Wait. Two of them limped, Kelly realized. Veterans. That was good news and bad news. People with combat experience were simply different. The time would come for action, and they’d react well, probably. Even without recent training, instincts would kick in, and they’d try to fight back effectively eve? without leadership – but as veterans they’d also be softer, disdainful of their duty, however cushy it might be, lacking the awkward eagerness of fresh young troops. As with all swords, that one cut in two directions. In either case; the plan of attack allowed for it. Kill people without warning, and their training was a moot point, which made it a hell of a lot safer.
Anyway, that was one wrong assumption. Troops on POW-guard duty were usually second-raters. These at least were combat troops, even if they had sustained wounds that relegated them to backup service. Any other mistakes? Kelly wondered. He couldn’t see any yet.
His first substantive radio message was a single code group which he tapped out using Morse Code.
‘EASY SPOT, sir.’ The communications technicians tapped out an acknowledgment.
“Good news?’ Captain Franks asked.
‘It means everything is as expected, no major news,’ Admiral Podulski replied. Maxwell was catching a nap. Cas wouldn’t sleep until the mission was concluded. ‘Our friend dark even delivered it exactly on time.’
Colonel Glazov didn’t like working on weekends any more than his Western counterparts, even less so when it was because his administrative assistant had made a mistake and set his report on the wrong pile. At least the boy had admitted it, and called his boss at home to report his error. He couldn’t very well do much more than chide the oversight, at the same time he had to praise the lad’s honesty and sense of duty. He drove his personal car into Moscow from his dacha, found a parking place in the rear of the building, and submitted himself to the tiresome security-clearance procedures before taking the elevator up. Then came the necessity of unlocking his office and sending for the right documents from Central Files, which also took longer than usual on this weekend day. All in all, just getting to the point at which he could examine the damned thing required two hours from the unwelcome phone call that had started the process. The Colonel signed for the documents and watched the file clerk depart.
‘Bloody hell,’ the Colonel said in English, finally alone in his fourth-floor office. CASSIUS had a friend in the White House National Security Office? No wonder some of his information had been so good – good enough to force Georgiy Borissovish to fly to London to consummate the recruitment. The senior KGB officer now had to chide himself. CASSIUS had kept that bit of information up his sleeve, perhaps in the knowledge that he’d rattle his ultimate control officer. The case officer, Captain Yegorov, had taken it in stride – as well he ought – and described the first-contact meeting in exquisite detail.’
‘Boxwood Green,’ Glazov said. Just a code name for the operation, selected for no particular reason, as the Americans did. The next question was whether or not to forward the data to the Vietnamese. That would be a political decision, and one to be made quickly. The Colonel lifted the phone and dialed his most immediate superior, who was also at home and instantly in a foul humor.
Sunrise was an equivocal thing. The color of the clouds changed from the gray of slate to the gray of smoke as somewhere aloft the sun made its presence known, though that would not be the case here until the low-pressure area had passed north into China – or so the weather briefing had declared. Kelly checked his watch, making his mental notes at every point. The guard force was forty-four men, plus four officers – and maybe a cook or two. All except the eight on tower duty formed up just after dawn for calisthenics. Many had trouble doing their morning exercises; and one of the officers, a senior lieutenant from his shoulder boards, hobbled around with a cane-probably a bad arm, too, from the way he used it. What got you? Kelly wondered. A crippled and foul-tempered NCO walked the lines of soldiers, swearing at them in a way that showed long months of practice. Through his binoculars Kelly watched the expressions that trailed behind the little bastard’s back. It gave the NVA guards a human quality that he didn’t welcome.
Morning exercise lasted half an hour. When it ended, the soldiers headed off for morning chow, falling out in a decidedly casual and unmilitary way. The tower guards spent most of their time looking in, as expected, most often leaning on their elbows. Their weapons were probably not chambered, a sensible safety precaution that would count against them either this night or the next, depending on weather. Kelly made another check of his surroundings. It would not do for him to fix too closely on the objective. He wouldn’t move about now, not even in the gray daylight that had come with the morning, but he could turn his head to look and listen. Catching the patterns of bird calls, getting used to it so that a change would register at once. He had a green cloth across the muzzle of his weapon, a floppy hat to break up the outline of his head within and behind the bush, and facial camouflage paint, all of which conspired to make him invisible, part of this warm, humid environment that – I mean, why do people fight for the damned place? he wondered. Already he could feel bugs on his skin. The worst of them were put off by the unscented repellent he’d spread around. But not all, and the feel of things crawling on him combined with the knowledge that he couldn’t make any rapid moves. There were no small risks in a place like this. He’d forgotten so much. Training was good and valuable, but it never quite made it all the way to full preparation. There was no substitute for the actual dangers involved, the slightly increased heart rate that could tire you out, even when you lay still. You never quite forgot it, but you never really remembered it all, either.
Food, nourishment, strength. He reached into a pocket, moving his hand slowly and withdrawing a pair of food bars. Nothing he’d eat by choice in any other place, but it was vital now. He tore off the plastic wrappers with his teeth and chewed them up slowly. The strength they imparted to his body was probably as much psychological as real, but both factors had their uses, as his body had to deal with both fatigue and stress.
At eight, the guard cycle changed again. Those relieved from the towers went in for chow. Two men took posts at the gate, bored before they got there, looking out at the road for traffic that would probably never come to this backwater camp. Some work details formed, and the jobs they performed were as clearly useless to Kelly as to those who carried them out in a. stoic, unhurried way.
Colonel Grishanov arose just after eight. He’d been up late the night before, and though he’d planned to arise earner, he’d just learned to his displeasure that his mechanical alarm clock had finally given up the ghost, corroded to death by the miserable climate. Eight-ten, he saw, looking at his aviator’s watch. Damn. No morning ran. It would soon be too hot for that, and besides, it looked like it would be raining all day. He brewed his own pot of tea over a small army-type cook stove. No morning paper to read – again. No news of the football scores. No review of a new ballet production. Nothing at all in this miserable place to distract him. Important as his duty was, he needed distraction as much as any man did. Not even decent plumbing. He was used to all of that, but it didn’t help. God, to be able to go home, to hear people speaking his native language again, to be in a cultured place where there was something to talk about. Grishanov frowned in the shaving mirror. Months more to go, and he was grumbling like a private soldier, a damned recruit. He was supposed to know better.
His uniform needed pressing. The humidity here attacked the cotton fibers, making his usually crisp blouse look like pajamas, and he was already on his third set of shoes, Grishanov thought, sipping, now at his tea and going over notes from the previous night’s interrogations. All work and no play … and he was already late. He tried to light a cigarette, but the humidity had also rendered his matches useless. Well, he had the cook stove for that. Where had he left his lighter ..?
There were compensations, if you could call them that. The Vietnamese soldiers treated him with respect, almost awe – except for the camp commander, Major Vinh, worthless bastard that he was. Courtesy to a fellow socialist ally demanded that Grishanov be given an orderly, in this case a small, ignorant peasant boy with only one eye who was able to make the bed and carry out the slops bowl every morning. The Colonel was able to walk out in the knowledge that his room would be somewhat tidy when he returned. And he had his work. Important, professionally stimulating. But he would have killed for his morning Sowetskiy Sport.