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"Good," Rourke muttered. Then, "If this battery doesn't turn this over, you
can go out and check for a battery and tools to change it with. Keep your
fingers crossed," he added.
He took the key out of the ignition, looked at it and whispered, "Come on
baby-this'll be the ride of your life."
He put the key into the lock and turned the ignition. The engine coughed and
then roared as he stepped on the gas pedal.
Rubenstein shouted. Rourke looked up at him, squinted his eyes against the
flashlight he held.
"You're takin' that cowboy hat awful serious, aren't you?" Then, "Come on,
Paul, pour in that gas and let's get out of here."
The smell of exhaust fumes was thick in the garage, despite both open doors,
by the time
Rubenstein threw down the empty gas container and ran around the front of the
two-door hardtop and climbed in beside Rourke. Rourke looked over at him and
smiled. "Let me guess. You've never stolen a car before-or ridden in a '57
Chevy? Right?"
"Yeah," Rubenstein said. "How'd you know?"
"Intuition," Rourke laughed, hauling the big long-throw gearshift into first.
"Intuition."
The needle on the speedometer was bouncing near twenty as Rourke slowed at the
end of the long driveway. He let up on the clutch again and made a hard left
into the street, sliding the stick back into second as he reached the end of
the block, then cutting a hard right onto what had been a main street. He
raced through the street, then turned onto one of the major arteries.
"You just ran a-" Rubenstein started, but then fell silent, smiling to
himself.
"I don't know about you," Rourke said, "but right now I'd be happy if a cop
pulled me over for a ticket." He glanced at Rubenstein and the smaller man
nodded.
A moment later, Rubenstein said, "Hey-this thing's got a tape deck."
"Wonderful," Rourke said. "Check the glove compartment and see if he's got any
tapes."
"One," Rubenstein said a moment later, then inserted the cartridge.
As the music began, the men looked at each other. "The Beach Boys?" Rourke
said.
"You gotta admit," Rubenstein said, touching the dashboard, "the music goes
with the car."
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Chapter Thirty-one
Sandy Benson hitched up the skirt of her stewardess uniform and climbed over
the rock out-
cropping, then edged along the large flat rock, stopping and holding her
breath to listen. She didn't hear anything. After a moment, she whispered,
"Mr. Quentin, are you out there?"
"Shhh," he hissed. "Up here."
She looked to the top of the large, flat rock, then climbed back along it and
over the rough out-
cropping again. Squinting in the darkness, she could just barely make out his
silhouette. "Mr.
Quentin?"
"I'm coming down," he whispered. She could hear him shuffling toward her, and,
soon, he was close enough so that she could make out his features.
As the Canadian approached her, Rourke's CAR-15 slung from his right shoulder,
she asked, "Any sign of them, Mr. Quentin?"
"No-not of Rourke or of the people on the motorcycles."
"I wish he'd hurry," she said.
"I don't know much about Rourke," Quentin said, leaning back against the rock,
"but he struck me as somebody who'd do his best. He'll be back. But I can't
say I liked the look of some of those men he took with him."
"Neither did I," the stewardess whispered, half to herself. Talking louder
then, she asked, "Do you think there was any help in Albuquerque. According to
what he said, he thought there had been a firestorm there-wasn't much left of
the town."
"I don't know," Quentin said. "I guess all we can hold out for is that Rourke
gets here with some help before that motorcycle gang comes back. I counted
twenty or more, all of them with rifles or shotguns. And I know they spotted
the plane."
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"What could they be waiting for?" the girl said, suddenly shaking from the
desert's evening chill.
"I don't know," Quentin said. "I hunt, do some target shooting. But I never
fired a gun at a person in my life. So I sure can't figure what makes people
like that tick. Maybe they were just getting out of Albuquerque and are out to
protect themselves. Or maybe not-I don't know."
Sandy shook her head, staring into the darkness. Suddenly, she touched
Quentin's arm, whispering, "I hear something."
"I'll go back up and take a look," he said. "No!" she hissed, holding his arm
more tightly. "It's the sound of motorcycles-lots of them. Listen"'
Quentin turned and stared off into the darkness. "You're right. They're coming
back."
"We've got to get to the plane!" Sandy Benson stood and started to run back.
Glancing over her shoulder, she saw Quentin following her. She had left
Rourke's big revolver beside her purse, back at the camp.
As she rounded a great outcropping rock and headed along the periphery of a
stand of pines, she could see the bonfire from the camp where the passengers
were, and well beyond that, the silhouette of the abandoned airplane.
She tripped, felt herself failing, and threw her hands in front of her to
break the fall. She felt a hand at her elbow and almost screamed, then looked
up and saw Quentin beside her. As she started back to her feet, she heard a
loud series of bangs.
She turned and stared at Quentin. "My God-those are shots!" Then she broke
into a dead run toward the camp, Quentin at her heels.
***
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"You know," Rourke said, "you've played that tape all the way through-twice
now."
Rubenstein laughed. It was the first time Rourke had heard him laugh out loud.
The smaller man pulled the tape from the deck, then said, "I know this sounds
horrible, with all that's happened-I
mean, World War Three began two days ago. But here I am, wearing a cowboy hat,
riding in a fireengine red '57 Chevy, out to rescue some people trapped in the
desert. Two days ago, I was a junior editor with a trade magazine publisher
and dying of boredom. Maybe I'm crazy-and I'm sure not happy about the War and
all-but I'm almost having fun."
Rourke nodded. "I can understand."
"Like two days ago, I needed help. Today-now I'm helping. I've done more in
the last two days than
I ever did in the twenty-eight years I been alive."
"You twenty-eight?"
"Yeah-last month. I look older, right? Everybody tells me that."
Rourke laughed. "I wasn't going to tell you that. You look twenty-eight to
me."
"Well," Rubenstein started to say, but Rourke held up his hand and ground the
Chevy to a halt.
"What is it?"
"Listen," Rourke said. "Gunfire. Just down the road and off to the right
there. Sounds like it's from the plane."
He accelerated through the gears, speeding the Chevy down the dirt road they'd
been driving along for the last ten miles. Abruptly, he started to slow down,
at the same time punching the lights off As they neared the crash site, he
killed the engine. The sound of the gunfire grew louder. He eased the car to
the side of the road.
"Paul," he said to Rubenstein. "You want one of my pistols or the rifle?"
"Let me try the rifle."
"Fine." Rourke reached into the back seat, removed the scope cover and showed
Rubenstein where the safety lever was. He worked the bolt and introduced a
round into the chamber. Fishing in his pockets, he found the two spare
five-round magazines for the Steyr-Mannlicher 550 that he had brought along
and handed them to Rubenstein. "Just look through the scope. When you see the
image clearly-with your glasses on-it should pretty much fill the scope. Get
the crosshairs over your target and squeeze the front trigger. You'll be a
terror with it. Come on."
Rourke threw open the driver's door and started for the rocks, Rubenstein
behind him. The sound of the gunfire was dying now, and above it, they could [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]