"Put these on to cover those American heads. Keep your hands in your pockets and maybe we can fake it up two blocks. Hope not a lot of folks are awake yet."
They put on the hats and Tretter nodded. "For God's sake don't rush. We're almost on the equator here and it's gonna be hot as hell in an hour or two. Just mosey along. I've got the peashooter in my pocket if we need it."
They ambled across the dusty street to the alley and moved up it. A door banged somewhere ahead, but no one was there by the time they reached the spot. They saw no one along a second garbage-filled dirt alley that showed the backs of a few old buildings on both sides. They went across a wider dirt street to an alley, and paused inside in some shadows.
"Halfway up the alley," Tretter said. He scowled at them. "Don't gawk at this lady. She's half Arab and half Kenyan. She talks in English and sometimes Arabic, and some Swahili thrown in. Just take it easy."
"Hey, she can speak Hindustani for all I care," Vuylsteke said. "Can she save our swabby asses from that wigged-out crazy colonel?"
"Yeah, I think she can. The Army killed her brother. A lot of the Kenyan people look down on the Arabs and the Arab mixtures. She's not a happy camper."
"She got a big place?" Perez asked.
Tretter gave him a snort for an answer, and they meandered on up the alley. Then in a blink they were gone. All three had stepped into a dark doorway that opened to a knock. They went up wooden stairs to the third floor, and then down a hallway. The person who led them was a small woman, no more than five feet tall, with long straight black hair and dark clothes.
She opened the door at the end of the hallway and slipped inside. Tretter waved the other sailors in. The woman closed the door and faced them. She was tiny and slender and had a creamy brown complexion. She wore no makeup, but her eyes glowed a deep brown. She wore a long black skirt and black blouse. Her face was grim.
"So, United States Navy sailors. I help you, you help me, no?"
They nodded.
"The Army kill my brother. I want you kill three Kenyan Army soldiers for me. Three for one, my family tradition."
"I don't know, lady," Vuylsteke said. "We do that, and the whole fuc — the whole damn Kenyan Army gonna be down here looking for us." He was the senior man. It was his call.
She shrugged. "You think about. I live alone. Have two rooms. No close friends. Work at place across town. You stay here. Be quiet. Tonight I show you how to kill Army soldiers and not get caught."
"Oh, guys, this lady's name is Pita," Tretter said. "It means the fourth-born, but she says she was only the second-born. Pita, this is Vuylsteke and Perez."
"Am pleased to meeting you. Now must go see my mother."
"Pita, is there anything to drink?" Tretter asked. "Water, coffee. We're all dry as hell."
Pita frowned for a moment, then brightened. "Yes, I have Coca-Cola. You like?"
5
Ambassador Harrington G. Jerome watched out his second-story window as the gunfire continued to rake the U.S. Embassy. This was totally outrageous. The embassy was United States soil. How dare this renegade colonel fire upon them.
His First Secretary, Frank Underhill, rushed in, blood dripping from his right arm, which hung useless at his side.
"Sir, we have only our twelve Marines. I'm afraid most of the rest of us don't even know how to fire a weapon. The gate is holding for now. The Marines drove our big truck against the steel gate, but they say they can't be sure how long it will last."
"Yes, Frank, thank you. Keep all of the civilians out of the line of fire. Thank God for the wall around the compound. Otherwise we would have been overrun the first hour. Have that arm tended to at once. We can't afford to lose you."
"Yes, sir. I'll do it. We've held out four hours already. Maybe we can keep them away until night. They won't continue to come at us in the dark, will they?"
Ambassador Jerome remembered his days in the infantry. Night attacks were always the best for those attacking.
"Don't worry about it, Frank. Just keep things together. Remember, if they do break in, your first act is to burn all papers and destroy the encrypto machine. Be sure of that."
"Yes, sir. I understand."
Below on the ground floor, three U.S. Marines stood beside a broken-out window. They had set up a light machine gun there and had a dozen belts of ammunition ready. From time to time the gunner sent five-round bursts over the top of the wall.
"There's one," Sergeant Wilson snapped.
An M-16 on single-shot barked once, and the figure trying to flip over the top of the concrete block wall jolted as the bullet hit him and he spun off the top of the wall and fell outside.
"Keep it up here," Wilson said. "I'm checking the north wall. That's their best attack point."
Sergeant Wilson ran through the embassy with his M-16. He had fatigue pockets stuffed with six spare magazines for the rifle. A window on the second floor on the north-facing side of the embassy had been opened before it could be shot out. A Marine stationed there raised up and looked out at irregular intervals, then quickly dropped out of sight. Twice rifle rounds had slashed through the window a fraction of a second after he'd ducked.
"Still there, Sarge," Private Marshall said. "Must be fifteen or twenty of them. Don't know why they don't come on across."
"They aren't sure how many guns we have in here," Sergeant Wilson said. "They think they know, but nobody is willing to be the first one to bet his life on it."
"So, is it a stalemate?"
"Only as long as they want it to be, Marshall. They have at least two armored personnel carriers out there and maybe five hundred men. One of those personnel carriers could probably punch a hole in our concrete-block wall. Not even sure if it has rebar in it."
A grinding and clanking brought both Marines up to the window for a quick look.
"Now we've got real trouble," Sergeant Wilson said. "We have any of those RPGs left, or did we burn them up in practice?"
"Should be four of them in the basement," Private Marshall said.
"Go down and get them and bring them all up here. I'll man your post. Run, damnit. That's a tank out there grinding along toward us. It could smash its way through that wall like it was flypaper, rebar or no rebar. Move it."
The Marine took off on a run. Sergeant Wilson lifted up and fired a burst of five rounds out the window at the wall. All of the rounds hit the inside of the blocks, but the Kenyan soldiers on the other side would get the message. He had to buy a few more minutes. He jolted up, looked out, and came down in one move.
A rifle round slapped into the outside of the wall near the window. The tank was halfway across the open field north of the embassy wall. This time, when Sergeant Wilson fired, he lifted his sights to aim at the tank. Then he paused just a fraction of a second to see if any of the six rounds hit the tank. He couldn't tell. He jerked his head down, and two chunks of hot lead blasted through the open window a microsecond later.
Where the hell was Marshall? The fucking tank would be on them any minute.
Marshall panted up to the window with four Rocket Propelled Grenades. They were self-propelled and had little back-blast. Quickly Sergeant Wilson put one of the devices on his right shoulder, checked the sight, then pulled the tab to arm the grenade. He moved up to the window, aimed the grenade out it and in line with the tank, and fired.
The rocket whooshed away, leaving a burning cloud of smoke behind it. Half-a-dozen rifle rounds hit the window and came through it, but Wilson had dropped down just in time. Long before the smoke cleared away they could hear the tank. The round hadn't stopped it. Wilson wasn't even sure if it had made a hit. He sent Marshall to a window down the hall with two grenades and told him to fire at the tank if it smashed through the wall.