"You killed him?"

"No, it is that drug. When he is awake, he makes noises and sees things. Sometimes he sleeps. Until the drug is over, he is like an idiot. You will see. He will join us in a few minutes."

"And why do you do this?" Lyons demanded, arching his back to motion with his tied hands.

Coral smiled. "Because you, you we will take to the International. You and Gunther." Coral motioned to the men sitting on Lyons. He felt hands grip his wrists, then a knife cut the ropes on his hands and feet. Another man passed him the burlap bag containing his weapons.

Glancing through the windshield, Lyons saw unmarked police cars leading the panel truck through traffic. Other cars followed.

"Now do you understand? How else could we go directly to the headquarters of the International?"

"What about my partners?"

Coral passed the hand-radio to Lyons. "Inform them."

"What about the lieutenant and the sergeant? Are they with the International?''

"I do not know. You see, we told the fascists that we work for them. We told them to find you, to follow you. The truck that followed you this morning, from the old garage? One of our people. But you lost him in traffic. We searched everywhere in the city. One of our people told us of the soldiers and North Americans renting a warehouse. We had our men around the warehouse. We wanted to talk, so you did not think we betrayed you, but the army comes and then the Blancos come and the shooting starts. We watched the fight from the roof. The lieutenant and his men fought the fascists. They are honest. I don't know about the sergeant."

Lyons keyed his hand-radio. He clicked only the transmit. One click to identify himself, three clicks as a coded "no." He repeated the one click, then three clicks, hoping Gadgets and Blancanales would understand.

Three clicks followed by three more clicks answered. Three clicks meant Gadgets. Then Gadgets repeated the code. Lyons waited. Gadgets would need time to walk away from the others so he could speak.

A flurry of clicks came. Voices and sounds came from the hand-radio. Lyons heard fists striking flesh. Then a voice came on.

"Okay, what is it?"

But the voice had a Spanish accent. Again the voice spoke, trying to get Lyons to answer.

"Okay, tell me what..."

The International had taken his partners.

In the underground garage, General Mendez positioned his men in a line behind concrete pillars and parked cars. Each gunman carried an FN FAL rifle. When the Ochoas descended the ramp from the avenida, they would drive directly into the ambush. The thin sheet metal of the Ochoa truck would not even slow the 7.62 NATO slugs fired by the FN FAL rifles.

An officer ran to the general. "Commander, urgent messages!"

"What?"

"Colonel Larde has the two other Americans. The Mexicans escaped, but he brings the gringos."

"Good. What is the other?"

"A problem, commander. The captain of the squads escorting the Ochoas waits to speak with you."

The general went to the four-door Dodge containing his secure-frequency radio. He took the microphone. "This is your commander."

"The Ochoas have Colonel Gunther."

"Where is he? Send him to me immediately. Is he wounded?"

"He is in the truck of the Ochoas. The truck that carries the American prisoner."

"What! Why did you allow that?"

"It happened too quickly, General. They stopped. Men transferred the colonel from a car to the truck. Then the truck started again."

"Are you sure it was Colonel Gunther?"

"We saw him in the lights of cars. I know the colonel. I am sure it was him."

"This changes everything. Radio the other cars! When the Ochoas' truck enters the garage, all your cars will follow. Do you understand? No one fires until we free Colonel Gunther. No one fires until he is clear."

"I understand," the unit leader answered. "I will brief all the others."

General Mendez switched off the transmitter and rushed to the waiting gunmen. He had to cancel the ambush.

As the panel truck sped through the evening traffic, escorted by the unmarked police cars, Lyons and the Ochoa gunmen prepared for the surprise attack on the International. Lyons pushed aside the unconscious Gunther to clear a space on the panel truck's floor. Then he field-checked his weapons, beginning with the silenced Colt Government Model. He worked the action and tested the seating of the suppressor. He loaded a 10-round extended magazine. An Ochoa gunman gave him a handful of .45-caliber hardball cartridges to reload his spare magazines. Those mags went into Lyons's left-hand coat pocket.

Then he checked his backup Python.

The Ochoas also provided 12-gauge double-ought cartridges to top off his Atchisson mag.

The Ochoas carried an assortment of weapons. Coral, the oldest and most heavily armed, had two revolvers, one in a shoulder holster, another in an ankle rig. He had a pistol-grip double-barreled shotgun sawed off to six inches that went into a coat pocket. And he carried an old Thompson .45 with two 30-round magazines taped end to end.

Knowing what they would face when they attacked the International, the other three gunmen carried high-cyclic-rate assault weapons. One man had a standard Uzi and a Mini-Uzi. Another man had a .45-caliber Ingram. The third man carried an Uzi and a pistol-grip Remington 1100. And all the Ochoa men wore bulletproof vests.

On the wide Paseo de la Reforma, only seconds away from the meeting with the commander of the International, Coral turned to Lyons. "We must make you our prisoner again. That shotgun, that Uzi..." he pointed to the two weapons in Lyons's hands "...have them near, but..."

"Yeah, yeah. I understand." Lyons found the ropes that had bound his wrists. He put his hands behind his back and one of the Ochoa men wrapped the rope around his wrists. Lyons held both ends of the unknotted rope in his fists. Another length of rope went around his ankles. The gunman tied the rope with a slipknot, then tucked the slipknot into Lyons's sock.

"Be ready," Coral told his men.

The line of escort cars slowed. Weaving through traffic, an unmarked police car sped ahead. Coral looked out to see the car pass. For an instant, he saw into its interior. Then the car swerved in front of the first unmarked police car and raced down the ramp into the underground garage.

"That was the others!" Coral told Lyons. "Your Americans. I saw them in the back."

"If we can free them, that'll be seven of us. Wish we could have brought the Yaquis. But in a way, I'm glad we couldn't."

"They will be here soon. Many others will come."

"Good." Lyons looked over to the unconscious Gunther. "As soon as we're moving, we have to get him someplace safe. We've brought him too far to lose him now to stray bullets."

On the floor, his hands tied behind him, his feet tied, Gunther eased one eye open to a slit. He did not move or otherwise betray himself. His eye glanced to the men around him. Then his eyelid closed. He waited.

The caravan descended into the underground garage.

"What do you see?" Lyons asked, flat on the floor.

"There are many men around. They take the North Americans out of the car. A Mexican colonel goes to an old man in a suit. The colonel salutes the old man. Maybe the old one is General Mendez."

"What about my partners?"

"The soldiers and pistolerospunch them. But they stop. Now we arrive. Be ready."

Lyons heard voices outside. The truck's doors opened, then the cargo doors opened. Coral dragged out Lyons and dropped him on the concrete.

As the gunmen of the International kicked him, Lyons saw Gadgets and Blancanales only a step away.