Rebound (13 page)

The Tranxene tranquilizer capsules were adult human strength. Dartley knew that a big dog rated medication at the level of
a human child. Four adult-strength capsules would knock the dogs for a loop. It would take some time for the dogs’ stomach
acids to dissolve the wax balls around each capsule, how much time Dartley did not know, but hopefully long enough so that
they would all be still alert when it came time to release them on the estate grounds. Dartley assumed that would be at dusk,
still more than
two hours away. If the person who released them noticed they were drugged, in all likelihood he would raise an alarm. Once
the dogs were free to run the grounds, they would have been impossible to approach, even with the most tempting food.

Dartley made his way back through the undergrowth and spent some time before he found the place where he had hidden his mask
and flippers. He flopped out onto the sand, waded into the water, wet his mask fast, fitted the mouthpiece, and swam outward
beneath the surface. He did not break the surface again for a long time. When he did, he found himself only a few hundred
yards ‘from the boat in which Harry and Benjael were still fishing. They had caught nothing.

“We’re really taking this seriously,” Roscoe James assured General Bonifacio in the lobby of the Manila Hotel. “Hodges, here,
went up to talk to the supposedly dead serviceman and his wife earlier today to make sure there would be no hitches from that
end. All he had to do was stay out of sight. The newscasts have been on every radio station throughout the Philippines and
on TV. Also in the newspapers. He reacted twice before on hearing about the deaths of U.S. servicemen, so chances are he’ll
react this time too. On every one of those newscasts it mentioned that you and Happy Man were going to walk together for old
time’s sake in Rizal Park tonight. He’ll show up, all right. My only fear is that he’ll use an automatic weapon and cut you
down too.”

“That’s the chance I will have to take,” the general said calmly. “So far he’s used a pistol and no weapon at all in the Makati
office building. My guess is that he prides himself on how he does things and will go to great lengths to show how he can
get Velez and meanwhile spare me. Doing that will give him even a greater sense of power than just mowing both of us down.”

“If he’s taken the trouble to check out who you are, sir,” Hodges put in.

“He’s taken the trouble to carefully select two business employees of Velez whose deaths would really hurt their boss economically.
The man who did that knows the difference between me and Happy Man Velez.”

“I agree, General,” Roscoe said, “but Hodges is pointing out that you are running a heavy risk, and both he and I admire your
guts to do it.”

Bonifacio looked at him in surprise. “I’m a soldier. Do you think this is the first time I’ve put my life on the line?” When
the Americans were silent, he went on. “I am not one of the incompetent, corrupt officers who know more about polo and polite
conversation than they do about combat. Roscoe, you know all about my war record in Mindanao and in the Moro rebellion a few
years ago. Why do I have to say all this?”

“I don’t want you to get into this to try to relive your glory days, General,” Roscoe said. “This is not a military campaign—it’s
strictly the dirty tricks department. We want to nail this rogue serviceman who has killed Velez’s men,
but only after he has killed Velez for us. It’s not pretty, but we’ve found ourselves an assassin in spite of Washington’s
orders. If all goes well.”

“I’d do an awful lot to be rid of Happy Man,” the general said with a sinister smile. “Sooner or later we had to settle this
between us. If I can do it now and escape all blame, it’s going to ease a lot of roadblocks for me.”

“You’re very candid, sir,” Roscoe said, complimenting him.

“When it suits me,” the general replied. “My chief worry tonight is that when Happy Man’s motorcade arrives, some of his security
men will notice that I have not placed a military cordon around this section of the park, as I promised him I would. Happy
Man may jump back in his car and take off.”

“No,” Roscoe said, “that would make him look like a coward in public. He could never allow that. Besides, I’ll be there to
assure him that a hidden military cordon is in place.”

The general shook hands vigorously with the two Americans as they told him they would be rooting for him. After Bonifacio
had strode away from them across the lobby, Roscoe James remarked to Hodges, “Once Happy Man is out of the way, there’ll be
no holding back this son of a bitch. That’s why he’s being so agreeable. You heard him. He even has the cheek to tell us so.
What he’s really saying to us is that we’re going to have to pay through the nose to him someday soon when he’s top dog here.
Stay friends with that bastard, Hodges. He’ll be your ticket to a lot of promotions in the Agency until
he gets what’s coming to him. By that time you’ll have found someone to replace him.”

Hodges smiled his thanks. For a CIA field man Roscoe James could be a real fatherly sort.

Dartley, Harry, and Benjael had been on the go since early morning, making preparations, traveling out to Laguna province,
meeting with Benjael after the rapids trip, doping the dogs in the Velez compound, and now, getting ready for the night assault.
Dartley missed being in contact with what was going on. Their radios did not pick up outside wavelengths, and they had no
time to listen to their car radios or buy newspapers. Dartley realized that this was a mistake on his part, since some unforeseen
event could have occurred that would have caused a change in their plans. When Dartley worked alone, as he was accustomed
to, he did not make such oversights. Having to work with others broke his concentration. But, as he saw it, he had no choice.

They took the boat out in the dark and again cut the engine about two miles offshore. Dartley oiled the oarlocks and placed
the oars, padded with burlap on their shafts, into the oarlocks and began to row toward the Velez estate. There was no moon,
but they could see plenty by starlight. Dartley spotted the wall where it neared the water and rowed along about three hundred
yards offshore. Harry sat in the prow, staring into the darkness for a sign of anything. Benjael sat in the stern, with an
M16 mounted with a night scope. Dartley was not convinced that the scope worked properly
but could not risk testing it. The weapon, supplied by Sumiran himself, was obviously stolen property from either the American
or Philippines armed forces. Benjael handled the weapon with familiarity. Harry had not even known how to hold it, so he was
lookout and would handle the boat while Dartley was ashore, although earlier he had not handled the oars any better than he
had handled the M16. But he couldn’t cause as much harm with a mishandled oar as he could with an automatic rifle.

“Just don’t make noise,” Dartley had told Harry, “and try not to lose the oars.”

After floating offshore and watching for a short time, Dartley rowed to shore and put the prow against the sand. He stepped
past Harry and jumped out onto dry sand. As Harry went to the middle seat to row, the prow lifted and the boat floated out.
Harry splashed with the oars but did his best to be quiet. They were to wait a hundred yards or so out on the lake until Dartley
lit a match in his cupped hands, when they would come in to get him, still rowing unless Dartley was being pursued. If there
was trouble, Harry would go aft and work the engine, while Benjael would provide Dartley with cover from the middle of the
boat. Dartley swore to himself that if this worked, he’d never in his life again depend on such a half-assed plan.

He moved fast through the undergrowth toward where he had seen the house from the air. Everything was quiet except for the
sound he made pushing his way through the shrubs. He had the .22 automatic he had bought from
Harry and the razor-sharp frogman’s knife he had carried earlier. If the dogs came at him, he would fend them off with these
and retreat for the boat. The German shepherds should have heard or scented him by now. They must be groggy, asleep, or dead.

Dartley came abruptly to the edge of the trees and shrubs. Between him and the house there was nothing now but grass and what
looked like pebbly sand in the lights outside the house. A long dinner table draped in a white cloth and stacked with empty
plates and empty bottles stood beneath a tree. The dinner guests had departed, leaving some chairs on their sides and a sole
man sleeping off a drunk at one end of the table. The man was big and heavy. He did not seem comfortable sitting there with
his head lying sideways on the table in front of him. He shifted his shoulders and scratched his leg, like a sleeper uncomfortable
in a bed. Dartley stared, and a cold smile spread across his face. The sleeping drunk was Happy Man Velez.

Dartley did not need to look at the photos again to know the man. He was a bit fatter and maybe older-looking than he would
have expected, but if this was what he did with himself, some wear and tear was not surprising. A woman came out of the house.
She was good-looking in a severe way and wore a long black evening gown. She spoke to Happy Man in what Dartley assumed was
Tagalog, not sounding too friendly. She then shook his shoulder. He looked as if he was saying something to her and he smiled,
the side of his face still on the tablecloth. She
strutted back into the house, her fists clenched, mad as hell.

Dartley had to act fast. He whipped out the frogman’s knife as he stealthily ran across the sand to the table. Standing next
to the passed-out man, he eased the flattened blade between his neck and the tablecloth, sliding it in all the way until the
hilt almost touched his chin. The sleeping man felt the cool blade next to his skin and mumbled something Dartley could not
make out.

Putting his left hand on the crown of the man’s head, Dartley pressed his chin down as he simultaneously twisted the sharp
edge of the blade up and drew it across the man’s throat. The steel sank easily into the flesh and slithered through it.

Dartley pressed harder on the head, forcing the man’s chin into his neck and closing the deep slice across his throat.

He was hoping they would not notice and decide to let the drunk sleep it off where he sat. This would give him a start of
several hours before they began searching for his killer. And Dartley knew that a nationwide hunt would be undertaken for
the assassin of such an important figure. Every hour he could gain would count.

He made it as far as the cover of the bushes before the woman came out of the house again. This time she had a man with her.
He had been afraid that she intended this. Well, at least he had reached his target. Dartley stopped to watch—not out of morbid
interest but in the hope that the man might change the woman’s
mind and let the sleeping man be. But that was not about to happen.

She shook him by the shoulder again. This time he did not smile or say anything to her. Instead his head lolled sideways at
an unnatural angle, and a spout of bright red blood splashed over the dirty dishes and the white tablecloth.

Dartley heard the woman screaming as he ran through the undergrowth toward the lake.

Before he reached the lake, Dartley heard the kicks and sputters of an outboard engine failing to start. Dartley loudly cursed
Harry as he rushed through the undergrowth. When he got to the lake edge, he saw Harry and Benjael, illuminated by a beam
of light, sitting in the boat with their hands raised above their heads, maybe fifty yards offshore. The beam of light originated
from another craft on the water, also about fifty yards from the shore and about the same distance again from the boat. The
point of origin of the powerful beam showed the front end of a rubber raft. The light was fixed on some kind of support on
the raft, and its rays glinted on an M16 rifle barrel leveled on Benjael and Harry. A shadowy figure, hardly visible behind
the light, stooped over the raft’s outboard, which was repeatedly failing to start. So far, as Dartley could make out, there
were only two men in the raft.

Dartley still had the foot-long blood-smeared underwater knife in his right hand, and he waded quietly into the water, trying
not to splash as he moved his legs forward through it. This was no time to wonder how Benjael and
Harry had let themselves be surprised and had surrendered without a fight. This was only a time to do something about it,
if he could. The water crept up over Dartley’s waist, and he sank into it after taking a deep breath. He did the breaststroke
vigorously, his limbs not breaking the surface and thus making no noise; only his head was visible. If the beam of the light
swung his way, he could duck his head beneath the surface in a second.

The second man in the raft had given up on the engine and had started to paddle by the time Dartley reached the side of the
raft. He saw the swimmer an instant before he dived under the raft. Dartley dived deep. His intention had been to puncture
the raft with his knife, but now he realized that this would collapse and sink it slowly, giving the man with the M16 plenty
of time to use his weapon on the two men in the boat and on Dartley, himself, in the water. So instead of plunging the blade
through the raft’s rubber skin, he came upward from his deep dive so that both his shoulders caught one side of the raft in
a powerful thrust.

At the moment Dartley hit the raft from underneath the man who had been paddling was firing a .38 revolver at random into
the water, and the one with the M16, who still half doubted the existence of this swimmer his comrade claimed to have seen,
had taken his eye off the boat’s occupants and was scanning the surface close to the beam of the light. Dartley raised up
beneath the air-filled rubber raft the way an angry hippo can surface beneath a boat in an African river. As the raft’s side
raised into
the air Dartley used up the last of his momentum in giving it one last violent shove with both hands, which succeeded in overturning
the ungainly, ultralight craft.

The raft came down on top of the man toting the M16, its inverted sides confusing and trapping him for seconds that were valuable
to Dartley. The American went after the one who had been tinkering with the engine and found him floundering and splashing
like a child a few yards away. Dartley breathed deep, sank below the surface, and kicked forward with violent froglike leg
movements, holding the knife before him in both hands.