by Jerry Ahern
"Major, repeat that in Russian. And remember that if anyone tries anything, you die first— I swear it." She heard the conviction in her own voice, realizing that she actually meant what she said.
The major passed through the gates, Sarah a few paces behind him. There were at least fifty Soviet soldiers there, all with guns, but Sarah kept walking.
The major said, "What is it you want, madam? Surely, you cannot—"
"You're right," she interrupted. "That's what I want. Those fifteen Resistance fighters. Get them out here, let them take arms, and we leave— nobody gets hurt."
The major stopped, not turning around, but looking over his shoulder at her. "You are insane!"
"Don't you forget it, either, Major," she told him, her voice trembling slightly.
"If you make it away from here alive, madam, I will find you," the major said, his voice velvety with hatred, she thought.
"You know you won't. If I thought that I'd kill you. Now give the orders."
"I— I cannot. I am not the commandant here."
"Give the orders— now!"
He looked at her again over his right shoulder, then just nodded.
The major shouted something in Russian. None of the soldiers moved. Then, his face reddening, he shouted again, louder. One soldier, then another started moving, and soon the ranks of Soviet soldiers opened and beyond them she could see the fifteen men, faces drawn, clothes torn and incredibly filthy. She listened as the major barked another command, then saw the first Russian soldier hand over his weapon to the Resistance man nearest him.
She almost fainted with relief. She shouted then, "No killing unless we have to!"
The haggard Resistance fighter turned, glared at her a moment, then lowered the muzzle of the rifle, just nodding. In a moment, the other fourteen men had armed themselves. "Order us a truck, Major," she told the officer still standing, hands up, in front of her.
"No!"
"Major, please. I'll kill you," she said softly.
He turned and looked over his shoulder at her again, then nodded. She heard him shouting in Russian, then in a moment heard the sound of an engine starting. She shouted, "Mary Beth, get everybody on board. Have them keep their guns trained on the courtyard here-and no shooting unless the Russians start it!"
She watched over the major's shoulders as the truck loaded, Mary Beth at the wheel.
Sarah said softly, "All right, Major, you come with us. Behave and you'll come out of this alive and unharmed. I promise."
He turned and looked at her. "And what if I do not?"
"This." She gestured with the muzzle of the submachine gun in her hands.
"Agreed," he almost whispered, his voice tight, as though he were about to choke on the words.
"Thank you." Sarah Rourke smiled.
In another two minutes, she judged, she and the major had boarded the truck, the major sitting between her and Mary Beth behind the wheel. She said to the major, "I know they'll follow us, but say something to make them follow at a distance. Tell them I'll kill you if I see anyone following us."
"Would you, madam?" he asked her.
"Of course," she said with a smile.
The major shouted in Russian and the Soviet troops by the gates fanned back. Mary Beth started the truck forward, then between the gates. It was starting to rain and Mary Beth had the windshield wipers going as the truck cleared the gates and turned into the street beyond. Then she cut a hard left into the intersection.
"Step on it, Mary Beth!" Sarah shouted.
"You'll never escape," the major told her, smiling.
"Better hope we do, Major," she answered, looking out the window behind her into the road. Whatever the major had said was working, she thought, and there were no Soviet vehicles in sight.
But she had learned well since the Night of the War. The Soviets were there, on parallel streets, waiting to make their move or calling in helicopters to keep the truck under observation. And now that she had gotten the fifteen Resistance men out of the prison, she felt a sick feeling in the pit of her stomach. She had no further plan— the rest of the way would have to be on guts and luck.
Chapter 45
Paul Rubenstein looked down at the ground below the low-flying aircraft. There were cracks in the ground-widening, it seemed, by the instant. Rain was falling in sheets and he silently prayed for the pilot. With Tolliver and Pedro Garcia and the others, Rubenstein had fought all the way to the airport, the other camps having spilled open as their Cuban Communist guards and warders had fled for their lives. Hundreds of men, women, and children were freed.
Many of the Cuban troops had fled by boat, the crafts visible as Rubenstein and the others had moved along the highway. Then Rubenstein had dropped off, going overland to retrieve his Harley, cutting back to the road again just ahead of the comparatively slow going convoy of every sort of land vehicle imaginable. Men hung on the outsides of the trucks, rode on the hoods of the cars and on the rooftops. It had taken two hours to reach the airport, and the airport itself was the greatest scene of mass confusion the young Rubenstein had ever witnessed. Cuban planes were loading Cubans, Soviet and American planes were loading the American refugees, some of the people from the camps having to be forced aboard the Soviet planes. The ground's trembling had been incessant, the cracks appearing everywhere in the runway surfaces.
And then Rubenstein had spotted Captain Reed, working to load one of the American planes impressed into the evacuation. Rubenstein had threaded his bike across the runways and buttonholed Reed, demanding to know what was happening.
And when Reed had told him, Rubenstein's heart sank. The tremors were the beginning of one massive quake that would cause the entire Florida Peninsula to separate from the rest of the Continental United States— what was left of it at least. Rubenstein had almost throttled Reed, demanding some kind of plane to get him to Miami where his parents were. Then Rubenstein had learned about Rourke. Rourke and the woman seismologist who had first brought the news of the impending disaster had gone to Miami to convince the Cuban commander of the reality of the impending disaster. Although Reed assumed they had been successful since the evacuation had been ordered, there had been no word from him since.
Again, Rubenstein had demanded a plane. Reed had agreed. There was a six passenger Beechcraft Baron specially altered to add almost another fifty miles per hour to its airspeed, the plane Reed himself had arrived in.
And now, as Rubenstein watched the ground cracking below the plane, watched the pilot manipulating the controls, and watched the sheets of rain, he wondered if by the time they reached Miami there would be a Miami to reach. Rourke was there, his mother and father were there. Even Natalia was there, Reed had told Rubenstein.
If Rourke died and he, Rubenstein, somehow survived, he would be honor bound, he knew, to continue the search for Rourke's wife, and the two children.
And what would he do, Rubenstein wondered, if the plane could land? Would he offload the Harley Davidson Reed and the pilot had grudgingly helped him get aboard? Would he somehow be able to find his parents, or John Rourke, or Natalia— but then simply die with them as the earthquake continued and the entire peninsula went under the waves?
A chill ran up Rubenstein's spine. It would be better to die— despite the chill, despite the sweating of his palms— than to live and never have tried to rescue the people— He stopped, a smile crossing his lips as he pushed his wire-framed glasses up on the bridge of his nose. "The people I love," he murmured softly.
Chapter 46
The main runway was beginning to crack. Rourke snatched the young child from the refugee woman's arms and handed the little girl aboard the DC-9, then helped the woman to follow. He should never have let Natalia go, he thought. They had reached the airfield, the evacuation already under way and most of the Cuban personnel aiding in the civilian evacuation or too busy trying to save their own lives to offer resistance. Rourke and Natalia had gotten Sissy Wiznewski on one of the first planes
to take off after they had reached the field, then Natalia had gone off to aid a party of refugees, Rourke working with a Soviet captain and an American major to bring some order to the airfield and speed up the take-offs. More planes hovered overhead, ready to land as they made a wide circle of the field. It was a miracle that so far there had been no mid-air collisions.
He loaded the last child aboard the aircraft, then the little boy's crying mother, then slapped his right hand against the fuselage as the crewman by the door started closing up. Rourke snatched the borrowed walkie-talkie from his hip pocket. "Rourke to tower— DC-9 ready for take-off pattern!"
"Tower here. Roger on that."
Rourke shoved the radio into his pocket, then turned around scanning the field for Natalia. The rain was pouring down, and as the propellers of a plane passing along the runway near him accelerated, the rain lashed at Rourke's face. Pushing his streaming wet hair back from his forehead, he started to run, sidetracking a small, twin engine plane that was landing. He looked from side to side along the runway's length. There were more planes loading refugees at the far end of the field, and Rourke started running toward them. It was more than the promise he'd made Varakov, to see Natalia get away alive. But Rourke forced the thoughts from his mind as he ran on, sloshing through puddles on the runway, the wind blowing the rain at near gale force now, gusts buffeting his body as he dodged incoming and outgoing planes, making his way across the field.
Rourke reached the planes still loading, but Natalia was nowhere in sight. He grabbed a passing Soviet airman by the collar, shouting in Russian, "The Russian woman— where is she?"
The man looked uncomprehending a moment, a strong gust of wind lashing them both, catching the Soviet airman's hat and blowing it across the field. "Wait," the young man stammered. "A beautiful woman— dark hair, blue eyes?"
"Yes— where?" Rourke shouted over the wind.
"There, I think!" The airman pointed toward the airfield control center, a complex of low buildings about five hundred yards away, nearer the water beyond the airfield than the runways.
Rourke started running, shouting over his shoulder, "Thank you!" but the young airman was already turned around, helping a woman load a baby aboard the nearest aircraft.
Chapter 47
They were out of the city and there was no sign of Soviet pursuit. Sarah Rourke thought she knew why. The ground under the truck was shaking, and the rain was falling so heavily its color reminded her of staring through a cheaply made plastic drinking glass. It was almost impossible to see anything.
"Mary Beth! Stop the truck!"
The woman behind the wheel looked at her and hit the brakes, the truck skidding slightly, then grinding to a stop.
Sarah Rourke turned out the window and looked into the rain again, then looked back at Mary Beth, saying, "You want to get them into hiding, where that fisherman took your children. But he was taking my children up the coast so we could get away. I'm leaving you now."
"You're crazy. You'll get killed out there alone." Mary Beth called over the rain.
Sarah smiled. "No I won't."
She started out of the truck cab, the rain lashing at her, the long skirt of the dress plastered against her legs. "Get down!" she shouted to the Soviet major, gesturing with the MAC-10.
The man looked at her a moment, then started out of the truck. "What are you doing, Sarah?" Mary Beth screamed.
"I made this man a promise. I want to see it gets kept and nobody kills him."
There was a car coming down the highway-Russian, she thought. The car was swerving, the driver coming too fast in the rain. Sarah pressed herself against the side of the truck as the car skidded out of the oncoming lanes and across, narrowly missing the front of the truck and slamming into a utility pole.
Sarah gestured with the MAC-10 and the Soviet major ran beside her toward the car.
It was a recent, model, an American Ford. The two Soviet soldiers inside it were dead. She turned to the major. "Get the bodies out— and no funny business."
The Russian looked at her. "All right."
Sarah reached under her sodden dress, snatching the .45 automatic bound to her thigh, then cocking the hammer to full stand.
She pointed the gun at the major, the Russian clearing the body from the back seat and placing it beside the man already on the ground.
"Mary Beth— the gun!" Sarah held the MAC-10 out at arm's length in her left hand.
In a moment, Mary Beth was beside her. "You know what you're doin'?"
"Uh-huh," Sarah answered. "Good luck to you all. Get out of here."
From the corner of her eye, she watched as Mary Beth ran back toward the truck, then climbed into the cab, the truck starting away.
Sarah turned and looked at the Major. "You've been wearing a pistol all this time, haven't you?" And she eyed the holster on his belt.
"Not very efficient of you, madam."
Taking a step closer to him, she said quietly, rain streaming down from her hair and across her face,
"Take it out and toss it into the bushes."
"Yes," he answered, taking the gun slowly from the holster, eyeing her a moment, then tossing it away.
"Now get your shoulder to that car; get behind the wheel or something. I want it away from that pole."
"It will not drive, probably."
She started to speak, then the major interrupted her. "I know— I'd better hope that it drives." The major slowly climbed behind the wheel of the car. There was a groaning noise, but then after several false starts, the engine turned over and she gestured to the major to back the car up. She kept the gun pointed at his head.
Sarah thought for an instant he was going to try to make a break, but the car stopped, and as she stepped back from the door he climbed out. "I can't believe it," he smiled. "Luck is with you today. The car drives."
"Now stand over there, by the utility pole," she ordered.
"For you to shoot me?"
"You'd better hope—" She stopped, hardly believing the sound coming from her own throat— laughter. The major was smiling, then he too began to laugh. He stepped back, slowly, still facing her and, as he reached the utility pole, she started into the car, behind the wheel.
"Madam!"
She looked into his face. He raised his right hand and saluted her, bowing slightly.
"To another campaign, madam!"
Sarah Rourke set the pistol down on the seat, put the gear selector into drive and started off the road shoulder, the rear wheels skidding in the mud. She could see the major, in the rearview mirror as she started onto the highway, still standing there in the rain beside the bent utility pole. The car sputtered, the windshield was cracked, and there was blood on the dashboard, but the car seemed to run adequately.
Silently, she hoped the major made it alive.
Chapter 48
Rourke reached the blown-open front doors of the terminal complex, kicking aside a huge shard of broken glass as he ran through the puddled doorway and inside. What was Natalia doing here? he asked himself. But as he turned the corner into the main hallway, there was no time to search his mind for an answer.
He stopped dead in his tracks. There were three dozen people in the room at the end of the hallway: men and women, some old, some Rourke's own age or so.
And Natalia was there, holding her tiny derringer pistol in her outstretched right hand. There were five Communist Cuban guards and one officer.
Rourke flattened himself against the wall of the corridor and inched ahead, trying to make something of the Spanish coming from inside the room. "... This is immaterial to me, senorita. Until a secure Cuban aircraft can be landed, these prisoners will remain with me. I do not care for the idea of shooting a KGB
officer, even a self-proclaimed one. However, if you do not, for the last time, step aside and leave this room immediately, my men will open fire. If you care so much for these American military personnel and their wives, then I should think you would not wish to risk t
heir being killed while my men are shooting at you."
Then Rourke's face creased into a smile. Natalia's quiet, alto voice, the Spanish perfect, began,
"Captain, aside from the fact that I outrank you, I also will shoot you in the face if you do not order your guards to put down their arms. Many of these people, if they ever were American military personnel, are likely retired. There is no real American military any more. Any purposes you might have to interrogate these people do not take precedence over the humane purpose of allowing them to be evacuated before this entire airfield is torn to pieces. Now," she said as she gestured with the pistol, "stand out of my way or die!"
Rourke shook his head, stepping away from the corridor wall, firing one of the Detonics pistols into an overstudded chair midway between where he stood and the entrance to the room at the end of the hall.
