Blood Of The Falcon

Ten

Carter paused at a pay phone in the lobby.

"You could have called for free from Greer's office," Wooten said.

"I'm trying to save the taxpayers a little money."

"Or maybe you didn't want Greer to listen in on the extension." Wooten hovered at Carter's back, craning his neck to see what number the Killmaster was calling.

"You don't mind if I make this a private call, do you?" Carter growled.

"Top-secret stuff, huh?" Wooten said. "Suit yourself." Shrugging, he shuffled a few paces away. "Lotsa luck on making your connection. The phone service isn't so hot around here."

Wooten was right. Working from memory, Carter punched the number Hawk had given him. Five frustrating minutes later, when he was half convinced that his memory might not be so hot anymore, he connected with Prince Hasan's answering service. Carter began in Arabic, but the voice on the other end of the line replied in English.

Prince Hasan was out of the city and temporarily unavailable, but if the caller would leave a message stating where he could be reached, the prince would contact him at the earliest opportunity.

Carter gave his Lewis Fletcher name and said he could be reached after six in the evening at the Grand Sojourn Hotel.

With Wooten in tow, he crossed the square to the building housing Howard Sale's office.

The Securitron office was a burnt-out suite of gutted, fire-blackened rooms. The smell of charred debris still hung in the air, a week later. Plywood panels were nailed up where the doors used to be in a makeshift attempt to seal off the rooms. A quick peek through a chink in the barrier was enough to determine that everything inside was totally destroyed.

That made Carter feel a bit better.

The short-lived, high-intensity fire had sizzled Securitron to a meltdown, while barely touching the neighboring offices.

"That's suspicious as hell, if you ask me," Wooten said. "I make it arson."

He was right, but not in the sense he meant. Howard Sale was an AXE operative, a field agent whose cover was as a local representative of Securitron, selling electronic security devices. There really was a Securitron, home-based in Lowell, Massachusetts. It was an AXE proprietary company, whose real business was producing high-resolution cameras for orbiting spy satellites. The research was so hush-hush that no civilian company could enforce the needed security measures. Therefore, AXE owned the company outright. Securitron also marketed a line of burglar alarms and smoke detectors as a sideline, to camouflage the company's true purpose.

The office had been destroyed not by an arsonist, but by an arson machine, a last-ditch self-destruct mechanism linked to sophisticated computer terminals on the premises. Some unauthorized person had tried to access the computer memory banks without the correct password codes and entry keys, triggering the white-hot incandescent blaze that left the machinery so much useless slag, as well as burning up the office.

"I've seen all there is to see around here," Carter said. "Let's go."

"Where to?" Wooten asked.

"Petro Town."

The man-made oasis of Petro Town stood some twenty miles northwest of the city. Getting there was no problem. The emirate had one of the best highway systems the Killmaster had ever encountered, and traffic was light.

Petro Town rose within sight of the southern rim of the Zubeir Depression, one of the most oil-saturated places on the planet. A handful of pumps stood sentinel along the perimeter.

Support personnel are required to operate a field of that magnitude — engineers and administrators, mechanics, drivers, loaders, pipe fitters, hydraulics experts, geologists, and many others. The majority of the technologically sophisticated staff had to be imported from overseas.

Petro Town existed to house and serve them. It was a startling slice of Americana set down in the desert, an enclave of over thirty-five hundred souls. Its layout was similar to military posts in other parts of the world, and it boasted all the comforts and conveniences of home: a giant PX, schools, churches, two movie theaters, even a bowling alley.

Here, security was a concept, not a reality. Carter winced at the site's aching vulnerability, the sketchiness of the fence surrounding it, the lackadaisical good humor of the hot, tired, bored guards, few in number.

He hated to think of what a suicidal car bomber could do here, or the havoc a few well-placed rockets could wreak. What a prime target!

A gate guard directed Carter and Wooten to Howard Sale's residence. While not an oil man, Sale lived in Petro Town to be among his countrymen.

He lived in a small, neat, flat-roofed bungalow fronted by a square of parched lawn in a section relegated to the bachelors. A tract on the other side of the avenue held the family men with their wives and children. After Al Khobaiq, where the few females abroad were wrapped and veiled in the traditional chador, it was a bit of a thrill to see women and girls openly strolling about clad in halters and shorts and slacks.

Superintending the bachelor quarters was a transplanted American couple, Gus and Millie Ferguson. He was a former oil field roughneck who had semiretired into this maintenance job. He had a gray crew cut and a belly that said that here was a man who bought his beer not by the sixpack, but by the case. Millie was fleshy, flushed, sweaty, and irritable at having to come out in the heat of the day to let Carter and Wooten into Howard Sale's quarters.

"Don't rightly know as I should let you in," Millie said, fumbling with her ring of keys. "What with Mr. Sale not being here, I mean."

"That's why we're here, Mrs. Ferguson," Carter said. "We're a bit worried about Howard. His folks haven't heard from him for some time. I'm sure you'll be happy to help out."

"Well, when you put it that way…"

"I been a little concerned about the kid myself," Ferguson said.

"Why is that, Mr. Ferguson?"

"Call me Gus."

"Glad to," Carter said. "You've been worried about him, you said?"

"Yeah. He always struck me as a decent sort — nice, quiet, regular hours. You know. But in the last few weeks, he changed. Stayed away for days at a time, came in at midnight only to go right back out again. That sort of thing."

Millie sniffed. "I didn't care for the company he was keeping. There was one fellow who came here a few times, a fancy-talking Ay-rab I didn't cotton to."

"Would you recognize him if you saw him again?" Carter asked.

"Land sakes, no! I can't tell one of 'em apart from the other!"

"You couldn't forget that slick car of his," Ferguson said. "Big red sports car, looking more like a goddamned spaceship than an automobile."

When Millie turned the doorknob to fit the key in the lock, the door opened. "Well, that's funny! It wasn't locked. I hope nobody took anything."

"Much theft around here?" Carter asked.

"Just from the whites," Ferguson said. "The Arabs don't steal nothing. Penalty for stealing is to get their hand chopped off."

"That would be a deterrent."

Millie said, "If anything's missing, we're not responsible for it. We can't go around checking doors to make sure they're locked."

"No reason why you should be liable," Carter said equably.

They went in. Howard Sale was neat, especially for a bachelor. A quick once-over failed to turn up anything of importance.

Set on top of a bureau was a framed photo. Carter recognized Sale from other photos shown him by Hawk. Sale was young, and looked serious, sincere, earnest. Pictures and faces can lie; Carter's instincts told him this one didn't. The picture showed Sale with his arm around a plain, sweet-faced girl.

A wall calendar furnished a poignant note. It was decorated with a scene of an Alpine landscape. Sale had made what they used to call in the service a "short-timer's calendar," marking off with red X's the days of the month. The X's ended in the middle of the previous week, right about the time Sale notified AXE that Hodler was in the area.

After a little more poking around, Carter said, "We're through here. Thanks."

They exited, Carter and Wooten first, the Fergusons lingering to lock up. Carter whispered to Wooten, "Somebody searched the place before us."

"Yeah, I noticed that, too," Wooten said.

Gus Ferguson muttered an oath. "The door won't lock. It's busted."

Behind the row of houses were modular units with sliding overhead doors. "What're those?" Carter asked.

"Garages," Ferguson said. "The sun and the wind plays hell on a car's finish. Sand gets in the engine, fouls it up…"

"Does Sale have one?"

"Sure, right behind his house."

"Let's have a look," Carter said.

The garage door was rolled down, locked. Carter smelled trouble… and something else.

After some searching, Ferguson found the correct key. Making a show of the effort it cost him, he unlocked the door and rolled it up. "What the hell…!"

Millie held her nose and fanned the air in front of her face. "Whew! It stinks in here!"

The interior was a simmering cube of brown meat. It held no car, only the single surrealistic note of a fifty-gallon oil drum. Its sides and the floor around it were covered with black stains.

"Dang!" Gus said. "You can never get that stuff out!"

Carter found a tire iron on a worktable against the wall and held it out toward Wooten. "How about opening that up?"

"Why don't you?"

"Because I'm in charge."

"Thanks a lot, pal." Wooten went to the barrel, nose crinkling in disgust. "Smells kind of ripe."

"Yes," Carter said.

Ferguson shook his head. "I thought that kid had more sense than that. What does he need a barrel of oil for? That's like selling ice to the Eskimos!"

"Maybe Sale didn't put it there," Carter said. "Maybe somebody else did."

"Huh? Why would anybody want to pull a damn fool stunt like that? Some kind of practical joke?"

The drum top was sealed with a metal snap-on lid. Wooten worked the wedge of the tire from under it. "Shit! I just got some on my pants!"

"Send the cleaning bill to Greer," Carter said. "Open it up."

"That'll make a terrible mess," Millie said.

"We'll be happy to take care of any expenses, ma'am."

The lid opened with a popping noise as it was pried off.

A hideous stench poured out of it. Gagging, Wooten levered off the lid, which fell with a clang on the floor.

A hand clapped over his mouth and nose, Wooten backed off from the barrel. Carter took the tire iron from him, held his breath, and poked around at the thing floating in the barrel.

The oil was just a preservative. A human figure was stuffed in the barrel in the fetal position, the top of his oil-saturated head bobbing and drifting.

"Holy Hannah!" Ferguson breathed. "What… what's that?!"

"I wouldn't be surprised if it's Howard Sale," Carter said.

Millie Ferguson's shriek died out before it could reach any real volume. She fell to the floor in a faint.

Making a positive identification of the corpse wouldn't be easy. Carter's quick inspection revealed that the head was minus its ears, nose, and lips. He had little doubt that other parts of its anatomy were similarly excised. And he had no doubt at all that the victim of torture and murder was Howard Sale.

Carter wondered if Sale had taken any consolation in having the last laugh on his tormentors. He took the secret of the auto-incendiary device to his grave, preventing his killers from cracking into AXE's computerized communications network.

Sale would be avenged. That would provide scant comfort for the dead man, but it would give a great deal of satisfaction to the Killmaster.

"But why put the poor guy in a barrel of oil?" Greer wanted to know when Carter met with him back in Al Khobaiq. "And why hide him in his garage, of all places?"

"Somebody's got a twisted sense of humor. And he was meant to be found. Call it a psychological warfare ploy. Kill one, terrify a hundred."

Greer shook his head. "Rough stuff. Who'd do a thing like that?"

"That's what I'm trying to find out," Carter said. With Tigdal's treachery fresh in his mind, Carter hadn't taken Greer into his confidence. He felt safer playing a lone hand. "Have you got anything for me?"

"I came up with something you might find useful. According to my sources. Sale's been a regular at the Crescent Club during the last few weeks."

"The Crescent Club? What's that?"

"I'm surprised Wooten hasn't mentioned it to you. He's rather fond of it himself. You see, the Khobaiqis are a lot like us Americans — they're hypocrites. They have laws forbidding just about everything under the sun, but somehow there's always a way to get around them.

"Khobaiqi nightlife is a contradiction in terms, with the happy exception of the Crescent Club. If you want to gamble, drink, or womanize, the Crescent Club's the only game in town. It's a place where just about anything goes, so long as you can pay for it."

"Sounds promising," Carter said. "I'd like to have a look at it."

"I don't doubt it," Greer said.

"How do I get there?"

"It's about ten miles away, on the southern highway," Greer said. "Wooten knows how to get there. He can drive you out there tonight."

"Good."

"How are you getting along with Wooten, by the way? He can be cantankerous at times."

"Oh, I think we understand each other," Carter said.

"Fine. One bit of advice — watch your step at the club. It's frequented by some pretty rough characters."

"You've been there?"

"But of course," Greer said, grinning. "Khobaiqi or foreigner, anybody who's looking for a good time turns up at the Crescent Club. Like I said, it's the only game in town."

Prominently mentioned in Karl Kurt Hodler's dossier was his virtual addiction to the pleasures of the flesh. Hodler craved his wine, women, and song. The pattern was all starting to come together…

"See you later," Carter said with a wave.

The Grand Sojourn Hotel was new. Except for the city's Old Quarter, everything in Al Khobaiq seemed to have been built in the last twenty years, the product of enormous oil revenues.

Carter turned his evening clothes over to the hotel staff for pressing. He took a dip in the indoor pool, knocking out a half-mile's worth of laps. Refreshing though it was, the swim failed to wash out the haunting image of Howard Sale in a barrel.

At least the exercise broke some of the tension. Carter felt loose, flexible, and able to absorb whatever the evening might bring.

He dined alone on indifferent French cuisine in the hotel restaurant. Returning to his room, he discovered that the simple detectors he'd left in place were untampered with, indicating that there had been no unauthorized entry.

The bellboy returned with his formal wear. Carter wore a white dinner jacket, black tie, black slacks, and the unholy trio of Hugo, Wilhelmina, and Pierre.

On his way out, he stopped by the desk to see if there were any messages for Lewis Fletcher. Prince Hasan had not yet returned his call.

Carter's vanity was pleased by the figure his image cut in the lobby's mirrored walls. Wooten was waiting for him, leaning against the pearl-gray limo parked by the front entrance.

He chuckled. "You look like a headwaiter in that getup."

Carter let the remark pass. He noted a bulging lump under Wooten's sloppy sport shirt, indicating the presence of a gun.

Carter needn't have worried about being overdressed. Night had come, and as in other desert climes, the temperature had dropped dramatically, by some thirty degrees or more, since the sun had gone down. It was even a bit brisk.

The car exited the hotel's horseshoe-shaped drive to pick up the southern highway. To the right rose the hills; to the left a swollen orange half-moon rose out of the sea above the city. The highway was a smooth silver ribbon rolling through a bleakly spectacular lunar landscape.

No more than five minutes had passed before Wooten said, "We've got a tail."

Having noted a pair of reflected headlights bobbing in the rearview mirror, Carter was not surprised. "Turn off at the next road you come to. Let's make sure they're really following us, and not just going south."

"Right, boss."

"I thought Greer was your boss."

"You outrank him. If I play my cards right, maybe you can fix it so that I'm his boss."

"You never can tell," Carter said.

Wooten swung right, entering a two-lane blacktop road running west and rising up a long, gently sloping hill. "They're still coming."

"Speed up."

The trailing car speeded up too. "They're gaining on us — fast," Wooten said. "Don't worry, I'll lose 'em!"

On a long straightaway, Wooten pulled what is known as the "bootlegger's turn" south of the Mason-Dixon line. Not slowing, he stomped the emergency brake while hauling the wheel hard left.

Tires howled as the car executed the ultimate in controlled skids, pivoting into a 180-degree turn that pointed its nose in the opposite direction.

Carter felt as if he'd left his stomach a hundred yards back. Wooten pulled the emergency brake and tromped the accelerator. The car shot forward, heading for a straight-on collision with the pursuer. Wooten leaned on the horn, adding to the confusion.

The pursuit car wheeled hard right to avoid a crash. No wonder it had overtaken them so easily, Carter thought; it was a low-slung, high-speed Porsche.

Speed was its undoing. It ran off the road, nose and headlights dipping as it plowed down a long, long embankment. A dust cloud marked its jouncing, shuddering descent.

"Punks!" Wooten crowed. "That takes care of them!"

Carter was doing some hard thinking. White Porsche — Prince Hasan — "an avid racing car enthusiast," Hawk had said.

Wooten followed the road in the opposite direction, rejoining the southern highway. They hadn't gone more than a mile when he said, "Uh-oh…"

"Something wrong?" Carter asked.

"I don't think that fancy maneuver was too good for the car. The wheel's pulling funny, over to one side. Feel it?"

"Umm." Carter pretended that he hadn't noticed Wooten surreptitiously feathering the brake pedal.

"Could be a bum tire," Wooten said with a show of concern. "I'd better pull over and take a look. We wouldn't want a blowout."

"Okay."

Slowing, Wooten left the road for its shoulder, coming to a halt in the middle of nowhere. No other cars were in sight.

Wooten sounded cheerful enough as he said. "I guess if there's a flat, yours truly is going to have to change it."

"That's why you're here."

"You're a hard man, Fletcher, but I like you."

The car stood on hard-packed earth. The boxy shapes and campfires of a small settlement showed far to the south. Carter and Wooten were the only living souls in this sprawling expanse.

They got out of the car. Wooten turned, a gun in his hand. "I got something for you, Fie…"

Wooten did a double take. Carter was not to be seen.

The Killmaster was hunkered down, using the car for cover. Wooten dropped into a combat crouch, trying to look everywhere at once.

Carter held the Luger under the car and shot Wooten in the ankle.

Wooten screamed, firing twice into empty air as he went down. Carter hopped onto the trunk, coming down on the other side where Wooten sprawled, cursing, agonized breath bubbling past clenched teeth.

Wooten was game, but before he could put his gun back into play, Carter stepped hard on the wrist of his gun-bearing hand, crushing it.

Centering Wilhelmina's snout on Wooten's forehead, Carter pried the gun from his fingers and pocketed it.

"You bastard!" Wooten groaned.

"Shhhh." Carter took nothing for granted and gave Wooten a fast but thorough frisking. The only thing it turned up in the way of weapons was a pocketknife, which Carter tossed into the darkness.

Frowning, Carter brushed off the dusty circles marring the knees of his trousers, from when he had knelt down out of sight. "Let's talk, Wooten."

Wooten's scream of obscenities was cut short by Carter's kicking his wounded leg.

"Suppose you save yourself a whole lot of unpleasantness and tell me who sent you," Carter said.

"Fuck you!"

"You want to be difficult? Fine." Holstering his Luger — Wooten was declawed — Carter went to the front of the car, tripping the button that unlocked the trunk. He went through it to see if he could turn up anything interesting that might persuade Wooten to be more forthcoming.

Jumper cables — jack — hunting rifle and a box of ammo — bottle of beer — bolt cutters — a toolbox — a can of powerful chrome-cleaning fluid. That would do it.

Carter grabbed Wooten by the collar and dragged him some paces from the car. Between groans, Wooten said, "Hey, what are you doing?"

Carter read the cleaning fluid's label by the trunk light. "Say, did you know that this stuff's highly flammable?"

"W-what? Hey, what are you doing? Don't…"

Sputtering, coughing, protecting his face with his hands, Wooten squirmed as Carter emptied the contents of the can on him, soaking him down. The stuff had a powerful alcohol smell.

"What are you doing, you maniac?"

"You've heard the expression, 'the heat is on'?" Carter said. "Well, buster, it's really going to be on you if you don't give with the answers."

"You wouldn't!"

"No? Watch me." Carter fished a pack of matches from his pocket and lit one. A sheltering ridge protected them from the wind, the small yellow flame burning steadily.

Carter flipped the match in Wooten's direction.

"Holy Christ, no!" Wooten squirmed away from where the match burned on the ground.

"Here, have another," Carter said, flipping some more his way. Wooten cried out each time a match fluttered near him. One missed his foot by a hair, his injured foot, and when he instinctively jerked it away, he screamed in pain.

"Don't, for the love of God!"

"I wonder if Howard Sale said that when they were working on him?" Carter mused.

"I don't know anything about that! I swear!"

"I'm not too fond of people who try to kill me, either."

"Wait!" Wooten panted, short of breath. "Wait. You've got it all wrong, Fletcher. I wasn't going to kill you. Just rough you up some, put you out of commission! I swear!"

"I'm not in the mood for fairy tales, Wooten." Carter set aside the matches and took out his cigarette lighter.

"Wait a minute! Give a guy a break, will you?"

"Howard Sale got a real break." Carter adjusted the wick to maximum aperture, so that when he flicked the lighter, it jetted a hissing twelve-inch tongue of yellow flame. "I don't want to set the world on fire. Just the part of it you're occupying, Wooten."

Wooten broke before the bright flame neared him. "I'll talk, I'll talk, for God's sake, stop!"

Carter flicked off the flame, keeping the lighter at the ready in case Wooten started waffling. Wooten made a pretty grim sight. Carter hated to see a grown man cry, though in this case he could live with it.

He fired questions at Wooten, not giving him the time to think up any lies. "Who're you working for?"

"You know."

"Say it."

"All right, I'm working for Hodler!"

"Now we're making progress," Carter said. "What did he tell you to do?"

"Get rid of you."

"Like you got rid of Sale?"

"I didn't have anything to do with that," Wooten said. "That was all Hodler's work. Sale was tight with the emir's people. He was snooping around, getting too close, sniffing around the club."

"The Crescent Club?" Carter said. "What goes on there?"

"That's Hodler's hangout. He's got it bad for one of the dolls there."

"A woman? Who?"

"A dancer. Sultana, she calls herself. He's nuts about her."

"You're lying," Carter said. "Hodler's not the type to let a woman get under his skin."

"This one did. Hey, what are you doing with that lighter? I swear, it's the truth! He's crazy mad in love with her — can't stay away from her. Even after Sale made him at the club, Hodler wouldn't lie low. He got rid of Sale instead."

"Who fingered Sale to him? You?"

"No. No! Hodler doesn't need anybody to tell him when he's being trailed. Sale was crazy to tackle an animal like that!"

"Not crazy. Just doing his job. All right," Carter said, "where do I find Hodler now? At the club?"

"No." Wooten shook his head until his teeth rattled, or maybe they were just chattering with fear. "Hodler took a trip out into the desert. He had to go meet the big boss."

"Who's that?"

"I don't know. Shit, you think he tells me anything? I'm just a stooge to him, that's all."

"That I can believe," Carter said. "What's Hodler planning?"

"I dunno."

"Too bad. You were doing so well up to now, too." Yellow-tongued flame whooshed out of the lighter.

It jogged Wooten's memory. "The Shiites! He's working with the Shiite radicals! They're going to off the emir and take over the oil fields!"

That made sense in light of what Carter knew about Al Khobaiq. Like his cousins the Saudis, Emir Bandar al Jalubi and his royal family were members of the Bedouin members of the Moslem Wahhabi sect. But the masses of the city were Shiites, the same sect as their radical Iranian cousins on the other side of the Gulf.

"What about Greer?" Carter asked. "Where does he fit in?"

"That asshole? He doesn't know which end is up. That's why Hodler wanted you of fed. He was afraid that the Company had finally sent somebody who knew what he was doing."

"I want Hodler. Where is he?"

"I don't know, I swear it!" Wooten cried. "I don't know when he's coming back from meeting the big boss. They've got an airstrip somewhere out in the desert. That's all I know. Even if you burn me, I couldn't tell you any more."

"All right, I'll do that," Carter said. He made a few close passes with the flame, while Wooten writhed, sobbing, rolling on the ground.

If he wasn't telling the truth, he was giving an Academy Award performance.

The lights of the oncoming vehicle could be seen from a long, long way off in this wide flat space. Carter had plenty of time to get Wooten to the far side of the car, out of sight from the road.

"If these are some of your buddies, Wooten, the first bullet belongs to you," Carter snarled. "And just so you don't die too quickly, you'll get it in the belly."

The oncoming vehicle slowed as its lights picked out the limo. Carter stood holding Wilhelmina out of sight behind his back.

A rugged Land-Rover halted in front of him, driven by members of the Al Khobaiq Home Guard, a Bedouin unit presumably loyal to the throne.

Two soldiers jumped out, rifles at the ready, while a third opened the passenger side door for a young man in his early thirties with the air of command.

He was chunky, with a quizzical mouth half-hidden by a drooping mustache. His ghutra was silk, the head covering's expensive fabric denoting his royal status while contrasting with his custom-tailored European suit.

Carter recognized him from photos included by Hawk at the final briefing back in Beirut. He slipped his gun back in the holster.

"Prince Hasan, I presume?"

"Indeed, yes! And you must be the elusive Mr. Fletcher. Or, rather, Mr. Carter. It gives me great pleasure to make your acquaintance at last. I confess that when your driver ran us off the road, I feared we had seen the last of you. I was already composing my note of regret to your government."

Prince Hasan took in the miserable figure of Wooten, reeking of cleaning fluid, filthy, in pain, nursing his bullet-shattered ankle as he slumped dismally against the limo.

Prince Hasan grinned. "I see you have the situation well in hand."