Ibn should have shot him without a word, but Pitt knew the Arab was only toying with him. The blast of fifty pellets would come in the middle of a sentence.
There was no reward in stalling. Pitt stared at Ibn, measuring the distance between them, figuring what direction he would leap. With casual ease, he edged the shield across his body.
Capesterre wrapped part of his robe around the bleeding stump, moaning from the increasing pain. Then he held up the blood soaked cloth in front of Ibn. "Get him!" he cried. "Look what he did to me. Shoot him down!
I am Topiltzin."
"His real name is Robert Capesterre," said Pitt. "He's a colossal fraud."
Capesteffe scrambled over to Ibn until he was sitting at the Arab's feet. "Don't listen to him," pleaded Capesterre. "He is a common criminal."
for the first time Ibn grinned. "Hardly that. I've studied a file on Mr. Pitt. He's not common at anything."
Looking better, Pitt thought. Ibn was momentarily distracted by Topiltzin. He slipped sideways a few centimeters at a time, trying to place himself so that Capesterre lay between him and Ibn.
"Where is Ammar?" Pitt asked abruptly.
"Dead," replied Ibn. The grin was quickly replaced with lip-tightening anger. "He died after killing that pig Akhmad Yazid."
The bombshell stunned Capesterre. His gaze automatically turned to his brother's body in the coffin.
"So it was the man my brother hired to hijack the ship," Capesteffe uttered in a hoarse croak.
Pitt fought the urge to say "I told you so," and moved another centimeter.
Ibn's eyes registered incomprehension. "Akhmad Yazid was your brother?"
"Two peas in a pod," said Pitt. "Would you'recognize Yazid if you saw him?"
"Of course. His appearance is as familiar as the Ayatollah Khomeini or Yasir Arafat."
Pitts mind raced with new modifications to his desperation plan, taking advantage of the few crumbs thrown his way. Everything hinged on how well he could read Ibn's mind and predict the killer's reaction to seeing Yazid.
"Then take a good look in the coffin."
"Do not even think of making a move, Mr. Pitt," said Ibn. His eyes hung warily on Pitt as he shuffled toward the coffin. When his right hip touched the pallbearer's handle he stopped and took a quick glance inside, and then back at his quarry.
Pitt had not moved a centimeter.
It all depended on the unexpected. Pitt planned on the classic double take. He took the gamble that Ibn's first cursory glimpse inside the coffin would cause a delayed reaction followed by a second longer look.
And Ibn did exactly that.
In the Special Operations Forces command truck, parked half a kilometer west of the excavation, Hollis, Admiral Sandecker, Lily and Giordino gazed at a TV monitor, their attention solidly locked into the drama being acted out under Gongora Hill.
Lily stood motionless, her skin eggshell-white, while Sandecker and Giordino fidgeted in frustration like a pair of zoo tigers with a platter of fresh meat just beyond reach of their cage.
Hollis was pacing the small enclosure, nervously clutching a small multi-frequency detonation transmitter in one hand while the other held a phone receiver.
He was shouting at an aide of General Chandler's. "Like hell I'll detonate! Not until the crowd passes the danger perimeter. "
"They've moved too close now," the aide, a colonel, countered.
"Another thirty seconds!" snapped Hollis. "Not before."
"General Chandler wants that hill blown now!" demanded the Colonel, his voice rising. "That's an order that comes from the President."
"You're only a voice over a phone, Colonel," Hollis stalled.
"I want the order direct from the President."
"You're asking for a court-martial, Colonel."
"It won't be the first time."
Sandecker shook his head fearfully. "Dirk will never make it, not now."
"Can't you do something?" pleaded Lily. "Talk to him. He can hear you over the speaker connected to the TV camera."
"We don't dare distract him," answered Hollis "Break his concentration and that Arab will kill him."
"That's it!" Giordino muttered, infuriated. He tore out the command truck door, jumped to the ground and dashed over to Sam Trinity's Jeep.
Before Hollis's men could stop him the car was bouncing through the brush toward Gongora Hill.
In one quick leap, Pitt uncoiled like a rattler and drove the shield against Ibn. The sword blurred and slashed again.
His muscled arm swung with all the strength of his shoulder behind it.
He felt and heard the blade edge clang against metal before it struck something soft. An explosion went off, seemingly in his face. He flinched as the main force of the blast struck the middle of his shield and ricocheted against the rock ceiling. The armored plastic sheeting that had been riveted to the laminated wood by Major Dillenger that afternoon was denied but not penetrated. Pitts sword hand finished the arc, and he launched a murderous backhand swing.
Ibn was fast, but his shock at seeing Yazid cost him a precious second.
He caught Pitts attack out of the corner of one eye and squeezed off a badly aimed snap shot before the sword blade glanced off the breech of the shotgun and sliced through his hand, severing his thumb and fingers just behind the knuckles.
Ibn uttered a ghastly groan. The pistolgripped shotgun fell to the hard limestone floor almost on top of the Colt Python still gripped in Capesterre's severed hand. But Ibn recoiled enough to duck away from Pitts swing. Then, in one violent twisting motion, he lunged at Pitt.
Pitt was ready for the assault, but, as he dodged to one side his right leg folded under him. In a flashing instant he knew that one or two of the shotgun's pellets had missed the shield and struck him in the same leg that had been wounded on Santa Inez Island.
Before he could react and dance away, Ibn dropped on him like a panther.
The black eyes gleamed satanically under the string of lights, the teeth ghoulishly bared. Pitt lost his grip on the sword hilt as Ibn knocked it away. His other arm was trapped under the inside straps of the shield. Then slowly, deliberately, Ibn's good hand closed around Pitts throat.
"Kill him!" Robert Capesterre shrieked repeatedly like a mad man.
"Kill him!"
Pitt heaved in a corkscrew motion and brought his fist up from the floor, striking Ibn in the Adam's apple. With the cartilage of the larynx crushed, most men would have gagged to death-the rest should have at least gone unconscious. Ibn did neither. He simply clutched his throat, made a terrible gurgling voice and reeled backward.
They both struggled drunkidly to their feet, Pitt hopping on one leg, Ibn gasping for air, his mangled right hand hanging useless. They stood there, facing each other like wounded pit bulls catching their breath for the next round, warily eyeing each other to see who would make the first move.
It came from an unexpected quarter. Capesten-e suddenly came to his senses and threw himself on the Colt, fiercely struggling one-handed to pry the frozen fingers from the grip.
The dead hand fell away.
Then, like a game of musical chairs, Capesterre's grab triggered a like response from Ibn and Pitt. They quickly looked around for the weapons nearest them.
Pitt lost. The shotgun was in Ibn's corner. So was the Roman sword.
any port in a storm, Pitt thought. He kicked out wildly with the foot of his wounded leg, connecting with Capesten-e's rib cage, but suffering a grinding pain from the effort. He also hurled the shield like a Frisbee at Ibn, s g the Arab on the stomach and knocking the wind out of him.
A loud wailing cry gushed from Capesterre's lips. He dropped the Colt and Pitt caught it in midair. It was a nearperfect catch-His hand slipped around the bloodied grip and his finger through the trigger guard. Ibn, doubled over by the blow from the shield, was still awkwardly lifting the pistolized shotgun with his left hand when Pitt fired.
Pitt tightened his grip for the next recoil. Th
e Arab stumbled backward against the chamber wall, and then his body fell forward onto the floor and his head struck with a repugnantthud.
Pitt stood panting through clenched teeth. Only then did he hear a familiar voice shout through the speaker.
"Get out of there!" Hollis was yelling. "for Jesus' sake, run for it!"
Pitt was temporarily disoriented. He was so busy fighting Ibn he forgot which passage led to the easier tunnel and which to the more difficult crater exit. He took a last fleeting glimpse of Robert Capesterre.
The face was ashen from the loss of blood but not, Pitt saw, with fear.
Hate filled the eyes of Topiltzin.
"Enjoy your trip to hell," Pitt said.
Capesterre's reply was the smoke bomb. He had somehow pulled the primer pin. Smoke instantly burst and fined the interior of the chamber with a densely packed orange cloud.
"What happened?" the President asked, staring at the strange orange mist that blocked out the camera view of the chamber.
"Capesteffe must have been carrying some kind of a smoke-screening device," Chandler answered.
"Why haven't the explosives gone off?"
"One moment, Mr. President." Chandler looked off-camera and conversed angrily with an aide. Then he turned back. "Colonel Hollis of the Special Operations Forces insists on a direct order from you, sir."
"Is he in charge of the detonation?" demanded Metcalf.
"Yes, General."
"Can you patch him into our communications network?"
"One moment."
Four seconds was all it took before Hollis's face was peering from one of the monitors in the Situation Room.
"I-you can't see me, Colonel," said the President.
"But you'recognize my voice."
"I do, sir," Hollis answered through tight lips.
"As your Commander-in-Chief, I'm ordering you to blow that hill, and blow it now."
"The mob is swarming up the hill," Nichols said in near panic.
They all tensed and swung their eyes to the monitor sweeping the hill.
The huge throng was slowly moving up the slope toward the summit, chanting Topiltzin's name.
"If you wait any longer you'll kill a lot of people," said Metcalf urgently. "for pity's sake, man, detonate." Hollis's thumb was poised above the switch. He spoke into his transmitter. "Detonation!"
But he didn't press the switch. He used the enlisted man's gambit: Never refuse an order and be tried for insubordination, but answer to the affirmative and never carry it out. Inefficiency was one of the most difficult of charges to prove at a court-martial.
He was determined to squeeze every second he could for Pitt.
Holding his breath as though he were diving under water, eyes tightly closed against the stinging smoke, Pitt willed his legs to move, to run, to crawl, to do anything which would rush him clear of that horror chamber. He made it into a passage, not knowing if it led to the tunnel shaft or the crater. He kept his eyes shut, feeling his way along the wall, half-hopping, half-hobbling on his bad leg.
He felt a burning rage to live. He simply couldn't believe he'd die now, not after having survived the last few minutes. Finally he opened his eyes. They burned as if stung by bees, but he could see. He had passed the worst of the smoke. It was only an orange vapor now.
The shaft through the limestone began to rise. He felt a slight increase in temperature and a light breeze. Then he stumbled outside into the night. The stars were there, almost blotted out by the bright lights shining up the hill.
But Pitt was not clear. There was a snag. He had the unsettling realization that he had exited through the crater tunnel. The slanting sides rose up another five meters. So close, yet so tormentingly far.
He began clawing his way up the incline, his wounded leg, totally useless now, dragging along behind. He could only dig in and push with one foot.
Hollis had gone silent. The Colonel had no words left to say. Pitt knew the explosion he'd so carefully planned was going to take him with it. Fatigue swept over him in great floating waves, yet he stubbornly crawled upward.
Then a dark form appeared over the rim of the crater and a massive hand reached down, grabbed the shoulder of Pitts sweater and heaved him onto level ground.
With seemingly incredible ease Giordino flung Pitt into the open tailgate of the Jeep, leaped into the driver's seat and jammed the accelerator pedal flat onto the floorboard.
They had barely covered fifty meters when Hollis pressed the demolition switch. The signal set off the two hundred kilo of C-6 nitroglycerin gel deep inside the hill with a monstrous roar.
for one brief moment it was as if a volcanic eruption was about to hurtle from the bowels of the earth. The hill shook with a rumble.
The great mass of Topiltzin followers were thrown to the ground, their mouths agape in horror, the concussion sucking the air from their lungs into a vacuum.
Then the whole summit of Gongora Hill rose almost ten meters into the air, hung there in the night as if clutched by a giant hand, and cnimbled and fell inward, leaving a huge plume of birowmg dust as a ghostly tombstone.
November 5, 1991
Roma, Texas.
Five days later, a few minutes past dnight, the President's helicopter set down at a small airfield a few miles outside Roma. Accompanying him were Senator Pitt and Julius Schiller. As soon as the rotor blades swung and drooped to a stop, Admiral Sandecker walked up to the door and greeted them.
"Good to see you, Admiral," the President said graciously.
"Congratulations on a splendid job, though I must say I didn't think NUMA could pull it off."
"Thank you, Mr. President," replied Sandecker with his usual cocky air.
"We're all grateful you had enough confidence in our mad plan to give us the go-ahead."
"A neat scam, a very neat scam indeed." The President turned and looked at Senator Pitt. "But you have the Senator to thank for my backing. He can be very persuasive."
After a few words between Sandecker and Schiller, they all climbed a short ladder ugh a concealed door into the bed of a huge tandem, ten-wheeler dump truck.
Two of the President's Secret Service agents, wearing work clothes, climbed into the cab with the driver. Four more piled into an old battered Dodge van parked in the rear.
The exterior of the truck had a worn, dusty and faded-paint look. But the interior of the four-and-a-half by two-and-a half-meter bed was converted into a room containing a kitchen bar and six roomy chairs. The top had been covered by side boards and covered with two centimeters of gravel to complete the disguise.
The door in the dump bed was closed, and they settled into the comfortable chairs mounted to the floor and fastened their seat belts.
"Sorry about the unusual transportation," said Sandecker. "But we can't afford to give the show away with choppers flying in and out of the site."
"This is my first ride inside a gravel dumptruck," the President joked.
"The suspension doesn't compare to the White House Lincoln limousine."
"We've converted six of these as undercover transports", explained Sandecker.
"A good choice," laughed the Senator, rapping the metal wall with his knuckles. "They come bulletproofed."
The smile on the President's face died and he turned serious. "the secret has been kept?" he asked.
Sanddecker nodded. "I've seen nothing to indicate otherwise from our end."
"There won't be any leaks from the White House," Schiller guaranteed, picking up on the General's veiled insinuation.
"The lid is nailed tight."
The President was silent for a moment. "We were damned lucky to get away with it," he said finally. "Topiltzin's mob of followers might have gone on an orgy of revenge after they realized he was dead."
"After the shock wore off," said Sandecker. "They wandered around the hill, staring into the explosion's crater as if it was a super phenomenon. Bloody rioting was kept to a minimum because of the presence of women and c
hildren, that and the fact that Topiltzin's close supporters and advisers quietly ducked out and beat a fast retreat for Mexico. Unleaderless, and hungry, the crowd slowly began filtering back across the border to their cities and villages."
"According to immigration," said Schiller, "a few thousand took off north, but a third of them have already been rounded UP."
The President sighed. "At least the worst is over. If Congress passes our aid plan to Latin America, it should go a long way in helping our neighbors to the south climb back on their financial feet."
"And the Capisten-e family?" asked Sandecker. "How will they be dealt with?"
"The Justice Department is going after any assets they have in this country." The President's face was expressionless, but his eyes had a steel-like glint. "This is just between us, gentlemen, but Colonel Hollis of our Special Operations Forces is planning an assault exercise on an island in the Caribbean that shall remain nwneless. If any of the Capesterre family happen to be in the vicinity at the time . . . well, that's too damn bad for them."
Senator Pitt gave a sarcastic smile. "With Yazid and Topiltzin gone, our foreign relations will seem pretty tame for a while."
Schiller shook his head negatively. "We've only plugged two holes in the dike. The worst is down the road."
"Don't cry doom, Julius," said the President, now in a jovial mood.
"Egypt is stable for the moment. And with President Hasan stepping aside for health reasons and turning over his office to Defense Minister Abu H d, the Muslim fundamentalists will be under enormous pressure to reduce their demands for an Islamic government. ,
"The fact that Hala Kamil has consented to marry Hamid won't hurt the situation either," Senator Pitt summed up.
The conversation was interrupted as the truck came to a stop. The concealed door was opened from the outside and the ladder set in place.
"After you, Mr. President," invited Sandecker.
They stepped to the ground and looked around. The area was surrounded by an ordinary chain-link fence and dimly lit by widely spaced pole lights. A large sign beside the entrance gate read, sAm sAM'S GRAVEL