Camel Club 01 - The Camel Club

by David Baldacci

  A split second later he heard a bomb go off inside the hospital.

  CHAPTER

  54

  REUBEN LIFTED KATE AND Adelphia over the fence and then joined the other Camel Club members there. As terrified people ran screaming past them, they took a moment to catch their breaths and collect their wits.

  “My God,” a very pale Kate said, looking around frantically for Alex Ford.

  “It is horrible,” Adelphia moaned. “It is like Poland and Soviets.”

  Stone was surveying the dedication grounds where the bodies of the fallen lay. The grass was red with the blood of the gunmen. The federal countersnipers had control of the situation and were now securing the area, moving from body to body, ensuring that the Arab terrorists were actually dead. However, even from the perimeter Stone could see that there was no life left in the lumps of flesh on the ground.

  Every one of Captain Jack’s men lay dead; many of the fedayeen were burned beyond recognition.

  They could all hear sirens in the distance. A few minutes later a fire engine appeared on the scene followed by several others. They quickly attacked the blazing cars with their hoses, and black smoke billowed into the air.

  Stone continued to watch as the wreckage of the police cruiser was cleared so that the presidential motorcade, at least what was left of it, could start streaming out. Mrs. Brennan and the chief of staff were swept into the second Beast and whisked away. The bruised and battered governor of Pennsylvania had been recovered and driven off in a van.

  Stone felt a big hand on his shoulder and turned to find Reuben staring at him.

  “We should probably get the hell out of here,” he said. “Damn cops might start shooting stragglers and ask questions later.”

  Stone looked puzzled. “Reuben, you grabbed one of the gunmen’s weapons. Did you notice anything unusual about it?”

  Reuben thought for a moment. “Well, I didn’t want to hold on to it too long, or else my head would’ve probably been exploding too. But now that you mention it, it did feel kind of funny. Lighter than I would’ve thought.” He looked at Stone. “Why’d you ask that?”

  Stone didn’t answer. He looked again at all the dead Arabs.

  Seconds after Adnan had entered the hospital, he placed Brennan, who was still moaning continuously, on a gurney that he’d left just inside the front door. The gunfight outside had driven everyone inside the hospital away from the front entrance. Adnan saw a group of nurses, doctors and aides staring fearfully at him from farther down the hallway.

  “What’s going on?” one of the doctors shouted as he edged forward.

  Adnan didn’t respond to this query, but he did nod at the man who’d just appeared next to him. It was the hospital’s newest staff physician who’d earlier expressed concern about the need for security guards at Mercy Hospital.

  “A wounded man,” the doctor called out. “I’ll take care of him.”

  “Stay away from the front doors,” Adnan warned. “People are shooting.”

  The doctor pulled a syringe from his pocket, uncapped it and injected the president in his arm; Brennan slipped into unconsciousness. Then the doctor placed a sheet over the president and strapped him to the gurney and pushed it down the side hallway. He got on the elevator there and took it down one floor to the basement. Adnan waited until this had happened and then turned back to the group of hospital personnel.

  “Hey!” another doctor yelled at Adnan. “Who was that man on the gurney?” They now all started moving toward him.

  Adnan reached inside his jacket, pulled out a gas mask, put it on and started walking toward the oncoming group. Then he pulled from his pocket what looked to be a grenade and held it up.

  “Look out,” one of the nurses screamed as the group turned and ran in the other direction.

  “Call the police,” another doctor yelled as she scrambled away.

  An instant later Adnan reached the fourth tile across from the center of the nurse’s station and threw the cylinder against the wall. It exploded, and the hall was immediately filled with thick smoke that was driven in all directions by the hospital’s air circulation system. A split second before the smoke bomb went off, Adnan heard glass shattering, but he couldn’t see the source. He couldn’t know this was Alex Ford throwing himself through the glass doors, but the Arab knew he had to hurry. He turned back toward the front of the hospital and counted off his steps, navigating in the dark solely through memory from his constant practice. As he neared the front entrance, Adnan felt something bump his leg, but he kept going.

  An instant later the timed explosive device he’d placed in the hospital’s electrical room went off. All power to the hospital was now gone; everything went dark.

  Adnan made his turn, walked down the passageway, stopped at the exit door, opened it and went through. He grabbed a long metal bar that he’d earlier hidden behind a steam pipe and wedged it through the closed door’s push bar. Then he began to run.

  As soon as the bomb went off and smoke filled the halls, Alex dropped to the floor and slithered forward on his belly. It was like being far underwater, and the fumes were making him gag. Then he bumped into something, and that something was flesh and bone. He made a grab for it, but then it was gone. He swiveled around and started heading the other way, following the sounds of the footsteps. They were measured, steady. How the hell could anyone be walking so calmly through this crap? And then it suddenly dawned on him: because that person had a mask. And the steady tread? The person was leading himself through the smoke by counting steps. Alex had practiced that very same tactic in the dark at the Secret Service’s Beltsville training facility.

  Alex crawled forward as fast as he could. The footsteps suddenly grew fainter and he redoubled his efforts, whipping his body back and forth like a serpent closing in on its prey. Thankfully, the footfalls picked up again. He hit another hallway, turned and belly-crawled down it. He heard a door open and then close. He slithered faster, pushing himself to the right and feeling for the wall. When his hand hit metal, he reached up and grabbed the handle, but the door refused to open. He pulled his gun and shot at the door at waist level. One of the slugs hit the push bar, collapsing it, and the metal pole bar Adnan had wedged there fell free. He wrenched open the door and flung himself through. The smoke wasn’t as bad in here, but the power to the hospital had obviously gone out because there was no light.

  Alex rose, found the handrail and made his way down the steps, slipping and sliding along the way. He missed an entire step and ended up in a heap at the bottom of the first flight of stairs. Bruised and bleeding, he picked himself up and kept going by using the rail the rest of the way down. His panic increasing, Alex started taking the steps two at a time before reaching the bottom and hustling down the hall. He burst out of the exit door right as Adnan was getting in the ambulance that was parked there. Alex suspected the president was in the back.

  He didn’t even cry out a warning. Alex just opened fire, hitting Adnan in the arm. Adnan fired back, and Alex had to throw himself to the side, where he lost his footing and tumbled down a set of concrete stairs. He rose, got off another shot and took a round in return, right in his ribs, fired by Ahmed, who’d emerged from the driver side of the ambulance. Luckily, Ahmed’s small-caliber ordnance had zero chance of penetrating the latest-stage Kevlar that all Secret Service agents wore on protective detail. Still, it felt like Muhammad Ali had nailed him with his best punch, and Alex slumped down in pain just as another shot fired by Adnan, burned through the skin of his left arm.

  The ambulance sped off, its sirens screaming, as Alex faltered after it on legs that were nearly dead. His chest killing him, his arm bleeding profusely and his lungs full of smoke, Alex finally dropped to his knees and fired at the ambulance, emptying his mag but failing to stop it. Then, he tried his wrist mic but it didn’t work. He realized the bullet that hit his arm must’ve also severed the wiring to his comm pack. The last thing he remembered before passing out was one fi
nal sight of the ambulance, and then it was gone.

  And so was the president.

  On his watch.

  CHAPTER

  55

  GEORGE FRANKLIN PULLED HIS car into the driveway. He had come from the other side of Brennan, opposite where the ceremonial grounds were located, and he hadn’t had his radio on.

  “Lori?” he called out. “Djamila?” He plunked his keys on the kitchen island and went through the house calling out again. He opened the door to the garage and was puzzled to see his wife’s convertible and the big Navigator SUV parked there.

  Had they all gone out in Djamila’s van?

  “Lori? Boys?”

  He went upstairs, starting to become a little uneasy. When he opened the door to his bedroom, that unease turned to panic as he saw the phone lying on the floor, along with a torn-up sheet.

  “Lori honey?”

  He heard a sound from the closet. He rushed over and ripped the doors open and saw his bound wife. Lori’s eyes were not focusing well, but she did seem to be looking at him. He raced to her side and pulled her gag off.

  “My God, Lori, what happened? Who did this?” he said frantically.

  She mouthed the name but he couldn’t hear it.

  “Who?”

  She said softly, “Djamila. She has the boys.” And then Lori Franklin started sobbing as her husband held her.

  The ambulance raced into the garage, and the doors shut behind it. Adnan and Ahmed jumped out of the ambulance, opened the back door and unloaded the president.

  Djamila had already opened the back of the van and was standing next to the rear passenger door where she was trying to keep the boys calm. They were all upset, but fortunately, they were also too young to free themselves from their car seats.

  Now Djamila raced to the rear of the van and pushed the button that was hidden in a crevice inside the interior there. The floor lifted up, revealing a compartment. It was lead- and copper-lined and cut into two shapes: one of a man in a fetal position and the other of a small cylindrical object. The shape of the man conformed to the measurements of President James Brennan, with an inch all around to spare.

  Djamila stared at the young man who had stepped back to let the doctor, Adnan and the other man present lift Brennan from the gurney.

  “Ahmed?” she said unbelievingly.

  He looked at her.

  “Ahmed. It is me, Djamila.” It was Ahmed, her Iranian poet; the one who had written down the exact date and time of his death, the young man who had given her so much good advice and also the young man she hoped to share paradise with.

  However, there was now a look in his eyes that Djamila could not remember ever having seen, even when he was in his full oratorical fury. It frightened her.

  “I do not know you,” he said bitterly. “Do not talk to me, woman.”

  Djamila took a step back from him, her heart crushed at this response.

  As Brennan was being transferred from the gurney to the van, Ahmed took a step toward the ambulance. Djamila saw him slip his hand inside the back of the ambulance but could not see what he was doing.

  When he walked over to the others, Djamila came forward again.

  “Ahmed, we were at the camps together in Pakistan. You must remember me.”

  This time Ahmed didn’t bother to answer.

  Djamila screamed as she saw a knife appear in Ahmed’s hand, its point aimed right at the president’s neck.

  Adnan was faster and he slammed into Ahmed, knocking him down.

  “You fool!” Ahmed screamed, getting to his feet as Adnan pointed his gun at him. “Do you realize who we have here?” He gestured to Brennan. “This is the American president. The king of evil. He has destroyed everything we have.”

  “You will not kill him,” Adnan said.

  “Listen to me,” Ahmed shouted. “We will never have this chance again. Can you not see that? The Americans will keep killing. They will kill us all with their tanks and planes. But we can kill him. That will destroy America.”

  “No!” Adnan said fiercely.

  “Why!” Ahmed cried. “Because of the plan?” he said derisively. “A plan devised by who, an American. We take orders from Americans, Adnan, do you not see that? This is all a plot. To kill us. I knew that. I have always known that. But now, now we take our revenge.” He held his knife up in the air. “We do it now.”

  “I do not wish to kill you, Ahmed, but I will.”

  “Then kill me!”

  Ahmed rushed forward and Adnan fired.

  Djamila screamed as Ahmed slumped to the floor of the garage with a single shot to the center of his chest. Adnan put the gun back in his holster and pushed Ahmed’s body out of the way. The tears slipped down Djamila’s cheek as she stared at her dead poet.

  The other men now worked away calmly, as though a cockroach had been killed in front of them instead of a man. Brennan was placed in the compartment, an oxygen tank in the other cutout space. The doctor fitted a mask over Brennan’s face and turned on the feed line.

  Adnan closed the compartment and turned to the sobbing Djamila.

  “He did know me,” she said haltingly between sobs. “That was my Ahmed.”

  Adnan’s response was a hard slap to her face. This startled Djamila so badly that she stopped crying.

  “Now get in your van,” Adnan said firmly, “and do your job.”

  Without another word Djamila did exactly as he said. The garage door flew back up, and the van raced out.

  Adnan looked at the other two men and nodded at Ahmed’s body. They picked it up and placed it in the oil pit while Adnan wrapped up his bleeding arm where Alex had shot him.

  Adnan had suspected that Ahmed would try something. He’d been keeping a close watch on him ever since they loaded the president into the ambulance. Still, it had been a close call.

  Seconds later the three climbed into the ambulance, where Adnan became the patient, with the doctor presiding over him and the third man driving. This was the original plan of escape and would have also included Ahmed.

  Despite this cover, however, Adnan knew they’d been seen at the hospital, and now he had a gunshot wound. They would not make it through the roadblocks. Yet they would make a fine decoy. And then very soon after that it would be over. Adnan gazed at the doctor, a man of fifty, and understood from his look that he knew this to be the case too. Adnan closed his eyes and held his wounded arm. The pain was not bad; he’d had far worse. It was just one more scar to add to what he already had. However, this time Adnan sensed it would be the last scar for him. He had no plans to rot in an American jail or let the Americans electrocute him like some animal.

  After the apartment building had been cleared except for the snipers, the lawmen had launched multiple RPGs into the sixth-floor apartment. Only then were the two gunmen finally silenced after the most intensive gun battle Pennsylvania had seen since Gettysburg. When the apartment was stormed, the shooters were both found dead, but only after having fired all of their M-50 ammo and thousands of rounds from their overheated machine guns, which were now both sizzling to the touch.

  The hospital was evacuated, and Alex Ford was discovered lying bleeding on the asphalt. When he was revived, he told them what he’d seen, and an APB went out on the ambulance.

  Djamila ran into a roadblock barely five minutes outside of Brennan. There were three cars in front of her, and the police were making people get out of their vehicles.

  She glanced back at the boys. The baby had fallen asleep, but the other two boys were still crying hard, and Djamila too felt tears sliding down her cheeks again.

  Ahmed said he did not know her. He had told her not to talk to him. Ahmed had been killed right in front of her. He had tried to stab the man. He’d gone against the plan and been killed for that. And yet what hurt her most of all were his words: “I do not know you.” His hatred had consumed him, crushing the poet’s heart in its grip. That was the only way Djamila could make herself understand what had h
appened.

  She was brought back from these thoughts by a tapping on her window. It was the police. She rolled down her window, and the howls of the children reached the ears of the officers.

  “Damn, lady, are those kids okay?”

  “They are scared,” Djamila said, launching into her prepared speech. “I am scared too. There are sirens and police and people running and screaming. I have just come from downtown, and people they are screaming everywhere. It is mad; the world has gone mad. I take children to their home. I am nanny,” she added, probably unnecessarily. She started to sob, which made the kids cry even harder. This woke the baby up, and he added his powerful lungs to the crisis.

  “Okay, okay,” the officer said. “We’ll make this real fast.” He nodded to his men. They looked through the van and underneath it. They were searching inches from where the president lay unconscious. However, he might as well have been invisible, and the police were quite anxious to move on to another car. From the putrid smells coming from the backseat, all three boys had gone to the bathroom.

  The officers slammed the doors shut. “Good luck,” one of them said to Djamila, and waved her on.

  A minute later, after repeated attempts, George Franklin finally got through on the flooded 911 line and reported what had happened, giving a description of Djamila, the boys and the van. However, Djamila was on the way to her rendezvous spot long before this message was relayed to the field.

  Ten minutes later the black chopper soared over the devastated dedication grounds and landed in the parking lot. One of the doors opened, and Tom Hemingway stepped out and hustled over to Carter Gray, who stood talking to some federal agents.

  Hemingway said, “My God, sir, we were on our way back from New York when we heard. Is the president still alive?”