Wilbur Smith's Smashing Thrillers

by Wilbur Smith

  The reek of incense was overpowering, and the hoarse chant of the office missed not a single beat as Peter and the robed monk passed swiftly amongst them.

  In the impenetrable shadows at the rear of the church, the monk seemed abruptly to disappear, but when Peter reached the spot he discovered that one of the carved pews had been swung aside to reveal a dark secret opening in the rock.

  Peter went into it cautiously. It was totally dark but his feet found shallow stone steps, and he climbed a twisting stairway through the rock counting the steps to five hundred, each step approximately six inches high.

  Abruptly he stepped out into the cool desert night again.

  He was in a paved open courtyard, with the brilliant panoply of the stars overhead, the cliff rising straight ahead and a low stone parapet protecting the sheer drop into the valley behind him.

  Peter realized that this must be one of the remotest and most easily defensible rendezvous that Caliph could have chosen and there were more guards here.

  Again they came forward, two of them, and searched him once again even more thoroughly than at the monastery gate.

  While they worked Peter looked around him swiftly. The level courtyard was perched like an eagle's eyrie on the brink of the precipice, the parapet wall was five feet high.

  Across the courtyard were the oblong entrances to caves carved into the cliff face. They would probably be the retreats of the monks seeking solitude.

  There were other men in the courtyard, wearing the same uniform with heads hidden by the Arab shawl headgear. Two of them were setting out flashlight beacons in the shape of a pyramid.

  Peter realized they were beacons for an aircraft. Not an aircraft. A helicopter was the only vehicle which would be able to get into this precarious perch on the side of the precipice.

  All right then, the beacons would serve to direct a helicopter down into the level paved courtyard.

  One of the armed guards ended his body search by checking the buckle of Peter's belt, tugging it experimentally to make certain it was not the handle of a concealed blade.

  He stood back and motioned Peter forward. Across the courtyard the big monk waited patiently at the entrance to one of the stone cells that opened onto the Courtyard.

  Peter stooped through the low entrance. The cell was dimly lit by a stinking kerosene lamp set in a stone niche above the narrow cot.

  There was a crude wooden table against one wall, a plain crucifix above it and no other ornamentation.

  Hewn from the rock wall was a ledge which acted as a shelf for a dozen heavy battered leather-bound books and a few basic eating utensils. It was also a primitive seat.

  The monk motioned him towards it, but himself remained standing by the entrance to the cell with his hands thrust into the wide sleeves of his cassock, his face turned away and still masked completely by the deep hood.

  There was utter silence from the courtyard beyond the doorway, but it was an electric waiting silence.

  Suddenly Peter was aware of the perfumed aroma again, here in the crude stone cell, and then with a small tingling shock he recognized it. The smell came from the monk.

  He knew instantly who the big man in the monk's cowl was, and the knowledge confused him utterly, for long stricken moments.

  Then like the click of a well-oiled lock slipping home it all came together. He knew oh God he knew at last.

  The aroma he had recognized was the faint trace of the perfumed smoke of expensive Dutch cheroots, and he stared fixedly at the big hooded monk.

  Now there was a sound on the air, a faint flutter like moth's wings against the glass of the lantern, and the monk cocked his head slightly, listening intently.

  Peter was balancing distances and times and odds in his head.

  The monk, the five armed men in the courtyard, the approaching helicopter The monk was the most dangerous factor. Now that Peter knew who he was, he knew also that he was one of the most highly trained fighting men against whom he could ever match himself.

  The five men in the yard Peter blinked with sudden realization. They would not be there any longer. It was as simp leas that. Caliph would never allow himself to be seen by any but his most trusted lieutenants, and by those about to die. The monk would have sent them away. They would be waiting close by, but it would take them time to get back into action.

  There were only the monk and Caliph. For he knew that the dinning of rotor and engine was bringing Caliph in to the rendezvous. The helicopter sounded as though it were already directly overhead. The monk's attention was on it.

  Peter could see how he held his head under the cowl, he was off-guard for the first time.

  Peter heard the sound of the spinning rotors change as the pilot altered pitch for the vertical descent into the tiny courtyard. The cell was lit through the doorway by the reflection of the helicopter's landing lights beating down into the courtyard with a relentless white glare.

  Dust began to swirl from the down-draught of the rotors, it smoked in pale wisps into the cell and the monk moved.

  He stepped to the doorway, the empty dark hole in the cowl which was his face turned briefly away from Peter as he glanced out through the entrance of the cell.

  It was the moment for which Peter had waited, his whole body was charged, like the S in an adder's neck before it strikes. At the instant that the monk turned his head away, Peter launched himself across the cell.

  He had ten feet to go, and the thunder of the helicopter's engines covered all sound yet still some instinct of the fighting man warned the huge monk, and he spun into the arc of Peter's attack. The head under the cowl dropped defensively, so that Peter had to change his stroke. He could no longer go for the kill at the neck, and he chose the right shoulder for a crippling blow. His hand was stiff as a headman's blade and it slogged into the monk's shoulder between the neck and the humerus joint of the upper arm.

  Peter heard the collar bone break with a sharp brittle crack, high above even the roar of the helicopter's engines.

  With his left hand Peter caught the monk's crippled arm at the elbow and yanked it up savagely, driving the one edge of shattered bone against the other so it grated harshly, twisting it so the bone shards were razor cutting edges in their own living flesh and the monk screamed, doubling from the waist to try and relieve the intolerable agony in his shoulder.

  Shock had paralysed him, the big powerful body went slack in Peter's grasp.

  Peter used all his weight and the impetus of his rush to drive the monk's head into the doorjamb of the cell; skull met stone with a solid clunk and the big man dropped facedown to the paved floor.

  Peter rolled him swiftly and pulled up the skirts of the cassock.

  Under it the man wore paratrooper boots and the blue full-length overalls of Thor Command. On his webbing belt was the blue steel and polished walnut butt of the Browning Hi-power .45 pistol in its quick-release holster.

  Peter sprang it from its steel retaining clamp and cocked the pistol with a sweep of the left hand. It would be loaded with Velex explosives.

  The woollen folds of the cowl had fallen back from Colin Noble's head, the wide generous mouth now hanging open slackly, the burned-toffee eyes glazed with concussion, the big crooked prize-fighter's nose all the well-remembered features, once so dearly cherished in comradeship.

  Blood was streaming from Colin's thick curling hairline, running down his forehead and under his ear but he was still conscious.

  Peter put the muzzle of the Browning against the bridge of his nose. The Velex bullet would cut the top off his skull.

  Peter had lost his wig in those desperate seconds, and he saw recognition spark in Colin's stunned eyes.

  "Peter! No!" croaked Colin desperately.

  I'm Cactus Flower!" The shock of it hit Peter solidly, and he released the pressure on the Browning's trigger. It held him for only a moment and then he turned and ducked through the low doorway leaving Colin sprawling on the stone floor of the cell." The helicopte
r had settled into the courtyard. It was a five-seater Bell jet Ranger, painted in the blue and gold colours of Thor Command and on its side was the

  Thor emblem and the words:

  THOR COMMUNICATIONS

  There was a pilot still at the controls, and one other man who had already left the cabin of the machine and was coming towards the entrance of the cell.

  Even though he was doubled over to avoid the swirling rotor blades, there was no mistaking the tall powerful frame.

  The high wind of the rotors tumbled the thick greying leonine curls about the noble head, and the landing lights lit him starkly like the central character in some Shakespearian tragedy - a towering presence that transcended his mere physical stature.

  Kingston Parker straightened as he came out from under the swinging rotor, and for an earth-stopping instant of time he stared at Peter across the stone-paved courtyard. Without the wig he recognized Peter instantly.

  Kingston Parker stood for that instant like an old lion brought to bay.

  "Caliph!" Peter called harshly, and the last doubt was gone as Kingston Parker whirled, incredibly swiftly for such a big man. He had almost reached the cabin door of the Jet Ranger before Peter had the Browning up.

  The first shot hit Parker in the back, and flung him Now forward through the open door, but the gun had thrown high and right. It was not a killing shot, Peter knew it, and now the helicopter was rising swiftly, turning on its own axis, rising out over the edge of the precipice.

  Peter ran twenty feet and jumped to the parapet of the hewn stone wall. The jet Ranger soared above him, its belly white and bloated like that of a man-eating shark, the landing lights blazing down, half dazzling Peter. It swung out over the edge of the cliff.

  Peter took the Browning double-handed, shooting directly Upwards, judging the exact position of the fuel tank in the rear of the fuselage, where it joined the long stalk like tail and he pumped the big heavy explosive shells out of the gun, the recoil pounding down his outflung arms and jolting into his shoulders.

  He saw the Velex bullets biting into the thin metal skin of the underbelly, the tiny wink of each bullet as it burst, but still the machine reared away above him and he had been counting his shots.

  The Browning was almost empty.

  Seven, eight then suddenly the sky above him filled with flame, and the great whooshing concussion of air jarred the stone under his feet.

  The jet Ranger turned over on her back, a bright bouquet of flame, the engine howling its death cry, and it toppled beyond the edge of the precipice and plunged, burning savagely, into the dark void below where Peter stood.

  Peter began to turn back towards the courtyard, and he saw the armed men pouring in through the stone gateway.

  They were Thor men, picked fighting men, men he had trained himself. There was one bullet left in the Browning.

  He knew he was not going to make it but he made a try for the entrance to the stairway, his only escape route.

  He ran along the top of the stone wall like a tightrope artist, and he snapped the single remaining bullet at the running men to distract them.

  The crackle of passing shot dinned in his head, and he flinched and missed his footing. He began to fall, twisting sideways away from the edge of the precipice but then the bullets thumped into his flesh.

  He heard the bullets going into his body with the rubbery socking sound of a heavyweight boxer hitting the heavy punch bag, and then he was flung out over the wall into the bottomless night.

  He expected to fall for ever, a thousand feet to the desert floor below, where already the helicopter was shooting a hundred-foot fountain of fire into the air to mark Caliph's funeral pyre.

  There was a narrow ledge ten feet below the parapet where a thorny wreath of desert scrub had found a precarious hold. Peter fell into it, and the curved thorns hooked into his clothing and into his flesh.

  He hung there over the drop, and his senses began to fade.

  His last clear memory was Colin Noble's bull bellow of command to the five Thor guards.

  "Cease fire! Don't shoot again!" And then the darkness filled Peter's head.

  In the darkness there were lucid moments, each disconnected from the other by eternities of pain and confused nightmare distortions of the mind.

  He remembered being lifted up through the hatchway of an aircraft, lying in one of the light body-fitting Thor stretchers, strapped to it tightly, helpless as a newborn infant.

  There was the memory of the inside cabin of Magda Altmann's Lear jet. He recognized the hand-painted decoration of the curved cabin roof. There were plasma bottles suspended above him; the whole blood was the beautiful ruby colour of fine claret in a crystal glass, and when he rolled his eyes downwards he saw the tubes connected to the thick bright needles driven into his arms but he was terribly tired, an utter weariness that seemed to have bruised and crushed his soul and he closed his eyes.

  When he opened his eyes again, there was the roof of a long brightly lit corridor passing swiftly in front of his eyes.

  The feeling Of motion, and the scratchy squeak of the wheels of a theatre trolley.

  Quiet voices were speaking in French, and the bottle of beautiful bright blood was held above him by long slim hands that he knew so well.

  He rolled his head slightly and he saw Magda's beloved face swimming on the periphery of his vision.

  "I love you," he said, but there was no sound and he realized that his lips had not moved. He could no longer support the weariness and he let his eyelids droop closed.

  "How bad is it?" he heard Magda's voice speaking in that beautiful rippling French, and a man replied.

  "One bullet is lying very close to the heart we must remove it immediately." Then the prick of something into his flesh searching for the vein, and the sudden musty taste of Pentothal on his tongue, followed by the abrupt singing plunge back into the darkness.

  He came back very slowly out of the darkness, conscious first of the bandages that swathed his chest and restricted his breathing.

  The next thing he was aware of was Magda Altmann, and how beautiful she was. It seemed that she must have been there all along while he was in the darkness. He watched the joy bloom in her face as she saw that he was conscious.

  "Thank you," she whispered. "Thank you for coming back to me, my darling." Then there was the room at La Pierre Benite, with its high gilded ceilings and the view through the tall sash windows across the terraced lawns down to the lake. The trees along the edge of the water were in full leaf, and the very air seemed charged with spring and the promise of new life. Magda had filled the room with banks of flowers, and she was with him during most of each day.

  "what happened when you walked back into the boardroom at Altmann Industries?" was one of the first questions he asked her.

  "Consternation, cheri." She chuckled, that husky little laugh of hers. "They had already divided the spoils." The visitor came when Peter had been at La Pierre benite for eight days, and was able to sit in one of the brocaded chairs by the window.

  Magda was standing beside Peter's chair, ready to protect him from over-exertion physically or emotionally.

  Colin Noble came into the room like a sheepish St. Bernard dog.

  His right arm was strapped and carried in a sling across his chest. He touched it with his good hand.

  "If I'd known it was you and not Sir Steven I'd never have turned my back on you," he told Peter, and grinned placatingly.

  Peter had stiffened, his face had transformed into a white rigid mask. Magda laid her hand upon his shoulder.

  "Gently, Peter,"she whispered.

  "Tell me one thing Peter hissed. "Did you arrange the kidnapping of Melissa-Jane?" Colin shook his head. "My word on it.

  Parker used one of his other agents. I did not know it was going to happen." Peter stared at him, hard and unforgiving.

  "Only after we had recovered Melissa-Jane, only then I knew that Caliph had planned it. If I had known I would neve
r have let it happen. Caliph must have known that.

  That is why he did not make me do it." Colin was speaking quickly, urgently.

  "What was Parker's object?" Peter's voice was still a vicious hiss.

  "He had three separate objects. Firstly, to convince you that he was not Caliph. that's why his first order was to have you kill Parker himself. Of course, you never would have got near him. Then you were allowed to recover your daughter. It was Caliph himself who gave us O'Shaughnessy's name and where to find him. Then you were turned onto Magda Altmann-" Colin glanced at her apologetically. "Once you had killed her, you would have been bound to Caliph by guilt."

  "When did you learn this?" Peter demanded.

  "The day after we found Melissa-Jane. By then there was nothing I could do that would not expose me as Cactus Flower all I could do was to pass a warning to Magda A through Mossad."

  "It's true, Peter," said Magda quietly.

  Slowly the rigidity went out of Peter's shoulders.

  "When did Caliph recruit you as his Chief Lieutenantr he asked, his voice also had altered, softened.

  "As soon as I took over Thor Command from you, He was never certain of you, Peter, that was why he opposed your appointment to head of Thor and why he jumped at the first chance to have you fired.

  That was why he tried to have you killed on the Rambouillet road. Only after the attempt failed did he realize your potential value to him."

  "Are the other Atlas unit commanders Caliph's lieutenants Tanner at Mercury Command, Peterson at Diana?"

  "All three of us. Yes!" Colin nodded, and there was a long silence.

  "What else do you want to know, Peter?" Colin asked softly. "Are there any other questions?"

  "Not now." Peter shook his head wearily.

  "There will be many others later." Colin looked up at Magda Altmann inquiringly. "Is he strong enough yet?" he asked. "Can I tell him the rest of it?" She hesitated a moment. "Yes," she decided. "Tell him now."

  "Atlas was to be the secret da get in the sleeve of Western civilization a civilization which had emasculated itself and abased itself before its enemies. For once we would be able to meet naked violence and piracy with raw force.