Gates of Hades (4 page)

As the
Zodiac
continued its slow circuit, Jason noticed the twin anchors hanging from hatches that opened just above the waterline. The hatches were designed to close once the anchors were retrieved so that a streamlined surface would be presented to the sea when the vessel was under way. One end of the anchor chains disappeared into
the water, the other into a port in the hull. Would it be possible . . . ?

Jason lazily turned to retrace his course and pass the line of yachts again. This time he stopped under the bow of the
Fortune,
the one place he could not be observed by anyone on board. He surveyed the anchor hatch carefully, mentally measuring the openings through which the anchor lines passed into the ship. He shook his head. Tight but unguarded.

He turned the
Zodiac
's bow toward the harbor's mouth and sped toward the roads.

Minutes later he pulled abeam of a small sloop that bobbed gently at its anchor buoy. A United States flag hung limply from the rigging of the single mast, along with shirts, swimsuits, and other drying laundry. Canvas was draped over the mainsail's boom to shelter the cockpit from the afternoon sun. Salsa music, probably radio from Puerto Rico, filled the air. Its appearance was similar to the number of small craft gently rolling in the swells nearby, one more indistinguishable small American boat making a stop at St. Bart's in view of the town surrounded by verdant hills.

Carefully balancing against the motion of the
Zodiac,
he stood and rapped loudly on the fiberglass hull. “Paco, Paco, wake up!”

The reaction was immediate.

Joyous barking was followed by the scratch of paws on the deck. A shaggy canine head was followed by a thick brown body that vibrated with a furiously wagging tail. Deep brown eyes regarded Jason with what in a woman could have been described as lust.

The dog's appearance finally pushed the melancholy of the painting from Jason's mind like a breeze clearing away clouds. He couldn't have suppressed a smile had he wanted to. “Miss me, did you, Pangloss? Go get Paco.”

The dog turned in a complete circle.

“Paco, wake Paco. There's a hamburger in it for you,” Jason coaxed.

The dog disappeared. Seconds later there was an explosion of Spanish invective as the boat rocked from shifting weight. A man came into view, bare to the waist. Jason could see the network of pink scars across his chest, souvenirs of torture during captivity by Colombia's ruthless and brutal rebels, FARC. Rumor said every man who had so much as nicked Paco took days to die once he got free and turned on his captors. Large, with hair tousled from sleep, he was wiping a hand the size of a bear's paw across his dark face.

“Fookin' dog! He lick my face, mon. I
hate
bein' licked in th' face!”

“Lucky he didn't piss on you to get you awake.” Jason tossed the
Zodiac
's painter aboard the sloop. “How 'bout tying me off?”

Still grumbling, Paco made his way to the stern to secure the rubber craft, and Jason scrambled aboard.

“Don' know why you hadda bring th' fookin' dog.” Paco was still griping as he made his way forward.

“Consider Pangloss cover.” Jason was scratching between the animal's pointed ears. “Who would think a boat with a dog on board was on anything but a pleasure cruise?”

Pangloss combined the ears of a German shepherd with the long hair of a collie and the size of both. Jason was fairly certain there were other breeds in the animal's uncertain ancestry. Jason began to scratch underneath the pointed jaw. Pangloss was in ecstacy.

“Coulda brought a fookin' cat instead.” Paco was headed below. “Cats don' lick your face.”

Jason followed, Pangloss on his heels. “Whoever heard of a loyal cat? You think a cat would guard the ship while we're gone?”

“Cat wouldn't shit on the deck. Fookin' cats are clean, man.”

Paco opened the small refrigerator in the tiny galley, popped open a bottle of Caribe beer, and offered it to Jason.
“You want cover, we shoulda brought a couple of fookin' womens. They could guard the ship
and
not shit on the deck. An' we could get laid.”

Jason sipped on the beer as Paco opened another and folded down the hinged galley table. “We finish here, you'll have all the time you need for women. And money.”

Paco became serious. “You get what we need?”

Jason turned off the radio and slipped a CD into the stereo. Brisk but melodic strands of Vivaldi's violins replaced the Latin beat.

Paco shook his massive head. “Man, that moosic sound like a somebody put two cats in th' same sack.”

Ignoring the complaint, Jason squeezed past the larger man to reach into the refrigerator and pull out a bit of ground beef. He had Pangloss's undivided attention. The dog sat, salivating.

Jason held out the treat. “Okay!”

The meat disappeared to the accompaniment of a satisfied gulp.

Jason took the paper from his pocket. “I think we have it. She drew a diagram showing the location of the master stateroom. As you know, we're doing a ‘rendition,' capturing the guy here and then rendezvousing with the ship at sea to turn him over.”

“Then what?”

“Not our business. Once the U.S. Navy has him safely out of somebody's territorial waters, I'd guess there'll be some fairly serious interrogation, something the Geneva Convention doesn't exactly cover.”

Rendition
was a CIA term for kidnapping someone from a sovereign nation and spiriting them away to where there were no bounds on interrogation methods. Having the actual capture performed by someone unconnected to the government gave at least technical truth to the constant denial of the practice.

Paco turned on a swivel-necked lamp, and both men stared at the paper before Paco said, “You fookin' better
hope she know what she doin', man. Won't be but one chance.”

Jason nodded. “One chance, if that.”

“Who is this guy, anyway?” Paco wanted to know.

“Aziz Saud Alazar,” Jason said. “ 'Nother of those Saudi princes who speaks Islam and acts Western. Bad dude, a graduate of Christ College, Oxford, as well as a number of schools for terrorists the Russkies operated in the seventies. Got into the arms-smuggling business just before the Evil Empire fell. Word on the street is he can broker the sale of anything from a slightly used F-14 fighter to a small Pakistani nuclear device. Sells to al-Qaeda, Hamas, Russian separatists, African dictators, anybody in the market for death and destruction. I'd guess someone wants his customer list.”

Paco drained his beer and reached for the fridge to replace it. “So, what's one o' them camel fookers doin' here? No mosque widdin a hunnert miles or more.”

“Get me one too, will you? Alazar's not like your basic fanatical fundamentalist, more like another Royal House of Saud playboy. His religion apparently doesn't stand in the way of his receiving a nice hunk of change for his efforts. He spends lavishly on the Riviera, the casino in Monte Carlo, or on the slopes at St. Moritz. He was there only until recognized. Then he disappeared minutes ahead of the French security people. Probably returned to safe haven in Syria.”

Paco popped the tops and handed one of the frosty bottles to Jason. “Shudda known it'd be somebody causin' shit. You don' do much other 'n spoil somebody else's party, go after the guys dealin' in killin' folks. Almost like you got somethin' personal against ordinary international crooks.”

The statement was more astute than Jason would have expected from Paco. He took the beer and put it to his lips before answering. “I just do my job and collect my pay.”

It was obvious Paco didn't accept this observation, but
he didn't choose to challenge it, either. “Ho-kay. I unnerstan' we bring this one back alive to question.”

Jason was on more certain ground. “Like I said, I'd guess our soon-to-be pal Alazar sold some really bad shit to the wrong people. Our customer would like to know what and who. We bring him back alive, turn him over to the spooks. They turn him over to someone who thinks the Geneva Convention is a meeting of watchmakers and chocolate manufacturers. They can make him talk. Some set of bad guys find out their secret isn't so secret anymore.”

Paco had already emptied his bottle. He tossed it into the garbage with a wistful look at the refrigerator. “I get it: no more stink like the 'merican press made a few years back about puttin' panties on some fookers' heads, havin' dogs bark at 'em, in that prison in Iraq, Abu Ghraib.”

Jason shrugged, a signal of indifference. “Suit me fine to punch his ticket right here, but orders are orders. Besides, taking him prisoner we got a real talking point, things don't go so well aboard that boat.”

Paco was digging around in the little refrigerator for something to eat. Over his shoulder he asked, “How'd we know th' fooker was here, anyway?”

Jason shook his head. “Don't ask me; I just work here, same as you. I do know the boat flies the Cayman flag.”

Under the table, where Paco thought it wouldn't be seen, his hand was rubbing Pangloss's long snout. Paco's dislike of the dog was a charade that gave the burly Hispanic something to grouse about. “So does ever' big yacht in the Caribbean. No tellin' where it really came from.”

“This one came from over there.” He pointed to where the hills of St. Martin were clearly visible less than twenty miles away. “At least, that's where Alazar boarded her.”

“Island's half French, half Dutch,” Paco said, as though that explained its role as a point of origin.

“Yep,” Jason agreed as he slid out a computer keyboard concealed underneath the table. He typed in a brief message.
When he hit enter, the electronics would automatically encode and compress the words into an unintelligible beep of less than a second's time. A satellite overhead would relay what sounded like mere static to equipment that would decode and print the words. The signal would be untraceable and indecipherable.

He finished and pushed the keyboard back in, then lifted the tabletop. He stretched and yawned. “May as well nap. We aren't going to get a lot of sleep tonight.”

Though neither would admit it to the other, both men knew there was no chance the adrenaline pumping through their systems would permit sleep.

By midnight the dark water of the harbor reflected lights from the adjacent bars and restaurants like jewels on black velvet. Music from Escalier, a gathering place for the younger visitors to the island, reverberated across the harbor with enough volume to cover the sounds of the small craft that scooted between entertainment establishments like water spiders. It was because of the activity of the island's nightlife that Jason and Paco had decided to move now, rather than wait for the silence of early morning, when the sound of an outboard might draw attention.

Jason maneuvered the
Zodiac
into the space between the
Fortune
and the ship to her port, where both hulls created a shadow on the water as black and viscous as used motor oil. For a full five minutes they listened to the tide sucking at the ship, the anchor chain's metallic groan, the sound of revelry across the harbor. Hair on the back of Jason's neck prickled like tiny antennae anticipating danger signals. It was a familiar experience.

The
Zodiac
's arrival had not been noted. Jason tied the painter to the anchor chain.

There was a metallic click as Jason checked the nine-millimeter SIG Sauer P228 automatic. Thirteen rounds in the magazine, another in the chamber. Two spare clips in quick-release holders on his belt. A good compromise between
weight and firepower, the Swiss pistol still was hardly a match for the weaponry Alazar was likely to have on board. Jason's plan required a quick in and out, something the weight of heavier equipment would only impede. If Jason and Paco needed superior armament, they would already be in serious trouble. Replacing the pistol in the holster slung over his Kevlar vest, Jason inspected the rest of his gear as best he could in the poor light.

“Ready?”

Paco's silhouette glanced up the anchor chain and shook its head slowly. “A fookin' rat couldn' get though there, man,” he whispered.

“A fat rat, you mean.” Jason tugged on a pair of work gloves, pulled himself out of the
Zodiac
by the anchor chain, and began to climb. “You'll have to suck in your gut.”

When Jason was halfway up the chain, Paco began his climb. Both men moved slowly, aware that a slip, a mistake, could set the chain into motion, clanging against the steel skin of the ship like an alarm bell.

At the top of the chain Jason stood on the lip of the anchor hatch, holding on to the chain for balance. Darkness prevented him from seeing Paco, but the larger man's grunts marked his progress. When Paco stood panting alongside Jason, Jason took a small flashlight from his pocket and played its narrow beam on the opening where the chain disappeared into the hull.

“No fookin' way, man,” Paco whispered. “No way I can squeeze through there.”

He was right.

“You'll have to take off your vest,” Jason said. “And lay off the beer and chips before the next time.”

Headfirst, Jason crawled through the hole into stygian darkness. The flashlight revealed a triangular room of no more than fifty square feet containing coils of rope, a toolbox bolted to the wall, and a motor for the electric winches overhead. The apex of the triangle was the ship's bow; the bulkhead that was its base contained a small door.

Jason tried the door. It refused to yield.

“Fook! I'm stuck!” Paco's head and shoulders filled the opening.

Jason suppressed a grin before he realized his face was in darkness. “Wriggle a little more. You look like somebody's hunting trophy mounted on a wall.”

“Real funny, man.”

Jason switched off the light and returned his attention to the door, squatting to peer along the edges. There was no watertight seal above the coaming, as there would have been on a military vessel. Through the space between the door and its frame he could make out dim light. He removed a diver's knife from its sheath on his ankle.