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  “It’s cheap no matter where you go,” Bolan replied, “unless it’s someone that you care about.”

  Ulenga’s smile was bleak, verging on bitter. “There is no one left,” he said.

  “Another thing,” Bolan said. “If you’ve got some kind of kamikaze fantasy, forget about it. Martyrs are no use to me, and I intend to make it out of this alive, by any means required.”

  “I have no death wish,” Ulenga said. “But the risk…if I can truly make a difference…”

  “I recommend you don’t go into this believing you can change the world,” Bolan replied. “It’s one step at a time, and even if you win, it’s never permanent. Take out one predator, there’ll always be another one waiting to take his place. In fact, they’re probably lined up around the block. The bottom line is that you can’t kill human nature. Evil never dies.”

  Ulenga turned into a side street and pulled over to the curb, shifted the Opel into Neutral, turning in his seat to face Bolan directly. “If that’s true,” he said, “why even try at all? It would be easier to join the other side, accept the bribes and lead a peaceful life.”

  “The simple answer is that I’m not wired that way,” Bolan replied. “Don’t get me wrong on this. I’m not a saint, by any means. I’m sure as hell no one’s messiah. But I never learned to look the other way or cross the street when I saw something happening and had a chance to fix it.”

  “But, you just said—”

  “Sure, the fix is temporary,” Bolan told him. “Help someone today and maybe they need help again tomorrow, when you’re not around. That’s life. Some people never learn from their mistakes nor find the guts to stand up for themselves. Me, I do what I can with what I’ve got, wherever I happen to be at the time.”

  “That simple?”

  “Never simple,” Bolan answered. “Never easy. Never clean.”

  Ulenga thought about it for another moment, then shifted the Opel into Drive.

  “I want to help you,” he told Bolan. “Here and now.”

  “Okay,” the Executioner replied. “We’d best get started, then. We’re running late.”

  Chapter 6

  Captain Rodrigo Acosta puffed on his fine panatela cigar, enjoying its flavor while watching his contact pace circles in front of the mahogany desk. Acosta had to keep the small Angolan happy, to a point, but he was growing weary of the melodrama that surrounded every phase of Oscar Boavida’s life.

  “You’re wearing out my carpet, Oscar. Take a seat,” Acosta said. His tone indicating that it was not an invitation, but an order.

  Boavida sat, but seemed to find the chair uncomfortable. Shifting nervously, he said, “I know I shouldn’t be here, but I needed your advice.”

  “There is, of course, the telephone,” Acosta said, smiling to minimize the sting of his remark.

  “I never know who may be listening,” Boavida said.

  “And you think they would not follow you? Would not observe you entering the Cuban embassy?”

  “Oh, God! I didn’t think! Suppose they know, and—”

  “Never mind,” Acosta interrupted, striving for a soothing tone. “You’re here, now. Tell me what is troubling you.”

  Acosta had a fair idea already. As station chief of Cuba’s Dirección de Inteligencia in Windhoek, he was paid to know such things and weigh their consequences for Havana. He had contacts inside the Namibia Defense Force and in Nampol—the Namibian Police—who were well-paid to forward any news that might be relevant to Cuban operations in the country. By the time that Boavida had reached the embassy, Acosta knew about the killings at Durissa Bay, had logged the body count and guessed that he would soon be hearing from the MLF’s commander. He had not, however, guessed that Boavida would arrive on his doorstep without a hint of warning in advance.

  The Angolan had finally worked up the nerve to tell his story. He began, “Captain, I must inform you there has been—”

  “An incident,” Acosta said. “Durissa Bay, correct?”

  “You know already?” Boavida gaped at him.

  “It is my job to know such things, amigo. How can I assist you if I’m ignorant?”

  “So, then, you know who is responsible?” Acosta saw a gleam of hope in Boavida’s rheumy eyes.

  “Alas, no,” he replied. “But I suspect that we can narrow down the possibilities. Who hates you, Oscar? Never mind the husbands of those women that you dally with. Who has the skill and resources to strike at you like this, destroying property, killing your men wholesale?”

  “The MPLA,” Boavida said at once. “They have the army and the National Police.”

  “A possibility, I grant you,” Acosta said. “Can you think of no one else who might have cause to wish you harm?”

  “You mean within Namibia?”

  “Where we are sitting at this moment,” Acosta said. “Sí.”

  After a moment’s tense consideration, Boavida said, “Perhaps someone from the NCIS?” referring to the Namibia Central Intelligence Service, launched in 1998 with headquarters at the corner of Hugel and Orban streets in Windhoek. It was patterned on—some said supported by—the American CIA, but Acosta had his eyes and ears inside that agency, as well.

  “You’re getting warmer,” he told Boavida. “Think a little harder.”

  He could almost hear the wheels turning in Boavida’s head, and yet, incredibly, the MLF’s top man in Windhoek seemed to draw a blank.

  “Try this,” Acosta said at last, when he’d grown weary of the awkward silence. “Who have you offended recently by…let us think a moment… Now I have it! Could it be hijacking ships at sea?”

  “It’s necessary to support the movement,” Boavida said defensively. “If we got a larger contribution from your government—”

  “Please focus, Oscar,” Acosta said. “I am simply asking who might have a motive for retaliation. Whose vessels have you robbed or sunk most recently? Whose crewmen did your people kill before this storm of vengeance struck them down?”

  “I don’t recall the shipping companies,” Boavida said.

  “But their flags were…?”

  “British and American,” the MLF commander grudgingly acknowledged.

  “Ah. I think we may be getting somewhere,” Acosta said. “And if either of those nations was aroused to punish you, who would they send?”

  “From England, possibly the SAS or SBS,” Boavida said. “For America, I think the Navy SEALs or Green Berets.”

  “A team, in other words,” Acosta said. “But if my information on the night’s activities is accurate—and I believe it is—your adversary was a single man.”

  “That’s speculation,” Boavida answered quickly. “The survivors were confused, I think. Cowards, too busy hiding to make sense of what was happening. I plan to punish them severely.”

  “That is your concern, of course,” Acosta said. “But what if they were not mistaken? What if it was just one man?”

  Again, the blank stare from his uninvited visitor.

  Acosta sighed and said, “You must have business to attend to, as do I. Oscar, I’ll think about your problem and get back to you with a solution at the soonest opportunity. Meanwhile, if you have anything to tell me, use the telephone. And watch your back, eh? Someone out there does not like you very much, I think.”

  * * *

  BOLAN AND SERGEANT ULENGA spent the morning drawing up a list of targets. After they retrieved Bolan’s VW from Bloekom Street, noting a closed sign posted on the door of the MLF’s branch office, they had driven to a spot Ulenga knew on Olof Palme Street, a bluff that offered them a panoramic view of Eros Park. They sat in Bolan’s car, Ulenga in the shotgun seat, and stayed alert for any sign of enemies approaching.

  “When we discussed the
ways in which the MLF earns money,” Ulenga said, “one source was omitted.”

  “Cuba,” Bolan ventured.

  “Yes. Havana first sent troops to Angola in 1975, supporting the MPLA against incursions from South Africa and Zaire. Your CIA directed those invasions, by the way.”

  “It’s not my CIA,” Bolan assured him.

  “In any case, when the invaders were repelled, the Cubans stayed to fight UNITA in Angola’s civil war. By 1983 the Soviets were helping, too. Perhaps they were behind the Cuban intervention all along. Who knows? Negotiations spanned the best part of a decade. Finally, we were told the Cubans all withdrew in 1991.”

  “But you don’t think they’re gone,” Bolan observed.

  Ulenga shrugged. “I couldn’t say about Angola,” he replied. “I’m just a lowly sergeant, after all. But I can tell you that they have not left Namibia. Their troops supported SWAPO in the war for liberation from South Africa and stayed to fight against apartheid. Now, we have the Cuban embassy, of course, and all manner of professionals around us from the friendly island. Every other year, our leaders meet with Cubans to discuss the country’s economic prospects and development.”

  “And what about the MLF?” Bolan asked.

  “We know that the Intelligence Directorate supports them. Certainly with money, possibly with arms, although Africa has no shortage of weapons.”

  Bolan had clashed with the Havana-based DI on several occasions, starting when it was the DGI—Dirección General de Inteligencia—under the wing of Moscow’s KGB. These days, with communism out of favor in the Russian federation, Cuba stood alone as a Red bastion in the western hemisphere, with its closest ideological allies located on the far side of the globe. But certain allies courted by Havana in the last quarter of the twentieth century still remained friendly, happy to ignore America’s ongoing embargo of all things Cuban, more than happy to buy Cuban sugar, tobacco—or guns.

  “And SWAPO doesn’t mind this going on?” Bolan asked.

  “Some officials may,” Ulenga said. “But they remember Cuba’s help against South Africa. More to the point, they know the people of Namibia remember it. SWAPO has ruled the country since the grant of independence, but they’re still affiliated with the Socialist International and they have to win elections. It is…what do you call it? A balancing act?”

  “That’s what we call it,” Bolan said. Already wondering how much he could afford to tip the balance in Namibia. His goal was to disrupt a group of terrorists, not sow chaos at throughout society at large.

  “Where shall we start, then?” Ulenga asked.

  Bolan scanned the list of targets that the sergeant had been jotting down in his pocket notebook, pointed to the third one from the top, and said, “Right there.”

  Ministry of Home Affairs, Kasino Street, Windhoek

  STEPPING FROM HIS CHAUFFEURED car outside the Cohen Building on Kasino Street in Windhoek, waiting for his bodyguard to close the door and join him on the short walk to the air-conditioned lobby, Moses Kaujeua wondered if he should request additional security. The threats that he received each week were probably no worse than any others mailed or telephoned to government officials in Namibia, but as the Second Deputy Assistant Minister for Home Affairs, Kaujeua thought a second bodyguard might raise his profile. Make him more worthy of notice—and from there, perhaps, promotion—by the Powers That Be.

  In truth, Kaujeua felt important, and he tried to look important, but the sharpest suit could only do so much. Clothes made the man, supposedly, but there was clearly more to it than that. Connections, for example. And performance of the secret, dirty little tasks that came his way from time to time.

  This morning was a perfect case in point. He had a meeting scheduled with Captain Fanuel Gurirab, second in command of D Department at Namibia Police headquarters. That department, also called FCID—Force Criminal Investigation Department—was the highest investigative arm of the Namibia Police, its nine subdivisions covering all manner of serious crimes in addition to Interpol liaison and operation of the country’s sole forensic science laboratory. Kaujeua dealt primarily with Gurirab whenever he had special problems of a legal nature to resolve, such as the one that faced him presently.

  The cursed MLF.

  Kaujeua understood why certain SWAPO leaders coddled the Angolan rebels and pretended not to notice their collusion with the Cuban embassy. The party’s upper ranks still harbored aging revolutionaries who had suffered much and done outlandish things to liberate their homeland from South Africa. Some had soft spots in their hearts for underdogs, people oppressed and fighting for their own place in the sun.

  While others, Kaujeua knew from personal experience, were simply opportunists with their hands out for another bribe.

  The MLF paid well for certain favors, using money gleaned from sponsors or from various activities that might result in prosecution of police, and prosecutors did their jobs effectively. The bribes, of course, ensured that there would be no such crusading zeal. Drugs would remain available, along with weapons and the victims who fell prey to human traffickers as slaves of one kind or another. Whether they were sweating in a godforsaken mine shaft, or servicing a foreign CEO in the honeymoon suite at a five-star hotel, each cog in the larger machine played its part.

  And there was piracy, of course.

  It gave Namibia a black eye in the global press and with insurance firms, but every hijacked cargo paid a dividend to someone in authority. No cash or weapons found their way back to Angola without fattening the bank accounts of government officials on the take. In that regard, the Germans and their Afrikaner offspring had taught their lowly subjects well indeed.

  Kaujeua was a trifle late this morning, by design. He knew that Captain Gurirab was always prompt, and forcing him to kill time waiting emphasized Kaujeua’s place in their relationship. He called the shots, and when he asked a question, answers were not optional.

  Kaujeua found the FCID captain waiting in the corridor outside his office. Gurirab, for some reason, refused to sit in waiting rooms. Perhaps he felt demeaned having to deal with a secretary, or maybe he enjoyed having assorted passersby observe him in his uniform. Kaujeua greeted Gurirab without a handshake, looked behind his frown and saw a worried man.

  As well he might be.

  When the two of them were settled in Kaujeua’s private office, the Second Deputy Assistant Minister for Home Affairs got directly to business. “Captain, can you help me understand the meaning of last night’s events?” he asked.

  There was no need to specify which incident he had in mind. The slaughter at Durissa Bay was foremost on the captain’s mind—or should be, if he hoped to keep the job he loved so much.

  “Sir, we are still investigating the occurrence,” Gurirab replied.

  “You must have some preliminary findings,” Kaujeua prodded.

  “Well…we know that nineteen men were killed. Four speedboats were recovered, all equipped for use in piracy. Beyond that…”

  “Were there no survivors?”

  “Two in hospital,” Gurirab said. “One comatose, the other most reluctant to cooperate.”

  “But you have methods of persuasion, Captain, yes?”

  “Of course, sir, in the proper setting. But a public hospital is not conducive to interrogation.”

  “I need information, not excuses!” Kaujeua snapped. “The men responsible for these events are dangerous to all of us. You understand?”

  “Of course, sir.”

  Captain Gurirab would know he had as much to lose as anyone if bloodshed publicly exposed the links between SWAPO and the Mayombe Liberation Front. Sufficient outrage might conceivably produce a shift in government, and Gurirab had cast his lot with those who held the reins today. A change might well result in his demotion or dismissal from the force.

/>   “I trust that you’ll have answers for me when we speak again,” Kaujeua said. “By telephone, let’s say. At noon.”

  He was not asking. Captain Gurirab was wise enough to recognize an order when he heard one.

  “Yes, sir. Noon.”

  “In that case,” Kaujeua said, “we both have work to do. Dismissed!”

  * * *

  MAKING WAR COMES DOWN to details. Bolan was prepared, but his new ally needed some additions to his arsenal before they started hunting in Windhoek. The good news seemed to be that most members of the Namibia Police stashed arms and ammunition for emergencies, and Ulenga was no exception.

  Bolan trailed the sergeant’s Opel in his Jetta NCS, watching for traps along the way but feeling reasonably certain that Ulenga was sincere. If it turned out that he was wrong, Bolan would have to make a run for it. He’d made a private oath at the beginning of his lonely war that he would use no deadly force against a law-enforcement officer regardless of the circumstances or of the risk to his own life. That didn’t mean he would surrender or cooperate, and he’d arranged the downfall of some dirty cops by legal means, but he would never put his crosshairs on a badge.

  In this case, Bolan’s judgment of Ulenga proved correct. The sergeant led him to a small house off Mahatma Gandhi Street, midway between Rhino Park Private Hospital and Windhoek Central Prison. Bolan wasn’t big on omens, but the setting could have been selected as foreshadowing of the campaign he had in mind. Inside the house, Ulenga left him in the kitchen, disappeared into a bedroom at the rear and came back moments later with a heavy-looking duffel bag. The clanking it emitted as he set it on the small, square dining table gave a hint of what was stashed inside, confirmed in spades when he unzipped the bag.

  The first piece that Ulenga showed to Bolan was an AKMS carbine, distinguished from its parent rifle by the downward-folding metal stock, reminiscent of a German MP-40 submachine gun from the Second World War. Next up was a surprise: a twelve-inch Steyr TMP—for Tactical Machine Pistol—that featured selective fire in 9x19 mm Parabellum bullets, feeding from a 30-round detachable box magazine. Its muzzle had been threaded for a silencer, which also lay within the duffel bag. Add loaded magazines for both guns and the pistol on Ulenga’s hip, plus half a dozen Russian Zarya flashbang stun grenades, and Bolan thought his new sidekick was good to go.