by Tom Clancy
The operation itself had been meticulously planned, everything done just right, a primary plan and a number of alternates, with each segment of the team so fully briefed and trained that every man could do every function in his sleep. Crashing a huge Sikorsky helicopter right in the camp itself so that the strike team would not have to wait to get to the objective. Using miniguns to take down the guard towers like chainsaws against saplings. No finesse, no pussyfooting, no movie-type bullshit, just brutally direct force. The after-action debriefs showed that the camp guards had been immolated in moments. How elated the troopers must have felt as the first minute or two of the operation had run more smoothly than their simulations, and then the stunning, bitter frustration when the “negative Item” calls had come again and again over their radio circuits. “Item” was the simple code word for an American POW, and none were home that night. The soldiers had assaulted and liberated an empty camp. It wasn’t hard to imagine how quiet the choppers must have been for the ride back to Thailand, the bleak emptiness of failure after having done everything better than right.
There was, nonetheless, much to learn here. Kelly made his notes, cramping fingers and wearing out numerous pencils. Whatever else it had been, KINGPIN was a supremely valuable lesson. So much had gone right, he saw, and all of that could be shamelessly copied. All that had gone wrong, really, was the time factor. Troops of that quality could have gone in much sooner. The quest for perfection hadn’t been demanded at the operational level, but higher, from men who had grown older and lost contact with the enthusiasm and intelligence of youth. And a consequence had been the failure of the mission, not because of Bull Simons, or Dick Meadows, or the Green Berets who’d gladly placed their lives at risk for men they’d never met, but because of others too afraid to risk their careers and their offices—matters of far greater importance, of course, than the blood of the guys at the sharp end. Song Tay was the whole story of Vietnam, told in the few minutes it had taken for a superbly-trained team to fail, betrayed as much by process as by some misguided or traitorous person hidden in the federal bureaucracy.
SENDER GREEN would be different, Kelly told himself. If for no other reason than that it was being run as a private game. If the real hazard to the operation was oversight, then why not eliminate the oversight?
“Captain, you’ve been very helpful,” Kelly said.
“Find what you wanted, Mr. Clark?” Griffin asked.
“Yes, Mr. Griffin,” he said, dropping unconsciously back into naval terminology for the young officer. “The analysis you did on the secondary camp was first-rate. In case nobody ever told you, that might have saved a few lives. Let me say something for myself: I wish we’d had an intel-weenie like you working for us when I was out in the weeds.”
“I can’t fly, sir. I have to do something useful,” Griffin replied, embarrassed by the praise.
“You do.” Kelly handed over his notes. Under his eyes they were placed in an envelope that was then sealed with red wax. “Courier the package to this address.”
“Yes, sir. You’re due some time off. Did you get any sleep at all?” Captain Griffin asked.
“Well, I think I’ll depressurize in New Orleans before I fly back.”
“Not a bad place for it, sir.” Griffin walked Kelly to his car, already loaded.
One other bit of intelligence had been stunningly easy, Kelly thought, driving out. His room in the Q had contained a New Orleans telephone directory in which, to his amazement, had been the name he’d decided to look up while sitting in James Greer’s office in CIA.
This was the shipment that would make his reputation, Tucker thought, watching Rick and Billy finish loading things up. Part of it would find its way to New York. Up until now he’d been an interloper, an outsider with ambition. He’d provided enough heroin to get people interested in himself and his partners—the fact that he had partners had attracted interest of its own, in addition to the access. But now was different. Now he was making his move to be part of the crew. He would be seen as a serious businessman because this shipment would handle all the needs of Baltimore and Philadelphia for. . . maybe a month, he estimated. Maybe less if their distribution network was as good as they said. The leftovers would start meeting the growing needs in the Big Apple, which needed the help after a major bust. After so long a time of making small steps, here was the giant one. Billy turned on a radio to get the sports news, and got a weather forecast instead.
“I’m glad we’re going now. Storms coming in later.”
Tucker looked outside. The sky was still clear and untroubled. “Nothing for us to worry about,” he told them.
He loved New Orleans, a city in the European tradition, which mixed Old World charm with American zest. Rich in history, owned by Frenchmen and Spaniards in their turn, it had never lost its traditions, even to its maintenance of a legal code that was nearly incomprehensible to the other forty-nine states, and was often a matter of some befuddlement to federal authorities. So was the local patois, for many mixed French into their conversations, or what they called French. Pierre Lamarck’s antecedents had been Acadians, and some of his more distant relatives were still residents in the local bayous. But customs that were eccentric and entertaining to tourists, and a comfortable life rich in tradition to others, had little interest to Lamarck except as a point of reference, a personal signature to distinguish him from his peers. That was hard enough to do, as his profession demanded a certain flash, a personal flair. He accentuated his uniqueness with a white linen suit complete with vest, a white, long-sleeved shirt, and a red, solid-color tie, which fitted his own image as a respectable, if ostentatious, local businessman. That went along well with his personal automobile, an eggshell-white Cadillac. He eschewed the ornamental excesses that some other pimps placed on their automobiles, nonfunctional exhaust pipes. One supposed Texan even had the horns of a longhorn steer on his Lincoln, but that one was really poor white trash from lower Alabama, and a boy who didn’t know how to treat his ladies.
This latter quality was Lamarck’s greatest talent, he told himself with great satisfaction, opening the door of his car for his newest acquisition, fifteen years old and recently broken in, possessed of an innocent look and demure movement that made her a noteworthy and enticing member of his eight-girl stable. She’d earned the pimp’s unaccustomed courtesy with a special service of her own earlier in the day. The luxury car started on the first turn of the key, and at seven-thirty, Pierre Lamarck set off on another night’s work, for the nightlife in his city started early and lasted late. There was a convention in town, distributors for something or other. New Orleans attracted a lot of conventions, and he could track the cash flow of his business by their comings and goings. It promised to be a warm and lucrative night.
It had to be him, Kelly thought, half a block away, behind the wheel of his still-rented car. Who else would wear a three-piece suit and be accompanied by a young girl dressed in a tight mini? Certainly not an insurance agent. The girl’s jewelry looked cheap-showy even from this distance. Kelly slipped the car into gear, following. He was able to lie back. How many white Caddies could there be? he wondered, crossing the river, three cars back, eyes locked on his target while peripheral parts of his mind dealt with the other traffic. Once he had to risk a ticket at a traffic light, but otherwise the tracking was simple. The Caddy stopped at the entrance to an upscale hotel, and he saw the girl get out, and walk towards the door, her stride a mixture of the businesslike and the resigned. He didn’t want to see her face all that closely, afraid of what memories might result from it. This was not a night for emotion. Emotion was what had given him the mission. How he accomplished it had to come from something else. That would be a constant struggle, Kelly told himself, but one he would have to contend with successfully. That was, after all, why he’d come to this place, on this night.
The Cadillac moved on a few more blocks, finding a parking place by a seedy, flashy bar close enough to the nice hotels and businesses
that a person could walk there quickly, yet never be far from the safety and comfort of civilized safety. A fairly constant stream of taxicabs told him that this aspect of local life had a firm, institutional foundation. He identified the bar in question and found himself a place to park three blocks away.
There was a dual purpose in parking so far from his objective. The walk in along Decatur Street gave him both a feel for the territory and a look at likely places for his action. Surely it would be a long night. Some short-skirted girls smiled at him as mechanically as the changing of the traffic lights, but he walked on, his eyes sweeping left and right while a distant voice reminded him of what he had once thought of such gestures. He silenced that voice with another, more current thought. His clothes were casual, what a moderately comfortable man might wear in this humid heat and heavy atmosphere, dark and anonymous, loose and baggy. They proclaimed money, but not too much, and his stride told people that he was not one to be trifled with. A man of understated substance having a discreet night on the wild side.
He walked into Chats Sauvages at eight-seventeen. His initial impression of the bar was smoke and noise. A small but enthusiastic rock band played at the far end. There was a dance floor, perhaps twenty-five feet square, where people his age and younger moved with the music; and there was Pierre Lamarck, sitting at a table in the corner with a few acquaintances, or so they seemed from their demeanor. Kelly walked to the men’s room, both an immediate necessity and an opportunity to look the place over. There was another entrance on the side, but no closer to Lamarck’s table than the one through which both he and Kelly had entered. The nearest path to the white Caddy led past Kelly’s place at the bar, and that told him where his perch had to be. Kelly ordered a beer and turned conveniently to watch the band.
At nine-ten two young women came to Lamarck. One sat on his lap while the other nibbled at his ear. The other two men at the table watched with neutral interest while both women handed over something to him. Kelly couldn’t tell what it was because he was looking towards the band, careful not to stare too often in Lamarck’s direction. The pimp solved that problem immediately: it turned out, unsurprisingly, to be cash, and the man somewhat ostentatiously wrapped the bills around a roll removed from his pocket. Flash money, Kelly had troubled himself to learn, an important part of a pimp’s public image. The first two women left, and Lamarck was soon joined by another, in what became an intermittent stream that didn’t stop. His table mates enjoyed the same sort of traffic, Kelly saw, sipping their drinks, paying cash, joshing with and occasionally fondling the waitress who served them, then tipping her heavily by way of apology. Kelly moved from time to time. He removed his jacket, rolling up his sleeves, to present a different image to the bar’s patrons, and limiting himself to two beers, which he nursed as carefully as he could. Tedious as it was, he disregarded the unpleasant nature of the evening, instead noticing things. Who went where. Who came and left. Who stayed. Who lingered in one place. Kelly soon started recognizing patterns and identifying individuals to whom he assigned names of his own creation. Most of all he observed everything there was to see about Lamarck. He never took off his suit jacket, kept his back to the wall. He talked amiably with his two companions, but their familiarity was not that of friends. Their joking was too affected. There was too much emphasis on their interactive gestures, not the casual comfort that you saw among people whose company was shared for some purpose other than money. Even pimps got lonely, Kelly thought, and though they sought out their own kind, theirs was not friendship but mere association. The philosophical observations he put aside. If Lamarck never took off his coat, he had to be carrying a weapon.
Just after midnight, Kelly put his coat back on and made yet another trip to the men’s room. In the toilet stall he took the automatic he’d hidden inside his slacks and moved it to the waistband. Two beers in four hours, he thought. His liver ought to have eliminated the alcohol from his system, and even if it hadn’t, two beers should not have had much effect on one as bulky as he. It was an important statement which, he hoped, wasn’t a lie.
His timing was good. Washing his hands for the fifth time, Kelly saw the door open in the mirror. Only the back of the man’s head, but under the dark hair was a white suit, and so Kelly waited, taking his time until he heard the urinal flush. A sanitary sort of fellow, the man turned, and their eyes met in the mirror.
“Excuse me,” Pierre Lamarck said. Kelly stepped away from the sink, still drying his hands with a paper towel.
“I like the ladies,” he said quietly.
“Hmph?” Lamarck had no less than six drinks in him, and his liver had not been up to the task, which didn’t prevent his self-admiration in the dirty mirror.
“The ones that come up to you.” Kelly lowered his voice. “They, uh, work for you, like?”
“You might say that, my man.” Lamarck took out a black plastic comb to readjust his coiffeur. “Why do you ask?”
“I might need a few,” Kelly said with embarrassment.
“A few? You sure you can handle that, my man?” Lamarck asked with a sly grin.
“Some friends in town with me. One’s having a birthday, and—”
“A party,” the pimp observed pleasantly.
“That’s right.” Kelly tried to be shy, but mainly came off as being awkward. The error worked in his favor.
“Well, why didn’t you say so? How many ladies do you require, sir?”
“Three, maybe four. Talk about it outside? I could use some air.”
“Sure thing. Just let me wash my hands, okay?”
“I’ll be outside the front door.”
The street was quiet. Busy city though New Orleans might be, it was still the middle of the week, and the sidewalks, while not empty, weren’t crowded either. Kelly waited, looking away from the bar’s entrance until he felt a friendly hand on his back.
“It’s nothing to be embarrassed about. We all like to have a little fun, especially when we’re away from home, right?”
“I’ll pay top dollar,” Kelly promised with an uneasy smile.
Lamarck grinned, like the man of the world he was, to put this chicken farmer at ease. “With my ladies, you have to. Anything else you might need?”
Kelly coughed and took a few steps, willing Lamarck to follow, which he did. “Maybe some, well, something to help us party, like?”
“I can handle that, too,” Lamarck said as they approached an alley.
“I think I met you before, couple years back. I remember the girl, really, her name was. . . Pam? Yeah, Pam. Thin, tawny hair.”
“Oh, yeah, she was fun. She’s not with me anymore,” Lamarck said lightly. “But I have lots more. I cater to the men who like ’em young and fresh.”
“I’m sure you do,” Kelly said, reaching behind his back. “They’re all on—I mean they all use things that make it—”
“Happy stuff, man. So they’re always in the mood to party. A lady has to have the proper attitude.” Lamarck stopped at the entrance to the alley, looking outward, maybe worried about cops, which suited Kelly just fine. Behind him, he had not troubled to see, was a dark, scarcely lit corridor of blank brick walls, inhabited by nothing more than trash cans and stray cats, and open at the far end. “Let’s see. Four girls, rest of the evening, shall we say, and something to help get the party started. . . five hundred should do it. My girls aren’t cheap, but you will get your money’s—”
“Both hands in the open,” Kelly said, the Colt automatic leveled twelve inches from the man’s chest.
Lamarck’s first response was a disbelieving bluster: “My man, that is a very foolish—”
Kelly’s voice was all business. “Arguing with a gun is even more foolish, my man. Turn, walk down the alley, and you might even make it back to the bar for a nightcap.”
“You must need money real bad to try something this dumb,” the pimp said, trying an implied threat.
“Your roll worth dying for?” Kelly asked reasonably. Lamar
ck measured the odds and turned, moving into the shadows.
“Stop,” Kelly told him after fifty yards, still behind the blank wall of the bar, or perhaps another just like it. His left arm grabbed the man’s neck and pushed him against the bricks. His eyes looked up and down the alley three times. His ears searched for sounds separate from traffic noise and distorted music. For the moment it was a safe and quiet place. “Hand me your gun—real careful.”
“I don’t—” The sound of a hammer being cocked sounded awfully loud, that close to his ear.
“Do I look stupid?”
“Okay, okay,” Lamarck said, his voice losing its smooth edge now. “Let’s be real cool. It’s only money.”
“That’s smart,” Kelly said approvingly. A small automatic appeared. Kelly put his right index finger into the trigger guard. There was no sense in putting fingerprints on the weapon. He was taking enough chances, and as careful as he’d been to this point, the dangers of his action were suddenly very real and very large. The pistol fit nicely into his coat pocket.
“Let’s see the roll next.”
“Right here, man.” Lamarck was starting to lose it. That was both good and bad, Kelly thought. Good because it was pleasing to see. Bad because a panicked man might do something foolish. Instead of relaxing, Kelly actually became more tense.
“Thank you, Mr. Lamarck,” Kelly said politely, to calm the man.
Just then he wavered, and his head turned a few inches or so, as his consciousness asserted itself through the six drinks he’d had this evening. “Wait a minute—you said you knew Pam.”
“I did,” Kelly said.
“But why—” He turned farther to see a face that was bathed in darkness, only eyes showing with light glistening off their moisture, and the rest of the face a shadow white.
