Still thinks armor alone can win wars. So he's got the dirty job of playing Horatio defending the bridge."
"What are your orders?" asked Pitt.
"To assist you and Dr. Sharp on whatever project you've got going.
Admiral Sandecker is to act as a direct line to the Senator and the Pentagon. That's about all I know."
"No mention of the White House?"
"None that's down on paper." He turned as Lily and the Admiral, who had taken the long way down the inside stairs, walked out the front door. As lily embraced Giordino, and Dillenger introduced Hollis to Sandecker, Hollis pulled Pitt aside.
"What the devil is going on around here?" he muttered. "A circus?"
Pitt grinned. "You don't know how close you are."
"Where do my special forces fit in?"
"When the free-for-all starts," said Pitt, g deadly serious, "your job is to blow the store."
The backhoe the Special Operations Forces had transported from Virginia was huge. Wide treads moved its massive bulk up the slope to a site marked by one of Lily's small marker flags. After ten minutes of instruction and a little practice, Pitt memorized the lever functions and began operating the steel behemoth on his own. He raised the two-and-a-half-meterwide bucket and then brought it down like a giant claw, striking the hard ground with a loud clang.
In less than an hour a trench six meters deep and twenty meters in length had been carved on the rear slope of the hill. That was as far as the excavation progressed when a Chevrolet four-wheel Blazer staff car came barreling through the underbrush with a truckload of armed soldiers following in its dust.
The wheels had not yet stopped turning when a captain with a ramrod-straight back and the eyes of a man driven by an inspired dedication to army discipline and standard operating procedure jumped to the ground.
"This is a restricted area," he snapped smartly. "I warned you people personally two days ago not to reenter. You must remove your equipment and leave immediately."
Pitt indifferently climbed down from his seat and stared into the bottom of the trench as though the officer didn't exist.
The Captain's face went red and he barked to his sergeant, "Sergeant O'Hara, prepare the men to escort these civilians from the area."
Pitt slowly turned and smiled pleasantly. "Sorry, but we're staying put."
The Captain smiled back, but his smile was scorching. "You have three minutes to leave and take that backhoe with you."
"Do you care to see papers authorizing us to be here?"
"Unless they were signed by General Chandler, you're chewing air."
"They come from a higher command than your general."
"You have three minutes," the Captain said flatly. "Then I will have you forcibly removed."
Lily, Giordino and the Admiral, who were sitting out of the sun in Trinity's borrowed Jeep Wagoneer, walked over to take in the show.
Lillie was wearing only a halter and tight shorts. She saucily paraded up and down in front of the line of soldiers.
Women who have never worked the streets as hookers cannot walk with a seductive swing and sway that appears in a natural phenomenon. They tend to exaggerate, to the point of slapstick. Lily was no exception, but the men could not have cared less. They ate up the performance.
Pitt began to tense with anger. He knew pompous people. "You have only twelve men, Captain. Twelve engineers with less than a hundred hours of combat. I have forty men behind me, any two of whom could kill your entire force in less than ten seconds with their bare hands. I'm telling you to back off."
The Captain made a casual three-hundred and sixty degree scan, but all he saw besides Pitt were Lily standing in front of the troops, a man named Sandecker, who was unconcernedly puffing a large cigar, and a man he hadn't seen before wearing an arm sling. They were both leaning against the Jeep as if they were half-asleep.
He glanced quickly at Pitt, but Pitts eyes gave no hint of emotion. He made a forward motion with his hand. "Sergeant, move people the hell out of here."
Before his men had taken two steps, Colonel Hollis seemed to appear as if by magic. The colors of his camouflaged battle fatigues and grease-blurred hands and face were incredibly faithful to the surrounding foliage. Standing less than five meters away, he blended into the underbrush nearly to the point of invisibility.
"Do we have a problem?" Hollis asked the Captain about as charitably as a sidewillder eyeing a gopher.
The Captain's mouth dropped open and his men froze in position. He took a few steps closer and gawked at Hollis more carefully, seeing no obvious sign of rank.
"Who are you?" he blurted. "What is your outfit?"
"Colonel Morton Hollis, Special Operations Forces."
"Captain Louis Cranston, sir, 486th Engineering Battalion."
Salutes were exchanged. Hollis nodded toward the line of engineers, their automatic weapons at the ready. "I think you can give the order for your men to stand at rest."
Cranston was unsure what to make of an unfamiliar colonel who appeared out of nowhere. "May I ask, Colonel, what a Special Forces officer is doing here?"
"Seeing that these people are allowed to conduct an archaeological survey without interference."
"I must remind you, sir, civilians are not permitted in a restricted military zone."
"Suppose I told you they have the authority to be here."
"Sorry, Colonel. I am under direct orders from General Chandler. He was very explicit. No one, and that includes yourself, sir, who is not a member of the battalion is to be allowed to enter-"
"Am I to understand you intend to throw me out as well?"
"If you can't present signed orders from General Chandler for your presence," Cranston said nervously, "I will obey my instructions."
"Your hardnose position won't win you any medals, Captain. I think you'd better reconsider."
Cranston knew damned well he was being toyed with and he didn't like it.
"Please, no trouble, Colonel."
"You load up your men and return to your base, and don't even think of looking back."
Pitt was enjoying the encounter, but he reluctantly turned away and climbed down into the trench. He began probing the dirt on the bottom.
Giordino and Sandecker idly strolled over to the edge and watched him.
Cranston hesitated. He was outranked, but his orders were clear, He decided his stance was firm. General Chandler would back him if there was an investigation.
But before he could order his men to clear the area, Hollis took a whistle from a pocket and blew two shrill blasts.
Like ghosts rising from the graves of a horror movie, forty forms that looked more like bushes and undergrowth than men suddenly materialized and formed a loose circle around containing Cranston and his men.
Hollis's eyes turned venomous. "Bang, you're dead."
"You called, boss?" said a bush that sounded like Dillenger.
Cranston's cockiness collapsed. "I . . . must report this . . . to General Chandler," he stammered.
"You do that," said Hollis coldly. "You can also inform him that my orders come from General Clayton Metcalf of the Joint Chiefs. This can be verified through communications to the Pentagon. These people and my team are not here to interfere with your excavation on Gongora Hill or get in the way of the General's operations along the river. Our job is to find and preserve Roman surface artifacts before they're lost or stolen. Do you'read, Captain?"