15

Wrestling the M-16 from Lyons' hands, Blancanales swung the plastic-and-steel rifle like a baseball bat. Lyons stepped back, letting the rifle stock slice past him, then jumped forward with a kick-and-punch combination. The kick went into Blancanales' ribs as he back-swung the rifle, which smashed Lyons in the arm and shoulder, and knocked him sideways onto a bunk.

Doubled over with pain from the kick, Blancanales could not press his attack. Lyons bounced back and drove another kick at Blancanales. He blocked it with the rifle, the kick bending the stock where it met the receiver. Gasping from the pain in his ankle, Lyons stumbled. He caught Blancanales' uniform, slamming at his friend's face with one fist and clutching him for support with the other hand.

Blancanales spun, throwing Lyons off him. Lyons sprawled on the floor, scrambled to get to his feet as Blancanales swung the bent rifle overhead and brought it down at Lyons' head. Lyons blocked the rifle with a double-arm X block. The plastic stock flew free, leaving Blancanales with the barrel and receiver assembly only. He swung the shortened rifle over his head again, and brought it savagely down.

Lyons rolled to the side so that the rifle hammered down onto the floor. It bent once more. Lurching forward, his gut hurting from the kick, Blancanales slammed the rifle down a third time. Lyons rolled safe again, but then caught the battered weapon before Blancanales could upswing. Still on the floor, Lyons hooked a foot behind Blancanales' knees and dropped him. The bent and broken rifle now in his hands, Lyons started to rise.

"What is your problem, Mr. Morgan?" Furst asked, standing over him, pointing a Colt automatic at Lyons' face.

"Kill that son of a bitch!" Blancanales roared. He held his ribs as he struggled to breathe.

"I thought you two were friends," said Furst.

Blancanales place-kicked Lyons' ribs. A soldier behind Furst rushed forward and shoved Blancanales away. Lyons groaned, choking, his arms knotted over his stomach, his knees touching his forehead. Blancanales laughed. "How's it feel? Feel good? Here comes the night!"

Lunging forward, shoving the soldier aside, Blancanales aimed a second kick for Lyons' head. Lyons rolled, taking the kick in his shoulder. The impact threw him over. Furst pointed the pistol at Blancanales' head.

"At ease, Marchardo. Take a break or I'll kill you. Soldiers!" Furst motioned to the curious soldiers crowding into the barrack. "Restrain that man. Put this other one on a bunk. Someone go for the medic."

Several men pushed Blancanales back. Some of them slapped Marchardo on the back, congratulating him on a good fight. They laughed, shoving Blancanales back when he tried to get at Lyons again. Finally Blancanales sat on a bunk, and laughed with his guards.

Two soldiers bent down to Lyons. He shrugged their hands away and rolled onto one knee. Then he stood painfully, holding his ribs, staggered to a bunk and collapsed.

Furst surveyed the damage. The M-16, incredibly, was a twisted piece of junk. Bunks lay overturned. A line of small-caliber holes stitched the enameled sheet metal of the ceiling. Two large-caliber holes deformed a wall. Trash and bottles from the previous day's and night's victory celebration littered the floor.

"What started this?" Furst asked.

Gadgets pressed through the crowd. He bled from his mouth and a bruise discolored the side of his face. "Morgan drank too much last night. He woke up drunk and hung-over, started carrying on about his wife. And then it was the politicians betraying us in Nam."

"How'd you and Marchardo get involved?"

"Marchardo told him to shut up. Morgan pulled his Magnum out, tried to pistol-whip Marchardo, I grabbed the pistol — it all went from there. Morgan acted crazy."

The camp medic arrived. "Who's hurt?"

Furst pointed at Morgan. "Give that man a twelve-hour sedative. Maybe the other one as well."

"Hey, if you're passing out pills," Gadgets joked, "me too."

"You're taking a ride to town, remember?" Furst told him in a low voice, turning away from the crowd. "I need that equipment. Tonight."

* * *

In a Kingston bar, Bob Paxton and Lieutenant Navarro waited for a Mexican. Another man had told them the Mexican might have information for them. They could do with some information. In two days and nights of crisscrossing Jamaica, passing out money and their hotel phone numbers, they had learned only that the three Americans they followed had left Jamaica in a private plane to Texas.

A hundred dollars had bought the memory of a bartender. Paxton had shown the bartender a photo of the Latin American federal agent, and the bartender remembered the Latin American meeting with a muscled scar-faced American.

Twenty dollars had prompted a doorman to remember a scar-faced man with a thick neck and strong shoulders stopping at a hotel entrance to take the three federal agents away in a rented car.

Three hundred dollars paid for three car rental agency employees to search their records and their memories. They recalled the man with the scars on his face. The records indicated that the agency had sent a driver out to an airfield to bring back a car.

At the airport, a gas-pump attendant remembered one word. A hundred-dollar bill bought that one word, "Texas." He also remembered the plane's tanks taking eighty-five gallons of fuel more than factory specifications.

A police detective came to Paxton's hotel room.

For a thousand dollars, he furnished a folder of photos of the scarred man, and his name: Pardee. Craig Pardee had visited Jamaica several times, the most recent time for two weeks. He traveled with a young blond singer. But his business was hiring mercenaries.

This information conflicted with Paxton's reasoning: if the three men were federal agents, why did they leave with Pardee as mercenaries? The United States government did not employ mercenaries to enforce its drug policies. But then, perhaps the contact with Pardee was part of their cover. Or perhaps the Drug Enforcement Agency wanted to distance itself from the extermination of the drug gangs by using mercenaries. Or perhaps Paxton had been wrong in all his guesses.

The detective had also told Paxton of a group of Mexican drug lords fleeing Mexico. Panicked, paranoid, and wealthy, they hid in a villa outside Kingston. They were guarded by gunmen twenty-four hours a day. One of the gunmen told of an airborne strike by Americans on a remote smuggling base and airfield. There had been no attempts to arrest the gang's personnel, only a slaughter. It was this Mexican that Paxton wanted to interview. For another thousand dollars, the detective told Paxton he would pass on an invitation.

Now Paxton and Lieutenant Navarro waited in the quiet bar, watching tourists wander in from the boulevard. A sunburned brunette dropped coins in a jukebox, selected a reggae record sung in incomprehensible Jamaican patois.

"Is that English?" Navarro asked Paxton in Spanish.

Paxton shook his head, glanced to the door. Two Latins stood there, scanning the interior. One man, with gray hair and a gray mustache, wore a blazing white tropical suit. The other, square shouldered and weighing over two hundred and fifty pounds, kept his right hand under his poorly cut sports coat. Paxton raised a hand to get their attention.

The Mexicans came to their table. The gray-haired man extended his hand to Paxton and Navarro. The heavy man stayed back, his right hand holding his left lapel.

"Buenos dias, gentlemen," the gray-haired man said. "Would you think me terribly impolite if I did not give you my name?"

"No problem, sir," Paxton answered, shaking his hand.

"First, who are you? Are you police?"