How—?
Finway’s presence in the blimp changed everything, Shue thought, his calm facade belying the turmoil inside him as he wrapped one blanket around the violently shivering man and helped the co-pilot ease him down on the other. He pulled the top blanket up to Finway’s chin as Terry Factor massaged Finway’s arms and legs. Then Harley Shue rose and walked to the rear of the gondola. He needed time to think and evaluate this new situation.
The captain adjusted the controls. As the blimp began to ascend, he leaned forward and flipped on the two radio switches. “Okay, Molly,” he said drily. “Now, where were we?”
“Hey! Kiss Frank for me! Were got that explosion and fire on tape; we’ll show it as soon as we find out what happened. And you want Sierrans, we’ve got Sierrans! They’re all over the place down here, and you’ve got a boatload coming around the bend. What the hell happened?”
Shue frowned as he watched Finway wrestle an arm free from the blanket, reach up and grab the front of the copilot’s shirt. He pulled the man’s head down and whispered in his ear. The co-pilot listened intently, then tensed and turned toward the coockpit.
“Jack? This guy’s saying something about his wife and Salva getting killed tonight.”
“Hey! What’s that?! Terry, what did you say?”
“T-turn off the radio,” John Finway stammered, his lips still blue and quivering from cold and exhaustion. “Important. People going to d-die.”
“Jack, I know this guy,” Factor said, staring hard at the man lying on the floor beneath him. “It’s John Finway. The lawyer.”
Shue watched as Finway once again clutched feebly at the co-pilot’s shirt. Terry Factor got down on one knee and leaned forward, putting his ear close to the other man’s mouth.
No matter what now happened inside the castle, Shue thought, Operation Saint George could not be launched as long as John Finway was alive. Shue had no idea how the lawyer had ended in the water or who the gunman had been, but he had to assume that Finway knew much more than he should and that the lawyer would tell what he knew. There would be no way to control him—especially if his wife were killed.
“Hey! Damn it, what’s happening up there?”
Shue knew that the time for consideration and debate was over; he had to act immediately if he hoped to have any control over future events. He crossed the length of the gondola in quick strides, reached over the pilot’s shoulder into the cockpit and turned off the radio switches.
“My name is Peter White,” Shue announced to the startled captain and co-pilot. The two men were staring at him as though he had gone mad. He took the credentials wallet from the breast pocket of his suit jacket, flipped it open and held it at arm’s length for the two men to examine. “I’m here on the direct authority of the President of the United States,” he continued in the same steady tone. “I can arrange for you to speak to him personally, but we’ll save time—very valuable time—if you’ll just accept my authority for now.”
There was a long silence while the captain studied Shue’s credentials. “You’re in charge, Mr. White,” Jack Barnes said at last. “Just tell us what you want us to do.”
“Thank you, Captain. Can you rig your communications gear so that we can maintain an open channel without anyone on the ground being able to hear what we say?”
The captain removed a headset with an attached microphone from a metal peg beside him. He put on the set, plugged a cable into a jack hole on the control console, and snapped on one of the two radio switches. “Okay,” he said. “I can cover the mike with my hand when you’re talking, but you’ll still have to keep your voices down.”
Shue tensed slightly at the tortured, gasping sound of John Finway’s voice.
“White, you son-of-a-bitch; you’re one of the people responsible for my wife being in that castle down there, aren’t you?”
Harley Shue turned to face the other man, who had somehow managed to struggle to his feet. Finway was swaying and trembling as he held the blanket tightly around him, but his eyes were brimming with hate, bright and hot as glowing coals in a face the color of ashes. The man had come to the open sea out of hell, Shue thought.
“That’s not true, Mr. Finway,” Shue said mildly. “The government only recently received intelligence reports that something unusual might happen tonight. That’s why I’m here. I don’t know anything about you or your wife, and I certainly would if the United States government were involved in any way. I want to hear what you have to say, but I think it should wait until we get things straightened out with the people on the ground. Otherwise, we’re likely to have a jet fighter or two for company. Agreed?”
Shue paused. When Finway turned away, the CIA’s Director of Operations spoke to the cameraman. “Did you get any clear shots of Mr. Finway?”
“No,” the cameraman replied in a surly tone. “You were in the way. Who the hell did you say you were?”
“He’s the man giving orders here, Frank,” Barnes said flatly. “Just do as he asks.”
Shue inclined his head toward the captain. “So they don’t know we’ve picked up a passenger. Let’s keep it that way. Stall them any way you can.”
“I have to get down there!” Finway shouted.
“Wait a moment, Mr. Finway. Be quiet, please. Captain?”
“Molly?” Barnes said casually into the microphone. “You there?”
“Am I here? I’m here! Where the hell are you?”
“A couple of minor problems here, Molly,” Barnes said in a calm, soothing tone. “We went down to see if anyone survived that explosion. Negative. But I think we may have been hit by some debris. I don’t think there’s any serious damage, but we’ll need some time to check it out. You can get by without us for a while, huh?”
“Sure. You’re coming back into sight now. You want me to call in some help?”
“Negative. At least not yet. We’ll check things out ourselves first. Over and out, Molly.”
“Roger, Captain Jack. Take care.”
Shue waited for the captain to shut off the transmission switch, then turned to John Finway. Incredibly, the lawyer, his muscles apparently fueled by the same terrible need and hurt Shue saw burning in his eyes, was pacing impatiently back and forth across the narrow width of the gondola. Shue could see that the other man was not shivering as violently as before, and some color had returned to his face.
“Now, Mr. Finway, would you care to tell us what happened down there?”
“I don’t have time to talk to you about it! I told you I have to get down on the ground!”
“There’s no way we can get you there, Mr. Finway,” Terry Factor interjected. “We have permission to fly over Tamara Castle, not land on top of it.” The co-pilot shrugged, continued. “And you can’t just set a blimp down in Angeles Blanca, even if the Sierrans did give us permission to land.”
Finway clenched his fists, pounded the side of the gondola.
Shue held up his hand in a pacifying gesture. “Why is it so important that you get down there, Mr. Finway?”
“Is Salva in the castle?”
“No. At least he wasn’t when we went down for you. Now there seems to be some question as to whether he’s coming at all.”
Shue could see that John Finway was barely managing to keep his emotions under control. The man’s eyes, as well as the sharp tone of his voice and the tight lines around his mouth, revealed the intensity of his inner struggle. His entire body sagged with exhaustion, yet his voice when he spoke seemed to grow increasingly stronger, as if reflecting some energy source at his core that only death could stamp out.
“You have to get the Sierrans to keep him away,” Finway said, speaking slowly and carefully emphasizing each word. “He’s going to be killed if he goes into that castle. A man by the name of Rick Peters has planted plastic explosives on my wife. She doesn’t have the slightest idea what’s going down, and her job is probably to get as close to Salva as she can. If Salva shows, Peters will blow them both up.
”
“Jesus Christ,” Terry Factor said.
Shue stepped up behind Jack Barnes. The captain was sitting stiffly erect, his hand hovering near the transmission switch. “Did you hear that, Captain?” Shue asked softly. When Barnes nodded curtly, the Director of Operations continued, “We have to locate this man’s wife, which means some specific pictures up here. Can you set up closed two-way communications with your director?”
“Tough,” Barnes said tightly. “The telecast is a cooperative deal. We’re supposed to be training the Sierrans, and they’re doing a lot of the technical work down there.”
“Never mind,” Finway said in a soft, haunted voice. “There she is.”
Shue glanced up at the monitors. The set on the far right displayed a shot of empty bleacher seats: Alexandra Finway could be clearly seen at the edge of the picture, seated on the aisle.
“My wife is the tall woman with the dark hair,” Finway continued in the same hollow voice. “You can’t see it from this angle, but she has a barrette in her hair that’s made out of plastique. Peters is somewhere in there. He’s carrying a radio that can transmit a signal that will fire off the explosives.”
“I’ll have to explain the situation to the Sierrans,” Barnes said flatly. “They can get the woman out of there and nail this Peters joker.”
“No!” the lawyer said sharply, his voice breaking, changing from a command to a plea in the single syllable. “I told you; Alexandra has no idea what’s really happening. She thinks she’s there to protect Salva, so she’ll be on guard. She can’t be approached by anyone but me. If she even begins to suspect that something’s wrong, she’ll signal Peters. Peters knows he’s a dead man if the Sierrans catch him, and he’ll probably blow away Alexandra out of spite. I have to be the one who goes in there.”
Shue studied the other man, decided that the lawyer was probably right: Finway alone had the best, if not the only, chance to save his wife. Rick Peters was paranoid, volatile, and totally unpredictable. Operation Saint George was off if Salva didn’t appear, and there was no sense in having a fine woman die needlessly.
On the other hand, Shue thought, having Finway inside the castle would make the lawyer their gunner’s responsibility. Then, if Salva did appear and were assassinated, John Finway would be eliminated, as originally planned.
In either event, it was best to let Finway go.
“You’re very weak,” Shue said carefully. “You don’t have any clothes; even if you did, you’d be recognized.”
“My physical condition isn’t your concern!” Finway snapped. “If this man will lend me his clothes, the cap will cover my hair.”
The cameraman nodded. “You’ve got anything of mine you want, buddy,” he said quickly removing his long-billed cap and starting to unbutton his shirt. “There’s a pair of coveralls and boots in the back I can wear.” He shrugged off his shirt, handed it to the lawyer. “There’s a credentials badge in the pocket. It’s a lousy photograph, and you might get past them with it; I didn’t need it working up here, but you’ll have to have it pinned on if you expect to get into the castle.”
“Captain,” Shue said, “you did tell your director that we have a crippled ship. Will the Sierrans cooperate if you tell them you have to bring it down?”
“Let’s find out,” Barnes said tightly, flipping on the transmission switch and tapping the microphone on the headset. “Molly, can you talk?”
“I’ve got you, Jack. How’re you doing up there?”
“Not good. I’ve lost hydraulic pressure in my right aileron. I’ve got to bring her down, and fast. The square in front of the castle looks wide enough. The problem is that I don’t have permission to land, and I don’t have time for interrogation by their air controllers. Take care of my chatter for me, will you? I don’t want them to think that the Goodyear blimp is leading some kind of invasion.”
“Will do. It’s an emergency. What can they say?”
“They can say anything they want as long as they don’t shoot. The Sierrans will have to clear the area, and I’ll need some men to hold the tethers.”
“Jack, what the hell can you do to a blimp parked in the middle of the street?”
“I won’t know that until I can get out from behind the controls and eyeball things,” Barnes said testily. “But landing in the street sure as hell beats ditching in the ocean. Do what you can for me, will you, Molly? My wife won’t like it if I come home with an assful of bullets.”
“I’ll notify the Sierrans, and they can handle it any way they want. Don’t worry about this end, Jack. You just get everybody down here in one piece. Got it?”
“Roger. Thanks, Molly. Over and out.”
Barnes once again switched off the radio, then eased the controls forward. “Here we go, folks,” he said tersely. “This could be hairy, you know. The Sierrans may go apeshit when they see this big son-of-a-bitch floating down on top of them.”
“We have to take the risk,” Shue said evenly.
His own risk was the greatest of all, he thought, at least in terms of national security, global politics, and war. The Sierrans and the Russians would dearly love to capture on Sierran soil the man who had been the CIA Director of Operations for close to three and a half decades. However, clearing the way for Saint George necessitated the gamble.
“I can’t set this thing down on the ground, you know,” Barnes said. “It would take half the night to set up a proper mooring. Mr. Finway’s going to have to use the rope ladder.” He paused, added thoughtfully, “He’s going to have to climb down right into the arms of the Sierrans.”
“I’ll make it into the castle,” Finway said, his tone flat and distant. It sounded to Shue as if the man were talking to himself. Finway was already standing by the bay door, dressed in the cameraman’s clothes. “I have to.”
Shue looked at the monitors. The action in the ring had stopped and everyone inside the arena was looking up at the sky. He turned, glanced out the side window. The ground was coming up fast; the plaza had been cleared, and barricades erected at both ends. There were perhaps two dozen men below them, all craning their necks to look up at the descending blimp. At least ten of the men were uniformed soldiers armed with Kalashnikov assault rifles.
“You understand that we’ll have to deal with the Sierrans if they stop you,” Shue said evenly to the man waiting anxiously at the bay door. “They’ll have to be told what’s going on.”
“I understand. And I appreciate being given this chance. I know all of you are sticking your necks out.”
Both Barnes and his co-pilot responded with a thumbs-up sign. “Hey, buddy,” the captain said with feeling. “I haven’t got the slightest idea what this is all about, but you go get your wife out of there safely.”
“And don’t get your ass shot off,” Terry Factor added.
“All bets are off if Salva shows up, Mr. Finway,” Harley Shue said, raising his voice slightly and glancing in the direction of the two men in the cockpit to make sure they had heard him. “Of course we can’t gamble with Salva’s life.”
John Finway said nothing. A number of the men on the ground were waving, their faces anxious but friendly. Shue smiled broadly and waved back at them.
The airship floated down. Barnes halted its descent when the bottom of the gondola was nine or ten feet from the ground. Finway and the cameraman flung the bay doors open and tossed out four heavy tether ropes, two on each side. The ropes were quickly seized by eight men, two to a rope, and pulled taut to steady the blimp.
Shue was relieved to see that none of the men appeared to be suspicious. One soldier was speaking into a walkie-talkie, but there was nothing in his expression that caused Shue to feel alarm; most of the soldiers had apparently come over merely to watch or help.
If there were DMI men in the crowd, and Shue was certain there were, they had seen no need to make their presence known. Barnes and Factor immediately got out of their seats and made a show of frenetically checking controls and equ
ipment. On the monitors, the bouts had been resumed at the urging of the referee. Shue noted approvingly that Finway did not rush. The tall, gaunt man waited a minute or two, then walked over and leaned casually against the frame of the open doorway. He glanced down at the ground, then called loudly, but not too loudly, over his shoulder, “We’re busted for this trip. There’s nothing for me to do here. I’m going in to watch the fights.”
Barnes, without pausing in his frantic activity, merely waved him away. Finway tossed a rope ladder with aluminum rungs out the door, turned around and, with what seemed to Shue surprising strength for a man who had been struggling in the sea only minutes before, agilely descended to the ground. Shue tensed slightly when he saw the lawyer challenged by two nervous soldiers, but Finway handled it correctly. The lawyer flashed his credentials badge in the soldiers’ faces, then gestured angrily at the blimp and shrugged. Without a trace of anxiety or hesitation, he pushed the cap back on his head—but only to the hairline. Almost immediately he turned his head to the side sharply, as if in disgust with the broken blimp. It worked. The soldiers conferred for a minute or two, but they did not give the murky photograph more than a cursory glance. Both men nodded and smiled at Finway. The soldier with the walkie-talkie conferred with someone inside the castle, read the number off Finway’s badge. He received an answer, then nodded an affirmation to his companions. Finway was clapped on the back and good-naturedly shoved toward the entrance to the castle. Shue grunted, slowly exhaled.
“Will you look at that?” Terry Factor said distantly, as though he could hardly believe what he was seeing. “Marches right into the castle just as cool as snakeshit. The guy’s got guts.”
It was true, Harley Shue thought. John Finway appeared to have rare courage—like his wife. Harry Beeler had possessed that kind of courage. It would be his duty and challenge, Shue thought, to make certain these people’s deaths were not squandered.
And yet …
Harley Shue was vaguely surprised to find himself hoping that Salva found whatever he was doing at the moment more attractive than the boxing matches.
Turn Loose the Dragons Page 34
