With the sun in the wrong place, he might be under the bridge before he knew it. And he might first have to come to a depth of only ten feet a few minutes from now. But when he saw the span, he would go as deep as he dared, as far from human and electronic eyes as he could manage, as deep as the river if he could.
The numbers flicked again – 2.116 West. Beautiful. If he could just keep going, he’d make it. He’d make it for Tommy and Anne. And he double kicked again, hard – BAM! BAM…! one… two… three… four. The bridge must be close, and at 18:29 on the attack board clock he angled up, until he was just seven or eight feet from the surface. Somewhere to the south he could hear the steady beat of a relatively small engine, maybe a tug or even a fishing trawler – he was an expert on those.
And there was the bridge. He could see it through the goggles, maybe a hundred yards ahead. He was just beyond the middle of the river, since the latitude still showed 47.16 North. He went deep, kicking down, until the water grew very gloomy, and up ahead there was only darkness.
Back on shore, Pierre Savary was just about at the end of his tether. The search was still roaring ahead with boats, helicopters, and people, all doing their level best. They had located everything that could ever be located along the north shore. They’d questioned local fishermen, grilled freighter skippers, started to dredge the harbor for Gunther’s body. Low-swooping helicopters, thundering ten feet above the surface, had terrified the turbot.
Pierre had more or less had enough of what must now be a dead-end operation. “Paul,” he said to his equally worried assistant, “we have to check the south shore. We need to switch this operation right across the river.”
“But we know it’s impossible for him to be over there,” replied Ravel. “The coast guard say it’s out of the question. He couldn’t have gotten there. He could not have survived.”
“Quite frankly, kid, I don’t give a shit what they say, not at this stage. We’re going to hit the opposite shore with the big battalions. Cars, boats, choppers, and people.”
Pierre Savary was one of those educated Frenchmen who looked as if he had just stepped out of the front row of a rugby scrum. He could scarcely help that, but his face looked as if he was scowling even when he was chuckling. He had a permanent five o’clock shadow, and there was a tough aura about him that he knew and cultivated. But the scowl he wore this afternoon was genuine. He didn’t know why this was such a complete screwup, but it was, and Pierre was angry.
“Paul,” he growled, “I’m going to catch this fucker. If it’s the last thing I ever do, I’m going to catch him.”
Chapter 13
At 18:30, the tide turned. The flow of water out of the river into the ocean petered out and died. The twice-daily miracle of the planet Earth was in progress, and out beyond Pointe de Saint-Gildas, the Atlantic’s turbulent, cresting swells prepared for their onward drive up the Loire estuary.
As ever, it took the long rollers a half hour to brace themselves, to get organized, and to begin the big push into the river. During this time, a tired Mack Bedford gained the first respite of his swim. The water went slack, running neither one way nor the other. For the next twenty minutes the center of the Loire, up there under the road bridge, would resemble the BUDs swimming pool back at Coronado. But it would be for only twenty minutes. Mack knew that as well as the river gods themselves. And with all of his remaining strength he kicked under the bridge, and then came a full ninety degrees right, heading south, straight across the now placid, good-natured stream, toward the far bank.
He was more than a quarter of a mile south of the center line of the river, which left him with around 1,250 yards to swim. If he was ever going to gain time, this was the moment. He drew on every last vestige of his strength; he kicked and counted, kicked and glided, kicked until he thought he must surely give up and drown. But as that BUDs instructor once said, “There ain’t no quit in you, kid.” And Mack kept going, uncertain whether his next kick, that big double BAM! BAM! would be his last. The lactic acid pounded through his body, and his muscles throbbed. His thighs felt as if they were made of stone, tight, aching, but still driving on, through the pain barrier.
Mack remembered his “bible,” that book about the 1983 America’s Cup when the Australians fought a bloodcurdling tacking duel against the Americans on the last leg of the last race. The big winch grinders called it the “red zone,” the state where everything hurts so badly a man almost loses consciousness, but somehow keeps going. He remembered the calls of the big Aussie winch men, hammering away in the “engine room” of the boat, shouting, dedicating each murderous tack to some beloved member of the team, trying somehow to personalize the agony, to make it count more – “THIS ONE’S FOR YOU, JOHN!” “AND NOW ONE FOR HUGHIE!” Holding Denis Conner’s big red boat at bay – closing their eyes and driving the winches with massive arms that felt like jelly. The shouts of the tactician, the screams of the sheets flying off the reels. The sheer bloody pain of the contest.
A long time ago, Mack had lived it through the words of the legendary Aussie helmsman John Bertrand. Now, for the first time in his life, he felt it, the experience of total, all-encompassing pain. Finally, he knew. And he too began to dedicate, not the tacks, but the minutes. He did not need an entire crew to give him a choice. He understood too well how to personalize the agony, and he pounded into the shallows of the river, with the same words in his mind that he would have for all of his days. Anne and Tommy. Just Anne and Tommy.
He felt the jolt of the attack board as it hit the river bottom. The clock said 18:50, and he had to get the hell out of the water. He stuck his head into fresh air for the first time in almost two hours. He spat out his Draeger line, and breathed deeply. But he was too exhausted to stand, and for a few moments, he lay wallowing in the water, feeling the strength ebb back into his body, as the tiredness evaporated, the way it surely must in the iron constitution of a man who has just achieved the impossible. The swim, that is. Not the assassination.
Mack looked around him. This part of the riverbank, a couple of miles from Saint Brevins, was deserted. Vacationers, looking for a beach, go the other way on the south side of the river, down toward the Atlantic Coast. If ever there was a time to make a run for it, it was now, and Mack dragged himself upright and stumbled, unsteadily, onto the bank.
Even as he did so, he heard the wail of two police sirens, speeding across the Saint-Nazaire Bridge. He glanced back, and he could see the blue lights coming toward the south end of the roadway. If anyone saw him, he was dead. Mack ripped off his flippers and goggles, held on to the attack board and ran for his life, up the bank, over the grass, across the road and into the woods. Whereupon he collapsed into the foliage, not having even the remotest idea where his base camp was located.
Now there was another sound splitting the evening summer air, the distinctive clatter of two helicopters, flying low across the river, their rotors making that familiar BOM-BOM-BOM on the wind.
In an instant Lieutenant Commander Bedford understood the search had switched sides, and they were now combing this southern bank, despite its hopelessness, despite the pure impossibility of a man swimming across the estuary of the Loire. The police might be desperate, and they might be disheartened, and they might think this was all a waste of time. But that would not stop them from finding him if he was not damned careful.
He wriggled forward back toward the road, and then kept going right to the edge of the woods, “walking” on his elbows like the sniper he was. The coast seemed clear, and, still lying face-down, he scanned the road up to the right, looking for the bus stop, which was about 200 yards farther along.
Mack stood up and headed back into the woods and then turned to his left and jogged back through the trees to the little camp he had left in the twilight last night. It was a hundred yards in from the road, on a direct line with the bus stop. And it was intact, the two bushy strands still jammed into the ground, which had not been disturbed.
Swiftly,
he took the attack board and smashed it against a tree trunk. He hurled the wrecked GPS as far into the woods as possible, obliterated the compass on the tree, and ground it into the soil. The polystyrene he scattered as he walked, and he carried the clock with him.
Mack dived under the overhanging branches of his camp and pulled out the stems he had cut. With his knife he scraped off the top layer of earth, scrabbled around for the handles of his leather bag, and heaved. It came out easily, and Mack shook off the dirt. He set it aside and then stripped off his wet suit top and retrieved his Jeffery Simpson wig, mustache, and spectacles, which were all bone dry.
He pulled off his rubberized trousers and folded them neatly. Then he placed the wet suit, goggles, and Draeger flat in the hole, complete with the flashlight and calculator. Finally, he took the fishing knife and cut away the numbers on his flippers before placing the three items on top of the wet suit. He covered them with dirt until they were completely obscured, a foot below the surface. Then he covered the earth with stones and leaves and bent three branches into position. He jammed in the two fronds he had cut and surveyed his work. In his opinion it would be years before anyone found this little woodland cache, if ever. And so what if they did? Nothing was traceable. Everything was brand new, save for the Taiwan-made wet suit, unmarked flippers and goggles.
It was two minutes after seven o’clock. He pulled out his clothes and dressed – dark slacks, clean white T-shirt, sport jacket, socks and loafers. He slipped the Jeffery Simpson passport into his inside pocket and stuffed a wad of euros in there with it. He fitted on his wig, mustache, and spectacles and placed the clock in his bag.
Then he moved a hundred yards along the woods and made his exit, onto the river road. He walked casually to the bus stop, where a young girl of around eighteen was already waiting. It was 19:08, and the scene on the river was chaotic. A helicopter was running up and down the shore at a low level, east of the bridge, right in front of them. Another was searching the bank downstream, on the far side of the span. Two coast guard launches were on their way across the river from the north shore. The evening sky had clouded over, and the two boats had bright searchlights on the water. There were four police cars in the middle of the bridge, blue lights flashing, officers aiming radar guns hopefully over the surface, guns normally used to trap speeding motorists. There was another cluster of police cruisers at this end of the bridge, and Mack could see three red lights, probably signifying crash barriers, barring traffic from crossing before a search of their vehicles was conducted.
None of that mattered to Mack. What did worry him was the police car coming dead ahead along the river road, moving slowly, watchful and deliberate. When it reached the bus stop, it pulled up right alongside, and the driver jumped out and opened the door to allow the passenger in the near-side rear seat to exit. Detective Inspector Paul Ravel stepped out. Chief Pierre Savary stayed where he was.
“Good evening, mademoiselle, monsieur,” said Paul. “This is just a routine check – but have either of you seen anyone along here who looks as if he might have just swum across the river?”
Mack raised his eyebrows, in the time-honored way of the truly astonished. The girl giggled and said, “Swum across the river! I didn’t think anyone had ever done that.”
“Sir,” said Mack, “could you tell me what is going on over there?”
Detective Inspector Ravel replied, “There has been an attempt on the life of Monsieur Henri Foche. We are searching the area.”
“Wow!” said the girl. “My father was going to vote for him. Is he okay?”
“We have not yet been informed. But I would like to see identification.” The girl produced a couple of credit cards, and Mack pulled out his passport, handed it over, and inquired, “Al-Qaeda again?”
“No one’s said so yet. But we wouldn’t be surprised.”
Ravel looked at the passport carefully and then said, “American, eh?” “Yes, Officer.”
“How long have you been in France?”
“Two weeks.”
Ravel flicked through the pages and said, “There’s no immigration stamp. How did you come in?”
“Cross-Channel ferry to Calais. They just looked at my passport through the car window.”
“Do you have a return ticket?”
“No, Officer. I’m going on down to Rome with friends. Then I’m flying home via Dublin.”
“Do you have that return air ticket?”
“I have the e-ticket document.”
“May I see it?”
Mack groped in one of the side pockets of his leather bag, produced it, and handed it to Paul Ravel.
After a very quick glance, he handed it back to Mack and said, “Thank you, Mr. Simpson. I’m sorry to bother you. But if either one of you sees anyone who looks as if he might have been in the river, don’t approach him, but please do let us know, won’t you?” He handed them each a card containing a succession of police numbers.
“Sure will,” replied Mack. “Hope you catch him. From what I read, Henri Foche is a very capable man.”
Paul Ravel reboarded the cruiser.
“Any good?” asked Savary.
“Well, he was the right height, and his passport was not stamped when he came into the country. But there were a few gaps.”
“Such as?”
“As you know, at the busy times of the day, hundreds of people come through French ferry ports without having their passports stamped. Especially Calais, where he came in. The rest were just minor discrepancies, like his entire appearance, name, address, nationality and the fact that he was dry. That’s quite unusual for someone who just jumped from a seventy-five-foot building into the harbor, and somehow swam across the Loire fully dressed. There was no other way he could have reached this side of the river.”
“Hmmmm,” replied Savary expansively. “Was he French?”
“No. American. American passport and address somewhere in Massachusetts. Showed me his return ticket.”
“I suppose it was only about a billion-to-one shot that he was our man.”
“Don’t be so hard on yourself, sir. There are only sixty million people in France. Half of them are women, and half of the rest are babies or elderly. So it must have been fifteen million to one.”
“I feel better already,” said Pierre.
The cruiser accelerated farther along the road and stopped alongside two more pedestrians. As it did so, the bus to Nantes came into sight, rumbling along from the bridge. There were just two elderly ladies on board.
The girl and Mack both climbed aboard, and the doors shut. Mack chose the corner seat on the empty back row bench. As he sat down he glanced ahead and noticed the police cruiser was making a U-turn and heading back to the bridge.
Pierre Savary had finally accepted there was no point in searching on this side of the river. Not only had they found nothing, seen nothing, but everyone to whom they had spoken looked at them as if they were stark-raving mad at the mere thought of some maniac jumping in the Loire and swimming all the way across.
Paul Ravel knew how badly his boss had taken it – the assassination against all the odds, his friend Henri gunned down right before his eyes, new security chief Raul Declerc hurled out of a window to his death, and then the total disappearance of the perpetrator.
Just twenty-four hours previously everything had seemed so controlled. They had the killer’s name, address, and description, confirmed and corroborated by several sources. They even had his passport number, driver’s license. The shipyard had contained sufficient security guards to defend the beaches of Normandy in 1944. And they knew the assassin was in Saint-Nazaire. His car had been found in a public parking garage on Place des Martyrs. And now he was well and truly missing, vanished from the face of the earth. Paul Ravel’s logic told him the man was dead, probably drowned, and his body would wash up somewhere along the coast in the next five or six days.
Pierre Savary’s logic also told him told him the man must have drowned i
n the powerful currents of the estuary, and he might well never be seen or heard from again. Yet a sense of failure settled on him. That was inexplicable, except that Pierre was damned sure the assassin was somehow still alive. And he could not be seen to give up. “We’d better keep the police cordon around the town,” he said. “Stop and question every driver. And intensify the search of the shipyard. Because that’s the most likely place he’ll be. He can’t still be in the water.”
“Sir, we’ve searched that place high and low.”
“I know we have,” replied Pierre. “But this character is on the move. Just think. He could have been hiding out along the wharves, staying in the water for maybe an hour, then crept out and found somewhere to wait it out. He may have had an accomplice. But somewhere, someplace, if he’s alive, he must have come out of the fucking river.”
* * *
At 7:15 pm the head of the Administration Department walked out onto the steps of the Central Hospital of Saint-Nazaire and announced to the waiting journalists that Monsieur Henri Foche was dead. He had died of two gunshot wounds, to the head and chest. Surgeons had worked for some time to revive him, but the official hospital report would state he was dead on arrival. “There was never any realistic possibility he could be saved,” said the spokesman. “But everyone in our emergency room wanted to try.”
He was accompanied on the hospital steps by Claudette Foche, who was still wearing her blood-spattered clothes. The sight of her was a chilling, inevitable reminder of that November day in Dallas, Texas, in 1963, when the devastated Jacqueline Kennedy stepped, blood-spattered, onto the aircraft bearing the body of JFK, her slain husband.
The spokesman had no intention of conducting a press conference, and after the formal announcement, with a barrage of questions being shouted at him from all angles, he led Madame Foche back inside the building.
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