Ted Bell - Hawke

“Good, good,” Howell said, then, into the mike, “Chuck, you’re going to need to deep-six that bear, son. Like, right now.”

“Sorry, sir?”

“The bear has a weapon in it, son, and it’s going to explode in about a minute. Maybe less. Okay? So just take her easy, level off, and reduce your airspeed immediately, you copy that?”

“Copy” was the terse one-word answer.

“Okay, you’re looking good, Zulu Bravo. I have you in visual contact. Now, I want you to jettison your canopy.”

“Roger that.”

The canopy blew off instantly, exposing the pilot and his radar intercept officer seated immediately aft of him to a hundred-knot-plus blast of air. Chuck Nettles felt a shuddering bump and the plane instantly started to yaw left and right.

“I think the canopy clipped the starboard rudder, sir!”

“Yes, it did, Chuck, I saw that. Took out a good-sized chunk. Big old piece. But you’ve got a more immediate problem. Can you reach that bear?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You’ve got exactly ten seconds to get that bear out of your plane, son.”

Admiral Howell waited, tracking his binocs right with the streaking fighter, holding his breath as if that would keep his heart in place. A smile broke across his face.

A small white object flew out of the cockpit, hit the Jetstream, and was blasted backwards and down.

He stayed with the bear all the way, saw it hit the water. For a few endless moments, he thought the goddamn thing might float, but a smile broke across his face as he saw the bear slip beneath the waves.

So much for your goddamn airborne spores, amigos.

The density of the ocean had instantly neutered the Cubans’ weapon.

There was a squawk over the speaker.

“Uh, I’m having a little trouble keeping this bird flying straight,” Nettles said over the speaker. “Busted rudder and all. Anybody got any bright ideas?”

“I’ve had all the good ideas I’m going to have this morning, Chuck. You just saved a lot of lives. I want to thank you for that. I’m going to turn you over to the airboss now. You just bring that big sucker on home, son. Bring her down safely. There’ll be a fifth of George Dickel with your name on it waiting in my wardroom.”

“Copy that,” Captain Nettles said, trying desperately not to let the effect of the blown canopy, destroyed rudder, and the fact that he’d just flown an entire mission with a bomb between his knees show in his voice.

“Bravo Zulu, you are a quarter mile out,” the airboss said. “Turn right to 060 degrees.”

“I can’t do that, she’s not responding to rudder.”

“Well, you’re going to have to land that bird with ailerons and elevators, Bravo Zulu, just like you did out at Coronado in flying school.”

“I can’t remember back that far, sir.”

“Bravo Zulu, you play a little golf, don’t you?”

“Affirmative.”

“Slice or hook?”

“Slice a little.”

“Know how you aim a teensy bit left to correct for that slice?”

“Affirmative.”

“You got a little slice in your current stance. I want you to shift your aim left, copy?”

“Left.”

“Easy, easy. Not that much, boy. A teensy. You want to draw it in down the left side of the fairway.”

“How’s that?”

“Call the ball, Bravo Zulu.”

“I have the ball, sir.”

“Come on home, then, Bravo Zulu. Come on home to Papa John.”

The third-story sitting room of the old house in Belgrave Square was lit only by a roaring fire. Pelting rain beat against the room’s tall, broad windows. The upper branches of the plane and elm trees outside, dancing violently in the howling wind, clawed and scratched at the glass.

It was a cold, sleeting rain, but the roaring fire Pelham had laid in the great hearth warmed the room and kept the chill of late evening at bay.

Savage filaments of lightning briefly illuminated the whole room, where two people sat side by side on an immense sofa before a crackling blaze. The lightning was followed immediately by an earth-splitting thunderclap powerful enough, it seemed, to shake a good portion of London to its ancient foundations. In the silence that followed, the woman rested her head on the man’s shoulder and spoke in a quiet, sleepy voice.

“My daddy used to say that all the great romances are made in heaven. But so are thunder and lightning.”

Alex Hawke laughed softly, and brushed back a wing of auburn hair, bronzed by the firelight, from her pale forehead. Her eyes were closed, and her long dark lashes lay upon her cheeks, fluttering only when either of them spoke.

“Amazing chap, your father,” Hawke whispered. “Everything he says seems to have quotation marks at either end.”

“A lot of them are unprintable,” Vicky said, yawning deeply, and pressing closer. “He has a few enormously politically incorrect opinions and he’s an ornery old cuss when you cross him.”

“What did he have to say when you rang him up this afternoon?”

“Not much. Sounded very shaky. It’s going to take him a while to get over all those roller-coaster emotions. I promised I’d come right away to look after him. I’m so sorry. I know you were counting on me to—”

“Shh. I understand. You sound tired, Doc.”

“I am, a little. We must have walked the width and breadth of every park in London. It was lovely. My dream of a foggy day in London Town.”

“We missed one. Regent’s Park,” Alex said, stroking her hair. “I wanted to show you Queen Mary’s rose garden. Why are we “whispering?”

“I don’t know. You started it. When one person starts, the other just does it automatically. Funny. Do you want some more tea?”

“What I’d love is a small brandy. Curious. I haven’t seen Pelham lurking about in the last hour or two.”

“I saw him sitting in the pantry just after dinner. Sniper was perched on his shoulder, chattering away, while Pelham was doing needlepoint. Very fancy if you ask me, Lord Fauntleroy. What is it?”

“I’m embarrassed to tell you. It’s to be a birthday present. For me, in fact. A waistcoat with the family crest. I’ve tried to convince him to quit before he goes blind, but he feigns deafness whenever I do.”

At that very moment, there was the creak of an ancient door, and the omniscient Pelham Grenville entered the room bearing a large silver tray, which he placed upon the ottoman before the fire.

“Begging your pardon, m’lord. That last flash and clap made me think a splash of brandy might be welcomed.”

“The man is a mind reader, I tell you,” Hawke said, reaching for the heavy crystal decanter. “Thank you kindly, young Pelham.”

Hawke noticed that, in addition to the decanter and small thistle-shaped crystal glasses, there was a most peculiar box on the tray. It was triangular and made of yellowed ivory, with a hawk carved of onyx embedded in the center of the lid.

“I’ve never seen that box before, Pelham,” Alex said. “Quite beautiful.”

“Yes,” Pelham said. “It was a gift to your great-grandfather from David Lloyd-George himself. Something to do with a political triad long lost to the mists of history.”

“Too small for cigars,” Alex observed.

“Indeed,” Pelham said. “Do you mind if I sit a moment?”

“You may sit as long as you wish, of course. Here, let me pour you a brandy,” Alex said, and he did so.

Pelham pulled up a leather winged-back chair and sat down with a small sigh. He sipped at his brandy, then picked up the box and turned it over in his hands. He focused his clear blue eyes on Hawke.

“Your lordship, I’ve been in service for nigh on seventy years. And for the last thirty years, I’ve been waiting for this exact moment,” the old fellow finally said. Then he downed the brandy in one swallow and held out his glass to Hawke for a refill. This done, he sat back against the cushion and looked about the room. The firelight was licking every corner of the huge space, even reaching up into the ceiling moldings high above them.