Though sought by virtually every police establishment in the nation, Bolan never fought cops. His war was with the Mafia and — whether the police accepted the idea or not — the cops were his allies, not his enemies. He also exercised great care to keep non-combatants out of his battle zones. There is no record of any innocent bystanders being caught in the crossfire of a Bolan campaign. It is known that frequently, in fact, he scrubbed missions and broke contact when it became apparent that bystanders would become involved, and several of these occasions were at great peril to himself.

It was at Chicago that Bolan finally came to grips with his own inner turmoil and accepted once and for all his place in the universe. "A man's character is his fate," said Heraclitus, the early Greek philosopher — and Bolan discovered at Chicago that this same truth applied to societies as a whole. He found there a city chained by its own character, and he left it that way, though minus a few characters it would never miss, -and continued along his wipe-out trail to Las Vegas, the city of chance and very nearly the city of Bolan's last chance.

The Mafia counter-war reached its greatest proportions ever at Vegas, and the national enforcers thought they had the Executioner sewed up for sure in this town where the comfortable end of the averages perennially rode with the house. Once again, however, the astute militarist uncannily read the offense and turned it to his own advantage — and he left Vegas with all the chips.

He also left with $250,000 of the mob's money, one of their helicopters, a pilot and an accountant, or "bagman." The helicopter represented but the first leg of a devious route to the Caribbean island of Puerto Rico — the money, "skim" from Vegas casino profits, was but the latest installment of a continuing cash movement onto the "Caribbean Carousel," a new scene of intense activity for the international syndicate. Thus Bolan's escape from Vegas was also his springboard to the next battleground. It seemed a virtual certainty that the survivors of the Vegas battle would recover from their stunning defeat early enough to read Bolan's play and arrange a reception for him at flight's end.

Bolan was a military realist, not a wishful thinker. He had known that the Vegas deception could last just so long, and was expecting the trap that awaited him at Puerto Rico. It was another calculated risk, little different than all the others. The important thing was that they had revealed their hardsite to him.

The next move was up to him.

A tropical paradise lay just beyond that airplane window.

But the Executioner had not come to America's backyard playground to gambol in the sun and sand.

He was living to the point, and he had come for the Caribbean Kill. Bolan was blitzing into paradise.

They circled low over the breakwater and dropped smoothly onto the glasslike surface of Bahia de Vidria, the pontoons taking a gentle bite and skimming along the water runway toward the beach. The pilot had cut back on the power and they were idling slowly in a soft glide for the seaplane dock, a hundred yards or so downrange, when the Beretta slid into Bolan's fist and muzzled into the guy's throat.

"End of game, Grimaldi," the Executioner announced coldly.

The pilot swallowed hard past the outside pressure of cool steel and muttered, "I don't get you, Mr. Vinton."

"Sure you do," Bolan told him. "When the engine dies, you die."

He divided his attention to lift the binoculars into a close scan of the shoreline. A signboard on the pier loomed into the vision-field:

GLASS BAY RESORT PRIVATE

Beyond the pier lay neatly landscaped grounds and a rambling structure resembling an oversized plantation house — a two-story job with verandas at top and bottom levels. Colorful cabanas lined the beach. People in bathing suits sprawled about here and there in the sand — all male-type people, Bolan wryly noted. Others strolled casually about the grounds or lounged at the railings of the verandas. Say, thirty people in plain sight. Two guys in white ducks and sneakers waited on the pier to dock the plane.

It all would seem perfectly innocuous, to the casual observer.

Mack Bolan was not observing casually.

Not a native Puerto Rican was in sight. No females, no relaxed frivolity, no fun or games anywhere in evidence. It was a set stage, sloppily done — no doubt, Bolan mused, the result of haste. They hadn't had time to get all the props out. Something inside a beach cabana was giving off telltale flashes as it reflected the strong rays of the midday tropical sun — a telescopic lens, maybe. The beach towels of the "bathers" revealed oblong lumps of just about the proper size and shape to suggest concealed rifles or shotguns.

As the plane steadily closed the distance, clumps of men on the lower veranda of the house began drifting down the steps and disappearing into the vegetation.

Yeah, Glass Bay was the hardsite. And it was primed and waiting for a gate-crasher in masquerade.

It was, of course, time for the official unmasking. Bolan had known in his bones, for several hours now, that his little game was over. And now the time had come to pay the fare for that wild-ass exit from Vegas.

By the numbers, now, very carefully. A single moment would decide life or death for Mack Bolan — a very precise moment in psychological time.

The pilot had been with Bolan through three exchanges of aircraft. He was a versatile flyer, but hardcore Mafia all the same, and he knew all the tricks of illegal evasion. Here was one situation that could not be evaded, however, and the knowledge of that truth was pasted all over the guy's face. He nervously cleared his throat and said, "Look, Bolan, it's all in a day's work, eh? Nothing personal. I just follow orders."

Bolan said, "Yeah."

"I didn't know it was you until the switch at Nassau. And I still didn't know for sure, I mean nobody told me. They just said Glass Bay instead of San Juan. That was the tip-off, I mean I knew something was up. And I put it together myself."

"Sure."

The guy was reaching for life. "You got to believe me, I wasn't in on the setup."

"I believe you," Bolan muttered.

A strangled sound from the rear announced that the bagman was not quite ready to die, either. He was cowering against his bags of bucks and trembling as he croaked, "Me, too, Mr. Bolan. Honest to God I didn't know until just now."

"Okay, get out," Bolan groaned.

"Right here?" the accountant warbled hopefully.

Bolan nodded. The pier was less than fifty yards ahead now. "Not the money, just you." To the pilot, he commanded, "Pre-set those controls for a quick lift-off. Then you follow Lemke."

"Too late," Grimaldi replied, sighing. "Can you fly this crate?"

"Watch me," Bolan told him.

"You'll never make it out of here now. They'll blow this thing out of the water before you can get it turned around. You waited too long, Bolan."

"Just set it up," the Executioner commanded.

Lemke pushed the hatch open and gazed apprehensively at the water slipping gently by just below, then he jumped and disappeared from view. The two men on the pier reacted immediately, and a sudden film of perspiration appeared on the pilot's brow.

"Okay she's set!" he yelled, and pushed himself clear of the seat.

The people on shore were beginning to look alive. A man on the pier cupped his hands and shouted something toward the house. A clump of men wearing bathing suits and openly displaying, weapons broke into a run for the seaplane dock.

Girmaldi threw himself through the hatch and Bolan swung around behind him to punch a pair of Parabellums into the two agitated figures on the pier. They went over backwards, their own weapons firing reflexively and wildly, and Bolan made a lunge for the throttle.