"Not the government," Blancanales told him. "Individuals within the government. Or the administration. Or Congress. Or the Agency. Somewhere, there's someone working for the Salvadoran fascists. Someone with access to our mission information. Before the next mission, we'll have to deal with the informer."
Lyons shook his head no. "We're not going back without the Man. We'll ask him who the informer is. He'll know."
"I vote for a tactical withdrawal," Blancanales stated. "They know we're here. They know we're after Quesada. The fincawill be locked down so tight it'd take a battalion of Marines to seize him. And you, we have to get you to a hospital for a few days' observation."
"I'm all right!" Lyons said.
"You hit that gate at eighty or ninety miles an hour. You could have a subdural hematoma. You could have a ruptured spleen. You could have a hundred internal hemorrhages. You could fall over dead any minute. Soon as the Wizard can put out the signal, we're on our way back."
"Hard to argue with that," Gadgets told Lyons. "Second the motion. Don't want to lose our shock-trooper."
"Captain..." Lyons turned to the guerilla officer "...Quesada's in that plantation. He has the answers to your questions. You want to go get that Nazi, I'll go with you."
The captain smiled. He looked to his younger brother. "Who are these men you brought to our country? They kill the Stalinistas, they kill the fascists. Other North Americans talk of democracy, but they..." he pointed at the three warriors of Able Team "...they fight for democracy."
The brothers laughed. The captain turned to his men and translated what had been said. Some laughed. Others gave Lyons the clenched-fist salute. One man talked with his leader for a moment. The captain turned to Able Team again.
"That man says to remember the Abraham Lincoln Brigade in Spain. When the Spanish people fought the Castilian fascists and the German Nazis, some North Americans joined the war. Perhaps if an Abraham Lincoln Brigade came to Salvador, we could make a democracy."
"Captain," Lyons told him, "what you want for your country is your business. I'm fighting for my country. To protect my country's democracy. There are Nazis threatening my country and Quesada knows who they are. I want to put the question to that fascist scum-hole. It is a personal mission. I'm out for revenge and he is the first step. So what is it? Do we go in?"
"Hey, Ironman," Gadgets broke in. "You are exceeding your authority."
Blancanales spoke in a low voice. "You are not for revenge. Our mission here is to return Quesada for trial."
"Okay!" Lyons snapped. "There it is. That's our mission. We'll do it. Stop this tactical retreat talk. So what if he knows we're coming?"
The truck's driver called back to his captain. "Aqui esta el carro de los norteamericanos."
"Your other jeep," Captain Lizco told them.
Two riflemen in black plastic ponchos left the cover of roadside brush when they saw their unit returning.
Blancanales called across the truck. "Floyd!" The young reporter had listened to the debate, quietly translating details for the Salvadorans. "You're college educated. You're in this. What do you say?" Blancanales asked him.
"Rick Marquez got me my first job. Without him, I'd still be a punk with a camera looking for work. And Quesada had him murdered. So don't expect me to say anything anything moderate. I say nuke Quesada."
Gadgets ran back to the waiting truck. "Political! Things have changed! I set my gear to monitor and record and what did I catch? Quesada's gone to someplace called Reitoca, in Honduras. To something called 'The School.' He ain't hiding inside the plantation, and he won't expect us to hit him in Honduras. What do you say?"
Lyons did not wait for Blancanales to answer Schwarz. The blond ex-cop turned to the Salvadorans.
"Where is Reitoca? How far? And can we get there tonight?"
20
Jack Grimaldi had landed in Tegucigalpa in the darkness and wind-driven rain of the storm from the Pacific. After a leisurely meal of reheated Air Force lasagna and stale white bread, downed with a six-pack of Honduran beer, he borrowed a raincoat and went to examine the men and aircraft available for his latest Stony Man assignment.
Sometime in the next three to seven days, Able Team would radio him for a lift out of El Salvador. Maybe they would radio from an airfield. Maybe they would radio from a clearing in the mountains. He needed mechanically dependable aircraft available twenty-four hours a day, with standby personnel to service the aircraft and man the flights.
At the military end of the airfield, the Central Intelligence Agency maintained a secret air force. An officer in the Agency's Langley offices had agreed over the phone to furnish a helicopter or plane for the Able Team mission. But an Agency promise in Washington, D.C., did not mean a plane and crew in Tegucigalpa.
Interdepartmental rivalries! Grimaldi walked through the rain cursing the problems created by petty bureaucratic egotism. Army Intelligence won't help Navy Intelligence. The Air Force won't help the NSA. The State Department wages paper wars with the National Security Council. Fight the Reds, fight terrorism, fight Libya, maybe the Frenchies, too. But first, we fight each other.
Likely as not, they'll tell me to type up an official request and send it to my congressman.
Continuing to the lighted window of a hangar's office, Grimaldi tried the door. Locked. He knocked. No answer. He knocked on the window. Condensation on the glass allowed him only a fuzzy view of the interior. After he pounded on the sheet-steel door with his fist, a face appeared at the window.
"Who's that out there?" a voice shouted.
"The name's Jack Eagle. You got a cable about me."
The door opened. A tall, bearded man with T-shirt bulging over a beer belly motioned him inside. "Been waiting all day for you, Jack. They buzzed us from up north that you'd be doing some taxi work."
"Here's my identification." Grimaldi displayed authorization papers complete with signatures and carbon copies.
"Well, yeah. Those look good. Got the right John Hancock down there. Recognize the name. Not that papers mean shit. You can call me Tennessee, Jack."
"Thanks for the cooperation, Tennessee. I need to take a trip into the mountains."
The other man laughed. "Yeah, that's what we do here. In fact, that's all we do. Question is, fixed wing or rotor?"
"Both, whatever..."
"We don't have any of those!" Laughing again, Tennessee led him through the office and into the hangar. "Least, not this week."
"I mean, I won't know until I get the signal. I'll need a standby helicopter and a standby plane. And personnel."
"Daylight or night pickup?"
In the dark interior of the hangar, Grimaldi saw a war-surplus Huey painted with midnight-blue enamel and corporate logos. Bullet holes pocked the panels. Beyond that helicopter, other Hueys waited in various stages of maintenance. Masking tape and gray primer paint covered the side of one helicopter.
"Twenty-four-hour standby," Grimaldi said.
"Hot or cold?"
Grimaldi glanced at the maintenance logs on the midnight-blue "corporate shuttle" helicopter. He compared the air hours to the dates of the service. "What do you mean?"
"The LZ."
"Won't know until I get the signal. In fact, it could change by the time I get to the landing zone."
"How many passengers returning? And what's the approximate weight of returning equipment?"
"Three for sure. Maybe two others. And hand luggage."
"Those numbers are subject to cancellation, right? We get calls to take out ten passengers. We show up, and three and four have been 'canceled' by the time we get there."
"No cancellations possible. I hope."
"We don't deal in hopes. We deal in lift weight. But if you're talking helicopters, five men or one man, it don't make that much difference. All we got is Hueys. But in planes, it means something."