Indeed, the broadness, the circularity, and the separation of the elevation lines to convey gentleness of slope appeared to the naked eye like two broad, clear lenses against the density of marking that expressed rougher ground. Squint and you were looking into the eyes of an aviator from the open-cockpit days.
“He’ll be able to see a long way coming,” said Ginger, as if his head had cleared, “and having set up, and alone knowing the site and having a chance to examine it with his fine eye, he’d have no fear of hidden shooters.”
“Moreover,” said Raymond, “the land right on the approach is rugged, craggy, with lots of dips and arroyos and valleys, then it crests up, you cross over, and there’s a big emptiness. He’ll bounce you through them valleys on the approach.”
“He will indeed,” said Anto. “Then this is where it’ll play out. He’ll call late afternoon. He’s got to sleep the day away; he’s not slept in three and he’s had that bout with the water, which would break all other men. So this I’ll tell you: he’s in a fog now. He’ll know that and not want to make mistakes. He’s found a fine bog and and he’ll sleep like a bear. Then he’ll call, and the game begins.”
“And we arrive at the crest once he’s exposed himself, you’re thinking, Anto,” said Raymond.
“Then with iSniper we write The End to this story,” added
Ginger.
“No, fellows, too many slips could occur. This is how it must happen. This is the fulcrum, the key. It’s that you’re already there. You moved in at night-tonight, that is-you set up a hide so good it can’t be spotted, because when he gets to the place after the long game he’s run, he’ll pass his shrewd eyes over it. That’s where your snipercraft must be as I taught you, and I won’t be there to check and improve. It’s on Team Irish, not on Anto. It must be perfect, and your patience and your stalker’s stillness and your shooting ability with iSniper911 and Mr. 168-grain Black Hills must be at the top of the heap, because you’ll only get one chance. You put the beam on him, let the magic bean do its trick and solve your jumble of numbers and designate your point of aim, and then you hold, control breathing, press to surprise, break, and put the man down.”
“Anto, suppose we search the body and the MacGuffin ain’t upon him? Should we then shoot for hip, smash it up, and leave him still breathing for further interview?”
“You will not. Shoot him dead. I don’t want him wounded, I want him belly up, the Sniper nailed. He’ll have it on him, as it’s fragile and can’t be left in nature, and if he’s hit or takes a fall, or the play blows him this way or that across the land, that makes picking it up afterward a consideration he’d rather not face. He’ll have it upon him, that I know.”
“I’d like the shot, Anto,” said Ginger, “if it can be arranged. It was my head he thumped, enjoying the blow, and it was my lungs that would’ve come up empty if Raymond hadn’t needed his cup of coffee, so with me, it’s taken on the personal.”
“You’ll understand, then, Ginger, why I’m placing you low, with a carbine, for close-in if it must be, because I don’t want you brooding in your hide and getting anxious and bumbling on the delicacy of the trigger. I’ll let Raymond take the shot from above, with Jimmy spotting, and you’re my security, down close. I’m putting you in a ghillie where I think he’ll make the play and you’ll be closest to him. If Raymond misses, you’ll have but a second to dump a magazine into him, or it’s poor Anto among the angels, what a mighty tragedy that would be. So Raymond, the shot you’ll take will be through the moving stuff, and that’s why it’s yours, because you are the best wind reader and through shooter on the team, as I know the fellows would agree.”
“It’s true,” said Jimmy. “Raymond’s a genius in the breeze. Otherwise, the poor man’s the dullest blade in the drawer, but fluff up the weeds and set the leaves to rustle, and Raymond’s the man you want.”
Everybody laughed, even Raymond, who was known to be a sensitive type.
“Then, mates,” said Anto, “we’re done with this bloody job and this bloody country with its thin beer and bad poetry, and it’s off to castles in Spain where his lordship has set up our fine lives for us.”
46
Swagger awoke from dark sleep that felt drugged, shook his head to drive out memories too grotesque to be recorded, wished hard for a cup of coffee. He didn’t feel refreshed or enlivened a bit; he wanted to go back to unconsciousness and escape his reality: in a dirty-smelling nook in the rocks, heaped with the crap he’d brought along, faced with a mission he felt too old for. Have to get my combat mind back, he told himself: have to!
He crawled out of his sleeping bag, crawled up the incline to the mouth of the cave, and went to his Leicas for a good five-minute examination of landscape. It looked fine-a drift of low hills and sparse forestry, a glimpse of green-yellow valley floors, a haze of far-off peaks. At one point he thought he saw a line that seemed a little too straight for anything in nature, and he put down the binoculars to take up the rifle. Through the Leupold Mark IV’s 10X, he studied hard and realized it was a length of birch trunk 240 yards out.
He glanced at his watch, saw that it was nearly 5 p.m., meaning it was 8 p.m. in the East and he was already behind schedule.
He ate three protein bars because he’d need the energy for the long night ahead, and stuffed a couple in his cargo pants pocket. Then he crawled to the mouth of the cave, checked again, crawled out, and pulled out his cell and punched in a number.
Come on, goddamn it, work, goddamn you, and in a bit he heard ringing.
“Where the hell are you?” said Nick Memphis.
“Never you mind,” said Swagger. “Are you back, are you out of the woods, are you the boss?”
“I’m back. Long story. Forget me. You said to Starling, ‘Jump time,’ and then you went incommunicado for three long days. What the hell is happening? What the hell are you doing? What is your situation? What are your plans?”
“Here’s what’s important. I have to get you something. No point describing it. Hmm, don’t see no FedEx offices around this neighborhood, so tomorrow I’ll find a way to get it sent FedEx; tomorrow being Saturday, I’ll pay for Sunday delivery. I want you ready for it, expecting it, set up to receive it, protect it, and understand it.”
“Where’s the nearest big city?”
“Lord, it ain’t that near, probably Missoula.”
“Too far? Give me a town then. I’ll have a team there tomorrow.”
“Place called Indian Rapids, Montana, downstate and east a bit from Missoula.”
“I’ll fly a team in. Bring it to the Indian Rapids airfield or airport. Anytime after noon. Go to the American Eagle desk, tell ’em it’s for Mr. Memphis. An agent will take it from you.”
“And take me too, no doubt. Well, I don’t think it’ll matter none by tomorrow. Tomorrow’s going to be a very damned interesting day, Special Agent Nick, that I guaran-fucking-tee you.”
He broke the connection, put the phone away, then reached in and pulled out the radio unit he’d taken from the charger in security headquarters. It was a Motorola CP 185 VHF two-way, set to MAINT DIRECT. He turned the unit on, then snapped a selector switch to VOX, which automatically voice-activated transmission on the preset frequency.
“Mr. Potatohead. Calling Mr. Potatohead.”
“Is it you, Swagger?”
“It’s me, Potatohead.”
“Tricky bastard, yis screwed all me plans,” came the voice, clear against some marginal static. “We needed them machines to get into Indian Rapids before the bank closed at noon, so’s I could access an operational account with more cash than a scoundrel like yis ever seen. Now it’s all buggered.”
“Then rob it tonight, I don’t care. If I don’t see a ton of cash tomorrow, you get nothing but a bullet between the eyes. The film goes to the feds. Your boss goes to prison. Then I bring some friends in, boys who know a thing or two, and we hunt down the other three O’Flanagans and take heads. I don’t have an Irishman over my mantel yet.”