Bolan streaked past the Meo, hand going for his dagger. He bounded up the steps and plunged it into the coughing soldier's heart. The man died instantly, and Bolan dragged both bodies inside the doorway of the pagoda. The Meo followed with the soldiers' rifles.
"Get the food things!" Bolan snapped, livid with anger. He would have the headman's neck for giving him greenhorns. He turned to the line of yellow-robed monks in the interior of the pagoda, gave a perfunctory wai, and said, "Venerable monks, sing."
The monks glowered back in antagonistic silence. Not only was this foreigner desecrating a holy place by retaining his footwear, he had the impertinence to bring savages with him.
No love is lost in Thailand between the lowlander and the Montagnard, one civilized to the point of decadence, the other primitive and pagan, but a superior fighter.
"Sing, venerable monks," Bolan repeated.
The shaved heads remained silent. They knelt on the stone floor under a giant statue of the Night Buddha. The god gazed at Bolan through half-open eyes giving the impression he, too, was displeased by this intrusion.
Bolan sympathized, but war is war. He told the Meo to bar the door and went over to the chief monk. He dropped to one knee and addressed him in the most formal manner.
"Venerable teacher, excuse this imposition. I have come to rescue the white man. Please have the other monks sing while we talk. If they do not, the Chinese might suspect and come, and there will be fighting. I have a hundred barbarians outside ready to attack if necessary."
The head bonze and his assistant exchanged glances.
Bolan continued, "If there is fighting, many of your monks could be killed. Many of your temple boys, too. Your monastery will be damaged by fire. Please sing."
There was another exchange of looks. The head monk nodded, the assistant intoned. Wooden sticks clacked, small brass cymbals clashed and the chanting resumed.
"Thank you, venerable teacher," said Bolan. "Where is the white man?"
The monk's gaze fell to the floor.
"He's under the pagoda?"
The monk nodded.
"Where is the entrance?"
The monk said nothing.
"Please, venerable teacher, there is not much time."
"We haven't the key."
"Doesn't matter—I can open locks without a key. Where is the entrance?"
"The entrance is in the rear of the temple. One must go outside."
They held each other's eyes. Was this a trick, Bolan asked himself. There was something of a snake about this man. The eyes were glazed and the voice was syrupy.
Bolan lifted himself to his feet. "Please come to show me the entrance."
A shaved eyebrow rose almost imperceptibly. The monk had not expected that. He glanced at his assistant and rose. Bolan signalled to the Meo to unbolt the door.
"No one is to leave, understand?" Bolan told them. "If anyone tries, shoot."
The two Meo nodded nervously.
They stepped out, Bolan leading. The square was empty. They descended the stone steps, avoiding the slippery blood, and Bolan motioned for the monk to go first. They went around the side of the pagoda.
The sky was still cloudy, obscuring the moon, the monks inside the pagoda were chanting, and the Tiger soldiers in the building were still laughing away. Everything was going like clockwork.
"Maiouk!"
Bolan spun around and ducked as a muzzle flashed. The monk was thrown against the wall by the impact of the bullets.
Bolan returned fire and a man screamed. Bolan fired again, a long, lateral burst. A second voice cried out and something crashed into the bushes.
The compound burst into life. Shutters banged, doors flew open, soldiers ran out. From the hill where the Meo headman was positioned, a whistle blew.
A musket fired dryly. An automatic rifle replied with a burst. A Meo war cry filled the air, followed by a fusillade of musket fire. The chanting continued.
Bolan dropped to the monk's side, then ran to the rear of the pagoda, found the door, and felt for the lock. There was no lock. The door was false.
He sprinted back past the body of the monk, feeling not at all sorry for him now that he knew the guy had tried to trick him. He bounded up the steps and pounded on the door.
"Open up!" he shouted.
The door remained closed.
"Open the door!" Bolan yelled over the gunfire outside and the chanting inside. "It's me—the white man!" He banged on the door with his fist.
There was the sound of a bolt being withdrawn, then the door opened and Bolan strode inside. This time there was no wai or kneeling.
"Silence!" he called out.
The chanting stopped.
Raising his voice above the din outside, Bolan said, "The head monk is dead. He tried to deceive me, the door is false. Where is the white man?"
The monks remained silent, eyes straight ahead.
Bolan walked up to the assistant. He placed the muzzle of his gun against the man's bare shoulder, and repeated his question.
"The white man is in a chamber under the pagoda," replied the monk.
"How does one get there?"
The monk rose, walked quickly to the side of the Buddha, and pushed a panel. A section of the wall swung open.
"Get a light and take me down there," Bolan ordered.
The monk took a torch from a wall, and they descended a long flight of steps into a large cave. On a mat, chained to the wall, lay a tall man with a mustache.
"It's me," said Bolan. "John."
"How come they're letting you keep your weapon?" asked Nark, squinting.
"I didn't come as a prisoner," said Bolan. "I came to free you."
"They told me you'd been captured," said Nark. "I knew they'd be on the drop zone. I was in the radio shack when Stony Man Farm radioed your time of arrival. How come your people fell for it? I specifically left out the true check to let you know I was transmitting under duress."
"The operator must have missed it," said Bolan, picking the lock on Nark's chains.
"How can anyone miss a check?"
"Routine, boredom, people get careless. It happens."
"Not in the NSA," said Nark.
"In the NSA too," Bolan assured him. "A few years back—this was before your time—the NSA agent in Tangier left out the true check to tell control he had been captured. Guess what control replied? 'Next time, please remember to include your true check.'"
They heard the sound of feet descending the stone steps, and the headman appeared. "Fight finished," he announced. "Hello, Mr. Nark."
"Hi, Major," said the tall, rail-thin American.
The headman held out a ball-shaped rocket attached to a small launcher. "You know this?" he asked. "Never see before."
"A RAW," Bolan replied. "Like an RPG but makes a bigger hole, and you fire it from a rifle."
"You want?" said the headman.
"Sure, I'll take it," said Bolan. It was of no use to him—the launcher only fitted an M-16—but to refuse a gift would be rude.
"Major," said Nark, "could you send someone to the shack to pick up my radio? Also, the ge-gene." That was what the Montagnards called the hand-pedaled generator used to provide current for the set. When pedaled it made a ge-ge sound. "And a flashlight, too."
"I go myself," said the headman.
"While you're there, put a few bullets through the Tiger radio. The big set on the table."
"Yes, sir," said the headman and ran up.
Bolan continued to pick the lock. It was a complicated mechanism. He signaled to the Meo who had replaced the bonze as torch holder to come nearer so he could see better.
"What did you tell Tiger?" Bolan asked Nark.
"I told them what I was supposed to tell them," said Nark, his pale features showing some amusement.
"They bought the cover?"
"They even suggested it. From the start they kept saying, 'You're Russian, aren't you?' Well, it was obvious, wasn't it? Russian weapon,
Russian radio, Russian clothes. I must say, John, your tailors are tops. Even the stitching on my buttonholes was Russian. You know, crossed instead of parallel? I saw them check."
"I'll pass on the compliment," said Bolan. After a while he added, "But if they bought the cover, how come you were tortured?"
"In the beginning I refused to talk. I figured if I talked too early, they'd get suspicious." He grinned. "After all, a hardened KGB agent is a tough nut to crack, no?"
The cover for Galloping Horse was that it was a Russian operation. Nark was a pathfinder for a KGB team coming to stir up a rebellion among Montagnards in Burma and Thailand. Objective: to destabilize the two countries in preparation for a pro-Moscow Communist takeover. The Soviet Union wanted Burma and Thailand as satellites to complete its cordon sanitaire of China. It already had Vietnam and Laos.
The lock finally snapped open. "There," said Bolan. He removed the chains and helped Nark to his feet. The man swayed, hand going to his head. "What's wrong?" asked Bolan.
"They were very fond of the sock," said Nark, massaging his head. "I never realized such a simple technique could be so painful."
"Yeah," said Bolan. "It can really knock you around."
"I'll be all right," Nark replied, his long legs becoming more steady as he crossed the room.
They went up to the pagoda. The torches flickered in silence; the monks had gone. They crossed the floor and came out. The square milled with black-clad figures, some loading booty on captured Tiger horses. Occasionally a shot rang out as some Montagnard finished off a wounded Tiger soldier. The Montagnards did not take prisoners.
Nark sniffed the air. "Tobacco?"
"They used bundles of tobacco to smoke out the troops," Bolan explained. "With our muskets and crossbows, Tiger could have held us off forever."
Three horses were tied by the bodhi tree, obviously for them. Two had saddles, while one carried Nark's radio and generator. From one of the saddles hung an M-16 with a canvas bandolier containing ammunition magazines, a weapon for Nark.
The headman came up. He glanced from the man with the mustache to the man with the ice-blue eyes. "Tiger know?"
"No, they don't know," said Bolan. "We can still surprise them."
"When come money and arms?" asked the headman.
"In two nights' time," said Bolan.
The headman's tiny eyes held Bolan's. "How you know?"
Bolan glanced at his watch. "In two and a half hours, which is when our next radio transmission is, we will ask for an air drop." He turned to Nark. "Where should that drop be?"
"Valley of the Spirits," replied Nark.
"We will tell our planes," Bolan continued, "to drop arms and money in the Valley of the Spirits the night after tomorrow. This is the earliest they can come. We will ask for the drop to be at midnight. You must send messengers to the villages to tell people that. They must be there to collect the drop."
The headman grunted. "We ride to village now?"
"You do," said Bolan. "Nark and I ride to reconnoiter the Tiger camp. I want to make a final check before we attack. Okay?"
"Okay." The headman turned to the milling figures in the square and blew a whistle. "Paj, paj," he called out.
Watched by bonzes leaning from windows, the Montagnards headed for home. The Tiger War had begun.
Mack Bolan knew this would be a strange one. Drugs were a blatant form of terrorism, he understood that to the depths of his being, and the enemy was as clearly defined as ever. But to Bolan there were even more serious concerns in his recent life that seriously slewed the picture.
Increasingly he was aware of the potential for betrayal. At every turn, politics and nationalism muddied the clarity of the essential task: the clean versus the unclean. More and more he realized the dangers implicit in his hastily organized missions.
So it felt good to be a soldier in fatigues again. A soldier's kind of action was the best way to find out which of a guy's allies were for real. Bolan needed that.
He felt he was edging toward some terrible revelation now. He needed a soldier's faith to see it through. Yeah, this would be a strange one.
4
The trio of horses wound its way through the cold, wet night. First came Nark, then Bolan, then the pack-horse. They moved slowly; rain had turned the trail slippery.
Bolan hissed for Nark to stop.
Nark reined his horse as Bolan drew alongside.
"I think we're being followed," Bolan whispered. "I'm sure I heard hoofbeats."
They sat motionless, listening. The still jungle dripped with water. Far away a barking deer called.
"You're imagining things," scoffed Nark.
"And was I imagining things when I parachuted into the DZ?" said Bolan. He twisted in his saddle and cocked an ear.
The horses tugged at the reins, trying to nibble the ferns bordering the trail. "We'll miss the cast," said Nark.
A gust of wind swayed the treetops, showering them with water. "Okay, let's go," said Bolan, and they resumed their journey.
A little later the trees thinned out, and they came to shacks and wheelbarrows. They dismounted and tied the horses to a wheelbarrow.
"I'll get the keys from the watchman," said Nark.
"What is this place?" asked Bolan.
"A tin mine that went bust," said Nark. "The owners are in Bangkok looking for a buyer." He went off, swallowed by the night.
Bolan waited, rubbing his arms for warmth. This detour would cost them a good hour, but it could not be helped. They needed shelter to transmit. It was too wet to send in the open air.
An electric generator broke the night's stillness, and lights came on everywhere. Now Bolan could see an entrance to a tunnel and a water tower.
Nark appeared, key ring in hand. "Won't need to pedal the ge-gene tonight," he said with a gesture at the lights.
They opened the mine office and carried in their gear. They lit a stove, cleared a table and started setting up the radio.
The radio was a Shashkov Mark II, a 1953 model, ancient, but the only Russian radio Stony Man Farm could lay its hands on. As with most old sets, it required a very long antenna.
They strung one hundred feet of wire between trees, attached it to the set and grounded it. They connected the Morse key and the earphones. Nark plugged the power lead into an overhead lamp socket, and Bolan switched on the set. The needle rose. Bolan took an earphone and tapped the key.
"Works? "asked Nark.
"Works," said Bolan.
"Toss you for who sends," said Nark, bringing out a fifty-satang coin.
"You send it," Bolan told him. "I'm not as good as the CIA with bugs."
The key was a semiautomatic transversal that was operated by moving it from side to side. A much faster key than the up-and-down one, it required considerable experience.
They pulled up chairs and sat down. Bolan began writing on a message pad. He wrote a sentence per page, handing the page to Nark for encoding. In the message, Bolan gave Stony Man Farm a sit-rep, requested the air drop and gave the coordinates for the drop zone.
As he was encoding the last page Nark said, "Wouldn't it be a good idea to ask for a team of Green Berets? They could help us lead the Meo. That Tiger hardsite won't be a walkover, and you know the Meo— they don't have much taste for protracted warfare. If the first assault fails, they're quite capable of packing up and going home. You and I can't be everywhere."
"There won't be any protracted warfare," Bolan replied. "Washington would never agree to troops. Troops leave bodies, and one of the stipulations on this mission is no sign of U.S. involvement. Why do you think we're playing at being Russians? If the Thais ever found out we staged a covert mission on their territory they'd pull out of SEATO. We can't afford that. You're acting typically CIA. I'm more modest, like the Meo. By the way, how many people know who we really are?''
"Only Vang Ky," said Nark. "All the other headmen have been told it's a Russian job, not that they care who's behind it as long a
s it gives them a chance to settle a score with the Chinese. They really hate the Chinese."
"Well, they've been fighting them for close to four thousand years," said Bolan.
"Mind you, we're not all that popular either," said Nark. "Some of the things I've heard the Meo say about us made me glad I was a KGB and not a CIA agent."
"That's not surprising either," said Bolan. "Not after Nam. If I were a Meo, I'd be a rabid anti-Yankee. We used them, then dumped them. It was criminal."
"I don't know about that," said Nark pensively. "I don't think we used them any more than they used us. They weren't in that war exactly for altruistic reasons. You know what Vang Jay told me once? Thanks to the Americans, the Meo now have a big enough army to drive the Lao into the Mekong. That was Vang Jay's plan for the postwar period—turn Laos into a Meo kingdom. I think you—"
The horses' neighing sent Bolan crashing through the door. As he came out, a man in a black Montagnard suit detached himself from under the window and fled down the slope. Bolan took off after him, pursuing him into the trees.
The Montagnard swerved like a rabbit, running this way and that, then he streaked for something white. A horse.
Bolan run full tilt, catching up, as the Montagnard was about to mount the horse. He grabbed him by the shoulders, and they crashed to the ground. The horse took off, and Bolan and the Montagnard rolled, thrashing in the, undergrowth.
A knife appeared in the Montagnard's hand. Bolan grabbed the man's wrist, his other hand going for the man's throat. The Montagnard twisted and turned, his free hand clawing at Bolan's face. But Bolan held on, and the man's movements weakened. Then he began kicking the way men do when they're being strangled.
"Surrender!" Bolan hissed in Meo.
"I surrender," the man wheezed.
Bolan released his hold on the man's throat. In return he got a punch in the head from the guy's hand, which held a rock. He fell to the ground, blood flowing from his head, but he retained his grip on the man's wrist. A moment later he was back on top again, and this time he did not release the pressure on the man's throat.
The knife fell; the Montagnard was dead.
Bolan found his head scarf, which had come off during the fight, shouldered the corpse, and walked back. So he had been right after all, he reflected. There had been someone following them. Once again his senses had proved right, though this time it was more obvious; he had heard hoofbeats. Bolan still could not explain where his sense of danger on the DZ had come from. Perhaps he never would know, he told himself. Sometimes you just had to trust those age-old survival instincts and not think too much about them.
Executioner 061 - Tiger War Page 3