Day of Mourning

12

Bolan had not intended this night in Washington to be one of rescuing damsels in distress or engaging everyone he encountered in pointless firefights. Sometimes, though, a man is forced into pure reflex response.

Kelly Crawford, case in point.

Bolan braked the Lancia for a moment at a drive-up pay phone and looked up General Crawford's residence in an area directory. It was listed and matched the address on the license in the young woman's purse.

He drove west on Constitution, through the moderate night traffic. Cruising at the legal speed limit, he took the Roosevelt Bridge across the dark expanse of the Potomac into Virginia.

The blonde in the blanket and nothing else batted her eyes open as Bolan swung south in the direction of the general's home in the upper-class suburbs of Alexandria.

Kelly Crawford said nothing to Mack Bolan. She glared straight ahead into the night as he drove, pulling the blanket tighter around herself, not even acknowledging the man beside her with a glance.

Bolan could see nothing of General Crawford in the girl's physical appearance. She must have taken after her mother.

Retired Brigadier General James Crawford and his daughter lived in a neighborhood of winding streets, the homes set back from the streets on manicured lots separated from each other by trees and evergreen hedge.

A porch light went on when Bolan wheeled the Lancia to a stop on the half-circle gravel driveway in front of a sprawling bungalow.

The door opened and General Crawford stood there.

The girl in the blanket ran past her father into the house, out of sight.

Bolan stepped in and punched off the porch light. He closed the front door.

The general watched the big man with steady eyes, noting the AutoMag holstered at Bolan's hip.

"Colonel Phoenix, would you mind telling me what the hell is going on here?"

The general's warm Arkansas drawl was taut with concern.

This man was the closest thing Bolan had ever had to a father figure, after his real father.

Sam and Elsa Bolan had instilled in their son the basic morality of right and wrong that inspired Bolan to this day.

General Crawford had taken a green young recruit and made of him a combat-hardened veteran. The general made a soldier out of Mack Bolan in Vietnam.

Crawford visited Bolan in the earliest stage of the Phoenix program when Bolan had been holed up recovering from the plastic surgery that had transformed The Executioner into John Phoenix. There had been some briefings after that, but Bolan had not seen General Crawford from then until this moment.

Bolan nodded in the direction the general's daughter had taken.

"You've got some trouble, General."

"I've had trouble with Kelly since the day Lucy died eleven years ago. Come in, Colonel. Drink?"

"I could stand some coffee."

"In the kitchen."

Crawford led the way.

They sat at the kitchen table, waiting for the coffee to perk.

"I've only got time for a quick stop," said Bolan.

"Tell me what happened."

"Kelly has rough friends."

"A black guy?"

"Three of them. Two of them are dead. Datcher and Brown, if it matters."

"It doesn't. One got away?"

Bolan nodded. "Wounded."

"That would be Jones. Were they... harming my daughter?"

Bolan told the general what happened.

The general registered no outward emotion as he listened. He stood and prepared the cups of coffee.

"Tell me about Jones," Bolan requested when he finished his report.

The general handed Bolan a cup of coffee.

"Grover Jones. He started calling himself Damu Abdul Ali a few months ago."

"How long has Kelly known him?"

"A few months. I expressly forbade Kelly to see him again. She decided it was because he was black."

Bolan knew the general better than that.

"What was the reason, sir?"

"I told Kelly what I found out," said Crawford. "Jones was a GI stationed in Germany until eighteen months ago when he was busted as the head of a full-scale drug operation he operated on the base where he was stationed. The murders of a German national and a Turk were involved, but it was never proved that Jones pulled the trigger. None of it was ever proved, as a matter of fact. But there was enough circumstantial evidence to get Jones bounced out of the service with a dishonorable."

"How did he meet Kelly?"

"Jones fought the proceeding right to the end. He was stationed in D.C. while his appeals went through. Kelly was working as a cashier at a PX snackbar."

"Jones may have changed his name, but he hasn't changed his style," said Bolan. "The men I took out were hired hands to do the dirty work while Damu Abdul stayed out of the rough stuff with Kelly."

"What rough stuff?" asked Crawford. "What did Kelly get mixed up in?"

"Have you been briefed on the Stony Man situation, sir?"

"I, uh, know of the difficulties you're having with Lee Farnsworth."

"That's not what I mean."

Bolan told the general about the sabotage of the Farm's communications system and the blood hunt that had taken John Phoenix to the Mafia, the Armenians, the CIA and Grover Jones and his pals.

He explained to the retired officer that he still did not have any answers as to who was behind the sabotage that so endangered Able Team and put a good man in a coma.

"The only way it plays is that Jones subcontracted a hit on me," finished Bolan. "Whoever wanted me hit knew about the CIA surveillance on those Armenians. They knew enough to figure that I would try for the Armenians on my own because their arrival in the city coincided with the sabotage."

"The someone you want seems to know a lot," said the general. "Do you think Kelly would know who hired Jones?"

"If Jones is big enough to subcontract a hit, he's smart enough to keep that kind of information to himself," said Bolan. "If he did have a name, it'd be just another middleman like himself."

"You must have some ideas."

"Some," acknowledged Bolan. "That's another reason I brought Kelly home to you, sir, instead of dropping her off somewhere. I could use your help."

"In what way, Colonel? I had a hand in designing the Stony Man and Central Foreign Bureau operations, but security requires that I keep my distance from both units."

"That's why you're the man, sir. I want a full rundown on Lee Farnsworth. Everything that didn't make his 201 file. There should be a lot. He's been in covert operations a long time."

"Farnsworth? You don't think he's behind the sabotage?"

"There's as good a case against the CFB as there was against those Armenians," growled Bolan. "The timing is right."

"Colonel, believe me, Farnsworth is as much a patriot as you are."

"Then you won't turn up anything. You had access to that information when you considered Farnsworth for the job, didn't you?"

"Let me get this straight," said Crawford. "You're suggesting that the head of the Central Foreign Bureau is a mole out to destroy the Stony Man operation?"

"I'm suggesting nothing," said Bolan. "I'm still looking. And I can't afford to slow down." He got to his feet. "You'll have to excuse me now, sir. I'll keep in touch."

The general stood and they left the kitchen.

"I'll do as you ask, certainly," said Crawford. "I've known you a long time, soldier. Long enough to trust your judgment. I just hope you're wrong this time. About Farnsworth and the CFB, I mean. I feel the same way about that outfit as I do about you and the bunch at Stony Man.''

The two men faced each other at the front door.

"I'll try to pick up Jones's trail," said Bolan. "Any idea where the guy hangs out?"

A voice answered from the top of the stairs.

"He hangs out at a club called the Tattle Tail," Kelly Crawford told Bolan. "That's T-A-I-L." She gave him the address. He committed it to memory. "A joint," she added, not moving from the head of those stairs. "A rough place."

Kelly had cleaned up her act. A shower had buffed her blond beauty to a fine glow. Even her wet hair did not detract from her fresh good looks. She was clad in a floor-length robe that clung to her figure.

"I'll take my chances," growled Bolan. "Thanks, Kelly."

"I'm sorry," she said quietly, not making eye contact with Bolan or her father. "I've been an immature, stupid fool. I'm sorry."

"You're home now," said the general. "That's the important thing. Rest up. We'll talk about it in the morning."

"I'm home because of this man," said Kelly. She looked at Bolan for the first time. "Who are you, mister?"

"The name is Phoenix," Bolan told her. "Kelly, do you have any other ideas where Grover will hole up if the club doesn't pan out?"

"If Grover isn't at the Tattle Tail, someone there will know where to find him," she assured Bolan. "It's his turf. He used to take me there so all his pimp friends could see his fine white bitch."

"Please, Kelly — " began her father.

"I was a fool, and I've got to admit it aloud to both of you or it won't mean anything at all," said Kelly. "I was slumming with some real slime, wasn't I, Mr. Phoenix?"

"The slimiest," Bolan acknowledged. "And one of them is still out there. Grover will need a doctor, but he won't go to a hospital. He's holed up someplace right now where he thinks he's safe. That's the edge I need. He won't be moving. I will. And I've got to start moving right now. Good night, both of you. And thanks."

"Thank you," said Kelly to the Executioner. "I thought I loved a man who cared about me. But all he did was use me. I guess he was using me all along. Thank you for saving my life and making me see that." Then she looked at her father and her voice quavered. "I'm sorry, daddy. I really am."

Then she turned and padded off down the upstairs hallway.

Bolan and General Crawford stepped out onto the front porch.

"My thanks too, Mack. It's good to see you again.'' Crawford saw only the Lancia in the driveway. "Take the Lancia, you'll be needing some wheels. Good luck. God bless you."

The two warriors shook hands, then embraced warmly like the brothers they were.

Bolan climbed into the Lancia and roared away from there, angling back toward the Roosevelt Bridge and D.C.

He would get rid of the Lancia at the first car-rental agency he came to. Then he would phone the general to pick it up.

He was driving a car registered to General Crawford.

That would make it easy for someone to identify.

Someone in the know, the general had said.

Who?

Farnsworth?

Could General Crawford be involved?

Bolan felt a flash of angry guilt at that last thought.

He pulled up at a pay phone by a closed service station. He dialed a number that was routed from a scrambler station in B.C. through a computerized reroute via Miami, Flagstaff and Missoula, Montana, before buzzing the switchboard at Stony Man Farm's central control.

April answered.

"Stony Man."

"It's me, mother hen."

Bolan could feel the woman of his heart smiling at him over the line.

"Striker, it's good to hear from you. How's it going?"

"Swinging. I could fill a book. What's the situation there?"

"Some very bad news, some not so bad. Konzaki is dead. He never came out of the coma."

Bolan felt something cold run down his spine.

"Now it's personal," was all he said.

"Maybe you should be back here," said April. "It's past midnight. If there is going to be an assault on the Farm tonight, shouldn't you be here?"

"I'm twenty minutes away," said Bolan. "You're just lonesome."

April chuckled, and the intimate sound of it made the warrior wish for one instant that he and this woman were together and none of this was happening.

"I'm lonesome for you, Captain Hellfire. Men, we've got plenty of. Phoenix Force arrived an hour ago."

"What about the communications repair?"

"That's the not so very bad news," said April. "The Bear is out there now. The parts just arrived."

"Still no word from Able Team?"

"Still no word. I take it you have no intention of returning here until and if you're needed?"

"There's a hot time in the old town tonight," Bolan told her. "I've got some more cage-rattling to do. Konzaki's soul won't rest until it's done. Neither will mine."

"Hal has been calling. He wants you to contact him."

"I'll bet he does. Tell him the trail's too hot right now for talk."

"Is there anything I can do?"

"Run a tracer on Grover Jones, a.k.a. Damu Abdul Ali. Recent dishonorable discharge from the Army."

"Will do. Anything else?"

"Uh, yeah. See what you can come up with on General James Crawford."

"The general? But, Mack — "

"Someone close to us is striking at us tonight," Bolan explained. "My only course is not to trust anyone."

"You can trust my love, guy," April said softly. "I'll get what you need."

"Stay hard, lady," said Bolan.

He broke the connection.

The low cloud cover draped a humid blanket across Washington, as if trying to suffocate it.

Bolan returned to his vehicle and headed into the nighttime city, into the belly of the monster.