It was the ultimate ego trip, sure. The notion that the world is composed of You and Everyone Else, because no one can touch you in deceit and manipulation. Except Edwards was wrong: he would be touched all right, and touched hard.

"I think Edwards has also received seed money from some of the wealthier terrorist groups. We know that before he began to set up his spy net, eyewitnesses placed him at the scene of several high-level meetings among Arab radical factions. At least a dozen European assassinations have been pinned on them in the past two years, and one or two of the earlier ones may have been Edwards's personal work. Now some of those groups are anteing up seed money."

"So it all ties in."

"Even more than we thought," Toby added. "It turns out that Edwards even has quasi-official status. Nominally, the reason he is in Tripoli is to train a class of Libyan intellectuals in espionage technique, and to design and start up an intelligence agency for Khaddafi. Of course, Khaddafi knows this is a cover for Edwards's own ambitions, but he doesn't particularly care. He'll be one of Edwards's best customers, and he'll even get a discount."

Bolan pressed in the Jag's dashboard lighter and fished out a cigarette. "I figured he's using Wheelus as a base."

"That's right," Toby confirmed. "His primary communication and computer data-bank facility is there, and his own planes fly out of the old base. He's also got his largest illegal-weapons warehouse there too, in an old quartermaster corps facility ( and right now it's filled with inventory."

"Can you sketch me a layout of the base, Toby?"

"You bet, Captain Grim."

She found paper and pen in the sedan's glove box and began to rough out a schematic as Bolan asked, "How long before Edwards misses Hansen?"

"I'm not sure. Hansen wouldn't necessarily check in just to tell Edwards we had reached Wheelus, not unless something was wrong. But there's a good chance that the next one of Edwards's group to pass this way is going to recognize those two wrecked cars, investigate, and blow the whistle. It's still pretty early; with luck we might have a couple of hours."

"That could be all we need."

Toby looked across the seat at him and frowned, like she already knew the answer to the question she was about to ask.

"Now wait a minute, Captain Incredible. Are you thinking of taking him on by yourself?"

"Toby, Frank Edwards can't be touched through official channels. Technically, he hasn't been charged with any crime by American authorities, because to do so would open some top-secret cans of worms. Technically, he's outside the reach and authority of our law, anyway. Technically, no American agent or law officer has any official status in Libya."

"Yeah," Toby Ranger said sarcastically, "and technically, the Mafia never existed. If you go strictly by the book, that is."

"Which is why..."

"Which is why," Toby interrupted, "we're going by the book you wrote. It's just like the bad old days, isn't it, Captain Tough? Hit "n" git the hellfire storm, all of it. Call it "Blitzing the Baddies, by Captain Death.""

Mack Bolan did not smile.

"I'll need intel, Toby. With cars and bodies littering that field, we could go on the heartbeat any second."

"Mack, with that arm the chances...." She bit at her lip. You did not start thinking chances at a time like this.

"The layout at the villa," Bolan pressed. "Number and positioning of security layout, anything else you can give me."

Toby sighed. "You got it, Captain Stubborn." But then her wry smile turned into a pained drawn expression, as if all the tension of the past six months of living undercover, acting a role for the Oscar Award that was life or death, had finally become frighteningly real to her. "Mack," she said, in a voice gone suddenly little girl. She leaned across, and he let her come into his arms. There was nothing sexual about it; it was the need of two people to feel for a few moments a human touch, in the midst of the all-too-inhuman world in which they found themselves so often. He felt the warm wetness of her tears soaking through the elastic material of the blacksuit.

"It's okay," he told her in an incredibly soft voice.

"Damn it," Toby sobbed, and Bolan knew she was referring to nothing and everything. "Just damn..."

Very too quickly the moment was over. So few, those moments, so far between ( and so essential.

As essential as the need to stop Frank Edwards.

Toby was sitting across the seat again, her eyes red but dry. "I'm ready," she said, calmly, levelly.

East across the flat grassy plain, dirty gray fingers of dawn licked away the night sky.

Another day, and another long yard in the Executioner's endless Third Mile of War.

But Bolan nodded. He was ready as well.

Mack Bolan lay without breathing on the floor in front of the Jag's rear seat, his still form hidden beneath a rough wool blanket. The car cruised to a stop, and Bolan heard the sound of boot heels on pavement as the gateman came over, Bolan tensed, holding the charged Uzi in ready position. If Toby's cover had been blown completely off and the guard blew the whistle on her now, the scene was going to go rapidly hard.

"Accident?" The gateman's voice came from the rig's passenger side. Its tone was casual.

"Somewhere along the line," Toby replied just as lightly. "It was like that when I left Frank's place."

"A Jag, huh," he heard the gateman say rhetorically. "I haven't seen this one around before." Either the guy was looking for conversation to break up the monotony of duty ( or he was stalling for time.

"I guess Frank just picked it up. Probably at a discount because of the dent, if I know Frank."

The gateman laughed. "Frank knows the value of a buck, that's for sure."

"Just like the rest of us, huh?"

"Right you are, Toby. Listen, what's up?" In the background, Bolan could hear the Doppler effect of an approaching plane.

"That goddamned tag car was on its way to pick up some guy named Sid Bryant. That's probably his flight coming in now," she whispered to Bolan.

"Who is he?"

"Used to be FBI, but he's been freelancing around Europe and the Middle East for the past couple of years. Frank's never met him, I guess, but he'd got the credentials and recommendations."

"Coming in for the big meet?"

"No, that's just coincidence. He'll be there, I guess, but mainly Frank is just checking him out." Toby shifted the sedan into gear.

"Take it easy, Toby," the gateman called as she moved on into the one-time USAF base turned terrorist nerve center.

Bolan let out breath and loosened his death grip on the Uzi. He had changed out of the midnight suit and into light cotton twill slacks, a khaki safari shirt, and dark glasses. In the front right-hand pocket of the slacks was stowed a C.O.P. (compact Off-Duty-Police), Inc. SS-I four-barrel hideaway pistol, in .357 Magnum.

The Jaguar rolled to a smooth stop. From the sound of the engines as they were killed, the plane was close by. The Jag's door opened, slammed again.

"How they hanging, Toby?" a man's voice asked.

"Keep your mind on flying, Jerry." Toby's tone was just as bantering. "Are you Bryant?" she asked after a pause.

A different man answered, "That's right."

"Your chariot awaits, chum."

Both front doors opened, and the Jag's suspension shifted under the weight of Toby and Bryant. The car started up again, swung around in a U-turn. It slowed long enough for Bolan to hear the gateman's, "Later, Toby," then sped up again." "Welcome to Tripoli, Bryant," Toby said casually Bolan slipped out from under the blanket and rose silently to his knees, bringing up the Uzi.

Bryant had started to murmur a response to Toby's apparent pleasantry when the barrel of the Uzi drilled into the base of his skull. "You've got two choices, Bryant," Bolan said into the guy's ear, his voice sharp and cold as an icicle. "It you keep your eyes straight ahead and your hands in sight, you get a long walk back from the desert. If you even twitch, you get your brains all over the dashboard."