If he survived the meet at Arlington, there would be enough time to think about the job, about pursuing Gianelli to the corners of the earth. It might require a lifetime, but Brognola would not rest until the D.C. capo had been killed or locked away forever.
If he survived...
It was the top priority now. He would be useless to his family if it went sour at the meet, if he did not live long enough to pluck them from captivity with Bolan's help. Hal cherished no illusions that he might be able to complete the job alone. If not for Bolan's help, if not for Leo's selfless offer of assistance, he would have been walking into Arlington alone, condemned to die.
With two guns beneath his coat and two friends at his back, he had a chance to pull it off, salvage something from the rubble. They were looking at a doublecross in Arlington; he knew that much before they ever left the house, but his opponents would not field an army in such close proximity to Washington. They would be waiting for a single man, convinced that he would follow orders and come alone. Three gunners, maybe four would be enough to do the job. He would be very much surprised if they were faced with greater numbers, and the hardware they were packing should be adequate to do the job.
Bolan had agreed that there was more than mere assassination in the wind, but he had kept his speculations to himself. Whatever happened, he would be on hand to stand with Hal against his enemies. As always.
Brognola sometimes wondered where he would have been, what course he would have taken, if the Executioner had never crossed his path. If Bolan's father had been wise enough to bypass dealings with the loan sharks up in Pittsfield, or if Striker's plane had gone down while en route from Vietnam to the United States and graveside ceremonies for his murdered family. What might have been, if there had been no holy war to suck Hal in and change his life forever, leading him to heights and depths that had been unimaginable in his other life?
It didn't matter now. Bolan's everlasting war was grim reality, and Hal had signed on voluntarily, his eyes wide open to the risks involved. From grudging admiration of the soldier's talents he had passed to something more like hero worship tempered with a veteran's knowledge that no single man is impervious to death. He sided with the Executioner because the guy was doing something, fighting in a world where action had been voted out of style, where wait-and-see was everything. He had enlisted in the soldier's fight because he finally had no choice, and Bolan's exit from the Phoenix Program had not dimmed Brognola's admiration for the man, nor his commitment to the everlasting war.
The war was coming home for Hal Brognola now, in ways that he had never seriously contemplated, but it did not change his mind. The move against his family might finally destroy him, but as long as he survived, he would continue striking back against the enemy with everything he had.
He understood Mack Bolan now as he had never understood the man before. He felt the pain that finally transcended human suffering, becoming simultaneously more and less than simple pain. If he should fail to rescue Helen and the kids, Brognola knew that wound would never heal while he survived. And at the same time, he was conscious of the fact that it would not impair his own ability to single out his enemies for retribution. Private suffering did wonders for a soldier's visual acuity. Brognola could see clearly now: his duty, the potential consequences everything except the outcome of his rendezvous with death at Arlington.
For that he would be forced to wait, and if his luck ran out there would be Bolan, running on against the savages, a doomsday engine programmed for destruction of the enemy. It gave Brognola peace of mind to know that one man's death could not abort the holy war.
He needed peace of mind tonight and strength to see him through the early morning darkness. Whatever daylight might reveal success or grim disaster he would face it and move on. While life and strength remained he would continue fighting, from his post at Justice or outside the fold. If necessary he would wage his battle from a prison cell.
And when they finally brought him down, he would be braced to take as many of the bastards with him as he could. It was the only way Brognola knew to play the game, and he had learned it from a master.
Time to go, and death was waiting for him in a graveyard full of heroes. If the shadow overtook him there, he would be satisfied to rest among them for a while, secure in the knowledge that an Executioner remained to carry on the fight. It was the best that he could do in terms of hope, and it would have to do for now. For Arlington and his fate.
18
Darkness and the ranks of gravestones seemed to stretch away forever, lost in murky shadow. Hal Brognola felt almost as if the dead were watching him, awaiting his reaction to their presence, looking for a signal that he understood them. At once he shrugged the morbid thought away as he realized that they were not deliberately spying on his grief. The dead knew nothing of his problems and if they had known, they probably would not have cared.
Before he reached the cemetery gates, Brognola pulled his four-door to the curb beneath some overhanging trees and doused the lights. He did not kill the engine, for he wasn't stopping long. If anyone was watching, he was banking on the fact that he was early to assuage their fears. They would believe that he was killing time, or having second thoughts about his mission, dawdling before he was committed irretrievably. With any luck at all, they would not understand that he was dropping off a passenger.
Behind him on the curb side, Bolan was already EVA before the car had come to a stop. Brognola scarcely heard him opening the off-side door and closing it again. They had removed the dome light prior to setting out, eliminating any chance that Bolan's move would be betrayed to watchers in the shadows.
Finished sooner than he had anticipated, Hal remained in place and counted down the fifteen seconds that had been allowed for his delivery of Bolan to the jump-off point. It was excessive, granted, but a rolling stop would probably arouse suspicions if his enemies were staking out the rendezvous, and he was not about to gamble with the calculated odds. Not when the lives of his wife and children were at stake.
The Executioner had chosen fifteen seconds as the optimum delay. It gave him ample time to clear the vehicle and find shelter in the shadows ringing Arlington. It also granted Hal the extra time he needed to apparently examine his dilemma, making up his mind. Another moment, and he would have drawn attention to himself; a moment less, and there would have been no apparent purpose for his pulling to the curb.
One down.
The other Leo Turrin would be riding with him to the drop. He was sequestered in the trunk, as comfortable as Hal could make him with a blanket folded up beneath him to provide some insulation from the road. The trunk lid was open far enough to let him breathe, secured in place by taut rubber fasteners that could be easily released. There was a possibility Brognola's contacts might wish to look inside the car, to make sure he had come alone as ordered, but the chance of anyone checking the trunk was remote. If their precautions took them that far, they would find themselves confronted by an Uzi primed and ready to dismantle anyone within effective range, and they would have a second, maybe less, to flip the mental coin and cast their vote for life and death.
Whichever way it went tonight, Brognola hoped that some of them would opt for life. He had no interest in the welfare of his enemies beyond a wish to see them all eternally consumed by hellfire, but he would require at least one prisoner to provide him with the information he required. The whereabouts of Helen and the kids, for openers. And after that...