War Drums

“Enough of this. Take him away. Put him with the other prisoner and they can convince each other it will be best they cooperate. I will talk to him later.”

Kerim’s dismissal was complete. He turned away to deal with other matters as the armed guards escorted Bolan from the tent.

Walking just in front of the guards Bolan took the opportunity to look around the camp. Tents and parked vehicles. The helicopters on the slight rise beyond the main area. A couple of stone buildings, one, just beyond a low stone wall, well guarded. He was taken away from the tents to a single stone building with barred windows and a heavy wooden door. The door was opened and Bolan pushed inside. A filthy passage led down to another door, which was barred from the outside. While one man covered Bolan with his rifle the other freed the door and held it open. The muzzle of an AK forced the big American in through the door. He was given a final push, sending him to his knees in the middle of the cell. Behind him the door was slammed shut and the bolts rammed home.

Bolan heard a slight movement on the far side of the cell. He glanced up and realized he wasn’t alone.

CHAPTER SEVEN

Bolan pushed to his feet and checked out his cell partner.

The man was of medium height, with wide shoulders and lean hips. He was clad in torn, stained black clothing that was covered by a loose robe. His neat black beard framed a light brown face that had undergone recent hard treatment. Bruises and bloody cuts marked his flesh and his hooked nose was badly swollen. Dried blood crusted his mouth. He regarded Bolan with a fierce stare. His dark eyes held an undiminished gleam that his rough treatment hadn’t dimmed.

“Do you speak English?” Bolan asked. “I ask because my Arabic is not good.”

“Of course I speak English,” the other replied in a tone that suggested he was talking to a child. “Do you think I am just another desert savage?”

“No, I was hoping to make conversation with a fellow warrior.” Bolan had recognized the configuration of the man’s dress. The black garb and flowing robes, the Jalabiyya, of a Bedouin. His head was covered by the traditional Arab kaffiyeh, the black cloth held in place by the double-corded agal. The man’s interest brought him closer, examining Bolan’s own black attire. “You are a warrior, too?”

“So I’ve been told, though I would never class myself in the same league as a true Bedouin.”

The man straightened, staring into Bolan’s eyes. His expression showed approval. His stance, though regal, wasn’t from vanity. The Bedouin tribes, though much decimated, were men of enduring pride in their long and noble history. Monarchs of the desert lands, they had once been many, ruling their dusty kingdoms with a fierceness little could equal. Reduced to dwindling numbers and with many of their kind having deserted the almost barren terrain, the few who remained close to their roots upheld the nobility of their past and retained their customs.

“You are American?”

“Yes.”

“They know of the Bedu in America?”

“Men of wisdom and influence know of the Bedouin. Of their history. Their great deeds.”

“Good. I am Ali bin Sharif of the Rwala.”

The Rwala, Bolan recalled, were one of the Bedouin tribes who wandered the dusty terrain of Syria and Jordan and the northern parts of Saudi Arabia.

“Then I am in good company,” Bolan said.

“How are you called, American?”

“Cooper is my name.”

Sharif spoke the name to himself, nodding as he registered the strange word.

“If they have brought you to this pigpen, Cooper, then you must be an enemy of these dogs, as I am.”

Bolan smiled at that. “No doubt about that, Ali bin Sharif. I am their enemy.”

“Then we are allies.”

“How did you come to be in this place?”

“Two of my fellow warriors and I stumbled across this place. We rode in asking for water and we were attacked. My friends were shot down in front of me even though we came in friendship.”

The Bedouin had moved to stand and stare out through the tiny square in the wall that served as the only window in the cell. Bolan sensed he was stifled within the confines of the room, longing to be back in his wide, clean desert.

“If we stay, they are going to kill us,” Sharif said as he turned, reluctantly, from the window. “I know this. They took great delight in telling me I would die when they poison me with the weapon they plan to use against the Israelis.”

Bolan tensed. “Tell me what you have heard, bin Sharif. It is important that I know.”

“Did you see the stone building standing on its own? Just beyond the wall?”

When he had arrived Bolan had made a silent appraisal of the camp’s layout. Recon was important when it came time to effect an escape, something always at the forefront of Bolan’s mind whenever he found himself disadvantaged. Thinking ahead and formulating an escape route could make the difference between staying free—or failing completely.

“Look beyond the window,” Sharif said. “At the eastern edge of the camp. Do you see the wall?”

Bolan nodded. “And the square stone building thirty feet out?”

“Yes. In there they store weapons. Guns and ammunition. Explosives. And the weapon they will kill the Jews with. Those Iraqi dogs who yapped at Hussein’s heels showed me. They delivered it here for the Iranians to use. They said it would make me scream like a child as I died. Ha, they must not be aware I am Rwala, of the Bedu.”

“What did this weapon look like? Liquid? Was it gas in cylinders?”

“In round glass balls. Big enough to fill my palm. Inside was a green-colored liquid. One of those Fedayeen laughed in my face when he told me one drop would spread all across my body and eat me alive.”

A reactive bioagent that became active when it made contact with living tissue. Bolan had heard about the varying strains of biological weapons, created in labs by men to use against other men. Another of the vile products of the endless search man immersed himself in to destroy his own kind. He wondered briefly where the Iranians had gotten hold of this particular strain. Not that it mattered right now. The where could come later.

“Did they say where it would be used in Israel?”

He shook his head. “If they send it into Israel it will set this whole region alight. Iraq. Iran. Why cannot these fools be satisfied with what they have? When will they be content? Only when we are all fighting each other? Or dead and the desert is rid of us all?”

“Ali, we can stand around all day discussing the worst. Or we can get out of this place and stop what these men are planning.”

The Bedouin thought about it for only a moment. “You are right, Cooper. So what is your wonderful plan that will release us from this miserable dung pit?”

“The truth?”

“Always.”

“I have no plan.”

Sharif smiled, stroking his dark beard and said, “Then we must do it anyway.”

“Do they feed you?”

Sharif laughed. “If you can call it food. I believe it is the slop that even the camp dogs refuse to eat. But they say I must eat to keep up my strength. So that when they use their chemical I will be strong and resist better.”

“That suggests they’re not sure of its power. They need to test it.”

“Is that good?”