False Front. Don Pendleton
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the beer a waiter had automatically placed in front of him before Hugo reappeared. “Sir, your call is here.”
The fat man pushed himself laboriously up from the chair and followed Hugo through the tables to a short hallway, then into an office. Behind the desk sat the restaurant owner. He rose quickly to his feet without needing to be told, exiting the office with his employee. Mikelsson smiled to himself. The restaurant owner had been provided with a free, state-of-the-art, security system. It had been his payment for allowing the fat man to take certain calls in his office. And to ask no questions about them.
A red light was blinking on the telephone on the desk. The fat man in the new suit lifted the receiver and pressed the button next to it. “Yes?” he said into the phone.
“Nothing has changed, Mr. Mikelsson,” said the voice on the other end, which he immediately recognized. “The union didn’t accept the offer.”
A slow boil of anger started in Mikelsson’s belly. More and more, it seemed these days, his legitimate business enterprises such as the automobile and aircraft industries not only bored but irritated him. His mood wasn’t helped by the fact that he was hungry. “Then let them wait,” he said in carefully controlled words. “If they don’t care to build automobiles for what I pay them, let them stay home in their pathetic little hovels. We will see who goes bankrupt first, them or me.” Without waiting for an answer he slammed down the receiver. It rang again before Mikelsson could get up from his chair.
“Hello,” Mikelsson said, sounding irritated.
“Mikelsson.”
“Candido?”
“Yes,” the voice on the other end said in Arabic.
“I assume you are in Israel, and all is well?” Mikelsson asked bluntly in the same language.
“All is well,” Candido said. “Our martyr is ready to enter the synagogue.”
Your martyr, not mine, you fool, Mikelsson thought. “Excellent. How far away are you?”
“Three blocks. You will be able to hear it,” Subing stated.
“How long will it be?”
“One, maybe two minutes at most.”
“Then I will wait,” Mikelsson said, his pulse beginning to race. “I like hearing them.” Seconds later he heard the explosion on the other end of the line.
“Did you hear it?” Subing asked excitedly.
“Yes.”
“I will call you as soon as I return, so you will know where I am.” Subing paused and the excitement returned to his voice. “In case everything is in place in America.”
“I have told you,” Mikelsson said, “the project in the United States is not yet ready. The ship will not even arrive until tomorrow.”
“I will be ready,” Subing said. “And, again, I will call you as soon as I return home.”
The fat man hung up the phone, struggled to his feet and started out of the office, toward the buffet line. He smiled. “Yes, call me, little brown man,” he said under his breath to himself. “But I will get word of your return to the Philippines and every other move you make, before you even reach a phone.”
CHAPTER THREE
“I’d forgotten how much fun the jungle could be in the middle of the day,” Charlie Latham said sarcastically. “Guess that’s why the siesta was invented.”
The Executioner glanced over his shoulder at the man behind him. They had been back on the jungle pathway for no more than five minutes but already sweat shot from every pore in their bodies to soak their clothes. Latham had produced a bandanna from somewhere on his person and tied it around his forehead as a sweatband. His straw cowboy hat now balanced atop the cloth high on his head, wobbling back and forth and threatening to topple off each time he took a swing with his machete.
The Executioner turned back, lashing out with his machete at a low-hanging vine before taking another step forward. He glanced at his watch to see that it was nearly 1300 hours.
They had fled into the jungle the night before to avoid being spotted by the residents of Rio Hondo. Once the Executioner felt they had gone deep enough that no one would follow their tracks, they had stopped to catch a few minutes’ sleep among the foliage. It was the first time the Executioner had closed his eyes since arriving on Mindanao and it wasn’t enough rest to bring him back into top form. But it was all he’d had, so it would have to do until another opportunity presented itself.
Upon awakening, he and Latham had found that the temperature has risen steadily. It now had to be somewhere between ninety and one hundred degrees with a humidity index that almost matched. They had returned to their parallel path, happy that only an occasional vine or limb had encroached upon them during the night. They walked quietly, swinging their machetes only when absolutely necessary, their ears cocked for anyone who might come down the regular shortcut from the mosque to the sea.
Considering the men who had so carefully looked over the Buick, Bolan suspected the men of the village were looking for whoever had left the car in the parking lot by now. At the very least, they would be curious.
The Executioner had just brought his arm back to slice through a thick green vine when he suddenly froze in place. Behind him, he heard Latham’s foot fall a final time. Bolan had no need to hold up a hand for silence—Latham sensed the need for it just as he had.
For a moment the only sounds around them were the buzzing of insects and the sudden flutter of bird wings between them and the older path. The Executioner glanced overhead through a hole in the jungle canopy to see a rare Philippine eagle—known as the haribon—sail out of sight. More birds took wing as the noise continued to drift through the foliage between them and the native’s shortcut.
As the sounds grew louder they became recognizable as voices, though the words could not be understood. The voices were low, muffled. They were the voices of men trying not to be heard, but not trying quite hard enough.
Bolan turned toward Latham.
The Texan silently mouthed the word Tagalog but shook his head, telling the Executioner he couldn’t make out the conversation, either.
Bolan stared through the foliage as the voices continued, growing increasingly louder. They sounded as if they hadn’t quite come parallel with the new path the two Americans had cut the day before. As they waited, the sound of feet trampling the underbrush began to accompany the voices. Then, as they apparently came abreast of Bolan and Latham, the words became more clear.
The Executioner turned back to Latham, but the Texan was holding up a hand for silence. He had twisted sideways, his other hand at the side of his face farthest from the native pathway. His index finger was stuck in his ear to block out all sound on that side. As the Executioner watched, the Texan nodded, frowning.
The words coming through the trees were discernable now and Bolan wished he could understand the language. What he did note, however, was one very distinct voice. One of the men spoke with a high, wheezing delivery as if he suffered from asthma or had some similar problem with his lungs.
Almost as soon as the voices had grown loud enough to hear, they began to decrease again. The men were moving past them now, slowly leaving audible range as they walked on toward the stilt houses and the sea. Their footsteps faded out first, then the words were gone again, too.
Latham looked at the Executioner. “They’re looking for us, all right,” he said. “Seems everybody in town wonders about the car.”
“Could you tell how many there were?” Bolan asked.
Latham shrugged. “Three. Maybe four. One guy has trouble breathing.”
“So I noticed,” the Executioner said. “What else did you pick up?”
“Somebody—I