At last, he stood up. The press of bodies about him parted as if by magic to let him out. He had gone only a few paces, when a shot rang out and echoed about the vaulted ceiling of the church.
The Russian crumpled, and as he did the grenade fell from his grasp. Those next three seconds were played out in horrific slow motion, filled with terror-stricken faces and frantic hopeless efforts to get away.
Shielded by the shallow step below the altar rail, Re veil still felt the blast. Fragments passed so close he heard their super-fast passage through the air. And he heard the ugly sound of other jagged lumps of casing finding their mark among the press trying to escape.
The violence of the explosion passed quickly. The suffering it had created was going to last a long time. Thirty or more people had been grievously injured. They lay tangled together, many partially stripped of their clothes, some of their limbs.
Revell pulled bodies aside, sometimes finding they still lived and becoming more gentle with them. Many were almost unrecognizable, smothered as they were in blood and pieces of tissue and scraps of shredded clothing.
He found Sophia, half-covered by the altar cloth. She was already going cold. The back of her dress was a mass of red blotches.
“I saw him. He’s gone up in the bell tower.” Dooley helped Revell lift the girl’s body and lay it on a strip of floor not speckled as yet with blood or too heavily littered with debris and scattered possessions.
“We’ve got him, Major.” Carrington handed Revell an AK47 he’d picked up. “He can’t escape. We’ve got him.”
“No.” Revell felt hate twist him up inside and turn him into someone he didn’t recognize, into something that wasn’t human.
“No, I’ve got him. He’s mine.”
TWENTY-EIGHT
The stairs climbed in a series of short steep flights. Before starting up, Revell listened intently. Not all the rage inside him could blot out his experience of this type of fighting, and he brought it all into play.
As the staircase turned to the right, he transferred his pistol to his left hand. He was not such a good shot that way, but the change would enable his weapon to cover a greater arc as he climbed. The inevitably short range of any engagement would also help to compensate.
There was no sound from above, and he started up, one step at a time. He transferred his weight carefully from one foot to the other, making sure at all times that he was perfectly balanced.
Still he had no indication of how close the Russian might be, and then as he came within a few steps of the third landing, he heard a repetitive bumping. He knew what it was before he saw the fragmentation grenade. It rolled to a stop against an angle of the wall, and he caught the briefest glimpse of the cylindrical green bomb before ducking as low as he could.
A fraction of a delay, and then the device detonated. Dust poured from every crevice, and pieces of casing zipped from the walls and stairs.
Before the thunder of the echo had died, Revell had snatched a concussion grenade from his belt, extracted the pin, counted off a brief delay, and then lobbed it upward as hard as he could.
It was a dangerous tactic, but all the more likely to succeed because it would be unexpected. With a crash the grenade burst, and at the instant it did, Revell was moving upwards as fast as he could in the severely reduced visibility.
As he neared the top, he snapped off single shots into the dust-enhanced gloom ahead. There were no answering reports.
Eyes streaming and lungs gasping for air, Revell reached the first of the shuttered windows. Fighting down his laboured gasping breath, he peered into the murk. Crouching down, he fired across the interior of the tower, and heard his own bullet ricochet madly back past his ear.
The fog was clearing fast, and he felt a strong gust of air on his face. An eddy in the rapidly dispersing dust cloud revealed a shutter gaping open, immediately opposite him.
From outside came the sound of a body landing, and hands scrabbling for grip on a pitched roof. When he reached the opening, he could just make out a dark form moving rapidly across the roof, working up towards the ridge at a tangent. Revell fired the rest of the magazine as fast as he could, feeling the Browning’s heavy recoil as he sent each 9mm round at the Russian.
One of the bullets must have found its mark. The figure reared up, and a rifle clattered away down the roof and over the edge to the long drop into the street. The Russian didn’t follow the weapon, instead he managed to get a hand to the ridge and began to haul himself up.
Revell dropped from the window onto the roof. The drop was longer than he expected, and he lost his balance and was winded as he fell sideways against the brickwork of the tower. Instinctively his hand went to the butt of his knife. It was still there. Taking it out of its sheath, he settled it firmly in the palm of his hand before starting up the slope.
Above him the wounded Russian had managed to get astride the ridge and was using both hands to pull his injured leg over.
I’ve got you!” Revell hurled himself the last few yards and was about to lunge at his target when the muzzle flash of a pistol dazzled him.
His night vision gone, Revell only heard, not saw, the second shot fired. It too missed at point-blank range, but he felt the heavy roar at along the side of his Kevlar helmet, almost ripping it away. Wildly he lashed out in a long slashing cut with the blade, and felt it connect.
It was only out of the corners of his vision that Revell could see. To look straight ahead was to experience again the searing light of the muzzle flash. Risking everything, he let go with his left hand of the projection he’d been clutching and grabbed blindly for his opponent.
His fingers brushed and then held tight a wad of material. The butt of a pistol came down hard, first on his helmet and then on his shoulder. Twice the blow was repeated, and he felt his arm going numb. In a last desperate attempt, he once more slashed upwards with the knife.
Again it connected, this time deeply penetrating flesh and muscle that he felt constrict and grip the blade. Wrenching it hard, at the same moment he felt another smashing blow.
Before any more could be landed and his collarbone broken, Revell threw all his weight against the knife. He could feel it grating along bone as it stripped cartilage away and severed arteries.
There was a metallic bump, and the pistol slid off the roof. Strong hands fastened on Revell’s neck, and his head was forced back as they tightened their grip. Still he held the knife, driving it ever deeper into tissue.
The major’s face was only inches from the Russian’s, he could smell whiskey on his breath, but only see him in outline against the lighter western sky. With all his effort concentrated on it, the knife had now slit the Russian’s leg open from mid-thigh to knee, but he showed no sign of weakening. If anything, the stranglehold was becoming tighter.
Only the corner of the flak jacket’s collar caught beneath the throttling fingers prevented them cutting off his air completely. Even so, he could feel his head starting to swim, his senses to reel, and he knew he couldn’t hold on much longer.
With all the effort he could muster, he pushed up hard with his feet. His left hand let go the hold on the Russian’s clothing, and his fingers jabbed for the man’s face. One found his eye, and there was a scream.
Thrashing about, the Russian overbalanced and as he toppled, he took Revell with him. They slid down the roof, locked together.
At the edge, Revell managed to grab hold of a stone statue. For an instant his adversary’s webbing caught on the same projection, then slid free, and he was gone. As he consolidated his hold, Revell heard the ugly sound of a heavy landing far below.