Perhaps the officer had already died or escaped.
Above the road, flames consumed several pines. The green brush burned slowly. Wind came for a moment. Lyons saw a Communist on the hillside leave the smoking brush and take cover in a tangle of low pine branches. A second later, heavy-caliber slugs slammed into the wood sheltering Lyons. The Salvadorans went flat to the ground to escape the downward-directed autofire.
Lyons shifted his position. Aiming his captured AK at the hidden gunman's cover, he sprayed out the magazine of 7.62mm ComBloc slugs. But the wind had shifted and the smoke obscured the hillside again.
He dropped the AK and sprinted for the embankment. Squatting beneath the tangle of pine branches, he waited.
The gunman fired again. Lyons took out his Python and checked the cylinder. He dropped the four unfired cartridges into his pocket. Slapping in a speed-loader, he waited.
Smoke swirled around him as the wind shifted. Clawing up the embankment, he looked into the muzzle of a G-3.
His eyes searching for targets near the burning Cadillac, the guerrilla did not see Lyons's face only two feet in front of him. Lyons put a hollowpoint into the gunman's right ear.
Lyons scrambled over the top of the hill and snaked into the tangle. He stripped the dead man of his bandolier and G-3, then scanned the road for other guerrillas.
Dragging a bullet-shattered leg, a Communist crawled toward the downhill edge of the clearing. Lyons sighted on the man's shoulder and fired. The bullet impacted inches to the guerrilla's right. Lyons corrected for the rifle's misaligned sights and fired again. Instead of hitting the man's shoulder, the bullet struck the guerrilla in the small of the back.
Lyons glanced at the G-3. A small star had been scratched on the plastic stock and then painted in red. On the receiver, the stamp of the army of El Salvador identified the source of the weapon. Years of wear and pitting from corrosion showed on the receiver and metal parts.
He aimed at the head of a dead guerrilla on the far side of the clearing and squeezed off two careful shots. The first slug missed by inches, the second hit the guerrilla in the chest. The old rifle no longer had the accuracy to hit a six-inch-diameter target at one hundred meters.
Lyons resumed his visual search for the officer, but did not spot him. He saw Salvadoran soldiers pulling their dead and wounded away from the burning vehicles. One soldier hacked at the faces of wounded guerrillas with his bayonet.
Beyond the smoking hulks, he heard the Atchisson boom once again. Two troopers threw a Communist guerrilla to the ground and stood on his arms while another soldier searched him.
A Communist appeared from a wall of smoke. He had no rifle. Coming directly up toward Lyons, the teenage guerrilla sprinted for the safety of the hillside. Lyons waited.
As the boy scrambled up the hill, Lyons clubbed him with the ancient G-3. The blow broke of f the plastic stock of the German rifle.
Dragging his prisoner by the collar, Lyons joined his partners and Salvadoran allies. They squatted behind the cover of the jeeps, alert to the threat of guerrilla snipers.
Gadgets, wild-eyed with adrenaline, greeted him with jive. "Hey, it's the Ironman. Who's too cool to cruise with his amigos. Did you have a good time? Out here with the Salvos?"
Lyons looked around at the hellground. No officer. Only dead teenagers.
The dead teenagers of the Popular Liberation Forces.
Dead teenagers of the Salvadoran Army.
The ashes and black bones of the anonymous dead near the burned-out trucks.
Lyons took a second to think of an answer to Gadgets's question.
"Next time," he said, "I fasten my safety belt."
7
In the swirling smoke of the burning vehicles and forest, Lieutenant Lizco and his North American allies searched the captured jeeps. They saw that the Popular Liberation Force jeeps still bore the markings of a Salvadoran army unit Las Boinas Verdes. Both jeeps had army radios. They found thousands of rounds for the M-60 machine guns in foil-sealed U.S. Army ammo boxes. In one jeep, they found clean uniforms and weapons taken from Salvadoran army troops.
"Las Verdes," the lieutenant commented, tapping the stenciled markings on the jeeps. "The Green Berets. They are stationed in Gotera." He pointed to the Salvadoran soldiers. "They are with the same unit."
"Can't be special forces." Lyons looked at the carnage a single platoon of guerrillas had inflicted on the soldiers.
"It is only a name," the lieutenant told him. "Only words. And paint."
"No red stars," Gadgets wondered. "Commie decals on their beanies and rifles, but not on the jeeps. Why?"
"Perhaps they used the jeeps to lure the trucks into the ambush," Blancanales suggested.
"Save the mystery for later." Lyons glanced toward the Salvadoran soldiers. "They've seen us, they know we're North Americans. What now?"
"Tell them we're just hardcore tourists," Gadgets suggested.
"Lieutenant, how long will we be in this area?" Blancanales asked.
"Until the rain comes." The lieutenant looked up at the gathering clouds. "And Quesada comes."
"So we could be here for days, waiting." Lyons watched the teenage Salvadoran soldiers tending their wounded and gathering their dead. "When they get back, everyone in El Salvador will know we're here."
Blancanales considered the problem. "We may be compromised," he said, "but I don't think so. However, we must guard the lieutenant's identity. If they see him, he cannot remain in his country."
"So what's the scheme?" Lyons demanded.
Blancanales looked to Lieutenant Lizco. "How can we explain ourselves? What would those soldiers believe?"
"They would not believe you are tourists," the lieutenant said, laughing. "And they know you are not journalists. Journalists would not help a soldier. We will say you are mercenaries. Traveling through Salvador to Honduras. Yes?"
Gadgets nodded. "On our way to play zap-zap with the Nicos. Makes sense to me."
"They will believe you are professional soldiers," the lieutenant stressed.
"That's what we'll tell them," Lyons agreed.
The lieutenant tore strips of OD green cloth from a captured uniform. "Cover your faces. They will understand."
"Who were those masked men!" Gadgets took a green strip and covered his face.
"Pol, we've got to question those prisoners." Lyons tied a strip over his face. "Wizard, Lieutenant, if you two can dump all this equipment and get us ready to move"
The Salvadoran soldiers stood around the three surviving guerrillas. They abused the prisoners, taunting them, kicking their wounds. Some of the soldiers pointed their rifles at the guerrillas' heads. Crossing the clearing in a jog, Lyons called out, "No! No shoot!"
"No dispare!" Blancanales shouted in Spanish.
The two North Americans pushed through the group of Salvadorans. The prisoners lay against the gravel pile. Flies swarmed on their wounds. One had passed out from blood loss, his life draining away from through-and-through buckshot wounds to his legs. Blancanales quickly slipped out his knife and cut away the man's pant legs. He used the cloth to make pressure bandages. The other seriously wounded guerrilla had a bullet-shattered forearm, but had already bandaged it himself. The third prisoner, the panicked teenager Lyons had clubbed with the G-3, stared around at the soldiers like a trapped animal.
One of the Salvadoran soldiers spoke to Blancanales in rapid Spanish. Blancanales answered. Then the soldier spoke again with a sneer.
"He asked me why I help the Communists," Blancanales translated for Lyons. "And I told him they'd die otherwise. He said they're dying no matter what."
The arm-wounded guerrilla spoke to the frightened boy. The boy crossed himself. The wounded guerrilla laughed at the Catholic gesture. He raised his clenched fist in a defiant proletarian salute. Blancanales pushed the man's arm down and spoke to him quickly. The guy laughed again.