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photographs and maps. He was enjoying himself. It was his first important mission since arriving

in South East Asia. He had half expected this small conference room at the Dusit Thani Hotel to

have been bugged. Not because of the impending meeting, but because of some past business

meeting. In the modern age, most of the spying was done for businessmen. Even the CIA was

not aloof from that. They had even bugged the office of the chairman of Airbus in Toulouse on

behalf of the Boeing Corporation.

Creasy and Guido were the first to arrive. They greeted Jennings warmly, but the American

knew that the moment Creasy walked into the room he was in control. Not by anything he said

or by his actions, just by his presence.

Susanna came next, together with the ex-Khmer soldier Nol Pol, who was dressed in a new suit

with a white shirt and a brown tie. She introduced him to Creasy and Guido and then listened

while Creasy spoke a few words to him in French. Five minutes before, she had given the

Cambodian his $500 fee.

She was surprised when he now reached into the pocket of his suit and handed it back to her. In

Cambodian, she asked him why.

He replied: "This man tells me that tomorrow night I might be killed. If I am, he promises that

you'll make sure that this money will get to my family in Battambang. I believe him, and I believe

you."

As she took the money, Creasy said: "His French is better than I hoped."

Jens and The Owl came next, together with one of the security men carrying a tray with coffee

and cups. He was followed by Maxie and Rene. Before exchanging any kind of greeting, Creasy

asked them: "Are you sure you weren't followed?"

"Negative," Maxie answered. "We have not been watched since we arrived at the airport."

Creasy was reassured. Maxie was the best tracker he had ever known and had the instincts to

know when he himself was tracked.

Jennings looked on curiously as the mercenaries greeted each other with the customary kiss next

to the mouth. He was startled to realize that these men were all middle-aged. They had come

from an almost forgotten period, but they had not forgotten their craft. One glance into their

eyes was enough to tell him that.

They arranged themselves around the oblong table. The Dane put his computer in front of him

and opened it. Jennings slid a piece of paper in front of Creasy, who studied it and then nodded

in satisfaction.

"I'm glad you got an RPG-7...You've done a good job, Mark. Thanks!"

Susanna asked: "What's an RPG-7?"

Guido provided the answer. "It's a Russian made antitank weapon. The best there is."

She thought for a moment, then asked: "Do you expect to meet tanks down there?"

Guido shook his head. "None showed up on the aerial survey, but that weapon has other uses.

It can blow away heavy metal gates and doors, and of course other vehicles apart from tanks."

He glanced at Creasy. "How many rockets?"

"Four. They'll be enough." He looked up at Jennings. "To save time, I'd be glad if you would

brief Maxie and Rene on the aerial photographs."

Jennings nodded importantly. As he laid out the photographs in front of him, the two

mercenaries moved round to look over his shoulder.

Creasy turned to Jens and tapped the list of equipment in front of him. He said: "The distance

from Trat to Tuk Luy is about forty-eight miles, so with this VHF equipment we'll be in good

radio communication with you. After we secure their base, Guido and I will go on to the temple.

We'll keep in touch, but only when absolutely necessary. I doubt those guys have listening

equipment, but these days you never know. That light plane should only take off from Bangkok

when I give the word." He turned and interrupted Jennings' briefing. "Mark, you've lined up two

guys to go on that aircraft to simulate Guido and myself?"

"Yes, two of our agents. The guys are outside the door. It just happens they're roughly the same

build as you and Guido. They'll be fully briefed. Leave that to me."

Creasy looked at him for a moment, then nodded. "OK, that's your department. Meanwhile, the

two jeeps and the rest of the equipment will be waiting at Trat?"

"Yes, they'll precede us by a few hours. I've secured a safe house with a compound down there."

"Good. Then we need to arrange a safe assembly point in Bangkok and transport to Trat."

Jennings could not keep the smirk turn out of his voice. "That's been done. Don't forget,

Creasy, we do have quite an organization as backup."

Creasy glanced at Guido. "So they should," he said, "with a budget bigger than most small

countries...OK, let's go over the details."

They worked for the next two hours. Susanna was astonished at the attention to detail, and her

conception of a bunch of hired gunmen dissolved into admiration as she listened to each of

them make their contributions and suggestions. Although they deferred to Creasy as a leader,

they were all very individual and forceful in the debate. At one point Rene suggested that three

of them should make the assault on the temple. Maxie shook his head and pointed out that

Creasy and Guido had always worked in partnership, and that having a third man along would

be more of a distraction than a help. He said with a grin: "If it takes three people to do it, then

Creasy and Guido can do it alone."

The Cambodian Nol Pol had been deftly brought into the discussion, and was treated by all of

them as an equal. They pored over the large-scale maps and aerial photographs, and the

Cambodian pointed out the best routes.

Finally, when the meeting broke up, Nol Pol spoke a few words in French to Creasy before

being guided away by one of Jennings' security men.

"What did he say?" Susanna asked.

Creasy shrugged, and answered: "He asked that if possible I bring him from that temple the

head of Connie Crum...You picked the right man, Susanna."

Chapter 67

When Susanna got back to her room the message light on her phone was flashing. She called the

reception and was told that a Mr Elliot Friedman had phoned and asked her to call him on a

personal matter. The message was timed half an hour previously.

She looked at her watch and calculated that it was now seven thirty a.m. in Washington. Elliot

must have been up early. She phoned him at home.

He immediately said: "Don't discuss your project. I'm getting fully briefed via our friends over

at Langley. Just wish the guys good luck from me."

"So why are you calling?" Susanna asked.

She could hear the sigh come down the line. "I've got a problem with a certain Professor Jason

Woodward."

Susanna had been standing by the bed. Abruptly she sat down on it. "What's the problem,

Elliot?"

"He's pestering me all the time. He's desperate to get in touch with you. What the hell have you

done to that guy? I thought it was a kind of low-key relationship. But he calls me half a dozen

times a day at the office, and even at home. Yesterday he barged into my office demanding to

know where you are and what you're doing. What do I tell the guy?"

"Tell him the truth," she said. "I'm in South East Asia on a mission connected with MIA. The

mission will be over within seventy-two hours, after which I'll call him."

"And I promise him that?"

"Yes, Elliot. Promise him that I'll call him within seventy-two hours."

"OK. Good luck to you and the guys. Take care of yourself, honey."

"Thanks, Elliot. Goodbye."

She cradled the phone and sat on the bed thinking for several minutes, wondering what was in

Jason's head. She thought that maybe it was a question of anxiety that she had decided to keep

the baby. On an impulse she picked up the phone and started to dial his home number. But as

soon as she had tapped in the first digits, she changed her mind. He could wait. Tomorrow night

it was possible that men could be dying, men who had become precious to her.

Right now those thoughts were more important than anything else. She stood up and walked to

the bathroom. But before she was halfway there, the phone rang. She went back and picked it

up. It was Creasy.

"Have dinner with me tonight," he said in his gruff voice.

"Is that an order or a request?" she asked.

"It's an order. We need to discuss the whole operation for tomorrow night."

"I thought we just spent two hours doing that."

"Yes, we only have to discuss it for thirty seconds."

"Then what?"

"Then we can talk about what's not going to happen after dinner."

"OK. Where and when?"

"Let's meet at eight o'clock in the bar."

"It's a deal."

She put the phone down and again headed for the bathroom. As she reached the door, the

phone rang again. She went back. It was Mark Jennings. His voice was tentative.

"I was wondering whether, if you have nothing planned for tonight, you might have dinner with

me?"

She stood by her bed with the phone at her ear and suddenly felt an overwhelming sense of

being wanted. She let him down gently.

"Mark, I'd love to have dinner with you, but I can't. Creasy just called and we need to have a

discussion about the operation tomorrow."

"I thought everything was worked out now?"

She thought quickly and answered: "Everything is worked out. But there are other details. If

anything happens to the other men, Creasy wants me to arrange matters for their families. He

needs to explain what I have to do. You can understand that, Mark. Six men are going deep into

Khmer Rouge territory. You know the danger. Some of them may not come back. Creasy wants

to be sure that their personal arrangements are taken care of."

There was a silence and then he said reflectively: "Yes, he would. He's that kind of guy."

"Let's take a rain-check on that dinner."

"Is that a promise?"

"It's a promise! See you in the morning."

This time, she made it to the bathroom.

Chapter 68

They left Bangkok at dawn, travelling south in a minibus. After three hours they stopped on the

outskirts of the town of Sattahip and ate the sandwiches and drank the coffee supplied by the

hotel. The six men who would be crossing into Cambodia somehow grouped together by the

roadside. Susanna, Jennings and the Embassy driver stayed inside the minibus.

"They seem relaxed," Jennings remarked. "You'd think they'd be as tense as all hell. Even that

guy Nol Pol looks relaxed. And he knows better than any of them what he's going into. If they

catch him over there, it'll be a slow death."

Susanna looked at the Cambodian. He was talking to Guido and occasionally smiling at

something the Italian was saying.

"How do they communicate?" Jennings asked.

"In French. Guido was in the Foreign Legion."

The men were in a loose circle, holding their mugs of coffee.

"It's like a form of osmosis," Susanna remarked. "In a way, they have sucked him into their

team. He feels like an equal. That's how they do it. Creasy is the leader, but any occasional

observer would never know that. They're all equals. They'll all rely on each other. They're relaxed

because they're doing what they enjoy. In a way, they never grew up. They're a sophisticated

form of a street gang, a bunch of kids about to do something naughty."

Jennings laughed softly. "Something naughty! Susanna, you have a gift for understatement."

The men finished their coffee and climbed back into the minibus. The driver headed due east

along the coast road. The Gulf of Thailand stretched away in a blue swatch to their right.

The house was secluded; set in a walled compound within a grove of banana trees. The two

Shoguns were parked at the rear. They were painted black. As the minibus pulled up beside

them, an elderly Thai couple emerged from the back door and greeted them.

"Who are they?" Creasy asked Jennings.

"They're secure," Jennings answered. "I won't mention their names, but he was one of our covert

agents for thirty years before he retired about five years ago. Let's go inside."

They filed into a spacious room with a single fan rotating above a long table. As Susanna looked

at the table, she felt a sudden wave of embarrassment. It was covered with weapons from end to

end. Submachine-guns, pistols, spare magazines, knives, grenades, black uniforms, webbings and

flak jackets. At the very end of the table was a black rocket-launcher and four cone-shaped

rockets. She was embarrassed about her earlier words to Jennings. This was no street gang going

out to do something naughty. This was warfare in its starkest light.

But the men did not seem to see it that way. They crowded around the table, handling the

weapons and commenting to each other about them. Creasy picked up one of the

submachine-guns and then asked Nol Pol a question in French. The Cambodian shook his head.

Creasy passed him the weapon and then said to Guido: "He's only ever used an AK47. Please

show him how to use it and strip it down." He turned to Rene and Maxie. "You're familiar with

it?"

They both nodded. Maxie glanced at The Owl, who shook his head and said: "I don't use things

like that. I've got my MAB pistol and that's all I want."

Creasy picked up the rocket-launcher and nodded in satisfaction.

"It's the model D," he said as he unscrewed the tube. "It makes it easier to carry." He looked at

Rene. "You're the mechanic," he said. "Please check the engines of the jeeps while the rest of us

strip down these weapons and check them out. Then we'll all try to get a few hours' sleep." He

looked at his watch and then at Jennings.