Wiping his face and head, Huai glanced at his prisoner. The man had regained consciousness and gazed idly out the window. He almost looked like he was enjoying the flight. The American saw that he was being observed and gave Huai a little smile, then winked.
And the man wasn’t faking it, Huai thought. He must know what was coming, and yet didn’t seem concerned. By allowing himself to be captured, the American had to realize that he’d be interrogated, tortured, and yet had chosen it over simply letting Huai’s men gun him down. The captive seemed content with his choice. If not anticipating, at least accepting of the inevitable outcome.
Sheer bravado or real courage?
Huai shuddered, knowing how Mr. Sun would find that answer on his quest for the truth.
The Canal Zone, Panama
An hour had passed since Mercer had driven away aboard the auto carrier. In that hour they had dropped down the near-vertical rails that launched the freighter’s podlike lifeboat and waited for ten tense minutes for one of the ship’s loading ramps to open. It was Bruneseau who motored them toward the repair docks at Gamboa, satisfied that he had given Mercer enough time and that the geologist was not coming. The Gamboa harbor was where the canal operators kept some of their tugboats, as well as the 350-ton crane barge Titan. Away from where workers repaired large buoys that bobbed along a seawall, the French spy had hot-wired an employee’s battered Chevy while Foch and Lauren helped the injured pilot. Bruneseau took the wheel for the drive to the Legion safe house in Panama City.
It was just moments into that ride, as they crossed the trestle bridge they had almost hit with their helicopter, that they saw the auto carrier again as it continued toward the Pedro Miguel Lock. From the ship’s towering deck they spied the Chinese Gazelle lift away toward the west, all of them certain that Mercer was on board, but only Lauren Vanik feeling that he was somehow still alive.
Panama’s military had just begun their response to the distress calls from the ship and a handful of army vehicles passed them on the road, headed toward the lock where the ship would likely be detained for an investigation. They were in the outskirts of the city when they spotted the first military chopper headed for the canal—far too late to go after the Gazelle.
Now they were safely at the house. Carlson was being looked after by a medic who had the skills to remove the bullet fragment lodged in his thigh. The corpsman singled out Lauren for stemming the pilot’s blood loss with a tourniquet while still maintaining a trickle of circulation in the lower limb. She had spent the time riding to Panama City ministering to the man. In her rage against the French, her aid to the pilot had nothing to do with compassion. She simply needed something to keep her from being overwhelmed by grief and anger.
Two of the off-duty Legionnaires went out to dump the stolen car downtown while the rest huddled over Carlson in a back bedroom, leaving Lauren alone. Restless, she stripped off her fatigue blouse and stood over the kitchen sink splashing palmfuls of water over her face. The cool water soaked the neck of her T-shirt and beaded like diamond chips in her long lashes. She could feel hot tears mingled with the water, greasepaint and sweat.
She couldn’t define what Mercer had become to her in the few days she’d known him. It had been so long since she’d had such a reaction to a man and she didn’t trust herself enough to dwell on it. During her tour in Kosovo, she’d learned to insulate herself from her feelings. To become too close to comrades or those she’d been charged to protect made the inevitable losses unbearable. In order to face the horror and the pain she had to prevent them from getting too deep. That lesson had cost her part of her soul, she knew. By insulating herself from the agony, she’d had to sacrifice what brought her the deepest joy, too.
The passage of time was mending that gap and maybe this was the first instance where her heart had broken through the shield she’d built around it. She wasn’t sure, and wouldn’t allow herself to think specifically about Mercer, gladdened that anyone had gotten through. She clung to that thought, drawing from it, using it to find the will to act. For the past hour, events had moved her along because she’d had no choice. Now, standing at the sink, she knew it was time for action.
Mercer had programmed Rodrigo Herrara’s number into her cell phone so she could dial it with the press of a button. Roddy’s wife, Carmen, answered. Without going into details, Lauren told her that she needed Roddy and Harry White. She gave directions to the safe house, which wasn’t too far from the Herraras’ home in Panama City’s El Cangrejo neighborhood. Carmen said the men were in the back-yard with Miguel and would be on their way in minutes.
Bruneseau’s actions at the lake—his reckless need to get into the compound—was an indication that the French mission in Panama went beyond a concern for radio interception antennas. But until she knew what it was they were looking for, she decided not to call the U.S. embassy. The ambassador had bought his post with financial contributions to the current White House administration, so he didn’t have the clout in Washington to forward any report she gave him. The CIA station chief was a hopeless drunk who was marking time to his retirement and Lieutenant Colonel Bancroft, her military superior, wouldn’t jeopardize his chance to put eagles on his shoulders by acting on what Lauren had found out. Maybe if she had concrete evidence—but for now he’d do nothing. That left her with Frenchmen she didn’t trust, an old man and an out-of-work canal pilot.
She was at the front window drinking from a second bottle of water when an older Honda Accord pulled into the driveway. She recognized Roddy behind the wheel and Harry sitting erect next to him. It was only when she opened the door that Rene Bruneseau came out of the back room.
He glared at seeing the two men enter the safe house. “What is the meaning of this?”
His size and intimidating build may have stopped most people in their tracks but Harry White brushed past him with such a casual contempt that the spy retreated a step. “Where’s Mercer?” he asked Lauren in a brusque tone that couldn’t cover his concern.
“Captain Vanik,” Rene snapped, “who are these men?”
Harry wheeled on Bruneseau, poking the heavier man in the chest with every third word. “I’ll ask you the same question in a second, but first I want to know where Mercer is.” It had taken him two seconds to gain control of the situation.
Lauren felt a rush of comfort that Harry was here. More than an ally, the feisty octogenarian was an advocate who wouldn’t stop until Mercer was safe. Had Bruneseau not been in the room, she would have hugged him. “The Chinese have him,” she answered. “They took him away in a chopper.” She paused, unsure how to tell him that she didn’t know Mercer’s condition. “We don’t know if he’s ...”
White ignored the implications of her voice trailing off. “Took him on a chopper from where to where?”
“From a ship in the canal. They were headed west.”
“I thought you guys were going to the volcanic lake?”
“It’s a long story,” Lauren replied.
“That is enough!” Bruneseau snapped. “Captain Vanik, you have compromised our safe house and our mission by inviting these two men. I will not permit you to tell them any more.”