"What will they do with us?"
"I don't know. I suppose we'll be useful to them until they have secured control of the Center. Then… who knows?"
"We've got to do something. We can't just give up hope."
"There is no hope."
"Daddy, we can't just let all those people up there become slaves to this madman. We've got to do something. We've got to try."
"It's too late. It's already happening."
"It is not too late," Ari said harshly. She took her father's arm and shook it hard. "Spence is still out there and free. He knows about them. He'll try to find us and free us."
"It's too late. He won't know where to start looking-we don't even know where they're taking us."
"He'll find us." She gave her father a knowing look. "Spence has as much at stake in this as anyone else, maybe more. And I have a pretty good hunch where we're headed and where he'll start looking."
6
… THE GUNSHOTS DID NOT wake Spence; it was the bullets themselves-rattling through the rusted hulk of the sedan like lethal hail-that snapped him to attention.
The moon was nearly down-the darkest part of the night several hours before dawn-and perfect for an ambush. The goondas had been waiting for the sentries to slip off to sleep before creeping out from hiding in the jungled hills. The attack, swift and professional, caught everyone off guard.
Merchants ran screaming into the night. The horde of barefoot followers scattered in every direction, not knowing where the shooting was coming from. The soldiers fired off quick bursts with their M-16s and someone-perhaps one of the merchants, more likely one of the outlaws-blazed away with a submachine gun.
The scene erupted in such confusion Spence could not be sure who was shooting at whom when he dived out of the back seat of the car onto the road. He collided with the crouching figure of Adjani.
"Ooof!" he said as he went down.
"Stay down!" Adjani pressed his shoulder to the ground. "Where's Gita?"
"I don't know. When I woke up he was gone. The shooting seems to be coming from those trees across the road."
Spence looked and saw that Adjani was probably right. A thin white trace of smoke drifted from the tops of a stand of tall trees about thirty meters away; a running line of bullets kicked up little clouds of dust as they ripped along the length of the caravan. A few bodies lay motionless between the trees and the line of vehicles, but whether these were dead, wounded, or just keeping down and out of sight he could not tell. He feared the worst.
All at once the shooting stopped. They heard shouts from the trees and then saw the three soldiers walking across the road with their empty hands in the air.
"So much for our protection," said Adjani. "What happens now?"
"They will take what they want and-we would do well to pray-they will go their own way." The voice was Gita's. Spence and Adjani turned around and saw the turbaned head sticking out from beneath the car. How he had squeezed his bulk under there was a mystery.
All around them the groans of the wounded rose from the earth, and the foliage on the far side of the road began to waver and shake as the bandits stepped into the open.
There were a dozen or more of them, and probably others still hidden in the trees. They were dressed in dark clothing, making them almost impossible to see as they fanned off along the caravan's length-they were dark shadows against a darker night. The feeble moonlight struck the bare metal of their old guns and glinted with a cold luster, letting any remaining doubters know that they did indeed mean business.
"We have nothing of value," said Spence. "What can they do?"
"Kill us," replied Gita. "It would be better if we had something to give them."
"Our provisions," suggested Adjani.
"They'll take those anyway. They want more."
"Well, let's not stick around to haggle about it; let's get out of here now." Spence, still on his stomach beside Adjani, began squirming backward behind the car. Adjani flattened himself and followed Spence's lead. Gita, wedged between the car chassis and the dirt road, hissed like a snake. "Stop! Stop! Wait for me!" In a moment he had disengaged himself from his hiding place and was rolling into the ditch after his friends.
They had not run three steps toward the cover of the jungle when a shout and the glint of the moonlight on the long barrel of a rifle halted them. Directly into their path stepped a large, dark figure. His teeth and the whites of his eyes shone in the darkness and he turned the gun toward them and shouted again, more insistently.
Without waiting for a translation Spence turned slowly and, putting his hands in the air, walked back to the car. There they saw that all the merchants were standing in front of their vehicles while teams of bandits unloaded the cargo. From the whining chatter which filled the air Spence guessed they were pleading with the robbers not to wipe them out completely. The goondas seemed oblivious to this racket and went about their business wholly unconcerned with the pitiful wheedling of the tradesmen.
Then two bandits were standing before them with rifles leveled. One of them spoke a rapid question to Gita. The little man, quaking with fear, stepped forward.
"He wants to know what we have to give him," whispered Adjani out of the side of his mouth.
Gita was speaking quickly with fear-inspired eloquence. The palms of his hands could be seen waving ecstatically before him in wild gesticulations.
"What's he saying now?"
"Gita is telling him that we are doctors on our way to Darjeeling to help a friend. That we have no money or possessions with us. He is praying that we be allowed to continue for the sake of our friend."
The bandit looked long at Gita and then at Adjani and Spence in turn. He came to stand directly before them and peered into their faces. Spence could smell the reek of puyati, the strong home-brewed liquor made from fermented palm sap, on the thief's breath. His face was greasy in the fading moonlight.
All at once the bandit whirled on his heel and barked out a short sentence. In a moment a very large outlaw with a huge white turban and a flowing, striped coat came striding up with a goonda on either side. Spence guessed this was the leader.
The two bandits conferred with one another briefly and then the leader turned with a flourish of his coattails and left. Spence thought for an instant that they would be left alone. But the first bandit roared a command at Gita which almost sent the little man rolling on his backside. Gita scrambled for the car and came out with the sacks bearing their provisions. He turned to Spence and Adjani with eyes wide and fearful.
"We are to follow him," said Adjani, nodding in the direction of the retreating bandit.
"What if we don't?"
"Then he hopes we have lived good lives and thought pure thoughts, for tonight we will have the opportunity of joining the World Soul in Nirvana."
"I'd rather not," said Spence. "Let's go." …
OLMSTEAD PACKER CROSSED AND recrossed his legs, folded and refolded his hands alternately and regularly. He was bored with waiting and apprehensive that security chief Ramm should be taking so long to iron out the difficulty between him and Dr. Williams. A sense of doom had settled over the big physicist as he waited; he saw his future growing dim before his eyes, and the hobbling shackles of a prison record snaking out to claim him.
And yet, the offense was so small, so trivial, so insignificant he wanted to laugh. This extreme ambivalence of feeling created in the red-bearded man a curious tension, as if a tug-of-war was being waged inside him with first one side gaining the advantage and then the other. And to make matters worse, Packer did not know which side to cheer for. At any moment, depending upon the swing of mood, either side seemed capable of carrying the day.