Barber looked at his watch. "It's just twenty-two hundred hours. We'll give you a sixty-second head start. When does the mission end?"
"When you're all dead," Carter said. He turned on his heel, slipped out the door, and headed directly across the access road toward the nursery, which was a broad area of apple trees that had been planted in regular rows.
He had gotten barely thirty yards when they opened fire from the greenhouse. He spun left, snapped off a couple of shots in their general direction, then ran zigzag for the protection of the trees.
They fired again, this time from the left as Carter dived and rolled as best he could.
He fired a third shot, this one at a figure rapidly retreating to the left past the main house.
A half-dozen shots were laid down directly in front of him — one so close he felt the puff of air by his ear — before he could flop over and return a couple of shots.
For just a split second the figure of one man was silhouetted against the backdrop of the south woods, and then it was gone.
Carter lay on his stomach sighting the area around the woods and around the helicopter landing area on this side of the access road with his rifle. But there was no movement.
It was puzzling. The man who had run past the main house had been Hansen; Carter was sure of it. The figure that had disappeared into the woods was Barber. He had recognized he man's bulk. Which left Forester. Where?
At least they had not given him his sixty-second head start. If they had, Carter would have fired them on the spot. The objective, not keeping one's word, was the important thing.
Carefully he worked his way deeper into the apple orchard before he got cautiously to his feet.
At seventy pounds, the carrying case on his back was nothing more than a slight hindrance to his free movement — for the moment. Over the long haul, however, it would make things damned difficult, he knew. Which meant he was going to have to make his move now.
He grinned. It was going to be interesting to see if Barber had come to the same conclusion.
Carter worked his way through the trees, keeping low, keeping his movement erratic, and blending with the shadows as much as possible.
Someone shouted something off toward the helicopter pad, which was now on Carter's left. Carter stopped to listen, straining his every sense to detect the presence of Barber or Forester out ahead of him.
The night was silent, and Carter moved a little deeper into the apple orchard. They would be expecting him to operate with the carrying case. They all knew how heavy it was, and they knew that it would slow him down.
Someone shouted again to his left. This time Carter recognized Forester's voice. He stopped and listened.
"Tom!" Forester's voice came through the woods. It sounded as if he were in pain. "For chrissakes, this isn't a goddamned game any longer!"
Carter looked over his shoulder the way he had come. Hansen had gone that way. Where? No doubt to circle around. But he could not be that fast. He could not have moved through the north woods in time to circle back there. Not yet.
Forester shouted Barber's name again. This time it definitely sounded as if he were in pain.
Carter angled back toward the left, making as little noise as possible, until he came to the edge of the apple trees, where he crouched down behind the gnarled trunk of one of the trees, the branches bare at this time of the year.
"Tom!" Forester shouted, his voice loud now.
For several moments Carter was unable to see the man, but finally he spotted a movement. Forester's head came up above a hummock to one side of the helicopter landing pad.
"Goddamnit!" Forester shouted. He crawled up onto the pad. It looked as if his left leg had been broken.
For real? Carter wondered. Or a ruse? It did not feel right to him. And yet the setup had been too obvious for his liking. He had seen Barber disappearing into the woods, the same direction Forester had gone. Hansen had taken off in the opposite direction.
This was a setup.
Carter backed away from the edge of the apple tree nursery and then, moving as fast as he dared, he searched the immediate area back toward the way he had come, finally finding a pile of brush and cut branches.
He unstrapped the carrying case from his back and shoved it deep within the pile of branches, making sure it was well covered before he turned and headed the rest of the way back to the greenhouse.
Forester was the decoy. Barber was an added decoy. The plan was for Carter to shoot Forester and then wait for an attack from the north woods by Barber. If Barber happened to be successful, the operation would be over. If not, Carter would be expected to double back to the north woods in the direction Hansen had gone. Only Hansen would be waiting for him somewhere much closer.
Carter reached the edge of the apple orchard directly across from the greenhouse. There was no movement. Again, however, he was getting a strong feeling of danger.
Forester had stopped shouting. Maybe he had overestimated them.
Carter rolled left at the same moment a rubber bullet smacked into the tree inches from his head.
The shooter was behind him.
Carter snapped off a shot into the orchard, then stepped out into the open and raced across the access road directly toward the greenhouse.
Two more shots came from the woods behind him. Someone was racing up from the direction of the helicopter pad. Carter caught the movement out of the corner of his eyes. He brought his rifle up to his hip and fired two shots on the run, the second finding its mark.
"Son of a bitch!" Forester shouted as he went down.
It had been a ruse, Carter thought. But he could admire the thinking.
Another shot came from the apple orchard as the Killmaster made the corner of the greenhouse, and he turned, brought up his rifle, and fired all in one smooth motion as Tom Barber emerged from the trees on the run.
The shot hit Barber squarely in the chest, doubling him over. He yelped in pain as he went down.
"We thought you might come back here," Hansen said from behind him.
Carter started to turn around.
"Don't," Hansen ordered. "It's only a rubber bullet, but I'm told they can do quite a bit of damage if they hit just right — say, at the base of the skull or on the spinal column somewhere — at point-blank range."
Carter laid down his rifle. "I wonder what your commissar will say when you bring him my body."
"I'll get a medal," Hansen said with a laugh.
"When you bring my body to him, but… not the computer chip."
Hansen sucked in his breath. It suddenly dawned on him that Carter did not have the carrying case. "Bastard!" he swore. "Where is it?"
Barber was laughing as he came across the field.
"Stay out of this, Tom," Carter called. "You're dead."
"We've got you."
"Hansen has got me," Carter said. "Let's see what he does with me."
Forester had gotten up and was approaching.
Hansen jabbed the rifle barrel into the back of Carter's neck. "Okay, ace, let's go get the suitcase if you want to play this entire thing out."
"Chuck!" Barber shouted.
"Go back to the house, Tom," Carter ordered. "We'll meet you there."
Barber hesitated. He was clearly upset.
"I'm not playing games now. Carter," Hansen said just loud enough for Carter to hear.
"I didn't think you were. The carrying case is back in the apple orchard, halfway between here and the helicopter pad."
"Let's go fetch it, then," Hansen said, prodding Carter again with the rifle barrel.
Barber stepped aside as Carter and Hansen passed him and headed back into the apple orchard.
"Goddamnit, Hansen…" Barber shouted.
"Stay out of it," Carter said over his shoulder.
They moved slowly through the apple orchard, Hansen never more than a step behind Carter, his finger on the rifle's trigger.