The Killing Rule

“I called him, like you asked,” McCarter continued. “He remembered me and agreed to see us, but he didn’t sound too happy about it. I’m—There are men in the hedgerows.”

Bolan had noticed them, too. McCarter brought the Land Rover to a halt as a man stepped out into the lane in front of them.

The man was about five foot ten. White hair fell around his ears in a shag that seemed to be three weeks past due for a cut. A white mustache draped across his upper lip. He wore a tweed hacking jacket with leather patches on the elbows and a quilted leather patch on the right shoulder for shooting. His heavy wool pants were tucked into stained Wellington boots. A tweed cap was perched on his head at a rakish angle. He looked lean and fit and every inch a British squire out for a morning hunt. All he needed was a double-barrel shotgun broken open and crooked in his elbow.

Instead Lord William stood in the misting rain cradling an L-2 A-3 Sterling submachine gun.

A pair of Great Danes flanked him. One had the black-and-white markings of a Dalmatian while the other was a startling, near-hairless pink. A human argyle vest with the sleeves cut off strained at its seams to insulate the giant furless dog against the cold.

The Sterling’s muzzle was not quite pointed at the Land Rover. Lord William’s finger was not quite on the trigger. His men came out of the hedgerows; there were four of them, two on each side of the lane. They were dressed in heavy wool sweaters, and all carried double-barrel shotguns.

McCarter glanced over at Bolan. The Land Rover’s armor package was rated up to direct hits from .30-caliber weapons. He was waiting for Bolan’s signal to run over the baron and his men.

“I say, David!” Lord William jerked his head. “Why don’t you and your friend come out, stretch your legs! We’ll chat a bit!”

Bolan caught motion out of the corner of his eye. The hedgerow was six feet tall, but a barn was visible above it some fifty yards away. A pair of men were atop it now, and Bolan recognized the 84 mm profile of a Carl Gustaf recoilless antitank rifle across one of the men’s shoulder.

The seven-pound, rocket-assisted warhead would light up the Land Rover like the Fourth of July.

Lord William shrugged. “Of course I could just bloody well light you up like November Fifth!”

November Fifth was Guy Fawkes Day in England, commemorating the day in 1604 when Guy Fawkes had stockpiled thirty-six barrels of black powder in a cellar beneath the House of Lords and tried to blow up Parliament.

Bolan turned to McCarter. “Let’s go stretch our legs and chat a bit.”

“Right.”

“Slow and easy!” Lord William called. He nodded at his yeomen. “Steady on, lads.”

Bolan and McCarter stepped out of the Land Rover and moved to stand in front of it. McCarter grinned. “Hello, Bill!”

Bolan nodded. “Your lordship.”

The two dogs quivered at the sounds of their voices. Lord William spoke soothingly. “Spot…Starkers…” Bolan looked into Starkers’s colorless albino eyes and saw cold, pale murder. Only their master’s will kept the giant dogs rooted in place in the muck instead of savaging the intruders.

Lord William ignored Bolan’s and McCarter’s greetings. “Lunk, their pistols, if you please.”

The man behind them was very good. Even in the squelching mud he’d barely made any noise on his approach. Bolan and McCarter slowly opened their jackets. A huge hand reached around Bolan and drew the Beretta 93-R. The Executioner spoke quietly. “Ankle holster and right pocket.” He was relieved of his snub-nosed 9 mm Centennial revolver and his Mikov switchblade.

The Executioner slid his eyes to look at the man as he moved off to disarm McCarter. Lunk had earned his name. He was huge. Not big like a bodybuilder or an athlete, but a human built to a different scale. He was running six foot six with shoulders that were axe-handle broad, from which hung arms like an orangutan. He had the pale complexion, anvil jaw, snub nose and tightly curling brown hair that fairly screamed Welshman.

He took McCarter’s Hi-Power pistol, noting the shortened Argentine “Detective” slide and the chrome base plate of the Israeli 15-round magazine with one raised brown eyebrow.

McCarter kept his smile painted on his face. “Not the warmest welcome I’ve ever had in Guernsey, Bill.”

“Can’t be too careful these days, David.” The aging lord stared at McCarter long and hard. “These days, in this business, it’s your friends who come to kill you, and they come smiling.”

“You sound like you’re speaking from recent experience, Lord William,” Bolan commented.

“A Yank, then?”

“Yes, your lordship. I’ve been having a few people coming by to kill me, as well. David was kind enough to arrange a meet so that you and I might compare notes. I think we have a few things in common.”

Lord William turned to McCarter. “I haven’t seen you in years, David. Then you call me out of the blue sky and tell me it’s urgent and come armed with an American in tow. What’s this all about?”

“Well, it’s a fine, soft morning, Bill. Shall we take that stretch of the legs and talk?”

Lord William stared up into the misting rain. “Oh God, no. I’m an old man. It’s worth my life to be out in this mist and muck.” He slung his weapon and suddenly grinned. “Let’s go inside and drink whiskey.”

CHAPTER FIVE

They sat in leather chairs in front of a roaring fireplace that was large enough to double as a car port for a Volkswagen. Spot and Starkers lay curled before it on a polar bear rug. Lord William had put away his Sterling, but when he unbuttoned his coat a Browning Hi-Power pistol in a shoulder holster was revealed. He and McCarter sipped ten-year-old Laphroaig single-malt whiskey from the Isle of Islay. Bolan drank a pint of the locally brewed ale. Lunk and two of the yeomen hung back in the shadows of the cavernous hall drinking ale and keeping their weapons close to hand. They were all quiet for a few moments while Lord William observed the laws of hospitality and everyone warmed their bones.

“So, David. What’s this all about?”

“Well, Bill, there’s been some trouble in London.”

Lord William peered over the rim of his whiskey glass. “Oh?”

“Yes, the CIA had two agents end up in the Thames. The IRA is involved.”

“Well, what the bloody hell is the CIA doing mucking about with the IRA? Can’t MI-5 cut the mustard anymore?”

Bolan decided to play it straight. “The operation was run without the cooperation or the knowledge of MI-5 or Her Majesty’s government.”

“Well, it serves them bloody right, then, doesn’t it?” Lord William snorted with disgust born of long experience. “Central sodding Intelligence my flaming—”

“Lord William, it appears some of your employees are involved.”

“Really.”

Lord William turned to the gigantic Welshman. “Lunk, you taffy bastard! Have you been having it on with the IRA again?”

“Oh, no, m’lord.” The giant grinned malevolently from where he stood drinking by the sideboard. His voice was as deep as thunder in the distance. “I haven’t killed an Irish in, oh, ten years?”

“CIA?” Lord William said hopefully.

“No.” Lunk finished his pint. “Not that I’d mind so much, though.”

Lord William gestured with his whiskey glass at the four men bearing shotguns and drinking on the couch. “How about the rest of you lads, then? Been misbehaving in London when I wasn’t looking?”

The men grinned and shook their heads in unison.

Lord William turned back to Bolan with a helpless shrug. “That’s most of the men I have on staff.”

“Actually, I’m thinking more along the lines of Aegis Global Security employees.”

Lord William shifted uncomfortably. “Well, for one, except for some accountants, lawyers and office staff, Aegis has no permanent employees. We have stockholders, and then we have contractors—we call them associates—whom Aegis employs, contract by contract, job by job. And two, Aegis Global Security doesn’t take contract work from the IRA. Indeed, on numerous occasions we’ve taken jobs to protect people from the IRA. Successful jobs, mind you, and we weren’t in the business of arresting people or taking prisoners, if you get my meaning. Except for MI-5 we’re the IRA’s worst bloody nightmare.”