Lightstone began to use his folding knife to cut the cotton lining out of his own jacket.
'What-' Jackson whispered.
'Trying to keep you from getting the refuge all messy,' Lightstone said, glancing up and listening for the sound of anyone moving in their direction as he began to tear the jacket lining into long strips.
'Hurts like hell,' Sam Jackson mumbled.
'Yeah, I bet it does,' Lightstone muttered as he began to pull handfuls of the synthetic fill from the lining of his thick jacket. 'You're losing a lot of blood out the back, but I think I can get it stopped. Looks like a straight through-and- through punch, no expansion. Must be using ball ammo.'
'Military?' Jackson whispered weakly, blinking his eyes in response to the pain of each shallow breath. 'Nobody… uses that stuff out here anymore.'
'Henry, this is Woeshack. Can you read me?'
'Yeah, well, somebody is today. By the way, you're not going to like this next part, but I've got to do it.' Lightstone held chunks of the synthetic fill on either side of the wound. 'You ready?'
'Yeah, sure,' Jackson nodded, blinking his glassy eyes as he looked up at Lightstone. 'Hurry up, get it over… Oh, shit! '' he screamed. Then his eyes rolled back into his head and he went limp as Lightstone used the tips of his fingers to jam the filler material deeper into the gaping wound.
'Yeah, hell of an idea. I'd faint too if it were me,' he muttered to himself as he quickly used the strips of cotton lining to tie the blood-soaked filler in place.
Lightstone scrambled back up to the top edge of the outcropping, the. 357 Magnum back in his hand, just in time to watch the man in shredded-rag camouflage gear kneel down beside his prone partner. He set the bipod- mounted sniper rifle in place, dropped the ammo belt with the extra 7.62mm clips next to the scoped weapon, slipped into the green nylon harness rig that held eight extra thirty-round magazines in snap pouches, and then picked up the 5.56mm Colt Commando automatic carbine.
'Oh, shit,' Lightstone whispered.
'Henry!'
Cursing, Lightstone scrambled back over to the clump of brush where he had dropped the small packset radio. In the background, somewhere off to his right, he could hear the echoing roar of the Cessna Skywagon's powerful engine as Woeshack circled the floatplane high over the center of the huge lake.
'This is Henry, go ahead,' he said, bringing the radio up to his mouth and keying the mike as he cautiously peered around the edge of the outcropping and saw the figure with the short-barreled automatic weapon start to move forward from tree to tree in their general direction.
'Jesus, I thought you-What's going on down there?' Woeshack demanded.
'Couple of shooters about a hundred yards south of us,' Lightstone explained, watching as the rag- camouflaged figure proceeded to move in closer, covered by his wounded but still very functional partner, who had taken over the sniper rifle.
'They're both wearing military cammo gear.' Lightstone spoke into the radio mike again. 'One of them's armed with an automatic weapon. The other one's got some kind of bipod-mounted rifle with a scope.'
'You mean they're soldiers?'
'Sure as hell look like it to me,' Lightstone muttered.
There was a momentary pause.
'I thought I saw one of you guys go down,' Woeshack said hesitantly.
'You did. Sam caught a round through the shoulder.'
'Is he okay?'
'He's alive, but he's out cold and losing blood pretty fast,' Lightstone said as he continued to watch the still- distant but rapidly approaching figure, not happy with the idea that the man really did look and act like a soldier.
'What about the suspects?'
'The one with the automatic weapon's heading our way right now,' Lightstone said in a cold voice. 'The other guy's staying in place with the rifle. Looks like I might have hit him. Can't tell.'
'Jesus, what the hell are they-'
'Listen,' Lightstone interrupted, 'we're going to need some help down here. Can you contact Anchorage on that radio?'
'Sure, if I get up high enough.'
'Then get up there and try to get ahold of Paul,' Lightstone ordered. 'Tell him to get us some backup out here, pronto. After that, come back down and help me keep track of these guys.'
'That's what I was trying to tell you,' Woeshack said. 'I spotted Paul's plane down by that island. It's tied up in the cove on the northwest side.'
'Can you see him?'
'No. I tried to raise him on the radio, but there wasn't any answer, and there's nobody back at the office.'
'Shit,' Lightstone snarled.
'What do I do?'
'Get ahold of the tower. Tell them to call the FBI or the Coast Guard or the goddamned Boy Scouts, for all I care,' Lightstone growled into the radio mike, watching from the protective shale edge as the rag-camouflaged figure cautiously moved forward another seven or eight yards. 'Just get somebody out here.'
'Christ, those FBI guys are way downtown at the Federal Building. It would take them a good two or three hours to get here.'
'Well, tell them to fucking hurry!'
Lightstone listened to the changing pitch of the Cessna's engine as Woeshack sent the floatplane climbing up and around the back of the island.
'Okay.' Woeshack's excited voice came back on the air in less than thirty seconds. 'I got ahold of the tower. They're calling the FBI and the-Hey, what's that?'
'What's the matter?' Lightstone demanded.
'Just a second. I thought I saw something,' Woeshack exclaimed excitedly and then went off the air as he brought the dark orange floatplane down in a sweeping low pass across the far north side of the island.
'Woeshack, what the hell are you doing?' Lightstone demanded.
'There's somebody down-Oh, shit!'
The roar of distant gunshots almost blocked out Woeshack's panicked scream. From his position below and behind the shale outcropping, Lightstone could hear the roar of the straining engine and see the dark orange overhead wings of the Cessna wobble frantically as Woeshack sent his aircraft almost straight up in a desperate effort to escape the ballistic onslaught from the ground.
'Woeshack, get the hell out of there!' Lightstone yelled into his radio.
'Two bodies!'
'What?'
'Two- Jesus, I've been hit!'
'Woeshack, what the hell-'
Dead silence.
'Woeshack!'
'… okay… not hit… airplane's been hit,' Woeshack managed to stammer out. 'Jesus, they shot this thing full of holes!'
'What about the bodies?' Lightstone demanded, watching the rag-camouflaged figure carefully because he was almost close enough now.
'I saw two bodies on the ground, in a clearing near the spit,' Woeshack answered in an audibly shaken voice. 'I think one of them's McNulty.'
'You assholes!' Lightstone whispered.
Then, after one last glance to make sure he had the approaching figure positioned correctly, Lightstone lunged out from behind the protection of the shale outcropping, dove to the ground and then rolled behind another smaller mound of rocks and brush as a jackhammering stream of 5.56mm rounds tore up the surrounding landscape.
