So-where was Eladio? He tried to close his mind off from disturbing images of a firefight aboard the yacht. He saw "The Absinthe Drinker" shot up with holes, Baudelaire's manic eyes peering out from under the brim of his top hat, bursting into flames, the boat rocked by explosions-

"Esteban!"

"Si, Niño?"

"Turn off that shit! I said classical."

Puzzled, Esteban switched off Charo. The crepuscular sounds of the river reasserted themselves-frog, cricket, beetle, bird-until they were drowned out by an organ version of "Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing."

34

Charley stepped out onto Esmeralda's flight deck wearing his flight suit and.45 snugged in its shoulder holster and took a deep breath. He hadn't slept but a few hours since the Indian attack, and for the first time since it had all begun, he felt his age. It was dark out, an hour to sunrise. Hot Stick was leaning over one of the UAVs-Fat Albert-adding nitromethane to the fuel mixture. Charley's nostrils tingled from the vapors; it woke him up, gave him a little energy charge. The smell was familiar somehow; then he remembered sitting in the back of the limousine with his sinuses full of gun oil, on the way to the morgue with Felix.

He reached inside the chopper for the radio handset. "Where is everyone?"

"Grasshopper Three, in position."

"Grasshopper Four, in position."

"One and Two, where are you?" Charley said. "State your positions, please."

Felix's voice came on. "Mac says we're a hundred yards from our position. I think we're lost. I can't see anything. Over."

Charley said, "Roger that. Stand by. We are preparing to launch." He gave Hot Stick the signal.

Hot Stick had the leaf blower going, funneling air into the turbines of the Thunderbolt to get them spinning. He held up the spark coil in his other hand and said, "Ready." Charley nodded. He touched the spark coil to the engine. A burst of flame appeared from the afterburner. Charley nodded again; Hot Stick hit the lever release on the catapult and the A-10 shot off Esmeralda's cantilevered flight deck.

Hot Stick maneuvered the joysticks on one of the five Futaba transmitters, bringing Slow Boy into a holding pattern above Esmeralda. The Futabas were all wired into a Toshiba laptop computer. He switched Slow Boy's controls over to the computer and got ready to launch the two F/A-18s, already positioned in the bow cats. Charley nodded; Hot Stick released the two levers and the Blue Hornets sailed off, climbing effortlessly as if their small size exempted them from gravity's demands, joining Slow Boy.

Charley and Hot Stick lifted Fat Albert out of its cradle and onto the catapult, gingerly, considering. Hot Stick fired its engine and sent it off. They watched the fireball climb and join the three orange specks circling two hundred feet above.

Charley was about to say some words he'd memorized from the St. Crispin's Day speech in Henry V when Hot Stick said, "Awesome, huh?" He climbed into the Hughes with his control apparatus and strapped himself in.

Charley crossed himself. Then he went forward to Esmeralda's flagstaff. He hauled it up the halyard: a red-and-white pennant followed by an "S" pennant, then a "Q" pennant and a "I" pennant. They hung there undramatically in the breezeless pre-dawn air. He climbed into the Hughes and closed the door and started the helicopter's engines.

"What's with the flags?" Hot Stick shouted over the roar.

"'I Am Attacking,'" said Charley.

It is tricky taking off from the small deck of a boat in a helicopter, and Charley was a tad rusty at it. You need to create what's called "ground-effect cover"-the cushion of air that holds the craft up. The moment a helicopter moves off over the water, it's like a trapdoor dropping underneath; you have to put your nose down to gain compensating forward speed.

Charley powered up to a hundred percent, moved off over the water and then pushed down on the cyclic stick between his legs, which put the chopper's nose down. He overdid it. Suddenly all he could see was river, coming up at him too fast. He pulled back on the collective, increasing the pitch of the rotor blades, and forcing more air over them, giving the craft lift. The skids dipped into the water. They were water-skiing. Finally the skids came out of the water. He gained speed quickly and climbed to a hundred feet.

"This is Dragonfly," he said into the radio. "I am airborne."

Hot Stick had lost all his color. Charley said to him, "That's the hardest part, taking off."

They were in the boathouse, everyone dozing. Eladio had still not returned.

Popo's voice came over the radio, loud and excited, "Niño, Niño! I have something on the radar. One definite target and something else, I can't tell, it's not clear."

"What's the position, the range?"

"Three kilometers. It's over the river, north of us."

"Where's Beni?"

"Asleep."

"Wake him up. Tell him to get the Stinger ready."

"Si, Niño. Should I give them a warning?"

"No. It can't be military. Espinosa always gives us notice ahead of time. Tell Beni to fire. Shoot the first thing he sees."

"Si, Niño."

Felix sweated. He was smeared with camo grease and weighted down by Dolby's Jungle Stereo System and his end of the 60mm mortar and expecting any second to hear the telltale click of a bouncing Betty mine before it made a stranger of everything from his waist down. Twice things had moved underneath his feet. They'd been walking since before midnight. He was profoundly grateful for the presence of Mac, on the other side of the mortar. Somewhere on the far edge of the compound, Rostow and Bundy were moving, alone, to their own positions, Bundy with his sniper rifle.

"There," said Mac, pointing at an area as black, to Felix, as the rest of it. But sure enough, as he focused, he saw the pinprick of electric light through the chiaroscuro of underbrush. "Let's not get too close," said Mac. "I don't want to get my dick blown off. Get that CD player ready. I'll get this set."

Felix said, "Listen-"

"That's them. Hey, sounds all right."

Charley's voice came on. "Dragonfly to Grasshoppers. Slow Boy is heading your way. Let's give him a big Texas welcome."

Mac offered Felix a mortar round. "You want to kiss it?"

"Why would I want to kiss it?"

"For luck."

"No."

Mac kissed it and held it ready. They heard the Thunderbolt whining by above them. Felix switched on the CD player; Dolby's subwoofers started to rumble out a low-frequency sound track of jets taking off the deck of a carrier.

Charley's voice said, "Fire one." Mac dropped the mortar into the tube. It arced over the trees and into the compound. They heard the explosion a few seconds later.

"Good shot," said Charley, watching. It had missed the chemical shed-the objective-by several hundred yards, but it hit another building Charley thought was a barracks but couldn't tell, the light was too dim. "Put the next about three hundred yards east."

"Roger."

Hot Stick had taken Slow Boy off computer and was making slow, come-get-me passes over the compound. Felix and Rostow's subwoofers were booming out their sound tracks (of planes taking off carrier decks) on either side of the compound. Mac's second mortar landed in the middle of the large grass field in front of the white house that Sanchez had told them was his residence. Charley was puzzled by the absence of people below. Where the hell was everyone?

"A little more to the east, about fifty yards."