'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.'
Chapter Thirty-one
Sandy Benson hitched up the skirt of her stewardess uniform and climbed over the rock outcropping, 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 outcropping 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.'
'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.
***
'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
