“We have made good time. OK. Let’s take a break and get some rest. Our forward patrol reported the interstate out up the road a few miles. They’re scouting an alternate route now. We’ll angle up toward Clark Hill Lake when we get cranked up again. Our last frequency scan showed Raines and his people to be around the town of McCormick. I want us to hit them just at dawn. This time I’m going to wipe the I pavement with Ben Raines” ass.”
The driver chuckled. “Won’t Raines be surprised? Hell, he thinks we’re still in California.”
“He won’t be surprised long,” Hartline said. “Just long enough for me to shoot that bastard right between the eyes. McCormick. That’s where you die, Raines.”
“Scouts out, now!” Ben ordered. “Just as soon as you see their bugout is real, let us know. We’re pulling out right behind them. I’ve got a hunch about
this place. I think we’ve overstayed our welcome.”
The Scouts slipped down the brush-covered side of the ridge and vanished into the timber.
Ben took Captain Rayle and James Riverson aside. Opening a map, he said, “We’re going to take this old road over to Highway 28, head north all the w up to Anderson, then on to where we pick up Highway 76. We’ll follow that across the top of Georgia and swing down, come into the Base Camp from the north. No one will be expecting us from that direction. Instruct the radio personnel to use o short-range radios. I don’t want anyone to be able to track our movement and pinpoint our location by radio frequency. I want to know exactly what has happened at Base Camp before we go blundering in there.”
“Yes, sir.”
Within the half hour, the Scouts reported the enemy’s bugout was for real. The men of Tony Silver’s army and the men of the Ninth Order had tucked their tails between their legs and ran like frightened rabbits.
Ben looked at the dead men on the ground below the ridge. “Take what equipment we can use and get all their ammo. Start tearing down here and loading the trucks and Jeeps. I want us on the road by two o’clock.”
He went to Gale’s side. Throughout the battle, she had sat withand comforted the wounded in the center of the camp, in a shallow, hastily dug bunker.
Ben stood for a moment, watching her calmly change the bandage on a young man’s arm. The Rebels had taken no casualties during this fight, but
still had some seriously wounded from the previous firefights of this trip.
“How’s it going, old girl?” Ben asked.
She lifted her eyes to his. “Old girl!” She shook her head. “Why I’m just fine, Ben. All my teenage years were spent longing to meet a man who would keep me constantly sitting in the middle of a war.”
Ben laughed at her.
She smiled at him and said, “Come on, Raines, tell the truth, now. You enjoyed every second of the battle, didn’t you? Come on, admit it. You live for the thrill of combat, don’t you?”
“Me, darling?” Ben rolled his eyes in protest. “Why … I’m a peace-loving man, full of love for my fellow man.”
She made a disbelieving, choking sound. “What you are, Raines, is so full of bullshit I don’t see how you can walk.”
He laughed and stepped down into the shallow bunker. Leaning down, he kissed her. The wounded in the bunker applauded them both. Gale blushed and Ben bowed courteously. All the Rebels loved to hear Gale and Ben have at each other. And most were amazed the relationship had lasted this long, for General Raines was not known for staying with one woman very long. Not since Salina.
“We’ll be pulling out soon, Gale. I’ll send someone over to help you with the wounded.”
“We heading home?” she asked.
“In a roundabout way, yes.”
“But first you have to see if we can get in another fight along the way, right?” she asked dryly.
Ben smiled. There was truth in what she said.
“We’ll get back to Base Camp in one piece,” he assured her. “Sure you won’t change your mind and come with me when I go traveling?”
“Not on your life, Buster. I want to have my babies in Chase’s clinic.” “Our babies,” Ben corrected.
“I can see it all now,” Gale said. “Years from now telling the twins about where their father was while they were being born. “Oh, he was out toodling about the country, starting wars and rescuing people and probably chasing after every woman he could find. For he has it in his head to single-handedly repopulate the earth.””
The wounded Rebels cheered and applauded.
“Darling,” Ben said, “you know I’ll be true blue to you while I’m gone.”
Gale fumbled in her duffle bag and pulled out a roll of toilet paper, handing it to Ben. “Like I said, Raines: full of it.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
When the engine in the old GMC pickup coughed and sputtered and finally roared into life, Nina clapped her hands and squealed in delight. She had never learned to drive. The one time she tried, she drove slap into a huge oak tree and cut a gash in her forehead. After that, she either walked or rode horses. Hell with cars and trucks.
But this time was different: Ike could drive. The GMC had been found inside a locked garage behind a barn. The owner had put the GMC short wheelbase pickup on blocks, and then removed the rubber. Using a hand pump, Ike inflated the tires and lugged them down tight.
A battery had been located, still in its factory box, and acid was added to the cells. The transmission was stiff from lack of use. Ike changed the fluid, changed the oil, checked the brakes, and he and Nina were on their way.
They found an old gas station just down the road, and using a long hose, Ike hand-pumped gasoline into containers, storing those in the rear, then he filled the tank.
Mice had found their way inside the cab of the OMC, and the seat was badly chewed, with several
springs sticking out. Nina covered the seat with a comforter from a house.
“How far is it to your place, Ike?” Nina asked.
“Pretty good jump, kid. And we’re not going to be able to push this old baby too hard.” He patted the fender of the GMC. “We got some pretty rugged country to travel over.” He unfolded an old road map and laid it on the hood, tracing their proposed route with a blunt finger. “We’ll take this road to Dahlonega, and then cut due west. We’ll be home this time tomorrow, I’m betting.”
“Providin’ we don’t run into more trouble, that is,” she cautioned him.
“Yeah,” Ike agreed. “There is that to consider.” He smiled and patted her shapely butt. “You ready, kid?”
“That depends on what you got in mind.”
Ike laughed. “Travel, baby. Get in the truck.”
“I’m so disappointed.”
“Well …” Ike hesitated.
“We got time,” she said.
“Yeah,” he said, his voice husky. “I reckon we do, at that.”
Ben and his Rebels pulled onto Highway 28 just as the sky darkened ominously and the black clouds began dumping silver sheets of rain on the small convoy. The young Rebel Ben had spoken to earlier about rain glanced at his wrist watch. It was two o’clock.
He told the Rebel sitting next to him about the general’s statement concerning forest fires and when it would rain.
His companion, a Rebel buck sergeant who had been part of Raines’ Rebels for years, merely shrugged. “The general knows things we don’t know and never will. I learned a long time back not to wonder about it too much. Just accept it.”
“I guess that’s the thing to do.”
The rain made Gale nervous. The heavy down-pouring on the roof of the pickup sounded like bullets. “This is not just a rain, Ben. This is a damned storm.”
“Yeah. Next month it’ll be sleet and freezing rain. We’ve got a lot of work to do back at Base Camp before
