Relentless by Brian Garfield Page A

twenty-nine he was burnt out. Washed up.
    He’d been in Tucson two months, pumping Texaco gas and drinking up his wages, when the Major had found him.
    4
    â€œYou may not remember me. Hargit, Leo Hargit.”
    â€œI remember you, Major.”
    The Major had driven into the gas station in a four-year-old Lincoln Continental. It suited him; he had the carriage to bring it off. Steel gray hair close-cropped against a well-shaped skull. Near six feet tall, long-boned, a straight taut body in superb condition. In mufti now, a cool light grey suit that had not come from stock. When Walker had last seen him at Hué the Major had been wearing a Green Beret uniform.
    Hargit had a flashing grin, the teeth as white and even as a military cemetery. He was powerfully handsome with that larger-than-life magnetism which was, in certain men, a force of leadership. His face was big and square and all straight lines.
    He had got out of the car and shaken hands with Walker. He wasn’t a bone crusher but you could feel the power in his grip; he had muscles he hadn’t even used yet.
    â€œThey tell me you’ve had it a little rough, Captain.”
    â€œI haven’t exactly been sweating the income tax.”
    â€œSomeplace we can talk?”
    Then it wasn’t just an accidental meeting.
    â€œI’ve got the place to myself till three o’clock or so.”
    The Major glanced at his watch and shot his cuff. “That ought to be time enough.”
    â€œYou want gas in that thing?”
    â€œLet it wait.” The Major had thrown his big arm across Walker’s shoulders and walked him inside the filling station. There was only one chair, by the telephone desk with its credit-card machines and free roadmap stand. The place was a litter of tools and old batteries and cans of oil; it smelled of lubricants. The Major swept a patch of workbench clear of tools, cocked himself on it hipshot with one foot on the floor, and waved Walker into the chair. It gave Hargit the position of command.
    The doors were open but it was hot and close. The desert sun shot painful reflections off passing cars and the store windows across the boulevard. Traffic was a steady noise.
    â€œI might have a job for you.”
    â€œDoing what? Back in the Army?”
    â€œNo. Something else. Flying a plane.”
    Walker’s laugh was more of a snarl. “I haven’t got a license.”
    â€œI’ll get you one.”
    â€œIt’s not that easy. They took it away from me and they’re not likely to give it back before World War Five.”
    â€œI’ll get you a license. Hell, a piece of paper?”
    â€œIt’s not that easy,” Walker said again, keeping his face blank, trying not to show the bitterness. His overalls were black and filthy with grease and he found himself wiping his hands on the bib front. His fingernails were inky.
    â€œIt might not be in your own name,” the Major said, watching him unblinkingly.
    Walker’s face shifted. “Just what kind of flying did you have in mind?”
    â€œTwin-engine. Mostly daylight flying, mostly on radio ranges. You could do it with your eyes shut.”
    â€œNot according to the FAA.” But he leaned forward, bracing a hand on his knee. “Unless you’re talking about flying somewhere outside of the country?”
    â€œPartly in, partly out.”
    â€œLook, Major, I don’t like fencing. The last time I saw you, you had a couple of Special Forces A-Teams working the back hills in Cambodia and Laos. All right, I read the newspapers, I saw where they were recalling the Green Berets and cutting them back.”
    Hargit said drily, “A few lard-ass Pentagon generals decided there wasn’t room in the United States Army for an elite corps. Which was pretty funny coming from charter members of the West Point Protective Association.”
    â€œOkay, they did you out of a job. But I hear the CIA’s hiring