The House of Cards Complete Trilogy (113 page)

“Urquhart, you English bastard. What are you up to?”

***

The Troodos Mountains are the pine green heart of Cyprus. The towering ranges that stretch up to Mount Chionistra act as a cloud trap, sucking in the winds of the eastern Mediterranean, bringing relief from the oppressive heat of the plains and water in an abundance that is the envy of most other Mediterranean islands. But it is not always so in the Troodos. The rain falls mainly in winter while the summer months are parched. The shadow-dappled glades between the pines scorch to arid bowls of dust, the forest ferns die and desiccate while the carpet of flowers that is spread in springtime is rolled back to reveal the dried bones of once-abundant vegetation. The bracken and fallen timbers of the forests are turned to a compost of kiln-dried tinder, and cooling winds may become the harbinger of death. Disaster in a spark.

The back of the Troodos itches with the scars and scabs of old forest fires, silent charcoaled testimony to the power of flame whose noise and smoke resemble a belching express train and may travel almost as fast. Men who know the mountains fear the flame.

The first wisp of smoke began to curl into the sky from beside the roadway that runs below the Presidential Lodge at the start of the tourist trail leading to the Caledonian Falls. A cigarette end, the rays of the sun focused through the glass of a carelessly discarded bottle, the embers of a lightning strike, there might have been many explanations, but only one consequence. The gossamer thread curled into the sky like a kitten edging for the first time away from its mother’s side. It was already growing rapidly when the Bishop’s guard posted in the third-floor window of the Lodge spotted it. By the time Theophilos had climbed up the stairs to see for himself, it was approaching with the roar of a lion.

***

He wrenched the phone from its cradle. “What double dealing is this, Urquhart? How stupidly you condemn four hostages to death.”

“Bishop, listen to me very carefully. You touch the hostages and both you and I are finished. I will be blamed and you will be butchered. I would have no choice but to order my troops in.”

“You pretend you did not set this fire? Liar!”

“For God’s sake are you telling me this is the first forest fire you’ve seen? It could’ve started in a thousand ways, the important thing is to finish it. My troops are already fighting the fire. If you wish to leave the Lodge I shall arrange safe transport…”

“We stay!”

“Then do that, but don’t touch the hostages. Remember that you and I will stand or fall together in this matter. We are bound as one.”

“Urquhart, I do not trust you. But you can trust me. I swear on my Holy life that at the first sight of any British soldier approaching this Lodge I shall take one of the hostages and throw him from the top-floor window. Just to show you my good faith. And if you don’t keep the fire away from the Lodge, I shall accept your offer of transportation. But I shall leave another hostage behind in the ashes. Do you hear?”

“All too well. But there is no need for that. I’m told that there are already two helicopters on their way to you equipped with firefighting facilities. The Lodge will be safe.”

“You’d better pray for your own soul if it is not.”

***

The Wessex HC2 trooplift helicopters were the old workhorses of the military skies, long since phased out in most other parts of the world for larger, more sophisticated machinery better able to deal with frontline conditions. But Cyprus wasn’t the front line—or hadn’t been, until now. The Wessex was all they had, but it was adequate for the task. The flight from Akrotiri lasted less than fifteen minutes, even equipped with the cumbersome rainmaker buckets slung beneath Mission Three-Zero Alpha and its sister craft Bravo. They’d flown in formation up beyond the Kouris Dam, which diverted the precious emerald waters from their rush to the sea and toward the concrete oven of Limassol, the drone of the twin gas turbines bouncing back from the valley sides, extending still further the footprint of noise and declaring their imminent arrival even before the villagers of Monagri, Doros, and Trimiklini could rise from the tending of vines and spot them in the sky. They climbed, the four-bladed rotors grabbing more urgently at the thinning mountain air, the torque increasing as the craft fought to maintain formation and speed, crewmen tightening in anticipation as, ahead of them, the malevolent swirl stood out dark against the clear skies.

They found their water supply less than two minutes from the source of the fire, the tanks of a trout farm full of fingerling and grower fish. In one mouthful each Wessex scooped up a hundred and fifty gallons of water and yards of protective netting—half a year’s work for the farmer, whose cries of despair and incomprehension were lost beneath the flattening roar of whirling rotor blades. With an ironic bow of acknowledgment the two Wessex left the farmer to his tears of frustration and headed for the Lodge.

***

On instructions from his brother, Dimitri had checked the bonds of the four hostages, ensuring that they were immobile and had no chance of escape by tying their legs as well as their upper bodies. As always, he took particular care with Elpída, his eyes groping and hands brushing across the cotton of her blouse as he tested the bonds, running his callused palms around her thighs, squeezing, wine-sour breath falling across her cheeks. His eyes were glassy bright, pumping with adrenaline and anxiety.

“Before this is over, my beauty, I’m going to show you what a real man is made of,” he smirked.

“Please, not so tight, you’re cutting the circulation in my leg.”

He settled on his haunches in front of her, removed the ligature, raised the dress high above her knees, and began massaging the muscles.

Elpída smiled, a look of pure plastic, then kicked him straight in the crotch.

It was only as he regained his breath and was no longer squirming in agony that the threats began to tumble forth. How he would have her, no matter what his brother said, and what he would do to her warm moist flesh. He stumbled to his feet, still bent, clutching himself with one hand while the other drew back and unleashed itself in fury across her cheek. His ring scoured a plum-colored graze; he sneered and stooped close in expectation of submission. Her father shouted in alarm.

There were tears in her eyes but again Elpída smiled, and spat in his face.

Dimitri was about to strike her once more when his collar was grabbed and he was cuffed about the head. He went sprawling in surprise and, rolling over, discovered the figure of his brother looming over him, arm raised to threaten him again.

“Fool!” Theophilos snarled. “Is there no time when your brain rises above your belt?”

Dimitri prepared to growl and snap, Theophilos to strike, when they both froze, their dispute forgotten in an instant. For in the distance they could hear the rumbling thunder of helicopters.

Thirty-Nine

A conscience is like a rock, always waiting to trip you up.

The two helicopters came in at three hundred feet, skirting the jumble of tourist shops and cheap restaurants huddled below the mountain top and dropping down through the gorge of ancient black pines. Even at that height they could feel the cauldron of heat bubbling beneath them, the pilots struggling to maintain control as bursts of superheated air hit the underside of the fuselage. The fire had fanned out, catching the mountain air and swirling it into innumerable eddies and currents that were then thrown out in all directions, the flames following. Climbing the mountainside. Creeping nearer the Lodge.

Mission Three-Zero Alpha was the first to start its bombing run, the pilot guided by the instructions of the crewman in the rear. Even leaning out from the fuselage in the embrace of the dispatcher’s harness it was difficult for him to determine a precise point of impact; from above all that could be seen was an angry swirl of thick dark smoke being blown forward above the flames. The first run would be no more than target spotting, suppressing the smoke screen to provide a clear line of sight.

Alpha hovered to get its bearings before moving decisively forward, slicing across the leading edge of the fire. It was traveling at forty knots, the pilot throwing anxious glances at his torque meter as he was forced to use near-maximum power to cope with the unhappy combination of height, sudden heat, and heavy payload that turned the craft from a porpoise into a mother duck. He could screw up the transmission if he wasn’t careful. It didn’t help that he was practically blind, the limited forward vision provided by the droop-nosed Wessex all but obliterated by plumes of smoke. He was in the hands of God and his crewman, one of whom, he knew for a fact, had slipped in an extra pint of Guinness last night.

The crewman was latched firmly to the handrail and had one foot perched on the wheel of the undercart to give himself extra inches of reach and sight. “Steady. Steady. Left ten. God, it’s bloody hot. Steady.” The craft was in his hands, the pilots following his commands as he tried to find the right release point. A gust of wind snatched at the smoke below, carving out a gap through which he thought he could see it. It was as good a bearing as he was going to get. He yanked the cable that fired the rainmaker release. The newly liberated Wessex leaped forward as half a ton of water spread out and drenched two hundred square yards of forest. Yet already thousands were in flame.

The first Wessex was already heading back toward the trout farm when Mission Three-Zero Bravo maneuvered into position. Perhaps the rear crewman directing the approach was a shade hesitant, for from above it appeared as though he’d covered the almost identical section of forest as Alpha, a wasted run, but from below the action looked spectacular, for a passing second the rainmakers creating great rainbow arcs in the sky before the pall of smoke and new steam once again covered the sun. Hope, heat, darkness, and still more flame marked the time as the rearmed Wessex craft returned to resume the onslaught.

But still the fire was not out. The flames licked forward like the tongue of a fire serpent, enraged, defiant, setting about everything in its path, which led directly to the Lodge.

And the trout pond was empty. A new water supply had to be found, more vital minutes away.

The attack was beginning to falter.

***

“For pity’s sake, Mr. Urquhart, the fire is less than a hundred meters from the Lodge.”

The Bishop’s tone had altered. The bluster had disappeared, ground away by anxiety as he had watched the assault of the helicopters being repulsed by the forces of nature.

“They are doing their best. Another helicopter has been scrambled from Akrotiri.” Yet even Urquhart was sounding less confident. “Their problem is finding a suitable water supply.”

“Enough of your excuses, Englishman!”

“Bishop, let me evacuate you and your men. I give you my word…”

“As I have given you mine. If I am forced to leave this place, one of the hostages will remain behind. And her death will be on your hands.”

“What more can I do, Bishop?”

“Pray, damn you. Down on your knees.”

“I already am.”

***

The flames were only seventy meters from the Lodge, advancing remorselessly. They had already encountered the fence of barbed wire thrown around the perimeter of the compound and reduced it to a cat’s cradle of blackened shards. Glowing embers were soaring on the convection currents, thrown high into the heavens before cascading down upon the lawn in front of the Lodge and bouncing off its metal roof.

Bravo had made his final pass. The water bombing had proved ineffective, the nearby water supplies exhausted. In a gesture that stank of defeat, the pilot pressed the jettison button and ditched the rainmaker bucket, shedding the last hope of quenching the fire.

Theophilos watched it all with growing anxiety. He had thought his plan foolproof, beyond the means of man to unravel. He hadn’t counted on God getting in the way.

As he watched through the partially opened shutters of the Lodge he was gripped by a grim fatalism. Someone was going to die—had to die, he had given his Holy word on it. As the moment of decision approached, he found his hand was trembling. He hid it deep within the folds of his cassock.

Yet the play was not finished. Even as the Bishop peered from the Lodge, Bravo circled around ahead of the fire until it was almost above the Lodge. Slowly it edged forward until it hovered only fifty feet from the ground, its wheels practically brushing the pine tops, interposing itself directly between the building and the approaching fire. The rotor blades sliced through the air, hurling a downdraft of immense force against the trees. A new front in the battle had been opened. A wall of air was pushed forward from the helicopter until it met the advancing flames and the two air masses engaged in a war of great winds. Choking billows of smoke and dust were hurled in all directions, encasing the helicopter in a blinding envelope of debris. Bitter tongues of flame leaped upward, only to dash against the concentrated fury of fifteen hundred horsepower of mechanical muscle and be forced back in retreat. Mission Three-Zero Bravo did not kill the flame, which sidetracked, sought new avenues of advance, but with both courage and skill and flying almost blind amid the smoke it held the fire from the Lodge while Alpha and the newly arrived support helicopter continued with the work of the rainmakers.

Inside the Lodge the noise was deafening. The force of the swirling blades beat down upon the corrugated metal roof like a hammer upon a drum, obliterating all other sounds and making conversation impossible. Shutters rattled, a chimney pot crashed down, corrugated roofing sheets began to flap loose, thoughts were shaken by the irresistible frenzy of sound until they fell apart.

Theophilos watched the scene from an upstairs window with a huge grin of relief. The forward march of the flames had been stopped, he felt much better now. He wasn’t going to have to kill anyone after all.

***