“He’s out there,” Rubenstein said, breathless sounding. “I saw him—must have heard us coming up and took off. You said he has heart trouble, that’s why he quit the astronaut program?” “Yeah,” Rourke answered.
“Then we’d better hurry and stop him. I’m not sure, but either he’s got a funny way of running or he was holding both hands over his chest.” “My God!” Rourke shouted, already breaking into a dead run for the trees, “Get your bike and come on,” Rourke snapped over his shoulder. Rourke hit the tree line, his right hand curling around one of the narrow pine trunks, stopping, swinging around the trunk, scanning the woods right and left. He spotted movement, then saw a white-haired man running up the steeply sloping grade a hundred yards deeper into the pines.
“Colfax!” he shouted over the drumming of the rain. “Colfax! Jim Colfax. I’m an American. I don’t want to hurt you. I’m here to help.” The man started running.
Shaking his head, Rourke glanced behind him for Rubenstein and the bike, saw him coming and yelled, ‘”Over here—toward the slope, Paul,” then started running through the trees, dodging the sparse brush, jumping deadfalls, his feet slipping in the mud, catching himself on his hands, pushing to his feet and continuing to run. Rourke could see Colfax up ahead, see Rubenstein zig-zagging through the trees trying to cut Colfax off. “Colfax! Wait, man!” Rourke shouted, stopping, scanning the trees ahead, spotting the white hair, then starting to run again.
Rourke missed a deadfall, half stumbled, and caught himself, slithering across the mud, then getting half to his feet. Rubenstein was at the far edge of the woods, and Colfax was running laterally to Rourke’s left along the slope.
Shaking his head, Rourke picked himself up and started running. “Colfax—wait!”
Colfax turned, started running again and, as Rourke started to shout once more, Rourke could see the white- haired, athletic man stumble and fall, rolling down the slope, his body slithering across the red mud of clay wash and colliding against a tree stump and stopping.
“Over here!” Rourke shouted to Rubenstein, waving his left arm as he ran toward Colfax.
Rourke dropped to his knees in the mud, lifting Colfax’s face to feel for a pulse.
There was none. “The Eden Project,” Rourke whispered. The white-haired man’s eyelids rolled open as the head sank from Rourke’s hands.
“Can’t you do anything?”
Rourke looked up at the face belonging to the voice. “No, Paul—if I had a hospital or a trained cardiac team— maybe I could start the heart again. He was dead before I reached him. The eyelids just came open as a reflex action when I bent his head away. He’s gone.” “Then what’s up there—what’s the Eden Project, John?”
Rourke set the white-haired man’s head down on the ground, closing the eyelids with his thumbs, then stood and stared up at the gray sky, rain washing across his face.
He clapped Rubenstein on the shoulder, starting back toward Rubenstein’s bike. “The Russians’ll bury him.” Then, “What’s up there, hmmm? Cheer up, Paul, maybe it isn’t a doomsday machine or a weapon of some sort. Who knows—maybe the Eden Project is something that’ll do some good. Maybe.” Rourke almost repeated “who knows” but a wry smile crossed his lips. The last man who knew was dead.
Chapter 42
The Russians came, ransacking the house, searching the woods. Rourke and Rubenstein had completed searching the house long before Reed had arrived, gone with Reed to a place of concealment on high ground in a cleft of rocks long before the Soviet helicopter’s whirring had filled the air and drowned out the rain.
“I guess I can tell you,” Reed said.
Rourke looked at him, then hunched back more into the rock, not bothering to watch the Russians anymore. He lighted one of his cigars, trying to shake the dampness in his clothing and in his bones. “Tell me what?” “Well— before I do—Fulsom. We used my radio. He wanted to do something for you. He’s got a contact in the Resistance up in Tennessee. Hadn’t said anything to you because he didn’t want to get any false hopes up. Got a message out last night before the raid and the Resistance man in Tennessee promised he’d check around. Fulsom just had a feeling about it. Made me call in on their frequency. Well, guy owns a farm, his wife is the aunt of the only survivor of the Jenkins family you mentioned. The guy was a retired Army sergeant. His son, anyway, just joined up with him, got wounded last night. They talked. Sarah and your kids are up at his farm—been there the last few days.” Rourke pushed away from the rocks. The cigar fell from his mouth, burning at his trousers as he brushed it away. “Where,” Rourke said, grasping Reed’s collar.
“Here.” Reed handed Rourke a dirty, folded Tennessee highway map. “It’s marked—up near some place called Mt. Eagle in the mountains. You know it.” “What,” Rourke said absently, not even opening the map, just staring at it in his hands. “Yeah, Mt. Eagle, yeah, I know it.” “John, thank God.”
Rubenstein threw his arms around Rourke, and Rourke slapped the younger man on the back.
“Reed,” Rourke stammered. “Fulsom—can you thank him for me, will you—?”
“I’ll see him. Just in case, I’m leaving Paul the radio set we have and some spare parts from the kit. You want to contact us, the frequency’ll be marked. One other thing.” “Yeah,” Rourke said, already standing at the edge of the rocks and staring down at the departing Russian troops. There was a small residual team up in the woods, carrying out the rubber bagged body of Colfax. “Looks like they’re going to give him a decent burial anyway.” “John, they’ll think maybe you found out before Colfax died. The Russians’ll want you. They want to know what the Eden Project was—almost more than we do. And you were right about that traitor—looks there’s someone in Chambers’s advisors who works for the Communists.” Almost disinterested, Rourke stuck out his hand. Reed took it. “I’ll be seeing you, Captain. Say goodbye to your men for me, huh?” Then, turning to Paul, Rourke said, “I’ll have Sarah cook you the best meal in the world at the retreat. I’ll see you there as soon as I can get them back.” “Sure, John —hey, John?”
Rourke turned and looked at the younger man.
“If something goes wrong, just—”
“It won’t,” Rourke said, smiling and snatching up his CAR-15. “It won’t.”
