The Hollow Man Series

THE HOLLOW MAN

CHAPTER 1

It was a dream. I am fairly certain of that now. A shadowy sixteenth-century cathedral emerged from the mist, and I found myself waiting for a funeral procession to begin. Except for a large rat that brushed past my leg, I was alone in the darkness, although it felt like someone was watching me. The tower bell tolled sharply, and each numbing stroke sucked a little more confidence from my bones, right through the muscle, and it settled like sweat on my skin. I wanted to push the melting courage back inside to strengthen my spine, but I couldn’t move. I was getting weaker by the second, and my body would no longer support the weight of my own thoughts.

The heavy timber doors of the church swung wide, and in the winter moonlight I saw a robed priest appear at the doorway. With his head bowed over scriptures for the dead, he mumbled soothing passages as he baby-stepped down three stone stairs to the ground. Six pallbearers followed him carrying their burden, solemnly gliding along the gravel path to the waiting coach and restless horses. Their footsteps made no sound on the hard surface even though they passed so close that I could smell death on the air around them. Gaunt, hollow eyes reflected heavy hearts but the men persevered to the coach where they lowered the plain casket to the earth.

The coffin was a small mahogany enclosure made for a half-grown child. The top was covered with a pale red lace that stood out against the anemic landscape. A sudden stale breeze caught the cloth and blew it into the night. A thin pallid girl of perhaps twelve sat up in the box and began clapping in time to the tolling bell. She slowly turned, pointing in my direction and I saw blood running down the side of her face from a bullet wound near the scalp. The child beckoned me toward her.

“I can help you,” she said, not quite looking at me with colorless, blind eyes.

“I’ve already told you that you can’t. No one can help me now,” I said.

“Yes,” she emphasized.

“How?”

“Come closer.” She absently wiped at the blood, but it only smeared her ashen face.

“Can you stop the bell from ringing?” The sound scraped across my raw nerves.

“You’re a strange policeman,” she smiled. “Why do you still search for him?”

“You know why. He slaughtered half the British Embassy, including you and I need to find him.”

“Be careful of Chaban,” she said. “He is a creature of evil and he’s brought you here to witness his power over you.”

She stared past me into the dark night. I turned in the direction she was looking to see if someone was standing beside me, but there was no one in the blackness that swallowed us.

“Where is he?” I asked.

She suddenly frowned.

“He’s been watching the watcher for a long time now. Look behind you, not in front.”

With vacant eyes still fixed on the dead unknown, her watery figure faded to a thin wisp and blew through me leaving cold fear in its wake. My soul parted like the Red Sea and when it closed again, there was another scar. It was always the same. I needed more but she was gone.

The sound of the bell shook the emptiness twice more before the gray-black dissolved into total oblivion and I started to wake. The telephone was ringing; it hadn’t been a church bell at all. My head was heavy, and my body was barely functioning. Unsteadily, I reached for the pillow that covered the handset.

“Si?”

“Status?” the voice asked in English.

“Unchanged.”

“Suspend surveillance on Chaban. I need you to go to morning Mass.”

“It’s Wednesday,” I said.

“It’s Madrid. People go to church every day in Spain.”

“Who’s the mark?”

“Luis Carrero Blanco.”

“The prime minister?” I stumbled over the words.

“I’m short-handed, kid,” the voice admitted. “You’re right there. You’ll do.”

I had followed dozens over the past year but none so high ranking.

“Mass is at nine o’clock,” he said. “A dossier is in the news box next to Museo del Prado.”

A thread of moonlight filtered through the window and reflected on the clock face. Still two hours until dawn. I rubbed crust from tired eyes with both hands. It had been a long time since I’d had a full night’s sleep. Every time I closed my eyes, the little girl was there waiting for me. I desperately needed to hibernate for the rest of the winter, but for now I’d have to settle for a strong cup of coffee. December had already been a long month, and it wasn’t over yet.

Generalissimo Francisco Franco himself had hand-picked a close confidant as his successor and for the last six months Luis Carrero Blanco has served as prime minister of Spain. He had fought with the Nationalist forces in the Spanish Civil War and had quickly become one of the leader’s closest collaborators. After the Nationalist victory and installation of Franco as Supreme Commander of Spain, Blanco’s power had grown with El Caudillo’s favor. Last June when he had been appointed prime minister, Blanco had also been named top deputy to Franco. Now that the dictator’s health was failing, it was only a matter of time before Blanco assumed control of the country.

At 8:50 a.m. on December 19, 1973, I was standing across the street from San Francisco de Borja Church on Calle de Serrano, waiting for the traffic signal to change. With its large buildings and attached park, the grounds covered a city block in the heart of Madrid. The church was at its center, standing majestically in a nondescript, middle-class neighborhood. Separated by a wide passage on the right, the monastery and office complex occupied a five-story, U-shaped structure with an inner balcony overlooking a courtyard. To the left lay an unattended tract of land with a dozen barren trees irregularly clumped amid several rough patches that I believe someone once called a lawn but it was now decayed and brown from neglect. The park had become a casualty of the dry Spanish winter and big-city pollution.

The inside of the church was not unlike a thousand other Catholic churches across Europe. The altar boasted an elaborate backdrop ornately fashioned from gold and other precious metals brought back from the New World. The nave floors and pews were made of beautiful padouk wood from Southeast Africa. But the dossier noted San Francisco de Borja’s most prized possessions were its collection of sacred relics. In the treasury lay the full body of a mummified saint in holy dress and an assortment of fingers and tongues from martyrs who had stuck out an appendage a bit too far in mixed company.

Somewhere there also had to be the proverbial strip of wood salvaged from the table at the Last Supper. Every church had one, a chunk of blackened cedar or cypress nailed to a wall where every tourist might stand in awe of its place in history. If all the pieces could have been somehow reassembled, the dinner table would have been massive. I imagined Christ yelling down a hundred-meter table to Peter or John, “I said pass the potatoes, not the tomatoes! Oh, never mind!”

I was brought back to reality and no doubt from the brink of eternal damnation for my thoughts by the short, ball-shaped figure of Luis Carrero Blanco walking along the prayer alcoves lining the side of the main hall. He wore an expensive cream-colored business suit and had a flamboyant stride but what impressed me most were his bushy eyebrows which preceded him by two paces. Accompanied by his full-time bodyguard, Police Inspector Juan Fernandez, Blanco genuflected and crossed himself before settling into the second row.

Seeing a single bodyguard with a top-ranking official was not all that uncommon these days in Europe but this pair seemed more like old friends. They sat shoulder to shoulder and spoke quietly, exchanging soft smiles. The two men had been together for many years, and perhaps a little complacency had set in. After all, the last head of state assassinated in Western Europe was back in 1934. Those were wild times. Today, the world was much more civilized, and Franco was certainly in control of his own country. With harsh restrictions on personal liberties, any disruption under existing martial law would have been unthinkable.

I turned toward a hand on my shoulder.

“Sir, I see you are English,” said an unshaven man standing over me. His speech was heavily accented but understandable. The man wore a light brown wool overcoat that would have flopped open had he not held it together with fists in his pockets. Heavy boots and a pair of loose-fitting broadcloth pants made me think he may have been a farm worker. The hair around his cap was shiny black, though flecks of gray dotted his beard stubble, and I guessed his age was close to fifty. He was uncomfortable, apologetic standing next to the pew.

“No sir, you’re mistaken,” I said.

“Ah, yes, American. My first thought,” he confirmed to himself.

I wondered why Americans were so easily identified wherever we went. I prided myself in disappearing within the thin cultural fabric of a country no matter where I found myself but obviously, I was still being schooled on exactly how to blend into the surroundings. These lessons were important for a humble government tourist like me. Be invisible or be dead. There was no in-between when one was finding people who did not want to be found, watching people who did not want to be watched, and learning from those who did not want to teach.

“Mass is beginning.” I tapped a finger to my lips.

Pushing me down the pew with his body, the Spaniard slid in beside me and crossed himself. We sat in silence, pretending to listen to the liturgy. I heard a heavy rattle in his breath above the priest’s Latin. He was a man who needed a cigarette. For some reason, that bothered me but his five-day stubble really irritated me, mostly because it took me forever to grow facial hair. Even then, my cheek would still be as barren as the top of an old pirate’s head and feel as smooth as a French prostitute’s thigh.

“I’m a poor student. I don’t have any money,” I whispered.

“I know what you are.” My eyes snapped in his direction but the Spaniard was intent on the sermon as the priest professed something in the name of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Finally, he said, “Tell America that España will soon be free again.”

“What are you talking about?”

“You know as well as me, young one. Do not make us send you home in a box.” He smiled. “We are no threat unless we’re threatened.” He crossed himself and rose to leave.

“Do you mean because Franco’s ill and he’ll die soon?”

“I thought you were smarter,” he sighed. The man stared down at me for a long time before turning away.

It wasn’t far from the truth when I said I had no idea what he was saying. Since arriving in Spain the week before, my entire focus was on tracking the man who recently held an embassy for ransom and I was so close I could smell his aftershave. But early this morning I was jerked off course and ended up in church sitting next to a misinformed lunatic. I needed time to figure out why I was now babysitting a prime minister.

Mass ended before I could feel sorry for myself or my circumstances. Blanco leisurely but deliberately moved back down the aisle toward the front of the church. Like those around me, I made the sign of the cross as I rose, pretending I knew what I was doing. But to get it right, I relied on a phrase I had been taught in the school yard as a kid, “spectacles, testicles, wallet, and watch.”

By the time I reached the door, the two men were climbing into the back of a Spanish-made Dodge Dart 3700 GT. To many, a compact automobile would have been an absurd choice for an armored car on the streets of New York or Chicago, but in Europe with its narrow lanes and tight corners designed for horse-drawn carriages and pedestrian traffic, this small car was the perfect choice. While shielding its occupants against imaginable harm with more than 3,000 additional kilos of steel plating and reinforced glass, the Dodge offered both agility and speed to navigate the congested inner city.

The car pulled away from the curb and rolled down Calle de Serrano, past the one-way Calle de Maldonado that dumped out traffic in front of me. I followed lazily on foot, not really thinking about what I would do now. As the car reached the next intersection at Calle de Juan Bravo, it turned left. I thought the driver might be using the maze of one-way streets to circle back to the government offices along Av. de Burgos. On a whim, I cut over on Maldonado and ran nearly to the next block before stopping to catch my breath at Calle de Claudio Coello. I was bent over and exhaling heavily as the Dodge cruised by. Luis Carrero Blanco met my eyes for one slow-motion second, and then the vehicle was gone.

THE HOLLOW MAN

CHAPTER 2

Thursday started out overcast and much chillier than the day before having dipped to 1oC overnight. I was beginning to regret not bringing my gloves and scarf as a cold gust cut through my long coat. The bitter weather reminded me of winters growing up in Chicago. No matter which way I turned, the swirling wind was still in my face. The frigid air seeped through my clothes and froze muscle as hard as bone.

I was glad to see the inside of San Francisco de Borja, not that it was much warmer but at least the sharp bite was gone. Blowing on my cold, dead fingers did little to soothe them. I felt like one of the relics near the altar and thought about lighting a few prayer candles to heat my frozen hands, but a large man was kneeling in the alcove having a serious conversation with his faith. The oversized cross on the wall above his head reminded me it was probably not a great idea to disturb him in the off chance his appeal was actually a dialogue. I pulled open my coat and stuffed numb fists into the thin warmth of my jeans pockets.

I was late for Mass and Blanco was already in his usual second-row pew with Fernandez. An early morning meeting with an informant within Franco’s inner circle had thrown off my schedule, but it had been worth it. The man had told me that because King Alfonso XIII had gone into exile without abdicating when civil war erupted, Franco has technically been ruling as Regent to the King since his victory.

Without royalty on the throne, he was only able to govern by the grace of a sovereign coalition which continued to support the Nationalists. However, the group had most recently been growing restless. It was now time to bring a Spanish king home and Blanco’s directive was to restore the monarchy to its former glory. But the new prime minister didn’t seem the least bit interested in giving up his recently acquired power and so far he had resisted the mounting pressures. This information added to what I’d already learned.

The hours had slipped away the prior day while I had examined the prime minister’s life. The dossier had been good but nowhere near complete. I had buried myself in library microfiche reading everything I could find concerning Blanco. In putting together the puzzle pieces, I had seen where his thoughts lived and I had discovered what scared him. I had been introduced to his few friends and his many enemies. As a man, he was overbearing, arrogant and dogmatic with a taste for control when it came to other human beings.

Apart from his own actions, spreading political and economic discord had further damaged Blanco’s popularity. The Madrid news agency Sabado had been printing a number of leftist bylines criticizing the lagging economy and El Mundo had just broken the story that he received threatening letters over the past week because of an upcoming trial for ten minor political dissidents. The men had been identified by a mole within their ranks as a group to be monitored. It wasn’t known how they had jumped so quickly from Spain’s watch list to accusations of civil crimes against the government but with their arraignment only two weeks away, the impending trial had attracted more than a little grassroots attention and it had all been negative.

While the priest offered communion, I moved to the aisle on the far side out of direct sight of the nave and walked closer to the altar. Blanco and Fernandez were the last to accept the sacrament and slowly walked to their seats as I reached the front. I sat in a pew opposite them and listened as the priest ended the concluding rite with a few announcements regarding the upcoming Christmas holiday and asked us to remember the poor and downtrodden during this time of year.

As soon as the priest was gone, I moved quickly into the center aisle to beat the crowd outside. I wanted to see how the common masses related to Blanco and how he responded to them. But when I looked up, the Spaniard from yesterday was standing at the back of the nave watching me. His gaze was so piercing it stopped me dead in the aisle.

A cold dread wrapped around me, sending shivers down my spine as he slowly crossed himself. A long sigh parted his thick lips. Disappointment lined his face. What are you trying to tell me, old man? What?

A heavyset woman walked into me from behind and pushed me aside, muttering to herself. She was dressed in black and walked bent over a wooden cane. Her gait and rounded back vaguely reminded me of a beetle waddling home.

I looked back for the Spaniard but he was already going through the front of the church. As the thick door slammed behind him, a cold burst of air filled the hall with a foreboding of the weather outside. Not waiting for the prime minister, I buttoned my coat, braced against the chill and pushed through the main doors.

The armored Dodge was idling at the curb and the driver waited on the sidewalk beside the rear fender. I turned left, then left again on Calle de Maldonado following the Spaniard. The space between us grew; he moved fast for an old man. I thought of yesterday’s conversation as I strained to catch up. Something had troubled me about the exchange but I couldn’t decide what it was.

I was coming up on mid-block when I heard the rattle of the Dodge’s powerful engine pass through the intersection behind me and suddenly I knew what it was. I walked faster as the Spaniard disappeared on Calle de Claudio Coello.

The prime minister’s car crossed in front of me not more than twenty meters away, moving casually around a double-parked taxi near the intersection. I started to run as a deafening explosion catapulted me backward over a row of parked cars.

LONDON BRIDGE IS FALLING DOWN

CHAPTER 1

Five men lay against the rise of a hill on the outskirts of Clones, barely a stone’s throw south of the border dividing Ireland. They were hidden beyond the tree line where thorn bushes grew out of rock and dead leaves. The men hunkered low, waiting for the night to begin.

The temperature dropped ten degrees in the last hour. It was near midnight and the half-moon had climbed high into a clouding sky, deepening the darkness and dissolving the black-clad raiders into the heavy shadows of the underbrush. The wind rustled the budding trees of late winter and when the breeze caught the new grass exactly right, the soft whistle of an old Gaelic lament could be heard in the distance.

One light remained in the Pierson cottage and occasionally, a shadow passed behind the curtained window. It was the girl. Once, she pulled the linen back to gaze out across the backyard. They froze though there was little chance she could have seen them. Jack the Ripper with his bloody knife might have been standing under the lone blackthorn tree at the garden’s edge and the night would not have given him up. The curtain reluctantly swung back into place.

In contrast, the mobile home thirty yards across the property to the east was lit up like Heuston Station in Dublin. There was no movement in the trailer but they knew the eldest Pierson boy was inside watching television. An announcer’s shrill voice periodically pierced the tin walls and canned laughter rattled the windows.

One of the team peeked through a side window earlier and saw cigarette smoke curling up from the boy’s fingers as he lounged on the couch. Robert Pierson wasn’t asleep though he might as well have been. A long ash dropped onto the thin carpet leaving yet another inch long black mark. The cigarette burns under his drooping arm oddly resembled the Chinese characters for approaching storm.

None of the men hiding in the woods spoke but they were all restless. The leader of this hand-picked local band of Provos, Kenneth Bunney, stared down the slope behind them. Where the hell was the IRA team from Belfast? When the Northman met with him the prior week, there was urgency in the discussion. The raid had to be done tonight.

He listened. Closing his eyes helped him focus his hearing back through the dense night. But he heard nothing except the soft lull of the wind that crept up under his jacket with a chilled hand. Bunney felt cold fingers walking up his spine.

“Kenneth, where are they?” whispered his brother. He replied with two quick shakes of his head and turned away, signaling the end of the conversation. He didn’t want his brother to see the concern in his face. Bunney felt anxious in the darkness. The Northman was almost an hour late. Another ten minutes and his team would be gone.

The wind faded and the air fell dead in the forest. A long way off, Bunney thought he heard something faintly sluice through the trees then quickly recede. Was it imagination? A dry leaf crunched, a winter twig snapped from rotten bark. No, he was sure. Someone was coming.

Within seconds the night lost its quiet to the low thumping of feet. How many men had the Northman brought? It sounded like a whole brigade, for the love of God. Why did he need our help? Bunney counted eight as the group split in two and settled on both sides of his volunteers.

No one said a word as the newcomers surveyed the houses.

“They’re inside then?” Someone finally asked. It was the man who approached him a week ago. Bunney nodded.

“The lad’s there,” he said, pointing to the mobile home. “And the rest of the lot are in the house.”

“Where’s the girl?”

“Upstairs,” Bunney said.

“The telephone line’s cut?”

“Yeah.”

“Then we’re settled.”

The Northman motioned to his associate. The man pulled a backpack from a shoulder and emptied it on the ground between the Provos. They stared at five handguns.

“Twomey, we agreed there’d be no shooting,” Bunney said.

“Relax,” Twomey replied. “What’s there to shoot at?” He watched Bunney uncertainly then added, “Take ‘em. They’re just for the muscle.”

“I told ya, I’m not having guns.”

“You’ve done time for robbing. What’s the big deal?”

“Yeah I done my share but I never stole nothing with a gun. Robbery is one thing and killing’s ‘nuther.”

“You fecking Brits know it all, don’t you?” Twomey sighed. “Look, I told you. We have solid proof the Piersons are Ulster sympathizers and they’re holding a cache of weapons for operations down south here. The same guns used in the Cooney bombing November last.”

Bunney remembered. He and his brother were staying with their cousins, the McGillens, though staying was a fairly vague term. They took refuge in Ireland whenever the British coppers applied too much grief about their latest crimes.

Two cars came across the border carrying half dozen men, slowing to a stop down from the McGillen house. Armed men surrounded the Cooneys, intending to burn their property. But something went wrong. The raiders stormed the house to find the Cooneys were throwing a party that night. Houseguests assumed it was part of the entertainment. No one took them seriously. Instead of following orders, the drunken partygoers continued to roll to their own tune, scattering like a jar of dropped marbles. After a frustrating thirty minutes, the intruders were able to herd most of the crowd into the yard.

In the chaos, one of the guests broke free, running to his car to retrieve a camera. Shots were fired after the fleeing man but he kept running. The UVF men panicked and fled before igniting the fire. Bunney heard the commotion and ran outside in time to see the last of the retreating cars.

“We’re only interested in the guns.” Twomey broke into Bunney’s thoughts. “We get ‘em, and we leave.”

The Provos hesitated until Bunney reluctantly grabbed a firearm. He considered it a long time before shoving it in a pocket. The others accepted their weapons and quickly secured them inside their coats.

The Northmen pulled Templar caps down over their faces. Only the whites of their eyes could be seen against the black night. The locals followed suit and the group moved up over the rise.

Twomey sent six of the Northmen to set up a perimeter along the property line facing the road. They crouched behind the brickwork fence and waited. He held up three fingers and chopped an arm toward Pierson’s mobile home. The rest of them headed toward the cottage.

One of the Provos planted a booted foot near the flimsy door handle, kicking so hard the thin metal buckled as it gave way. The noise brought Robert Pierson fully awake. The new cigarette fell from his hand as he struggled to rise. It was already too late. Three armed men stood in front of the twenty-four year old and he was driven back onto the couch. He tried to stand again as a shotgun butt flattened his nose.

Two gunmen pulled him off the couch by his hair and a handful of shirt. Pierson landed hard on his face and blood splattered across the threadbare carpet. A twenty gauge double barrel pinned the back of his neck while his hands were ripped from his face and tied behind his back. He struggled to breathe, twisting his head from side to side.

“Where are the guns?” shouted the Northman commanding the raiders.

“What guns? I don’t have any guns?” He blew his nose to clear it.

“We know you’re supplying Loyalist activities in this area and we want your arsenal.”

“Look around. Do you see any place to hide a store of guns? There isn’t room in this bloody hellhole for anything but me and my beer.”

“Take him up to the house before I smash the rest of his head,” ordered the Northman.

Pierson was yanked up by his bindings and slammed against the wall face first. He yelped in pain. His breath came quick but shallow. A forearm crushed the back of his head, giving his nose little relief.

“If you’re lying, I will find out.” The voice near his ear sprang from the devil himself and smelled of raw onions and sour sweat.

Pierson was forced through the door. He stumbled and landed hard on the packed clay at the trailer’s entrance. The earth spun. He thought he was going to vomit. One of his captors hauled him to his feet by an arm. He staggered, disoriented.

The collision with the ground dislocated a shoulder. His left arm was riding low on his neck. A fierce pain marbled down his arm. An unbearable spasm drove him to his knees but he was promptly jerked back to his feet. A pistol tap to the back of his head drove him toward the main cottage.

Twomey and the others waited for the small team at the cottage entrance. He rapped on the door with the butt of his pistol then again when an immediate answer didn’t come. A harsh, smoker’s cough echoed above indistinct noises coming from far back in the house. Twomey kicked the door.

“Who’s there?” A sleepy voice came from inside. Another coughing fit.

Twomey turned around and the man closest to Robert placed a gun at his temple.

“It’s Robert, dad.” His voice croaked.

“Son, are you hurt? I told ya those friends of yours were nothing but trouble.”

The old man spoke as the bolt released and the heavy barrier swung inward. The gunmen swarmed around the older Pierson. Twomey struck him on the head with a pistol and forced the old man to the floor. One of the raiders knelt on George Pierson’s back to tie his hands. Robert was shoved on the floor next to his father. The old man studied his son.

“Are you alright, lad?”

“My shoulder’s a bit dodgy. I think they broke something.”

“Here, what the devil’s going on?” The old man demanded, trying to make sense of this nightmare.

“Shut up, Pierson. Get his wife and the girl,” Twomey commanded with a jerk of his head toward the back of the house.

“How do you know me? What’s this about? We don’t have any money.”

Mrs. Pierson emerged from the hallway dressed in a long, flannel nightgown. She was still befuddled with sleep. One of the gunmen supported her by the upper arm. Her eyes slowly focused in the stark light. She flinched when she saw blood running down the side of her husband’s face.

“George!” She screamed, running to the old man. “What have they done to you?”

“The same as I’ll do to you in exactly one minute. Get. On. The. Floor. Now!” Twomey said through his teeth.

She didn’t recognize her son’s mangled body until he turned a cheek toward her.

“Robert, is this your doing?” She hissed under her breath.

“No, ma,” Robert pleaded, begging her to believe him. It hurt that she would even ask.

The old woman slowly knelt allowing her hands to be tied before being pushed face first to the floor. She squeezed closer to her husband until their arms touched. She didn’t struggle until she heard her daughter stomping down the stairs.

“Marjorie! Go back to your room and lock the door!” She cried though it was far too late.

“If you think I’m going to stand for this, you’re bloody well mistaken!” Marjorie said.

“Jesus, this is a talkative family! Will you all shut your traps? I’ll not ask again,” Twomey demanded.

He thought about shooting every last one of them. The knuckles on his gun hand whitened. A raider tugged a leather strap from a back pocket. He reached for Marjorie’s hand.

“What the bloody hell?” she cried.

“I’m just trying to tie ya, miss.”

“You’ll do no such thing.”

“Girlie, I’ll be giving the orders,” interrupted Twomey. He waved the barrel of his gun in front of her face. “Get it?”

His eyes dropped from Marjorie’s face to the chasm between her breasts. He followed the curves of her body to the exposed thighs beneath her mini-skirt where he lingered. When Twomey returned to her face, she was staring hell through him.

Her makeup was in place. Her lips were red. He loved a beautiful woman. She folded her arms across a blue silk blouse. Marjorie Pierson was ripe for the taking.

“All dressed up to kill. You have someplace to be?” His words were suggestive of something more.

“I’m expecting company and he’s going to have you all arrested when he sees this!”

She spoiled his mood.

“Shut up and stay there, will you? Before we gag the lot of you. You’re not to be hurt more than we have to.”

“What’s this about?” George insisted.

“Guns, dad,” Robert answered the question. “They think we have guns.”

“I have a shotgun there.”

“Not that. Where’s the cache?” Bunney’s voice was close to pleading.

“Cache? What…?” Pierson lifted his head toward his captors. “Please don’t hurt my family. We’re simple people.”

“Let’s search the place.” Bunney couldn’t understand why Twomey was dragging his feet. We came for the guns. Let’s get them and get out of here. “We know you’re supplying the Loyalists with weapons. It’ll go easier on ya if you just tell us where they are.”

“There are no guns. Search all ya want.”

“You think we won’t find them?”

“I think ya won’t find anythin’,” spat the old man.

Furniture scraped across the wooden floor. The men pulled up a blue hand-knotted Persian rug and piled it in a corner. They found nothing but wide, worn planks under their heavy boots. There was no trapdoor to a hidden location. No false floor where guns could be stored. Bunney stamped a foot. Solid surface, there was nothing below.

“Where’s the cellar?”

He didn’t wait for an answer. He pulled books from shelves and assaulted the plaster, searching for hollow walls. Pictures came down and an ancient grandfather clock smashed to the hard wood of the parlor. Frustrated, Bunney threw a glass vase into the dying embers of the fireplace. He wasn’t sure if he was madder at himself or Twomey.

“Where. Is. The. Cellar?”

Bunney cocked the hammer on a pistol and knelt over George Pierson. He smashed the butt of the weapon between Pierson’s shoulder blades and jammed the barrel against the older man’s neck. He shifted position so that a knee pressed into the small of his victim’s back. Pierson grunted.

“I’ll not ask again,” he growled.

They were all surprised by the gunshot. Mrs. Pierson screamed. Marjorie struggled to rise. Robert turned to his father. The gun’s recoil was loud, but it came from outside.

Bunney ran to the door and flung it open.

“Who fired that shot?” he barked.

“For the love of Christ, man, keep your head down. There’s somebody shooting at us!”

The reply came from beyond the reach of the door’s light. Beyond the dark edge of the shadows. Twomey was beside Bunney in an instant.

“Keep your boys here,” he said and jumped off the porch, swallowed by the black night.

Bunney switched off the parlor light and watched a lone figure dart around the mobile home and vanish into the tree line. The eight Northmen were on his scent, trailing by less than fifty feet. The Provos crouched and nervously peered through the windows. Everyone was whispering at once. Several pulled their pistols.

“Heavenly Father, it’s time for us to forget the past, forget the mistakes we’ve made…”

The words drifted across the room. Bunney glanced back to see the Piersons praying. They huddled together, believing they were about to die. Bunny’s men sat in clear view, staring at him for direction. The Northmen were chasing God knows who through the woods. The situation was now officially out of control, he thought.

The man ran down through a gully and scrambled up the other side. Undergrowth tangled his legs. He tripped and fell twice but didn’t stop. Thorns and sharp branches ripped at his clothes, tearing flesh from muscle beneath the thin cloth. Blood streaked his face and hands. He kept running.

He ducked under a low branch and rebounded off a tree trunk as a bullet splintered bark, driving wood into his back. He stumbled. Fire lit the woods as slashing torch beams cut through the dense night but the man kept going. He had to get away. Who were these people? What did they want? He heard voices. They were farther back now. He was putting some distance between these psychos chasing him.

Suddenly, a jagged numbness exploded through his calf and he tumbled into a thicket. His leg wouldn’t respond. It was paralyzed. Hell, it felt like it wasn’t even there. Where was his leg? He crawled. He struggled up and fell on his face. Breathless, he rolled over.

When he looked up, he saw the dark sky pressing down and the hand of God reaching toward him. It took a few seconds to realize the fingers were five figures towering over his lifeless body. The race had ended.

“Who the hell are ye?” He licked his lips as he struggled to push the words out.

A torch was switched on, momentarily blinding the man. He raised a hand and saw a silver barreled pistol glinting in the sharp light. His breathing increased. He needed time to think.

“I didn’t see your faces. Let’s leave it at that. My name is Billy Fox,” he gasped. “I’m the senator from Monaghan. You don’t want to kill me.”

“Yes, I do,” corrected Twomey. “I’m killing you precisely because you are Billy Fox. You see, you’re the first on our list.”

He fired once into Fox’s chest and patiently watched blood pulse from the wound.

The senator from Monaghan lay on the cold ground wondering what the hell happened, as his blood seeped into the earth. He shivered. The paralysis in his leg traveled up his body. His arms turned to clay, his fingers to stone. His breath faded.

Twomey curiously watched the surprise in Fox’s eyes turn to recognition, or perhaps it was some kind of sadness. The dying man unsteadily gulped one last breath before settling into a quiet goodnight.

Twomey lowered his weapon and spat on the ground.

SURVIVING PRAGUE

PROLOGUE

The sun fell beyond the rolling peaks, bringing an early evening to rural Ukraine. The dark ridgeline above the narrow mountain pass was tinged in fading yellows and flickering golds. Dusk carried a witching wind along the Carpathian slopes from the heights of medieval legend to the bottomless bedrock of superstition’s realm.

Deep wagon ruts from gypsy caravans snaked through ancient dirt down there in the canyons, forming unprotected trails where even gods tread lightly in the despair of this evening. The flat lands surrounding the mountains were a place of sobering imagination. It was a forbidden dimension where less than human creatures waited in the shadows.

As the rocky formations brought an earthly darkness to hell’s valley, a blood orange moon rose above the treetops on the plains to the east and set the foothills on fire with a glowing light that shook the depths of our gravest nightmares. The inferno spread quickly over the lowlands, intensifying gloom into disparity and making it difficult to determine who, or what, may be following unsuspecting travelers.

An old flatbed truck rolled along the rough road trying to find a path of less resistance. The steering wheel was in freefall. The tires sagged to the left and rose to the right, then sagged to the right and rose to the left through a minefield of distemper. At times, the wheels cut sharply around nothing at all as if avoiding imaginary bodies left from dead days past.

The man driving glanced in the rearview mirror. He swore he saw dead-eyed goblins sitting among the swaying tree branches. The sight scared him more that he imagined it would, reminding him of tales his old babushka used to whisper in the quiet of firelight.

“You look like you’ve just seen a ghost, or something worse,” nodded his passenger.

He briefly thought about punching a hole in the man’s chest. He had already regretted asking him along in the first place. Several times. The last thing he needed right then was another idiotic observation from this imbecile.

The driver concentrated on the road. His eyes didn’t waver from the incline as the old truck began its climb into the black heart of oblivion. The road crunched and popped under the weight of the three-ton Zis-5 vehicle. He prayed the bald tires would hold together long enough to reach their destination.

“Shut up,” he finally answered.

“Are you scared of vampires and werewolves? You don’t still believe that old woman’s tales do you? It was just talk. Crazy talk.”

Who would make up such stories, the driver thought? There is evil in this world, my brother. Real evil that can’t be explained. It haunts us in the uncertainty of human night, in the faltering confusion of our minds, in the sudden eclipse of our souls.

“I never mock such things and neither should you,” he assured his passenger.

The driver took a deep breath. Air eased from his lungs like cold fog drifting across the flat surface of a night-stained lake. He wiped his face with a damp shirtsleeve.

“You are scared, Yuri. I never thought I’d see the day.”

“If you don’t shut up, you won’t see tomorrow.”

“You sound like you’re thinking about putting a bullet in me,” the passenger said with a tentative smile.

“I’m thinking about putting you out right here. You can walk on if you like or run back home for all I care.”

Light turned to twilight quicker than the driver had hoped. It wasn’t the presence of total black that bothered him. After all, what he can’t see can’t hurt him. His real fear lay in the movements and whispers intensifying every shadow and they were swiftly closing around the truck at that moment.

Yuri pulled in his arm and cranked up the window. As the truck rocked back and forth over unseen potholes, he tightened his grip on the steering wheel. He didn’t need to lose control right now and nosedive into a ravine.

“For God’s sake, it’s another two hundred kilometers to Kraków. What am I supposed to do?”

“You can walk back through the valley down there. It’s the shortest way home.” Yuri flipped a thumb over his shoulder before continuing. “Since you’re such an atheist all of a sudden, I’m sure you’ll find someone, or some - thing, to pick you up.”

“You superstitious…” He shook his head and looked out the window. “Come on Yuri. You’re talking to family. I was just being funny.”

“Brother or not, Valeri, if you don’t shut up and give me some peace, I swear I’ll put you out. I see nothing to joke about until we deliver this crate.”

Yuri downshifted as the old road wound farther into the foothills. The gears ground metal on metal. The cab bucked under him. He stared into the rearview mirror again to ensure everything was as it should be. I hate these mountains, he thought.

“This ain’t like you, Yuri. What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

Valeri looked at the side of Yuri’s face. Even though his silhouette was half-formed in the faint light, he saw something he’d never seen before. Fear soaked the brow of his unshakable brother. Yuri was keeping something from him.

“What’s in the crate?” asked his brother.

The rear left axle suddenly bounced into a rut and hit bottom. The steering wheel jerked hard to the left. Yuri’s first instinct was to swipe at the brakes but he had to keep the slow momentum going up the pass. He corrected course and tapped the gas again.

“Yuri?”

A scraping beneath the truck bed grew louder and echoed in the wind. The noise stopped as a tire climbed out of a long pothole. Yuri readjusted himself in the bench seat.

“What!?”

“What is in the crate?”

“Something heavy.”

“I know that. It took five of us to lift it inside. But what is it?”

“The man said manufacturing ingredients.”

“Yuri, what sort of ingredients needs to be stored in a lead container?”

CHAPTER 1

The dull, grainy figure of a man came into focus as the sniper adjusted the knob on the night scope. He calibrated the distance; ninety-three meters. At that short distance with the SVD modified Kalashnikov and new night scope he would be able to see the blessed face of god in the man’s eyes as the bullet pierced his brain.

The target stood near the corner of the building, just outside the light ring of the streetlamp. He was dead if he stepped into the light. But it didn’t much matter either way. The glow of his cigarette was enough to mark the kill zone. The sniper nudged the dial to sharpen the man’s features.

Another figure suddenly walked into the reticle and the image in the night scope blurred. The abrupt movement surprised the sniper. He pulled his eyes away, wiped his forehead on a sleeve, and let his sight adjust to the darkness again.

The night air was thick with humidity but his line of sight from back inside the third floor window was clear all the way to the target. The sniper peered down at the two figures. The late arrival was as tall as the first but slighter in build. Was it a woman? It was hard to say with the watch cap pulled low over the ears. Maybe a boy, he thought.

He would kill that one for the fun of it.

The sniper loosened his shoulders and stretched his neck. He stared through the scope again. Tonight was easy money, as they said in the United States; sight, squeeze, sight, squeeze. A few seconds was all he needed to finish both of them and still be back at the barracks in time for late mess call.

Before he could refine the image again, the sniper saw the cigarette bounce in the street from an outstretched arm. The exploding sparks shattered the scene into a million pieces. He pulled his face away from the weapon to readjust his eyes to the night again.

The slender one pulled the sniper’s target backward. They disappeared into a recessed doorway that took them to the far end of darkness. The sniper could see the outline of the door frame but his two targets were invisible within the protection of its black shadow.

Even with the night optics, he knew any shot would be risky. He had to be certain at least the primary target was put down cleanly. A soft smile creased his lips. He would let the instant unfold in slow motion and follow god’s will.

The sniper was patient if nothing. He had trained to be patient. Those were weeks, months, years he would never get back. Still, he waited. He would remain on overwatch. The moment will come soon to drop both and he would be ready when that time came.

He refocused the 1PN51 night scope on the black cavity of the doorway and slowly exhaled. When they reappeared, the pair would be moving fast. This added a bit more challenge to the game, he thought, that’s all.

“Zita, thank God you’re here. I’m in trouble. We’re in trouble. Three of your mates are dead. That leaves me, and you.”

“I understand. What’s happened now?” she asked.

“They’re following me. I see them everywhere.”

The sniper recognized a waving arm in the darkness. He smiled.

“Who is following you? Please calm down, Jersic. And keep your voice low.”

“That’s easy for you to say. I have the exposure here. I’m a member of the Central Committee, for God’s sake.”

“Yes, I realize that. You’re the deepest mole we’ve ever had inside the Soviet government.”

The sniper pressed the ten-round magazine into place. It locked with a faint click. He chambered a round.

“I have to leave Prague. Now. They know I work with MI6,” Jersic said.

“Who knows and what do you think they know?”

“Vlček knows. He knows everything!”

“I need another day to get things sorted.”

“I won’t last another day.”

Jersic wiped his forehead with a handkerchief and returned the damp cloth to his pocket.

“I’ll call the Americans as a last resort. I know someone who can help.”

“The Americans won’t help us.”

“Calm down. We’ll deal with it.”

“How are we going to do that?”

“Jersic, you’ve been in place for seven years. Why the urgency now? What has you so frightened?”

“I’m telling you they know about me. They’ve systematically killed the others and I’m next.”

“You’re being paranoid. Wilson was in a traffic accident and Bradley drowned on a fishing trip up in Doksy. He was nowhere near Prague at the time. Timm died in his sleep; bad heart. The field office has not been able to find a connection between their deaths. They are sending replacements as soon as time permits.”

“And you accept that three deaths in three weeks is coincidence? All you can say is bad timing? I know how these people operate and I’m scared.”

“I believe you. They were good men. London has taken your situation under advisement and they are working on an extraction plan.”

The sniper exhaled. He reduced his breathing to one quarter the rate of his heart.

“I can’t wait for London. I’ll be dead by tomorrow.” Jersic said.

“Don’t do anything rash. I’ll get you out,” she said.

“The game is over, Zita, it’s time to make my peace or run,” he sighed. “Take care of yourself.”

The black pit fell silent. He turned to leave. Zita grabbed an arm.

“Collect what you can’t live without. Meet me across the river at Restaurace Pravěk at. 9:00 p.m. One hour, do you hear me? If you aren’t there by a quarter past, you must wait until tomorrow evening.”

“I’ll be there. Thank you.”

It was a halfhearted reply. Jersic placed a weak hand on Zita’s shoulder.

He stepped out of the doorway into the path of a 7.62 mm bullet, traveling at 830 meters per second. The projectile entered his face below the right eye. Jersic was dead before the skull shattered and sent shards of bone into his brain. Dead before the sound echoed through the canyon of buildings on Myslikova Strasse.

Zita rolled the opposite way out of the blind recess, coming up in the light of the streetlamp. Realizing her mistake she continued to roll to the corner of the building as a second round exploded against the brick above her. She crouched in the shadows, weapon ready to return fire.

Yes, definitely a woman, the sniper thought.

He whistled as he dismantled the rifle and packed it away. Mission accomplished, he thought. The woman wasn’t his concern anyway. She would have been a nice bonus, but no matter. That situation would take care of itself. He was certain he would see her again.

He casually wiped the window sill of fingerprints and looked around the room to determine what else he might have touched. Still whistling, he lifted the gun case over the body of the suite owner. The old man had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. It was too bad, but necessary. Life was a series of wrong places and wrong times.

He stepped around a patch of blood on his way to the apartment telephone. He lifted the handset, dialed and requested a wet works team for the body on Myslikova Strasse.

CHAPTER 2

“Is the traitor dead?”

“The kill was clean.”

“No one saw you?”

The smell of Turkish tobacco filled the room with an acrid odor. The man seated behind the desk picked up a still lit cigarette and flicked the ash into a full ashtray. The fire burned dark red as he inhaled.

“Comrade Vlček, you hired an elite Soviet SDM marksman with twenty-seven confirmed kills during the suppression of Dubcek’s reforms in ‘68,” said the sniper.

“Yes, quite an impressive achievement, Comrade Major. Your eyesight is not in question.”

The sniper shifted his weight from one foot to the other at parade rest. He looked down at the Czech Communist Party Leader with a faint odor of disdain. Politicians were so pompous, he thought.

“There was another. Perhaps it was a woman. The two spoke briefly.”

“And you failed to eliminate her with Jersic?” The sitting man gazed curiously at the sniper, mocking his failure. “Well, I see. You left a witness. Perhaps we hired the wrong man.”

“She was athletic and I am still managing the new night scope. In my defense, sir, no one else could have succeeded with two kills under the circumstances.” The soldier hesitated then tried to change the subject. “I assume she is his handler.”

“Yes. We know who she is.”

“Then I’ll find her and finish the job.”

The fat bureaucrat smiled as he lit another cigarette. He slapped the lighter back onto the desk. Vlček squinted up through thick smoke at the sniper standing in front of him. How wonderfully uninformed this stupid man is, he thought. He knows nothing of what’s really going on. He’s only interested in fulfilling my irrelevant taunt while everything around his pathetic petty life’s about to change within days.

“I have a better idea, Comrade,” Vlček began, “Do not let your misplaced pride come between us on this. An opportunity presents itself with this woman slipping through your grasp.”

The bureaucrat peered at the sniper’s face to be certain there was no objection. It was difficult to read his emotionless face. The soldier stared at the wall above Vlček’s head.

“We have five witnesses who swear she was with Jersic and each is positive she brutally murdered Jersic. You see… two flies with one hit.”

Vlček opened a top drawer and pulled out a single sheet of paper. He glanced at it before dropping the document on the desk and spinning it so the snipper might read it.

“I have taken the liberty of drafting this official report which will be released to the 6:00 AM morning wire for major news desks across Europe,” Vlček continued.

The soldier looked down at the paper. He read the words not quite understanding.

Czech authorities are looking for a female British national in connection with the brutal assassination of a Communist Committee Member last night. The young woman is also a suspect in the suspicious deaths of three other British nationals in recent weeks.

Airports, trains, and border crossings have closed to foreign travelers until each can be properly secured. Eastern Bloc troops moved to the western highlands as a precautionary measure. Prague has also closed to international commerce and all public gatherings in the city are cancelled until further notice. These steps were taken to ensure the safety of our citizens. We apologize for your delayed schedules.

“I don’t understand,” the soldier said. “How did you know she was there and that she lived? Were you following me?”

“We have been watching her and the others for some time. She just happened to intersect with your op and my people were there to witness the event,” Vlček waved a hand in the air.

“Sir, I request a day to find her,” requested the Major.

“I’ll give you a day,” Vlček responded. “…to report back to your unit. You have done as we asked. Enjoy the city. Sample its food or savor its women; whichever you prefer. But stay away from the Brit.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Major, do not betray my generosity.”

“No, sir.”

“We’re fighting for our survival here in Prague. And, at this moment we have been offered the unique opportunity to finally destroy Britain’s spy network here. Let politics finish this.”

“Sir, yes, sir,” the sniper repeated.

The fat bureaucrat wondered why he felt the need to explain such a complicated matter to this animal who had been trained to do only one thing. It was beyond his kind to understand. He cared for nothing except his Kalashnikov.

“You are dismissed, Major Akulov.”

The sniper came to attention and saluted. He retreated through the door, along the hall, down the stairs and into the street, all the while thinking about the target he missed.