“You know I don’t like to be disturbed when I’m thinking, Daniel.”
“There are matters that must be addressed, sir. They require your immediate attention.”
Rasin swung abruptly around. “It is Israel that requires my attention, Daniel. Nothing more. Nothing less.”
“This is what we must speak about, Yosef. Threats. Complications.”
Rasin’s eyes narrowed into slits of repressed rage. When he spoke Daniel noted his voice was hoarse again.
“You have my attention.”
At first Rasin had tried peacefully to prove his points to the Israeli public, to work within the system to affect the changes he felt were so desperately needed. His militant stands began with the signing of the Camp David accords. Giving back the Sinai was a tragic error, not for strategic reasons so much as for the precedent it set. Once the givebacks began, they never stopped. A Palestinian state was closer than ever to existence on the West Bank that belonged to Israel and only to Israel. Did the present leadership think the Arab rabble would be appeased with that? Did they think it would bring peace? Rasin knew it wouldn’t. For him the issue was a simple one: either the Arab world would survive or Israel would. And he had been blessed with the means to ensure the latter. No, not blessed — chosen. And if not by God, then by whom? Everything had been too neat and clean to be anything but predestined. The weapon was his to employ when and how he saw fit.
The breeze blew his hair and Rasin squinted his eyes into the sun. To the casual observer, he might have looked like a schoolteacher or mundane public official. His face was nothing if not simple, forgettable, and Rasin was glad for that. There was strength in simplicity, and he used it to distill the essence of truth.
The Arab peoples of the Mideast had to be shown the error of their ways. Plain. Simple. Period. He had the means, though it would not be the ends that provided the justification. That came from the past, from the proven brutality of a culture that had been at war since the dawn of its existence. The barbarians of the modern world, full of inbred hate and a death wish. The names they went by — Al-Fatah, Black September, PLO, PLF, the Islamic Jihad — were all fronts formed in an attempt to legitimize their existence. But Rasin saw through the fronts; the issue in his mind was simple. The Arabs hated the Israelis and would destroy them if given the opportunity. The only way to stop them was to find the opportunity first.
And now to use it.
“We have completed our interrogation of the traitor Traymir.”
“And?”
“Your fears have been confirmed. He sent McCracken to Japan, to the Bujin.”
“And what have you done?”
“About Traymir?”
“No, about McCracken.”
“The Bujin spirited him away before we could act.”
“That is hardly a surprise.”
“His next destination is equally obvious. He could do us irreparable harm if he finds …”
“Finds what, Daniel? No trace was left, no evidence. That was made sure of.”
“This is McCracken we are talking about, not an ordinary man. He has skills and resources that defy our comprehension.”
Rasin came forward and calmly tapped Daniel on both shoulders. “Perhaps you forget, my friend, the circumstances of his employ this time. He has no friends, no government resources behind him, and the life of his son is at stake.”
“He has brought down operations single-handedly before. Several times.”
“Then we will deal with him at our convenience. If your information is correct, it should be relatively simple. Relax.”
But Daniel tensed and pulled away.
“Speak your mind, my friend,” Rasin bade him.
“When we learned of his involvement, we should have killed him immediately. I warned you of the consequences of failure.”
Rasin nodded. Daniel was right, of course. The problems had begun with the discovery that Evira had planted an agent high within their midst, an agent who they could only assume had passed on Rasin’s possession of the superweapon before his capture. When word of the woman’s desperate interest in McCracken surfaced, Rasin took the most logical step available to him: Help Evira play out her cards through Fett, let her retain McCracken’s services so his own people might be led to her in the process. Everything would have gone as planned if not for the presence of the one-armed man and his team who had come after Evira in Jaffa. Even allowing for McCracken’s prowess, the unexpected had hurt more than anything.
“Your point is well taken,” Rasin conceded. “Now tell me about the woman.”
“She has vanished.”
“That is the best you can do?”
“She is no longer in the country.” Then, eyeing Rasin closely, he continued, “That could be enough. If she even suspects the truth, if that suspicion takes her to—”
“Enough! She could not possibly suspect the truth, no one could. Do you hear me, Daniel? No one! Every detail of this operation has been thought out to the letter. All we are facing are minor inconveniences. Look at me, Daniel. Look at me!”
Rasin grasped the younger man at the shoulders and held him there tight. “Do you think I like living in this self-imposed exile? Do you know why I speak to the orange groves? Not out of madness, Daniel, but frustration. It pains me so much to be isolated and alone when I am so needed. But that is going to change soon and nothing, no one!, is going to stop it! We are barely a week from the culmination of my operation. I will be a hero. Israel will be mine, to cherish and lead as I was born to.”
Rasin steadied himself, released his grip, and backed slightly off.
“Independence Day, Daniel. May fourteenth. Next Sunday. One week from tomorrow.”
Daniel’s response was one word:
“McCracken.”
“We know where he is going. We will finish him there.”
“And if we fail?”
Rasin squinted his acknowledgement. “Then perhaps the time has come again to use Evira’s plan against her.” His eyes were cold now, showing no hesitation. “Contact the women. Tell them to go to where McCracken’s son is being held. Tell them to kill the boy.”
Part Three
The Indianapolis
Guam: Monday, May 8; eleven A.M.
Chapter 12
“Yo!” McCracken heard as a hand jostled him at the shoulder. “Hope you don’t mind me waking you up.”
“You interrupted a good dream,” he told the woman who was standing over him with her hands on her hips.
“I am ever so sorry. But I thought you might want to join me on deck now that we’ve reached your goddamn coordinates.”
“Aye-aye, sir,” Blaine returned, but Patty Hunsecker was already through the cabin door.
Blaine threw his legs over the edge of the cot and stretched. They had been at sea for nearly twenty hours now and few of them had been easy. The Pacific was in a mean mood, seas choppy and rough. The only brief calm had come in the first few hours after setting out from Guam. If McCracken had his bearings correct, they were now somewhere around the halfway point between Guam and the island of Leyte with nothing around them but sky and water.
Thirty-six hours earlier on Saturday, Hiroshi had arranged for a private jet to fly Blaine to Guam’s Tamuning Airport. The country’s strong Pacific military presence included a complete naval air station which very likely contained the equipment he required. Unfortunately, though, under the circumstances he could not approach any legitimate authority for help. Not only had Evira forbidden him to do so, but now Mossad was on his trail and Mossad’s ears were everywhere.
Again Hiroshi provided the answer. The waters around Guam, including the nearby Marianas, contained a hotbed of research projects, and all those in the area for such purposes had to register with the naval station. Hiroshi’s check found several teams with the necessary equipment, but only one he could pin an immediate location to: a young woman named Patty Hunsecker, who was studying ecological balance in the Marianas Trench. Her boat was docked for the time being so she could assemble data to meet a grant deadline.