Relentless

2

They lay in a line at what the Major called the military crest of the hill-just below the top so they wouldn’t be skylined. They moved forward on their bellies. Like some kind of exercise in Basic Training. The Major had studied the maps and had said the place was just over this hill and he was right: they’d seen the glow of its lights in the air above. Now Walker reached a point from which he could see it.

The dirt road came up from the south and dead-ended in the yard. There were lights on in one building and half a dozen buildings dark. He could make out the lines of corral fences. There was a grove of trees behind the main house. Wires came in along the road on poles-electric power, telephone, or both. There was the faint sound of a motor pulsing: probably a water pump for the well. Windows in the main house splashed enough light around the yard to show the arrangement of buildings: a row of dark cabins, probably tourist accommodations, and a scatter of outbuildings-barn, tack shed, smithy lean-to, a three-car garage with half a dozen roofed carports extending out from one side of it. No cars in sight. One of the downstairs windows in the house showed a bluish reflected glow-possibly a television set. There was a tall spidery aerial on the roof.

Someone touched his ankle. He jerked.

It was Baraclough. The rest of them had already slid back off the hilltop. He crawled backwards down the slope and sat up.

They were gathered in a little knot. The Major spoke in an undertone.

“They know we’re in the area so we have to assume they’ve posted cops in the place to ambush us. So we go in light and take care of them. No noise. Sergeant Burt stays here with the money. Hanratty, you’re on me-if you drift more than six feet from me I’ll garrote you and I don’t want a single word out of that mouth of yours. Walker, stick to Baraclough.”

It was clear the Major had thought it out and taken the least undesirable option. The Major didn’t trust Hanratty and didn’t wholly trust Walker; that was why he refused to leave them near the money. He wanted both of them along where he could keep watch on them. Burt could be trusted with the money; no one else could, except possibly Baraclough, but Baraclough was needed if there was trouble below.

The Major said to Baraclough, “You go down first and check out the garage. I’ll come through the barn and meet you at the back porch-the dark corner on the northeast side. Then we’ll take the windows.”

They had probably had plenty of practice in Vietnamese hamlets. Walker hadn’t; he’d been an airman to whom the face of the ground war had been remote.

Baraclough touched his arm. “Move.”