some thorn bushes. Two of them fired back some useless, unaimed shots while their buddy squatted in terror.
It was suddenly quiet, the only sound being the moaning of a dying young mujahideen up a bit higher on the mountain. The two active survivors stood up and moved upward toward the summit, pumping out quick bursts from their AK-47s. The sound of the M-203's firing was masked by the noise of their own shooting, and the kids failed to note the HE grenade falling toward them. It struck a waist-high boulder and exploded, shredding them with shrapnel, as they buckled under the multiple impacts of white hot metal pellets.
The last rookie, panicked into insanity, leaped up and began running down the slope toward the valley floor. He didn't quite make four full strides before a 5.56-millimeter round hit him between the shoulder blades. He tumbled face-first onto a spread of small stones. The neophyte mujahideen raised his head just in time for one more bullet to split his skull.
Bravo Fire Team, led by Senior Chief Buford Dawkins, came out of their ambush site, gazing down at the destruction they had blasted into the small patrol. Chad Murchison shook his head at the stupidity of the dead fighters. 'It appears that we ruined their whole day.'
'Let's go see if there's anything useful on them dumb shits,' the senior chief said.
They made their way down to the corpses and stopped, shocked at the youth of their victims. 'Uff da! ' Gutsy Olson said, falling back into a Norwegian-American expression. 'I thought they was just nuts the way they were singing and yelling. It never dawned on me they was a bunch of idiot kids.'
Connie Concord, holding his combination M-16 and M203, rolled one over. 'There ain't any sense in searching these guys, Senior Chief. Nobody is gonna give 'em anything important to tote around.'
'You're right:' Dawkins agreed. 'The sound of our shooting irons is gonna attract attention. We better pull back.'
'Well, the Skipper said he wants to keep the sons of bitches off balance,' Concord said. 'Mission accomplished for today?'
The Bravos turned and followed their fire team leader back up the mountain.
.
WARLORD COMPOUND
1800 HOURS LOCAL
WARLORD Ayyub Durtami seethed in silence, ignoring his tea. Across the table from him Ahmet Kharani kept his eyes averted. This was a dangerous time. Even though he had brought back two valuable hostages that would net them a million afghanis, his chief was in a black mood. When Durtami finally spoke, his voice was low in a subdued fury.
'Just before you arrived, I was told that six of our youngest fighters were discovered slaughtered,' the warlord said. 'We heard the firing and I sent some men to investigate. It was a massacre.'
'I was not aware of that,' Kharani said.
'This was supposed to be a pleasant outing for the lads:' Durtami said. 'The instructors let them go up onto the mountain ridge to have some fun after weeks of hard training. They were obviously victims of some vicious treachery by an older, more experienced enemy.'
'Are you going to punish the instructors?' Kharani asked. He knew the men were probably fearfully anticipating certain death for the mishap.
But Durtami shook his head. 'We have done this a dozen times to reward youngsters who have been training hard. Today was a most unusual event.'
Kharani was relieved by this uncharacteristic mercy. One of his cousins was among the instructor cadre of the warlord's small army.
'It is now obvious that numerous enemies have invaded my fiefdom,' Durtami said. 'Perhaps they are Americans.'
'It is possible,' Kharani said. 'And I think they are here to stay awhile. There is only one place for them to remain out of sight. They must be skulking atop the far mountain from here:'
'I agree. But they could be anyplace up there. The entire ridge is a natural fortress.'
'What about your brother-in-law Hassan Khamami? Does he not number mortars in his arsenal?'
'Au,' Durtami replied affirmatively. 'He has a large cache of weaponry. Some of his arsenal is new.'
'Ask Khamami to help you, Amir,' Kharani suggested. 'With mortars we could shell that mountain from one end to the other.'
'My brother-in-law would want too much money,' Durtami said.
'With the ransom money for the two hostages you would get enough to refill your war treasury very quickly,' Kharani said.
Durtami looked over at his second-in-command and smiled. 'You are most clever, Brother Ahmet. In fact, you are so intelligent that at times you make me nervous.'
'I desire only to serve you with loyalty, Amir,' Kharani said, humbling himself. To be too assertive could lead to a summary execution as a serious potential threat to the warlord's leadership.
'Make arrangements to send a message to Khamami.' 'I will take care of it, Amir.'
Chapter 6
STATE DEPARTMENT
WASHINGTON, D. C.
10 AUGUST
1400 HOURS LOCAL
IN the complicated environment of international diplomacy, there is a clandestine segment of most proceedings that only a few insiders know about. The talented people of these secret negotiations are known outwardly as undersecretaries, envoys or attaches in their various state departments or foreign offices. But whatever the official title, they perform their surreptitious tasks in two phases; the first is 'preparation' and the second is 'wrapping up.' The former paves the way to concurrence and the latter assures that the deals and treaties thus parleyed to conclusion are put into effect.
These anonymous negotiators are polite and sophisticated but speak among themselves in an open, candid manner that only people with proverbial 'thick hides' can tolerate. If some of their exchanges of ideas were made public, the citizens of their respective nations would be outraged by much of the give-and-take aspects of the haggling. Their conferences get down to the nitty-gritty. Threats are made, warnings issued, concessions granted and agreements struck that are either happily or rationally accepted.
The bottom line is that solid covenants are made.
One of the world's best and most effective of these diplomats was an African-American undersecretary of the United States State Department by the name of Carl Joplin. The tall, slim man with a gentle voice came from Baltimore, Maryland, and was the forty-year-old son of a father who was a retired janitor and a mother who was still employed as a licensed vocational nurse in a local hospital. The couple had worked hard all their lives to maintain a steadfast home life for their family, at times juggling their regular jobs with additional part-time employment when the bills piled up. When it came to their children, they deemphasized sports, pushing the value of education to the four offspring, and each youngster recognized and appreciated these high standards. All obtained college degrees with the full scholarships they earned through scholastic excellence. Carl, the youngest, continued his education, obtaining a PhD in political science at Maryland State University.
Joplin was a soft spoken man with an unusual insight into other human beings. Even in the earliest stages of his career, he'd demonstrated an uncanny ability to negotiate, knowing just how to convince a stubborn foreign counterpart that going along with the United States' side of an issue was not only in his nation's best interest but would benefit him personally as well. Joplin flattered, cajoled and demanded, while seeming not to. Consequently, he ended up with a reputation of being able to score diplomatic coups when the need for getting the American point of view across was the most critical.
NOW, in the meeting room just off his personal office, Joplin sat across the table from Zaid Aburrani, a special envoy from Afghanistan. He and Aburrani had known each other for three years, and though they were not close friends, they each felt respect and even a bit of affection for the other. The main subject of their undercover meetings was the thorny issue of warlords in Aburrani's native country. The Afghan had come to Washington from Kabul to discuss what he termed a 'sensitive' and 'judicious' issue. As usual, neither man had an attending stenographer or maintained personal notes. They kept the gist of their conversational exchange in their heads.
Joplin settled back in his chair and smiled. 'I was most pleased yesterday when they informed me of your
