by Ted Bell
“Don’t shoot the dog, Stoke,” Jet said.
“What?”
“Tell him to release the dog.”
“Are you completely nuts?”
“Just do it.”
“Maybe you’re suicidal, but he isn’t going to let this dog go long as I got my gun in his ear.”
“Then take the leash away from him with your other hand, Stoke. Then you’ve got control of the dog and him.”
“Okay. That sounds more like it. You heard her, Arnold. I’m going to take the dog now. You just be cool and nobody gets his head ventilated.”
As a precaution, Stoke ground the gun barrel deeper into the German’s ear canal while he unwound the dog leash from his hand and wrapped it around his own. Instantly, the barking and snarling animal attempted to rip Stoke’s arm from the socket. He was getting jerked around so badly by the lunging Doberman it was hard to keep the Schmeisser aimed at Arnold’s head. It wouldn’t take Arnold long to figure out that now was his chance.
“All right, I got the dog. Now what?”
“Just let him go, Stoke,” Jet said. “It’s okay.”
“Jet, seriously, have you lost your mind?”
“She’s my dog, Stoke.”
“Your dog.”
“Right. Her name is Blondi. She’s just happy to see me, aren’t you, girl?”
“Your funeral,” Stoke said and dropped the chain. He was all out of argument with the woman. The big dog bounded across the floor and, instead of going for her jugular, immediately began lathering Jet’s cheeks and forehead with wet sloppy kisses.
“Good dog, Blondi,” Jet said, patting his head and nuzzling her cheek against the dog’s neck. She put both arms around Blondi’s neck and hugged the big Doberman to her.
“You believe this?” Stoke asked Arnold, the two of them standing there looking down at her.
“Not really,” Arnold said in surprisingly good English.
“Schatzi gave her to me when she was a puppy,” Jet said. “Didn’t he, baby? Right? Who’s my buddy?”
Stoke and Arnold just looked at each other.
“Hey, Arnold,” Stoke said, “You think I could fit in your uniform?”
Arnold looked at him.
“Little tight across the shoulders, maybe?” Stoke said. “What do you think?”
Chapter Forty-one
Gulf of Oman
CACIQUEROLLED HEAVILY IN THE SIX-FOOT SEAS. THE SIXTY-four-foot trawler, under the command of Captain Ali al-Houri, had seen better days. Her old diesel was moody. Temperamental. But Brock’s new sidekick Ahmed had assured Hawke that she was at least seaworthy enough for their current purposes: a surveillance circumnavigation of the island of Masara and a closeup look at Fort Mahoud itself.
Ahmed had found and chartered the old trawler for them, assuring them that she normally did a milk run along the coast from Ras al Hadd down to Salalah. The theory was that since she’d frequented these waters for years, no one on the island or the mainland would pay her any mind. With a checklist prepared and supplemented by Brock, he’d made sure she was properly provisioned.
Properly, in Brock’s parlance, included weapons, explosives, experimental optical equipment, hi-res digital video and still cameras with telescopic lenses, a dozen SEAL scuba rigs, a bottle of Gosling’s Black Seal for Hawke, and a case of Budweiser for Brock.
Between the wily Ahmed and the well-connected Brock, it seemed, anything on earth was attainable. Watching the supplies arrive on board, Hawke imagined that if he told Ahmed he simply could not proceed with the hostage rescue until he had the original of van Gogh’s Sunflowers under his arm, the framed painting would appear a few hours later.
As it was, a brand-new U.S. Navy SDV minisubmarine was hidden under an old tarp, lashed to blocks on the stern. The SDV, a Swimmer Delivery Vehicle developed by the navy for the SEALs, had been just part of the shipment arriving at Muscat on a Hercules C-130 the night before.
At the moment, Cacique was steering a northeasterly course along the Masara Bank, a good fishing spot lying roughly a mile off the eastern coast of the island of Masara. They were doing a leisurely eight knots in the rough seas. Hawke had been outside at the port rail with his high-powered Zeiss binoculars for the last hour. Finally, he’d grown weary of reconnoitering endless miles of bleak grey rock being pounded by heavy waves and stowed both the Sony video camera and the Zeiss Ikons.
The sun was already dipping below the yardarm of the stubby mast for’ard of the pilothouse. The only thing of interest Hawke had seen all afternoon was a herd of green turtles and a small blue fishing boat chugging along towing a string of white dinghies behind her. He’d counted ten of them bobbing along like baby ducks behind their mother. It was something he’d not seen in any other part of the world.
Hawke and Brock sat inside the pilothouse at a small table strewn with maps, satellite photos, and thermal-imaging photos of the island and Fort Mahoud itself. A dedicated U.S. bird launched six hours ago had shot the Oman recon photos Hawke was looking at now. The mood inside the pilothouse was grim. It had rapidly become obvious to both men that their early plan of getting the hostages out by air would be well nigh impossible.
Ahmed, having grown weary of the endless strategizing, had wandered out onto the afterdeck and found himself a comfortable patch of precious shade. Despite all the pitching and rolling, he was now lounging in one of the old-fashioned steamer chairs lined up along the stern rail. His chair was carefully aligned amidships for minimum yaw, facing aft. He was reading a ten-year-old copy of Architectural Digest, happily flipping through the pages. He seemed to have decided that, since he was going to be living aboard this old tub for a few days, he might as well make himself as comfortable as possible.
The desolate island of Masara lay just off their port beam, bleak and, so far, uninhabited. It was basically little more than a large rocky outcropping situated a few miles off, and lying parallel to, the coast of Oman. So far, the only island residents Hawke had observed were massive flocks of white flamingos. Ahmed had told him that morning that the bird-watching in the afternoon would be spectacular. Oman was the central corridor in the migratory pathway of thousands of exotic birds journeying between Asia and Africa.
Hawke had thanked him for this very useful information but said that he was far more interested in whirlybirds at the present moment. He was searching for some place, hidden from the spy cams above, where he might put a chopper on the ground. A wide spit of sand revealed at low tide might even be sufficient. Hell, anything remotely flat would do.
So far, nothing. No smooth hilltops, no elevated plateaus, no roads. Hawke saw nothing remotely resembling a place to set even a small bird down. Nor did the surveillance photos reveal any flat surfaces within or atop the fortress that looked large enough to accommodate a helicopter.
Finally, there were no large interior courtyards, a thing that Hawke had been hoping for. He concluded there was simply no place to land aircraft of any kind on Masara. This “simple snatch,” as Brock had come to call the mission, would clearly have to be accomplished from the sea. Getting this job done was, to all appearances, going to be an extremely difficult proposition.
Somehow, he and Brock had to figure out how to storm this bloody fortress, subdue a few dozen French mercenaries, rescue the sultan and his harem, and get them safely back out to Cacique. And they had forty-eight hours to figure it out. Brick Kelly had called Alex on the sat phone earlier in the day. He said events were moving very rapidly in Washington and London. The president and the British prime minister had just issued a joint statement saying that any invasion of Oman by any foreign government would have serious consequences.
“Don’t let us get to that point, Alex,” Brick had said before he hung up. “And don’t get caught. Brock’s already a no-name NOC. As you well know, you’re an honorary one. The U.S. has no dog in this fight. Got it?”
Hawke now looked over at the man standing at the old-fashioned wooden wheel, feet planted wide apar
t, eyes peeled for shoals.
“Captain, how do they get supplies out to this island? Food and drink for the museum staffers, I mean?”
“Please call me Ali, sir,” the captain said, smiling back at Hawke.
“All right, Ali, tell me about the supply situation.”
“There is a long steel dock, sir. Built into the rocks just below the fort. Where the daily tourist ferries tie up. The supply ship, she comes once a week. She ties up there, too.”
“A supply ship,” Hawke said, “Same day each week?”
“Yes, sir. Comes every Saturday night around nine. Day after tomorrow. Just like clockwork, sir.”
“Very helpful, thank you.”
“In about fifteen minutes we’ll be rounding Point Mala, sir. Then you’ll be able to see our beautiful fort in 3-D living color.”
Hawke had taken an immediate liking to the Cacique’s skipper. He’d already decided he could trust him. Years of exposure to sun and salt air had weathered his skin to a fine, nutty brown. He was a good-looking fellow, in his midforties perhaps, with thick black hair just going grey. His large brown eyes were sad and watchful above the jutting nose. He had strong white teeth and a mouth that, while smiling at the moment, could easily harden into a fierce line when the shooting started.
Hawke had sized the captain up as both a steadfast friend and a merciless enemy. He was glad to have him aboard.
“Here’s our problem,” he now said to Brock, tapping his index finger on a faded drawing appended to a larger elevation of the fort.
“The twin towers,” Brock said with only a trace of irony.
“Right. Standing guard over the only entrance in the entire structure, according to Ahmed. Look here. These steps leading up from the sea to the entrance. I have them rising fifty feet above sea level, leading up to this main gate. The only way in or out. If I were Rommel, I would have put heavy machine guns in those towers. High-rise pillboxes. I would imagine the Chinaman in charge has done the same.”
“No way inside from the rear?” Brock asked.
“No. The rear of the fort is built right into the bluff facing the sea. Surrounded on three sides by solid rock. Whoever built this bloody castle was thinking ahead.”
“We can’t sneak up behind them, we can’t land on their roof. Looks to me like we’ve got to go up the front steps and knock on the front door.”
“With the towers providing overlapping fields of fire.”
“Turning anyone attempting to mount the steps into hamburger.”
“And any approaching vessel to scrap iron. Sounds exciting, doesn’t it, Harry?”
The captain turned away from the wheel.
“All right, Commander, you can see the fort just coming into view on our port bow!” Ali said. “I won’t be able to get any closer or slow down, I’m afraid. Otherwise it will look like we’re looking.”
“Let’s go see this thing,” Hawke said.
He and Brock got up from the table and quickly moved outside onto the afterdeck. Ahmed put down his magazine and looked up as if pleasantly surprised by all the commotion. “Hate to disturb your studies, old fellow,” Hawke said. “Apparently Fort Mahoud just hove into view.”
The three men ran for’ard and stood at the rail on the port bow. Hawke and Brock both had their glasses trained on Point Mala. Gulls and terns whirled about above the towering waves that hammered the ragged and rocky shoreline. The air was misty along that point of land, and it was difficult to see much from this distance.
Hawke found himself watching with not a little apprehension as Cacique plowed through the deep, rolling waves and bits and pieces of the fort became more and more visible. They had the thing almost abeam now, and as soon as this huge wave receded, he’d have a much better idea of what he was up against.
Hawke was both thrilled and appalled by what he saw. Fort Mahoud was far more forbidding in reality than on paper. Huge waves continously smashed against its battlements and retreated. It stood there as it had for centuries, back against the sheer-faced wall, impregnable and unassailable.
It was as magnificent an example of military architecture as he’d ever seen. The fortress was built of whitish stone that seemed to gleam in the late-afternoon sun. It was battlemented, crenellated, and towered. The most imposing aspect was the looming, perfectly circular towers facing the sea. He could see the wide steps now, leading up to the large arch of the gate. It appeared to be a massive iron-barred affair that was raised or lowered from within the fort.
“See that gate?” he said to Brock standing beside him.
“Oh, yeah. I was just checking it out. I got one word for you. Semtex.”
“Yes. Assuming there is still someone alive at the top of the steps to set the charges.”
“I guess we can forget about coming down that cliff face.”
“I guess so,” Hawke said.
Fort Mahoud had been purposefully designed and built with its back hard up against a sheer perpendicular wall of reddish rock. The rock face swept up smoothly above the fort, with neither a crevasse nor a crack to be seen, for a good five hundred feet up to the top. Any thought of a nighttime abseil down that vertical cliff face was now clearly seen to be impossible. It was obvious that the only possible approach was the suicide steps leading up from the sea.
“Is this as close as we can get?” Brock asked.
“It won’t get any better closer up,” Hawke said. “What do you think, Irontail?”
Brock looked at him. “What did you call me?”
“I got it from the director. He says bullets bounce off your butt. So, what do you think?”
“Okay, how do you like your news?”
“Straight up.”
“Reminds me a little bit of Normandy in a funny, bad, way,” Brock said with a wry smile. “All we have to do is make it to the beach alive and then, completely exposed, dodge a few bullets going up fifty feet of steps, scale two sixty-foot-high towers and overpower the guards up there, take out a couple of their heavy machine guns, blast our way through an iron gate, kill a few dozen heavily armed ex–French Legionnaires and some Chinese characters, and then get twenty women and god knows how many children safely off this island.”
“I’m sorry,” Hawke said, “I wasn’t listening. What did you say, Brock?”
“I said, all we have to do is—”
“Hold on a second,” Hawke said. He’d been scanning the steel dock built into the rock on either side of the staircase. Now, he quickly swung his glasses a few degrees back to the left and froze. He’d seen something there a few seconds ago, during a break in the waves. Now it had disappeared underwater. An anomaly in the rock, perhaps, just above the waterline. He started moving the glasses in tiny increments farther to the left. The binoculars froze once more.
“What have you got, Hawke?” Brock said, raising his binoculars. “You see something I don’t see?”
“Ahmed, take a look at this, will you?” Hawke said, handing the man at his left the Zeiss glasses. “Left of the staircase. About four or five meters. Almost invisible. Tucked up under the dock.”
“Ah, yes, I see it.”
“What is it? It looks like some kind of small crescent-shaped opening in the rock.”
“It leads to the powder magazine.”
For the first time all day, the sun came out on Alex Hawke’s face. “The powder magazine?”
“Yes, sir. For wartime purposes. So forces on the mainland could resupply the garrison. They could secretly ferry stores inside the fort during a siege. During the night. Powder and ammunition.”
“Strange, I didn’t notice it on any of the plans I saw.”
“You won’t see it anywhere.”
“And why is that, exactly?” Brock said, newfound optimism in his voice. He raised his glasses and found the near-invisible tunnel again.
“A military secret, Mr. Brock. If the fortress plans unfortunately fell into enemy hands…well, you could easily see what a disaster that would be, sir,
if your enemy discovered a tunnel leading directly inside the fort to the powder magazine. Field Marshal Rommel had it sealed up for just such a reason in early 1941. I myself had it reopened when I restored Fort Mahoud to original specifications. Frankly, I’d forgotten all about it. It’s not on the tour.”
“That’s good news,” Hawke said, “Do you think our Chinese friends are aware of it?”
“I very much doubt it. It’s only a bit of chance that you yourself saw it. It is only visible from the sea at a certain precise angle. And even then, the chances of ever seeing it are minute.”
“Why?”
“The entrance is completely below sea level most of the time. Only at dead low tide, like we have right now, for a short time, is it visible and accessible.”
“Feel like a swim?” Hawke asked Brock, a wide grin on his face.
“A swim?” Brock hadn’t told Hawke this, but he was something of a landlubber. Unlike his lordship, who seemed in his element at sea, Harry Brock longed for the feel of good old shifting sand beneath his feet. Compared to Hawke, he was Ahab the A-rab, the Sheik of the Burning Sands.
“We’ll wait until dark. Then swim over there and check out this very serendipitous chink in the armor.”
“Yeah,” Brock said, his expression grim. “Thank God for serendipitous chinks.”
“Ever hear of an outfit called ‘Thunder and Lightning’?” Hawke asked.
“Hell yes. Everybody in the community has. Legendary. Fitz McCoy and Charlie Rainwater. Seriously bad boys. Bunch of kick-ass mercs based out of Martinique, right? Some old fort with a fancy French name.”
“Right. They call it Fort Whupass now.”
Brock laughed. “You know those guys?”
“We shared some special moments in Cuba a few years ago. When Fidel went on vacation and his generals took over. It got noisy. We all got along pretty well.”
“Still have their number?” Brock said, a big smile on his face.
“No, but my buddy Stokely Jones does. Maybe I’ll give old Stoke a call.”