The First Casualty (21 page)

46

Hangar 19

Andrews Air Force Base

Prince George's County, Maryland

At the Same Time

The huge hangar that was home to the two very special 747s was a scene of orderly activity, activity Colonel Bill Hasty watched closely. When one of those babies was going to fly in two days, there were a lot of necessary preparations; and, as pilot in command, it was his job to see they were made correctly. He observed the self-contained retractable stairway and baggage loader work over and over. Their function was part of the plane's extensive equipment that assured the aircraft was never dependent on airport facilities.

Inside the huge aircraft, he began his normal inspection of the entire 4,000 square feet on three levels, starting with the cockpit. The plane had all the electronics one would expect to see in a modern commercial airliner and a quite a few that might not be so normal: an antimissile defense activator switch, which would release clouds of super-heated metallic chaff to decoy heat-seeking weapons and defeat any guidance radar; surge protectors to ensure even the electromagnetic pulse of a nuclear weapon would not interrupt communications; an in-flight refueling system to give the aircraft unlimited range; and radar-jamming electronics were only a few. Then there were the 240 miles of internal wiring that assured all forty-eight telephones on board had full air-to-ground capability as well as the ability to speak to one another.

It took nearly a half hour to work through the extensive check list, flipping toggles, pushing test buttons, and cross-verifying instruments. Satisfied, he left the cockpit, entering the president's suite: an office with a full-size conference table, fax, shredder, computers, printers, and twin television screens. One of the latter was on, a twenty-four-hour commercial news station turned to low volume. Sitting at the table watching was a black woman wearing the stripes of an Airman First Class on the sleeves of her uniform. She jumped to her feet as Hasty entered.

He motioned her back into her seat “Stay put, Rosie. All the bells and whistles working?”

“Yes, sir! Any what aren't will be, time I leave this aircraft.”

He touched the bill of his cap, not quite a salute but not not one, either, as he passed through to the presidential bedroom and bath. “Carry on, then.”

Not a doubt in his mind. He had inherited Rosie Carpenter along with most of the Air Force One crew. If it was electric, she could fix it, from a toaster in one of the ship's two galleys to the most sophisticated computer. He had originally been suspicious of why she had stayed with the U.S. Air Force when her talents would bring a much higher salary on the civilian market. The answer had made him ashamed of his doubts: Her husband, confined to a wheelchair by incurable multiple sclerosis, would have had a difficult time affording treatment outside the military.

Two men were in the president's bedroom suite. One, earphones looped over his head, was vacuuming the lush carpet. The other could be seen through an open door polishing the bathroom fixtures. Neither man saw Hasty and he passed through unnoticed.

Ten minutes later, he was standing amid the gleaming stainless steel of the forward galley. A steady procession of uniforms was carrying provisions to the mammoth refrigerator, the huge freezer, or the cavernous pantry. All told, the plane could carry 2,000 meals. Hasty knew the non-coms doing the work had unloaded dozens of vehicles, mostly unmarked SUVs driven by men and women in civvies who had made the purchases at random grocery stores around the DC area. That, plus the rigid security surrounding the airplane until it was in the air, would make tampering with the food supply very difficult.

“Hungry, Colonel?”

Hasty turned to a man in turtleneck and jeans. “I'd known you were going to ask, I'd skipped McDonald's on the way here.”

A bright smile split the swarthy face. Placide LeBrun, the president's famous Cajun cook. The president, from Louisiana, had brought the chef of his favorite Baton Rouge restaurant with him to Washington to ensure his fare did not suffer in quality. Admittedly, the practice of noisily sucking the juice from crawfish heads, adding hot sauce to everything except dessert, and serving fried alligator tail at state dinners had caused a stir in the ever-scandal-hungry city. But when the emir of Dubai pronounced LeBrun's sassafras-laced filet gumbo (minus the andouille pork sausage) “truly fit for the mouth of the Prophet,” a Cajun craze raged through the nation's capital. Formal dinners were less likely to conclude with classical string quartets or piano concertos than appearances by Zachary Richard (pronounced “Ree-chard”) or Gerald Thibedeaux's Cajun bands.

“Looks like you have everything under control here,” Hasty observed.

“Colonel, if you manage this airplane with the care I manage its galleys, all will be well.”

Hasty gave him a pat on the shoulder. “Sounds like we're in great shape, then.”

Next, the colonel passed through the aircraft's medical facility, an office that could quickly be converted into a surgery should the need arise. Sam Silverstein, the full-time Air Force One doc, was inventorying the pharmacy. Long past retirement age, Sam had somehow evaded severing ties with the service. Popular rumor was that he had been around long enough to have a bit of dirt on those now in high places in the Air Force, and had every intention of using it should that be necessary to continue to enjoy the prestige and travel associated with his job.

“Got enough pills?” Hasty asked. “Eye of newt, toe of frog?”

Silverstein turned around, adjusting frameless glasses. “Oh, hi, Colonel. Nothing quite that exotic, I fear. Just making sure we have enough motion sickness medication. One little bit of turbulence and half the press corps are flipping their lunch, which, in turn, makes the others ill.”

“See what you can do, Doc.”

Finally, Hasty was in the cargo hold. A separate C-17 Globemaster III had already departed with the heavy stuff—two armored GMC TopKick trucks with Cadillac-like bodies, the Suburban that followed the presidential limo with various defensive mechanisms and the rest of the presidential cavalcade. Air Force One's cargo would largely contain scrupulously inspected baggage of the crew, the attending press, and the president. Two Airmen Third Class were already stacking suitcases.

“You men be careful with the president's golf clubs,” Hasty admonished.

Both men snapped to attention.

“Sir!” One of the men's eyes were centered on a spot an inch or so above the colonel's head. “The president's golf clubs, along with the rest of his gear, will be loaded last, probably not until just hours before departure.”

Again the fingers touched cap brim. “Very well, then.”

Hasty stood akimbo on the cement floor of the hangar, looking up at the plane he had just vacated. He had done all he could at this stage to make sure the president was delivered safely to Egypt.

The rest was in the hands of what Hasty's experience had taught him was a very capricious God.

47

Hotel la Colombe

Rue Askia Mohammed

Timbuktu, Mali

Jason watched for what seemed an eternity, but the bedclothes remained as placid as a pond with no wind. He flicked his eyes around the room, searching for the phone.

There wasn't one.

As far away from the bed as he could get, perhaps three or four feet, he stooped, reached up his pants leg, and came up with his killing knife. One step and the tip of the blade was lifting the top sheet.

What happened next took place as a blur in his memory. The sheet lifted and something struck, something long and brown and angry.

The thing had made a leap, or strike, that was long enough to have reached Jason, had it not hit at the knife's point instead. Now it was on the floor, twin needles of fangs facing Jason. Anvil-headed, dappled brown, with Satanic horns above each catlike eye, and a flicking tongue that seemed to be savoring a victim already. From long ago desert training, Jason recognized the deadly horned desert viper.

A native of the nearby Sahara, this one was unusually large at just over a couple of feet. Its venom was a witch's brew of toxins that affected everything from kidneys to heart to bowels.

And it was definitely not in a good mood.

The snake had no intent of giving ground; and if the strike from the bed was any example, Jason was within easy range even adding the length of the blade. Attempting to use the knife was going to get him too close to those fangs. Keeping his eyes on those of the serpent as though they might telegraph intent, Jason poked the sheet with the knife again as he slowly backed up to put the bed between him and the snake. The creature advanced quickly across the tiled floor, a sideways movement like the sidewinder rattlesnake of the American Southwest, a movement adapted to the loose, shifting sands of the desert.

In less than a minute, Jason was going to be out of room.

Impaling the sheet on the tip of his knife, Jason waved it in front of the viper, drawing another strike, this time at the fabric.

A second attempt achieved what Jason had hoped for: The snake's fangs were caught in the cotton threads of the sheet.

Swallowing the almost atavistic fear of snakes, Jason quickly stepped on its head, pinning it to the floor. A single stroke of the knife and the headless body wriggled furiously, leaving a thin trace of blood and slime across the tiles before it went still.

Jason carefully lifted his foot, unsure if he might still be in danger from some death spasm that could send those fangs into his foot or leg. If he ever could have used a shot or two of Viktor's vodka, it was the time.

He started for the door, to get someone up there to remove that thing before he stepped on it in the dark.

No, wait.

The viper didn't get in here on its own, and there is no point in alerting the would-be assassin it failed. Let him wonder. Mental advantage Jason.

Jason speared the head on the tip of his knife, carried it into the bathroom, and flushed it down the toilet followed by sections of the snake's body he fed into the spinning waters one at a time.

Jason placed his knife and a recently unpacked .40-caliber Glock on the bedside table before turning out the light. Armed or not, sleep was not going to come easily.

48

Hotel la Colombe

Rue Askia Mohammed

Timbuktu, Mali

6:42 a.m. Local Time

Day 9

Breakfast consisted of rice porridge floating in sorghum and
injera
, a bread made from flour, honey, and rosemary. And, of course, coffee, thick, aromatic African-bean coffee. Overhead, a fan spun lazily, doing little but rearranging the already hot, dry air in a room empty except for the four men at the same table. The one next to theirs could have been a display case at a photography store: cameras with varying attachments, tripods, strobe lights and klieg lights on stands.

The four were dressed almost identically: khaki safari jackets over V-neck T-shirts and cargo pants stuffed into military-style combat boots. Only in headwear was there a difference: One Indiana Jones–style broad-brimmed hat, a tightly woven straw Stetson, and two long-billed caps.

Jason was finishing relating the events of last night. “. . . And I'll be damned if I can figure out why they didn't try something more certain. A gunshot, perhaps. Why would they put a two-foot horned viper in my bed?”

Emphani smiled. “Perhaps because they could not find a five-foot cobra.”

“You complaining, Artiste?” Andrews chimed in. “Advantage of your dying of snakebite is that the police could treat it as something other than murder. I'm sure the one in your bed wasn't the first varmint to creep in from the desert.”

Jason put down the piece of bread at which he had been nibbling. “Why do I have the feeling the sudden demise of a foreign infidel would not cause a great deal of concern among the local gendarmerie?”

Viktor, astonishingly chipper in view of the volume of vodka he had consumed the previous evening, spoke for the first time. “Important thing is someone knows is not crew from magazine.”

“Thanks a lot, asshole,” Jason said good-naturedly.

Viktor grinned, holding up both hands. “Mistake. Is important next to you being alive.”

Andrews pushed back from the table, the legs of his chair protesting against the floor's tiles. “OK, now that someone knows our business isn't glossy pictures in a magazine, what do we do?”

Do? What the hell could they do, Jason thought. Damn Momma and her duplicity that put him and his men in a place synonymous for remoteness with their cover likely blown and no way to identify their enemies.

“Don't see we have much choice,” he answered. “We continue the masquerade.”

“Continue?” Viktor protested. “How is possible? Our enemies know we are here.”

“What would you suggest?” Jason asked patiently, all too aware Emphani and Andrews were listening with more than passing interest. “We can pack up and run, leaving the good folks who tried to kill me in our rear, free to contact their Tuareg buddies to set up an ambush if they don't get to us first. It's not like we can just go to the airport and skedaddle.”

“And why not, Artiste?” Andrews wanted to know. “You sure as shit aren't planning to return the same way we came.”

Jason turned to face the former Navy man. “Our extraction plans do, in fact, call for us to depart by air, although hardly by commercial service. They also call for pretty precise timing, which we can discuss tonight along with our attack plan for tomorrow. The Timbuktu airport has only two flights a week direct Paris. All the others go to Mopi or Bamako. If we succeed, I doubt anyone will be eager to wait at either place for a flight out of country. No, I believe the safest thing is to stick with the plan we have. We'll just have to be extra careful.”

There was grudging agreement around the table.

“OK, Artiste, you win. So, what are our plans for today?”

Jason glanced around assuring himself he would not be overheard. “Emphani, it's too late for
Fajr
,
the prayer said before sunrise . . .”

“Tell me about it,” Andrews grumbled. “Surely, I wasn't the only one that screeching from the mosques woke up.”

“I was already awake,” Emphani replied coolly. “Saying my
Fajr.”

“Sorry. I didn't mean . . .”

A smile twitched across Emphani's lips. “Recording the muezzin's call to prayer instead of having a live person call from the minarets hasn't done a lot for the tone.”

Jason looked from one to the other. “If I may, gentlemen.”

When he was certain he had their attention, he began. “Emphani, you are the only one who speaks both Arabic and French . . .”

“But not Koyra Chiini.” The dialect spoken along the Niger Valley and by far the most popular dialect in Timbuktu, one of over fifty in Mali.

Jason continued. “Do the best you can. French is the country's official language and you're sure to hear some Arabic if the people we think are here are here. You go to
Dhur
prayers shortly after noon at the Sankore Mosque, snoop around. Oh yeah, no point in playing with a disguise. If anyone asks, you're with the magazine's mission here because of your linguistic skill but, more important, because you are a Moslem. The mosques here are not open to us infidels. And, of course, you want to look around, maybe take some pictures if the local imam doesn't mind. Naturally, you'd be interested in the older parts of the place like the southernmost of the two minarets.

“Chief, you take in Djinguereber, the Great Mosque, on the western side of the old town. Viktor, the Sidi Yahya Mosque. Don't slink around. You are legitimate journalists, OK? Just remember, non-believers are not welcome inside, and we don't want to cause a ruckus.”

The rule regarding non-believers in mosques varied according to two seemingly conflicting verses of the Koran. In Turkey, for instance, tourists are welcome during non-prayer hours as long as dressed appropriately. In most African mosques, not so.

“No one ever accused Moslems of being open-minded,” Andrews grumbled.

“That is one person's view,” Emphani replied tartly. “Had it not been for such mathematical devices as the invention of zero as a number, you will still be counting on fingers and toes.”

A glare from Jason silenced them both.

Andrews and Viktor exchanged glances before the former asked, “Anything in particular we should be looking for? I mean, if we can't go inside . . .”

“Well, from the wreckage of the Air France plane, the angle of damage to certain parts of the aircraft, the French triangulated back to this area of Africa, give or take a hundred kilometers or so. Assuming this ray, or whatever it is, can't jump sand dunes, trees, and the like, it would have to have been launched from a relatively high point . . .''

“Only one of which in maybe fifty kilometers of here would be tower, er, minaret of one of the mosques,” Viktor interrupted.

“Precisely,” Jason continued. “So, what we are looking for is anything suspicious around a mosque.”

Emphani cleared his throat. “But you think it is the one we can see from our windows. Why?”

“Making another assumption, that the beam or missile or whatever moves in a more or less straight line, it would have had to depart in a westerly direction. According to the guidebook I read on the plane, the southern minaret of the Sankore Mosque is the only one with an opening facing away from Mecca, westerly.”

“And you, Artiste, what is going to occupy you this morning?”

Jason drained the dregs of his coffee. “I'm going to take advantage of the height on which this place is built. I can see damn near the whole town.”