Paul Christopher - The Templar Cross

"How did you find out we were coming for Peggy?" Rafi asked.

"She said you would," explained Alhazred. "Both of you. I thought it was bluff and bluster, but then Fusani's body floated up and I knew you were coming." He smiled. "I guess neither of you was a Boy Scout; your knots weren't tight enough."

"Fusani?" Rafi frowned.

"The engineer on the Khamsin," suggested Holliday.

"Quite so," said Alhazred.

"At which point you set us up with Tidyman," Holliday said.

Again Alhazred nodded.

"Yes. It was logical that without papers to cross the border at Sollum you would find your way to Siwa. After that it was easy."

"It's a great story," said Holliday. "But it doesn't get us any closer to Peggy."

"Nor will it, not for the moment."

"Not for the moment?" Holliday said.

"How do we know she's even alive?" Rafi asked bluntly.

"You don't," said Alhazred. "But I can assure you that she is."

"What do you want from us?" Holliday asked.

"I'd like your opinion about something," said Alhazred. "Yours from a military perspective, Colonel Holliday, and yours from an archaeologist's point of view, Dr. Wanounou. Do that for me tomorrow and I'll be happy to tell you where Peggy is." He gave a curt little nod. "We'll head for the tomb tomorrow evening, less chance of being seen. Until then feel free to wander about the camp. Try to escape and Miss Blackstock will be killed within the hour. Understand?"

"Yes," said Holliday. Rafi was silent.

"Good," said Alhazred. He turned on his heel and threw back the tent flap, then disappeared outside.

"Illuminating," said Holliday, leaning back on the pillows, staring thoughtfully at the entrance to the tent.

"How much of that do you believe?" Rafi asked.

"All of it. None of it. Who knows?" Holliday shrugged. "All I do know is that guy talks too much and there's something creepy about him. Something missing."

"Is Peggy alive?" Rafi asked, his voice cracking.

"If she's not I guarantee you sayyed Alhazred is a dead man," vowed Holliday grimly.

They awakened with the rest of the camp at dawn the following day. Holliday knew there was a guard outside the tent throughout the night because he heard him singing softly to himself. The songs were all quiet dirges, like memories of the enormous desert they had just crossed. Sleep didn't come easily and his thoughts inevitably turned to Peggy and her whereabouts. He'd told Rafi that Alhazred would die if he'd harmed her in any way, but privately on his own restless voyage through the night, Holliday also promised himself that the man's death would not come either quickly or easily.

Breakfast was strong black coffee and taguella, a thick crepelike bread made from millet flour and goat's milk but without sugar. A Tuareg brought them the overnight bags they'd brought with them from Siwa and they changed into fresh clothes. After that, just as Alhazred had promised, they were given the run of the camp. Holliday was the first to decipher the site's design.

"It's a Roman castra," he said after a few minutes of walking through the camp. "A square inside a sand rampart and a dry ditch. About three hundred by three hundred and all the tents laid out in rows. That big tent in the middle is probably Alhazred's. It's a military formation. The first real attempt at urban planning." They climbed up the sandy hill at the south side of the camp. A Tuareg guard patrolling the top of the rampart with a rifle slung across his back eyed them speculatively. Like targets. Or prey.

"New weapon from the looks of it," said Rafi as they reached the summit of the sandy wall. "Alhazred equips his people well."

"It's a C7 assault rifle," said Holliday. "Knockoff of the U.S. Army M-18. Canadian again."

"Tidyman was raised in Canada and Alhazred's mother was Canadian as well; they must have lots of connections there. I know they have a big Lebanese immigrant population; it's been that way for a long time."

"Canada, the terrorist's Switzerland," replied Holliday, looking down at the camp. "Easy to get into on a visitor's visa and the border is a four-thousand-mile sieve. You can walk through a wheat field in Saskatchewan and not even know you'd crossed into Montana." He shook his head wearily. Holliday knew a few Homeland Security types who'd told him that between terrorists and high-grade marijuana, the Canadian border needed a fence even more than Mexico. "During the Vietnam War they said more Russian spies crossed into New York State at Niagara Falls than anywhere else. Couldn't go on a tour bus without running into some guy in a Hawaiian shirt named Vladimir."

"Funny place," said Rafi, a slightly wistful tone in his voice. "There was a beautiful girl in one of my classes at university named Joy Schlesinger. She had the greatest… Anyway, she came from some place called Medicine Hat. What is a medicine hat?"

"I don't have the slightest idea," said Holliday, distracted. He turned around and looked out across the open stretch of sand between them and the ragged promontory of rock that separated the camp from the main desert beyond. The camp had been situated about two miles from the foot of the dark, stony crags. Far enough away so that the steep cliffs offered no strategic high ground. An enemy could be seen coming from miles away. He turned again and looked at the Tuareg guard. As well as the rifle he had a pair of Leupold 10?50 binoculars. Holliday turned toward the distant hills. He squinted and shaded his eyes.

"What are you looking at?" Rafi asked.

"Look out here," Holliday instructed. "What do you see about five hundred yards out?"

"Sand," Rafi answered. "Blindingly white sand."

"Look closer."

Rafi thought he could make out a slightly darker strip in the bright hot sunlight.

"A road?"

"Except it doesn't go anywhere," murmured Holliday. "Look."

Rafi stared. The "road" looked like a line of hard-packed sand about half a mile long, parallel to the camp.

"What kind of road doesn't go anywhere?" The archaeologist frowned.

In the distance, overhead, there was a faint mosquito whine that grew louder with every passing second.

"A runway," said Holliday, glancing up. "These guys have got a plane."

A minute or so later, coming from the west and dropping down from the high plateau to the south, the aircraft appeared, an old design with two booms creating twin tailplane assemblies. As it began its approach to the runway the guard on the parapet grew very agitated, unlimbering the rifle from his back and rushing toward them, brandishing the weapon.

"Edh'hab! Edh'hab!" the man screamed.

"I think we're supposed to get off the rampart," said Rafi.

The plane's wheels touched down and the propeller sounds deepened as the pilot backed the engines. The guard stopped, lowering the weapon and aiming it at them.

"I think you're right," agreed Holliday. They scrambled down the sandy hill. Above them the guard seemed to relax. Holliday and Rafi made their way between two rows of igloo-shaped tents and walked toward the big camel enclosure close to the center of the camp.

"What was that all about?" Rafi asked. He turned his head and looked up at the guard. The Tuareg had gone back to patrolling the rampart.

"I don't think we were supposed to see the plane," said Holliday.

"Why not?" Rafi said. "It's not like either one of us can fly."

"I flew in planes like that all the time in Vietnam," said Holliday. "It was a Cessna Skymaster. They called them O2s in-country. They bird-dogged downed pilots and worked as forward artillery spotters. They used to take me and my men into Cambodia and Laos. They even made a movie with one in it. Bat 21, I think it was called. Danny Glover and Gene Hackman, our French cop's favorite actor.