Victor grabbed the man and dropped him to the floor on his belly, then bound his hands behind him. The man grunted and frowned, but remained unconscious. Franklin bound his ankles together with the plastic cuffs.
“Skipper, we’ve got one lookout, drunk as a skunk, and a sandwich. He’s bound up. I’ll bring his weapon.”
“Roger that,” DeWitt said. “Return quickly.”
In less than a minute the two SEALs were on board, and the Pegasus moved slowly forward. The throb of its engine was low and guttural, but mostly eaten up by the sound-absorbing jungle.
“Let’s stay alert, people,” DeWitt said softly into the Motorola. “Locked and loaded.”
The stream narrowed. Ensign Swartz bit his lip and kept watching the banks. At least they didn’t have to worry about the screws hitting bottom. The craft was propelled with twin water jets.
Anther small turn, and the coxswain idled the engines so the Pegasus stood still in the gentle current. Ahead fifty yards DeWitt saw two buildings, both built facing the river on the left-hand side. He guessed they were for storage.
“We’ve got to clear those buildings,” DeWitt said. “Canzoneri, Franklin, and Jefferson, on me. The rest of you set up a perimeter around the sides of the boat. Coxswain, move us over to that little sandbar and we’ll jump to it.”
The driver motored twenty feet upstream and to the left until the bow nudged the sandbar. The SEALs jumped off the bow onto the sand, stayed dry, and ran into the fringe of brush between them and the buildings.
They lay belly-down in the grass and weeds looking at the two structures forty yards ahead. Frame, one-story, maybe twenty feet square. No doors or windows in the back or on this side.
“On me, ten yards,” DeWitt said, and lifted up and ran through the brush crouched over until he could see the other side of the closer building. The three SEALs trailed him at ten-yard intervals. When all were around and down in the grass, they saw that there was a door and a window.
DeWitt pointed to Canzoneri, waved him forward, and then pointed to the building. They lifted up at the same time and sprinted for the side of the structure. DeWitt expected to hear the stutter of submachine guns at any time, but he made it there with no gunfire. Canzoneri hit the wall on the other side of the window. He lifted up and tried to look through the glass. He dropped down, moved his hand in front of his eyes, and shook his head.
So, the door. DeWitt moved silently to the door and tried the knob. It was unlocked. He pulled it gently forward fearing a squeak. Nothing. He edged it out an inch and looked inside. At first he couldn’t see a thing. Then, at the far side, he saw two chairs and a card table with a single lightbulb burning above them. Two men sat in the chairs, and a submachine gun and a small two-way radio lay on the table.
DeWitt took a breath, motioned Canzoneri over, and let him look through the inch-wide slot. He motioned to the SEAL to jerk the door open. DeWitt would be in first. He held a silenced MP-5 set on three-round bursts.
DeWitt took one more look. The men were playing cards. He nodded. Canzoneri jerked the door open and DeWitt charged forward across the wooden floor, his boots sounding like thunderclaps as he brought up the sub gun.
“Don’t try for it or you’re dead,” DeWitt brayed. One man grabbed the submachine gun and dove to the floor. DeWitt tracked him with the MP-5 and sprayed six rounds into him before he could get the weapon around to fire. The second man froze in his chair, and then silently lifted his hands high over his head.
Canzoneri was right behind DeWitt. He checked the throat on the man on the floor. He shook his head. The man in the chair mumbled something, and DeWitt pushed the MP-5 into his belly.
“What did you say?”
“Hablo español. Hablo español.”
Canzoneri waved at DeWitt. “I’ll go get Fernandez.”
Five minutes later the Spanish-speaking Fernandez had all the information the downriver guard knew. They were hired to stay there and guard the river. Nobody ever came up there. It was an easy job. He didn’t even think his gun was loaded. Yes, the radio connected them with the first guard in the shack. If he said somebody was coming upstream, they were alerted.
DeWitt checked the live guard’s weapon. It was loaded with a full magazine, and a round was in the chamber with the safety off.
“That’s about it, Lieutenant,” said Fernandez. “He said the boat went upstream about half an hour ago and they all waved. Most of the men on the boat were drunk. He said the camp is upstream another mile, but the motorboat can go only half that distance.”
“Tie up this one and bring his sub gun,” DeWitt said. He used the Motorola. “Ensign Swartz, tie up the Peg there. We’ll move on up by foot. SEALs, get your asses up here to the buildings. This one is clear. Canzoneri and Fernandez, clear that other building. Then we’ll be ready to haul ass out of here.” The two SEALs rushed out the door and approached the other structure. There was no light inside. They crept up to the door that sagged on one hinge and looked inside. One room, some boxes, and a large rat that scurried away. Nobody else in the place.
Five minutes later the SEALs had assembled, checked weapons, and moved up the left-hand side of the stream. The prisoner had said that was the side the camp was on, a mile ahead. The SEALs left the lookout tied hand and foot on the floor.
“There will be someone with the boat, so we take them down silently,” DeWitt said. He sent Colt Franklin out in front as point, and they moved out ten yards apart.
Franklin had always wanted to be scout, and now was his chance. He moved as silently as he knew how, keeping a hundred yards ahead of the main body. The closer he came to where the boat should be, the slower, more deliberate, and more careful his movements. He faded from one tree to the next, skirted a spot of brush, and always kept near the river so its gurgling and bouncing down rocks would cover any sounds he made.
Ten minutes later he edged up to a clearing, parted some heavy grass, and stared at a dock on the river. It was solid, made of four-by-sixes and built to last. The floating pier would rise and fall with the water level. Tied to the pier was the boat they had chased. Two men worked on it. One was scrubbing it down with fresh water and a sudsy brush. Franklin saw a second man working inside. Both men had sub guns slung over their backs.
“Lieutenant, you need to take a look,” Franklin whispered into his Motorola mike. A few moments later, DeWitt bellied up to where Franklin lay.
“Oh, yeah. Just two. We take them out, then move on up. Fernandez, get up here with that sniper. We need you.”
When all of the SEALs had lined up along the edge of the brush facing the boat, DeWitt gave Fernandez the go. He sighted in on the man washing down the boat, who was on the dock now with a swab and a bucket of soapy water. Just as he started the next swipe with the swab, Fernandez nailed him in the middle of the back with a silenced 7.62 NATO round. The pirate crumpled without a sound and didn’t move.
They heard the other man call out. Then when he had no response, he came out of the cabin to the rail looking for his buddy. Fernandez let him lean over the rail, then shot him in the chest with one round. He added a second one, and the inside man tumbled over the rail and hit hard on the wooden dock. He never moved again.
Three silenced shots, like a huff or a puff, and it was over. They left the dead men where they had fallen and moved up the river. There was a good trail here, much used. Franklin kept a fifty-yard interval now in front of the troops. Things were tightening up. He’d seen Lam do it a dozen times. Move and watch, all eyes and ears. Every bit of him. Observe and work ahead if it was clear.