Games of the Hangman (88 page)

When the nearest terrorist was about six hundred meters away, Fitzduane
ordered Murrough and Andreas to open fire on single shot.
 
Sporadic sniping then broke out, with no
automatic fire being used on either side.
 
The firing died down after about fifteen minutes, with the terrorists in
position for an assault in a semicircle around the castle and with their
watchers monitoring the sea side.
 
Murrough and Andreas swore they had achieved some hits but couldn't be
too precise about the numbers.

Sergeant Tommy Keane was the castle garrison's first fatality.
 
A random sniper round hit him in the center
of his forehead while he was peering through an arrow slit in the keep.
 
He died instantly.

Kadar's forces were now dug in around them, just outside normal
combat-rifle range, and daylight was fading.
 
The castle defenders had completed most of their preparations, but
Fitzduane noticed that his people were getting tired and potentially careless.
 
He called a food break and called a council
of war wit
those not on watch
.
 
The mood was somber but determined.
 
Tommy Keane's death had countered any
euphoria left after their escape from Draker.
 
The brutal realities of combat were becoming clear:
 
it was kill or be killed, winner take all.

"At the college we had surprise on our side," said
Fitzduane.
 
"Now they know where we
are and roughly who we are, and the ball is more in their court.
 
We'll have to keep sharp if we're to come out
of this in one piece."

"How long do you think we'll have to hold?" asked
Henssen.

Fitzduane shrugged.
 
"We had a
regular radio check with the Rangers set up.
 
We've missed several in a row now, so that should bring some help in a
couple of hours.
 
On the other hand,
we're cut off from the mainland, and who knows how much help will arrive?
 
My guess is that it might take some time
before the scale of the problem becomes known and adequate reinforcements are
thrown in.
 
We may have to hold until
morning or even later."

"Not a long time for a siege," said Henssen.

"Long enough when modern weaponry is involved," said
Fitzduane.
 
"But let's save
conjecture till later.
 
First of all, I
want to review our preparations."
 
He turned to the Bear.
 
The Swiss
detective's formal training and his personal interest in weaponry made him the
natural choice as armorer.

"We've improved our small-arms position," said the Bear,
"thanks to the weapons taken from the frogmen and from
Draker
College
.
 
In fact, unless we arm some of the students,
we have more weapons than people to use them.
 
Starting with automatic weapons, as of now, we have the four SA-80
rifles, one M-16, one AK-47, five Ingrams, and three Uzis — that's fourteen in
all.
 
In conventional rifles, we have
Murrough's .303 Lee-Enfield and two .303 deer rifles I found in the armory.

"Moving on
 
to shotguns, we
have one Remington pump action — that's the shotgun Hugo brought back from
Switzerland — one Browning automatic shotgun, and six double-barrel
shotguns."
 
He turned to
Fitzduane.
 
"Including a pair of
Purdeys, I see," he added, referring to the famous English sporting guns,
each individually tailored and costing about as much as a suburban house.

"It's a long story," said Fitzduane, "which will
keep."

"That makes a total of eight shotguns," continued the Bear,
"although only the Remington and the Browning are of much military
use.
 
The next category is handguns.
 
We have seven — four nine-millimeter
Brownings, one nine millimeter Mauser broom handle, a
U.S.
Army .45
Colt service automatic, and a rather old .45 Webley.
 
Ammunition:
 
moderately healthy if everyone maintains fire discipline and uses either
single shot or short bursts; not so good if we all operate on full
automatic.
 
In numbers, we have about
three thousand rounds of 5.56-millimeter ammunition left, about fifteen hundred
of nine-millimeter, over a thousand rounds of assorted shotgun ammunition, and
less than two full clips for the AK-47.
 
In terms of other firepower, we have a regular arsenal of antique
weapons, including half a dozen muskets, two crossbows in full working order,
and Christian's longbow."

"My longbow is not an antique," objected de Guevain.

"Whatever," said the
Bear.
 
"The point is that we have a large
collection of weapons of limited military value in modern terms, but some of
which could prove useful.
 
I've
distributed them around the castle to be grabbed in emergencies.
 
The muskets, incidentally, are loaded, so be
careful."

"I assume you'll be using a crossbow, Heini," said de Guevain.

"The Swiss national weapon wasn't the crossbow, as it happens, but
the pike or halberd."

"Let's get back to other firepower," said Fitzduane.

"Well," continued the Bear, "here we have the Hawk
forty-millimeter grenade launcher and about thirty grenades of different
types.
 
We have a box of conventional
hand grenades.
 
We have some C-4
explosives and Claymores we took off the frogmen's raft, and we have some home
brew made with weed killer and sugar and diesel oil and other trimmings.
 
Unfortunately we don't have a lot of
gasoline, since the castle vehicles run on diesel, but we've siphoned a few
gallons from the Volvo to make Molotov cocktails."
 
He looked at Fitzduane.
 
"I used the poteen to make up for the
gas shortage.
 
I'm afraid I made quite a
dent in your reserve stock."

"My whiskey."
 
Fitzduane paled.
 
"You've taken my whiskey and mixed it
with gasoline?"

"Hard to tell the difference sometimes,"
muttered Henssen.

"What about the cannon?" asked de
Guevain.
 
"Are we going to give them a
try?"
 
He was referring to the two
small eighteenth-century cannon that normally stood in the bawn.

"We'll see," said the Bear.
 
"There is only a small stock of black powder, which I'm keeping for
the muskets.
 
That means using our weed
killer explosive for the cannon — with trial and error being the only way of
working out the right load.
 
I can't say
I'd like to be the gunner during those tests."

"They'd be ideal for covering the gate," said de Guevain.
 
"We can load them with nails and broken
glass and the like to get
a shrapnel
effect."

"Let's do it," urged Fitzduane.
 
"We'll try a few test shots at one of the outhouses to get the
loading right — and use a long fuse."

"And watch out for the recoil," said Henssen, "or your
toes will be flattened — or worse."

"This fellow obviously knows what he's talking about," said the
Bear.
 
"And I thought you only knew
about computers.
 
Consider yourself
volunteered."

Henssen raised his eyes to the ceiling.
 
"Why did I open my big mouth?"

"Good question, said de Guevain.

The review continued, covering the placing of the Claymores, distribution
of the hand-held radios, food, medical backup, blackening of faces, duty
rosters, and the host of matters, major and minor, essential to consider if the
castle was to be defended properly.

"Is there any way we haven’t thought of so far that we can send for
help?" said Harry Noble.
 
The
ambassador's face was pale and
strained,
the shock of
his son's death etched on his features.
 
For the moment the heavy work load was keeping him sane.
 
Fitzduane didn't like to think about the
private torments the man would face in the future.
 
To have killed your own son; it was a
nightmare.
 
The Hangman had much to
answer for.

"Fair point," said Fitzduane.
 
"The question is how.
 
We're
completely surrounded and now their ship—"

"The
Sabine
," said
the Bear.

"The
Sabine
,"
continued
Fitzduane,
"is blocking the seaward
route."
 
The ship, now that the
focus of the Hangman's attention had switched to Fitzduane's castle, had left
the point and was less than half a mile offshore from the castle.

There was silence for a few moments.
 
The fact was that sooner or later the Rangers should realize that
something was wrong and send help.
 
In
contrast, no one present had any illusions about the dangers of trying to break
through the Hangman's cordon, let alone getting off the island.

"Something else to think about," said Fitzduane.
 
"We don't want to let the Hangman get
hold of a hostage."

Harry Noble nodded.
 
"That's
something I hadn't considered.
 
Perhaps
we should wait it out."

Fitzduane looked around.
 
From
everyone's eyes he could tell there was general agreement to wait, so they
moved on to discuss the students.
 
Some
were still in shock at what had happened, but a number, refreshed after eating
and intrigued by the preparations they had witnessed while filling sandbags and
doing other manual work, wanted to join the active defenders.
 
They were now bunked down behind locked doors
in a storeroom off the tunnel.
 
They
hadn't gone willingly.
 
The protests had
been vigorous and had died down only when Fitzduane explained the problem:
 
After the business of the Sacrificers, who
could be trusted?

"I don't know about keeping them all locked up," said
Andreas.
 
"I appreciate the problem,
but I think we're going to have to arm a few of them.
 
We need the manpower.
 
The perimeter is too big to hold for long
with what we've got."

There was some agreement with this view.
 
The defenders were stretched thin, and things would get worse after
dusk.

"They're not kids," said Judith.
 
"Many of them are about my age."

The Bear smiled.

"Look," continued the Israeli girl, "they know the
security problem.
 
Why not let them pick
some volunteers?
 
They ought to be able
to pick some people who can be trusted — unless you think they've all been
suborned."

Fitzduane shook his head.
 
"No, we probably don't' have a security problem with the students
anymore, but even so I'm reluctant to pout them on the firing line.
 
Let's compromise.
 
Let's put them to work picking some
volunteers, but let's not use them unless we really have to."

"Makes sense," said the Bear.

Fitzduane looked at Andreas and Judith.

"Fair enough," Andreas agreed.

"Judgment of Solomon," said Judith.

"Let's get on to considering what we're up against," continued
Fitzduane, "and the options open to the Hangman."

He looked at Noble, who had been given the job of coordinating everything
they knew, including the string of reports from those on watch.
 
The ambassador, de Guevain, and Henssen had
then put themselves in the Hangman's shoes to evaluate his options.
 
Both Noble and de Guevain had previous combat
experience — de Guevain had been a paratrooper in his earlier years — and
Hensssen had the greatest knowledge of the Hangman's methods of operation
gleaned from his endless hours working with the Nose in Wiesbaden.

"Best estimate," said Noble, "is that we're up against a
force of between seventy and eighty hard-core terrorists, to which may be added
a small crew from the
Sabine
.
 
I would guess the one motivation they have in
common is mercenary, but considering the Hangman's MO, there will be subgroups
with their own specific reasons for wanting to strike back at what they see as
the establishment.

"The terrorists will have been highly trained in a rather rigid,
unquestioning way.
 
They will have been
oriented toward a violent assault against ill-prepared opposition with an
emphasis on inflicting maximum damage in the shortest possible time; they
probably won't have had the kind of systematic, specialist infantry training
needed for an assignment like taking this castle.
 
But whatever the weaknesses in the fine
points of their training, they will all be highly proficient in basic weapons
handling and are undoubtedly fit, committed, and determined.

"Their weapons seem to be typical Eastern bloc stuff apart from the
Ingrams carried by the frogmen and the explosives, which are American.
 
They have AK-47 assault rifles, Makarov
automatics, plastic explosives, undoubtedly hand grenades, and probably a few
RPG-7 anti-tank grenade launchers.
 
We've
seen no sign of anything heavier so far, but with the
Sabine
freeing them of normal transport constraints, they may have
something more lethal in reserve.
 
If
they do, I'm afraid we'll find out the hard way.
 
The likely candidates would be heavy machine
guns, mortars, rockets of various kinds, or even artillery.
 
Somehow I can't see most of that stuff being
available because, on the basis of what the Hangman originally intended to do,
what would be the need?
 
But you never
know with this fellow.
 
He likes
gadgetry, and he likes surprises.