Up the hill from the dock, the men had cleared underbrush to make a camp, with enough room to make a fire and hang their hammocks. It was far more comfortable than sleeping aboard the workboat. They’d brought a slew of mismatched chairs and rigged up an oiled-canvas tarpaulin to keep out the rain. Someone had even fashioned a crude sign and nailed it to a tree. The six men who made up Talbot’s crew had named the camp the Vipers’ Den, in honor of their recent exploits.
“Look sharp, everyone. We’re bringing down two of the bombs,” Court Talbot called out. “Tonight’s the last of it. We set the final charges, and the Red Vipers disappear for good.”
None of the men gave any real indication that they’d paid any attention until Talbot added, “Oh, and you all receive your pay in good gold coins.”
That brought a lustful cheer from their throats and turned their eyes bright with greed.
Raul Morales gave Talbot a cancerous look. Talbot held up a reassuring hand. “You get your brother’s full cut and my guarantee that Bell won’t leave Panama for as long as it takes for the Germans to get to Jamaica. They kidnapped his wife.”
A burst of light from above was the signal that the sailors on the Cologne had positioned the first of the one-ton mines over the bomb bay door and were ready to lower it. Talbot flicked his light twice to tell them they were ready. A few moments later, the mine materialized, out of the dark, over the men’s heads, two lengths of rope dangling from it like a jellyfish’s tentacles. When it was low enough, men reached up to grasp the ropes and heave so that the deadly package swung enough for it to touch down on the edge of the dock. The wood creaked under the burden but held fast. One of Talbot’s people climbed on top of the square explosive device to unhook the cable so the second one could be placed on the boat.
The men had done this so many times by now that the job had become second nature.
The wind picked up a little more speed, prompting an increase in power to the four Essenwerks motors. The propellers’ steady drone changed to a higher pitch, which forced the men working under her floating bulk to raise their voices to be heard.
Once his man was clear of the heavy steel hook, Talbot used his flashlight to signal the German flight engineers to retract the wire and send down the next bomb. The hook quickly vanished into the night. He called over to Raul and handed him a key dangling on a leather thong he kept hung around his neck. “Do me a favor and get me a spare pistol from camp. The Germans wouldn’t let me keep my Webley. As if I’d fire it inside a tube more volatile than a stick of dynamite.”
Raul didn’t reply, but he flicked on his own light and crossed the deck to take the short trail up to their camp.
At first, Raul Morales didn’t understand what he was seeing. The moon was hidden behind some clouds, so the light was just about nonexistent, but it looked like a figure moving around the camp. It made no sense because everyone was either on the dock or the workboat. He slowed his approach, crouching low. His machete was in his hand without him realizing he’d drawn it.
He and Rinaldo had grown up around violence. Their father used the machete as a teaching tool, going so far as to cut off a finger of one son’s hand when he’d taken a canoe out without permission. Raul had killed his first man when he was barely into his twenties. The man had been poaching the family’s fish traps, and Raul had felt the punishment fit the crime when he’d harpooned the thief in the chest with an iron lance. Rinaldo had always been the flashier one, the dreamer and schemer. Raul had been content to stay in their old village as long as those around him knew not to cross him.
The few who tried did not live to regret their decisions.
He was ten feet from the figure when he realized that the intruder was systematically searching the camp. There was nothing to find, a few boxes with food and cooking utensils, spare clothes, fishing gear, and a sixty-pound lockbox where Talbot kept their wages and a spare pistol. He didn’t want to leave the box aboard the workboat in case they were caught planting the bombs and had to abandon it.
Just as he threw on a burst of speed to catch the intruder unawares, the clouds parted and the moon’s glow played across the man’s profile for a moment, before he turned back to his clandestine search. Raul went from calculating hunter to berserk savage in an instant.
It was him. Bell. The man who’d murdered his brother.
He abandoned his flashlight and ran at Bell as silently and as intently as a big jungle cat whose prey has no idea it’s about to die. Bell finally sensed the onrushing attacker and turned to meet the man. He barely recognized Raul Morales because his face was twisted into a mask of uncontrolled rage. The whites of his eyes shone all the way around the irises, and his mouth was open in a silent scream full of hate.
Bell had been watching the camp since early afternoon. Rowing in from where he’d stashed the seaplane had been easy enough, though he did cross paths with an anaconda that swam past him and saw a number of crocodiles sunning themselves on the shore and a couple using the power of their mighty tails to swim. None thought enough
