wreckage that had bobbed to the surface from the Super Cub. As he did so, he kept a close eye on the half-dozen alligators that had begun to investigate the floating debris.
Back on shore, the second rifleman removed his ear protectors and slipped them into his jacket pocket. Then, after carefully changing the frequency setting on his scrambled radio, he brought the small electronic instrument up to his camouflage-painted face.
'Charley Whiskey Seven to Charley Whiskey Four,' he spoke quietly into the radio microphone.
'Charley Whiskey Four, go,' Paul Saltmann, the voice of 'A1 Cousins, Florida State game officer,' responded.
'Charley Whiskey Seven, mission completed.'
'Can you see him?'
Gunter Aben looked out across the bay as Felix Steinhauser cautiously reached over the side of the pirogue and retrieved the bullet-punctured lid of a foam ice chest.
'That is negative. We can see nothing except the debris and the alligators.'
'Charley Whiskey Four, copy. They can have him,' Paul Saltmann said. 'Two down and four to go.'
Chapter Thirty
Lightstone had been expecting to see McNulty waiting for them at the gate. Instead, he saw a young Eskimo man standing off by himself, holding up a sign labeled ' lightstone.' Pulling Marie off to the side, Lightstone watched the young man with the long, dark brown hair and dark features.
'Is something wrong?' Marie Pascalaura asked, still looking around for Paul and Martha McNulty.
'See that young guy over there to the right, the one holding the sign?'
'Yes, I… oh, that is odd, isn't it?'
'What do you say we sit over there for a while and see what he's up to?' Lightstone said, gesturing toward a group of empty seats at the opposite gate.
They walked over to a pair of seats that would give them a good view of the young Eskimo man. Lightstone dropped his carry-on bag at his feet and settled into the chair.
'So what are we looking for?' Marie asked calmly. 'Somebody else named Lightstone?'
'Tell you the truth, I'm not sure,' Lightstone said.
They waited until the first group of stewardesses came through the ramp gate, signaling the end of the deboarding process. The Eskimo walked over to one of the stewardesses as Lightstone rose and walked around and behind him.
'Yes, sir, I am certain that all the passengers on this flight are off the plane,' Lightstone heard the stewardess say. 'You might try down at the baggage-claim area.'
'But-' the young Eskimo started to say as he turned to follow the stewardess.
'Maybe I can help you,' Henry Lightstone said in a neutral voice.
'Uh… you, are you Henry Lightstone?'
'I know a guy named Henry Lightstone. Any reason why he might know you?'
'Oh, yeah, right,' the young man nodded as he quickly reached inside his jacket, unaware that Lightstone had almost delivered a takedown kick to his groin as he pulled a black folding badge case out of his pocket.
'I'm Special Agent Thomas Woeshack,' he said, holding the opened credentials out for Lightstone's inspection. 'Paul… I mean Special Agent in Charge Paul MeNulty was supposed to be back in the office by now, but we got a call this morning about somebody shooting at bears down around Skilak Lake. He was going to be flying by the area, so he asked me to come out to the airport and pick… uh, you up.'
'Henry Lightstone,' Lightstone nodded, relaxing and smiling as he accepted the eager young agent's firm handshake. 'And this,' he said, putting his hand on Marie's shoulder, 'is my fiancee, Marie Pascalaura.'
Thomas Woeshack smiled and shook her hand also. 'Happy to meet you, too. Welcome to Alaska.'
'It's nice to be on the ground again,' she said.
Woeshack picked up one of the two carry-on bags and led the way out of the deboarding area.
'Man, I can't tell you how glad I am to see you,' Woeshack said.
'Oh, really? Why's that?' Lightstone asked.
'Because MeNulty said that if I wanted to learn how to do undercover work, I'd have to wait until you got here to teach me.' Woeshack smiled with bright enthusiasm.
'You're coming up here to teach covert work?' Marie asked, looking over at Lightstone with mixed amusement and disbelief.
Lightstone shrugged as he looked down at the young agent's hands. 'As a start, if we're going to do any covert work within a hundred miles of this airport, you might want to ditch that sign and put your badge away.'
'Oh, yeah, right,' Woeshack nodded as he returned the badge case to his jacket pocket and stuck the crudely lettered sign in a nearby trash can.
'I can't believe it,' Marie said, shaking her head in amazement. 'You really are going to give it up, aren't you?'
'As it was explained to me by a wise fellow named Carl Scoby,' Lightstone said, 'once you accept a promotion to senior resident agent, the fun's over. Nothing but paperwork and headaches until you retire.' He looked over at Marie and grinned. 'Sound good to you?'
They took the stairway down to the lower level, entered a tunnel with red and blue neon tubes arched over the ceiling, took a short escalator back up to baggage claim, and then worked their way over to the third carousel.
'Speaking of fun,' Woeshack said, 'Special Agent in Charge McNulty-'
'It's okay to call him Paul,' Lightstone interrupted. 'He won't mind.'
'Yeah, okay, that's sort of what he said, too, but I wasn't sure..'
'Paul's a real easy guy to work for. Just don't try to bullshit him too much and you'll be fine.'
'I'll remember that,' Woeshack said solemnly. 'Anyway, Paul suggested that I take you two out for an orientation trip. I thought we might go down to the Kenai Peninsula, put you in one of the cabins, see some wildlife, and then maybe take one of the patrol boats out to do some lake-trout fishing on Skilak Lake.' The young agent grabbed up the two larger bags that Lightstone pointed out. 'He said you could either do that or sit in his office and do his paperwork until he gets back.'
'Orientation trip,' Marie Pascalaura said enthusiastically.
'Sounds a lot better than paperwork,' Lightstone nodded agreeably as they started for the parking lot.
'Okay, we'll get you checked into the hotel and then, unless you want to rest up some, we'll head on out.'
'We can rest up later,' Marie said as she watched the two men toss the luggage into the back of the government Suburban. 'I want to see my new backyard.'
At the opposite end of the ground-level Anchorage Airport parking lot, Gerd Maas climbed into a van, tossed his duffel bag to the back, and pulled the door closed. He turned to Kimiko Osan.
'What has happened so far?' he asked.
'Aben and Mueller reported in two hours ago,' she replied in a controlled, respectful voice. 'Phase One and Phase Two were completely successful. The teams are currently repositioning for Phases Four and Five.'
'Excellent,' Maas nodded as his cold eyes surveyed the parking lot. 'Tell me about Phase Three.'
'Everyone is in position. They have been waiting for your arrival.'
'What about our diversion?'
'We are monitoring his movements right now,' Kimiko Osan said.
'Shoshin says that he has been alert and uneasy for the past few hours, as if he senses that we are out there.'
'Oh?'
'But that is of no concern,' she quickly added. 'We can take him at any time.'
'And the female?'
'There is no indication that she is aware of our presence or our movements,' Kimiko Osan said. 'She will be
