by Jerry Ahern
Sarah Rourke still smiled.
Natalia, her voice odd-sounding to her, answered. “Sarah—I wanted so to meet you. The children are beautiful.”
“So are you.”
Natalia didn’t know what to say.
Chapter Twenty-eight
Michael and Annie had adopted Paul—he had awakened and appeared in the doorway of his bedroom a moment after Natalia and Sarah had met—Rourke had almost felt like kissing him, the distraction of his appearance breaking the tension between the two women. And the children had liked Natalia, as well.
With three bedrooms, the addition of three people had represented a logistical problem at the Retreat.
But Natalia had solved that. “Annie can sleep with me in my room, and Michael can sleep with Paul. That way, you and Sarah will have privacy—it’s the best solution,” and she had lit a cigarette.
Sarah had said nothing, only nodded agreement.
Annie had been ecstatic, and Michael—a more mature, more low-key child than Rourke had remembered him—had seemed enthused as well.
After they had explored the Retreat and
Rourke had used the microwave to make a hearty dinner that the children would like, there had been showers for Michael and Annie and then, both children weary, they had been put to bed.
Rourke stood beside his wife now, looking from the doorway at Annie, already asleep in Natalia’s room, who seemed somehow lost in the king-sized bed. Michael was sleeping as well. Paul and Natalia sat on the couch in the Great Room, Natalia changed to a gray turtleneck knit top and black skirt, Paul wearing blue jeans with his shirt out of his pants.
Rourke had showered—he wore clean clothes, but clothes identical to what he always wore—except that he was without stockings and wore rubber thongs on his feet. He considered all that as he watched Sarah—he was a bland personality. He had always known that. In the days of civilization, when he had worn suits or neckties, his suits had always been conservative, his sports coats serviceable. He had early on realized that silk knit ties wrinkled less, lasted longer and were more comfortable about the neck. He had, consequently, used three neckties, replacing them with identical ties as needed—one blue, one brown, one black—all silk, all made in Italy, all knit, all identical in length and width—tying one was like tying the other. When a tie was given to him as a gift at a speaking engagement, or by one of the children for a birthday or Christmas, he had been perfunctorily grateful and hung the ties in the closet to gather dust and never be worn.
It was his way.
Sarah wore clothes Natalia had practically insisted that she borrow. Rourke had provided blue jeans, T-shirts, and sweaters in his wife’s size in the stores for the Retreat, as well as underwear and track shoes and two pairs of combat boots. But Natalia had insisted Sarah would feel more at ease in more normal clothes. Rourke surveyed her, standing beside her—a pale blue blouse, a navy blue cardigan sweater—Sarah had complained the temperature in the Retreat seemed cold to her—and a blue A-line skirt. The skirt was longer than Sarah usually wore—but Natalia had always seemed more conscious of clothing than Rourke had ever found his wife to be. Incongruously, she wore a pair of the rubber thongs Rourke had stockpiled for her—black soled and not matching the rest of what she wore at all.
“What’s the matter?” Sarah asked him.
“Just looking at you—it’s good to be able to say that—just looking at you.”
“I suppose I can always let Natalia borrow one of the three dozen pairs of Levis you stored here for me.”
“I didn’t know what to buy for you—you’d never even come up here.”
“I’m not blaming you,” she smiled.
He nodded, feeling himself smile at her as he let out a long sigh. “What do you say I buy you a drink, huh?”
“All right,” and he watched the little dimples at the corners of her mouth deepen as she smiled up at him. “All right—I’d like that.”
“Thanks for trying so hard—I mean—”
“Natalia seems like a good person—and I like Paul. But Natalia’s in love with you—you know that, don’t you?”
“Yeah.”
“And you’re in love with her—”
“I—”
“I didn’t say you weren’t in love with me—I know you are. I knew that wouldn’t change. You love us both. And she knows that and so do I. Do you have any idea what’s going to happen—to the three of us?” She leaned her head against his right shoulder, Rourke holding her left hand.
“You’re my wife—and—”
“I know a lot about you, John—I always did. Sometimes, before The Night of The War, sometimes a friend would intimate that you were fooling around when you were away from me on those trips—”
“I never—”
“I always knew that—I never questioned it. Whatever happened between you and Natalia just happened—I guess that’s why I can’t be mad at her, either—”
“We, ahh—”
“I wouldn’t have blamed you if you had—the children and I could have been dead. You looking for us like you did—finally finding us—that’s an act of love no one in her right mind could argue with—dispute.”
“I’ve told her this—and it’s true—this was just something,” he whispered, “something I didn’t prepare for—do you know—”
“I know,” and she leaned up to kiss him lightly on the mouth. “Natalia had that letter from her uncle that she wanted us to hear—and you promised me a drink—we can’t settle anything now,” and she squeezed his hand.
Rourke took her in his arms, kissing her hard on the mouth—he loved her. . . .
Rourke sipped at a glass of Seagram's Seven and ice, Natalia, Sarah, and Paul drinking the same. Rourke smoked one of his thin, dark tobacco cigars, Natalia smoking a cigarette—he wondered, absently, what it would be like for her when she ran out.
Natalia sat on the couch between Paul and Sarah, Rourke sitting in the reclining chair that flanked the coffee table opposite the couch.
Natalia opened the envelope. “It is addressed to you, John— “
He nodded, leaning forward, taking the envelope, his fingers touching hers as he took it.
Rourke sipped again at his drink. He looked at Sarah, “Natalia’s uncle is General Ishmael Varakov, he’s the supreme commander for the Soviet Army of Occupation in North America—but he’s been straight with me the times I’ve had dealings with him—he’s the head of the bad guys, you might say,” and his eyes flickered to Natalia, watching the muscles at the corners of her blue eyes tighten slightly, “but an honorable man. He’s a soldier doing his job—a patriotic Russian—I can’t fault him for that.” And then Rourke looked at the letter. It was dated some four weeks earlier. He began to read, out loud.
“Doctor Rourke—
If you read this letter, Natalia, my niece, has arrived safely to your care. You may wonder that my English is so good—I spent many years in Egypt and in order to understand as much as I could, it was necessary to improve what English I already knew or master Arabic—the Egyptian variant, precisely. I had dealt with American and British officers during World War II and spoke English well enough to make myself understood—so I polished my English. I have sent Natalia to you not only for the reason which you suspect—that her position here deteriorates, as does mine. But another, more grave reason. You have heard, I’m sure, at least casual reference to something called The Eden Project— an American project done in cooperation with the NATO, SEATO, and Pan-American allies, but not with their full knowledge. It was a counter-measure to a post thermonuclear holocaust scenario, and this scenario is unfortunately coming to pass. When it transpires—very soon now—few if any living things will survive. What I offer to you, to the young Jew Rubenstein, and to your wife and children should you have located them by now, or find them still, is the slim hope of survival. It will in no way compromise your beliefs as a capitalist, nor my beliefs as a communi
st, if either dialectic can even matter. I offer this in exchange for your continued care of my niece, Natalia—like a daughter to me she has been all these years. I helped to raise her as the child of my dead brother and his wife, my brother a physician of great reknown, his wife a prima ballerina. I assume that you read this aloud to Natalia—if such is the case, help her to understand me when she learns this. For I had no brother at all, only two sisters who died during the early days of World War II. Natalia’s father was indeed a physician of some great reknown—”
Rourke looked up—Natalia was staring, saying nothing, her eyes fixed—
“... but a Jew. Her mother indeed was a ballerina—of the most incredible beauty and grace, her background Christian, and she was a practitioner of this religion despite the numerous injunctions of the State.”
Rourke looked at Natalia again—Rubenstein held her left hand in his right.
“... I was deeply in love with Natalia’s mother—her name was Natalia too. But I learned—the original Natalia was as honest and decent a woman as is my Natalia, my niece—that she had secretly married Dr. Carl Morovitch, the Jewish physician. Considering myself a gentleman, I withdrew. But it was some years after the War-World War II, that Morovitch, himself only half Jewish, his mother’s family name Tiemerov, spoke out against the oppression of Jews in the Soviet Union. I learned through my sources in GRU that his wife, Natalia, the woman I had loved, had departed the ballet before Morovitch’s rash actions, which, had she been associated with them, would have forced her expulsion. And that Natalia was pregnant. I learned also that the KGB was plotting against Morovitch. I endeavored to warn Morovitch and Natalia—I still loved her, and she knew that I did. But they could not escape because Natalia was due to deliver her child. The child was born, a girl, long-legged and skinny, but with eyes the most beautiful blue color I had ever seen—except for the eyes of her mother. It was the father of my dead chauffeur, Leon, who accompanied me that night to the home outside Moscow where Morovitch and Natalia and the newborn child were in hiding from the KGB. Leon’s father and I went there, because, through my GRU contacts, I knew the KGB was alert to their whereabouts. It was our intent—Leon’s father was as loyal to me as Leon himself was—to spirit them away and get them to Finland and then to Sweden where they would be safe. We arrived too late—”
Rourke looked up, relighting his cigar—Natalia was weeping, Sarah’s left arm around her shoulders. Rourke took a good swallow of his drink.
“—to save them. Doctor Morovitch had owned a gun—I had given it to him. He resisted the KGB as I too would have done. To defend his family. Carl Morovitch was dead, shot three times in the chest, then his throat slit. Natalia was bleeding and dying—one of the KGB officers was attempting to rape her. I shot him in the head—and then general shooting began. Leon’s father was killed defending the small room Morovitch and Natalia had used as a nursery for the baby girl. I was shot in the leg—the left leg, and I still carry the bullet there. I could not trust a doctor to remove it at the time, and afterwards it became physically impossible to remove. But all the KGB were dead. The infant girl still lived. There was a woman—also once a dancer—whose services I used from time to time and whose discretion I trusted. I brought the infant to her. Through those few persons I trusted, with meticulous care, I altered my army records to indicate a brother who had lived with relatives ever since birth. This because of my family’s poverty. I was a general by then, and the task was not as difficult as might be imagined. I found in recent death records a doctor who had no known family, a doctor named Plenko. It was not uncommon in the Twenties and Thirties to change one’s name in Russia—it was sometimes necessity. To disguise criminal background or unfavorable political association. I made this man my brother. I invented of whole cloth a woman who was secretly his wife, but the name uncertain, and I invented her death. This too was simple enough. With parents for the infant girl, and myself established as her uncle, I acquired the house I still own on the Black Sea, esconcing the trusted woman there as my housekeeper—and to raise Natalia during my absence. For that is what I named her—Natalia, after her beloved, exquisite mother. The eyes gave me no choice, nor did my heart. And then Anastasia, because to me she was the lost princess—presumed dead. But my Anastasia was alive. Tiemerovna after her father’s family. Two years later, the woman who was caring for Natalia married a doctor, his name Tiemerovitch, perhaps some distant relative of Morovitch’s family. The woman and Tiemerovitch loved Natalia as their own. I once again altered my background records, eliminating the references to Dr. Plenko and instead linking Dr. Tiermerovitch to myself as a lost brother. Tiemerovitch’s medical career was greatly enhanced by the newly “discovered” relationship to a prominent Soviet general. I lied to Natalia only in that her “father” was my brother. After her father and mother—Tiemerovitch and his wife—died in an accident when Natalia was eighteen, again I took her in and saw to it that she had the best education, the best training. When she saw her patriotic duty as being linked to the KGB, I did not dare to interfere lest something somehow be suspected—and in times such as these, perhaps the greatest safety lies in being counted among those who threaten the safety of others. When she married Karamatsov, I was disheartened, but saw it as further enhancing her safety. Natalia— “my niece”—is all that I have, my obsession is that she live. Her mother died at the same age Natalia is now. I do not wish this for Natalia, whom I love.
“There is a choice for you. To save yourself, your friend, perhaps your wife and children, and since we both love her so deeply—”
Rourke licked his lips, looking at his wife, then looking at Natalia. He finished the letter, repeating the last few words—
“... and since we both love her so deeply, my niece. You must come to me in Chicago before it is too late—and bring Natalia with you, for there is no other way of it than to force her into danger again. I offer you the chance at life against certain death. Look to the skies, the electrical activity there each dawn—the End is Coming.”
A scrawled signature was at the bottom of the note—the note itself was printed by hand.
Rourke folded the pages of the note together, setting down his cigar.
Natalia, her voice like he had never heard it, stood up, her fingers splayed along her thighs. “I will change to suitable clothes—my uncle— “
Rourke smiled at her, stood, walked around the table and folded her into his arms. “He loves you—and God help me, so do I—”
“I—”
“We’ll leave as soon as you’ve changed.” Still holding Natalia, he looked at Sarah’s eyes. After all the years of marriage, the years of arguing, there was no argument there—but the understanding he had sought for so long.
He still held Natalia Anastasia Tiemerovna.
Chapter Twenty-nine
His weapons were laid out, his gear ready. They would ride double on his Low Rider to the place where they had left the prototype F-111, using that to get them to Chicago—it was the fastest way. Sarah stood behind him—he could feel her hands on his shoulders. He bent over to kiss Annie— “I love you, honey—honest,” he whispered to her. She rolled over, not awakening, but a smile crossing her lips.
They left Natalia’s room, Annie sleeping there, and moved on to Paul’s room—Michael.
Rourke sat again on the edge of the bed. He looked at his son. He spoke to his wife. “If I die, Paul will care for you and the children. And pretty soon Michael will help him. Maybe he’s too much like me—”
“He is,” Sarah’s voice murmured in the darkness.
“I tried,” Rourke whispered, sighing loudly. “Honest to God, I tried. To be a father, a husband. If General Varakov is right—hell—” and he bent his head over his son, crying.
Sarah held his head—and in the darkness, she whispered, “I’ll always love you—I hate your guts, but I’ll always love you. I’ll be with you if we all live or if we all die.
”
He swallowed hard, hugging his wife to him—and he let himself cry because he might never come home again....
His sinuses ached as he strapped on the old holster rig for the Python. The belt was heavier, a spare magazine pouch with two extra-length eight-shot magazines for his .45s, the magazines made by Detonics. On the belt as well was a black-sheathed, black-handled Gerber MkII fighting knife with double-edged stainless blade with sawteeth near the double-quillon guard on each side. He had the little Metalifed Colt Lawman in a special holster made by Thad Rybka for him years before The Night of The War—it carried the gun in the small of his back at a sharp angle.
He picked up the Government Model .45—a Mk IV Series ‘70, not the newer series ‘80 gun that had come out before The Night of The War. It, like the other two Colts he carried, was Metalifed. Chamber empty, the magazine loaded with 185-grain JHPs, he rammed the Colt into his trouser band.
The twin stainless Detonics .45s were already on him in the shoulder rig from Alessi, and the little Russell black Chrome Sting IA was in his belt.
The CAR-15 lay on the kitchen countertop. Beside it an M-16, one he had taken the time to hand-pick from the stores of weapons brought from the plane. Between the two assault rifles was an olive-drab ammo box, eight hundred rounds of 5.56mm Ball.
