The only truly odd thing was that the dead men were said to be triplets. While Smith found this interesting, he could not fathom its relevance. He vowed to question Remo about the matter when CURE's enforcement arm checked in from South America. In the meantime, he had work to do.
Twenty more minutes passed before Smith's headache began to reassert itself once more. The main pressure area was a spot at the crown of his skull. It felt as if the painful throbbing were connected by a taut and twirled elastic band that ran straight through his brain and out along his optic nerve. He felt nauseous.
Smith pulled his bleary eyes away from the computer screen. He leaned back in his creaking chair. Pushing his glasses up, he gently rubbed his eyelids with his fingers.
The headaches were worsening and coming with more frequency. They had begun in the wake of his return from France after the vacation debacle that was supposed to be a celebration of his fiftieth wedding anniversary.
Smith knew that the headaches must somehow be related to the blow he had received on the back of the head by an unnamed IV operative. At the time, the man had been posing as a member of British Intelligence. Circumstances had been such that no one save the Master of Sinanju had bothered to question the man's authenticity.
Smith was lucky he hadn't been killed. If the headaches continued much longer, he knew he would have to consult a specialist. Dr. Drew was a competent physician, but if there was some greater trauma, the Folcroft doctor would be out of his element.
Smith opened his tired eyes. The queasiness still clung to his stomach and ribs. For an unsettling moment, he thought he might vomit.
Smith steeled himself. He didn't have time for nonsense.
He leaned forward once more in his chair, readjusting the rimless glasses on his patrician nose. The black-and-white images on the computer seemed clearer to him now.
Good. Perhaps it was all simply a matter of determination.
Peering down at the screen, Smith began to once more carefully scrutinize the contours of the current satellite image.
A COUNTRY AWAY from the area of South America that was the focus of Harold Smith's pointless search, Adolf Kluge was touring the silent, tidy streets of IV village.
The pretty little gingerbread houses in their gaily painted colors were silent tombs. They were lined up along the cobbled roads-their doors locked, their shuttered windows closed on dead, black interiors.
A numbing stillness stretched up like icy hands from the mountainous rock beneath Kluge's feet. It wound its arms around everything-houses, streets, even the distant mountaintops. The very air around him seemed wrapped in eerie calm.
Everywhere was silence.
It was the beginning of summer in this hemisphere. Flowers had been planted in the rich black soil of brightly colored window boxes. As he walked along, Kluge wondered if the plants would grow wild and eventually go to seed, or if they would be burned to ash.
He had never seen the village empty. These hills in the lower Andes had not been without activity since the first handful of carpenters hired by IV had put hammer to nail to construct the first block of quaint, old-world homes. That had been in the 1950s.
Now all was still. Every building was empty. And it had happened on the watch of Adolf Kluge.
His sadness was tinged with threads of anxiety as he walked past the last of the small houses.
The mountain fortress that was the nerve center for IV even before the rest of the village had been built loomed on its separate mountain peak before him. It was like something from another world. The long stone bridge that connected the fortress peak with the mountaintop on which the village had been constructed stretched downward until it became part of the road Kluge walked on.
Between the village and the bridge, just before the chasm that separated the two peaks, was a lush, bucolic field. Ordinarily parcels of this land were portioned out to the older members of the village with an interest in gardening. Today, the field was home to Kluge's neo-Nazi army.
Several hundred men were gathered in the meadow. Each of them carried an assortment of weapons. Kluge's aide walked over to him as the IV leader stepped from the road and began walking through the tall grass of the field.
"We are ready," Herman announced.
Kluge smiled wanly. "Are we?" He focused his thoughts. "Any news out of Berlin?"
The aide hesitated. "They ... failed."
Kluge closed his eyes. "All dead?"
"Three of them. The fourth has not yet faxed in."
"Faxed," Kluge said sarcastically. "We do not even have agents capable of using a simple telephone."
He looked over at the men lined up in the field. At first glance, an intruder might think that he was seeing some elaborate illusion. A funhouse-mirror army.
Impossible as it might seem to the uninitiated, many of the men lined up in that small Andean field were identical to each other. Azure blue eyes, collarlength blond hair pulled back into ponytails, perfectly hewed, almost feminine bone structure. They looked to have been stamped out, one right after the other, by some bizarre Aryan factory.
It was a disturbing image.
Mixed in with these men were a few other IV soldiers. Like Kluge, they were dedicated young men who had been born into the movement. Some had even been raised here in the village. They were standing here, waiting to defend their home.
Kluge had never felt compelled to dress the soldiers of IV in the maudlin frippery of days gone by. In fact, he had made a deliberate effort to avoid sticking his troops in Nazi uniforms. If someone had somehow managed to sneak a camera up into the village, the last thing he wanted was for his people to be goose-stepping around in SS uniforms.
Dressed in plain brown shirts and slacks, the men in that field looked as if they could have been part of any nondescript South American police force from Venezuela to Chile. That is, with the obvious exception of the small silver lapel pins on each of their shirts.
The pins were bisected by a narrow line. On one side was inscribed the Roman numeral IV. On the other was a simple engraved swastika.
Kluge looked away from the pin on the nearest man. With a bitter grumble, he turned his attention to his aide.
"It is possible that the agent who has not been reported dead somehow managed to succeed in his mission," Herman ventured. "Perhaps he is en route here."
"Yes," Kluge replied dully. "And perhaps they are en route here. Did you think of that?"
Herman cleared his throat. "That thought did occur to me," he admitted.
Kluge's blue gray eyes were flat as he turned from his aide. "It is very quiet here," he commented, looking back over the silent village. "Almost peaceful."
"Herr Kluge?" Herman questioned, his voice striking a troubled note. It was as if he wanted to draw attention to the seemingly apathetic attitude of IV's leader without being insulting. His tone worked.
"I have not taken leave of my senses, Herman," Kluge replied tightly. When he looked back from the sleeping village, his brow was furrowed. "Yet," he added. "Have you made certain the other defenses are fully operational?"
Herman nodded sharply. "We will give them more of a fight than they expect, Adolf. And we will prevail."
"Perhaps," Kluge said. He didn't sound convinced.
"Unquestionably," Herman said with a determined nod.
Kluge said nothing. Let the fool bury his head in the sand if he wished.
The head of IV looked out over the sea of identical faces. "Explain to them what is to be done," he directed. It seemed an effort for him to point a world-weary finger at his army. "I do not have the patience."
Clasping his hands behind his back, Adolf Kluge walked back across the field to the road. Shoulders hunched, the leader of IV strolled up the path toward the bridge.