The telephone rang, its sharp jangle seeming visibly to jolt the quiet waves of air in the darkened room. Smith lifted the receiver slowly and said, "Hello."
Smith had never before heard the voice, which said, "What kind of deal are you offering?"
"Depends on what you've got," Smith said non-committally. "Suppose you tell me something about yourself."
"What I've got is one of the great stories of our time. A secret agency for the United States government. An official government assassin and his elderly Oriental trainer. A father-son love theme that runs through it. Their battles against evil to try to make America safe for all its people again."
As the voice ranted on, Smith's stomach sank. This man, whoever he was, knew everything. CURE had been compromised.
. . . He Refuse!
THE DESTROYER SERIES:
#1 CREATED, THE DESTROYER
#26 IN ENEMY HANDS
#2 DEATH CHECK
#27 THE LAST TEMPLE
#3 CHINESE PUZZLE
#28 SHIP OF DEATH
#4 MAFIA. FIX
#29 THE FINAL DEATH
#5 DR. QUAKE
#30 MUGGER BLOOD
#6 DEATH THERAPY
#31 THE HEAD MEN
#7 UNION BUST
#32 KILLER CHROMOSOMES
#8 SUMMIT CHASE
#33 VOODOO DIE
#9 MURDERER'S SHIELD
#34 CHAINED REACTION
#10 TERROR SQUAD
#35 LAST CALL
#11 KILL OR CURE
#36 POWER PLAY
#12 SLAVE SAFARI
#37 BOTTOM LINE
#13 ACID ROCK
#38 BAY CITY BLAST
#14 JUDGMENT DAY
#39 MISSING LINK
#15 MURDER WARD
#40 DANGEROUS GAMES
#16 OIL SLICK
#41 FIRING LINE
#17 LAST WAR DANCE
#42 TIMBER LINE
#18 FUNNY MONEY
#43 MIDNIGHT MAN
#19 HOLY TERROR
#44 BALANCE OF POWER
#20 ASSASSIN'S PLAYpFF
#45 SPOILS OF WAR
#21 DEADLY SEEDS
#46 NEXT OF KIN
#22 BRAIN DRAIN
#47 DYING SPACE
#23 CHILD'S PLAY
#48 PROFIT MOTIVE
#24 KING'S CURSE
#49 SKIN DEEP
#25 SWEET DREAMS
#50 KILLING TIME
#51 SHOCK VALUE
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PINNACLE BOOKS
NEW YORK
This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this book are fictional, and any resemblance to real people or incidents is purely coincidental.
DESTROYER 52: FOOL'S GOLD
Copyright © 1983 by Richard Sapir and Warren Murphy
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book or portions thereof in any form.
An original Pinnacle Books edition, published for the first time anywhere.
First printing, May 1983
ISBN: 0-523-41562-1
Cover illustration by Hector Garrido
Printed in the United States of America
PINNACLE BOOKS, INC.
New York, New York 10018
For ink. With love.
And for the Glorious House of Sinanju, P.O. Box 1454, Secaucus, NJ 07094
FOOL'S GOLD
One
She did not expect to see death. She had enough problems with heights. She asked the guide if the ropes were steady, and if he would be steady at the other end.
"Lady," said the guide, "I got hands of steel and a spine of platinum."
"What does a spine of platinum mean?"
"It means don't worry, lady, you ain't gonna fall."
Dr. Terri Pomfret looked up toward the top of the cave. Without a flashlight, she couldn't even see the top of the arched cavern.
Some visiting British spelunkers had crawled up there a month ago while exploring these caves of Albemarle County in North Carolina. They had been going along the ceiling, driving spike after spike, when they came across it. It was a plaque, some kind of metal, chiseled into the stone. They had made a hasty, sloppy rubbing of the stone. No one could identify the writing until it got to Terri Pomfret's office at the university.
"Of course it's Hamidian," she had said.
1
2
"Are you sure?"
"Yes. Look at the letters. The formations. Perfect. Perfect ancient Hamidian."
"Then you can read it?"
"This is a bad impression," Terri had said. "I can barely see it."
"If you saw the original, you could read it?"
"Certainly."
"It's at the top of one of the deep Albemarle caves."
"Shit," said Dr. Pomfret.
"Is that negative?" asked her department head.
"What it is is that I hate two things in the world. Going under the ground and going high."
"You're the only one who can do it. And don't worry, Terri, nobody as pretty as you is going to be allowed to fall."
So because of her fear of heights, her guide had strung a rope down from the spikes the British spelunkers had left in the ceiling, and attached a pulley to it. All she would have to do would be to go straight up to the plaque, pulled up by a rope. No climbing along the roof of the cave.
"It's safe, lady," the guide said.
"All right," said Terri. The flashlight was sweaty in her hands and her voice felt weak. Her pencil and paper were strapped to her belt in a little canvas bag. She was 32 years old, with cream-white skin and raven hair and a face that could have been used for a magazine cover, but she preferred to use her mind for her work, not her body.
And now her body was being lifted up to the top of the cave and her breath was stopped as she
3
was thinking, I will not think about falling to the bottom of the cave. Definitely not. I will not think about falling.
Falling, she thought. She wondered if the silica sand at the bottom of the cave would soften a fall. The guide's light seemed very far below. She wondered if she released her bladder, what would happen. Then she reminded herself not to breathe.
Then the roof of the cave was up there at her belly and she saw the plaque and she said to herself, "This is not English." And then she said to herself, "Of course not, you beanbag, it's Hamidian. That's why you are here."
The plaque seemed to be chiseled in some rough Hamidian script; as she touched it, she felt that it was metal, but it had been covered with some kind of paint ...
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