"You people have nukes?"
"More terrible than nukes."
Remo blinked. What the hell were they talking about?
"Now, if you do not tell us your mission, you will be shot."
"You shoot an American tourist," Remo warned, "and a weapon more terrible than yours will land on your heads."
And the major laughed so heartily Remo wondered if he had gotten into the loco weed.
While he was laughing, Remo decided to make his move.
He came up from the floor like a spring.
The Mexican major sensed the gringo jumping up but wasn't concerned. The man's hands were, after all, handcuffed at his back.
So when a length of stainless-steel chain—stretched between two wrists like small I-beam girders—wrapped around his throat, he was one surprised officer.
"Cuervos. North, south, east or west?" hissed the gringo.
"We-est," he choked out.
"Much obliged," said the gringo, who brought such terrible pressure on his throat that the major blacked out.
Remo eased the unconscious officer to the ground, snapped the handcuff links with a careless tug and got out of the bracelets by scrunching his hands up so they slipped out as if his finger bones were paper.
He stepped out into the hot sun wearing the major's uniform and peaked cap, which got him past the stiff-faced tent guard and to a desert camo Humvee.
As soon as he dropped behind the wheel, Remo was recognized and another Humvee raced to block his way. Remo stomped the gas pedal into the floorboards. When he lifted his foot, it stayed jammed down.
The two Humvees came together with a sound like a trash compactor, throwing Mexican soldiers in every direction.
Remo landed lightly on the road just in time to greet a third Humvee. Its driver came out with a side arm, which Remo obligingly confiscated, crushed to junk and returned to the soldier by way of his steel helmet.
Stepping over the man, Remo took the Humvee's wheel. Tires kicking up grit and sand, he headed north.
A desert camouflage tank tried to block the way. Steering around it, Remo shot out a foot that struck the right track so hard it broke clean. When the tank tried to follow, the track clanked loose and the exposed wheellike gears ground it to junk.
A soldier scrambled out of the turret and got his thumbs on the trips of a swivel gun. He fired his first burst into the air, his second into the heat-softened asphalt behind Remo and, in the middle of walking rounds toward the Humvee, the belt ran empty.
He pounded it with a dark fist as his quarry sped out of range.
That put Remo in the clear. He just hoped no one in Cuervos would give him any trouble.
After all, it wasn't as if the U.S. was at war with Mexico. And his killing days were behind him.
Chapter Ten
The President of the U.S. received the first reports of trouble on the border with Mexico from his national-security adviser.
"I'd better have a talk with their ambassador," he said, reaching for the telephone.
"The Mexican ambassador was recalled to Mexico City for consultations, Mr. President," his national-security adviser reminded.
"That's right. We ever get to the bottom of that melee at the UN?"
"That's State's affair."
"What's gotten into those people?" he blurted.
"Unknown, Mr. President."
He glanced at the report again. It was unbelievable. Mexican army units, just a day ago busier than a one-handed chicken-plucker dealing with internal problems, had been redeployed to the U.S. border. Without explanation.
"Don't they have enough problems down there?" he complained.
"We have to mount a response."
"Get the president of Mexico on the line."
"No, I meant a military response."
"They're on their side of the border, aren't they?"
"Yes. But they're poised to jump across."
"Mexico invading the U.S. is as likely as the U.S. invading Canada."
"Actually we did that once."
The President looked intrigued. "When?"
"Oh, around 1812 or so."
The President of the United States frowned with all of his fleshy face. In the background an obscure Elvis tune played. But his ears hardly heard it.
Only this morning his biggest problem had loomed as large as an asteroid hurtling toward his political future. As usual it had taken the form of his wife, who had marched into the Oval Office to announce that this year the White House would not celebrate a traditional Thanksgiving because it might offend Native Americans, not to mention animal-rights activists and as for Christmas—
The national-security adviser broke into the President's troubled thoughts. "If we deploy troops on our side, it will act as a clear deterrent."
"Our goddamn friendship with Mexico should be all the deterrent we need."
"As you know, the Mexicans are pretty touchy about that anti-immigration thing in California. What is it called?"
"Prop 187."