The Fiery Cross Read online

  "You packing?" Bob Shelton asked as Bolan approached. Bolan pulled back the left side of his jacket to show the Browning in its shoulder harness, and the leader of the hit team handed him a sawed-off Ithaca. "You'd better take this, just in case."

  "Expecting problems with the reverend?"

  "I'm just like you. I like to be prepared."

  "Suits me."

  He looked the shotgun over, pumped the slide to put a live one in the firing chamber, flicked the safety on. The buckshot would not have much chance to spread if he was forced to make his move inside the battlewagon, but it wouldn't hurt to have the scattergun along. In case.

  "Let's saddle up."

  He counted five men in the second car, McCullough driving. In the back of the battlewagon, Bolan had a window seat this time, with Jackson driving and Shelton riding shotgun, as before. Bolan sat beside a Klansman he had never seen before, with Thorndyke topping off the sandwich on the driver's side.

  They let the other car lead out, the battlewagon trailing, Bolan once again noticing street signs as they rode. The nameless Klansman tried to keep a conversation going with some ethnic jokes, apparently to camouflage his nervousness, but finally gave it up. It might not be his first time out with Shelton's team, but he was definitely showing signs of stage fright, which made him doubly dangerous when the chips were down. A frightened man was unpredictable, unstable, prone to fire at anything that moved — including friends. It did not help to see the nervous Kluxer carrying an Ingram MAC-IO submachine gun fitted with a 32-round magazine.

  When they were fifteen minutes out, they passed the blackened ruins of the church. Shelton cocked a thumb in that direction.

  "Bastard should have learned," he said. "Some niggers just can't take a hint."

  "That ought to wake him up, all right," Jackson said.

  "Too bad the fucker isn't going to live so he could learn from his mistake."

  "Ain't it a crying shame?"

  Four blocks beyond the church, the battlewagon slowed and moved toward the curb. As McCullough killed the lights, the car kept on rolling, nosing in across the street some fifty feet beyond.

  "What are we doing?" Bolan asked.

  "We're backup," Shelton said. "They won the toss for who should take him. We stand by in case he's got some of those union boys along for company."

  The nameless Klansman looked relieved, and tried to hide it with a show of mock belligerence. "I thought you said that we was gonna take him!"

  "Keep your shirt on. They're not going to dust him here. We'll all be at the party once he's in the bag."

  "Okay, that's better." But the nervous tension was sounding in his voice again, and Bolan saw the Ingram trembling in his grasp.

  Downrange, four Klansmen were unloading from the other car, McCullough hanging tough behind the wheel. They struck off in a flying wedge across the minister's lawn and were halfway to the house when floodlights blazed to life behind the hedges, trapping them at center stage.

  "FBI! Lay down your weapons!"

  One of the excited Klansmen fired a shotgun blast at Little's house, and suddenly the night was cleft by thunder, muzzle-flashes winking from the shadows, members of the raiding party dodging, weaving, sprawling as they tried to hold their own. McCullough dropped the point car into gear, tires smoking from a standing start, but men in navy coveralls with "FBI" emblazoned on the backs were charging from the bushes, peppering the car with automatic fire. Absorbing hits, the wheelman lost control and veered across the street, colliding with a car parked on the other side.

  "Get in there!" Shelton bellowed at Jackson. "Let's get those Klansmen out!"

  The battlewagon dug for traction, tortured rubber moaning on the pavement. Bobby Shelton was already craning through his open window, aiming his M-l carbine at the FBI men, squeezing off before the agents recognized their danger. Then they were returning fire, the battle-wagon taking hits, her windshield etched with graphic spiderweb designs.

  A rifle bullet clipped the rearview mirror, plowing on to strike the nameless Klansman squarely in the face. A portion of his flabby cheek was sheared away, blood spurting everywhere, and he went crazy, holding down the trigger of his Ingram as he clapped the other hand against his face. It took a second and a half to empty out the weapon's magazine, and in that time he riddled Jackson, splattering his brains across the dashboard, tracking on to drill Bob Shelton in the back.

  They were accelerating toward the house, a dead foot jammed against the pedal. Bolan did not have to think about his move before he made it, leaning hard against the door and rolling clear. He heard a muffled curse from Thorndyke as the Klansman tried to emulate his move and blew it. Then the pavement rushed to meet him, flaying palms and knees. The Ithaca was jolted from his fingers, skittering across the pavement, lost.

  He rolled and came up running, well aware that members of the SWAT team would regard him as the enemy and cut him down if they were given half a chance. Behind him, riot guns and automatic rifles strafed the battlewagon, but they could not slow it down with Jackson slumped across the wheel. There was a rending crash as Little's house absorbed the crushing impact, followed by the hollow rushing sound of flames. Some of the probing rounds had reached a hot spot, and the battlewagon was about to self-destruct.

  Bolan ran, unmindful of the pain that jarred through his legs with every stride. Across the street, in shadow, he tangled with a rosebush, long thorns ripping at his clothing, furrowing his flesh. He scaled a wooden fence and came away with splinters in his bleeding palms, relieved to feel the pain that meant that he was still alive, still moving on his own. Behind him, there was no more gunfire. More important, there were no voices calling after him to halt.

  Had he eluded them, against all odds? Or were they coming after him in silence, knowing that a terrorist in flight would not respond to calls for his surrender?

  Bolan crossed the tiny yard and scaled another fence. More splinters, biting deep. He touched down in a narrow alley that ran east to west between the fenced backyards of smallish, well-kept homes. Around him, lights were coming on inside those houses, residents aroused by screeching tires and gunfire in the night. He listened closely for the sounds of hot pursuit, heard nothing and began his retreat along the alley.

  Keeping to the shadows, Bolan covered several blocks unnoticed save for the attention he drew from family dogs. In the confusion of the shoot-out, canine warnings went unheeded, and the Executioner was not observed until he chose to show himself, three-quarters of a mile from Reverend Little's home.

  The taxi was cruising aimlessly in search of fares, its driver half-asleep, when Bolan stepped out of a shadowed doorway, flagged it down. The driver of the cab was black, and he examined the disheveled soldier with a cautious eye before he said, "Where to?"

  Without providing a specific address, Bolan named the intersection nearest to the meeting hall of the Teutonic Knights. If it meant anything to his chauffeur, the black man gave no sign.

  "Rough night?"

  "You might say that."

  "This neighborhood can get that way, you know? Especially for folks like you."

  "What kind of folks are those?"

  "The pale kind."

  "So I gather."

  "Not that I got anything against you-all. The only color my eyes focus on is green."

  "I hear you."

  "Some folks, though, they see a gentleman like you down here, a night like this, they figure you're just asking for it."

  "Maybe next time I should plan ahead."

  "That might not be a bad idea."

  He paid the cabbie double on arrival, checked the streets in each direction, walked back to his car. The other vehicles would still be there in the morning, waiting for their drivers to return, like faithful beasts of burden tethered to stakes.

  How many of the Klansmen had survived the ambush? If there were survivors taken prisoner, would they turn on Ritter and the others, offer evidence to save themselves from prosecution? If it
played that way, a portion of Bolan's job would be complete. He would be free to concentrate on Freeman and the Vanguard and their supporters in the upper crust of Little Rock society.

  His absence from the scene of the fiasco would be noted and remarked upon in time. If he intended to avert suspicion and maintain his cover, he would have to get in touch with Ritter soon, tonight, before he got the word from other sources. Explanations might not do the trick, but neither would silence. If Bolan simply went to ground, he would attract suspicion that much sooner, blowing any hope of keeping up his pose as a devoted Klansman.

  It was worth a try. And if he failed, the savages could only kill him once.

  15

  "So what happened?"

  "I'm still working on the details."

  Freeman counted it a victory of sorts that he could sit across the desk from Mason Ritter and discuss the catastrophe in normal tones, resisting the temptation to reach out and smash the wizard's face.

  "Why don't you give me what you have?"

  "Okay... well, uh, I got a call from Bowers, like I told you on the phone, and I went down to see him at the meeting hall. He said the FBI was waiting for them when they got to Little's place, some kind of SWAT team, from the sound of it. They got the drop on Jackson's crew, and someone started shooting. Their side, our side — I don't know. When Bobby recognized the trap, he tried to help them out and he got wasted."

  "Bowers says."

  "That's right."

  "We sent ten men to do a relatively simple job," Freeman said, reiterating. "Six of them are dead now, two are in intensive care with bullet wounds, and one is in the fucking burn ward. And you tell me Bowers walked away?"

  "Well, ran would be more like it, I suppose. He bailed out of the battlewagon when Jackson got it. Jesus, you should see his hands and knees from where he hit the pavement."

  "Save your sympathy. I had a little powwow with a contact in the medical examiner's office. They aren't done with all of the butcher work yet, but they do know Jackson and Bobby were shot in the back. Do you follow me, Mason? They were shot in the back from inside their own car."

  "What the hell?"

  "Who was riding in back?"

  "Well, Jackson was driving, and Bobby was riding up front. That puts Bowers and Thorndyke behind them, along with Bud Murphy."

  "The fat boy?"

  "That's Bud."

  "Well, now, Thorndyke's in ICU, Bud's in the morgue, and I'd say that leaves Bowers."

  "But why? I mean, he was the one set the bomb that took down Little's church. He'd been tested and proved. Why the hell should he turn on his brothers like that in the middle of things? I don't see it."

  "Could be that you still have your eyes closed," he answered. "Could be he was never a brother at all."

  "You were there when I gave him the oath."

  "I was there. But the fact that he swore doesn't mean he was telling the truth."

  "Jesus Christ, if you're right..."

  "Then we've got an informer — or worse — on the inside. That's right."

  "But the bomb..."

  Freeman shrugged. "It's a small price to pay for acceptance if he could get next to the leadership, build up a case that would put us away. Ask the boys down in Selma and Jackson how far an informer will go to dig up the dirt that he needs. You can find them all cozy and warm in the federal pen outside Atlanta."

  "I still can't believe it."

  "Let's hear the alternatives," Freeman demanded. "You think the good reverend invited an FBI SWAT team for coffee and crumb cake? You figure God told him the boys would be paying a visit last night?"

  "Could be one of the others."

  "The dead ones, you mean? Or the ones that were shot up and fried? I've been fighting this war for a while, but I've never seen Federals so clumsy they'd shoot up their own damned informers. It's time to wake up, Mason."

  "Okay, let's say it's Bowers, then. What should we do?"

  "We take him out as soon as possible and minimize our losses. Keep your fingers crossed and pray he hasn't passed on anything a prosecutor might find useful."

  "I can try and finish it tonight."

  "Is he at home?"

  "I'll have to call and check."

  "Feel free."

  He watched and waited while the wizard searched his pockets for a tiny address book and found the number he required. Behind the poker face, Freeman's mind was racing, seeking varied ways to save himself if Bowers had communicated with his sponsors, if incriminating information had changed hands. The thought of failure and betrayal turned his stomach. He would not live through that nightmare. Not again.

  The Vanguard's chairman drew some consolation from the fact that Bowers was a member of the Knights and thus removed, to some degree, from details of the central operation. Still, if he had gathered evidence enough to bring about arrests, some of the Knights would doubtless point a guilty finger at their wizard, and from there...

  Freeman studied Ritter's face, imagining it with a bullet hole between the piggy eyes. With Ritter gone, no one could ever hope to prove a working link between the Vanguard and the Klan. No matter that their memberships might overlap; a man's political affiliations were his own concern, and Freeman could not be expected to police what his members did in their leisure time. His first concern would be with heading off a serious investigation. If the probers looked too deeply, they might find some tattered remnant of his other life, the name he had been born with. And from there...

  "Not home."

  Be calm, he told himself. There's time. But was there?

  "Friends? A woman?" He would not quite bring himself to voice his fear that Bowers might be with his sponsors, spilling everything he knew for court stenographers.

  "I'm told he's getting cozy with the Halsey girl."

  "The chaplain's daughter?"

  Ritter nodded.

  Women. They were a pathetic weakness he could do without. In this case, though, a woman just might be his adversary's strength. The Halsey girl ran Ritter's office, did his filing, took his phone calls. She had access to the information Bowers might require to build his case.

  "Make sure."

  Another call, and this time Ritter got an answer. "Reverend H.? Mason Ritter here. I hope I didn't interrupt your dinner. No? That's good. I'll tell you why I'm calling, Reverend. I've got a message for Mike Bowers, and I wondered if you knew where I could find him. Ah. They are? No, no, it's nothing urgent. Reckon I'll just catch him in the morning. Thank you kindly, Reverend."

  He cradled the receiver, frowning.

  "Bowers and the girl are out somewhere. He doesn't know where they went or when they might be back."

  "It doesn't matter. Put a team on Halsey's place, and one on Bowers's. Either way, they have to come home sometime. You can take him when he shows."

  "It may be tricky, with the girl."

  "No trick at all. I don't want any witnesses."

  "You mean...?"

  "I mean your ass is on the line! Your secretary has been snuggling up to an informer, and you don't know what she might have given him already. Cut your losses, Mason. Be a man."

  "I'll give the order."

  "Do that, Mase. You do that."

  * * *

  Sitting in his parlor, Reverend Jacob Halsey eyed the telephone suspiciously, as if expecting it to slither off the table and attack him. He had been shaken by the call from Mason Ritter, though the wizard often phoned him after hours to discuss Klan business. It had been the sudden interest in Mike Bowers and his whereabouts that set alarm bells clanging in the back of Halsey's mind.

  Because of Lynn.

  How many times had he advised her not to get involved with members of the Vanguard or the Knights? Each time they had the conversation, Halsey suffered pangs ot guilt, a feeling of hypocrisy that he could not escape. As Lynn had pointed out, he was a Klansman, one of those he had warned her to avoid. She worked for Mason Ritter — over his objections — and she came in daily contact w
ith the Knights. It was entirely natural that friendships might develop, even something deeper, but the fact that it was natural would never put his mind at ease.

  He recognized the violence simmering within the men he served as chaplain. They were soldiers in a holy war, and combat brought out the beast in a man. It was the chaplain's job to keep an army mindful of its link with the Almighty, mend the wounded souls that were a natural result of mortal combat.

  Lately, though, he had begun to question his involvement with the Knights. He still believed in what they stood for, adamant resistance to the creeping socialism that was ruining America. His brother's life had been destroyed by bankers, tax men, leeches living off the sweat and blood of honest working men. If violence was required to break their stranglehold upon the national economy and salvage other decent lives from ruin, then it was a reasonable price to pay.

  But what did burning churches have to do with banks and Jewish plots and all the rest of it? How could he reconcile his own vocation with a midnight arson raid against the house of God?

  Last night the wrecking crew had taken after Cletus Little. Halsey knew that much from news reports, although he was never personally briefed on the actions of the paramilitary wing. He recognized the published names of those who had been killed or taken into custody, and realized that Ritter's plan had broadened from destruction of a church to the abduction and assassination of its pastor. Not that Mason would have dreamed up the plan on his own. He was a man of action, not a thinker. The idea would have originated elsewhere, and unless Halsey missed his guess, its author would be Freeman.

  Had Mike Bowers been involved in the attack on the church or the raid on Little's home? It seemed probable. Halsey was all the more uneasy over Lynn's attachment to the tall, dark Klansman when he thought of Ritter's recent call. Did Mason have other secret work for Bowers? Was he simply checking on his man? Or had the new recruit somehow incurred the wizard's wrath?

  If Ritter had it in for Bowers, Lynn would be in danger while she shared his company. Halsey's mind called up an image of her body torn by bullets, instantly supplanted by a vision of a house — his house — in flames. No coward, he was man enough to feel a primal terror for his loved ones, and his niece was all the family that remained to him in his autumn years.