Free Texas Showdown by Don Pendleton, Dick Stivers Page B

bucked and shuddered as the pilots maintained an altitude of fifty feet over the desert gorges and plateaus. Every thermal updraft and crosswind threw Lyons against the men on each side of him, or else back against the bulkhead. Lyons gripped the nylon and foam case for the M-14, and tried to keep the equipment of the other mercenaries from bumping the Starlite scope.
    A man touched a lighter flame to a cigarette. Pardee's shout tore through the engine's roar:
"Put that out before I shoot at it!"
    The smoker threw the cigarette down, ground it out. Pardee leaned to Lyons, spoke with his head touching Lyons'.
    "A night op, so what do they do? They smoke! Two months I've nursed these losers. I should have recruited Girl Scouts."
    Time went slowly. As the sky darkened to night, the terrain below them became black. The pilot took the helicopter higher. Now the swerves and lurches came infrequently. Twinkling lights appeared to the east, then the dark form of a mountain obscured the town. The monotonous vibration and night landscape lulled Lyons almost to sleep.
    He had not slept since he'd seen Robert Furst, ex-army officer, ex-movie actor, ex-bank robber. After the gut-twisting near confrontation on the rifle range, Lyons and Pardee had returned to camp. They fitted the Starlite scope and a bipod onto an M-14, then Pardee made an unauthorized entry into the PX and carried out two six-packs of beer. Out in the hills, they drank the beer, then shot the cans to zero the rifle. Finally back in the barrack, Lyons had lain awake until dawn, figuring angles. How long could he avoid Furst? Could he risk Furst "disappearing"? Where did Furst sleep? How could Lyons get the body past the sentries?
    If Lyons wanted to live, if he wanted Blancanales and Gadgets to live, Furst had to meet with a fatal accident. But how? After brooding all night, Lyons knew he could do nothing, the guarantees were too slender. Therefore he had to avoid Furst until an opportunity for elimination arose later.
    The men participating in the raid had had no duties during the day. At dawn, Lyons borrowed a set of high-powered binoculars. Telling the sentries he wanted to practice, he took the binoculars and the M-14 into the rocky hills overlooking the base. Until assembly time, he studied the camp, watching the sentries, noting the frequency of their patrols and when the shifts changed. He watched the camp operations. He watched jeeps and trucks shuttle between the airfield and the base.
    At four in the afternoon, he returned to the barracks and gathered his equipment. Only the crowding and the confusion in the trucks and helicopters saved him from discovery. Furst and Monroe watched from a limousine as Pardee and the squad leaders checked details and counted soldiers. Lyons had hoped Furst would accompany the strike force... Furst would not have returned. But the man had stayed in the limousine, and waved as the helicopters lifted away.
    For a moment after the helicopter touched down and the pilot killed the engine, there was silence and stillness. The rotor-throb of the other helicopters came and faded too. Pardee left his seat beside Lyons and squatted with his back to the closed side door.
    "Listen up. There's no going back, you men. We're two hours into Mexico, and the helicopters have fifteen minutes of fuel left. Either we win, or we die, or we go to Mexican prisons. Right now we're going to take a walk. No talking, no noise, no smoking, no slack. When we get there, everything dies. Men, women, babies, pet lizards. You hear me?"
    The squad mumbled its answer. Pardee threw open the side door and stepped smartly out. Red-lensed lights flashed from the three other helicopters. As the soldiers filed out of the Huey, cool desert air displaced the odors of fuel and sweat and face-blacking with the fragrance of chaparral and wild spices.
    Lyons followed the others out. To the east, the silhouette of a mountain cut into the dome of stars. There was a very faint glow