Soul of the Assassin

12

THE MEDITERRANEAN SEA, NORTH OF AFRICA

It had been several years since Guns had participated in an armed ship boarding, and then it was simply an exercise. But the adrenaline and weapons were plenty familiar. He climbed down from the destroyer to the rigid- hulled boat, taking a place behind the team leader as the craft revved its outboard and slipped into a dark patch between the destroyer and the search beams playing on the cargo ship it had just stopped. The rain had passed, but the waves were still choppy and swells reached well over the hull of the tiny boat.

Guns and Rankin had come aboard the USS Porter, DDG 78, just an hour before, flying to the ship in the southern Mediterranean aboard an Italian helicopter. The Porter had been tasked to stop the last remaining vessel that Atha might have escaped to, assuming he had not found a way to sneak past the Italian coast guard and get back on land near Naples or Sicily.

Though the Porter was a destroyer, her firepower would have likely given her the advantage over a confrontation with a World War II cruiser. The ship had recently been deployed in an effort to stop pirates and gunrunners near the east African coast, and her specially trained SITT team — the letters stood for Shipboard Integrated Tactical Team — was well practiced at boarding and searching for contraband, human or otherwise.

The chief petty officer directing the team was a graybeard who claimed not to remember exactly how old he was; he’d groaned as he pulled on his bulletproof vest and the rest of his gear aboard ship. But there was a definite spring in his step as they pulled next to the cargo vessel: he lunged for the rope ladder at the ship’s side, climbing up behind the point man.

Guns went up third, the strap for the shotgun he was carrying hooked through his arm so that he could wield the weapon quickly. The boarding party was met by a nervous-looking man standing in a tiny pool of light on the foredeck of the cargo craft. He told them in Spanish that they were welcome aboard and that the captain was waiting for them on the bridge.

“I’ll bet we’re welcome,” said the chief as the rest of his men came up.

Guns didn’t like the fact that the crewman was nervous. He glanced around the deck area nearby, trying to spot other men who might be waiting to ambush them. Such an attack would be foolish — it would take the destroyer only a few moments to sink the ship — but counting on someone else’s ability to reason things out was an easy way to get killed.

With the SITT team aboard the vessel, the chief, Guns, and two other sailors made their way up to meet the captain. The captain protested mildly — the vessel was in international waters; there was no reason for an inspection — but then volunteered that since they had nothing to hide they would be happy to accommodate their friends from the U.S. Navy, and even inquired if they would like some tea. The chief politely declined the invitation and asked to examine the ship’s log and papers.

Guns didn’t bother looking at the papers, knowing they were unlikely to show that the boat had picked up a passenger. Instead, he walked around the bridge, silently sizing up the two sailors who were with the captain. The men seemed nervous. The mate at the ship’s wheel kept jerking his shoulders upward, his hands still tight on the wheel though the boat had come to a full stop.

The chief explained to the captain that they had come because the Italians were searching for a man who had made a terrorist attack and was believed to have escaped Italy by boat. The ship’s captain said this was a terrible thing, but of course not something he would be involved in. They had seen no small boat, let alone a terrorist.

The outcome of their talk was preordained, since there was no way the SITT team was leaving without having thoroughly searched the ship. But the chief played diplomat; cajoling a ship’s captain into a state of semi- cooperation made his job considerably easier, if not necessarily safer.

Guns, meanwhile, went back down the ladder to the compartments below, thinking about what he had seen so far aboard the ship. The most obvious fact — Ferguson always said start with the obvious — was that the crew and the captain were of different nationalities. The crewmen were Filipino, while the captain had said he was Egyptian. That implied a certain distance between them, a possible weakness that Ferguson would have been quick to exploit.

Guns approached one of the crewmen, asking in Spanish if the ship had picked up someone at sea.

At first, the man pretended not to understand. When Guns repeated the question, the man told him no, they hadn’t made a stop since Marseilles. Guns then asked if he was married, trying to make small talk — stalling really, while he thought of some way to determine if the sailor was lying. But the man told him that he was sorry, but he was busy and the person he should speak to was the captain.

Ferguson might have gotten the same results, Guns thought as he walked down the corridor. But he would have gone about it differently — small talk first, and… and he would have been much more leading when he struck up the conversation.

What happened to the guy you picked up? I can’t find him anywhere…

That was the vintage Ferguson question, leading and personable at the same time.

Guns tried it with the next crew member he met, but all he got in response was a blank stare. He tried describing Atha, but the man just shook his head. Part of the problem, Guns thought, was the difference between the Spanish spoken in the Philippines and Mexican Spanish, which was what he spoke. But he also wasn’t quite able to seem as smooth as Ferguson. Guns wasn’t as sure of himself, talking to people. He needed more of a pretext than Ferg did.

Guns walked on, moving out to the narrow deck area behind the ship’s superstructure. There was a small boat tied there, a rigid-hulled vessel similar to the one the navy team had used to board. There was no way of telling if the boat had been out recently, or at least none that Guns could tell, but examining it gave him an idea. Back inside the ship’s corridors, he accosted the first man he saw, telling him that he’d noticed some of the ropes on the boat were loose and suggesting they be fixed before the rough seas caused the craft to go overboard. He went out with the man, and helped him secure the ropes.

“Guess you guys didn’t tie it tightly enough this afternoon,” said Guns.

“The boatswain is an ass,” said the man. “He doesn’t know his job.”

That was as much of a confirmation that Guns could get that the boat had been used, despite more suggestions and hints. The search didn’t turn up anything, either, and after more than an hour of looking through the ship the navy sailors returned to the destroyer.

While Guns had been over at the cargo vessel, Rankin had been in a satellite phone conference with Corrigan and two intelligence officers aboard the USS Anzio, an Aegis-equipped U.S. Navy cruiser that had joined the search. The Anzio had picked up a long-distance helicopter contact near the Tunisia coast; the helo had been on a flight vector that could have meant it came from the cargo vessel Guns had just searched. It had also been flying through the teeth of the storm just a few hours ago. Not necessarily suspicious, but worth checking, Rankin thought.

“Corrigan, see what you can find out about Tunisia and tracking down helicopters there,” Rankin told him after the intel officers got off the line. “While I go see if can talk some of these navy guys into finding a way for us to get there.”

13

NAPLES, ITALY

Rostislawitch had assumed that the left baggage office would be open around the clock. When he arrived at the station and found it closed, he stood and stared at the gate for so long that a policeman approached and asked what was wrong. Rostislawitch told him he’d left a bag and wanted to retrieve it — had to retrieve it, in fact — but the officer told him to come back in the morning when the office opened. The scientist next went to the stationmaster’s office, which was also closed; he couldn’t find anyone to help him at the information kiosk, either.