Robert Ludlum's (TM) The Janson Option (Paul Janson) Read Online Free Page A

people gather around him, the women holding hands to their mouths, the men staring wide-eyed. “Oh my God,” whispered one. “Look at the blood.”
    There was so much blood on the deck that Adler appeared to be floating on it. He looked, Allegra Helms thought, like a swimmer doing the backstroke in a red pool. The New York woman whispered, “We have to stop the bleeding. It severed an artery. See how it’s pumping?”
    It was spurting rhythmically, the pulsing against his trousers as if a mouse trapped in the linen were trying to batter its way out.
    “Tourniquet,” said the white-haired diplomat. “He needs a tourniquet.”
    Maxammed shouldered them aside and knelt in the blood. He unbuckled Adler’s belt, yanked it out of the loops, dragged his trousers down to his knees, shoved one end of his belt under his leg, pulled it above the ragged wound the bullet had furrowed in his flesh, slipped the tongue through the buckle, and pulled it tight.
    The blood kept spurting. He couldn’t hold the belt tightly enough.
    “Use this,” said Allegra, handing over her scarf. Maxammed tied it around Alder’s thigh and thrust his SAR in the loop and turned it like a lever, drawing the cloth so tightly that it bit into the flesh. At last the blood stopped spurting.
    “Hold this here,” he told her.
    She knelt beside him in the blood and held the gun in both hands. She fancied that she could feel Adler’s heart beating through the steel. It felt very weak, and she was struck by her ignorance. She knew not even the most basic first aid, and she was helpless to save his life.
    He opened his eyes and they locked on hers. She felt the beating slow. He tried to speak, and she leaned closer to hear. “Hey, Countess? Don’t hate your father for groping the servants.”
    In a moment of insight as sharp as it was unexpected, Allegra Helms realized it was probably the gentlest thing the man had ever said, and she whispered as intimately as pillow talk, “I don’t hate him. He’s just not my favorite relation.”
    “Who’s your favorite?”
    “Cousin Adolfo. Since we were children.”
    “Kissing cous—?” Adler’s body convulsed. Allegra lost her grip on the tourniquet. She tried desperately to tighten it again. Then she saw that it didn’t matter. Where his blood had spurted, it now just dripped.
    “Oh my God,” said someone.
    Allegra stood up and backed away. But she could not tear her eyes from Adler’s face. The slackness had vanished. Dead, he looked more like himself: aggressive, and confident that he was invulnerable. She was truly afraid for the first time since the attack began. With Adler dead and Captain Billy sent away in the boat, she could not imagine anyone else on the yacht who could protect them.
    The ridiculously imperious wife of the retired UN diplomat began to cry. Her husband patted her awkwardly on her shoulder. Hank and Susan, the New York couple, who were constantly holding hands, were gripping so tightly their fingers turned white. Poor Monique was biting her lips and shaking her head.
    The pirate spoke. “This is your lesson. Do what I tell you. No one makes trouble. No one else dies.”
    Allegra Helms stiffened. She had been afraid. She had felt useless. But suddenly she was outraged. “You didn’t have to kill him.”
    The pirate shouted back, “No more trouble, no more die.”
    “Where could he run? You have his ship. He had no place to hide.”
    “No more trouble, no more die,” Maxammed repeated. To Farole he said, “Punch in a course for Eyl.”
    “Can’t.”
    “Why not? You said you have run ships.”
    “I have run ships. But the instruments are all dead.”
    “What about the radar?”
    “Burned up, it seems,” said Farole, who had studied electrical engineering. “I bet the captain fried it with some kind of electric surge.”
    “No radar?” Maxammed echoed, his heart sinking. The radar was vital. They could steer by compass, and even without a compass the fishermen