Tibbet lingered a moment at the fence and lit a cigarette. A seal jumped for a piece of fish, when a short, intense-looking young man stopped and leaned over the fence. Tibbet glanced at him.
"The children's laughter is good to hear," the man said in a Russian accent.
"Lieutenant Lavrov?" Tibbet asked.
Lavrov nodded. His smile was sad. "You know, I am married. I have two children of my own whom I will never see again."
"You have the computer chip?"
"Not with me. First we will talk…"
The Russian's skull erupted in a bright red geyser of blood, his body flipping over the fence. Tibbet stepped back at the same moment he heard the crack of a high-powered rifle.
Children and their teachers or mothers were turning around. Everything seemed to be happening in slow motion.
Out of the corner of his eye Tibbet could see Bernholtz himself racing up the broad path, his handgun drawn. Tibbet started to raise his hand, when something terribly hot and strong slammed into his head, and he felt himself being lifted over the fence.
He never heard the shot that killed him…
One
At 10,000 feet, downtown Washington, D.C., twelve miles to the southwest, looked like an elaborate architect's model of the capital city. The lush green Maryland countryside was spread beneath Nick Carter's feet as he braced himself on the Cessna 180's wing strut, the wind buffeting his body as they neared the drop zone.
He was a tall, well-built man with dark, intelligent eyes that at times could turn almost black. His moments of greatest pleasure came whenever he was pitting himself against a difficult adversary, either another man or simply his own abilities. That quirk of personality, combined with a nearly superhuman will to survive, suited him perfectly for his work with AXE, a highly specialized intelligence-gathering and special action agency. Whatever military intelligence — or even the CIA — could not do was given to AXE, which operated under the cover of Amalgamated Press and Wire Services. Within the organization, Carter was designated N3: he had a license to kill.
They were nearing the drop zone over the U.S. Department of Agriculture's research center north of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. Carter turned and looked in at the pilot, John Howard, who smiled and shook his head.
"You're a crazy bastard, and I'll probably lose my license for this stunt," Howard had told him before they took off.
"Then we'll get someone else."
Howard, who did occasional contract work for AXE, held up his hand in protest. "Oh, no, I wouldn't miss this for anything."
Carter glanced across the interior of the small, specially equipped plane at his jumpmaster, Tom Redman, who gave him the thumbs-up sign. With the engine and wind noises, all talk was impossible. But they had rehearsed this maneuver a dozen times now, so no talk was necessary.
Howard held up his hand. Redman tensed. Besides the main chute and reserve pack, Redman would carry down with him a third chute, one that Carter had packed himself.
This time, Carter wore no parachute. Not even a reserve chute.
Howard's hand dropped and Redman stepped out, the slipstream carrying him neatly away.
A moment later Carter could see him falling, and a few seconds later his chute came open as the plane banked sharply to the right, back the way they had come.
Carter had read about this ultimate sky diving stunt twenty years ago. He had waited for the right time to try it himself. As he told his boss, David Hawk, he was becoming soft. He'd been off assignment now for nearly six months. His edge was starting to go. He was beginning to relax. Fatal flaws in his business.
He needed something to bring the sharpness back. Of course, he had not advertised what he was going to do. Only Redman and Howard knew. Neither of them approved, but they were willing to go along for the ride.
Howard had brought them around so that they were a few thousand feet above Redman, and more than a mile back.
Carter could just pick out the brilliantly colored chute far below.
Again he glanced at Howard, who shook his head, then raised his hand. Carter tensed. One shot was all he had. He would either get close enough to Redman to grab the spare chute, or he would not. There'd be no coming back if he missed.
Howard dropped his hand, and without hesitation Carter stepped off the strut and he was falling.
For the first second or two he was tumbling, but he easily straightened himself out in the spread-eagle position, his legs bent at the knees, his arms outstretched, and he was flying.
There was little apparent speed at this altitude; it always seemed as if he were just floating in a stiff wind.
Redman's canopy was much closer now, and a little to the left. Carter angled his body that way so that he edged closer to the correct trajectory.
For the next few seconds Carter willed out of his consciousness the fact that he was plummeting toward the earth at better than a hundred miles per hour and concentrated instead on Redman. He was going to have to come in at a shallow angle beneath the jumpmaster's canopy, and in front of the chute's cords. If they tangled, they would both fall to their deaths. There would be absolutely no chance of recovery for either of them.
Carter adjusted his free-fall angle again. He could see Redman clearly now. The jumpmaster was looking up.
Redman spotted Carter, swung around so that they were facing, and held out the spare chute at arm's length.
It happened quickly. Redman's canopy flashed in front of Carter's faceplate, and there was a tremendous shock as he connected with the outheld chute, and then the jumpmaster was above and behind him.
Carter worked quickly but methodically. To lose the chute now would be certain death. And the ground was rushing up at an incredible speed.
He got the chute on his back, but it took him precious seconds to find and secure the leg straps, and then stabilize his tumbling.
His altimeter was buzzing angrily, warning him that he had passed the thousand-foot mark, and then he was ready.
Now the land did not seem like a gentle panorama. Now he was acutely aware of his speed.
At six hundred feet he pulled the ripcord. For what felt like an eternity nothing seemed to happen, but then the chute began feeding out of the pack, opening when he was barely two hundred feet above the ground.
Carter smiled. One day, he knew, he would try and miss. But not this time.
Brad Williams, who ran AXE's Far East desk with an Englishman's precision, was leaning against his car, a blue Chevrolet Caprice, fifty yards from the drop zone target when Carter landed within three feet of the big white X.
He walked over as Carter was bundling up his canopy and unhooking his harness. He had a pair of binoculars hanging from a strap around his neck. He looked up.
"That Tom Redman up there?"
Carter nodded. "Does Hawk know?"
Williams chuckled. "When are you going to learn, my boy, that Hawk knows everything. It's his business, you know."
Hawk was the hard-bitten, cigar-smoking director of AXE. He had come out of the OSS after World War II, had helped set up the CIA, and then had created AXE when it became evident that such an agency was desperately needed. He and Carter went way back together. Their relationship, at times, bordered on that of a father and son. There was no other person on the face of the earth whom Carter respected more.
"Did he send you out here?"
"Yes, but not to stop you. Something's come up."
"An assignment?" Carter asked, his pulse quickening.