Three of Diver's boys were chasing along beside it, waving pistols and shouting at one another.

A burst of fire from an automatic weapon lanced away from the cab of the truck and the three boys went down sliding in their own blood.

The truck had slowed again, almost coming to a complete halt near the front of the property, and the automatic-weapon fire was sweeping into the house itself as that d.a.m.ned guy down there methodically raked the whole joint. Window gla.s.s was breaking and crashing all over; Lucasi could hear yelling and stampeding feet as his visitors sought cover. Above it all, the loud commands of big Diver could be heard as the veteran house captain tried to get his forces deployed against the unexpected a.s.sault.

Without even realizing what a foolish thing he was doing, Lucasi shattered his window with the shotgun, leaned out, and let go with both barrels into that bread truck.

The double ba-loom ba-loom of his own retort was echoed instantly far away by the powerful reports from a big-game piece. Something tore the shotgun out of Lucasi's grasp and sent it spinning to the ground; something else smacked into the window frame a fraction of an inch from his eyes and tore a foot of it away. of his own retort was echoed instantly far away by the powerful reports from a big-game piece. Something tore the shotgun out of Lucasi's grasp and sent it spinning to the ground; something else smacked into the window frame a fraction of an inch from his eyes and tore a foot of it away.

Lucasi fell back quickly into the safety of the room, his hands still tingling from the hit on his shotgun, and he knew that he'd come as close to sudden death as he ever wanted to get.

He scrambled down the stairway yelling, "Diver! Diver!"

But the Diver was already outside, leading his pack of triggermen in a hard run across the yard, taking the battle exactly where Mack Bolan probably wanted it.

"Don't go out there!" Lucasi wailed.

Too late.

Another rattling sound from up the street signalled the entrance of a second automatic weapon into the battle, and the rolling cra-acks cra-acks of that big-game piece were now coming end-to-end, almost sounding as one. of that big-game piece were now coming end-to-end, almost sounding as one.

Yeah, Lucasi knew it. It was too d.a.m.n late now.

Bolan had been watching for a response to Blanca.n.a.les' stutter-pistol attack, and he saw the shotgun the moment it presented itself outside that upstairs window.

He immediately acquired that target in his cross-hairs and sighed into the squeeze-off, realizing as he did so that he was at least a heartbeat behind the other guy's trigger. His own piece bucked into his shoulder at the same instant that the report from the shotgun reached him; he rode the recoil and hung into the eyepiece for another quick round into the same general target area.

The intense magnification of the big scope provided a field of vision measuring in inches but he saw the shotgun take the hit and spin away, and he had a milli-second glimpse of Ben Lucasi's frightened visage jerking away from a splintering windowframe.

He paused then for an area-evaluation with the binoculars.

Blanca.n.a.les had abandoned the bread truck. Apparently the shotgun blast had disabled the vehicle.

Two men were in the street, about midway between the house and Schwarz's position with the warwagon. At the moment they seemed to be torn between their original a.s.signment and the obvious need for their presence back at the house.

Bolan barked into the shoulder-phone, "Pol, Gadgets, report!"

Blanca.n.a.les came in immediately, a bit winded, "I'm grounded, two o'clock from the front of the house, behind the little rock wall."

"I'm done," Gadgets announced calmly. "Get ready, Pol, I'll pick you up."

"Negative!" Bolan commanded. "You do a one-eighty and haul out of there. I'll spring the Politician."

"Too late," Schwarz replied. "Here come the reserves."

Bolan snarled, "It still goes. You break and haul-backwards!"

"Aye aye."

"I'm okay," Blanca.n.a.les a.s.sured everybody.

With his naked eye Bolan could see that the Politician would not be "okay" for long.

A swarm of hardmen were pouring out of the house and making a cautious advance toward the street.

As he was leaning into his eyepiece, he heard the stutter of Schwarz's weapon and got a peripheral glimpse of the two men in the street as they dived for cover. One of them did not dive quite soon enough; Bolan saw him flop and roll, then he sighed into his own targets. Gadgets, he knew, could take care of himself.

As for those guys down there in that yard ... at this range, with this piece, it was almost a shame. Even scrambling, they were sitting ducks.

He was in a tight spot, and the Politician d.a.m.n well knew it.

The little NATO machine pistol had jammed on him and there was no time to work on it. He had a d.a.m.n revolver and six lousy rounds between him and about fifteen guys who were moving across that lawn over there.

His closest help was d.a.m.n near one hundred yards away, and he he had been ordereed out of the area. had been ordereed out of the area.

The Sarge, of course, was laying-in with the big precision piece-and that fact would not prove at all comforting to anyone moving into those cross-hairs.

Blanca.n.a.les had confidence in Bolan. If the guy said he'd spring him, then he'd spring him. Still ... this was not the most enviable of all possible circ.u.mstances for a life-loving dude like Rosario Blanca.n.a.les. And he had not seen the Sarge at work for quite awhile. A guy, even a Mack Bolan, could sometimes lose his numbers.

He watched a group of hardmen splinter off from the main force and start a movement toward Schwarz in the warwagon just as Gadgets opened fire on the two guys already up there. Then the big booms from Bolan's Weatherby began rocking the air again.

The guy could sure tickle a trigger.

h.e.l.l, he was firing from about three blocks away but those people over there were going down like clockwork. Blanca.n.a.les watched them depart the field of combat forever-one, two, three, four -like a cadence count-and those who were left were already beginning to get a whole new slant on the art of warfare.

Some guy was standing in a doorway over there and screaming at them to get back inside.

Bolan's cool voice came through his shoulder-phone then: "Make your move, Pol. Fall back to the next street behind you and hold there. Gadgets, circle around and pick him up."

"Aye, aye," said Gadgets.

"Wilco," Blanca.n.a.les responded, sighing.

h.e.l.l. He'd known all along that the Sarge would spring him. He hadn't lost any d.a.m.n numbers.

The big question now, of course, was could the Sarge Sarge spring spring himself. himself.

The wail of police sirens was beginning to crowd the area, boring in from several directions.

Two more big booms erupted from that distant firing-drop and Blanca.n.a.les, glancing over his shoulder, saw the bread truck explode into flames.

He grinned, aware that Bolan was simply adding a confusion-factor to the scene.

Sure. The guy would spring himself.

11:

WAR ZONE.

Captain Tatum threaded his way through the congregation of official vehicles and came to a halt at the edge of the war zone.

There was no better way to describe the scene there.

The shattered and burning vehicle in the middle of the street.

Bullet-riddled house, shattered gla.s.s, abandoned weapons lying about.

A team of medics moving grimly among the dead and the dying.

Firefighters and uniformed policemen everywhere the eye could see.

The uniformed watch officer spotted the Captain, then came over to offer a report. Tatum recognized him as George Gonzales, a twenty-year veteran with the department-a good man.

"h.e.l.l walked through here," Gonzales told the homicide chief. "Seven dead, four stretcher cases, two walking wounded. House is pretty well shot up." He glanced toward the gutted bread truck. "Lot of toast in there, but nothing else. We haven't found the driver. So far all of the victims have been identified as Lucasi's people. Somebody really hit 'im hard, Captain."

"What does the little big man have to say about all this?" Tatum asked musingly.

"He's reserving comment until his attorney arrives. Also refuses to step outside the house- or to show himself at any window ... with a hundred cops walking around here...."

"He get hurt?"

"No sir, just his dignity. I'd say he's working his way toward a stroke or something, though."

Tatum quickly squelched a wry smile and instructed the watch officer, "Let me know as soon as the lawyer gets here."

"Yes sir. Well be making charges?"

"You find anything yet to make a book?" the Captain inquired.

"No sir, frankly nothing. It was a one-sided battle, by all appearances. All the firing seems to have come from the other side, whoever they were. Rival gang, looks like. But I haven't even found a weapons violation on Lucasi. All his people are duly licensed as security personnel."

That last was obviously a sore point with Tatum. He screwed his face into a scowl and said, "Yeah, that's nice and neat. How about witnesses?"

"We're working the neighborhood now. So far only one has voluntarily come forward. Lady directly across the street, a Mrs. Bergman. Saw part of it from a bathroom window. Said a man in a white uniform of some kind was crouched behind her wall-" Gonzales paused to point out the spot. "-directly across, there. Said he ran through her property toward the rear just about the time the shooting stopped."

Tatum was scowling toward the burned-out truck, obviously trying to draw conclusions. A small two-way radio at his waist beeped and he reluctantly took time out to answer the call.

"Air Ten has picked up the L.A. special advisor at Lindberg and now has him aboard," was the report. "Do you want him up there?"

"Yeah," Tatum growled. "Give the pilot the general area and tell him to just look for the battleground. He can't miss it."

Gonzales was staring at the Captain as though he wished to know more about this development. Tatum was not yet ready to turn the thing into a circus, however. He knew how the press loved to latch onto a Bolan hit, and he was not quite prepared to go that route. He smiled thinly at the watch officer and told him, "Could be some connection between this and a case up in L.A. awhile back. We're getting a consultant."

This explanation seemed to satisfy the uniformed officer.

The police helicopter was already in sight, wheeling up from the southwest. Tatum watched the little bird come in and settle onto the front lawn, then he went forward to greet the tall young man who had been dispatched from Los Angeles.

The self-introductions were perfunctory and curt, being shouted above the din of the helicopter-but Tatum was sizing up Sgt. Carl Lyons of L.A.'s Organized Crime Division, and he liked what he saw ... intelligent, quick, a lawman with a personal commitment.

As soon as the helicopter and its noise had departed the area, Tatum told the new arrival, "I'm only a minute or two ahead of you so we're starting off even." He introduced Gonzales, who brought Lyons up to date on the preliminary report, then the three of them took a walking tour of the battleground.

They halted beside a sheet-draped lump on the front lawn and the Captain knelt for an inspection of the victim. He pulled the sheet away, studied the corpse for a moment, then went on to the next. After the fourth stop, he commented, "Right through the head, all four of them."

"Ma.s.sive wounds," Lyons added.

"You said seven dead," Tatum told the watch officer. "Where're the other three?"

Gonzales pointed toward the street. "By the truck."

"Head wounds like these?"

"No sir. Multiple body hits from a small calibre weapon. Looks like they got zipped with a light chopper." He swiveled about to point up the street. "Found two more in the next block, lying along the curb in the street. Not dead yet, but d.a.m.n near. Same type of wounds, they were zipped."

"You said six six wounded," Tatum reminded him. wounded," Tatum reminded him.

"Yes sir, the others were hit inside the house. They just got unlucky. Wrong place at the right time."

Lyons had moved off to the side and was doing a 360-degree survey of the surrounding terrain.

His attention became riveted to a pair of distant hillocks.

Tatum and Gonzales ambled over to join Lyons, and the watch officer advised, "Forgot to mention, I sent a car up on Sunset Circle to check out a firing report."

Tatum drawled, "Yeah...." He was sighting toward the high ground which was occupying Lyons' attention. "That would be the western knoll," he informed the out-of-towner. "A guy with a telescopic sight and a good rifle could command this whole neighborhood from up there."

"And looking right along the street," Lyons murmured.

"Is Bolan really that good?" Tatum asked him.

"He's that good," the L.A. cop replied.

The watch officer's eyes had flared at the mention of Bolan's name. In a subdued tone he commented, "It'd take a lot of self-confidence to go for the head from that distance. Did I hear you right? Are you saying this is the Executioner's work?"

"That's what we're trying to determine, George," the Captain replied. "Don't talk it around, though. Sergeant Lyons has tangled with the guy before. Hopefully he can give up a jump on identifying the problem." He grinned without humor. "And I guess the Sergeant has good reason to want to nail Bolan, himself."

"Wrong," Lyons murmured.

"What's that?"

"I owe the guy my life. I'm not that anxious to nail him."

Tatum stared at the young cop for a moment before he quietly inquired, "What did they send me? One for my side or one for his?"