The Kobra Manifesto

That's the way we'd like to go, when we've got to.

Not lying around with the drunks in the gutter without even a drop left in the stinking rotten bottle-

Steady.

Waiting for a crushed skull and nothing to show for it, the mission run into the ground because-

Steady. You've got to sweat it out.

Easy to say.

But it's got to be done.

Think. Shoes out of sight and one sock half off to make it look like a potato heel, dirt on my face and my hair roughed up: was there anything I could do to emphasize the image? Not a lot. Roll over another inch or two and get the light off my face because it hasn't got the yellow pallor, the drained look of the man lying next to me.

Roll over and moan a bit, give a moan. You're a drunk and your head's full of booze. Work for your living. Work for your life.

The bottle rolled in the gutter. One of the others woke up and cursed and someone told him to screw himself and he shut up but it was good cover, first-class cover, The man hadn't moved.

He was watching the street Two cars went by, one of them with the emergency light flashing and the siren beginning to howl. Then a truck, with its wheels bouncing over the bumps near the intersection.

Now the man moved.

I watched his feet.

He was going back to the alley.

Someone was talking and now I could hear a sudden sharpness come into his tone.

'Hey, Harry. Chuck's had it.'

The man's feet disappeared into the alley and I rolled over and got up and staggered along the pavement, passing the doorways and keeping close in case I needed them, my shoes in my hand because when you break cover you leave nothing behind you.

Except, when it's unavoidable, a few spots of blood in the gutter.

'What happened?' Ferris asked me.

'I was twenty minutes overdue on the call.

'They put a bracket on me.'

'How many?'

He wasn't listening for bugs this time. 'Four.'

'What about your face?'

He meant could anyone recognize me again.

'It was half dark.'

'Did the objective see you?'

'No.' The objective was Zade.

He was getting his priorities right: there was still a chance to lock me on and he wanted to know how difficult it was going to be.

'Where are you?'

'West 69th Street. A pay phone.'

In a couple of seconds he said: 'The objective's on the move.'

'Oh Christ, when did-'

'Don't worry.'

'Listen, I can't-'

'Shut up.'

So I did that but it wasn't easy because I'd just blown the tag and it shouldn't have happened and I was beginning to think I couldn't handle this one and that brought the sweat out more than anything else.

Be positive.

I'd let them throw a wall in my face in Cambodia and now I'dBe positive and remember that a mission can be difficult.

'All right,' Ferris said, 'have you still got your transport?.'

'No.'

'Why not?'

'I can't go back into the area.'

'What kind of trouble was there?' he asked rather quickly.

'I've bloody well told you — they put a bracket on me and — '

'Information. Just information.'

Ferris is good at pulling you up when he knows you need it.

'It was just a case of getting out,' I said, and rested my head against the acoustic panel. 'So I got out'

'I see.'

He knew I'd give him more if mere was anything more to give but he didn't want a running commentary because one get-out action is like the next and there's nothing to talk about afterwards.

Some of the bruises were starting to throb and my shoulder felt wrenched, try telling him that, 'I had to terminate,' I said.

'Oh did you? How many?'

'One.'

'D'you need smoke out?'

'No.'

'What's your condition?'

'Stunning — how's yours?'

Meant I was operational and that's all he wanted to know.

'Very well. Get to the Hertz office on West 71st Street and I'll have some transport lined up. The objective is at a diner in Queens and we've still got one man on him. Give it another go and this time see if you can take him over. Questions?'

I needed a clean-up but there wasn't time. I needed some new clothes but there'd be no stores open yet Maps, cash, cover were still intact, 'No,' I said.

He gave me the Hertz address and where to find the diner.

'You'll need to be quick,' he said and hung up.

He was taking a newspaper from me box outside the Varig Airlines — section of the check-in area. The first coin apparently didn't work because he hit the box with the flat of his hand and tried again. Nothing happened so he put another coin in and this time it was all right and he pulled the paper out and let the glass lid slam back.

Five ten, lean, thick black hair, long arms, feet splayed a little as he stood by the box. Leather jacket zipped halfway up to polo neck sweater. Panda sunglasses, thick gold chain around the neck, two heavy gold rings. Bronzed, general attitude relaxed.

Satynovich Zade.

I watched him from inside the Hertz Cougar at a distance of fifty yards. He couldn't see me even if he were looking for surveillance in this area because the sun was 09:16 hours high in the south-east and the reflection off the windscreen would blind him to anything behind it.

I listened to the engine cooling. It had been a fairly exacting run from the diner in Queens to Kennedy Airport because I'd had to assume three elements: Zade, the Bureau tag and fee Kobra protection cell. I couldn't just fall in behind the leader because until we were within three miles of the airport we hadn't followed any of the main routes to the downtown areas and I didn't know if the Kobra cell was in front of me, behind me or both. The only suspect had been a Corvette with two men inside but they'd peeled off and stayed out of sight and didn't come up in the mirror. The only thing to do was put the Cougar through a series of doubling-back patterns whenever I could skin through on the amber and that had called for a lot of acceleration bursts and close control of the brakes and the whole car smelt of a hard run as I sat here watching the objective.

The Bureau tag had been using a dark blue Pinto and it had gone now. I'd seen him get out and go across to one of the phones and talk to Ferris for thirty seconds; then he'd got back into the Pinto and driven away. The objective was now solely in my hands.

Ferris had told me he'd still got one man in the running and he hadn't told me what had happened to the other one and I didn't want to think about it now. Later I'd have to.

Zade moved, opening the paper and glancing at it and folding it as he went into the airport building. I was out of the Cougar at the same time.

This was a hellishly sensitive phase and I tried not to think about that either because at this moment I could be moving through an opposition surveillance zone and there wasn't anything I could do about it. I believed Zade had got here from Queens without a protection cell because I hadn't seen any evidence of one and I could be wrong.

There were two reasons why I didn't want to think about the second man who'd been watching Zade at the Lulu Belle Hoteclass="underline" Ferris wouldn't have simply called him off, and that meant he'd either been got at by Kobra or Ferris had been ordered by London to dispense with him as a disinformation tool and neither eventuality would have been pleasant for him.

The thing was that I was now locked on to the objective and the field looked clear, and Zade's destination could be the Kobra rendezvous.

The check-in area was crowded when I got inside the building. 'Porter, are you free?'

'Can't help you right now — '

'Here's fifty.'

'Okay, what do I do?'

That man in the queue at the Varig desk, black hair, leather jacket, dark glasses-'

'Sure, I got him.'

'Hang around close to him and find out where he's going — I want every detail you can get — his name, flight number, destination, single or return. Another fifty if you get it right'