Step by agonizing step, Evan climbed the narrow dirt road behind the Mexican until they reached the island’s immense fence-enclosed generator, the bass-toned hum assaulting their ears to the point of painful vibrations. Signs of Peligro!… Danger! were everywhere, and the single gate to the interior was secured by two huge plate locks that apparently took simultaneous insertions of keys to open. Limping around into the darkest shadows of the floodlights, Kendrick gave the order while handing Emilio the wire cutters. “Start here, and I hope you’re as strong as you say you are. This is heavy-gauge fence. Slice an opening, three feet’s enough.”
“And you, señor?”
“I have to look around.”
He found them! Three iron disks screwed into concrete thirty feet apart, three enormous tanks, cisterns for fuel, supplemented by banks of photovoltaic cells somewhere, which no longer concerned him. Opening a disk required a T-squared sexagonal wrench, its upper bars long enough for two strong men on each bar. But there was another way, and he knew it well from the desert tanks in Saudi Arabia—an emergency procedure in the event the caravans of fuel trucks forgot the implement, not uncommon in the Jabal deserts. Each supposedly impenetrable disk had fourteen ridges across the top, not much different from the manhole covers in most American cities, although much smaller. Hammered slowly counterclockwise, the circular vaults would loosen until hands and fingers could reach the sides and unscrew them.
Kendrick walked back to Emilio and the near-deafening island generator. The Mexican had cut through two parallel vertical lines and was starting at the ground-level base. “Come with me!” said Evan, shouting into Emilio’s ear. “Have you got your hatchet?”
“Pues sí.”
“So do I.”
Kendrick led the Mexican back to the first iron disk and instructed him how to use the dish towels from the electronic cabin to muffle the blows from the blunt ends of their hatchets. “Slowly,” he yelled. “A spark can set off the fumes, comprende?”
“No, señor.”
“It’s better that you don’t. Easy, now! One tap at a time. Not so hard!… It’s moving!”
“Now harder?”
“Christ, no! Easy, amigo. Like you were cracking a diamond.”
“It has not been my pleasure—”
“It will be if we get out of here.… There! It’s free! Unscrew it to the top and leave it there. Give me your towels.”
“For what, señor?”
“I’ll explain as soon as you get me through that door you’re cutting in the fence.”
“That will take time—”
“You’ve got about two minutes, amigo!”
“Madre de Dios!”
“Where did you put the gasoline?” Kendrick moved closer to be heard.
“There!” replied the Mexican, pointing to the left of the “door” he was cutting.
Crouching painfully in the shadows, Evan tied the towels together, tugging at each knot to make sure it was secure until he had a single ten-foot length of cloth. His body aching with each twisting movement, he unscrewed the top of the gasoline can and drenched the string of towels, squeezing each as if it were a dish cloth. In minutes he had a ten-foot fuse. His knee now boiling, his ankle swelling rapidly, he crawled back to the fuel tank dragging the towels at his side. Straining, he pried up the iron cover, inserted three feet of fuse and moved the heavy disk off center so that a flow of air would circulate throughout the black tank below. Backtracking, he pressed each towel, each leg of his fuse, firmly in the ground, sprinkling dirt over each, but only “dusting” them so as to retard the speed of the flame from base to gaseous contact.
The last towel in place, he stood—wondering briefly how long he could stand—and limped back to Emilio. The Mexican was pulling the heavy-gauged cut-out section of the fence toward him, bending it up to permit access into massive, glistening machinery that through the dynamoelectrical process converted mechanical energy into electricity.
“That’s enough,” said Kendrick, bending over to speak close to Emilio’s ear. “Now listen to me carefully, and if you don’t understand, stop me. From here on everything is timing—something happens and we do something else. Comprende?”
“Sí. We move to other places.”
“That’s about it.” Evan reached into the pocket of his mudencrusted suit coat and withdrew the flashlight. “Take this,” he continued, nodding his head at the hole in the fence. “I’m going in there and I hope to hell I know what I’m doing—these things have changed since I installed them—but if nothing else, I can shut it down. There may be a lot of noise and big sparks—”
“Cómo?”
“Like short bolts of lightning and … and sounds like very loud static on the radio, do you understand?”
“It is enough—”
“Not enough. Don’t get near the fence—don’t touch it and at the first crack, turn away and shut your eyes.… With any luck, all the lights will go out and when they do, shine the flashlight on the opening in the fence, okay?”
“Okay.”
“As soon as I get through to this side, swing the light over there.” Kendrick pointed at the last of his knotted towels protruding out of the ground. “Have your rifle over your shoulder and hold out one for me—have you got the cap you took from the first guard? If you do, give it to me.”
“Sí, Here.” Emilio took the cap out of his pocket and handed it to Evan, who put it on.
“When I’m clear of the fence, I’ll go over there and strike a match, setting the towels on fire. The second I do that we get out of here to the other side of the road, comprende?”
“I understand, señor. Into the grass at the other side of the road. We hide.”
“We hide; we work our way up the hill in the grass, and when everyone starts running around, we join them!”
“¿Cómo?”
“Twenty-odd personnel,” said Kendrick, checking his pockets and removing the two cans of Sterno, replacing them in his trousers, then ripping the coat off his back and and the tie off his neck. “We’re only two of them in the dark, but we’ll be making our way over the hill and down to the dock. With two rifles and a Colt forty-five.”
“I understand.”
“Here we go,” said Evan as he awkwardly, painfully bent down and picked up the rubber-based tree clipper and a machete.
He crawled through Emilio’s opening and rose to his feet, studying the whirring, life-threatening machinery. Some things had not changed, they never would. Above on the left, bolted into a fifteen-foot-high tar-covered pole was the main transformer, the shunt wires carrying the major load of power to the various offshoots, the cables encased in rubber conduit at least two inches in diameter to prohibit seepage from water—rain and humidity—which would short-circuit the load. Ten feet away on the ground and diagonally opposed above the two black squat main dynamos were the grid plates, whirling maniacally on flywheels on top of the machinery, changing one field of energy into another, protected by a heavy latticework of wire and cooled by the air that had open access. He would study them further but not now.
First things first, he thought, moving to his left and extending the telescoped tree clipper to its full height. Above in the floodlights the saw-toothed jaws of the long instrument gripped the upper shunt cable, and as he had done with the wire cutters on the tail assembly of the helicopter, he worked furiously up and down until his professional instincts told him he was within millimeters of the first layer of coiled copper. He gently leaned the extended metal pole against the fence and turned to the first of the two main dynamos.
If it were merely a question of shorting out the island’s electrical power, he would simply continue slicing into the transformer’s conduit while gripping the nonconductive rubber handles and let the short take place by angling the metal clipper into the metal fence when he struck cable. There would be a brief electrical explosion and all the power terminated. However, more was at stake; he had to face the probability that neither he nor
Emilio would survive, and a damaged transformer cable could be repaired in a matter of minutes. He had to inflict more than damage; he had to cripple the system. He could not know what was happening in San Diego, he could only give Payton’s forces time by disabling the machinery to the point where it would take days to replace, not repair. This island compound, this headquarters of a government within a government, had to be immobilized, isolated, without means of communication or departure. The transformer was, in actuality, his backup, his far less desirable option, but it had to be there and ready to execute. Time was everything now!
He approached the dynamo, cautiously peering into the enormous wire-encased flywheel. There was a horizontal space, no more than a half inch wide, separating the upper and lower screens of thick latticework that kept objects of any size from penetrating the whirring interior. That space or something similar was what he had hoped to find, the reason for the machete. Sections of all generators, needing air, had openings of extremely limited dimensions, vertically and horizontally; this was his. It was either his or he was its in death; one slip meant instant electrocution, and even if he avoided death by millecounts of high voltage, he could be blinded by the exploding streaks of white electric light if he did not turn away in time, keeping his eyes tightly closed. But if he could do it, the island’s generator would be shut down for major replacement. Time … time might well be the last gift he had to give.
He pulled the machete out of his belt, sweat pouring down his face despite the wind from the flywheel, and inched the blade toward the horizontal space.… Trembling, he yanked the machete back; he had to steady his hands! He could not touch either edge of the narrow space! He tried again, inserting one inch, then two, and three … he rammed the heavy blade inside, snapping back both hands before the blade made contact and lurched to the ground behind him, his face and eyes buried under his arms. The self-contained electrical detonations were ear-shattering, and despite his tightly closed eyes, white blinding light was everywhere in the darkness. The flywheel would not stop! It kept chewing up the primitive metal of the machete while spewing out bolts of Frankenstein electrical charges, spitting jaggedly, violently into the fence.
Kendrick leaped up, shielding his eyes, and, step by cautious step, crossed back to the tree clipper, its saw-toothed jaws embedded in the transformer’s conduit. He gripped the rubber handles, and in desperation crashed them back and forth until the jolt threw him off his feet. He had struck the cable proper and the telescoped metal clippers fell into the metal fence. The whole generator complex went mad, as if its electrical inhabitants were infuriated by mere man’s interference with his superior inventions. Lights went out everywhere, but there was still blinding, erratic, jagged streaks of electrical lightning within the lethal fenced enclosure. He had to get out!
Scrambling on his stomach, his arms and legs propelling him like a racing spider’s, he reached the hole in the fence, the beam of the flashlight guiding him through. When he got to his feet, the rifle was thrust into his hands by Emilio.
“Matches!” yelled Evan, unable to reach his own; the Mexican gave him a handful while angling the flashlight over to the last towel. Kendrick ran, limping to his fuse, lurching to the ground and striking a half-dozen matches on a rock. As they flared he threw them on the last towel; the flame caught and started its deadly journey slowly, relentlessly, no more than a glow in the dirt.
“Hurry!” cried Emilio, helping Evan to his feet and leading him, not to the path back to the dirt road but instead into the high grass below. “Many have come out of the house and are running down! Pronto, señor!”
They raced, literally diving into the grass as a swarm of panicked men, most with rifles, approached the blinding, erupting generator, shielding their eyes and shouting at one another. During the chaos Kendrick and his Mexican companion crawled through the grass below the terror-stricken crowd. They reached the road as another equally stupefied stream of men came rushing out of the long, low building that was the staff’s barracks. Most were only half dressed, many in undershorts, and not a few showing the effects of too much alcohol.
“Listen to me,” whispered Evan into Emilio’s ear. “We’ll get out there carrying our rifles and start up the road.… Keep shouting in Spanish as though we were following someone’s orders. Now!”
“Traenos agua!” roared the Mexican as both men sprang out of the grass and joined the stunned, screaming crowd from the barracks. “Agua! … Traenos agua!” They broke through the mass of excited bodies, only to be confronted by the panicked contingent from the main house, half of whom had cautiously moved down the path to the dying, smoking, spitting machinery that had been the island’s source of power. The darkness was awesome, made eerie by the maniacal voices shouting everywhere in the dim, intermittent moonlight. Then beams of flashlights shot out from the house above.
“The path!” cried Kendrick. “Head for the main path down to the dock. For God’s sake, hurry! That tank will blow any second and there’ll be a stampede for the boats!”
“It is ahead. We must pass through the galeria.”
“Christ, they’ll be at the windows, on the balconies!”
“There is no other way, no quicker way.”
“Let’s go!”
The dirt road stopped, replaced by the narrow path that only minutes ago had been bordered by the parallel rows of domed amber lights. They ran, Kendrick lurching in agony, down into the sunken patio, racing across the bricks to the steps that led to the main path.
“Stop!” roared a deep voice as the beam of a powerful flashlight swung down on them. “Where are you.… Jesus Christ, it’s you!” Evan looked up. Directly above, standing on the short balcony he had stood on barely an hour ago was the outsized yachtsman. In his hand was a gun; it was being raised, aimed at Kendrick. Evan fired his rifle at the same instant the yachtsman’s weapon exploded. He felt the searing hot bullet slice into his left shoulder, hurling him back off his feet. He fired again and again as the giant above held his stomach, screaming at the top of his lungs. “It’s him! It’s Kendrick!… Stop the son of a bitch, stop him! He’s going down to the boats!”
Kendrick took closer aim and fired a last shot. High Noon in the Town of Corruption grabbed his throat, arched his neck, then fell forward over the railing and down into the brick patio. Evan’s eyes began to close, the mists swirling about his head.
“No, señor! You must run! Get to your feet!” Kendrick felt his arms being pulled out of their sockets and his face being repeatedly, harshly slapped. “You will come with me or you will die, and I will not die with you! I have loved ones in El Descanso—”
“What?” shouted Evan, saying nothing, agreeing to nothing, but answering everything as part of the mists cleared. His shoulder on fire, the blood drenching his shirt, he rose and lurched for the steps, somehow in the far reaches of his mind remembering the Colt .45 he had taken from the mafioso, ripping it out of his back pocket, tearing the stretched cloth to remove the weapon too large for its recess. “I’m with you!” he cried out to Emilio.
“I know,” replied the Mexican, slowing his pace and turning around. “Who pulled you up the steps, señor?… You are hurt and the path is dark, so I must use the linterna—the flashlight.”
Suddenly the earth exploded, shaking the ground with the impact of a block-sized meteor, smashing windows throughout the manor house on top of the hill and sending fire up into the night sky. The generator’s fuel tank erupted into the heavens as the two fugitives raced down the path, Kendrick staggering, trying desperately to focus on the wavering beam of the flashlight ahead, his knee and ankle searing in pain.
Shots. Gunfire! Bullets snapped above them, around them, digging up the earth in front of them. Emilio switched off the flashlight and grabbed Evan’s hand. “It is not much longer now. I know the way and I will not let go of you.”
“If we ever get away from here, you’re going to have the biggest fishing boat in El Descanso!”
“No, seño
r, I will move my family to the hills. These men will come after me, after my niños.”
“How about a ranch?” The moon abruptly emerged from beyond the rushing low-flying clouds, revealing the island’s dock barely two hundred feet away. The gunfire had ceased; it started up again, but again the earth seemingly blew apart, an isolated galactic mass in frenzy. “It happened!” shouted Kendrick as they neared the base of the dock.
“Señor?” cried the Mexican, terrified at the ear-shattering, unexpected detonation, panicked by the ball of smoke and the branches of fire that rose beyond the house on the hill. “This island will go into the sea! What happened?”
“The second tank blew! I couldn’t predict, I could only hope.”
A single gunshot. From the dock. Emilio was hit! He doubled over, grabbing his upper thigh as the blood spread through his trousers. A man with a rifle moved out of the moonlight shadows fifty feet away, raising a hand-held intercom to his face. Evan crouched, his whole body now a festering boil, and raised his left hand to steady his right and the Colt automatic. He fired twice, one or both of his shots hitting the target. The guard reeled, dropping both the rifle and the radio; he fell on the thick wood planks and was still.
“Come on, amigo!” cried Kendrick, gripping Emilio’s shoulder.
“I cannot move! I have no leg!”
“Well, I’m not going to die with you, you bastard! I’ve got a couple of loved ones, too, over there. Get off your ass or swim back to El Descanso and your niños!”
“Cómo?” shouted the Mexican furiously as he struggled to rise.
“That’s better. Get angry! We’ve both got a lot to be angry about.” His arm around Emilio’s waist, his barely functioning shoulder and legs supporting the Mexican, the two men walked out on the dark dock. “The big boat on the right!” yelled Evan, grateful that the moon had gone back behind the clouds. “You know about boats, amigo?”
“I am a fisherman!”
“Boats like this?” asked Kendrick, propelling Emilio over the side onto the deck, laying the .45 on the gunwale.