Halfway across, running hard, they could see the robot tanks forming up to defend the western perimeter. Saladin and his men kept running, weapons at the ready. A hundred yards, now, fifty…still, no one fired. The burned-out bunker had not been returned to action. But there were more enemy troops moving up through the trees. Why didn’t they shoot? He and his two men kept running toward them, weapons poised, fingers itching on the triggers.
Twenty yards from the end of the bridge, Saladin raised his hand and signaled for the two men with him to halt. They each dropped to one knee, covering him. He ran ahead alone across the bridge. He was firing his weapon, spraying the oncoming tanks now streaming toward the bridge. The tanks returned fire, troops moving in behind their advance.
Saladin went down. As the tanks advanced, his two comrades raced forward and grabbed their leader under each arm, retreating back across the bridge on the run, firing as furiously over their shoulders as they were able, knees pumping, running hard for the safety of the jungle where their squad was waiting. The tank controllers, seeing all this disarray, would be filled with glee. And speed men and machines across the bridge for the kill.
Saladin craned his head around, looking back over his shoulder. The tanks were rolling onto the bridge in high-speed pursuit of the enemy.
“Excellent!” Saladin shouted, as they dove, pulling him headfirst into the foliage. Everyone had played his part perfectly. They now turned and watched the enemy tanks and men behind them streaming across the bridge toward them. The suspension bridge was sagging under weight it was not designed to hold. But it would hold, the engineer in Saladin told him. That was the idea.
“Ready, sir?”
“Five seconds, Sergeant,” Saladin said. “Wait for those last three tanks to roll on—okay—now!”
The young soldier pushed the old-fashioned plunger. The charges his team had so carefully placed beneath the bridge blew in perfect sequence. Three massive charges exploded: one at either end of the bridge, and finally one in the exact center. The explosions tore the heavy rope bridge to pieces, sending at least fifteen Trolls and thirty of the enemy guards plummeting into the deep ravine below.
Saladin allowed himself a grim feeling of satisfaction. He had just struck a serious blow against his enemy. Bolivaristas, my ass. It was a narco-criminal terrorist army, financed and led by foreigners with no interests beyond their own benighted religious fantasies of a humbled America.
Now, Saladin’s squad would all descend into the ravine, cross the river, and begin the tough climb up the other side. Such a climb under fire would be hell. But this recent action, and the one that would surely follow it, had drawn resources from the center to the western perimeter. And destroyed them. The first blow against Top had been struck.
Saladin believed his actions now would give Hawke and the men on the river a fighting chance later.
80
WASHINGTON, DC
P resident is waiting in the Oval,” Betsey Hall said. Jack McAtee’s pretty ash-blond secretary was standing just outside the office. She was frowning at her watch as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs approached. General Moore, a lean six-footer in his dress blues, did not look happy. In fact, nobody looked very happy on this Inauguration Day morning.
“Sorry,” Moore said, “We couldn’t get here any faster.”
“You’re all right. He just got back from across the street. Morning worship service at St. John’s. He’s only been in there ten minutes.”
“How is he?” Moore asked her, pausing before he went in.
“In a word?”
“Yeah.”
“Pissed. At everybody.”
“He’s not postponing?”
“He’s not postponing and he’s not canceling and that’s that. You talk to him. He listens to you.”
“What did you tell him to do, Betsey?”
“I’m not in the habit of telling the president what to do.”
“Right,” Moore said, smiling and squeezing her shoulder. He snapped off a salute at the two marines standing guard at the door and went inside.
The president stood by the windows with his back to the door, looking out into the snow-covered Rose Garden. “Hello, Charley,” he said without turning around.
“Morning, Mr. President. I got here as quickly as I could.”
“Town’s a mess. Another Inauguration Day, you know. What will they think of next?”
Moore laughed. “We’re lucky to be here, sir. It could easily have been the other guy.”
“Not that easily,” McAtee huffed, “Take a seat, General.” He walked around his desk and collapsed into the upholstered sofa by the fireplace. Moore sat opposite him and picked up a silver urn.
“Coffee?”
The president waved the question away and Moore filled his own cup. “Mr. President, what do you intend to do?”
“You’re the tenth person to ask me that question in the last goddamn hour.”
“Sorry, sir.”
“Charley, I like you. Always have. You were the guy I most looked up to at Annapolis. Hell, I still look up to you and I’m the damn president. A lot is riding on this decision. If I run, everybody runs. Park Police estimate there are already half a million people out there on the parade route. The media is already going apeshit. Positively salivating at the chance to see me slip out the back door. What the hell would you do? You going to rain on my parade, too?”
“What are the options, sir?”
“Marine One is warming up its engines out on the lawn. Ready to fly me to Site R in Raven Rock Mountain. There are also two identical Secret Service motor-cades waiting for me. One of them is going to Camp David. The one at the North Portico will take me to the Capitol steps where I will be duly sworn in for my second term. Pick one.”
“Intel right now points to a possible WMD in that Potomac unmanned sub.”
“What sub? Nobody’s seen it. We’ve got sensors on every bridge. The most advanced electronic countermeasures on earth can’t find a radiation signature! Nobody can even guarantee me the damn thing exists. I’m going to cancel because some kid lawman from Texas told some sheriff he saw some bad guys put something in the river? C’mon, Charley, you know me better than that.”
“What about Rock Creek Park?”
“What about it? Somebody trucked a couple of Suburbans packed with conventional explosives into the park and blew them up. Rattled some windows at Walter Reed. BFD.”
“The Suburbans were designed to exactly replicate Secret Service vehicles. Very sophisticated plan of attack, I’d say. Hide your bombs in plain sight.”
“Everybody’s all over that, Charley. Media says I shouldn’t have sent all those troops to the border. Left the capital unprotected. Unprotected from what? So far, nobody’s been able to find a single heavily armored black Chevy Suburban in this town that does not belong to the Secret Service.”
“I still don’t like it. One of those look-alike machines could roll right up alongside a bunch of Iowa cheerleaders and no one would think anything of it.”
“Hell, I don’t like it either! But I’ll be damned if I’ll run based on any of this airy-fairy crap I’m hearing from the boys at Langley.”
“What’s the First Lady say?”
“Aw, you know Lynn, Charley. She only wants to protect me.”
“So do I.”
“I know that. So, what the hell do I do? No, I’ve got a better question. What the hell would you do?”
