“Frank! Let’s go!” Olly shouted from the front entrance.
“Get out of here, Sutter,” the bartender ordered.
“Yes,” said Mr. Sutter, and, tight-lipped and terrified, he darted out the back.
When Frank left the bar with Olly, the bright afternoon sunlight blinded him and he could only see a few figures moving rapidly from left to right, toward the docks. The gunfire was coming from off to the left and from behind the buildings across the street. There was another loud explosion and the ground trembled under their feet. Then he could see smoke rising above the boutique across the street. As he and Olly turned right to make for the docks Frank saw an ancient brown tank rumbling down the street toward them, a handful of soldiers running at a crouch alongside and behind it.
He and Olly scurried along the sidewalk, watching the tank and the half-dozen soldiers—mostly black, Frank noted with surprise— head past them in the direction of what Frank assumed were the black rioters. A small Datsun heading toward the docks with a cracked windshield careered up onto the curb nearby to avoid the soldiers and tank; the white driver, bleeding from a head wound, looked terror-stricken.
At the corner of the first street, still a block from the docks and the marina where Mollycoddle was tied, a cluster of white civilians were crouched behind two overturned vegetable carts, looking up the street where the tank had stopped and where the shots were coming from. Most of the men had either a rifle or handgun.
Another explosion rocked the pavement, and Frank turned to see that the tank had turned around and its smoking cannon was now aimed down the street at them. Half the soldiers had disappeared, but the others were crouched down behind parked cars; two were firing at the whites.
“The bastards are firing at us!” someone shouted.
“Let’s go!” another yelled, and two of them began running toward the docks, soon followed by the other four.
A piece of sidewalk popped up in front of Frank as he and Olly followed. It took him two strides to realize that it was a bullet.
They were all running now and within a minute’s time had arrived at the dock area, where cars were being overturned as barricades while a few soldiers—here mostly white and looking bewildered—made halfhearted efforts to direct the flow of people. Along the three blocks of waterfront Frank could see only a single additional tank; it sat with its cannon aimed incongruously and ominously out to sea.
At the marina where Mollycoddle was moored were dozens of men, women, and children and mounds of luggage. Most were gathered near the small boat dock, trying to get out to the Norway, which was still at anchor a half-mile out in the harbor. There was no crowd around Mollycoddle, and as he approached Frank saw why: Macklin and Sheila were standing on the foredeck, each with an automatic rifle held at the hip and aimed at the dock. Although Sheila looked like she could probably handle her gun, Macklin looked like he wanted to use his, and his grim face alone would discourage most people.
The ground in the marina parking lot abruptly exploded less than fifty yards away, sending people running in all directions and leaving four or five men sprawled on the ground. When Frank turned back, he saw that rafted seaward to Mollycoddle was Scorpio, so low in the water compared to the Hatteras that he hadn’t seen her at first. With a surge of joy he saw Jim and Lisa coming out of the main cabin with empty boxes for transferring Mollycoddle’s food to Scorpio. Jim waved and shouted, “We found her on Scorpio!”
“For Christ’s sake don’t stand there!” Macklin shouted. “Get aboard! We’ve got to get away!”
“Where’s Jeanne and Neil?” Frank asked as he and Olly boarded Mollycoddle.
“They’re not back!” Macklin shouted. “They’ll never get back through this. Get us out of here.”
Frank looked at Sheila, who looked back at him questioningly. Her face was pale. Glancing at his watch, Frank realized that Neil and Philip were already a half-hour overdue.
Oscar ran across from Scorpio.
“Pull us out of here,” he said, his small eyes wider. “They’ll sink us!”
“Tony!” Macklin shouted.
Ten feet away Mollycoddle’s main windshield shattered as three neat holes appeared in the glass; Macklin crouched down and Oscar threw himself to the deck. Frank, standing numbly, now realized there was gunfire all around them.
Tony sprang from Scorpio and in a crouching run joined Macklin and huddled behind Mollycoddle’s combing.
“Get us out of here!” Macklin shouted at him.
Tony crawled over to the controls and, glancing fearfully around him, finally stood up and turned on the engine.
“Get the dock lines!” Macklin shouted at Frank and Oscar.
Another explosion boomed behind them, and Frank turned to see the dock one berth away burst into fragments and a body go flying off into the water. Sheila clutched his arm.
“We can still wait,” she said. “We can’t desert them.”
“Get the goddamn dock lines!” Macklin shrieked at Frank and Oscar.
Jim appeared beside Frank, slightly hunched over.
“We’re not leaving yet, are we?” he asked. The smoke from the recent explosions, although it was blowing away from them, prevented them from seeing much of what was happening in the streets. Along the docks people were running, crouching, stampeding onto boats to get out to the Norway, occasionally shooting, seemingly at random, back into the smoke.
“No… no, we’re not,” Frank said in a low voice.
Macklin, wild-eyed, suddenly leapt up, knife in hand, ran forward along Mollycoddle’s side, and slashed the forward dock line. With the wind blowing the yacht against the dock, Mollycoddle remained where she was, but when the two aft lines were cut, Tony would be able to motor off. As Frank, Sheila, and Jim watched, Macklin ran aft and cut the two other dock lines.
“Go Tony!” he shouted.
But Frank and Jim both came alive at once and ran to the helm.
“Not yet,” said Frank.
Tony stared back at him, his usually placid face filled with fear, then looked to Macklin for support.
“Get out of the way, Frank,” Macklin said loudly but with his accustomed icy calm. “I’m saving our lives. Get us out of here, Tony.” Macklin’s automatic rifle was aimed directly at Frank and Jim. “If you’re so hot to be with Neil and Jeanne and Philip, get off the boat. You too, Sheila.”
Sheila, still holding her automatic rifle—aimed vaguely shoreward—looked at Frank, then at Macklin, and finally back at the scene on shore.
“Oh, my God,” she said.
When Frank let his eyes follow hers, he saw Neil and Katya coming through the smoke in the parking lot, one pulling a garden cart, the other, a wheelbarrow.
Escaping from the estate had been a nightmare. Philip had been shot twice; one bullet had passed relatively harmlessly through the fleshy part of his side, but the second had buried itself in his back, just to the right of the fifth vertebra.
Jeanne had taken a bullet through her shoulder but, amazingly, after they had staunched the flow of blood, she could still use her other arm to help Katya (now fully dressed in shorts and T-shirt) transport food. When the car wouldn’t start, Neil found in the garage a wheelbarrow and a large garden cart. He carried Philip outside and placed him in the two-wheeled cart. Jeanne and Katya brought out boxes, cartons, and plastic bags of food and packed them gently around the wounded Philip. They put the heavier foodstuffs into the wheelbarrow. With Neil towing the garden cart like a dray horse and Katya pushing the wheelbarrow, they fled. Jeanne, insisting that she was still strong enough, bicycled one-handed on ahead of them.