Cold War Trilogy - A Three Book Boxed Set: of Historical Spy Versus Spy Action Adventure Thrillers

by William Brown

  The wire and the lights were ominous enough, but what scared Yussuf most out here were the guards he saw around the compound. They were real ones, not the incompetent Egyptian militia who usually guarded monuments, historic places, and places like this. The militia were amateurs, and Yussuf had not seen crack troops like these since the British left. He watched them sweep methodically and relentlessly through the compound and around its perimeter repeatedly — hard-eyed, alert, and heavily armed. Well, one thing was for certain, he thought. They were not Egyptian. The troops sleeping in those barracks and minding the tanks might be Egyptian, but not the men who guarded them. They were far too professional.

  Landau hinted he was Mossad and talked a good game, but what would happen if the guards caught him, or worse still, what if they had already caught him! That thought made Yussuf break into a cold sweat. What if Landau was down there at this very moment spilling his guts out and telling them about his Egyptian ‘partner’ hiding in the sand dunes on the other side of the fence? Yussuf had been crazy to trust his life to a lunatic like that. The money had looked so very, very sweet back in Cairo. Now he realized that he had sold himself too cheap by at least half.

  Suddenly, he heard a sound. This time it was not his imagination, either. He pressed his fat carcass deeper into the sand and prayed. There! He heard footsteps, slow and steady, walking along inside the fence, coming closer. The guards! He could see them now, two men with automatic rifles backlit by the lights in the compound, and he heard voices. Yussuf could not make out their words, only hushed laughter as they joked and shared a quick smoke. He strained to make out the words, but it was too garbled. The language was certainly foreign. Russian? No, he knew a smattering of Russian and that was not what he heard. It sounded more guttural… German? Perhaps. Yes, a few words here, a few more there, and then he was positive — it was German, all right. Those bastards! They were Germans, old Nazi Storm Troopers, no doubt, strolling about the Egyptian desert after they had been evicted less than twenty years before. So what were they doing here guarding Egyptian troops and tanks? Were they keeping them in, or keeping others out? It was a mystery all right; but if Landau wanted to know it this badly, then it must be valuable indeed, and Yussuf knew what to do with things of value. There was no telling what it might be worth, but in the Middle East, even bits and pieces of the truth were like gold nuggets to a shrewd operative like Mahmoud Yussuf. He could only guess what that information might be worth and began licking his lips and dreaming again of the smart-mouthed whore in Cairo. Soon, he would have money, enough money to keep her all night this time and maybe the next day and the next day and night too. She would not be laughing at him then.

  That was when the guards stopped walking, and Mahmoud Yussuf stopped breathing. The guards were not a hundred feet from where he lay and not ten feet from the fence. Surely, they saw him. Surely, they saw the hole. After all, it was right there at their feet. With the slightest turn of their heads and the slightest glance, they would see the cut wire and Yussuf would be a dead man. He would hear the shouts and the angry chatter of gunshots, just before their bullets punched him full of holes. When the sun rose in the morning, his corpse would be lying out here like a bloody lump of carrion left for the vultures.

  However, what if they decided not to kill him? His stomach suddenly jumped into his throat as he realized those grim prospects. What if they grabbed him and took him alive? Torture? “Oh, merciful Allah,” he groaned as he closed his eyes again, thinking of the terrible pain they would inflict on his body. He could never let that happen. Yussuf could not stand even the slightest amount of pain, so he could never let them take him alive. In his sweating hand was the pistol Landau had given him. It was old, but it worked. He gripped it tighter, raised it to the side of his head, and slowly pulled the hammer back until he heard a crisp Click! Better to die right here in the sand, he vowed, than to let those sadistic German bastards take him alive. Still, the touch of cold steel made him whimper. Gritting his teeth, he took up the slack on the trigger, trying not to think of the white-hot pain that was about to follow.

  Then, just as he was about to blow his own brains out, he heard muffled laughter. He opened one eye and saw that the guards were actually laughing amongst each other, not pointing at the hole in the fence and screaming. To his utter amazement, he saw them turn and continue walking down the fence line and away from him. His finger froze on the trigger. He could not believe it. As quickly as they had come, their footsteps faded away into the stillness of the desert night and they were gone.

  Yussuf’s body began to tremble. The pistol dropped from his limp hand as if it weighed a ton. He felt drained, numb, giddy, and astonished to still be alive, until he remembered what he had almost done. His blood ran cold. The bile rose in his throat, making him gag. Had he lost his mind? He had almost killed himself although those jackals had not seen a damned thing. He had almost pulled the trigger and blown his own brains out, all because of that crazy Jew bastard, Landau! He cursed the man even harder now, convinced that his insanity had become contagious. That son of a whore. If he wanted to go get himself killed, that was fine; but now he had Yussuf doing it, too. Well, no longer. The money be damned and Landau along with it.

  Yussuf rose to his hands and knees and began to crawl backward across the sand, intent on getting away quickly, until a new sound made him drop flat on the sand again. He froze. Someone was coming. Oh, no, not those cursed guards again, he moaned. They had only been pretending to leave, taunting him; and now they were coming back to kill him. Yussuf could not bring himself to look. He shut his eyes and listened to the pounding of his heart, certain they could hear it in Cairo.

  He prayed to the cold sand, “I shall never do this abominable work again. Never! Allah, let me live! Mecca! I’ll take Haj, the pilgrimage; I swear it by the Prophet’s beard.” The prayer died in his throat, however, as a pebble plopped onto the sand next to him. Then he heard a faint whisper calling to him from the other side of the fence.

  “Yussuf,” the whisper called out his name. “Yussuf, where are you?” He frowned and lifted his head a few inches as he realized it was Landau. Landau, the insane bastard of all insane bastards, had finally come back. “You fat piece of crap,” he heard Landau whisper again. The Israeli wore a dark sweater and slacks and had blackened his face like a commando, so Yussuf could not see him. Still, Yussuf knew he was not far away. He scrambled down the sand dune to the fence as if the Israeli were his long-lost brother. Forget the money, forget that skinny whore, and forget all the cursing and insults he had laid on him. All Yussuf wanted now was to grab Landau and run as far away from this place as he could. He reached the hole in the fence, intent on pulling that crazy Jew the rest of the way through and running away; but Landau pushed his hand away.

  “No,” he said calmly. “I’m not finished yet, I’ve got to go back inside.”

  Yussuf was stunned. “Back inside? You are going back in there? You — you cannot do that. I won’t let you. You are insane, Landau. We must get away from this cursed place before the guards come back. Can’t you see that?”

  “You go, if you must,” Landau whispered, as he fumbled with something in the dark.

  “But the guards were just here, you fool.”

  “I know. I saw them too.”

  “They are Germans; they will feed us both to the dogs if they catch us.”

  “Then go back to the car; I’ll meet you there in thirty minutes.”

  “Thirty minutes? You will be dead in thirty minutes. Can you not see that? Then once they kill you, they will come back here and kill me, too. Have you no pity?” he begged, his gold tooth flashing in the dim light.

  “Don’t worry,” Landau smiled at him in the darkness, “you’ll still get your money.”

  “How does a dead man pay someone?” he demanded to know, his voice trembling with fear. “Tell me, how am I going to get paid?”

  “Yussuf, if you don’t shut up, you’ll get nothing. I am not finish
ed in there so I must go back inside — unless you want to come back here tomorrow night and do this all over again? That isn’t what you want, is it?”

  Yussuf groaned.

  “No, I thought not. Here,” Landau said as he reached his hand through the fence and pressed something hard into Yussuf s palm.

  Yussuf jerked the hand away, as if Landau had put a red-hot coal in it.

  “Take it,” Landau snapped. “Go back to the car if you want, but take this with you.”

  “You really are insane, you know,” Yussuf whimpered, looking down at his hand, realizing that it held a small silver can of film. “More photographs? Haven’t you taken enough of your cursed photographs already?”

  “Don’t lose them! Don’t get any cute ideas like leaving me here, either. You and the car had better be there in thirty minutes when I get back.”

  “And what if you don’t come back? What happens to me?”

  “You?” Landau chuckled. “You’ll land on your feet like the overfed alley cat you are, Yussuf. If I don’t come back, take the film to Evans. He’s CIA. He’ll know what to do with it, and he’ll pay you. Have no fear about that.”

  “Evans…? You crazy Jew,” the Egyptian muttered in frustration. “What if they catch you this time? The Americans, those cheap bastards, they’ll never…” and his voice trailed away into nothing as he realized he was alone talking to the empty sand. Landau was gone.

  CHAPTER TWO

  Landau knew Yussuf was right. Sneaking into this old British base once was risky enough. Trying to do it a second time was suicidal. Still, Landau was good at this line of work, and completing the mission was something he knew he must do. He had already seen enough to have strong suspicions about what was inside, but suspicions would count for absolutely nothing in Tel Aviv if he did not have proof — absolute, incontrovertible proof. It might start a war or stop one, but he must know the truth. Over the two nights, he had methodically searched the compound from one end to the other. He looked everywhere, except inside that big hangar that was standing off by itself beyond the weeds and scrub that once passed for the RAF’s runway. That was the only place left, so Landau knew it was where they must be hiding whatever it was they were doing out here.

  Egypt was slowly sinking into chaos. The Revolution of 1952 had driven out that fat fool, King Farouk, and his British protectors. They hauled down the old Union Jack and handed over the keys with smug little smiles and crisp parade-ground salutes, but they had stripped everything useful from these old WW II bases before they left. Call it revenge for an empire lost or maybe simple spite against a little people who had never appreciated their betters. Even as the Arab press screamed in Cairo, in a bitter post-war London there was no sentiment to leave anything of value behind for the Wogs. The unwashed mobs in the streets now ruled the country, and the once-proud, British-trained Egyptian Army Colonels danced for their favor like trained bears in the circus. Unfortunately, the Colonels had little to offer except the old hot torch of nationalism, a burning hatred of all things foreign, of Jews and of Israel in particular. Cairo was now a tinderbox. With a quarter of the country’s population crammed into its stinking slums, the right spark could set it ablaze, and the radical Islamic Brotherhood intended to provide one. Working with their compatriots in a dozen other countries, the blaze would create an ideological firestorm that would sweep across the Middle East like flames driven on the wind across a dry wheat field.

  Even so, why should Landau worry? Why should Israel? They had beaten the Egyptian Army to a pulp in two wars, each ending in a decisive Israeli victory. True enough, but the second one was more painful and bloodier than the first, and the next was certain to be even worse. Besides, the number of battles and wars they won was irrelevant. All it would take was one defeat. That was the everyday reality of Israel’s tenuous situation. Each time they fought and each time they won, the celebrations grew more muted; because her people knew this was merely one more chapter and not a finished book. Still, would the Egyptians dare attack Israel a third time and so soon? If they did, where would they strike? When would it come? What was their plan, and what did this long-abandoned RAF base in the desert have to do with it? Landau had worked undercover in Egypt for seven months now, and it fell to him to find out.

  As he worked his way around the compound these two nights, he knew Yussuf was right about the guards. They were indeed German, but he did not need to hear them talk to recognize the breed. From the very beginning, he knew in his gut that he would find them at the bottom of this business. Germans! His memories of them were now as cold and gray as the ash they had left in the ovens. Over the years, he may have put the worst of those memories to rest, but not his simmering hatred of them. In his mind’s eye, he could see the tall barbed-wire fences of the death camp as vividly as if it were yesterday. He could see the cruel-eyed men dressed in black and silver, as well as the wispy columns of pale smoke rising above the ovens into a pitiless, gray sky, too. Smoke? That was family, friends, neighbors, and three generations of European Jewry, nearly wiped out in ten short years. Landau survived it. He survived it all, but he remembered and he hated. Death? He died and went to Hell each and every night in the death camp, only to be awoken and forced to start the journey anew the next morning, the next, and then the next. Around “the Office” in Tel Aviv, they called him “the Dead Man” because of his gaunt appearance. He was nowhere near as old as he appeared. At 37, he looked to be twice that age. While highly effective for a master spy, his appearance was largely unintentional. Landau did not smoke, did not drink, rarely ate, and even more rarely talked. He had no apparent religious or political beliefs. He could well have been dead for all any of them would have noticed, but the truth was much simpler. Death held no mystery or fear for Landau. It had become an old and trusted friend, which was why he slipped back inside the old RAF base without giving it a second thought. Afraid? Insane? No. Not really. He was blessed with the reckless abandon of a man who had already lost everything, and for whom life held very little meaning.

  Back inside the compound, he moved like a whisper on the wind, blending into the shadows until he reached the old runway. There he stopped and flattened himself in the weeds along the edge of the tarmac. He was barely fifty feet from the sidewall of the hangar, a good place to carefully watch and wait. This was the largest building on the base, nearly three stories of rusting sheet metal. It was hard to believe anyone would try to hide a military secret in a building like this, Landau thought, but it was where all the signs pointed. He had snooped around most of the other buildings, watched the activity and the guards, studied the tracks in the sand leading to them, and examined the storage tanks and crates stacked around them. This big hangar was all that remained. It had more lights around it, and the guards did seem to check it more closely than any of the others, Landau reluctantly admitted; so if there was something hiding inside this old base in addition to the tanks and troops, it had to be here. That was why he knew he had to get inside.

  There were freight doors at the front end of the building. They were tall, heavy, and sitting on rollers. That would be how they took the vehicles and big equipment inside, but that entrance was bathed in broad pools of light. There was a smaller man-door at the far end, but that did not look any easier to breach. Reluctantly, Landau saw his only chance would be through one of the windows that ran down the side of the building. The glass appeared to be painted matte black, so the only way he would be able to see inside was to pry one open and crawl in. That is, if he could make it across the brightly lit tarmac without being seen.

  Looking more closely, he saw someone had stacked a half-dozen oil drums near the center of the hangar wall, casting a long shadow beneath one of the windows. Well, Landau thought as he took a long, last look around, this was as good a time to die as any. He rose to his feet and sprinted toward the building. The bright glare from the lights made him squint, but he ignored them and concentrated on the window and the shadow beneath it. This was reckl
ess at best and probably suicidal. A black figure floating slowly through the shadows was one thing, but a black-clad figure sprinting across the brightly lit sand was something altogether different. It made him a clear target and that awareness caused him to run even faster.

  His knife was out before he reached the window. He drove the blade up and into the gap between the upper and lower sash, first tugging and jerking the handle from side to side and then pushing until the steel tip touched the latch. He pushed harder, expecting it to pop open, but the latch was old and rusted and it fought back. He was certain the coats of faded, chipped paint were all that held the old wooden window together. Perhaps that was true, but the damned thing refused to surrender. Landau pushed the knife up even more and worked it back and forth again, straining and praying its thin blade would not snap. The latch squeaked in protest, and the blade bent, almost breaking, but the latch finally sprang open. When it did, he pulled the knife out, ran its sharp blade down the joints where the frame met the sash to break the seal, gripped the lower sash with both hands, and pushed up, then again, harder! Finally, the old paint gave way with a loud, splintering crack and the sash slid up.

  Landau cringed at the noise and glanced toward the front and rear corners of the building. He expected to find himself staring down the barrel of a submachine gun, but no one was there. Well, it was much too late to worry about the guards. If they heard the noise, he was as good as dead already. All he could do now was keep moving and get out of sight. He climbed through the narrow opening, pulled his legs inside after him, pushed the window closed as best he could, and pressed his body flat against the inside wall. He held his breath and waited, expecting the empty silence to be shattered by shouts and whistles, for the darkness to be slashed by the crisscrossing beam of powerful flashlights, and for the gunshots that would surely follow. Still, he heard nothing. Landau was a patient man. He wanted desperately to begin exploring the building, but not until he regained his night vision. If they had posted guards inside and someone else was hiding here in the dark with him, perhaps the other man would make that first, fatal mistake, not him. So for a full five minutes he sat there waiting; but he heard nothing — no lights, no shouts, and thankfully, no gunshots.