The Hidden Target Read online

  Mac pointed to the empty compound. “Look!” Two dark shapes were coming slowly out of the armoury’s shadow, still unsteady, still unsure of what had happened to them. “My God, Sal, an hour you said. Like hell it was.”

  Sal raised a hand for silence, his eyes on the main house. “Don’t move yet,” he whispered.

  Renwick and Mac exchanged a puzzled glance, but they stayed where they were. The door to the terrace opened, a path of bright light spread half-way towards the fence. The silhouette of a man stood at the threshold took three-dimensional shape as he crossed the flagstones. He halted again, looked around the compound as if puzzled. Then his hands went to his lips. The whistle cut through the night. The Dobermans heard it. They came slowly around the armoury’s end wall, hesitated. A second whistle, and they were out of their dream world. Obediently, they began their patrol. “Don’t play tricks with me,” the man yelled at them. He turned to go inside, met the small fat cook. “Lazy sons of bitches,” he was saying, “thought they’d take it easy for...” The voice dwindled to nothing as the door was shut behind the two men.

  Who’s the lazy son of a bitch? Renwick was thinking. He rose and led the way. Mac made an effort and smothered his fit of laughter. Sal was grinning widely. “Wonder who’s winning that game,” he said softly.

  They were over the top of the hill. Their pace increased on the home slope, the lights of Buena Vista welcoming them from behind carefully drawn curtains. Just as we left it, thought Renwick as they reached the back porch and heard the radio playing. First, we’ll unload our gear: next, food and drink; then questions and answers. He could sense Sal’s impatience. “Yes,” he said to hold him meanwhile, “we got something. Enough, I think, to make Washington’s eyes pop.”

  “Then it was worth it?” Sal asked.

  “It was worth it.”

  Mac had a sudden fit of laughter. “Those dogs—” His laughter choked his words. “Groggy. A couple of old soaks—” The laughter increased.

  Sal looked at the usually solemn MacEwan in amazement. “He has these attacks,” Renwick said. “Just be thankful he didn’t let one explode on the hillside. Come on, let’s heat up that soup. I’m starved.” Strange ways we all have, he thought. After tension and fear are over, I get hungry. Mac goes into uncontrollable laughter. And Sal? Renwick studied him as he got rid of his tools, placing them carefully in a neat group on a counter top. There was much more to Sal than he, or Mac, had ever surmised. Chauffeur, cook, guardian angel? Not on your life, Renwick told himself. Without him we’d have accomplished little. He watched Sal unfasten the light harness that held the throwing knife between his shoulder blades. “Thank God you didn’t have to use that,” Renwick said.

  Sal only smiled.

  ***

  Supper was quickly eaten. The windows were firmly closed, the radio turned on once more. The three men still sat at the table, plates pushed aside.

  “So here’s what we learned from the barn,” Renwick said. “It looks abandoned, shuttered tight. But it is a classroom, with desks and chairs and good lighting. Air conditioning, too. The blackboard behind a lectern had been rubbed clean—except for some faint chalk marks on one low corner. They didn’t mean much at first, until we began examining the big maps fixed on the wall. I took photographs of them—directed the strong light on the lectern at them, hoped they’ll be clear enough. Three maps. One of them covered the south-eastern states with red circles near certain small towns, but not on highways or roads. The circles were on railway lines. That was Mac’s discovery: freight routes for inflammable material, dangerous chemicals.”

  Mac turned modest. “I just noticed one of the circles was crossed off, and remembered the name of the town. A bad derailment near there three weeks ago: town evacuated; two deaths; everything blamed on faulty equipment.”

  Renwick went on. “The next map showed the United States—not the usual relief map. Just a large stretch of white paper with the states outlined, and across them a spider web of black lines: heavy for main highways, thinner for first-class roads. Only certain towns were named. Near them, or within reach by road, were small red squares. We recognised some of these locations—major storage facilities for oil. At first we wondered if the markings meant atomic energy plants, but these can be dealt with by someone on the inside who forgets to turn a little wheel, or turns the wrong one. You don’t need a squad of trained terrorists for that job.”

  “The third map was a real puzzler,” Mac said. “It was a city, streets and buildings clearly plotted but unnamed. However, the layout—if you knew Washington—became recognisable.”

  “Washington?” Sal asked. “And where were the red markings this time? The White House, the Cap—”

  “No. Not the White House. Not the Capitol. Not the busy centre of the city, either. They were—most of them—in a row along one street. Bob’s guess was—foreign embassies.”

  “Embassies?” Sal was incredulous.

  Renwick said, “Seize them, blackmail their governments, prevent them from helping America when she’s under attack.”

  Sal stared at them in open disbelief. “Listen you two—” he said, suddenly breaking into a broad smile—“railroads, oil and gas storage, embassies. And all that taken care of by six young bastards with a week’s training behind them?”

  “Six young bastards each week,” Renwick reminded him. “Rancho San Carlos has already been in operation for three weeks at least. Give it free rein until the end of the year. How many trained terrorists by then? A hundred and fourteen. All ready to command their own groups of men.”

  “Could be even more,” Mac said sombrely. “Once Gunter establishes that Foundation for Ecological Studies, he’ll extend the numbers. Demolition, of course, would have to stop— unless he adds field trips out into the desert areas.”

  “But how good is their training?” Sal persisted.

  Renwick said, “It’s a refresher course. These guys aren’t novices. It’s just possible they’ve been brought here to learn how to operate as a team. Perhaps,” he added with a pointed look at Sal, “we won’t have one hundred and fourteen expert terrorists on call by the end of the year. We’ll have nineteen well-functioning squads, capable of instructing others in close teamwork.”

  “Not funny,” Sal said slowly. His dark eyes narrowed as he stared at the fireplace and its dying embers. “Equipment—how do you rate it?”

  “Simple but effective. It can be just as deadly as more sophisticated hardware. And it’s easier to procure.”

  “What’s their purpose? Complete anarchy?”

  “It could end that way.” And that was more than Theo and his friends had been aiming for. Break down a dam, release a flood of water that would serve their needs; but what if it reached the strength of a tidal wave? They’d be swept away along with the rest of us. Poor comfort, thought Renwick.

  There was a brief silence. Renwick’s quiet voice continued. “We didn’t find much in the desks. Just some textbooks on explosives. Elementary stuff but good for hard basic training. Also several mimeographed sheets dealing with urban guerrillas, treatment for tanks and armoured cars in city areas. I filched a specimen.” He went into his hip pocket and produced a folded sheet, handed it over to Sal.

  Mac said, “There was a communications set-up in one corner of the barn. Nothing too elaborate, just enough to teach them some electronic facts.”

  “What about the chalk marks on the blackboard?” Sal handed back the mimeographed sheet to Renwick.

  Mac pulled out his note-book, opened it to the page with his copy of the marks. “Juncture of railroad tracks. A neat place for dynamite, I presume.”

  For a long minute, Sal sat glaring down at the table. He pushed aside his coffee cup and rose. “Yes,” he said to Renwick, “the sooner the FBI gets into this, the better. I’ll contact the boss late tomorrow afternoon—Sunday. He should be back in New York by then. He leaves for London that night.”

  “I’ll contact London, too. They’ll get in t
ouch with Washington.” We need someone at the highest level to start pushing the right buttons, Renwick decided. “I don’t want our report, with copies of our photographs and that mimeographed sheet, to be dropped into an in tray and left lying on someone’s desk while he makes up his blasted mind whether to risk his promotion. I don’t want someone, either, who’ll read it and go shrieking the news to the outer office. Or someone who likes to leak hints to reporters, just to show his importance. None of that. We need someone who can start the action, and keep his own lip buttoned as well as all his agents’ lips. They’ll want time to observe, to follow the terrorists when they scatter from Escondido. Not too much time, I hope. If it were left to me, I’d gut out that suppurating sore next week.”

  “But we don’t,” Mac said regretfully. “We discover the facts, make our report, and fade away.” He pulled himself on to his feet. “I’m fading right now, upstairs, into a sweet, soft bed. Call it a day, Bob.”

  “Shortly.” Renwick listened to their heavy footsteps slowly making their way to their rooms. We’re all dropping with fatigue, he thought. But we did the job. We did it; and left no trace. What remains to be done? Tomorrow, an urgent message for Merriman & Co., full report to follow next week; and a look, if possible, at the busload of new arrivals. On Monday— Gunter. How do I manage to see him? He could identify me, too. If he is Maartens. Maartens and Amsterdam and a green camper changed to brown, and Theo behind it all.

  He knew this stage of exhaustion well. The mind was lost in a maze of possibilities and every solution ended in blank depression. They should have been celebrating their small victory tonight. Instead, all three of them could only think of the grim threat they had uncovered. To America. To the rest of the free world, too. Why else the foreign embassies? Blackmailed by terror into inaction? Allies split apart?

  He roused himself, rose and switched off the radio, the lights, opened the front door. He stood there breathing the clean cool air, looking at the darkened mass of endless hills and valleys, listening to the deep silence of a sleeping land. At last he turned back and locked the door. A sleeping land, but with hidden strength, too. Remembering that, he felt better. He went upstairs ready to face tomorrow.

  18

  On Sunday morning, the message went out to Merriman’s listening station in Grace Street. Renwick kept it brief: he’d take the full report to London himself and, with luck, that could be in a few days’ time. It was enough now to give Gilman the essential facts about Rancho San Carlos and let him contact Washington for an immediate response—if not action, then certainly containment. Renwick also appended advice about Frank Cooper: on his arrival Monday, get him to postpone his visit to Grace Street—not only for its security but also for his own safety; tell him to stick to the law business until Theo’s interest in him had cooled off. Frank wouldn’t like the suggestion, but he would listen.

  The message was received and acknowledged. Two hours later, Gilman sent a terse answer: Will co-operate fully. Renwick relaxed and began planning some ways of slowing up the minibus later that afternoon. Keep it simple, he warned himself: all you need are photographs, a head count, a check on the bald instructor. Was he a regular, a permanent part of the training programme?

  So just before noon Sal paid a visit to Sawyer Springs in search of a Sunday paper and stayed for a chat with a couple of old-timers who sat on a bench outside the General Store and watched the passing traffic. There were three cars in twenty minutes by Sal’s count, one of them stopping for directions to Palomar. “They’re always getting lost,” he was told as the car left. “Should have kept on the highway instead of coming around here.”

  “This road rejoins the highway, doesn’t it?”

  “About seven miles past the last house. A bad stretch of road, too. They’ll be turning back. Just wait and see.”

  “The last house? Where’s that?”

  “Eight miles up the road. Used to be a big ranch. Horses.”

  “Oh, the San Carlos place? Miss Gladstone was telling us about it. A lot of new money. That should be good for business.”

  “Haven’t seen it.” A look was cast in the direction of the gas station. “Stan was expecting some. Didn’t get it.”

  “I’d have thought there would have been a lot of gas sold. It’s a big establishment, Miss Gladstone said.”

  “They don’t go driving around. Don’t keep many cars anyway.”

  Only a jeep, Sal learned, and Mr. Gunter’s Mercedes-Benz. A beauty. Silver-grey and fast, held the road, didn’t need to slow down for the turns. Serviced in Escondido. Understandable, it was admitted: no spare parts for it here. The workmen didn’t bring their cars. A small bus was provided for them by the contractor. Saved energy, it might be said; this gas shortage and all; was there an oil shortage? Never knew what these big companies were up to.

  Sal got the drifting talk back to its moorings. “A bus can use a lot of energy, too. That is, if it makes many trips back and forth.” It didn’t do that; Saturdays to Escondido, Sundays back here. He could see for himself if he just waited around until four-thirty. He’d see the truck, too. Brought in supplies for the week. Nothing too good for these boys.

  “A truck? They must eat a lot.” And need constant supplies of ammunition and explosives. Sal, leaving a couple of laughs behind him, waved good-day and went back to Buena Vista empty-handed. There had been no newspaper to buy: all copies spoken for.

  ***

  By quarter past four, Mac was driving the Chevrolet into the service station at Sawyer Springs. “Can you spare a few gallons? My tank is half empty.” The owner and sole attendant (Stan, if Sal was correct) was glad to oblige, glad to talk with someone new. “Pretty quiet around here,” Mac said as he got out of the car. He didn’t have to add anything more. Sure it was quiet: few Sunday drivers, scared they’d run out of gas, what did you expect with all the odd-and-even-day rules, and the rising prices and that OPEC and those oil companies? The surmises and opinions lasted a full ten minutes. Then water and oil were checked while Mac strolled around the car and listened sympathetically to Stan’s woes as a small business-man.

  Mac halted, turning his back to the road as he heard a heavy engine coming uphill into Main Street. He raised his hand to his lips, kept watching. Quietly, he spoke into the small transmitter hidden in his palm. “Small truck. Passing now.”

  “Who found the goddammed oil wells anyway?” Stan was asking as he polished the windshield. “If I had my way...” He broke off, stood hands on hips, looking at the bus now travelling into sight.

  “Bus. About to pass,” Mac told his transmitter. He shut it off as he slipped it back into his pocket, took out a cigarette. “Have one?” he asked Stan. Not one head in the bus was turned in their direction.

  “Don’t even give us a good-day,” Stan said, staring after them. He noticed the offered cigarette, shook his head. “Gave up the habit when I bought this place, started working the pump.”

  “Who was Sawyer?” Mac asked, getting into the car.

  “Who?”

  “Sawyer.”

  “Oh, him. Been dead for ninety years.”

  “Where are the springs?”

  “They dried up.”

  Like everything else around here, thought Mac. He reached for his wallet. “What’s the damage?”

  He paid, talked some more. There was no need to hurry. Up at Buena Vista, a traffic jam should be in progress.

  ***

  Sal let the truck pass. Then, as he received Mac’s message signalling the approach of the bus, he began backing the station wagon out of Buena Vista’s driveway. He turned the wheel just enough to put the big Dodge at an angle athwart the road. There, he stalled the engine, kept trying to restart it. All he created was a series of rasping sounds and a strong smell of gasoline.

  Perfect, thought Renwick. He was well hidden by bushes, his favourite camera ready. The bus ought to come around the curve of road below the driveway and stop. There would be plenty of curses and genuine confu
sion until Sal could get the ignition started again and angle the station wagon around to face downhill. Even that last manoeuvre would take time: the Dodge was long, the road narrow.

  The bus came around the turn, groaned to a halt. Renwick was barely fifteen feet away from it. He didn’t expect a clear view of faces through glass windows, but he did hope to get— if curiosity and surprise were strong enough—several heads stuck out of the windows to see what the hell was going on. His hopes weren’t disappointed. He began photographing. Six newcomers, he counted. And the baldheaded instructor.

  They stayed inside the bus, let their driver get out to yell at Sal. “You’re flooding it! Let your foot off the pedal. Stop pumping, goddamn it!” There were accompanying calls from the bus, far from complimentary. Sal pressed the pedal firmly to the floor, held it there, gauged when he could turn the ignition, and got the motor running. Now it was a matter of straightening the car. The bus driver shook his head, walked back, yelling now at his passengers to shut up. Renwick managed two pictures of him before he climbed into his seat. A good one, too, of old Baldy coming to the door to talk with him. And one, of course, of the rear registration plate of the bus as, at last, it started moving. Once past the station wagon, it picked up speed and soon was out of sight.

  Mac returned from his visit to the gas station and found Renwick and Sal with broad smiles on their faces. “So it worked,” he said with relief. He had had doubts. They went indoors to have a quiet drink to celebrate.