like it was sucking him down. They were on high ground now. In some places, the water was already up to your knees. The rain still came and the river was rising rapidly. In many places, camp was already flooded. That’s why the treehouses, dummy, Stoke said to himself, looking over at Froggy.
He caught his eye and then pointed at the two tangos smoking at the base of the tree. They still had their backs to Froggy. Stoke gave his patented hand signal, pointing his index finger at the side of his own skull and lowering his thumb hammer twice. Froggy nodded. Understood. Two headshots.
The Frogman rose up to his full height of five-foot-five and raised the CAR-15, sighting, and, almost instantaneously, firing. Pfft-pfft. The two guards crumpled to the ground, dead before they hit the mud. Good guns, these Colts. Now. When Stoke first used this weapon in the Delta, it had been too loud. Guys went deaf firing that gun. And the muzzle flash was too bright, blinding his guys at night and giving away their position to the enemy. They’d fixed all that, now. Had a longer flash suppressor that actually worked.
Stoke moved quickly to the tree, his eyes scanning the trunk, looking for the thin slash mark that would tell him he’d found the right tree. He did a three-sixty around the base. Nothing at eye level. Wait a minute. That was his eye-level. Harry’s girl, Caparina, who’d cut the bark for them, would have a lot lower eye-level, wouldn’t she? Unless she, too, was six-six. He doubted it. He’d heard she was a total babe.
He bent down and went round again, running his index finger lightly over the bark as he circled, a foot lower this time.
There. A thin diagonal slash, fresh greenish white wood showing.
He took a deep breath. Ambrose Congreve was at the top of this tree. Whether he was dead or alive was the question. He waved Froggy and the squad in closer, circling the wagons with his index finger. There was heavy ground cover and good scrub not ten feet from the tree. Froggy could lay low there, cover his butt for at least the ten minutes this might take. He was going up the tree alone.
There was a funky hand-operated elevator. Basically, you just stepped onto a four-by-four-foot metal platform, grabbed the handrail, and pushed the red button on the controller hanging from the rail. Zip, you were airborne.
He looked up as he rose from the ground, his weapon at the ready. The treehouse was a round structure, supported by trusses underneath. The thing was built right around the trunk. Another house, slightly larger and a few feet higher up, was connected to this one by a small ropewalk. The houses had corrugated metal roofs, raised up to let the air flow in this tropical heat. There were narrow verandas that went all the way around.
He saw a head bending out over the rail, looking straight down at him, the guy obviously wanting to say something to whichever of his buddies was on the way up.
“How you doing?” Stoke said.
He saw the guys eyes go wide, looking straight down into the muzzle of a light alloy CAR-15 commando rifle that must have been growing bigger and blacker by the second.
Stoke squeezed off a shot, hoping the guy would not tumble forward and fall from the railing. He didn’t. He collapsed half way over the rail and stayed there.
He stepped off the platform onto the circular porch. All clear so far. The door to the house was a quarter of the way around. He moved that way in a semi-crouch, gun out front. The dead guard was hanging there, blood dripping from what was left of his head. The sliding metal door was closed. To the right was a window. There was a light inside, but curtains blocked the view.
Stoke did a three-sixty around the veranda, not taking any chances. He moved in fractions of inches, trying not to make any noise, and then edged back around to the door. He looked at the steel window again, trying to peer beyond the edges of the black-out curtain. Couldn’t see diddly.
He put his hand on the door, pausing to control his breathing. Slowed the system way down, just the way he’d been trained to do at Heat & Skeet, down in the Keys.
Then he slid the door along the track. Slowly. One inch at a time until he could get a look-see.
No bad guys inside. Only a room with no furniture except a picture hung on the wall. There was a hospital gurney on the far side of the little round room. A pool of light from a lamp on a steel table lit the whole room. There were surgical instruments in a tray on the table. And a man was lying on the narrow gurney, his hands and legs shackled to the frame. An intravenous tube ran down to his arm from a bag of liquid hung on the trolley. Stoke’s heart beat a little faster.
From a distance he looked a whole lot like Ambrose might look, if he hadn’t eaten in a week. Stoke moved quickly to the gurney and looked down at the gray-faced of the man on the gurney.
It was Ambrose Congreve, all right.
He looked a whole lot dead.
A voice behind him caused him to spin around and tighten his trigger finger at the sight of the soldier. Not squeeze it, which was good, because this soldier was wearing a long white coat over jungle camos. The figure framed in the doorway yanked off a floppy hat revealing a recently shaved head. It belonged to a beautiful woman. She was carrying an armful of medical supplies instead of a gun.
“Stokely Jones?” she said.
“Yeah?”
“Caparina. Harry Brock’s friend.”
“Is he dead?” Stoke said, looking at Ambrose.
“Not yet.”
“You think you can do anything for him, Caparina?”
“I’m going to try.”
Stoke pulled out the small handheld radio and hit speaker.
“Hawke, Hawke, copy?”
“Stoke, where are you?”
“He’s alive, boss. I’m with him now.”
“Hurt?”
“Yeah. He needs an exfil, pronto. We’ve got to get him to sick bay.”
“Your job is to keep Ambrose alive, Stoke. Whatever it takes.”
“Can you stay in position? I’m on the river. The canoes are ten minutes away. Has Brock made the rendezvous?”
“Negative. Haven’t seen him.”
“He’s upriver, ahead of me. Should reach you any minute.”
“Where’s Stiletto?”
“Navigating the minefield with the probes. She’s maybe twenty minutes out, depending on how bad it is. I’m assuming there’s enough water to get there.”
“We’ll do what we can for Ambrose till you get here. Meanwhile, I got another report of troop movement from Saladin’s guys. They’re all headed north.”
“Stiletto’s got them dialed in. Saladin’s scouts radioed the position. Fire Control is launching everything we can spare. Take care of him, Stoke. Keep him breathing.”
“You heard the man,” Stoke said to the woman bending over her gravely injured patient.
“What’s his name?” she asked, resting a cool hand on his forehead.
“That’s Ambrose Congreve of Scotland Yard. He’s the only man on the planet who might know how to keep Papa Top from pulling the trigger.”
83
WASHINGTON, DC
F ranklin zipped up his last pair of clean blue jeans and pulled the t-shirt and sweater over his head. It was a tight squeeze with the bandages and all. His only clean clothes he had left in the bag he’d taken to Key West. He put on his boots. He was ready to go home, soon as this mess was over.
The Secret Service had been kind enough to invite him to attend the Inauguration ceremony. He’d said he’d rather help than watch but they said no, somebody would pick him up. After that, they’d take him to Reagan Airport
