Carte Blanche

by Jeffery Deaver

  Eight rounds left.

  The two guards seemed to know what they were about – ex-army, he guessed. Deafened by the shots, he couldn’t hear voices, but from the shadows in the corridor, he got the impression that the men had joined up with others, perhaps Dunne among them. He sensed, too, they were about to make a dynamic entry, all of them at once, fanning out, going high and low, right and left. Bond would have no chance against a formation like that.

  The shadows moved closer.

  Only one move was possible and not a very clever or subtle one. Bond flung a chair through the window and leapt after it, sprawling on the ground six feet below. He landed hard, but with nothing sprained or broken, and sprinted into the Green Way facility, now deserted of workers.

  Again he turned towards his pursuers and dropped to the ground, under cover of a detached bulldozer blade sitting near Resurrection Row. He aimed back at the window and a nearby door.

  Eight rounds left, eight rounds, eight…

  He put a bit of pressure on the sensitive trigger, waiting, waiting. Controlling his breathing as best he could.

  But the guards weren’t going to fall for a trap. The shattered window remained empty. That meant they were heading outside by other exits. Their intention, of course, was to flank him. Which they now did – and very effectively too. At the south end of the building Dunne and two Green Way guards sprinted to cover behind some lorries.

  Instinctively Bond glanced the other way and saw the two guards who’d fired on him in the corridor. They were moving in from the north. They too went to cover, behind a yellow-and-green digger.

  The bulldozer blade protected him from assault only from the west, and the hostiles weren’t coming from that direction but from the poles. Bond rolled away just as one of the men started to fire from the north – the Bushmaster was a short but frighteningly accurate weapon. The bullets thudded into the ground and clanged loudly against the bulldozer’s yoke and Bond was pelted with searing shards of lead and copper from the fracturing slugs.

  With Bond pinned down by the two in the north, the other team, Dunne leading, moved in closer from the opposite direction. Bond lifted his head slightly to scan for a target. But before he could paint one of his attackers, they moved on, finding cover among the many piles of rubbish, oil drums and equipment. Bond scanned again but couldn’t spot them.

  Suddenly earth exploded all around him as both groups caught him in a crossfire, the slugs finding homes closer and closer to where he huddled in a dip in the ground. The men to the north vanished behind a low hill, presumably intending to crest it, where they’d have a perfect vantage-point from which to snipe at him.

  Bond had to leave his position immediately. He turned and crawled as quickly as he could through grass and weeds, east, deeper into the grounds, feeling the chill of absolute vulnerability. The hill was behind him and to the left and he knew the two shooters would soon be at the top, targeting him.

  He tried to picture their progress. Fifteen feet from the top, ten, five? Bond imagined them easing slowly up to the hillock, then aiming at him.

  Now, he told himself.

  But he waited five harrowing seconds more, just to be sure. It seemed like hours. He then rolled on to his back and lifted his pistol over his feet.

  One guard was indeed standing on top of the rise, painting a target, his partner crouching beside him.

  Bond squeezed the trigger once, then shifted his aim to the right and fired again.

  The standing man gripped his chest and went down hard, tumbling to the base of the hill. The Bushmaster slid after him. The other guard had rolled away, unhurt.

  Six rounds left. Six.

  Four hostiles remaining.

  As Dunne and the others peppered his location with rounds, Bond rolled between oil drums in a tall stand of grass, studying his surroundings. His only chance of escape was through the front entrance, a hundred feet away. The pedestrian walkway was open. But a lot of unprotected ground separated him from it. Dunne and his two guards would have a good shooting position, as would the remaining guard still at the top of the hill to the north. He could-

  A rapid barrage erupted. Bond kept his face pressed into the dusty ground until there was a pause. Surveying the scene and the positions of the shooters, he rose fast and started to sprint to an anaemic tree – at its foot there was some decent cover: oil drums and the carcasses of engines and transmissions. He ran flat out. But halfway to his destination he stopped abruptly and spun round. One of the guards with Dunne assumed he was going to continue running and had stood tall, leading with his rifle to fire in front of Bond so the bullets would meet him a few yards further on. It hadn’t occurred to him that Bond was running solely to force a target to present; the double tap of Bond’s 9-millimetre rounds took the guard down. As the others ducked, he kept running and made it to the tree, then beyond that to a small mound of rubbish. Fifty feet from the gate. A series of shots from Dunne’s position forced him to roll into a patch of low vegetation.

  Four rounds.

  Three hostiles.

  He could make it to the gate in ten seconds but that would mean five of full exposure.

  He didn’t have much choice, though. He would soon be flanked. But then, looking for the enemy, he saw movement through a gap in two tall piles of construction debris. Low on the ground, barely visible through stands of grass, three heads were close together. The surviving guard from the north had joined Dunne and the man with him. They didn’t notice they were exposed to Bond and seemed to be whispering urgently, as if planning their strategy.

  All three men were in his field of fire.

  It wasn’t an impossible shot by any means, though with the light rounds and an unfamiliar gun, Bond was at a disadvantage.

  Still, he couldn’t let the opportunity pass. He had to act now. At any moment they’d realise they were vulnerable and go to cover.

  Lying prone, Bond aimed the boxy pistol. In competitive shooting, you’re never conscious of pulling the trigger. Accuracy is about controlling your breathing and keeping your arm and body completely still, with the sights of your weapon resting steadily on the target. Your trigger finger slowly tightens until the gun discharges, seemingly of its own accord; the most talented shooters are always somewhat surprised when their weapons fire.

  Under these circumstances, the second and third shots would have to come more quickly, of course. But the first was meant for Dunne, and Bond was going to be sure he didn’t miss.

  And he didn’t.

  One powerful crack, then two others in succession.

  In shooting, as in golf, you usually know the instant the missile leaves your control whether you’ve aimed well or badly. And the fast, shiny rounds struck exactly where they were aimed, as Bond had known they would.

  Except, he now realised to his dismay, accuracy wasn’t the issue. He’d hit what he’d aimed at, which turned out not to be his enemies at all, but a large piece of shiny chrome that one of the men – the Irishman, of course – must have found in a nearby skip and set up at an angle to reflect their images and draw Bond’s fire. The reflective metal tumbled to the ground.

  Dammit…

  The man who thinks of everything …

  Instantly the men split up, as Dunne would have instructed, and moved into position, now that Bond had helpfully revealed his exact location.

  Two ran to Bond’s right, to secure the gate, and Dunne to the left.

  One round left. One round.

  They didn’t know he was nearly out of ammunition, though they soon would.

  He was trapped, his only cover a low pile of cardboard and books. They were moving in a circle round him, Dunne in one direction, the other two guards together in another. Soon he’d be in a crossfire again, with no effective protection.

  He decided his only chance was to give them a reason not to kill him. He’d tell them he had information to help them get away or offer them a huge sum of money. Anything to stall. He called, ‘I’m
out!’ then stood, flinging the gun away, lifting his hands.

  The two guards to the right peered out. Seeing that he was unarmed, they cautiously came closer, crouching. ‘Don’t move!’ one called. ‘Keep your hands in the air.’ Their muzzles were aimed directly at him.

  Then, from nearby, a voice said, ‘What the hell are you doing? We don’t need a bloody prisoner. Kill him.’ The intonation was, of course, Irish.

  60

  The guards looked at each other and apparently decided to share the glory of murdering the man who had brought down Gehenna and killed several of their fellow workers.

  They both raised their black weapons to their shoulders.

  But just as Bond was about to dive to the ground in a hopeless bid to avoid the slugs, there was a crash behind him. A white van had ploughed through the gate, sending chain-link and razor wire flying. Now the vehicle skidded to a stop and the doors opened. A tall man in a suit, wearing body armour under his jacket, leapt out and began firing at the two guards.

  It was Kwalene Nkosi, nervous and tense, but standing his ground.

  The guards returned fire, though only to cover their retreat east, deeper into the Green Way facility. They disappeared into the brush. Bond glimpsed Dunne, who was surveying the situation calmly. He turned and sprinted in the same direction as the guards.

  Bond picked up the weapon he’d been using and ran to the police vehicle. Bheka Jordaan climbed out and stood beside Nkosi, who was looking around for more targets. Gregory Lamb peered out and stepped cautiously to the ground. He carried a large 1911 Colt.45.

  ‘You decided to come to the party after all,’ Bond said to her.

  ‘I thought it wouldn’t hurt to drive here with some other officers. While we were waiting nearby up the road I heard gunshots. I suspected poaching, which is a crime. That was sufficient cause to enter the premises.’

  She didn’t seem to be joking. He wondered if she had prepared the lines for her superiors. If so, she needed to work on her delivery, Bond decided.

  Jordaan said, ‘I brought a small team with me. Sergeant Mbalula and some other officers are securing the main building.’

  Bond told her, ‘Hydt’s in there – or was. His three partners too. I’d assume they’re armed by now. There’ll be other guards.’ He explained where the hostiles had been and gave a rough geography of the headquarters. Jessica’s office, too. He added that the older woman had helped him; she would not be a threat.

  At a nod from the captain, Nkosi, keeping low, started for the building.

  Jordaan sighed. ‘We had trouble getting back-up. Hydt’s being protected by somebody in Pretoria. But I called a friend in the Recces – our special-forces brigade. A team is on its way. They aren’t so much concerned about politics; they look for any excuse to fight. But it’ll be twenty or thirty minutes before they arrive.’

  Suddenly Gregory Lamb stiffened. Crouching low, he lumbered south, towards a stand of trees. ‘I’ll flank them.’

  Flank them? Flank who?

  ‘Wait,’ Bond shouted. ‘There’s nobody there. Go with Kwalene! Secure Hydt.’

  But the big man seemed not to have heard and plodded over the ground like an elderly Cape buffalo, disappearing into the brush. What the hell was he doing?

  Just then a few rounds peppered the ground near them. Bond and Jordaan dropped to the ground. He forgot about Lamb and looked for a target.

  Several hundred yards away Dunne and the two men with him had regrouped and paused in their retreat, firing back at their pursuers. Bullets hit near the van but caused no damage or injury. The three men vanished behind piles of rubbish on the edge of Disappearance Row, the seagull population thinning as the birds fled from the gunfire.

  Bond jumped into the driver’s seat of the van. In the back, he was pleased to see half a dozen large containers of ammunition. He started the engine. Jordaan ran to the passenger side. ‘I’m coming with you,’ she said.

  ‘Better if I do this myself.’ He suddenly recalled Philly Maidenstone’s recitation of Kipling’s verse, which he’d decided was not a bad battle cry.

  Down to Gehenna or up to the throne, He travels the fastest who travels alone…

  But Jordaan jumped into the seat beside him and slammed the door. ‘I said I’d fight by your side if it was legal to do so. Now it is. So go! They’re getting away.’

  Bond hesitated only a moment, then slammed the van into first and they bounded off down the dirt roads that gridded the huge complex, past Silicon Row, Resurrection Row, the power plants.

  And rubbish, of course – millions of tons of it: paper, carrier bags, bits of dull and shiny metal, fragments of ceramic and food scraps, over which the eerie canopy of frantic seagulls was reassembling.

  It was hard driving as they swerved around earth-moving equipment, skips and bales of refuse awaiting burial, but at least the winding route gave Dunne and the two guards no easy target. The three men turned and fired sporadically but were concentrating mostly on escaping.

  On her radio Jordaan called in and reported where they were and whom they were pursuing. The special-forces team would not arrive for at least another thirty minutes, Bond heard the dispatcher tell her.

  Just as Dunne and the other men reached the fence separating the filthy sprawl of the plant from the reclaimed area, one guard spun around and fired an entire magazine their way. The rounds pounded the front grille and tyres. The van jerked sideways, out of control, and ploughed head first into a pile of paper bales. The air bags deployed and Bond and Jordaan sat stunned.

  Seeing that their enemy was down, Dunne and the other guards began firing in earnest.

  Amid the sound of bullets slamming into sheet metal, Bond and Jordaan rolled out of the shuddering vehicle and into a ditch. ‘You injured?’ he asked.

  ‘No. I… It’s so loud!’ Her voice quivered but her eyes told Bond she was successfully fighting down her fear.

  From beneath the wing of the van, Bond had a good shot at one of their adversaries and, lying prone, he aimed with the automatic.

  One round left.

  He squeezed the trigger – but the instant the firing pin hit primer, the man ducked. He was gone when the bullet arrived.

  Bond grabbed an ammunition box and ripped off the lid. It contained only.223 rounds, for rifles. The second held the same. In fact, they all did. There were no 9mm pistol rounds. He sighed and looked through the van. ‘Do you have anything that’ll shoot these?’ He gestured at the wealth of useless bullets.

  ‘No assault rifles. All I have is this.’ She drew her own weapon. ‘Here, you take it.’

  The pistol was a Colt Python, a.357-calibre magnum – powerful and boasting a tight cylinder lock-up and superb pull. A good weapon. But it was a revolver, holding only six rounds.

  No, he corrected when he checked. Jordaan was a conservative gun owner and kept the chamber under the hammer empty. ‘Speedloader? Loose rounds?’

  ‘No.’

  So, they had five bullets against three adversaries with semi-automatic weapons. ‘You’ve never heard of Glocks?’ he muttered, slipping the empty one into his back waistband and weighing the Colt in his palm.

  ‘I investigate crimes,’ she replied coolly. ‘I don’t have much occasion to shoot people.’

  Though when those rare instances doarise, he thought angrily, it would be helpful to have the right tool. He said, ‘You go back. Just keep to cover.’

  She was looking steadily into his eyes, sweat beading at her temples, where her luxurious black hair frothed. ‘If you’re going after them I’m coming with you.’

  ‘Without a weapon, there’s nothing you can do.’

  Jordaan glanced to where Dunne and the others had disappeared. ‘They have a number of guns and we only have one. That’s not fair. We must take one away from them.’

  Well, maybe Captain Bheka Jordaan had a sense of humour, after all.

  They shared a smile and in her fierce eyes Bond saw the reflection of orange flames from the
burning methane. It was a striking image.

  Crouching, they slipped into Elysian Fields, using a dense garden of fine-needled fynbos varieties, watsonias, grasses, jacaranda and King Protea as cover. There were kigelia trees too, and some young baobabs. Even in the late autumn, much of the foliage was in full colour, thanks to the Western Cape climate. A brace of guinea fowl observed them with some irritation and continued on their awkward way. Their gait reminded Bond of Niall Dunne’s.

  He and Jordaan were seventy-five yards into the park when the assault began. The trio had been moving away but it seemed that they had done so merely to lure Bond and the SAPS officer further into the wilderness… and a trap. The men had split up. One of the guards dropped on to a hillock of soft green ground cover and laid down suppressing fire while the other – Dunne, too, possibly, though Bond couldn’t see him – crashed through the tall grasses towards them.

  Bond had a good shot and took it, but the guard went to cover the instant Bond fired. He missed again. Slow down, he told himself.

  Four rounds left. Four.

  Jordaan and Bond scrabbled into a dip near a small field filled with succulents and a pond that would probably be home to stately koi, come the spring. They looked up, over the grass veld, scanning for targets. Then what seemed to be a thousand shots, though it was probably more like forty or fifty, rained down on them, striking close, shattering rock and spraying water.

  The two men in khaki, probably desperate and frustrated at their delayed escape, tried a bold assault, charging Bond and Jordaan from different directions. Bond fired twice at the man coming at them from the left, hitting the man’s rifle and left arm. The guard cried out in pain and dropped the weapon, which tumbled to the bottom of the hill. Bond saw that, though the man’s forearm was injured, he’d drawn a pistol with his right hand and was otherwise capable of fighting. The second guard made a run to cover and Bond fired fast, tapping him somewhere on his thigh, but that wound too seemed superficial. He vanished into the brush.