by Ted Bell
“What?”
“Yessir. I know because I used to work for him. Did a security job for him at an oilfield in Saudi. He signed my paychecks. His name is Beauregard, Colonel Brett Beauregard from Port Arthur, Texas.”
Hawke could not contain his surprise. “Beauregard! You don’t mean to say you actually worked for Vulcan, Gator?”
“I did, yessir. Before the colonel got himself in all that hot water and went to ground. He’s back, looks like, and working for Putin. He was working here in Cuba until recently, the guy said, coordinating Cuban special operations for Uncle Joe.”
“For Uncle Joe. Not Putin, but Uncle Joe. Is that what he said? Were those his precise words?”
“Yessir.”
“What else did he say?”
“Not much. He died.”
Hawke didn’t say a word. Just got to his feet and started pacing back and forth, puffing his cigarette.
Finally he stopped and said, “Harry, I’m going to need your help. I’m finally starting to get an understanding of how this all fits together.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean all of it. Cuba, that goddamn Feuerwasser demonstration, bringing down that airliner and using a bloody Yank to do it! Exploiting American weakness, throwing everybody off their game . . . so he can . . . redraw the map of the world. And convincing himself that nobody will do one damn thing about it.”
“I got a feeling that ain’t exactly true,” Gator said.
“Whatever do you mean?” Hawke replied.
“I mean I got a suspicion you’ll do something about it, sir.”
Hawke laughed. He liked this kid. A lot.
“Gator, I want you and Mr. Brock here, and Mr. Jones, to meet me up in the war room in exactly thirty minutes. I need to get my thoughts together. And, right now, if I can find him, I need to ring up Ambrose Congreve in the U.K.—I hope to God he’s back from Siberia—and see if he’s found out who the hell this Uncle Joe character is. Our number one mystery man at the moment.”
The two got up. Harry paused at the door and said, “Isn’t that what they used to call Joe Stalin? Uncle Joe?”
“That’s right, Harry. But he’s dead. Oh, and do me a favor while you’re waiting. Create a digital file for all the stuff you can get on Siberia. Sat maps of the region in question, thermal overprints, you know the drill. Standard stuff.”
“We going there next, boss?”
Hawke just smiled and closed the door behind them.
“HULLO? ALEX? IS THAT YOU on the line?”
“It is indeed, Ambrose. I’m still aboard Blackhawke, steaming for Key West. Listen, I’m so glad you’re home safe. I’ve just found out some information regarding recent events in Siberia. During your ill-advised adventure with Halter, did you two run across someone called ‘Uncle Joe’?”
“We did indeed. It’s a long story, I’m afraid. But I’m very glad you called. I’ve been worried sick about Professor Halter since I got back here.”
“Why is that?” Hawke said.
“I think he may have feigned a heart attack in order to save my life. As I said, it’s a long story. But he’s either dead of a heart attack in Siberia, or they’ve got him in some dreadful cell in Lubyanka Prison in Moscow, KGB goons torturing him to death for his splendid treason. I’ve got to do something to help him soon. Or at least find out the truth. Bring his body home to Cambridge for a proper burial in St. Paul’s Cemetery if need be, Alex.”
“As it happens, I’m planning another Siberian excursion at the moment. Like to tag along? With your brains and my charming personality, we’re bound to be able to get Halter out of there, one way or the other. Are you in? Diana will kill me, dragging you back there so soon. But there you have it.”
“Of course I’m in, damn you! Why didn’t you tell me you were going! When and where shall I meet you?”
“St. Petersburg central rail station. My pilot’s waiting for me at Key West, Ambrose. I intend to fly nonstop to St. Petersburg on the Gulfstream. Let’s agree to meet at the rail station. Checked the rail schedules already. The Red Star, a Trans-Siberian express, pulls out at midnight. Can you be there?”
“Of course. Just the two of us? It could get very spicy when Mr. Putin learns you’re poking about in his backyard, even more than you have been.”
“Then you’ll be happy to hear that I’m planning on bringing a few friends along for the ride. Mr. Jones, for one, likes to travel to exotic locales. As does our perennial favorite, Mr. Brock. And then there are a few other invitees, including a young chap whom I’ve only just met in Cuba. Fellow named Gator, for some reason or other. Rather one of those one-man-army type of chappies, if you get my drift.”
“Good idea, Alex. And, right now, the way things are going in the world, I would say we may well need a couple of one-man armies for Hawke’s historic invasion of Russia.”
Hawke smiled and said, “‘Hawke’s invasion of Russia,’ did you say? I bloody well like that. Let’s reconvene in the ticket agent’s office at the St. Petersburg rail station, shall we? Say, at eleven sharp the night of? I’m already ordering your billet online.”
“The game is afoot, as the celestial Sherlock Holmes used to say.”
“I would say that Holmes, as usual, got it right. Don’t forget your cloak and dagger, Constable.”
CHAPTER 78
Key West
Stoke paid for his newspapers, coffee, and Danish. Then he whirled around, banged out through the swinging screen doors of the Cuban Coffee Queen on Margaret Street in Key West, ran flat out two blocks east, and jumped into his black raspberry GTO convertible. The sound of that monster engine exploding and blatting into life reverberated through the sleepy, shady streets of old Key West on a quiet Sunday morning.
Normally, it took him twenty minutes to get from his favorite morning joe spot in town out to the navy docks. On this particular morning, he did it in twelve. What he had in his hands was something the boss would find extremely interesting.
It was 6:15 A.M. EST when Stokely made it back aboard Blackhawke. It was already hot as hell and his carefully pressed Cuban guayabara was sticking to him like a second skin, albeit one of the white persuasion.
He found Hawke in the war room, all alone, carefully studying satellite videos of some new Russian military training facility in Siberia. It was where they were all headed next, and the boss was deep into his brass tacks mode. “God’s in his heaven but the Devil’s in the details” kind of thing he had going on. Man was definitely in the zone.
“Morning, boss,” Stoke said, pushing through the green baize doors.
“Stoke,” Hawke muttered, lost in thought, rewinding a scene and staring at it again.
“You gotta see this!” Stoke said.
“See what?”
“This. Just hit the streets.”
“What is it, Stoke?” he said, finally lifting his head.
“Have a look, boss, hot off the presses.”
Stoke handed him a copy of that morning’s New York Times. A bold black headline dominated most of the front page above the fold:
US INVADES CUBA, PUTIN SENDS TROOPS
AND TANKS INTO ESTONIA, POLAND
Hawke stared at it for a long moment, put his feet up onto the table, stuck a cigarette in the corner of his mouth, and lit it. He exhaled a long, long plume of blue smoke and said: “Well, I’ll be damned. Didn’t waste any time, did he?”
“That’s all you got to say?”
“What else is there to say?”
“Boss! Don’t you see what they’re saying? They’re blaming us for starting World War Three! You and me! Oh, man, we’re going to go down in the history books as the nuclear trigger! The two outlaws who started the last World War . . .”
“No, Putin is blaming us for starting World War Three.”
“You saying there’s a difference, boss?”
“Well, technically, no. It is the New York Times, after all. The Daily Worker. Putin could blame us for inve
nting wine coolers and they’d run with it.”
“This doesn’t bother you? Even a little? Seriously?”
“Nope. May I remind you that just last week, Russia tried to blow up Miami? Putin takes out American cities, we then take out his ability to do that. Period. He has zero interest in going nuclear right now. He’s just taking it to the next level. Just as he’s been planning to do all along. Expand his borders and nobody gives a good hot damn. He knew I’d rise to the bait. Ever notice how he kept putting that bloody explosive of his in my way? First, he demos it on a sunken freighter in France, then we find it on that Russian spy ship leaving Cuba, and then used by proxy terrorists in Miami. I’m surprised he hasn’t already had a case of that crap delivered here to the docks as a bon voyage gift.”
“Wait, you’re saying that Feuerwasser stuff is phony?”
“I am. He fooled the hell out of me. Hell, out of all of us. But I just got the results back from independent testing at both the CIA and Department of Defense forensic labs. It’s just plain old vodka.”
“Vodka?”
“Yeah. One hundred percent cheap German rotgut. He’s shipped hundreds of thousands of cases throughout the world. Hoping to use them as a bargaining threat against London and Washington when push, at long last, comes to shove. Leave me and my armored divisions alone or I’ll blow up Edinburgh . . . or Atlanta. Don’t be surprised if you hear him threaten us with exploding vodka in the next twenty-four hours. At the same time, he was going after my son. Attempts to kill him in London, Washington, and, just yesterday, my hunting lodge up in Scotland. Trying to keep me off balance.”
“What? Scotland?”
“Yeah. Pelham just called me via radio phone from Castle Drum, our old family lodge up on the Isle of Skye. KGB landed twenty-one commandos off a submarine up there and made a run at Castle Drum and grabbing Alexei. Those Russian thugs are dead now, thanks to Inspector Walker and Sergeant Archie Carstairs. Not to mention Pelham and Laddie McPhee. The bastards did murder Laddie’s son Colin, however, and they’ll pay for that, too.”
“Alexei, he’s all right?”
“Absolutely. A bit young to be defending castles right after his sixth birthday, but apparently he was well up to the challenge with his trusty .22 rifle. Runs in the family, I suppose. You didn’t bring me another of those aromatic Cuban coffees by any chance, did you? Is that a ‘no’?”
“Um . . . I got an extra Danish? So, excuse me, what did they use to level that power plant?”
“Some hybrid method of imploding C-4 that eliminates any trace of itself. Something like that, I think. Ask Harry, he knows.”
“Yeah, but what about that freighter you saw in France? What about that—”
Hawke’s mind was already back in Siberia.
Stoke just smiled and headed for the door. Man never failed to amaze him. Never.
HAWKE WAS SOUND ASLEEP IN his cabin. He’d left instructions for his steward to wake him at dawn. His plane was wheels up at six, soaring across the pond for their rendezvous with destiny.
What was that noise? Oh. His phone. He rolled over and picked up.
“This better be good,” he said.
“It’s not. It’s Brick, Alex. Wake up. All hell and half of heaven has broken loose up here in the nation’s capital.”
“Talk.”
“The White House went batshit when the morning papers hit the streets. I take it you’ve seen the Times? They’re demanding that you get here today if not sooner and explain yourself. They just called me. And Admiral Moore. And probably your boss in London by now. The Big Cheese is looking for you, pal, Sir David wants to know where the hell you are.”
“What’d you tell him?”
“That you were tired and taking a sick day.”
“True. But, really, what did you say?”
“That I didn’t know but I’d try to find out.”
“And then what?”
“And then it’s up to you. Where are you?”
“Key West. Doing a little fishing. Lots of mackerel around the docks.”
“Can you please tell me what you’re up to, Alex? I won’t breathe a word, I promise. Just in case I have to send somebody out to look for you.”
“Well, let’s see. How about if you call your Deep Throat at the Washington Post. Tell him you’ve got a great above-the-fold header for next Sunday’s paper—‘Hawke’s Invasion of Russia!’”
THE RED ARROW CHUGGED INTO the tiny station. Tvas was deserted in the predawn hours. It was cold as billy-be-damned here in the Siberian wilderness, a howling blizzard. Gator and the Raiders had enlisted the help of two burly porters to help them get all their gear off the baggage car and onto the icy platform.
Hawke stood, stamping his boots to keep his circulation going and gazing at the growing mound of combat materiel. “One logistics detail, I’m sure you’re aware of, Constable. That would be getting to the—”
“Already arranged, dear boy. Chap in the village I put on Scotland Yard’s payroll last time out. Blacksmith named Orlov. Should be here in a tick. Charming fellow, utterly charming.”
“What’s this Orlov got in mind?”
“Three large sleds. Six strong horses. And mounds of blankets, buckets of caviar, and oceans of vodka for the cross-country run.” Hawke wasn’t listening.
“I’m looking forward to meeting this Uncle Joe.”
“Prepare to be amazed.”
“That close to the real thing?”
“Bastard son, or genetically engineered replica. It’s positively astounding, Alex.”
“What’s his relationship with the American? The colonel who blows civilian aircraft out of the sky.”
“Stormy, to say the least. When Halter and I first saw him, Uncle Joe was reading Colonel Beauregard the riot act about something and—look!—here’s my man Orlov with our sleighs. If we press on, we can be there before first light.”
And then Congreve was bounding off through the snow in his bear coat, not quite as streamlined as he’d once been, but calling out for Stokely to get the men moving, for heaven’s sake. Hawke smiled, listening to him harangue the team loading the dog sleds with gear. For a man pushing sixty, and a bit on the plumpish side, his energy and zest for life was amazing. Indefatigable, cheery, just the kind of fellow any man might want for a dear friend. And, standing next to you in a gunfight.
Now, for better or worse, these two old friends were waltzing right into the bloody thick of it once more.
CHAPTER 79
KGB HQ, Russia
Ambrose led the men into the snowy woods. To the precise spot where he and Halter had hidden such a short time ago.
Their entire team were dressed in the winter combat whites of the Tenth Mountain Division. Congreve had promised snow, and he’d been right on the money. They looked like swiftly moving ghosts, with invisible feet, slipping silently through the trees.
“Here’s the spot, just here,” Congreve whispered to Hawke. “Clear shot at the main gate just outside the entrance at KGB II headquarters. Something’s going on. See the black Audi with the chauffeur asleep at the wheel out front?”
Hawke raised the binoculars and had a look.
“An A8. The kind of car you’re likely to see buzzing around the Kremlin,” Hawke said.
“Exactly,” Congreve said. “I recognized that plate number from the last time I was here. He’s back all right. That’s Uncle Joe’s car and driver, all right.”
“Good. I thought we’d end up in Moscow going door-to-door looking for a ghost. Do you know who belongs to the battered old jeep as well?”
“That would be our American cousin, Colonel Beauregard. He lives here on the base. Halter and I both saw his jeep parked out there before we saw him getting dressed down by Uncle Joe and his military tribunal. Halter told me that both the Colonel and old Joe maintain offices in that headquarters building. And private sleeping quarters as well. I think we just got lucky.”
“We could use a bit right now. What’
s at the other end of that road disappearing around the trees over there?”
“That’s the original and primary Russian military operation. Four miles away. Nearly ten thousand troops over there. I’d leave that sleeping bear the hell alone.”
“What about the guard situation here?”
“Standard ops. Four Spetsnaz fighters outside at the gate, two more off duty inside the guard house. Twelve-hour shifts.”
“Okay, let’s get this done.” Hawke rose and went over to Stokely, who was crouching behind some fallen trees laden with snow, checking his weapons.
“Stoke, sniper time. We’re a go in five minutes. Where’s Fat?”
Stoke turned around and whispered over his shoulder, “Fat, on me. Now.”
“What’s up?” Saunders said, crouching down to join them, brushing fresh snow off the barrel of his sniper rifle.
“Two guards. Spetsnaz, nothing but trouble. One on either side of the gate. Take ’em out.”
“Spetsnaz? That’s all they got? Shit, man.” Fat brought up his weapon and sighted in on his designated targets, adjusting for elevation and windage.
“You don’t think much of them, Fat?” Hawke said. He always liked to hear what the real deal had to say. The guys who were in elbow deep and knew what they were talking about.
“Tell you the truth, compared to our reduced training lately, those dang boys over there are pure badass. Our current military is so watered down and pussified that it’s sickening, sir. I’m former Army Infantry and I’m pretty appalled at the lack of toughness in our current armed forces. I wanted my drill sergeants to kick my butt, ’cause I thought there was more dignity in getting hit in training than getting smoked in combat. But today? That’s why I quit. Hard-ass is just not allowed anymore because of the gradual pussification of standards.”
Hawke looked at him with new respect. He had the right man with the right gun. Same gun he’d probably carried as an Army Ranger sniper. A 5.56 semiauto sniper rifle.
“Take ’em out now, sir?”