Operation Norfolk (11 page)

Now all he had to do was break the man's grip before he drowned.

The diver had both of Hawker's arms pinned against his sides, driving him sideways, deeper and deeper. Hawker had been struggling, but now he forced himself to go limp, staging a total lack of resistance. The assailant reacted just as Hawker hoped he would, loosening his grip to readjust his position. The vigilante used that small opening to rip his right arm free, find the diver's face, and yank the man's face mask and regulator away.

Now Hawker was loose, swimming wildly toward the surface and finally finding his own regulator. Hawker jammed it into his mouth and found just enough residual air in his lungs to blow the exhaust ports clear.

The vigilante was taking a few small draughts of the bottled air, looking at the glimmer of lights above, when he was caught from behind again.

Except for the wild swinging beam of the flashlight, it was like fighting a barely visible dark blob. Hawker got his arm locked around what he knew must be the diver's head. He tried feverishly to find the Randall knife in the calf scabbard, but missed when the diver got his hand around Hawker's throat … and then he felt a stinging pain along his cheek.

The diver had a knife of his own. He had it out and was trying to use it.

Hawker used both feet to fend the man off, kicking away. He saw the beam of light come up and hold on him, temporarily blinding him. The diver could see him, but all the vigilante could see was the powerful light coming closer and closer. The man couldn't miss again with his knife. After all, he now had the advantage of being able to see.

But then, in the narrow bloom of light, the vigilante saw something else appear, something he never thought he would be relieved to see: a huge black shape coming out of the gloom. Hawker saw the wide missile-shaped head, tiny eyes, and jagged wide grin of a shark.

The shark came sailing into the light, head wagging back and forth. It disappeared for a moment, but then all Hawker saw was the gray belly-blur as the great fish rolled toward the diver who had attacked him.

The beam of light strapped to the diver's wrist made wild, crazy circles, spinning as he spun. It stabilized for a moment, showing both of the diver's hands clawing furiously at the shark's head. It was an unsettling sight, especially since by this time the shark had taken the diver's whole chest into its mouth. Hawker shuddered as the shark swam away with the man, the horrible picture getting smaller and smaller as the fish sped away. Dark smoke, like dust, boiled out of the fish's mouth. The vigilante knew it was blood.

Hawker swam instinctively to one of the big pilings, clinging to it for cover. The crazy fear that there might be two sharks around, not just one, entered his mind.

Finally, when his brain began to work again, he knew he had to get away. The men on the wharf might have seen the lights, heard the commotion. They might be expecting their patrol diver to surface at any moment.

He had to get away from the pier, shark or no shark.

Hawker took a big breath through the regulator, steeling himself. Then he swam back toward the dark water, back toward the reef where the big fish congregated. He swam until his watch told him he'd gone far enough, then headed into shallow water.

When he was finally back in knee-deep water, wading toward the inflatable boat he had hidden in the jungle, a nausea came over him that he could not possibly ignore. Turning his head away, he vomited salt water and bile and something else, something ripe and musky from deep down inside his gut.

It was the taste of fear.

Hawker knew the taste; he had tasted it before. But somehow he couldn't remember it ever having been as horrible as this.

thirteen

Sha came onto the beach as he pulled the inflatable toward the jungle. She was digging her fist at her eyes and yawning, her lean, longhaired figure looking dazzling in the moonlight. The only clothes she wore were a T-shirt and shorts.

Still, Hawker hardly paid any attention. He hadn't felt so tired since the first three days of Coronado.

“Where you been?” she asked. “I been worried about you. Why take so long?”

“Went out for a boat ride. Just restless. Go on back to sleep, Sha.”

“You not do nothing dumb, no? You not try go around island. Many guns there. Many men. Boom-boom, shoot you, no kidding.”

“I didn't go around the island, Sha. There's nothing to worry about. You look sleepy. Go on back and get some rest.”

“They got machine up there. Things go around and around, tell them when big boats get too close. See pictures on screen. Very dangerous you go out alone like that. I worry, could hardly sleep.”

Hawker had the Randall out and was cutting more tree limbs in the moonlight, hiding the boat. He stopped long enough to look up at the woman. “Are you sure you haven't already been to America? You sound more and more like half the women I knew back in Chicago.”

Sha put her hands on her lean hips. “What that mean? I should feel bad 'cause you go out, make it so I can no sleep—” She stopped in midsentence, her mouth open. “What happen to your face? You bleeding!” Immediately Sha was at Hawker's side, one hand on his shoulder, the other inspecting the slash on his cheek.

“Ouch.” Hawker pulled away. “Damn it, Sha, that hurts. Get your fingers off it.”

She backed away. “You did go around island, didn't you? Had big fight, I bet. Now Cwong know we here. He be looking for us. I think—”

Hawker snapped at her: “Do me a favor—don't think, okay, Sha? I'll do the thinking. You're getting paid to do just one thing. Remember, that was your rule, not mine.”

Sha stuck her lower lip out, pouting. “Need bandage on face. Cut bad. Very bad. I promise ask no more questions, but let me fix face. You ugly 'nough, don't need no more scars to make you more uglier.”

Hawker stopped working for a moment, looked at her again, and almost laughed. “Okay,” he said finally. “You fix my cut. If that makes you happy, go ahead and get the first-aid kit. I'll finish up here.”

The woman came trotting back with bandages and a Coleman lantern. After sitting the vigilante down on the Avon, she lit the lantern. The Coleman made its steady hiss, throwing a warm circle of light into the jungle around them.

Moths and insects found the light almost immediately, battering themselves against it. Hawker watched the insects, wondering why they were unfailingly attracted to the very thing that was the source of their destruction. The insects made him wonder about the woman. She could have played it safe. Could have stayed away. Yet she had returned to the island where her father had been killed. Where she had almost been destroyed as a little girl. And she did it on her own. She had even refused money, still not knowing he had made the deposit in her account.

She worked on his face with obvious skill—cleaning it, putting on sulfur powder, cutting butterfly bandages to fit. She drew the skin together and pressed gauze and tape into place.

“You've done this before,” Hawker said. “I'm not surprised. Working at The Saigon, you probably got a lot of practice in first aid, huh? Probably a fight every time an American walked in there.”

The woman smiled at him ruefully. “You very funny, you know? Always say funny things. Tell me one thing. Why you think I dumb?”

“Dumb? I don't think you're dumb.”

“You tell me not think no more. Very angry. Treat me like I too dumb to think. Make me know my place. I like you in restaurant 'cause you let me think. Say you trust my judgment. Now, all sudden you just like all men at restaurant. Very bossy. Make me feel too dumb to help.”

“Oh, boy,” said Hawker, but feeling guilty anyway. “All I meant was—”

She was standing, packing the first-aid stuff away. “What you mean was, Sha no talk. No think. Stay in my place. You say I only get paid to do one thing. That what you really want?”

“Not at all,” Hawker said. As he said it, he wondered why nature seemed to give women an inborn ability to reduce men—any man—to apologetic boobs within a matter of seconds, regardless of who was right or who was wrong. “I want you to think,” he said.

“I think you're very bright and appreciate any advice you can give me. I shouldn't have said what I did. I'm sorry. And I'm sorry I snapped at you.”

“You really mean it? You really think me smart?”

“Sure do. Yep. You're a very bright lady.”

“You really like me give advice? You want me to be like partner? Equal partner?”

“Partner?” said Hawker. “Sure. Sure, and I want you to give advice too. Honest.”

“Then here my advice,” Sha said.

“I thought we'd get to this.” He smiled.

“My advice is stay away from other side of island till I show you only good way get there! Don't be such big dummy! I no like big dummy for partner!” Sha whirled away, stomping off toward the jungle hammocks.

Hawker released a heavy sigh. Twisting the gas knob on the Coleman, he watched the light fade. “Christ,” he said wearily.

They left for Cwong's military complex in the morning.

Hawker awoke later than normal. The sun was just over the palm trees that arched in a line away from the beach. He could hear the sounds of birds squawking and monkeys chattering through the jungle.

Hawker spread open the hammock and crawled from beneath the netting. He scratched his head and immediately winced. His jaw hurt like hell. His shoulders ached. Even his joints ached. His hands had been cut on barnacles, something he didn't even notice last night.

He smiled wryly. Getting older sure was a bitch. Five years ago he would have come through the whole ordeal without noticing the abrasions and bruises. Now he felt as if he'd been beaten with a bat.

Hawker stretched painfully, yawned, and looked around.

Sha's hammock was empty.

He walked out into the little clearing near the beach, making sure no boats were out there to see him. Sha's tracks led down the beach. He followed them.

Her tracks cut in abruptly toward a sheer wall of volcanic rock. Hawker could hear the distant splash of water and someone singing. It was Sha's voice.

He worked his way through the palm trees until he came to a clearing. A small river came down the side of the mountain and fell off a ledge. A waterfall. There Sha stood, naked in the pool of water below, washing her hair. There was a bar of soap on the rock beside her and a coconut with its top whacked off.

Hawker stood watching, enjoying the sight of her, the tautness of her body, the leanness of her hips, the small firm breasts with then-brown nipples, the glistening pubic thatch, long and black. He watched as she threw her hair over her shoulder, like a dark sodden rope, then picked up the coconut and worked the coconut water into her hair.

He felt like a snoop. Hawker didn't like the feeling, but he didn't want to leave either. It was a nice thing to see, her standing beneath the waterfall, a true island beauty.

Pushing his way out into the clearing, Hawker stopped beside the pool, ten yards from her. “How you doing, partner?” he said.

“What? Hey!”

Hawker laughed at the way she tried to cover herself—pulling her right knee up, throwing an arm across her breasts, trying to cover her pubis with an open hand.

“Let me know when you're done with the shower, partner. I'm next.” The vigilante turned and walked back toward their camp. “And don't use all the hot water!” he called over his shoulder.

Sha came back into camp a few minutes later looking sheepish.

“All done?” Hawker asked, smiling.

“You spy on me. Watch me naked.”

“That's right, I spied on you. You were too pretty not to watch.”

That seemed to please her, but she tried not to show it. Indeed, she slapped at him as she walked by. “I get stuff ready to go while you shower.”

“You no come and watch?” Hawker grinned, mimicking her.

“No! I got manners. I no watch!” She paused and grinned back. “Beside, I already see you.”

“And you didn't like what you saw?”

She just walked away, flapping her hand at him.

It took them half an hour to pack the gear they might need into backpacks with frames.

Hawker carried the Colt Commando slung over his shoulder.

He noticed that the woman had stuck the little snub-nosed revolver into the big pocket of her shorts.

For half an hour they walked, avoiding the mountain. As they made their way through the jungle, hacking at vines, monkeys and birds scolded them from the high trees.

Hawker kept an eye on Sha as they went, watching her expression. She seemed confused at first. That worried him. It had been a long time since she had found her “secret” path across the mountain. She had been a little girl then, probably frightened half out of her mind.

He had to force himself not to second-guess her, ignoring the persistent urge to keep asking if she recognized anything. Hawker knew that pressure froze the memory banks, and he wanted her memory to be at its best.

Gradually the confusion left her face. She began to move faster through the dense foliage. Once she stopped and looked at a huge black tree, one of the biggest trees Hawker had ever seen. Its trunk was the size of a two-car garage, maybe two hundred feet high. She peered up and said, “Yes. This I remember. This great tree. When a little girl, I rest here, wanting so bad someone come and help me.”

Sha touched the tree fondly, then moved on without another word.

The “secret” passage was a great crevasse in the mountain. It began as a cave opening hardly wide enough for Hawker to get his shoulders through. Sha simply walked toward a sheer rock ledge covered with vines and leaves, began poking at the vines, pushing them away, and there it appeared, this crack in the earth. Hawker wondered how in the hell she found it, how she possibly could have remembered. But somewhere in that little girl's memory, the way of her escape from the bad man of Kira-Kira was forever etched.