'Comrade General,' Catherine began. 'You have been sleeping— it is late. You should go to bed, Comrade General.'
He felt himself smile at her as he sat up fully, shaking loose the memorandum, watching as it fluttered from his hand to the floor, Catherine stooping in her overly long skirt and picking it up.
'You are my secretary, Catherine— you are not my mother. Although I remember my mother having eyes like yours.'
He felt himself smile again, Catherine blushing. 'What time is it?'
'It is almost eight-thirty, Comrade General.'
Varakov nodded to her, looking at his own watch, confirming it. 'Yes— has there been any word since I —'
'Since six o'clock there has been no word, Comrade General— neither on Comrade Major Tiemerovna or the American Rourke, or the other American, Rubenstein.'
Varakov looked about his office without walls in the far side of the Museum of Natural History, the figures of the mastodons dominating the center of the great hall, the hall mostly in shadow now, only the yellow light on his desk and a light by the guard post just inside the brass doors leading from the outside disturbing the shadowy darkness. The mastodons— he stood, stuffing his feet into his shoes with considerable effort, walking toward them now— seemed somehow more ominous. He could hear the click of Catherine's heels beside him, slightly behind him.
'A man tries, Catherine,' he murmured.
'Comrade General?'
'A man tries. I have knowledge— knowledge I wished to share, to save as much of mankind as possible. Now I cannot. There is so little time left. If this Rourke can be found, and my niece still lives— then perhaps a few —'
'I do not understand, Comrade General.'
Varakov turned, smiling toward her, watching her face, the uncertainty at the corners of her mouth— her lips thin and pale, cast partially in shadow— raised slightly.
Varakov reached out to her, touching her hands, the steno pad she habitually carried falling to the floor between them, the pencil making a tiny sound as he heard it bounce on the stone floor.
'That you do not understand— count this a blessing, child.'
He closed his eyes, still holding her hands, in his mind seeing the mastodons— extinct— more vividly than ever.
Chapter Eleven
Rourke worked the right fuel shutoff handle, continuing the shutting down procedure as Natalia spoke to him. He removed his own helmet to hear her better. 'What if Cole is waiting for us—
what if he knew Paul had tuned the radio set to our frequency?'
Rourke flipped his last switch, then began opening the canopy. 'He isn't that smart— and in case he is, I'll kill him,' he rasped, his voice little over a whisper, the rush of cooler air on his face causing him to suck in his breath. He pushed the release for the safety harness, starting to climb out. 'I'll kill him,' he said again...
Rourke reached under the armpits of his flight suit, drawing first one, then the second stainless Detonics .45, thumb cocking each pistol as they approached the first hangar, glancing to his left, Natalia beside and slightly behind him, the Metalife Custom L-Frame Smith
He turned away, concentrating on the hangar— if Cole were waiting it would either be on the field in one of the hangars or in the radio room where Paul and the other man had been shot, Rourke realized.
The hangar doors were open.
'You wait here.'
'The stitches in my abdomen are fine— I don't have to run a race to shoot a gun anyway— the hell with waiting here,' she told him.
Rourke looked at her, smiling. Sometimes he liked that about her— she didn't take orders well.
'Suit yourself,' he said noncommittally, then continued walking.
'I can go around back.'
'Only three of them,' he nodded. 'Stick with me.' Three of them— with assault rifles at the very least.
He stopped beside the hangar doors, the pistols tight in his hands— he half-wanted Cole to be waiting there, waiting for him. It would give him the excuse.
Natalia looked at him, Rourke nodding, diving through the doorway, Natalia beside him. He went into a crouch, both weapons poised at hip level.
'My God,' Natalia whispered.
Rourke didn't look at her. He looked at the bodies along the far wall instead. 'I thought good Communists didn't believe in God.' He started walking, his eyes scanning across the concrete base of the vaulted-ceilinged metal structure— no sign of Cole.
'If I were a good Communist, I wouldn't be here,' he heard her say, hearing the sound of metal against leather, one of her guns being holstered.
He stopped, ten yards from the wall— dead men. The landing party, the survivors of Filmore Air Force base, bodies lurched over one another, the arms and legs in bizarre positions, heads cocked back, eyes wide open, glassy. The blood was on the concrete floor in small puddles, blood spattered over all the victims as well, hands covered with it. Rourke started nearer, watching the hands, the faces— for any sign of movement.
He stopped, beside the nearest edge of the pile of dead men, the bodies heaped upon one another as though those still living but shot had tried shielding their comrades with their bodies— a hand touched gently at the face of another man, the cuticles of the fingernails clotted red-brown.
'That butcher,' Natalia's voice murmured.
Rourke looked at her. 'Yes— butcher.' He looked back at the dead men— his eyes suddenly catching something.
His left thumb hooked behind the tang of the Detonics in his left fist, upping the safety, his right thumb upping the safety of the second pistol, both pistols ramming into his leg pockets on the flight suit as he dropped to his knees in the blood. 'Help me.'
He shifted at the body weight of a black man— dead, eyes fixed. 'Watch your stitches—'
'I will,' Natalia answered.
A seaman, shot three times in the chest, then once in the head. An airman, twice in the neck, twice in the abdomen and once in the head. 'They came afterward and shot each one in the head.'
'Yeah,' Rourke rasped.
He moved the last body aside— at the base of the pile, one of the first shot apparently, lay Lieutenant O'Neal. His neck pumped blood. 'He's alive.'
Natalia was running, Rourke looking back at her. 'Must be a first aid kit here!' she shouted back.
Natalia Tiemerovna walked briskly, her stitches itching her, her crotch itching her where the hair was starting to grow back after being shaven for the surgery. She wondered if Rourke had shaved her there— it was his way, not to let someone else see her, perhaps. She didn't have the nerve to ask him, she realized, smiling at her own embarrassment.
He was in the first hangar still, trying to keep Lieutenant O'Neal from bleeding to death.
She walked— an M-16 taken from the hangar in her hands, spare magazines stuffed in the pockets of her flight suit, awkward feeling as she walked. She stopped walking now— the command bunker doors were closed, and on the third level down would be the radio room. And Paul— almost certainly dead...
Fluorescent lights burned in the hallway as she entered it from the stairwell, no living thing in sight. The radio room was at the far end— she had looked at the set before going airborne with Rourke. She sucked in her breath hard— she had been in a hurry, told Paul good-bye. She wished she had kissed him. Rourke was something besides a friend, beyond a friend— but Paul was her friend, a confidant, someone she admired and loved. She felt her throat tightening as she approached the doorway.
