"Why didn't you just take off? Make for the horizon!"

Furst gave Pardee a knowing grin. "Then Monroe would send youafter me. And if I offed you, he'd send ten more. And if I got them, he'd send a hundred. You don't mess with someone who can buy every freelance shooter in the world. Makes for bad experiences."

"Speaking of shooters, I got three new recruits who're good. One man's great."

"You still hiring men? We don't have time to train them."

"They don't need it. They're trainer material themselves. One guy speaks Mexican, one guy's a deadeye, pistols and rifles, and one's supposed to be an electronics freak. I'm going to work them into the raid tomorrow night."

"An electronics man?" Furst wondered out loud. "And a marksman? Let's talk to these fellows."

* * *

The base offered two first-run movies a night. Walking to the theater next to the PX, Lyons and Blancanales saw a jeep driven by Craig Pardee stop at the gate. The sentries saluted the two men in the open jeep, and the electric gates started open.

"I wonder who the hardcase with Pardee is," Blancanales said to Lyons. There was no answer. Blancanales glanced around for his friend. He was alone in the roadway.

"Hsst!" The signal came from the shadows between the prefab offices.

"What's with you, Morgan?" Blancanales stepped into the darkness. "What..."

Even in the shadows, Blancanales saw the panic in Lyons' eyes. Blancanales pushed Lyons farther back into total darkness.

"What's wrong?" Blancanales whispered.

Lyons forced his voice to be calm. "I want you to denounce me. Tell Pardee I said something, I did something. Tell him I wanted you to get a message out to the Feds. Anything."

"What're you talking about? They'll take you apart, you'll die."

"Do it fast and you can save yourself and Gadgets. The officer next to Pardee, that's Robert Furst. Last time I saw him was in court. I helped put him away for five years, armed robbery. I tell you, I'm dead."

8

Mercenaries stood to attention as Furst and Pardee strode into the barracks. Men abandoned magazines and checkerboards, stood beside their bunks. Wearing towels, pressed fatigues, or embroidered Afghan smoking robes, they saluted as their officers passed.

"Luther Schwarz!" Pardee shouted.

Sprawled on his upper bunk, Gadgets looked toward the loud voice as his hand went to the razor-sharp bayonet under his pillow. But he noted that Pardee and the other officer had no armed soldiers with them. Gadgets slid off the bunk and saluted.

"This is Commander Furst," Pardee announced. "I told him you are an electronics technician. What is your specialty?"

"Tricks."

"What kind of tricks?" Pardee demanded.

"Electronic tricks."

"That doesn't tell us much," Furst broke in. "How about giving us a briefing on what you've done for other people?"

Gadgets glanced around to the crowd of mercenaries in the barrack room. He nodded toward the door. "Let's talk out there."

On the way out, they met Blancanales. "And here's the man who speaks Mexican," Pardee told Furst.

"Join us," Furst said to Blancanales. "We might have an op for you tomorrow night."

Outside, Pardee leaned against the jeep. "So what can you do for us?"

"You said there's going to be an operation," Gadgets started. "Give me an idea of what your operation is, and I'll tell you how I can help."

"Where's Morgan?" Pardee asked Blancanales.

"He went to the movies. You need him?"

Pardee looked to Furst. Furst said, "I'll talk to him later. Here's what we're doing tomorrow night. At sunset, Captain Pardee is taking four troopships south. There's a doper base in the mountains down there. It has an airfield, thousands of gallons of fuel in tanks, good buildings, a defensible road. We need to take it intact. We need to take it quickly, so quickly that they can't get a message out on their radio. If your friend Morgan is familiar with a Starlite scope, we can use him. And you, Marchardo, we can use you and your Spanish. But I'm not sure how electronics could play a role."

"You're going south," Gadgets said. "Then the helicopters come back?"

Furst nodded.

"That means you'll be flying through American radar twice. Means you'll be in Mexico all night. That's two air forces that'll be looking to give you trouble. If you're flying treetop low, maybe they won't spot you. But what happens if they've got a plane with downward-looking radar? What if a dope patrol locks on you? You're going to have to get back here without it following you. And what happens if your doper target has radar? They can afford it."

"We plan to drop the men on the far side of mountain," Furst told him. "Then march over the top."

"Okay, but you can't have your soldiers walk all the way back here. So I could put together an assortment of anti-radar devices — I can't make the Hueys disappear, but I can confuse anyone who's chasing you."

"With what?"

"You have an electronics shop here, for your radios and things," Gadgets said. Furst nodded. "Then take me there. I'll see what I can put together."

Furst turned to Pardee. "Get a Starlite rifle from the armory, take Morgan out to the firing range, see how he does. I'll walk this man over to the electronics shop."

"Come on, Marchardo," Pardee ordered Blancanales as he climbed into the jeep. "Looks like Morgan misses the movie."

* * *

Staring at the screen without seeing the images, Lyons waited. The film's story followed the recruitment of a mercenary force to attack an African nation. After corporate executives struck an agreeable deal with the nation's leaders, the executives abandoned the soldiers of fortune to the mercy of thousands of Cuban-led Simba cutthroats. The scenes of death, dismemberment and heroism brought bursts of laughter from the real-life mercenaries in the audience. Soldiers guzzled their rations of beer, then threw the cans at the screen. Storms of popcorn flew in the air. Soldiers ad-libbed, shouting advice to the actors. Other soldiers argued with the advice.

Chaos and noise, so no one noticed Blancanales slip into the seat beside Lyons. "How's the flick?"

"No one's started shooting yet," Lyons replied.

Bursts of machine-gun fire, mortar blasts and screaming came from the screen. Blancanales pointed. "Then what's that?"

"I mean in here." Lyons indicated the audience of mercenaries around them. Both of them laughed briefly. Lyons asked: "What's going on?"

"Your shooting impressed Pardee, so you've got a chance. They want you and me to go on an operation tomorrow night. Furst went over to the electronics shop to see what Gadgets can do. Pardee's waiting outside. We're supposed to go out to the firing range and check you out on a Starlite. You sure Furst would recognize you?"

Lyons grinned. "You bet your life. And Gadgets' life too."

"Furst won't be out at the firing range. I think we should risk it, it'll be dark soon. You got a chance."

"What about tomorrow?"

"Tomorrow's another day."

They left the seats and wove through the shouting, beer-drinking, popcorn-heaving mercenaries. At the exit, Lyons stopped Blancanales: "The way we have our stories worked out, I'm the newcomer. You and Gadgets can deny it all. Turn me in, and you've got a chance." Blancanales shook his head, no.

* * *

Searching through racks of components, Gadgets made a list. A plastic bucket containing discarded solid-state circuit boards toppled from the top of the rack and crashed to the floor. Gadgets glanced at the spilled circuit boards. He picked one up and scratched a component from the list.

Televisions filled the workshop. Remote-controlled pan/tilt/zoom units lined one wall. A technician cleaned a mass of gears with a fine brush as he talked with Furst: