“God in hell!” cried Fawkes. He gazed into Francis’s eyes, searching for a small ray of light. “My family. What of my family?”

Francis fought to get the words out, then gave up and dipped his head in the direction of the blanket-covered bodies. Fawkes pushed past him and stumbled across the yard but was caught short by the stout arms of the constable, which suddenly encircled him about the chest.

“Leave them be, Patrick. I’ve already identified them.”

“Dammit, Shawn, that’s my family lying there.”

“I beg you, my friend, do not look.”

“Let me go. I must see for myself.”

“No!” said Francis, grimly hanging on, knowing he was no match for Fawkes’s massive strength. “Myrna and Jenny were badly burned in the fire. They’re gone, Patrick. The loved ones you knew are no more. Remember them alive, not as they are in death.”

Francis could feel the tenseness slowly drain from Fawkes’s muscles and the constable loosened his hold.

“How did it happen?” asked Fawkes quietly.

“No way of describing in detail. All your workers have either been driven off or killed. There are no wounded to tell the tale.”

“Somebody must know … must have seen …”

“We’ll find a witness. One will turn up by morning. I promise.”

The grim conversation halted while a helicopter whirled to the ground and the soldiers tenderly lifted the bodies of Myrna, Jenny, and Patrick Junior inside the cargo cabin and strapped them down. Fawkes made no move to go to them. He only stood there and watched with great sadness in his eyes as the helicopter lifted off and headed toward the mortuary in Umkono.

“Who is responsible?” Fawkes said to Francis. “Tell me who murdered my wife and children and my workers and burned my farm.”

“One or two CK-eighty-eight plastic cartridges, the charred remains of an arm inside the house with a Chinese watch on the wrist, prints in the dirt from military-soled boots. Circumstantial as it is, the evidence points to the AAR.”

“What do you mean, ‘one or two cartridges’?” Fawkes snapped. “The bloody bastards should have left a whole mountain of them.”

Francis made a helpless gesture with his hands. “Typical of an AAR

Operation Wild Rose I 75

raid. They always police the area right after an attack. Makes it tough to tag them with any hard evidence. They plead innocent to any international investigation of terrorism while pointing a hypocritical finger at the other liberation organizations. If it hadn’t been for our Alsatian dogs, we never would have uncovered the spent shells or perhaps even the arm.