The Second Saladin

“Stepanovich, you always think of me, don’t you? I’m touched. But I’ve some experience myself. And I’ve been looking forward for some time to this.”

“I wish you’d let me send some backup people along.”

“Oh, no. Too cumbersome. Wouldn’t think of it.”

“You’re sure, Colonel?”

“No, I’m quite fine,” Speshnev said. He smiled. The damp warm air had somewhat disarranged his hair. He turned in the cab, opened the door, and stepped out.

“You’ve got the device?”

“Of course,” Speshnev said. “Right in here.” He tapped himself just under the arm, and the young man knew it to be a standard KGB silent killing device, a tiny CO₂ pistol that fired small pellets of a traceless microtoxin.

“And just in case?”

“Of course, Stepanovich. The Luger.”

He smiled, and the younger man marveled at his calmness. His whole operation hung in the balance and the old man himself was going to push it the final step. The younger man, by temperament a sentimentalist, wanted to weep in admiration. But he controlled himself as he watched the colonel head for the building.

“Don’t! Please don’t,” Chardy heard himself urge with insane civility. He had the Ingram trained on the Kurd from a range of about fifteen yards. It seemed, in the passion of the second, immensely heavy. It was hot to his touch. He could feel his fingers on it, sense its weight, its warmth, its cruel details.

“Don’t,” he cried again. He could feel his voice quaver, grow phlegmy. It was so dark; the seconds seemed to be rushing past.

The Kurd was absolutely still, frozen against a pillar, his own weapon before him.

“It’s a trick,” Chardy began to argue. If he could just explain it all. “It’s a Russian trick. It goes way back, it —”

He wished he could breathe. He could feel the perspiration forming on his body. It was so hot down here; it smelled of cars, of gas.

“Speshnev,” he thought to say. If he could get that part out, make him see that part of it. “It’s Speshnev —”

“CHARDY KILL HIM!” Danzig screamed. “CHARDY STOP HIM!” The voice echoed in the chamber.

Ulu Beg’s head moved just an inch in the darkness.

“CHARDY! OH CHARDY SAVE ME JESUS!”

“Speshnev killed—”

“CHARDY KILL HIM KILL HIM JESUS!”

“It’s the Russian, it’s Speshnev, it’s—”

“CHARDY GODDAM—”

Ulu Beg brought the Skorpion to his shoulder and Chardy heard a weapon fire a long burst. The Kurd fell to the pavement, the machine pistol clattering away. Blood ran from his mouth and out his nose and his eyes were open.

Chardy looked down at the Ingram and pretended to be amazed that he’d fired. It had just happened, almost accidentally: a twitch, the slightest, faintest tremor of nerve running from a secret part of his brain down his spine and arm to the finger, and the weapon, its orchestration of springs and latches and chambers and pins set in motion, had fired eleven times in less than two seconds.

No.

You did it, Chardy thought.

You did it.

Chardy walked to the man. He searched for a pulse, found none. He reached and closed the two eyes and the mouth. He set the Ingram down and tried to roll the Kurd to his right side. But it would not work; the man kept slipping forward sloppily. Chardy was trying to get it right.

“My God,” said Danzig, suddenly just behind him. “He could have killed me. You stood there for an hour. Chardy, you bastard. Do you think this is some kind of a game? My God, Chardy, you bastard.”

Chardy at last stood, gripping the Ingram. He put it on safety. A terrible grief and rage filled his head. He swung and hit Danzig across the face, under the eye, with the heavy silencer, driving him down. The man lay on the floor among spent shells. It occurred to Chardy that he might have killed him and it occurred to him he didn’t care.

He looked back at the Kurd, who lay untidily, half on his side, half flat, legs twisted, face blank.

He explained to the corpse:

See, they have this way of putting you in a jam where you have to do the only thing in the world you don’t want to, but you have to. It always works out that way. That’s how it worked with Frenchy and Johanna and with …

At last he backed away. He could smell the burnt powder from his last burst. It clung in his nose and seemed to work through his capillaries as it climbed into his head.

He tried to figure out what to do next and after some effort remembered he’d taken a radio unit. He fished into his jacket, pulled it out and snapped it on.

“Candelabra,” he said without emotion, “this is Hosepipe One.”

The unit crackled. It wasn’t receiving down here. He looked at it with disgust and almost threw it against the wall.

Do your fucking job. I did mine.

But then it spoke in a burst of grating energy.

“—dy! Chardy! Chardy!”

Another voice cut in.

“Hosepipe Three, this is Candelabra. I said get the hell off the air.”

Chardy spoke quickly.

“Hosepipe Three, this is One. It’s Chardy Do you read?”

“Paul? It’s Miles.”

“Hosepipe One, this is Candelabra. Request position. Can you give your position. Chardy, where the fuck are you?”

“Paul, listen. Listen, Jesus—”

“Is he there?” the man in front said.

Miles tried again. “Hosepipe One? Hosepipe One? Goddammit, Paul?” He turned to them. “I can’t raise him. He’s off the net.”

“Hosepipe Three, this is Candelabra. Did you get a fix on Chardy?”

Somebody grabbed the mike from Lanahan. “Candelabra, we’ve lost him.”

“Did you get an acknowledgment?”

“He was there,” Miles said. “He heard me.”

“Candelabra, this is Three,” said the man up front next to the driver. “We didn’t get a fix either. We were barely receiving him. He must have been under something.”

They drove on in silence.

“What’s he up to?” Miles asked nobody in particular as the car raced down the parkway toward Key Bridge and Washington.

Nobody answered him.

Yost Ver Steeg was the first to arrive. He walked from the elevator across the cement, coming out of the light, his feet snapping on the pavement.

Chardy, leaning wearily against the pillar with his headache and his grief, watched him come.

“Hello, Paul. My people are on their way.”

“Hello, Yost. I expected Sam.”

“Sam can’t make it, Paul. Well, you tried. But you couldn’t quite bring it off.”

“No. No, goddammit.”