It was after 5:00 A.M. when Mack Bolan unlocked his hotel door and entered the room. He sensed someone there and crouched, then snapped on the light.
Johnny slept on the bed, fully clothed.
He sat up, rubbed his eyes and grinned.
"Guess I dropped off to sleep."
"Yeah." Bolan went to his suitcase, took out a first-aid kit and broke it open. Johnny was beside him in a minute, checking the slashed left arm, taking over. He cleaned it with a wet washcloth, doused it with antiseptic, put a compress over it and bandaged it tightly.
Mack Bolan inspected his wound, then put on a clean black jersey and looked at Johnny. "When is that ship due to dock?"
"At 13.30 hours, one-thirty, at Terminal One, berth fifteen."
"So it'll enter the mouth of the Columbia about daylight. I should be able to find it along the Columbia on the way."
"You need help?"
"I need two hours sleep. Then I'll be ready to go. See if any of the helicopter rental agencies are open yet. See if you can find one that has a pilot who flew choppers in Nam, and find out about renting a bird from eight o'clock to about noon, cash in advance."
Johnny nodded and turned to the phone book. Before he found what he was looking for, the Executioner was asleep.
At nine A.M. Bolan and Scooter Roick slanted down the Willamette River from the Portland International Airport. Both were scanning the water. They were flying a Bell Jet Ranger, with enough speed and power for the job.
Scooter Roick was a lean man of about thirty-five. His eyes danced when Bolan told him that what they were about to do was highly illegal but that Scooter would be only marginally involved.
"Damn, just like Nam. Most of what we did there was a little wild, too!"
"Some guys on deck may shoot at us with handguns or rifles," the Executioner said. "Are you still game?"
"Hell, yes! I haven't had any fun in years. You want me to set you down on the fantail of some freighter?"
"Right. She'll be moving upstream at maybe ten knots. Get me within eight or ten feet of the deck, and I'll go down a rope. There might be some guy wires or cranes on this thing. I don't know."
"Man, I'll put you down so you can step off."
"This freighter is smuggling a load of arms and ammunition to the Mafia for terrorist training. It's my job to stop the shipment from getting to port."
They talked about Nam for a while as they flew along the Willamette to the mouth of the mighty Columbia River as it flowed toward Astoria and the Pacific Ocean. They spotted a freighter coming upstream, but it showed a Dutch flag and was riding high in the water.
They continued downstream. Ten minutes later they saw another freighter.
"Japanese flag," Bolan said. They came down for a closer look. The name on the bow was Karatsu Maru. "That's our baby, Scooter. How does she look?"
"Piece of cake. There's that short mast right on the stern, but there aren't any cranes or lines stretched around. I can get you within three feet of the deck."
Bolan nodded. "We go on downstream until we're out of sight, then turn and come back at them low over the water."
"You got it!"
They continued downstream, made a sweeping turn over green woods and fields, and returned at reduced speed, barely above the river.
Bolan checked the Uzi, hung around his neck.
His combat harness was filled with the usual gear and two smoke grenades. Big Thunder clung to his thigh and the Beretta 93-R nestled in shoulder leather.
"Let's do it!" Bolan said.
The chopper raced up-current, came around a bend and found the black stern and churning wake of the Japanese freighter three hundred yards ahead.
Bolan looked down and saw water no more than two feet below. He hoped they did not hit a sudden downdraft.
He checked the latch on the outward swinging door.
Scooter looked over and grinned. "In another thirty seconds I'll lift our nose up and come over that fantail, then drop down, almost touching the left-hand side of the deck. You ready?"
Bolan unbuckled his seat belt.
Scooter momentarily scrutinized the controls, then the water and the black hulk ahead. "Now!" he yelled. The craft lifted like an elevator and nosed over the thirty-foot wall of steel.
Bolan slammed back the door and jumped. An instant later he rolled onto the deck of the Karatsu Maru.
He ran behind a small shack near the center of the big deck. At once the chopper lifted and headed downstream at full throttle. Bolan had seen no guards or seamen. No shots had been fired.
Two men rushed past Bolan to the stern rail and watched the chopper disappear. One was obviously a Mafia soldier. He held an old model .45 automatic. The other was a Japanese seaman wearing blue jeans and a blue T-shirt.
"Now what the hell was that all about?" the hood said.
"Friendly American hello?" the puzzled Japanese said in heavily accented English.
The soldier shook his head. "I think we got trouble."
"Yeah, back here," Bolan said, the 93-R in his right hand.
The hood spun, his .45 ready before he had seen a target.
Bolan fired. The shot took the hood under the chin and traveled upward through his brain. The Executioner rushed to the rail and flipped the Mafia corpse over the barrier into the churning wake.
Bolan turned to the stunned Oriental. "Friend," Bolan said, looking at the seaman. "I won't hurt you. How many bad Americans like him are on board?"
The Japanese sailor's eyes were still wide.
"You... you... killed him!"
"Yes. He's a Mafia criminal. How many?"
"Four. They come with river pilot at Astoria."
The Executioner scowled. It figured Canzonari would want some protection coming upstream. He motioned for the Japanese to follow him, and they squatted behind the metal shack for cover.
"Do the other Mafia guys have guns?"
"Yes, big pistols. Most of them two guns."
"Have they hurt any of your crew?"
"No, but Captain most unhappy."
"I bet he is. Can you bring one of the Americans back here?"
"Not if you kill him."
"Yes. I understand. Where are they?"
"One with pilot, one in captain's cabin with captain. Other two..." The Japanese shrugged.
"Do you know there are illegal guns on board, thousands of them?"
"No, industrial machinery!"
"Big closed boxes?"
"Yes."
Bolan asked the seaman to direct him to the captain's cabin. Then he ran past three cargo hatches to the superstructure.
There were three decks above. He slipped through a doorway and climbed some steps to the top deck and found the room he had been told was the captain's cabin.
The Executioner tested the doorknob. It moved.
He turned it as far as it would go to the right, held the 93-R in his left hand and quietly and quickly opened the door.
It was a big cabin with a window. A Japanese man — the captain, Bolan guessed — sat in a soft chair. A tall Mafia soldier wearing jeans and a T-shirt and a black stocking cap stood looking out to sea.
"I thought I saw a white man down there," muttered the hardman. "You got anybody else on board?" He glared at the captain, a heavy handgun held at his side.
"I'm right here, bad-ass," Bolan said quietly.
The soldier spun, his piece coming up, but it never reached target. A 9mm slug punched a widening hole through the side of the soldier's head, killing him with only the sound of a gentle cough.
The captain leaped to his feet, chattering in Japanese. At that moment the seaman Bolan had met below entered and began translating.
"Captain Ohura wants to know if you are one of the criminals."
"No. I'm here to help him, to help all of you and to stop the hidden arms from reaching their new owners."
The crewman translated. The bilingual man listened to the captain speak, then turned to Bolan.
"Then you are a policeman. Welcome. Now we must retake the bridge. Another pirate is there with the river pilot, and you may kill the criminal, also, if you wish."
Bolan grinned. "You lead," he said.
The seaman spoke briefly to the captain, who took a small automatic from a handsome mahogany cabinet.
Then they left the cabin and moved forward and to the left, as the seaman indicated.
"That's the door. Inside are three big windows, and navigational and operating instruments. The pilot knows the river and he steers us upstream to the port." The captain spoke quietly but sharply. The seaman listened, then translated. "Captain Ohura says he must fight this battle. It is his honor. I am to enter the room first to distract the Mafia man. My captain will capture him."
"Tell him I'll back him up at the door." Bolan stood by the wall beside the door and watched the seaman open it and enter the room.
"What the hell! Told you guys to stay off the bridge!" The voice was a roar.
The seaman muttered something softly.
"What the hell! Speak up!"
The captain bolted into the room. Bolan followed, aware that more than one Mafia soldier might be inside.
There was not.
The captain yelled something in Japanese in a wild, high voice, then shot on the handgun sounded like a .32 to Bolan, who watched the hoodlum take four rounds in the chest, then drop the .45 automatic he carried and collapse. There was no need to check his condition.
The American pilot at the electronic steering board stared in amazement.
"What's going on here? First these gunmen take over the ship, and now the captain shoots this guy down in a rage. And who are you?"
"Shall you just got a gun out of your ribs, joker. Don't push your luck. You do your job, we'll do ours." The Japanese were talking quietly. The bilingual seaman approached Bolan.
"My captain says he will stay here with door locked. I show you where last two are. He says you may kill them."
"Let's go find the other two rats in your holds."
They descended metal ladders, traveled along the deck, then down more ladders into a dark hold. It was jammed with big boxes and pallets of goods stacked high against the walls. Ahead, by a bright light, two men were laughing and joking as they wiped grease off a pair of submachine guns. A large cargo box was open beside them.
Bolan noticed that neither seemed to be familiar with the big weapons, and neither held side arms.
Bolan lifted the Uzi, made sure it was charged with a round and crept forward in the gloom. He stopped beside two heavy pine boxes and looked around. The men were trying to load a magazine with rounds. The two weapons were German-made MP-40 submachine guns.
"You've got to release the operating lever first, guys," Bolan said from twenty feet away.
Both men dropped the machine guns and dug for hand weapons.
The Executioner triggered a 5-round burst at the faster one, dumping him on the floor in front of the box with four holes in his chest. The slower one dived to the floor and crawled behind a wooden box. Bolan motioned for the seaman to stay put and ran ahead to the cover of an eight-foot-square box, the first in a row.
There was no sound. Stepping on a small crate, Bolan boosted himself on top of the tall box. He bellied across it and looked down an aisle.
Nothing. He jumped to the next box, and bellied across it and looked down. More nothing. He jumped to a third box and looked down. The gunman lay directly below, his .45 two feet from his hand.
Bolan stood.
The gunman lunged for his weapon.
"Touch it and you're full of lead." The hand stopped moving. "Some questions. You work for Canzonari?"
"Yes."
"Will he be at dockside at one-thirty today?"
"Yes, him and Joey."
"Good. Now stand up and walk back to those MPBLEDJ's. Put them away so all looks fine. Are all of the hidden weapons in this hold?"
"Yes. I saw the loading manifest."
"Move it."
The soldier repacked the two submachine guns in the box, replaced the box in the larger crate and nailed it shut. It took five minutes.
The box looked enough like the other crates now to pass. Bolan was about to order the mobster to move, when he heard someone coming.
Captain Ohura stepped into the glow of the bare bulb in the cargo hold, and glared at the hoodlum without speaking.
Then the Japanese skipper took out his small automatic and shot the hood in the head three times at point-blank range.
The Executioner watched as the Japanese maritime captain fired twice more into the Mafia gunman after he fell to the floor.
The captain intoned something in an urgent voice and marched away.
Bolan turned to the interpreter.
"The captain says this man has no right to live, no right to dirty the captain's good name by using his ship for smuggling."
"I have some suggestions," Bolan said. "First you hide the dead Mafia gunmen in a locker. Then I want to see who comes to pick up the guns. When your captain calms down, explain this to him. There will be no problems for him over the smuggled guns."
The Japanese seaman nodded grimly. "I try, but captain is furious. We have three hours before docking. I better go free rest of crew."
Bolan went topside and talked with the pilot.
"Three hours is all I need," Bolan instructed. "Do not mention the Mafia hoodlums or the killings to the customs and immigration inspector. At the end of that time you can tell the port authorities, the FBI and the Portland Police Department anything you want."
The pilot was in his mid-forties and had been up and down the river between Portland and The Dalles more times than he could count.
"This is the craziest ride I've ever had. Those guys really Mafia hoodlums?"
"They're all dead. The captain took care of the last two himself."
The pilot was thoughtful for a moment.
"Say I go along with this. What do I tell them when they find out I clammed up for three hours? They'll lift my ticket. I'll be out of a job."
"No way. Show them this." Bolan handed him a marksman's badge. "Tell them I threatened you and your family."
The pilot grinned as he steered the big ship through a narrow opening in the channel and continued up the Willamette toward Portland.
"Man, you got it all figured out."
"Now if I can convince Captain Ohura. He's the tough one."
Bolan found the captain in his cabin and talked to him for an hour; talked until the interpreter's mouth was dry. He used every argument he could. At last the captain laughed.
"Because you and I, we resisted those pirates, killed all five, I will do it. I will wait three hours before launching my protest about pirates. And I know nothing of smuggled arms."