Megan’s voice was angry, nearly hysterical. “How the hell did they take the attic? What the bloody hell is going on, Brian? What the
He drew a long breath. “Megan, when you’ve been on fifty missions, you’ll know not to ask those questions. You just fight, and you die or you don’t die, but you never ask—Listen, tell Leary to scan Farrell’s post—I think they’re also up there—”
“Who the hell ever said you were a military genius?”
“The British—it made them feel more important.”
She hesitated, then said, “Why did you let Hickey do that to my brother?”
Flynn glanced at Pedar Fitzgerald’s body propped up on the organ bench. “Hickey—like Mr. Leary—is a friend of yours, not mine. Ask Hickey when next you meet. Also, tell Leary to scan Gallagher’s triforium—”
Megan cut in. “Brian … listen … listen …”
He recognized the tone of her voice, that childlike lilt she used when she became repentant about something. He didn’t want to hear what she had to say and hung up.
Bellini scanned with the periscope as he reported to all points on the field phone. “Yeah … they’re starting to look over their shoulders now. Man at the chancel organ … but he looks … dead … Still don’t see Hickey…. Might be in the crawl space. Two hostages … Malone and Baxter … Murphy still missing … shit … Cardinal still missing —”
The Fifth Squad leader in the octagon room to the side of the sacristy gates cut in. “Captain, I’m looking at the gates with a periscope … bad angle … but someone—looks like the Cardinal—is cuffed to them. Advise.”
Bellini swore softly. “Make sure it’s him, and stand by for orders.” He turned to Burke. “These Mick bastards still have some tricky shit up their shillelaghs— Cardinal’s cuffed to the gates.” He focused the periscope on Flynn in the pulpit directly below. “Smart guy…. Well, this potato-eating bastard is mine … but it’s a tough shot…. Canopy overhead and a marble wall around him. He knows it’s going down the tube, but he can’t do shit about it. Cocksucker.”
Burke said, “If the attic is secure and you get the bombs … you ought to try negotiating. Flynn will talk with twenty rifles pointing down at him. He’s a lot of things, but stupid isn’t one of them.”
“Nobody told me nothing about asking him to surrender.” Bellini put his face close to Burke’s. “Don’t get carried away with yourself and start giving orders, or I swear to God I’ll grease you. I’m doing okay, Burke—I’m doing fine—I’m golden tonight—fuck you and fuck Flynn—let him squirm—then let him die.”
The Fifth Assault Squad dropped one at a time from the duct opening and lay on the damp floor of the crawl space, forming a defensive perimeter. The squad leader cranked his field phone and reported, “Okay, Captain, we’re in the crawl space. No movement here—”
Bellini answered, “You sure you’re not in the fucking attic now? Okay, I’m sending the dogs and their handlers through the ducts with Peterson’s Bomb Squad. When you rendezvous, move out. Be advised that Hickey may be down there—maybe others. Keep your head out of your ass.”
Bellini signaled to Wendy Peterson. “Perimeter secure. Move through the ducts. Follow the commo wire and don’t get lost.”
She answered in a laconic voice that echoed in the ducts, “We’re already moving, Captain.”
Bellini looked at his watch. “Okay … it’s 5:45 now. At 6:00—at 5:55 my people are getting the hell out of there, whether or not you think you got all the bombs. I suggest you do the same.”
Peterson answered, “We’ll play it by ear.”
“Yeah, you do that.” He hung up and looked at Burke. “I think it’s time—before our luck turns.”
Burke said nothing.
Bellini rubbed his chin, hesitated, then reached for the phone and called the garage under Rockefeller Center. “Okay, Colonel, the word is Bull—fucking—Run. Ready?”
Logan answered, “Been ready a while. You’re cutting it close.”
Bellini’s voice was caustic. “It’s past close—it’s probably too damned late, but that doesn’t mean you can’t earn a medal.”
Colonel Logan threw the field phone down from the commander’s hatch of the armored carrier and called to the driver, “Go!”
The twenty thousand pounds of armor began rumbling up the ramp of the underground garage. The big overhead door rose, and the carrier slid into Forty-ninth Street, turned right, and approached Fifth Avenue at twenty-five miles per hour, then veered north up the Avenue gathering speed.
Logan stood in the hatch with an M-16 rifle, the wind billowing his fatigue jacket. He stared at the Cathedral coming up on his right front, then glanced up at the towers and roof. Smoke billowed over the Cathedral, and helicopters hovered, beating the smoke downward, thick hoses dropping into the attic hatches. “Good Lord …”
Logan looked into the silent predawn streets, empty except for the police posted in recessed doorways. One of them gave him a thumbs up, another saluted. Logan stood taller in the hatch; his mind raced faster than the carrier’s engines, and his blood pounded through his veins.
The armored carrier raced up to the Cathedral. The driver locked the right-hand treads, and the carrier pivoted around, ripping up large slabs of the blacktop. The driver released the treads as the carrier pointed toward the front doors, and he gunned the engines. The vehicle fishtailed and raced across the wide sidewalk, bounced, and hit the granite steps, tearing away the stone as the treads climbed upward. The brass handrails disappeared beneath the treads, and the ten tons of armor headed straight for the ten tons of bronze ceremonial doors.
Logan made the sign of the cross, ducked into the hatch, and pulled the lid shut. The truck tires attached to the front of the carrier hit the doors, and the bolts snapped, sending the massive doors flying inward. The alarms sounded with a piercing ring. The carrier was nearly into the vestibule when the delayed mines on the doors began to explode, scattering shrapnel across the sides of the vehicle. The carrier kept moving through the vestibule and skidded across the marble floor to a stop beneath the choir loft overhang.
Harold Baxter grabbed Maureen and pulled her down beneath the clergy pews.
Brian Flynn raised a rocket launcher and took aim from the pulpit.
The rear door of the carrier dropped, and fifteen men of the 69th Regiment, led by Major Cole, scrambled over the door and began fanning out under the choir loft.
Frank Gallagher was speaking to the Cardinal when the sound of the exploding doors rolled through the Cathedral. For a moment he thought the bombs beneath him had gone off, then he recognized the sound for what it was. His chest heaved, and his body shook so badly that his rifle fell from his hands. He lost control of his nerves as he heard the reports of rifle fire in the Cathedral behind him. He let out a high-pitched wail and ran down the sacristy steps, falling to his knees beside the Cardinal. He grabbed at the hem of the red robe, tears streaming from his eyes and snatches of prayer forming on his lips. “God … O God … Father … Eminence … dear God …”
The Cardinal looked down at him. “It’s all right, now. There … there …”
Colonel Logan rose quickly through the carrier hatch and rested his automatic rifle on the machine gun mount in front of him. He peered into the darkness as he scanned to his front, then saw a movement in the pulpit and zeroed in.
The First Squad, including Bellini and Burke, had risen up in unison from behind the balustrade, rifles raised to their shoulders.
Abby Boland saw the shadows appear along the ledge, black forms, eerie and spectral in the subdued light. She saw the tiny pinpoint flashes and heard the silencers cough like a roomful of old people clearing their throats. She screamed, “George!” Sullivan was intent on the transept doors opposite him but looked up when she screamed.
The Third Squad had burst out of the attic and occupied Farrell’s triforium. They lined up along the parapet and searched the darkness for targets.
Brian Flynn steadied the M-72 rocket as a burst of red tracers streaked out of the commander’s hatch of the carrier and cracked into the granite column behind him. He squeezed the detonator. The rocket roared out of the tube, sailed over the pews with a fiery red trail, and exploded on the sloping front of the armored carrier.
The carrier belched smoke and flame through ruptured seams, and the driver was killed instantly. Logan shot up from the hatch, flames licking at his clothing, and nearly hit the overhang of the loft. His smoking body fell back
