The Ides of March

By Ron Cutler

As punishment for disobeying his superiors and bringing a Serbian killer to justice, McCord, an experienced intelligence officer with the NSA, is sent to investigate a mysterious disturbance on the Ugandan border. What he discovers is a camp manned by Russian scientists who once worked for Bio-preparat, the top secret Soviet bio-weapons facility. Using the cover of the civil war, the scientists have been monitoring the experimental use of a strange new weapon being used to destroy the native population. But before McCord can get there, the camp is attacked by terrorists who manage to hijack the weapon.

A sole terrorists survives the attack, which reveals the weapon's devastating effect for which there is no known cure. Ironically, it is the surviving terrorist who carries the genetic code for a possible treatment. A man McCord must find before he accomplishes the horror of his deadly mission.

In a race against time, McCord is aided by Dr. Kate Atwood, a researcher at the Army's top secret bio-weapon facility at Fort Detrick. McCord and Kate are propelled on an intensive journey that takes them from Africa to Moscow, South America, London, Washington and finally, New York, where they discover the true nature of the weapon itself and the ultimate aim of the terrorist's mission. A holocaust that will destroy millions.

• Language: English
• Publisher: iUniverse
• Release date: Aug 1, 2000
• ISBN: 9781469775692

Ron Cutler

Edgar Award nominee Ron Cutler is the author of nine novels, including THE IDES OF MARCH, THE SEVENTH ASACRAMENT and TO KILL A KING. He has been an indie filmmaker, commercial artist, teacher and attorney. Roin is currently a screen and television writer. His numerous credits include he critically acclaimed ARTICLE 99.

Book preview

PART ONE

The Search

  One

Markov hated Moscow.

The city reeked with the stench of defeat. It clung to the shabby clothing of the old and filled the eyes of the young with despair.

Markov despised the weakness of his countrymen. He despised their shame in front of foreigners and their willingness to grovel in the face of authority. He despised it most in himself.

Yet, Markov was one of the lucky ones.

He lived in a spacious apartment in a block of luxury flats, complete with air conditioner, Swedish refrigerator, washing machine and dish washer and even a terrace that opened on expansive views of the Kremlin, glowing each night like some operatic stage set under a hundred gleaming lights. To live in such style required a stratospheric level of corruption, and Markov was if anything, stratospherically corrupt.

Markov swathed his short, dumpy frame in Armani suits. He sported a Rolex on one hairy wrist. An ID bracelet dangled from the other spelling out his name in diamonds. He drove a Mercedes sedan and owned a four bedroom dasha in a suburb that had once housed party leaders and now provided a weekend refuge for important members of the new capitalist oligarchy. The locals liked to joke that the dashas were the same, only the criminals living in them were different.

Markov entertained lavishly offering his guests Beluga caviar in crystal bowls. His marble topped bar contained an enormous selection of flavored vodkas. Scotch too, if they wanted it, along with British Beef and salmon from Norway. And of course, they wanted it all. They would abandon even the most expensive Russian delicacies to gorge themselves on Western luxuries. It was only natural. Most of them would soon be changing life styles. It was Markov’s function to provide an introduction to the sumptuous existence most of them would soon be leading outside their own godforsaken country.

The people Markov entertained were former colleagues. People who had worked with him at the Biopreparat facility in Omutninsk in western Siberia. Some had gone on to bigger careers at Vector in Novosibirsk, where the pioneering work on Anthrax had been done. He had even recruited one or two scientists from the main Biopreparat headquarters in Moscow. But his biggest coup had come that September, when he managed to turn one of the top men from the super secret facility at Sergiyev Posad, who had been working on a new strain of Variant U.

Markov had been lucky.

The man was the cousin of a cousin, whom he had already sent off to the West. They called it the West, though that was not geographically accurate. His people went everywhere, but West. Teheran, Baghdad and Libya, were more likely destinations.

Markov had been paid exorbitantly for this operation, which required months of delicate maneuvering. Just getting the man out of the facility under the suspicious noses of the military was tricky enough. Getting him and his family out of the country was even more difficult, resulting in so many unforeseen complications that it caused Markov a month of sleepless nights and long days of nervous paranoia. It gratified him to know that his client was now safely installed in a ugly but spacious villa outside Basra, applying his trade under the very noses of the United Nations weapon’s inspectors.

So far, his luck had not deserted him. Now he had something even more important to offer. A secret that went beyond secrets. Something even more deadly than the viral or chemical weapons presently in such demand. As the new work with AIDS revealed, even the deadliest viral infection could be modified, perhaps even cured and with the aid of vaccines, possibly prevented. For what Markov had to sell there was no cure. No preventive, no possible hope. And that had become his ace in the hole.

Markov was a man of the computer age. He dealt in information and as everyone knew, information was power. He possessed intimate knowledge of the work of certain important scientists and their select field of expertise. Possessing such knowledge, gave him the ability to place them where their expertise would produce the most effective results. The people who bought his services, paid handsomely, even exorbitantly. The market had expanded beyond the few outlaw countries and now included less formal organizations in various parts of the globe.

In spite of his success, things were far from perfect. Above and beyond his profits, and those were considerable, Markov was experiencing the same anxiety as many others who now traded in the commodity. Even Microsoft had learned the painful lesson that knowledge was power only until it was superseded by newer and more powerful knowledge. In this new and complex cyber world in which he operated, such events happened much too quickly. Markov knew he was in a race against time. That was why he needed to by-pass the middleman and take his secret directly to the consumer.

He knew the risk. Such risk came with being a single entrepreneur. But time was against him. He was not the only one operating in the arena. His field was becoming more and more crowded with every passing day. Concessions had been made to the Americans to eliminate various kinds of weapons programs. This had resulted in a surfeit of scientists and engineers, all of them clamoring to sell what they knew. Markov still had the luxury of being in a sellers market, but in Moscow competition was settled with an assassin’s bullet.

Markov was normally a cautious man. But the secret he possessed was too dangerous for one man, the potential for riches too compelling to withhold from the market. He needed to act and act soon. One or two select placements would provide enough for him to live comfortably, if not ostentatiously, anywhere in the world for as long as he lived. So, Markov planned carefully. He possessed several passports and as many untraceable bank accounts. As a mandatory condition of the deal, the individual or organization that utilized him had to provide him with both protection and a place to hide. That was the plan. All he needed was a buyer.

Things had calmed down since he had smuggled out his last client, but Markov was never entirely free of fear. He could never rid himself of the nagging thought that one of the mutilated bodies which turned up regularly in out of the way alleys and obscure by-ways around Moscow, might one day, be his. The various Mafias he was forced to share his profits with traded in various forms of death. They were made up of grim and humorless men, hungrily demanding and equally merciless.

However, Markov felt sufficiently protected to continue his visits to a series of bars and night spots where he could indulge his many and varied tastes in women, the one arena of Moscow life in which there were no shortages. It was there, in one of the plushily decadent neon lit hotels he loved so ardently, that he found the man who would become his savior.

His name was simply Brown.

He claimed to be South African, though Markov could not be sure of his nationality. He spoke like an American, but in Markov’s trade such details were of minimal importance. Only one thing counted and that was the ability to pay. Brown proved he could pay and pay handsomely.

The contact had been made through one of Markov’s regular girls. She was a pretty ash blonde with full breasts and beguiling legs, named Adelena, who operated out of one of the glittering five star hotels Markov frequented. With Markov’s backing she had begun her own select dating service and now employed four attractive young university graduates, all of them fluent in half a dozen languages.

Markov liked Adelena and trusted his dealings with her. There were many opportunities to acquire information in her line of work, so when she mentioned the foreigner and what he had come to Moscow for, Markov was instantly alert. She described him as handsome, with eyes that were dark and sympathetic.

Markov relied on Adelena’s instincts. He instructed her on what to say and when to say it, and she followed his instructions to the letter. He questioned her about the foreigner’s manner, the clothes he wore, where he ate and what he drank, and even the way he made love to her. When the foreigner told Adelena what he was after and how soon he would have to make his move, Markov made his own.

They met in Adelena’s apartment with its comfortable overstuffed furniture and gold flocked wall paper. The foreigner was just as Adelena had described him, courteous, benign and sympathetic. His beard was neatly trimmed. His dark double breasted suits covered a lean and muscular frame. There was something about him that inspired trust. Perhaps that should have provided a warning, but he met Markov’s eyes with a level probing gaze and Markov felt reassured. They talked well into the morning. The stranger told him what he wanted and in a no more than a whisper, Markov revealed his secret.

The foreigner listened and reserved judgment. He would not disclose the name or nature of his organization, nor would he reveal the nature of his intended target. He said only that he would have to see. See what? Markov was thrown off-balance. He had revealed his treasure and had received nothing in return. They did not shake hands when he left. Markov was in shock. Had he made a mistake?

For the next 48 hours, Markov lived in a torture of suspense wondering if he had fatally compromised himself. Adelena tried to comfort him, but he was too terrified even to get an erection. He remained inside his apartment, swilling vodka and cursing his stupidity in trusting a whore. He became terrified of the phone, of every noise on the landing outside.

When the time came for their next meeting, Markov could not control the tremor in his hands. The foreigner was exactly on time. He sat opposite Markov on the velour couch, accepted a glass of scotch and with a gracious smile, agreed to all of Markov’s conditions. He even provided a generous down payment. Markov was overjoyed. He had been right to trust Adelena and after the stranger left, he embraced her again and again, promising her a Cartier, furs, anything. Things moved quickly, after that. They kept keep their meetings brief in order not to arouse suspicion, using Adelena as their go-between. A week later, Markov was ready.

Markov followed the instructions Adelena had received from the stranger. To make sure he wasn’t being followed, he drove his Mercedes to the dascha, parked in the drive way and took a taxi back to Moscow, carrying all the information the stranger had requested. Various top secret specifications and even the formula for an experimental and as yet untested serum. Normally, he would have been more cautious, doling out each piece of information piecemeal, but trust had been established and this was to be his final run. Markov was happy.

His destination was a small out of the way hotel in a dreary block of dilapidated Stalin era flats. He went through the empty lobby, following the worn carpet to the back entrance and into the shadowy alley outside. A car was waiting. Markov smiled when he recognized the driver. He got inside and the car pulled away.

Adelena waited beside the phone just as Markov had instructed, waiting to bring the suitcases he had so carefully packed, filled with designer clothing and expensive pieces of jewelry, even a priceless icon that had once belonged to the Romanov’s.

She waited until the shadows turned the room into darkness. She checked the answering machine before she went out and later, after she returned.

There were no messages. The phone never rang.

  Two

The gun ship threw its nervous dancing shadow across the desiccated African plain fifteen hundred feet below.

It was following the course of a stagnant river that spread itself out in a disassociated pattern of tributaries and streams that resembled the MRI of a slowly dying nerve.

The ship bore no markings and carried seven passengers. Five of them were in the compartment behind the pilot, their weapons piled on the metal deck between their feet. Their heads were turned to receive the wash of warm air that swept back across their pale sweating faces. Each cheek and forehead had been covered with slick brown daub, as much for protection against the broiling sun, as to make them invisible in the thick dark green foliage they would soon encounter.

They were all under thirty except for their leader, who might have been ten years older. He was known to them only by the name of Brown, though his real name was Kiernan. His skill with weapons and explosives had surprised them. He trained as hard. Raced them, step for step. His endurance surpassed even their own.

His military acumen subdued their natural braggadocio, reducing them to a grudging silence that quickly turned to admiration. He met their questions about his past with silence, which put an end to that line of inquiry. They had as little idea as to the ultimate purpose of their mission, as they had of the nationality and background of the man who had hired them. These questions bothered them little, they were mercenaries and knew they had no right to the answers.

They had worked their way into the Sudan the night before, flying up from Kenya along the rim the Didinga Hills. Then they turned west toward Torit, the provincial capital. Now they skimmed low above a desolate plain, dotted with occasional wind blown acacias and patches of thorn scrub. The high pitched whine of their engines scattered desperate herds of Wildebeests hunting for parched scraps of pasture.

They refueled at several points in the trackless scrub. Their fuel was supplied by a madman in dreadlocks, who led an army of depraved children in a bloody guerrilla war against their parents and fellow Acholi tribesmen.

Each dump was guarded by a legion of these silent ragged adolescents, all of them armed with machetes and late model Kalashnikovs. They stared at the white men with sunken emotionless eyes. No words were exchanged, as they pumped gasoline from the rusted drums. There was something about these children that prompted the men to move quickly and clutch their own weapons close. They even avoided looking at the girls, many of whom were still dressed in the remnants of dark blue uniforms bearing insignias of the schools they had been abducted from.

They dumped the boxes of ammunition whose delivery was the price of the refueling service and took off quickly. The children watched them depart, shielding their eyes against the dust with match stick thin arms.

By the time they reached the mountains the sun was bleeding into the aching splintered earth. Each peak rose abruptly out of the surrounding plain, the string of them, one behind the other, like teeth in the underslung jaw of a desiccated animal.

Their destination appeared, at dusk. A mountain that resembled an off-center pyramid crowned with a series of broken ridges stuttering toward a fourteen thousand foot summit surrounded by a pale blue haze.

They came in low above the tree canopy, using the rugged crest as cover. As they descended, the wind suddenly changed, blowing steadily from the North. It was a hot wind that danced its way across the arid savanna like a blind dervish, its voice a relentless deafening howl masking the sound of their approach.

The main encampment lay on the other side of the crest. and was guarded by a Sudanese army unit. They were bivouacked there to keep out any local native foot traffic. The area was off-limits to everyone but the soldiers and scientists who inhabited the camp and performed the work of extermination being conducted by the Muslim controlled Khartoum government upon the local Christian Sudanese population.

It was dusk when the gun ship finally dropped to earth. The men inside had become demonic specters, standing crouched just inside the open hatch. They had all donned green hot-suits and hoods with glass visors so that all but their eyes were hidden. Besides automatic weapons, the two in front carried heavy edged aluminum film cases.

They jumped to the ground even before the skids were down, their boots landing softly in the long shimmering, grasses rippling in ragged waves beneath the hot powerful wind. The men moved quickly one behind other following their leader’s long loping stride as he headed away down the sloping red dirt track that led to the encampment below.

There was no hesitation in their movements. They had studied the terrain. They knew exactly where they were going.

The camp was surrounded by a wire mesh fence. It consisted of a series of brown canvas tents ranged alongside several tin-roofed open sided structures. At its center, was a single story air-conditioned lab, its instrumentation powered by gasoline generators.

The camp was silent. Twin Russian made Hind helicopters were parked one beside the other in the center. These were the ships used in the exterminations, the death they carried released from two thousand feet. The Sudanese soldiers would be asleep at that hour. It was the moment just before the day’s heat rose and expanded in unbearable waves of stifling humidity that made even breathing difficult. Kiernan knew they would be sprawled under trees or bathing in one of the streams that gnawed their way through the dense growth clothing the mountain’s flanks. The Russian scientists would be inside the lab or their air-conditioned mess. The intruders had counted on that.

What they had not counted on were the Iraqis.

There seemed to be about a dozen. Two were on sentry duty, crouched half asleep in the shade of the generator. The others were asleep under an open sided canvass tent. The sentries had barely time to react as the intruders came toward them out of the bush. Their heavy lids widened as their vision cleared to focus on the image of the leader who suddenly materialized out of the bush. A burst through the long silencer on his automatic weapon finished them.

The rest of the Iraqis were sprawled on their cots in a heavy lidded slumber. None awoke as the green suited phantoms entered the shaded silence of the tent armed with long daggers they had removed from sheaths strapped to their legs. In a moment the Iraqi’s mundane dreams dissolved into final visions of paradise promised those who died in battle.

Two of the Russians were inside the lab when the intruders burst through the door. They turned in stunned surprise and threw up their hands. They were hustled out quickly and locked in one of the tin roofed huts. The men with the aluminum cases remained inside with their leader, while the others took up defensive positions at each of the camps’ twin entrances.

Kiernan went directly to the refrigerated steel cabinet. The killing variant was stored inside, contained in neat rows of oval glass amplules filled with amber colored material. He stared at them for a moment, then began systematically transferring each amplule from the storage cabinet to one of the metal film cases he had opened and placed on the table beside him.

He worked with great care, placing each amplule into an exact fitting metal protector that covered it like the shell of an egg. Then the protectors were placed inside the aluminum case whose velour covered interior was configured like an egg crate configured to the exact size and shape of each amplule.

They were sweating profusely in spite of it being fifteen degrees cooler inside. Their visors became fogged and they had to repeatedly wipe the glass rectangles clean. The actual operation took no longer than fifteen minutes, during which time they also gathered all the notes and scientific records. Then they carefully closed and locked each case and started back outside.

The team moved out quickly, struggling back up the trail which had begun to disappear into the quickly descending darkness. It was almost black on the ground although the sun still rested on the lip of horizon. They were soaking wet, and stifling in their suffocating propylene enclosures. The temperature inside was well over a hundred and twenty degrees.

They were nearly midway to the gun ship when the first Sudanese crossed the trail in front of them.

The soldier’s black skin glistened in the half light. He carried his green uniform over one arm and his Ak-47 in the other. He turned his head to stare at the approaching figures, momentarily transfixed by their fantastic appearance.

He raised his rifle almost in reflex when the burst from the leader’s weapon cut him down.

The soldier pivoted on one foot, falling to his knees and sprawling face down on the red clay trail. The burst was muffled by the silencer so there was still hope that it had not been heard.

The intruders did not pause. Two of them stepped out on either side of the trail, facing backwards, their weapons raised as the others increased their pace. The ground rose, as the trail narrowed toward the rise ahead. The gun ship was just on the other side. They almost reached it when the rest of the Sudanese detachment came up to meet them.

The soldiers were caught by surprise as the intruders opened up, spraying withering fire in all directions. Some fell where they stood, others scattered. But they were experienced troops and had been caught in ambushes before, during the fighting in Rwanda. They did not retreat. The darkness offered protection. They faded back, slipping into the brush and returning fire.

Kiernan was in front when the firing began. He felt something pass through his hot-suit and graze his calf.

He pivoted and squeezed off several short bursts into the dense foliage. Then he stepped off the trail and dropped onto his back, his body forming an invisible pocket in the tall spidery grass. He reached inside the pouch on his chest and drew out the rubber repair patch, pulled off the adhesive and carefully slapped it over the hole. He did the same on the other side where the bullet had gone through. Then he grasped his weapon and turned onto his belly.

The rest of his men were strung out on the trail behind him, firing from a kneeling position. But their shiny hot-suits shone eerily in the half light making them easy targets.

The mercenary behind Kiernan was shot in the neck. The bullet pierced his hot suit just above the collar bone. He staggered forward, then dropped to his knees as blood poured into his throat. He tried to pull off the hood when the second bullet caught him in the chest. He pitched forward just as a shell struck the aluminum case he had been carrying.

The case sprang open and was instantly riddled by a burst that split the protective covers and shattered the glass ovals inside releasing a cloud of shimmering particles that were quickly absorbed by the moist night air.

The effect on the soldiers was instantaneous.

Their eyes bulged. Their pupils filled suddenly with blood. Expressions of horror were glazed on their faces, as they simply ceased to breathe. Suffocating instantly as they fell.

One or two tried to crawl. A moment later clotted blood shot explosively through their noses and open mouths then burst directly through their pores forming a spidery filament that covered each victims body with a transparent shawl of lacy plasma. Tiny connected crystals of frozen essence.

Within sixty seconds all movement ceased. The air was still. There was no sound, only silence and the permeating odor of death.

Kiernan rose and looked around.

His men lay sprawled around him, their hot suits torn open twitching in a final agony.

None had survived.

He dismissed the horror around him, his mind focused on only one thing. He had to find the other case.

He walked several feet, picked up the undamaged case then started back along the trail. Each step he took required an effort of will. It was impossible to breathe. He was suffocating in his own sweat. But he could not raise his hand to pull of his hood. That would have meant instant death.

His insides felt as if they were on fire. The weight of the case was more than he could bear, but he knew he could not let go of it. Words hammered in his head. Keep going…keep going…

His head swam, but he forced himself to continue moving.

His eyes ached with excruciating pain. Light and dark alternated like someone madly reversing a shutter. He blacked out, then regained consciousness, but somehow he was still on his feet, still moving. His vision fractured into jerky images of reality, like a movie projector with damaged sprockets.

Miraculously, he remained on his feet steadying himself with the butt of his weapon. It was almost impossible to see the trail through the fogged window of his visor, but he resisted the intense desire to rip off his hood and fill his lungs with air. That impulse would have been his last.

A single thought drummed through him like a mantra.

A few more feet and he would be airborne…only a few more feet…

He remained focused on it like a tiny light within the throbbing pounding horror inside his skull. He moved tipsily, terrified of losing his footing and crashing down slope into the tangled thorny brush of the ravine below. That would have meant instant oblivion.

He staggered along the rise toward the small clearing where the chopper was waiting, its props turning in lazy indifferent circles.

The pilot had foolishly removed his hood. His young blonde head lay pressed against the glass canopy which was smeared with an oozing tracery of blood interlaced like strands of brightly dyed wool.

Kiernan shoved him aside and laid the case on the floor of the cockpit. He slipped into the pilot’s seat. Every effort caused him enormous pain, as if huge hollow needles were being forced into each joint. He hit the rotor switch and the prop spun into action. His vision blurred, but he gripped the stick, watching like a drunken man as the chopper shimmied along on its skids. Looking up, he saw the trees as they began rushing wildly toward him.

His vision went black for an instant, until he forced his hands to work.

Survive. Survive,

The words beat like a drum in his aching skull.

He eased back on the stick and felt the earth rushing away. Then he was airborne. He stared at the altimeter, struggling with the impulse to tear off his helmet. An eternity passed as he waited for the needle to rise, to reach five hundred feet. When the dial touched the white line, he pulled off the hood, sucking the cool incoming air, drawing it deep into his burning lungs.

His head cleared. He could see.

He jerked the stick hard over. The chopper bucked and shuddered, as it banked north, away from the contagion below. Away from the amber cloud of death that killed without mercy.

Three

McCord was in one hell of a mood.

His feet were freezing. Worse, the side arm he had been issued chaffed his skin beneath his arm. It had been some time since he had fired a weapon, any weapon, and the Colt was both heavy and cumbersome as well as being ice cold.

Then there was the waiting.

And waiting was all they had been doing for the last two hours. They were parked beneath a quarter moon that silvered the frost piled on the red tiled roofs of a hostile Croatian village, whose houses were spread around them like the smashed ramparts of a ruined fortress.

McCord was sitting in the passenger seat of an underheated jeep, perched on the edge of a narrow road above a steep rock strewn ravine, waiting to apprehend an elusive Serbian fugitive named Rajic, who had slipped through their fingers three times before.

Rajic had been a major during the Bosnian war, responsible for murdering a few thousand Croat and Muslim women and children, whom he had promised safety then lured into range of his batteries. From there, he had graduated to even greater atrocities, enough to fill half a drawer in a filing cabinet inside McCord’s office in Sarajevo.

Rajic was living in a safe house in a suburb on the outskirts of Sebriniska and they had been given the clearance to take him. The British commando unit assigned to the task was eager and efficient. But there had been the usual delays, so it was dark when they arrived and began surrounding the house. Now, they waited for intelligence to reconfirm that the man they sought was still inside.

Rajic had been on the wanted list for two years, yet had been living in relative freedom, flaunting his status and growing rich off a whole slew of smuggled commodities. There was nothing original about his story. The only thing unusual about it was his arrest. For that McCord would soon begin to pay.

Rajic was the third war criminal McCord had captured. Snatched was a better word. Each arrest was accompanied by howls of protest that threatened to grow into yet another political crisis. Each incident stirred up a frenzy, as each side made its usual accusations of favoritism. The furor it created caused the usual whirlpool of difficulties in Brussels and Washington and elsewhere among those who were purportedly the masters of the peace.

Did anyone really care?

Bosnia was crowded with war criminals. So why, Rajic? Perhaps, it was because the major had developed a particular brand of sadism, forcing prisoners to commit atrocities upon each other. Acts of mutilation that haunted McCord’s sleep. Still, what had it gained him? He had been branded a maverick, an unreliable quantity, a man who did not respect the dictates of policy.

The British Sergeant shifted his weight on the seat beside him.

McCord looked over at the house. The lights were still out and the place was silent, except for the occasional barking of a dog somewhere across the ravine. The fear was that someone might have tipped Rajic off. McCord’s fear was that they might wind up apprehending a decoy, and find themselves up shit’s creek in the middle of another diplomatic brouhaha, with the Serbs screaming for McCord’s scalp.

McCord sighed and stared straight ahead, oblivious to his reflection in the windshield. His black hair was already silvering, making him look older than his forty-seven years. His flinty gray eyes looked out from beneath dark brows, expressing the wary determination of a man who has been burned many times by his own mistakes.

McCord was lean, almost gaunt, with large sinewy hands and the long tapering fingers of a musician, though no one had ever known him to play any kind of instrument. There was a granite like quality about him, an unyielding single edged razor like determination that was less than endearing to many of those who worked with him, or felt the sting of his ire. His personnel file was explicit. In large bold caps, it clearly spelled out the message that McCord was not a team player.

No one knew that better than his superiors in Bosnia, or the constantly shifting teams of administrators he had done battle with over the last few years, as the West fumbled, bickered and dodged responsibility for the Balkan debacle. McCord was an anachronism.

He was a knight, armored and weaponed, a warrior enlisted for action in an agency of listeners. An agency filled with immobile men who despised the idea of action and concentrated instead on moving sentences on pieces of fax paper.

McCord was an alien species among the bishops and queens of Intelligence who prowled their dark corridors of secrecy and whose world was anonymous and imprecise. McCord had too many times violated their codes of misdirection and innuendo. There was something too laser like, too narrow and precise in McCord’s definition of moral certitude. So they steered clear of him, when what he presented to them required a force of will they were unwilling or unable to muster. But they drew him close again, when that force became necessary, and too often called upon him to provide it.

And so, because of the methodical precision of his actions, needle like in their precision, made secretly and without fanfare, a small but growing number of criminals were now safely installed in prisons in the Hague, facing trial before the world tribunal. That was the good news.

The bad came later. McCord expected no thanks for his efforts, nor did he receive any, except from his pale legion of ghosts. Their images accompanied him everywhere, appearing in his dreams or at those moments when his mind began to wander. Their dark craving faces were filled with reproach and bitter resentment for his many failures. Only occasionally did they deign to offer a sparse word of encouragement.

What drove McCord was often speculated upon. The truth was kept in a top secret file in the dark tomb like floors of a Washington bureaucracy. It was known only to a handful of narrow men, who hoarded such secrets to themselves. But for those who did know, the facts were simple and as unchangeable as the granite stone above a grave.

The Lieutenant!

McCord sat up. The Sergeant’s sharp warning whisper had drawn him out of his reverie.

McCord looked through the frosted window and saw the blond mustached officer making his way back to them from the command vehicle, parked further down the narrow road.

McCord rolled down the window admitting a sliver of icy air. He smelled snow. It would arrive before morning. He had become expert in the rigors of the Balkan winter.

The officer leaned in and began whispering softly. Intelligence just picked up a phone conversation. They think Rajic was tipped off, but that he may still be inside. Want to have a go?

McCord looked at him. The lieutenant was grinning expectantly. Ready for hunting the fox. McCord shrugged. It was either that or another six months of work down the tubes.

Tally ho. After you, old chum. He said wearily.

The lieutenant grinned and joyfully hurried back to his car.

McCord and the Sergeant got out and made their way along the rim of the road. It was colder now. Moisture froze on their lips. They paused making a visual