense undergrowth.
They hoped to be back at the boat in four or five hours, yet everyone carried enough equipment and food to sustain them for a few days. Neither Mercer nor Lauren was armed with anything heavier than their pistols.
Humidity rose with the sun. The air became so thick Mercer felt like he could drink it. Rather than refreshing his system, each breath seemed to suck away his strength. The stink of rotting vegetation clung to the back of his throat. And he had to discipline himself not to slap a
t the bugs that bit into his exposed hands and neck. The Legionnaires appeared immune to the discomfort, as did Lauren Vanik. Mercer suffered in silence.
Bruneseau was the oldest person on the patrol, carried twenty extra pounds in his gut and had a two-pack-a-day cigarette habit, yet when Mercer looked behind to check on the spy, he was moving with the suppleness of a jungle cat. He wasn’t even sweating that hard. In contrast, Mercer’s skin felt slick with perspiration and he had to wipe a continuous stream of salt water from his eyes.
The rain forest was too tangled for them to see more than fifty paces in any direction and dripping leaves hovered just feet over their heads. Sunlight was filtered by the greenery, making shadows more murky and ominous. Everything had an indistinct quality, as if viewed from underwater, like they were swimming through a tidal pool rather than walking through a jungle. Only occasionally would a shaft of light penetrate the canopy and beam against the forest floor.
For an hour they hiked along the stream, contorting their bodies around obstacle courses of fallen trees and bushes to avoid making the tiniest sound. Foch finally came to a halt, hunkering down to await the others. He pointed up the hill that had slowly emerged from the jungle. It was the lower flank of the volcano. Above them was the lake. He allowed the team twenty minutes to rest, moving to each person to pantomime questions about their physical condition. No one spoke. Liu Yousheng could very well have guards stationed on the mountain’s rim looming hundreds of feet above them.
Foch went out first, slithering through the jungle on his stomach, his FAMAS assault rifle clamped in his hands. After moving only five feet away, it was as if he’d been swallowed. Ten minutes later he returned, sliding backward with exaggerated slowness. He didn’t rustle a single branch and barely moved the grasses growing along the slope of the mountain.
He pressed his mouth to Mercer’s ear. “There’s no one on top of the hill, but I could hear machinery from inside the caldera. I assume something’s happening on the shores of the lake.”
“Liu’s excavating equipment,” Mercer whispered back. Foch nodded.
“They sound like they are on the far side. I think it’s safe for all of us to go up.” Foch gave a thumbs-up to Bruneseau, Lauren, and Hauer.
Following in the path he’d blazed, the team crawled up the hill, moving out from the jungle cover for the last hundred feet below the summit. The grass growing along the slope was at least a meter tall, dense, and as stiff as aluminum. It sliced into skin like knife blades. More insects feasted on the shallow wounds. Once in the open, the sun beat down like a hammer, but when Mercer looked up he could see a wall of black clouds moving across the sky. Rain wouldn’t be far behind.
The storm would provide excellent cover, but would make the hike back to the Zodiac a miserable slog.
Elbows and knees aching from the crawling climb, Mercer reached the crest of the hill. Before he could take even a second to gather his bearings, Foch dragged him into the protection of a small fold in the earth and waited to haul the others behind cover when they reached the top. Only when he knew he couldn’t be observed from below did Mercer concentrate on the vista spread out below him.
The broad lake was fifty feet beneath their natural redoubt. He could clearly see the small island at its center. It looked undisturbed. Lauren moved next to him and they exchanged proud smirks, both thinking of how they’d cheated death that night. Only when he scanned along the shore could he see anything different about the isolated body of water.
From this distance, it looked like an entire army of laborers was tearing into the walls of dirt surrounding the lake. The shafts that Gary had dug over the past months were puny in comparison to these vast excavations. Hatcherly-and he assumed it was Hatcherly-had airlifted excavating machines to the lake, where they ripped huge furrows out of the mountain with their hydraulic arms. Waste dirt was bulldozed into the lake and brown stains of mud bloomed from the shore. Workers in hard hats helped guide the vehicles while others, natives it looked like at this extreme range, sifted through mounds of spoil with hand-held screens. Men with automatic weapons watched over their labors, vigilant for the gleam of gold in the overburden.
Long canvas tents had been erected for the workers, along with a field kitchen, and latrine pits and a garbage dump for the refuse generated by at least a hundred humans. There was a sleek helicopter resting on the beach, its rotor blades as limp as palm fronds, and several aluminum boats with outboard engines tied to a dock made of empty fuel barrels and sheets of plywood.
Mercer’s fears that the looting of archeological sites had turned high tech were dead-on. Hatcherly had erected a town for their robbers, brought in supplies from Panama City in the chopper, and, because of the remoteness, could operate with virtual impunity.
All the discomfort he’d endured getting to this point fell away as his anger grew. He wasn’t aware of the cuts on his hands or the raw insect bites on his neck. He felt nothing but horror at what was happening below him. His lips curled into a cruel smile. Once he had his evidence, at least this part of Hatcherly’s activities on the isthmus would be over. He pulled the pack from his shoulders and withdrew the camera. He snapped off half a role of film before turning to Bruneseau.
“I can’t see faces from this range,” he whispered. “We need to get closer.”
Foch had heard the request. “We can crawl back over the peak of the hill, circle around to just above the main part of the camp and take your shots from there.”
“Let’s go.”
They backtracked to the jungle edge and used its cover to flank the mountain, climbing back up only when they were exactly opposite the camp area. This time Mercer led them up the hill, making sure each movement was thought out before it was executed so that he made no noise, not that anyone inside the volcano could hear them over the diesel growl of the excavators. From the uneven crest of the mountain, he could distinguish faces. The guards and the men working the machinery were all Chinese. Only the lowliest laborers were dark-skinned Panamanians.
As he watched the work, he hoped to see at least one person who seemed to be in charge, but none of the men below distinguished themselves. They worked like drones, having direction, but no control. He had the camera focused on one promising man, a bit older than some of the others, who was talking with a bulldozer driver when Lauren tapped him on his shoulder. She was pointing toward one of the tents.
He saw who she was pointing out immediately. I know you, Mercer thought as he zeroed in on the figure in the lens. He wore khaki pants and a bush jacket here, but a few nights ago he’d been in the warehouse in a suit. He’d been with the other executive who’d peered at the gold. Mercer took ten pictures, the camera cycling film as if it had a motor drive. The Chinese executive appeared to be in walkie-talkie communications with a pair of surveyors working with a laser transit a quarter of the way around the lake.
That’s when Mercer realized the problem with what he was seeing below him. Hatcherly was still digging holes all over the place, working in a systematic approach that would eventually encompass the entire area. There wasn’t one spot where they were focusing all their attention, not one site that had proved to be the mother lode of the Twice-Stolen Treasure. Liu hadn’t found the gold yet. He was still searching.
Meaning the ingots Mercer had seen in the warehouse came from-where?
Rather than answering questions about Hatcherly, this trip was creating even more.
He felt a tug on his pant leg from Foch who lay a little farther down the mountain’s flank. The Legionnaire had been speaking to Bruneseau and had just slipped a piece of unidentified equipment into a large cargo pouch secured to his harness. He moved closer so he could whisper to Mercer.
“Monsieur Bruneseau and I have to get into the camp,” Foch breathed. “There is one tent they are using for administration. Bruneseau needs to get inside.”
This change in plans was a complete surprise, but Mercer’s initial shock gave way to anger and his jaw tight
ened. When laying out their strategy, they hadn’t talked about actually going into the camp, but now he saw it had been the Frenchman’s intention all along. “Are you out of your mind?”
Foch didn’t seem to care about Mercer’s reaction. “You will wait here with Hauer until we get back.”
“We have what we need,” Lauren protested. “Let’s just get the hell out of here.”
“I’m sorry, Captain.” Bruneseau was unapologetic. “I have to get down there.”
“You’re jeopardizing our entire mission!”
“Getting in there is our mission,” the agent replied sharply.
Without another word, the two men crawled into a gully scored on the inside of the caldera and began moving down toward the back of the camp. Once they reached the broad beach, they paused behind a collection of fuel drums until they could cover the open ground to the closest tent. Reaching it, they both vanished under its loose side. A minute later, they ran out the front of the dormitory tent and found more shelter near a pile of dirt twenty yards closer to the square administration tent. From there, they would need to cross another thirty yards of open ground to get to their target.
Mercer cursed. They’d never make it. He had no idea why they were taking this risk but knew it was a mistake. Feeling a strong premonition, he knew he had to act. Never having control over this sortie, he took it now.
“Corporal Hauer,” he said to the young Legionnaire. “Call the chopper and get it in here.”
“Why? What for? Foch will be back in a few minutes.”
“He’s going to be caught in a few minutes. Call the damned chopper.”
The soldier was about to protest again when his radio came to life. The volume was just high enough for Mercer to hear the whispered French.
“Foch, this is Levesque.” Levesque was the Legionnaire who had remained with the Zodiac. “I’m two hundred meters downstream from the boat. There’s an armed patrol approaching. I’m backtracking now, but if they stay along the stream bank they’re going to find the Zodiac. What do you want me to do?”