Sergeant Hawkins was staring, fascinated. There was a pronounced delay, and then her hand snapped up in a salute. Kilmara was a general and he had reappeared. Which was something of a surprise.
The whole thing had been so incredibly fast and yet had gone on for so long. Could people really maneuver and fight this way? It was a hell of a thing to see.
She snapped her hand down and glanced discreetly at her watch. Only ten fucking minutes! Unreal!
"You're still too vulnerable from the air," said Kilmara. "You've got Stingers, and they're fine if you are static, but if you're on the move and get strafed you want something heavier than the 5.56mm Ultimaxs you've mounted that will really persuade a pilot to keep his distance if he doesn't want to fly right into a buzz saw. My suggestion is that you mount a GECAL. 50 as the standoff weapon on at least one Guntrack. Use the three-barrel version and you can get off two-thousand rounds an minute if you're feeling sociable."
Fitzduane's eyebrows had both risen. A GECAL. 50 was a Gatling gun designed originally for aircraft use. He did not doubt its effectiveness but was far from sure it could be mounted on a Guntrack. "Surely, it would be too heavy," he said.
"Well under a hundred pounds," said Kilmara. "As to ammunition, you will have to work that out. The problem with GECALs is keeping them fed. But you have that NATO pallet on the back of each Guntrack, and we put in load-carrying capacity for a reason."
"I'll look at it," said Fitzduane. "Subject to time."
There really was not much time. He was operating on the minimum time necessary to do the job right the first time.
He had allowed three weeks. Twenty-one days to plan, assemble equipment, recruit, train, and rehearse to such a level of perfection that when they hit they would not fail.
They could not fail. It was far too long to his mind, but there was so much to be done and he knew that for the duration of this mission his head must rule his heart. Every emotional feeling made him want to throw together an ad hoc mission and go storming in by helicopter, but all his experience dictated that such an approach had a high chance of failure. That was exactly what the opposition would expect and had taken precautions against. He had to find another way, even if it took longer.
He felt he was letting Kathleen down.
It was tearing him apart.
Surprisingly little showed.
Kilmara swung back into the Humvee.
Sergeant Hawkeye looked across at him. He had expected the inquiry. Fitzduane seemed to have that effect. Women almost always did ask about him, even when it was a need-to-know operation and such a question was most decidedly out of line.
"Who was that man, sir?" she said. "The colonel? The one you called Hugo?"
"The rules say its none of your business, Sergeant," said Kilmara.
"I know, sir," said Hawkeye quietly. "But I don't often see men like that. He seemed exceptional and maybe a little sad. Is that the way it is, sir?"
"He was my pupil once and he is my friend now, and I guess that is the way it is," said Kilmara heavily. "Life has a habit of screwing up the best-laid plans."
"Amen to that," said the sergeant fervently, and Kilmara looked at her and wondered.
Then the Humvee's suspension cut in and the General had more immediate and painful concerns on his mind.
It was late when Fitzduane and Kilmara got back from the Aberdeen Proving Grounds to the apartment in Arlington.
Fitzduane made Kilmara an Irish coffee. He took his black and straight. Kilmara sprawled with relief in one of the armchairs. Fitzduane sat on the edge of his chair nursing his coffee mug. It was near midnight.
"Still no news?" inquired Kilmara cautiously but with the privilege of an old friend.
He had delayed asking earlier. Fitzduane was wound tight as a drum but seemed to be controlling himself by shutting down unnecessary thoughts of Kathleen. He rarely mentioned her name and was focused almost coldly on the mission. Kilmara could almost feel the tension building up day by day, but he knew from experience that Fitzduane had the stamina to stay in control as long as was necessary. Eventually there would be a catharsis, an explosion of pent-up feeling.
Right now the mask of normality was down. It was almost convincing.
Fitzduane had made some calls before sitting. Since the kidnapping there had been no word of Kathleen at all. No messages, no demands for ransom, nothing.
Kathleen had vanished without a trace, yet Fitzduane proceeded as if he knew with absolute certainty that she was in Mexico. He was running entirely on instinct. He was probably right, Kilmara reflected. He had seen Hugo like this on a number of occasions before, and it was uncanny how often the man's feelings had proved right.
Life should be more rational, in Kilmara's opinion, but for Fitzduane, in situations like this, intuition was rationality.
"Kathleen is in Tecuno," said Fitzduane flatly.
"Has that been confirmed?" said Kilmara. "A positive ID?"
"No," said Fitzduane slowly. "Nothing more than you know, and now the near certainty that Oshima and Yaibo are behind this. I've talked more to Chifune, and it's the only thing that makes sense. Incidentally, Chifune thought Oshima was dead also. Now it appears that some of her superiors in the Japanese intelligence community have been mounting an operation which has gone somewhat adrift. Instead of a terrorist on an invisible string leading them to her colleagues, they've got a loose cannon.
"Even worse from their point of view, it looks like Oshima is mounting operations against the U.S. from her Mexican base. Given the uncertain relations between the U.S. and Japan, this is worse than embarrassing. It's bloody serious. It might just occur to someone in the U.S. government that the Japanese are behind this in some way. They are not, she insists, but it looks bad. The Tokyo bureaucrats involved hoped the problem would just go away. Now it has escalated and Chifune has been sent over to try and resolve it discreetly."
Kilmara tried to drink his Irish coffee without giving himself a cream mustache. He more or less succeeded.
He remembered Koancho agent Chifune Tanabu vividly from Japan. Now, there was a woman of true worth, if not exactly the wife and mother type. He had the feeling that she and Fitzduane had been involved briefly, but Hugo had never said anything. He had returned and married Kathleen, the homemaker.
"Chifune knows Oshima better than anyone," he said. "What's her take on Oshima's motive in grabbing Kathleen?"
"Pure revenge," said Fitzduane. "Interesting, Chifune thinks kidnapping Kathleen was a secondary objective, a pure target of opportunity. I tend to agree."
"So you don't think Kathleen is being held as bait," said Kilmara. "A sprat to catch a mackerel, with Hugo Fitzduane being the fish in question?"
Fitzduane shook his head. "It's possible, but I don't think so. To spring a trap she would have to be sure that I knew about the Devil's Footprint, and that would mean laying a trail. So far all the evidence is that their base is being kept under wraps. No, my gut tells me that Oshima has a different agenda and Kathleen is peripheral. If precedent is anything to go by, Oshima will play with Kathleen for months, try to break her, and eventually kill her. That's the pattern. Oshima likes having a few victims around. It's a power thing. She kidnapped a policeman in Japan and kept him chained up for two years in a cave." He did not mention what Oshima had done to her victim. When the policeman had been found he had been alive, but… He blocked the picture from his mind. The only consolation was that Oshima tended to leave serious physical torture until late in the game. Her initial torture was always psychological.
"Tell me more about this Japanese agent in Tecuno," Kilmara said. "If there is someone on the inside, surely you can get confirmation on whether they've got Kathleen."