Rourke thought of the Chicano priest back in Albuquerque and the burn victims there in the church-in his mind he could see the little girl whom he had worked over to save. Then she had died.
“Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life…”
He closed his eyes. Where was Sarah? Where was Michael and Ann at this moment? Were they even alive?
“And I shall dwell in the house of the Lord forever.”
Rourke opened his eyes and saw Rubenstein turned to face him. “You’ve gotten all the rotten jobs, John. It’s my turn, now. Give me the torch.” Rourke said nothing, but handed the gasoline-soaked rag to Rubenstein, then the lighter. “Be careful,” he said, then watched as the younger man flicked the lighter and touched the flame to the rag. In an instant the rag was a torch and Rubenstein-hesitating for a split second-threw it into the gaping hole in the fuselage.
“Come on,” Rourke rasped, his voice suddenly tight and hoarse.
Rubenstein was still standing by the plane, and Rourke walked up to him and put his hand on his shoulder. “Come on, Paul. We got work to do.”
Rubenstein looked at Rourke, took off his glasses for a moment, but said nothing. The sound of the flames from the plane was all there was for either of them then to hear.
Chapter Thirty-three
The ride across the desert, trailing the bikers, had been hot. Rubenstein had fallen off the big Harley once but had not been hurt. As Rourke and Rubenstein stopped on a low rise, Rourke turned to the younger man, saying, “I think you’re getting the hang of it, Paul. Good thing, too. Look.” He pointed down into the shallow, bowl-shaped basin before them.
“My God!” Rubenstein said, shuddering.
In the basin-once a lake bed, Rourke supposed, but now nothing but sand and some barrel cactus dotted here and there-were the bikers they had been trailing. Rourke recognized, even at the distance, two of them from the clothes they wore. One man in particular, whom Rourke had picked as the leader of the gang, wore a Nazi helmet with steer horns jutting from each side, not unlike a Viking helmet. None of the other bikers in the basin had such a helmet. There were at least forty.
“What is it-some kind of convention?”
“What? Rourke asked absently, then, realizing what Rubenstein had said, he commented, “They were probably part of a larger biker gang and they all set this spot as a rendezvous. Could be more of them coming.”
“Damned bikers.” Rubenstein spat in the dust.
“Hey-we’re bikers, now, aren’t we?” Rourke said, looking at Rubenstein. Taking off his sunglasses to clean the dust from them, he went on, “Most bikers are okay-some of them, badasses. But you can’t generalize. Just ’cause somebody’s got a machine under him and he doesn’t much care for authority doesn’t make him scum. It’s just these guys-they’re scum.”
“But there’s gotta be almost three dozen of them down there.”
“I make it forty, give or take,” Rourke said lazily. He checked his watch, then checked the sun. “In another two hours, it’ll be dark. Looks like a good moon tonight, though. We’ll get ’em all then.”
“There’s just two of us,” Rubenstein said. “That’s twenty-to-one odds.”
“Yeah. At least they can’t accuse us of taking unfair advantage of them.”
“Twenty-to-one, John?”
“Remember what we said over the men and women they killed, back at the plane? ‘Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil.’ Well, I never cared for fearing things-doesn’t help anything much.” Then, pointing to the desert behind them, he said slowly, “See all that Paul? Now, that’s something we’re never going to cross in fear. What’s out there in that country after the war, neither of us knows. Nuclear contamination, bands of brigands that’ll make these suckers down in the basin look like sissies, probably Russian troops. I don’t have the idea that we won the War, really. Good knows what else. There’ll be plenty of chances to be afraid later, I figure. No sense starting before we have to.”
As quietly as they could, then, Rourke and Rubenstein took their Harleys behind the cover of some large rock outcroppings, ate some of the food they’d brought from the plane, and rested. Rourke told Rubenstein of his plan. When he had finished, Rubenstein said, “You’re gonna get killed.” Rourke shrugged.
They waited until past sunset and well into the night. The moon was up, and the sounds from the biker camp in the basin indicated to them that everyone was pretty well drunk. While they’d waited, another half a dozen bikers had come into the camp.
Rourke checked both of the stainless Detonics 45s, checking the spring pressure on the magazines, even hand-chambering the first round rather than cycling it from the magazines of the guns. This gave him six rounds plus one in each gun, plus the spare magazines. He secured the Detonics pistols in the double Alessi shoulder rig, then slipped the massive two-inch Colt Lawman inside his trouser belt, at the small of his back. Metalifed, like the Lawman snubby, the Colt six-inch Python in the Ranger leather holster on his right hip was checked as well. The Ranger belt had loaded dump pouches, but Rourke was counting on speed if he had to reload. For that reason, he checked the Safarilands cylinder-shaped speedloaders. There were four of them. Designed for use with the Python, they worked equally as well with the Lawman two-incher. Rourke put two each in the side pockets of his jacket. Taking a swig of the old coffee, he stood up and walked toward his bike.
“I still say you’re crazy,” Rubenstein warned.
“Could be,” Rourke said, settling back, lighting a cigar. “You know, I’m almost out of cigars. Hope we find some place that’s got some one of these days.” He sucked deeply on the big cigar. “Don’t forget to get down there with that Schmeisser when I need you, now.”
Rubenstein stuck out his right hand. Rourke looked at him, smiled, and shook it. Then he cranked the bike and headed out from behind the rocks and down into the basin.
The slope into the basin was a long, gentle incline, and he kept the bike slow as he rode it down. Glancing from side to side, his jaw set, the muscles of his neck tensed, he counted perhaps fifty bikers, most of them lying about on the ground. From the brilliance of the moonlight in the clear sky he could see the glint of wine and whiskey bottles strewn about the campsite. He could see the guns-assault rifles of every description, some submachine guns. Virtually everyone was wearing at least one hand-gun, and several of the bikers were wearing two. As he reached the perimeter of the campsite and started in, he saw some of the bikers get to their feet, watching him. He flashed a smile and waved to one of them. The man waved back, looking at Rourke, but his expression was puzzled.
Rourke kept riding. Not quite halfway to the center of the camp and the man with the Viking helmet, Rourke saw the bikers closing in behind him. He heard a voice in the crowd shouting, “That’s Pigman’s bike!”
Rourke slowed the bike as he reached the center of the camp. He kept the engine running and stopped less than three yards from the big man with the horned Nazi helmet. He was sitting with his back to his machine. A woman was on each side of him. Rourke took a deep drag on his cigar, smiled, and rasped, “Hello. You the head honcho around here?”
The Viking stood up, hitching his jeans up by the wide black belt slung under his beer pot.
“Yeah. Who are you?”
“We met before, but maybe you don’t quite remember,” Rourke said, slowly exhaling the gray cigar smoke as he spoke. “My name’s Rourke. John Rourke. We were never introduced.”
“I ain’t met you,” the Viking said.
“He’s ridin’ Pigman’s bike”‘ Someone shouted. Rourke watched the Viking’s eyes under the lip of the helmet.
“Like I said. Who are you?”
Rourke, the cigar in the left corner of his mouth, squinted against the smoke and said, “We met back there, where you and your bunch of pussywhips massacred all the people outta that airliner. I’m the guy with the sniper rifle who snuffed out twelve of you assholes. Remember me now?”
The Viking stepped closer toward Rourke. “Yeah. I remember you now. And I’m gonna kill you.”
Rourke smiled, whispering, “I just wanted to make sure you knew who I was.” His left hand had been resting on the back of the bike seat. Now he flashed it outward, the snubby-barreled Lawman appeared in his fist. He pulled the trigger twice. The muzzle was less than a yard from the Viking’s face. Both bullets sliced through his head, and blood and brains exploded, spattering the two women, who began to wail and run.