3

      Bolan’s secondary target lay across the Arkansas-Missouri line, some thirty miles away, at Poplar Bluff. The man he wanted was a gunsmith for the ARM, one Neville Alan Hoskins. Friends called him “Chopper,” in homage to his fondness for machine guns, but rumors persisted that certain jailhouse wolves had dubbed him “Nellie” when he pulled a five-spot in Atlanta, for weapons and explosives violations.

      Federal dossiers named Hoskins as an ARM member who stayed “in the world,” conducting business of a sort in mainstream society while serving the cause when he could. Rumor had it that his services included the purchase of banned weapons and conversion of semiautomatic civilian arms to full-auto illegals, but no such charges had been proved since his emergence from the pen.

      From all outward appearances, Hoskins and his small appliance repair shop in Poplar Bluff were completely legitimate, if decidedly low-rent and on the terminally scruffy side. The photos Bolan had examined didn’t show a classic member of the Master Race, by any means.

      He hadn’t taken out the commo hut at Camp Yahweh, but he’d done the next best thing—alerting county sheriff’s officers to the attack while he was on the run—assuring that the compound would be overrun with uniforms before another hour passed. Still, Bolan knew his adversaries could’ve spread the word on his attack before he’d reached the county line. And while that posed no threat to him per se, he feared that those he hunted might escape to parts unknown if they were spooked.

      It all depended on the system of communication from Camp Yahweh. First alerts would go to those who ran the ARM—Curt Walgren, Barry James and their top aides. Beyond that, if they had no network for emergency alerts in place, the news might spread haphazardly, skip certain members altogether. Then again, they might turn on their TV sets and catch the live broadcast of the search for bodies at CampYahweh on all the news channels.

      There was a chance that Neville Hoskins wasn’t in the loop, so far, and that the neo-Nazi armorer might have at least some clue about the nature and whereabouts of a certain mystery weapon. If Bolan could find him, the gunsmith would spill what he knew. That much was guaranteed.

      If Bolan could find him.

      The Executioner reached Poplar Bluff without incident, no sign of patrol cars on the highway or the city streets. It seemed to be a dead night in the Show Me State, and Bolan hoped that it would stay that way. His mission in the town of eighteen thousand could be a relatively simple one—or it could go to hell in nothing flat, if things went wrong.

      He found the combination shop and residence where Hoskins hung his overalls, circling the block to check for lookouts on the street. In light of what had happened farther south, Bolan supposed police might have the place staked out, or soldiers from the ARM might’ve rallied to a brother who had served them well. If there were any watchers on the quiet street, though, they were well concealed.

      He made a second pass, then parked his rental car two doors north of Ace Appliance and cut through a silent yard to reach the alleyway in back. Jeans and a nylon windbreaker covered Bolan’s blacksuit, while his hands and face were stripped of war paint. He could pass a casual inspection in the seedy neighborhood, as long as no one checked beneath his jacket, where the sleek, silent Beretta nestled in its shoulder rig.

      Against all odds, the gunsmith had no dogs. Bolan had been concerned that he might have to deal with Dobermans or pit bulls in the yard, but no such threat materialized. Instead, he simply had to hop a sagging chain-link fence and sneak up on his target’s dark apartment from the rear.

      So far, so good.

      The back porch sagged and groaned under his weight, two-hundred-plus pounds added to the appliances and parts collected there with no apparent system to their storage. Bolan tried the back door, certain that it would be locked, and froze when it moved at his touch.

      Was it a trap, or was his quarry simply careless? Bolan drew his Beretta, stepping well back from the doorway as he gave the door a shove. It swung wide open on a kitchen redolent of grease and deep-fried food. No guns blazed, no burglar alarms shrieked for attention in the predawn silence. After another cautious moment, probing with his mind and senses, the soldier stepped across the threshold into the unknown.

      The kitchen was a long-established mess. Whatever else Hoskins believed in, sound nutrition hadn’t made the list. For all its grime and clutter, though, the room held no proof that its owner had evacuated. Neither did the living room, where empty beer cans had assumed the status of an art form, posed on every flat surface available. The kitchen’s oil smell gave way, in this room, to stale sweat and mildew.

      Bolan found the proof of hasty exit in his target’s bedroom. There, general disorder of his living space gave way to ransacked chaos. Drawers from a cheap dresser had been dumped out and discarded. Wire hangers from the closet made a trail across the floor, some of them bent where clothing had been jerked away. Presumably, the missing items had been packed, since Hoskins’s bedroom had less clutter on the floor than any other room Bolan had seen, so far.

      There had been weapons in the closet, too. He could smell the oil and solvent. His guns were probably the only thing Hoskins had truly cared for, beer aside, and they were gone. Besides the lingering aroma, all Hoskins had missed was a half box of .357 Magnum cartridges, pushed back into a corner on the topmost closet shelf.

      Something had spooked the Nazi gunsmith. Whether it was Bolan’s raid in Arkansas or something else, the end result was still identical.

      Hoskins was gone, without a forwarding address.

      And Bolan had to choose another target from his shrinking list.

      “SO, WHAT’S THE FINAL body count?” Curt Walgren asked.

      “Holding at nine dead, seven wounded,” Barry James replied. “Grundy’s ass-deep in cops and Feds.”

      “Of course he is. They’ll tear the place apart before they’re finished. Where’s our fucking lawyer?”

      “On his way,” James answered in a soothing tone. “I had to wake him up.”

      “The rates we pay, I don’t care if you had to raise him from the dead. I want him shadowing those cops and Feds. Make sure they don’t take anything that isn’t specified by warrant.”

      “He knows