The Devil's Footprint (26 page)

She bowed formally.
 
Beside her,
Oga bowed also.

Fitzduane returned their bows.
 
As
Chifune straightened their eyes met fleetingly, and suddenly she knew that
Fitzduane had not forgotten and that she was very important to him and that
this would never change.
 
She wanted to
embrace him, to console him.
 
It was not
appropriate.

"Tanabu-
san
and Oga-
san
, it is good to see you again,"
said Fitzduane.

Oga beamed.
 
He had been suspicious
of the
gaijin
when they had first
met, but that initial reserve had evolved into high regard.
 
His one reservation concerned Chifune.
 
He was devoted to Tanabu-
san
and did not want to see her hurt any more.

"Fitzduane-
san
, we deeply
regret we could not have done more," said Chifune, "but we believe we
can help."

"Kathleen is alive," said Fitzduane flatly, "and we're
going to get her back.
 
That is one of
two certainties.
 
The other is that this
time Oshima will be stopped permanently."

"Fitzduane-
san
," said
Chifune cautiously, "it is not certain that Oshima has Kathleen."

"But it is probable?" said Fitzduane.

"Yes, Fitzduane-
san
, it is
probable," said Chifune.

"Let's talk," said Fitzduane.
 
"How much time do you have?"

"As long as is necessary," said Chifune.
 
"Oga-
san
was in the Japanese airborne, you may remember, Fitzduane-
san
, and the airborne have an expression which sums up our situation."

"‘All The Way,’" quoted Oga.

The thought came to Kilmara that Oshima seemed to have much the same
motto.
 
She would stop at nothing.

*
         
*
         
*
         
*
         
*

Three hours later, Fitzduane was acutely conscious of not having had
enough sleep and strongly suspected that whatever the FBI medic had pumped into
him was not the kind of thing you wanted to play with too often.

Still, fatigue and headache apart, some of the helplessness he had been
feeling had evaporated and he felt a course of action was beginning to come
clear.
 
It might not conform to the
standards of evidence the FBI required, but he, Fitzduane, ran on instinct and
it seemed to work for him.

Chifune and Oga had
gone,
Fitzduane and Kilmara
were going over what they had heard.

"Something to bear in mind," said
Kilmara,
"is that Chifune's position is not easy.
 
Her own
side don't
entirely trust her, or they
would have told her that Oshima was still alive much earlier.
 
Even more relevant right now is her situation
in the
U.S.
.
 
She can't just go
to the FBI and pour out her life story.
 
She's the agent of a foreign power, and currently she's working through
a Koancho network set up in the
U.S.
 
Tell the feds all about this, and they'll
roll them up quicker than the NRA blocking a gun-control bill."

"The Japanese are a friendly foreign power," said Fitzduane.

"That doesn't give them carte blanche to have a network of spies in
the
U.S.
,"
said Kilmara.
 
"And remember that
friendly
covers a multitude, including
quite a dose of international espionage, which gives the feds gas pains.
 
So
friendly
doesn't mean let's all trust each other and share secrets.
 
Its more like how you treat your
in-laws."

"Okay," said Fitzduane.
 
"I understand that Chifune is here to track down Yaibo and is
working through her own people, but why, when she got wind of action here,
didn't she contact me?
 
She knew I was
around.
 
She'd rung home.
 
They know her.
 
They'd told her where I was."

Because in my opinion she's still
in love with you, Hugo, and did not know how to handle an encounter
,
Kilmara felt like saying, but this was not quite the time for such directness.

"I guess she was going to contact you," said Kilmara, "but
all this shit blew up first.
 
Also,
Chifune and Oga are emphatic they did not know what was going to happen.
 
They thought there was going to be some kind
of terrorist meeting.
 
They did not
envisage any action, let alone this kind of carnage.
 
Hell, who would!"

"But when Kathleen was brought to the terrorist safe house, Chifune
made contact," said Fitzduane.
 
"But then Kathleen was moved before we arrived."

"This time with Chifune following," said Kilmara.
 
"Until they boarded a helicopter and
headed out to sea.
 
End of the
trail."

"And the woman killed at the safe house by the terrorists was one of
Chifune's agents left behind on watch," said Fitzduane.
 
"What a mess!"

"The good news is Kathleen is definitely alive," said Kilmara,
"and since they could easily have killed her it is reasonable to assume
they intend to keep her alive for some purpose.
 
They killed that unfortunate hitchhiker she gave a lift to without
hesitation."

Fitzduane nodded.
 
"But we
don't know where Kathleen is or who is holding her.
 
Oshima is a good guess, but here people were
only one of several groups involved in the assault.
 
Oshima herself was not seen.
 
So Kathleen could be anywhere.
 
Or held by anyone."

"You don't believe that, Hugo," said Kilmara.

"I guess not," said Fitzduane.
 
"Every instinct tells me she's in Tecuno, but without proof the
U.S.
is going
to do nothing.
 
And even with proof,
Mexico
seems to be a no-go area."

"All true," said Kilmara, "but those
kind
of constraints never stopped us before, and this time I don't think we'll be
alone.
 
Have faith."

Fitzduane went over to the window and peered through the blinds.
 
Night had fallen, and under the lights
outside he could see the sheriff's deputies and state police.
 
Off to one side a Humvee mounting a 40mm
automatic grenade launcher was parked.

"Serious security," he said.

"One of these days we are going to learn to hit them before they hit
us," said Kilmara.

"If they hit us tonight, I'm going to sleep through it," said
Fitzduane.
 
"I'm going to hit the
sack."

"You've one more thing to do," said Kilmara.
 
"Talk to Dana.
 
She'd like to apologize about losing her
charge."
 
He stood up.
 
"I'll go get her."

According to Captain Dana Felton, Kathleen had asked her three times to
leave her alone.
 
She was fed up with all
this security and needed some space.
 
Eventually, Dana had pulled way back out of sight and then lost her
client when Kathleen had switched off the agreed-upon road.

The rules of the bodyguard business were that your client's safety was
more important than a client's feelings.
 
On the other hand, when Kathleen needed her space it was an unwise
person who got in her way, and she was eminently capable of losing her
tail.
 
Dana's story had the ring of
truth, and in all honesty Fitzduane could not see that she could have acted in
any other way.

Dana came in.
 
Kilmara stayed
outside.

"I feel like shit, sir," said Dana.
 
"I should have known better.
 
I was trained better.
 
I have no excuses, sir.
 
I feel sick about Mrs. Fitzduane.
 
Anything I—"

Fitzduane held up a hand to halt the flood.
 
"How many people does it take to provide
real security on someone, Dana?" he asked.

"It depends, sir," said Dana.
 
"Six at least if the threat is serious.
 
One or two if you're going
through the motions.
 
Shit, sir, I
didn't mean it that way."

"I know my wife when she wants to be alone," said Fitzduane,
"and I know you did what you could, Dana.
 
None of us anticipated this level of threat.
 
If you'd been with Kathleen when she was
jumped, you'd have been killed.
 
Simple as that.
 
You'd
be dead like
Texas
,
and I'm damn glad you're not."

Dana took several deep breaths.
 
There was a glint of moisture at the corner of each eye.

"I miss
Texas
,
sir.
 
She was a good buddy.
 
I'd like to even the score, sir.
 
What can I do?"

Fitzduane smiled tiredly.
 
"Keep me safe while I work on getting Kathleen
back
 
Can
do, Captain?"

"HOOAH, SIR!" said Captain Dana Felton.

Kilmara returned after Dana left.
 
He had a bottle of red wine and two glasses.
 
"Better than pills," he said.

"What does
hooah
mean?" said Fitzduane.

"‘Fucking A’ or similar," said Kilmara.
 
"It's also used to indicate the right
stuff.
 
If you are an
Okay guy in the airborne or rangers, you are ‘hooah.’"

"What's the origin?" said Fitzduane.

"Rangers in World War Two had completed a hazardous mission and were
resting when they were asked to go back into action.
 
‘Who, us?’ they said indignantly, but back they
went.
 
And ‘Who us’ became ‘hooah.’"

Fitzduane suddenly felt a rush of fatigue and emotion.
 
His voice broke.
 
"You know, Shane, in the middle of all
this shit it does sometimes strike me that there are some really good people
out there.
 
Despite
everything."

Kilmara filled their glasses.
 
"Despite everything," he said with feeling.
 
He raised his glass.
 
"To Kathleen.
 
We're going to get her back.
 
Whatever it takes."

"Whatever it takes," said Fitzduane.

*
         
*
         
*
         
*
         
*

In the morning they heard that the murdered woman found in the trunk of
the Dodge had been officially identified as Sergeant Jenny Pullman, a parachute
rigger with the 82
^nd
Airborne who had been hitching back from the
coast after seventy-two hours' compassionate leave.
 
She was an innocent victim who had been
unlucky enough to hitch a lift with the wrong person.

The wreckage of the destroyed farmhouse was sifted through item by
item.
 
The body had been blown apart and
pieces had been found over a wide area.

One arm was found sufficiently intact to take fingerprints.
 
They were identified as belonging to Akio
Taro, a Japanese freelance journalist doing an assignment on
Fort
Bragg
.
 
Chifune's agent.

The Dodge found by the state police had been rented by Kathleen
Fitzduane.
 
The rental company recognized
Kathleen's photograph and the driver's license number checked out.

There was no longer any doubt about the identity of the kidnap victim.

They had also heard that apart from the terrorist attack on the
special-forces exhibition, an explosive device concealed in a large,
self-propelled floor-cleaning machine had gone off in the
Oak
Creek
shopping mall in
Fayetteville
.
 
The place was packed with shoppers at the
time, including thousands of off-duty airborne soldiers and their families.

The cleaning machine was capable of washing, drying, polish application,
and buffing, and contained tanks for its consumables.
 
These tanks had been packed with more than
two hundred pounds of miniature steel balls suspended in a gel.
 
An odorless gas contained in a cylinder in
the built-in storage compartment — normally used for spare buffing pads — had
been released in advance.

The explosives combined with the gas to create a destructive effect
considerably more powerful than the explosive on its own would have achieved.
 
It was, in effect, a fuel air bomb.

The American military establishment was being attacked where it was most
vulnerable by an unknown enemy following an unknown agenda.
 
In strictly military terms, the casualties
were of little significance.