Though the sniper tracked her progress in his scope, he did not fire. There was no point to firing; the other children had already reentered the mission.
As Josefina reached the gate, a hard hand grabbed her clothing and pulled her inside. Then an outraged Father Montoya took a mostly covered kneeling firing position and scanned for targets. Most especially did the father look for whoever had shot Sister Sofia.
* * *
"Are you all right, Elpi? Oh, God, please be all right."
Miguel didn't have the training to know that the girl's wound was nonfatal; so far and no farther had the FBI man flinched. But she wasn't talking, she didn't seem conscious, and there was blood all over her side.
Certain the girl was dead, with a wordless cry of utter anguish Miguel began climbing the same ladder from which she had been hurled. With each step upward he muttered, "Motherfuckers. Motherfuckers. Motherfuckers."
* * *
"New target. Prior location. Eleven o'clock."
Again the sniper made a minute adjustment. Again, he commanded his finger to tighten. Again the rifle rocked against his shoulder.
"Hit," he announced.
Frustrated beyond words, Montoya saw only a spurt of dust to mark the sniper's position. Not a chance. They're behind cover from here. With a sigh of regret he withdrew the rifle from his shoulder, then leaned against the rough-hewn gate to close it. Once it was in place he lowered the bar.
Already some of his people were rushing to the still warm and breathing Elpidia . . . and rapidly cooling Miguel.
Chapter Six
From the transcript at triaclass="underline" Commonwealth of
Virginia v. Alvin Scheer
DIRECT EXAMINATION, CONTINUED
BY MR. STENNINGS:
Q. Alvin, I know it's hard to remember. It's been a long time and a lot has happened. But try to recall and tell the Court how you felt about the mission.
A. I remember being mad. Really mad. See, it weren't a fair fight, not at all. Them poor folks in the mission, young kids most of them, they didn't stand a chance.
They made you proud though. Made you think a little on olden days . . . an' Texas . . . and a whole bunch of other things that people mostly done forgot.
My old pappy come on over to watch my TV during the assault. He kept whistling something . . . sounded sort of familiar. I asked him what it was.
He told me, "It's 'Deguello,' boy. The 'throat cut' song. And ain't they a bunch of cutthroats, too?"
MS. CAPUTO: Objection. Hearsay.
MR. STENNINGS: Not offered for the truth of the matter asserted, Your Honor.
THE COURT: Overruled.
* * *
Austin, Texas
Schmidt fumed and raged. "Murderers! Butchers! Goddamit, Juani, this has gone far enough!"
Nagy just shook his head while staring at the television. "My man Akers," he announced, "told me your brother's folks did not open fire at all, let alone first, Governor. No matter what GNN may be saying."
"Then what happened?" demanded the governor.
"Akers didn't know; not the whole story. But he was definite that the first shot came from the feds. The second—the one that killed the nun—came from the feds. That the third came from the feds and that there was not a fourth."
"Then what's all that shooting sound they put on the TV?"
Schmidt answered, "They dubbed it in, Juani. Afterwards."
He turned to Nagy, "How'd your man get away?"
"He said there was a ditch by the gate. That he jumped into that and waited for nightfall. Said he wasn't too worried about being shot by the mission folks, but that he wouldn't be too surprised if the feds took a shot at him. Oh, he was in a fine rage . . . and Sergeant Akers is never angry."
"In a ditch, was he?" Jack mused.
* * *
Qui Nhon Province, Republic of Vietnam, 1966
The helicopters had radioed for friends, then proceeded to do whatever they could themselves to help Montoya and Schmidt with their own door guns. It helped, but it wasn't quite enough.
Montoya recited "Ave Maria" as he poked his head and rifle over the wall of the ditch in which he and Jack sheltered. Blam, blam, blam, went the rifle and two of the pair's assailants fell into bleeding, choking, shrieking ruin not fifteen meters from the ditch. A burst of fire drove Jorge's head down again.
Overhead one helicopter made a low pass from Montoya's right. Its left side gunner fired a long burst into the tree line before the pilot pulled his nose up and around to line up for another pass. Jorge saw tracers outline the helicopter even in the bright morning light.
It all seemed futile to the barely conscious, bleeding Schmidt. With a radio between them and the helicopters, the choppers could have cooperated with Montoya, and vice versa. As it was, the shot-up radio being long abandoned, they were each guessing at what the other would do or had seen.
"Jorge!" Schmidt cried as three Viet Cong leapt into the ditch, not far from where he lay.
Montoya turned, attempted to fire only to have his magazine run dry after the first, missed, round. With an inarticulate shout he drew a knife and charged the VC.
Whatever the guerillas had been expecting to greet them in the ditch, it apparently was not a hundred and fifty pounds of shrieking Mexican fury. They turned and clambered back out again, shouting for help. All except the last got away. That one's escape was halted by Montoya's knife, buried eight inches in his back. He slid face against the earth to the foul dirt below.
* * *
Jack reached a sudden decision—sudden, although its nature and implications had been torturing him for days. "Juani, let me roll my division. I've got over three hundred tanks and a like number of other armored vehicles. And they're manned by Texans, Juani. They won't let your brother go down."
Spanish eyes flared. "You want to start a civil war, Jack? We lost the last one, remember?"
Schmidt smiled. His multi great-grandfather, the captain, and the governor's, the sergeant, had fought side by side in that lost cause, members of Hood's Texas Brigade. His eyes turned and looked over the governor's bookshelves. He walked over to one and selected from it an old, red leather-bound volume. He checked the index and then opened to a page.
A nod; it was the right page. Schmidt's eyes scanned briefly before he began to read aloud. " 'There is no retreat but in submission and slavery. Our chains are forged . . . The war is inevitable—and let it come. I repeat it, sir, let it come.'
"Patrick Henry said that, Governor." Schmidt closed the book slowly, reluctantly.
"Jack, I just don't know."
"Juani," Schmidt persisted, "we won the civil war we had before the one we lost. Maybe you should remember that. Come to think of it, Americans won the civil war before the Texas revolution, too . . . if you'll remember that."
He didn't need to open the book again to say, " 'The battle is not to the strong alone. It is to the vigilant, the active, the brave.' "
* * *
Dei Gloria Mission, Waco, Texas
The children had kept vigil over the dead; all but Elpidia. She, bandaged, alone and doped to deaden horrifying pain both physical and mental, lay in the mission's tiny infirmary.