“Yeah,” Chavez agreed. Two in a row for Team-2 was what he thought. A little over an hour’s flight time to Vienna, he thought next, checking his watch. One such incident was happenstance, Chavez told himself, but terrorist incidents weren’t supposed to happen so closely together, were they? Not that there was a rulebook out there, of course, and even if there were such a thing, these people would have violated it. Still . . . but there was no time for such thoughts. Instead, Chavez examined the information coming into Price’s laptop and started wondering how he’d deal with this new situation. Farther aft, his team occupied a block of economy seats and spent their time reading paperback books, hardly talking at all about the upcoming job, since they knew nothing to talk about except where they were going.
“Bloody large perimeter for us to cover,” Price observed, after a few minutes.
“Any information on the opposition?” Ding asked, then wondered how it was that he was adopting Britspeak. Opposition? He should have said bad guys.
“None,” Eddie replied. “No identification; no word on their numbers.”
“Great,” the leader of Team-2 observed, still staring sideways at the screen.
The phones were trapped. Altmark had seen to that early on. Incoming calls were given busy signals, and outgoing calls would be recorded at the central telephone exchange-but there had been none, which suggested to Captain Altmark that the criminals were all inside; since they were not seeking external help. That could have meant they were using cellular phones, of course, and he didn’t have the equipment to intercept those, though he did have similar traps on Ostermann’s three known cellular accounts.
The Staatspolizei now had thirty officers on the scene and a tight perimeter fully formed and punctuated by a four wheel armored vehicle, .hidden in the trees. They’d stopped one delivery truck from coming ire with -some overnight express mail, but no other vehicles had attempted to enter the properly. For one so wealthy, Ostermann did indeed lead a quiet and unassuming life, the captain thought. He’d expected a constant parade of vehicles.
“Hans?”
“Yes, Petra?”
“The phones have not rung. We’ve been here for some time, but the phones have not rung.”
“Most of my work is on computer,” Ostermann said, having noted the same discrepancy himself. Had Gerhardt gotten the word out? If he had done so, was that good? He had no way of knowing. Ostermann had long joked about how cutthroat his profession was, how every step he took had danger, because others out there would try to rob him blind if they ever got the chance . . . but not one of them had ever threatened his life, nor had any ever pointed a loaded gun at him or a member of his staff: Ostermann used his remaining capacity for objectivity to realize that this was a new and dangerous aspect to the world that he’d never seriously considered, about which he knew very little, and against which he had nothing in the way of defenses. His only useful talent at the moment was his ability to read faces and the minds behind them, and though he’d never encountered anyone even vaguely close to the man and woman in his office now, he saw enough to be more afraid than he’d ever been before. The man, and even more the woman, were willing to kill him without any pangs of conscience whatsoever, no more emotion than he showed when picking up a million dollars of American T-bills. Didn’t they know. that his life had worth? Didn’t they know that
-no, Erwin Ostermann realized, they did not. They didn’t know, and they didn’t care. Worst of all, what they thought they did know wasn’t true, and he would be hard pressed indeed to persuade them otherwise.
Then, finally, a phone rang. The woman gestured for him to answer it.
“Hier ist Ostermann, ” he said on picking up the receiver. His male visitor did the same on another extension. “Herr Ostermann, I am Captain Wilhelm Altmark of the Staatspolizei. You have guests there, I understand.”
“Yes, I do, Captain,” Ostermann replied.
“Could I speak with them, please?” Ostermann merely looked at Hans Furchtner.
“You took your time, Altmark,” Hans said. “Tell me, how did you find out?”
“I will not ask you about your secrets if you do not ask me about mine,” the captain: replied coolly. “I would like to know who you are and what you wish.”
“I am Commander Wolfgang of the Red Workers’ Faction.”
“And what is it you want?”
“We want the release of several of our friends from various prisons, and transport to Schwechat International. We require an airliner with a range of more than five thousand kilometers and an international flight crew for a destination which we will make known when we board the aircraft. If we do not have these things by midnight, we will begin to kill some of our . . . our guests here in Schloss Ostermann. “‘
“I see. Do you have a list of the prisoners whose release you require?”
Hans put one hand over the receiver and held the other out. “Petra, the list.” She walked over and handed it to him. Neither seriously expected any cooperation on this. issue, but it was part of the game, and the rules had to be followed. They’d decided on the way in that they’d have to kill one hostage certainly, more probably two, before they got the ride to the airport. The man, Gerhardt Dengler, would be killed first, Hans thought, then one of the women secretaries. Neither he nor Petra really wanted to kill any of the domestic, help, they were genuine workers, not capitalist lackeys like the office staff: “Yes, here is the list, Captain Altmark . . .”
“Okay,” Price said, “we ha e a list of people we’re expected to liberate for our friends.” He turned the computer so that Chavez could see it
“The usual suspects. Does this tell us anything, Eddie?”
Price shook his head. “Probably not. You can get these names from a newspaper.”
“So, why do they do it?”
“Dr. Bellow will explain that they have to, to show solidarity with their compatriots, when in fact they are all sociopaths who don’t care a rip for anyone but themselves.” Price shrugged. “Cricket has rules. So does terrorism and” Just then the captain of the airliner interrupted the revelation, and told everyone to put the seat backs up and tray tables away in preparation for landing.
“Showtime soon, Eddie.”
“Indeed, Ding.”
“So, this is just solidarity bullshit?” Ding asked, tapping the screen.
“Most likely, yes.” With that, Price disconnected the phone line from his computer, saved his files, and shut the laptop down. Twelve rows aft, Tim Noonan did the same. All the Team-2 members started putting on their game faces as the British Airways 737 flared to land-in Vienna. Someone had called ahead to someone else. The airliner taxied very rapidly indeed to its assigned jetway, and out his window. Chavez could see a baggage truck with cops standing next to it waiting alongside the terminal.
It was not an invisible event. A tower controller noted the arrival, having already noted a few minutes before that a Sabena flight scheduled in a slot ahead of the British aircraft had been given an unnecessary go-around order, and that a very senior police officer was in the tower, expressing interest in the British Airways flight. Then there was a second and very unnecessary baggage train with two police cars close by the A-4 jetway. What was this? he wondered. It required no great effort on his part to keep watch to learn more. He even had a pair of Zeiss binoculars.
The stewardess hadn’t received instructions to get Team-2 off more quickly than anyone else, but she suspected there was something odd about them… They’d arrived with out having been on her computerized manifest, and they were politer than the average business travelers. Their appearances were unremarkable, except all looked very fit, and all had arrived together in a single bunch, and headed to their seats in an unusually organized way. She had a job to do, however; as she opened the door into the jetway where, she saw, a uniformed policeman was waiting. He didn’t smile or speak as she allowed the already-standing passengers to make their way off. Three from first class stopped just outside the aircraft, conferred with the policeman, then went out the door to the service stairs, which led directly to the tarmac. Being a serious fan of thriller and mystery novels, it was worth a look, she thought, to see who else went that way. The total was thirteen, and the number included all of the late-arriving passengers. She looked at their faces, most of which gave her a smile on the way out. Handsome faces, for the most part . . . more than that, manly ones, with expressions that radiated confidence, and something else, something conservative and guarded.