Nick Carter: The Omega Terror

“The Russians?” he asked.

“I’m not sure.” I told him about the message scrawled on the note.

He grunted. “I know Madrid is not the safest place for you at the moment, but it was convenient for both of us right now, and I had to speak with you quickly.”

He turned and moved to a small, rickety table on which were spread several official-looking papers. He sat down and shuffled the papers absently while I slumped onto a straight chair near him.

“I think you’ve heard me refer to an American defector named Damon Zeno,” Hawk began.

“A research microbiologist,” I said. “You figured he was doing some work for the Russians a while back.”

“That’s right,” Hawk said quietly. “But now he’s on the Chinese payroll. They set up a research lab for him in Morocco, and he’s been doing work on a tropical bug called bilharzia. Are you up on your tropical diseases?”

“It’s a flatworm,” I said. “A parasite that eats away at a man from inside. You pick it up in water, as I recall. Has Dr. Z done something to this bug?”

Hawk stared at the remains of his cigar. “Zeno took the bug apart to see what made it tick. And he found out. Our informant tells us that he’s developed a mutation of the normal flatworm, an almost indestructable strain of bilharzia. He calls it the Omega Mutation. Since Omega is the last letter in the Greek alphabet, we figure Zeno took the designation from his own last name.

“At any rate, if what we’ve learned is correct, the Omega Mutation is particularly virulent, and it multiplies at an almost unbelievable rate. It resists all known drugs, antidotes, and water purifiers currently in use.”

I uttered a low whistle. “And you think Zeno means to use this bug against the U.S.?”

“He’s admitted as much. America is to be the proving ground for any effective biological weapon he’s developed. A handful of enemy agents could easily infect our lakes and streams. Even after we learned of the bug’s presence, we could do little about it. Within days — not months or weeks— within days of contamination, most of us would have contracted the disease. In another few days, we’d be dead.”

“I guess I go visit Zeno in Morocco,” I said.

Hawk fiddled with the cigar again. “Yes. We believe the L5 man who runs the operation, by the name of Li Yuen, has personal ties with a couple of Moroccan generals who still have aspirations for a leftist coup. He may have made a deal with them; we don’t know yet. In fact, we don’t even know exactly where the lab is located.”

I shook my head. There was no advantage to being AXE’s Number One man except for the pay, and a man had to be a fool to do what I did for any amount of money. “I suppose time is of the essence?”

“As usual. We think Zeno is just about ready to make a final report to Peking. When he does, he will undoubtedly send the results of his experiments along with it. I’ve made reservations for you on a flight to Tangier tomorrow morning. You’ll meet Delacroix, our informant there. If you can bring Zeno back to us, do so. If not….” Hawk paused. “Kill him.”

I grimaced. “I’m glad you haven’t set my goals too high.”

“I promise you a good rest when this one is over, Nick,” Hawk said, moving his thin-lipped month into a small grin. Sitting there across the table from me, he looked more like a Connecticut farmer than a powerful intelligence chief.

“I may get a longer one than I want,” I said, returning the grin.

Iberia Airlines flight 541 arrived in Tangier late the next morning. As soon as I stepped off the plane, I noticed that it was warmer than in Madrid. The air terminal was a fairly modern one, and the uniformed Moroccan girls at the desks were friendly. There was a reservation booth for hotels, and I arranged for a room at the Velasquez Palace, in the French Quarter.

On the balmy ride into town, along a tree-lined but dusty road, I reflected on the note I had found in my room. Did the Russians leave it to let me know they were on AXE’s trail? Or was it a message from the Chicoms? Maybe, the Chinese L5 had gotten wind of AXE’s renewed interest in the Omega experiments, and an agent was trying to frighten us off until Zeno got his report to Peking.

The Velasquez Palace sat on a hill overlooking the harbor and Straits of Gibraltar and the med-ina section of Tangier, with its crammed-together ancient buildings and narrow streets. Tangier was a sparkling white-washed city set against the greenery of the hills behind it and the cobalt blue of the Straits. It had been a center of trade for over a thousand years, the meeting place of European and Asian commerce where Berbers and Bedouins mixed with merchants from every corner of the world. Smuggling and shady deals had flourished in the narrow streets of the medina and casbah until new laws were passed just after the Second World War.

When I called Delacroix from my hotel room, a young woman answered. The voice was filled with emotion as soon as I asked for André Delacroix.

“This is his real estate agent?” she asked, using the identification code that Delacroix had been given.

“Yes, that’s right,” I said.

There was a short pause. “My uncle has met with an accident. Perhaps we can meet to discuss the matters you wanted to take up with him.”

That was one of the problems with this kind of work. No matter how carefully you planned, an unknown factor was always being thrown at you. I hesitated before I spoke.

“Mr. Delacroix is unable to see me?” I asked.

Her voice was trembling slightly. “Quite un-able.” She spoke with a French accent.

“All right. Where would you like to meet to discuss the matter?”

Another slight pause. “Meet me at the Cafe Tingis, in the medina. I will be wearing a green dress. Can you be there by noon?”

“Yes, noon,” I said.

And then the phone was dead.

As I left my European-style hotel, a boy in a beige djellaba and a brown fez tried to sell me a taxi tour, which I declined. I walked along the Rue Velasquez to the Boulevard Pasteur and made a right to the Place de France. A couple of blocks later I entered the medina through an ancient archway.

As soon as you step into the medina you sense the chaos. The narrow streets are crowded with robed Moroccans. It is all winding streets and overhanging balconies and dark doorways leading to shops that sell brass and leather goods of all kinds of exotic things. As I moved along toward the Little Socco, oriental music assailed my ears from a shop somehwere, and strange but fascinating odors reached my nostrils. Veiled women wearing gray kaftans stood and spoke together in hushed whispers, and two American hippies stood in front of a dilapidated hotel, arguing with the proprietor about the cost of the room.

The Cafe Tingis sat at the end of the Little Socco. It was a large place inside, but nobody ever sat there except Moroccans. Outside on the sidewalk were tables with a wrought-iron railing in front of them to separate the patrons from the masses of humanity.

I found Delacroix’s niece seated at a table next to the railing. She had long straight, flaming red hair and wore a green dress that showed plenty of long white thigh. But she seemed completely un-aware of how beautiful she looked. Her face was tense with worry and fear.

“Gabrielle Delacroix?” I asked.

“Yes,” she answered, relief starting to show on her face. “And you are the Mr. Carter that my uncle was supposed to meet?”

“That’s right.”

When the waiter came, Gabrielle ordered a Moroccan mint tea, and I ordered a coffee. After he was gone, she turned large green eyes on me.

“My uncle is — dead,” she said.

I had guessed as much from the way she talked on the phone. But hearing her say it gave me a small empty feeling in my chest. I did not speak for a moment.