Here was the scene: Two kerosene lanterns stood on the ground, illuminating the work without sending out a lot of glare to the surrounding countryside. Several feet behind the van, where the rear gully wall turned sharply upward, an oval hole about three feet high and two feet wide had been dug into the ground. The four men were unloading the dynamite from the van, two men toting each heavy carton across the packed-down empty space to the tunnel entrance. Inside, the oval was pitch black, but apparently they had some sort of plastic sheet in there, or something else to make a smooth slide down the slope from the entrance, because each carton was maneuvered into the hole, then given a push, and away it went.
The van had originally been full, and was now about half-emptied. Presumably, more men at the bottom of this first slope were dragging the cartons the rest of the way — a quarter mile, perhaps — to an opening readied for them beneath the mosque. So much effort for such a miserable goal.
The men were too involved in their work to notice me. I had to attract their attention, so I stepped clearly into the light and said, “Stop.”
They gaped at me. I’d chosen a moment when they all had their hands full and wouldn’t be able to reach for their guns, and in the uncertain light of the kerosene lanterns they looked angry and surprised and chagrined and humiliated. One of the pair over by the tunnel entrance dropped his end of the carton and reached for his pistol anyway, while the other three just stared.
No more killing, not if we can avoid it. With my righthand gun I fired one shot into the ground at his feet, the sound flat and hard in the night air, like a dog’s bark. I knew it would carry, the people at the house would hear it, so I didn’t have a lot of time. “Don’t die, my friend,” I told the fellow with his hand on his gun.
He considered. It was the situation between Ross and me again, except that this time both people knew what the story was. Ross had let me point my gun at him, which had made us physically even and given me the psychological advantage. This fellow knew by looking at me that I wouldn’t let him get that pistol all the way out from under his belt; after a few seconds his hand came away empty.
I gestured at the other two guys with my lefthand gun, saying, “Put it down.” When they looked at me blankly, I pointed the gun at the carton and made downward movements, repeating, “Put it down.”
So they put it down, back in the van from where they’d just picked it up. The fellow who’d decided not to point his gun at me said in heavily accented English, “You should not stop this.”
“But I’m going to stop it,” I told him.
“Our war,” he said. “Our God. Our enemies.”
“My neighborhood,” I told him, and gestured with the righthand gun at the tunnel entrance. “Get in there.” His eyes widened, and he pointed at the hole in the side of the hill almost as though he’d never seen it before, had no idea what it was. “In there? All us?”
“That’s right. Quickly.”
One of the others said something in some language, and all at once they were all jabbering back and forth. Before they could decide to fan out and attack me from every side, I fired again, this time shooting one of the kerosene lanterns as a dramatic way to hold their attention. It worked, too; a large amoeba of flame from spattered kerosene on the bare ground flared up, showing their startled faces.
For all I knew, only the one guy spoke English, so I spoke directly to him: “I killed them in the house, to get out here. I’ll kill you, too, if you argue. Go in the tunnel.”
His eyes flickered away from me, toward the house. I could see him thinking, working it out. Was it possible this one man had killed all the people in the house? But if not, how did he get out here?
“Quickly,” I said, and spoke more generally. “First, all of you, with thumb and one finger, take your gun by its butt and throw it on the ground.”
“They have no American,” the talker said.
“Then you tell them. Very fast.” I found it not at all hard to portray growing hysteria; letting some of it out, I said, “If it’s easier to kill you all, I’ll kill you!”
The talker spoke to his comrades. It was hard to watch four of them at once in the lesser light of the one remaining lamp, but they did as they were told, littering the ground with sidearms. Then, the talker first, one at a time they climbed into the hole and slid away out of sight.
Close the entrance; but how? Other people inside would have guns, so if I showed myself at the opening, I’d be shot.
The van. I ran to its front, and the keys were inside. So were three shovels, leaning against the passenger seat, no doubt the reason for that clammy smell I’d noticed last night.
It was an old small van, badly beat-up by life, but it contained a good engine, which caught right away. Looking out through the opening at the back, I put the van in reverse and drove it hard at the entrance to the tunnel.
I don’t know what shoring-up arrangements they’d made farther along, but near the surface they’d relied on roots and natural density to keep their tunnel open. I drove the van up, the slope increasing so steeply the rear bumper dug a groove into the ground and the straining wheels threw up mud and twigs and dead brush. Then the bumper was over the entrance and the wheels were on both sides, and I could hear the pop-pop of guns going off, bullets caroming from the undercarriage. That was dumb; if one of those had hit the gas tank, it wouldn’t have been good for any of us.
The top edge of the opening stopped the van with a jerk. I shifted into drive and mashed hard on the accelerator, spinning the wheels the other way before they caught and jolted me forward. Reverse again, and back up, the wheels slipping and sliding, the heavy weight of the half-loaded van grinding down into the soft ground. Forward, and I could see the blurred edges of the hole back there, where part of the surrounding earth had already given way.
It was on the fourth hard reverse that the van suddenly side-slipped a foot or two and dropped with a thud, snapping my teeth so hard my jaws ached. I shifted into drive and accelerated, but the van merely slewed and settled.
Was that it? I got out and went back, and the answer was yes. The tunnel sides had fallen in enough for the rear wheels to drop down into the hole, and now the van’s undercarriage was pressed firmly to what was left of the opening. If they tried to dig out from underneath, all they’d do would be bring the van more and more into the tunnel with them.
But what about their friends from the house? First, I threw the car keys far off into the woods. Then I shot all four tires. Then I searched the van, and under the front seat I found the wire cutters I’d been hoping they’d still have with them. And finally I took the surviving kerosene lantern with me (the fire from the other had gone out) and plunged on, looking again for the Al-Gazel fence.
I found it about five minutes farther on, an eight-foot-high chain link fence topped with a spiral of razor wire and liberally provided with metal warning signs that talked about private property and tight security measures without ever mentioning exactly whose property or what measures.
I respect razor wire. If you grab it, you’ll never own those fingers again. The kerosene lantern made it possible to see what I was doing as I clipped an opening in the fence with my borrowed wire cutters, doing just enough so I could slip through. (Without them I guess I would have used the gun to dig a hole underneath.)
On the other side, before proceeding, I disarmed myself, leaving all three guns on the ground there. I continued to carry the lantern, but now I walked with one hand up in the air, to show I came in peace. I had no idea how soon I’d show up on their monitors, or how long it would take them to come out and collect me, so I just kept walking, on level ground now, away from the fence.