The woman turned down a small corridor, past open office doors, men inside the offices, some-times a face looking up, then quickly turning away.
She stopped at the last office, the door open.
A man perhaps Rourke’s own age, perhaps a lit-tle younger, looked up from a paper-littered desk. His face lit up with a smile beneath his close-cropped, light-colored, curly hair. His eyes seemed to radiate a good humor Rourke had seen in none of the other men or women of the local Resistance. And Rourke re-membered the man. “It’s Maus, isn’t it?”
“Tom Maus,” the man said, rising from his seat, extending his right hand, Rourke took it. “And you’re—John Rourke, right? The M.D. who taught survivalism and weapons training—I re-member the presentation you gave.”
“That’s right,” Rourke nodded. He watched Maus’s eyes as they took in Natalia.
“And you, miss—I know your face, too—it’s Major Tiemerovna of the KGB—mistress or maybe the wife of Karamatsov before he was killed.”
“Wife,” Rourke heard Natalia answer—life-lessly.
“I guess that’s kind of a negative way of starting a conversation, though, isn’t it—I didn’t mean anything by it. Before the war I used to think I was busy— Reserves, running the shop here, the wholesaling business—hell, I wish I had that much free time now. I get a little testy when I’m tired. Why don’t we all sit down.”
Rourke looked at Natalia—her face seemed to show that she had relaxed—if only a little.
“Emily,” Maus said. “Good to see you’re still alive—” and Maus grinned as he looked at Rourke. “Her husband was one of the best field people I had—and she’s better. But I still miss him. I’d offer you coffee but I don’t like poisoning people—and the pop machine never worked that well before The Night of The War and anyway we ran out of pop.”
“We’re fine,” Rourke nodded.
He noticed Maus looking at Natalia, and then Maus spoke. “I know a lot about you, major— heard through U.S. II all the scuttlebutt about what you did in Florida during the quakes. And I also know through our sources—we have some spies who take a lot of risks and sometimes get us pretty good information—so I know that the KGB has you on some kind of hit list—wants you dead. Why, I don’t know. So,” Maus looked at Rourke then. “Like I said—nothin’ I like better than re-newing old acquaintances, but I’ve got a field hos-pital to run, a weapons repair shop, a reloading operation—”
“What’s where the range used to be?” Rourke asked him, interrupting. “More beds?”
“No—we can’t accommodate the people we have out on the floor down there—no. Since it’s soundproofed, we use it as a training area, a test-ing area for the weapons we repair—everything it needs to be used for—and a few other things be-sides. But like I said, if I had twelve hands, I still wouldn’t have a thumb to twiddle—so why are you both here? Something for U.S. II or what?”
Rourke shrugged, saying to Natalia as he looked at her, “You explain it—all of it. We can trust this man.”
Natalia’s eyes—they seemed to look into his soul, Rourke thought, but then she turned to look at Maus.
“My uncle is General Varakov, the su-preme commander—”
“I sort of figured he was some kind of relative of yours—go ahead.”
And, gradually, she told Tom Maus everything.
Chapter Forty-one
The hospital that occupied the sales floor of Waukegan Outdoor Sportsman, and had almost since The Night of The War, was known to the So-viet authorities—General Varakov periodically sent teams of Soviet doctors into the hospital to help however they could, and what medical sup-plies—meager—could be spared were sent as well. The plans were simple—when Soviet patrols were in the area, or an inspection was due, or the medi-cal team was to be sent, the beds were spread out into the range area and the weapons and reloading equipment hidden in an underground area left from an old storm drain.
It was risky business, Rourke knew, the timing critical, a gap in information potentially fatal. If the underground storage area were discovered, or the equipment not gotten away in time, or the beds not spread out in time—a firing squad.
Even General Varakov would have no other choice, Rourke realized. And Maus was risking his entire operation now—he had provided Rourke with medical credentials, and Natalia as well, medical credentials that would serve as travel permits. And he had loaned them an automobile, the kind of loan Rourke knew Maus had realized would never be returned. Rourke’s false identity listed him as “Peter Mas-ters,” a dead Resistance fighter in reality, but on paper a hospital volunteer with little medical back-ground. To have listed Rourke as an M.D. would have been suicidal—all medical doctors were reg-istered with Soviet headquarters, Maus had said, and Natalia confirmed it. Natalia was listed as “Mary Ann Klein,” another volunteer. The travel request—Maus had signed it as ad-ministrator of the de facto hospital—indicated they were en route to the Soviet Mobile Surgical Unit stationed at Soldier’s Field Stadium to re-quest a fresh supply of hypodermic syringes. Maus had used the system before, for the actual pro-curement of medical supplies, and to cover covert operations of his Resistance command. Somewhat the statistician, Maus had predicted odds of three to one that the travel documents would get them through, at least as far as the sta-dium.
And medical emergency was the only even re-motely justified purpose for nighttime travel. They had passed the Belvedere Road checkpoint leaving Waukegan—no difficulties there, Rourke driving. They had passed two checkpoints along what had been the Illinois Tollway, no difficulties either. The checkpoint on the Edens Expressway had been something both Rourke and Natalia had sweated, Rourke watching her eyes as the Soviet officer in charge of the checkpoint had been sum-moned to examine their travel documents. But they had been allowed to move on their way. Their risk was doubly great—concealed in a hid-den compartment of what had been the gas tank, accessible by going through the firewall from the inside or outside of the trunk of the vintage Ford LTD, were their weapons and gear. Should these be discovered, it would mean instant death. To compensate for the Ford’s reduced gasoline tank, an auxiliary tank had been rigged partially under the rear seat—Rourke wouldn’t have wanted to have been in the car in case of high-speed impact, he had decided.
The checkpoint leaving the Edens and entering the Kennedy Expressway had been almost too simple. They had proceeded.
There was a long line of military vehicles ahead of them as they came within the boundaries of what had been the Chicago Loop, the downtown shopping and business district. As they drove, Na-talia had described to him what it had been like there after The Night of The War—wild dog packs which had come in from outside the neutron bomb area, roving gangs of thugs who lived like rats be-neath the once great department stores and in the abandoned subway tunnels. Soviet troops would chase after them, but for the most part—this ur-ban equivalent of Brigands would vanish before the soldiers could close with them. The urban Brigands were armed with everything from stolen
Soviet assault rifles to clubs, some of the bands re-sorting to the behavior of beasts, Natalia had told him.
She had not amplified.
They sat now, the engine running, the LTD ad-vancing a car length at a time toward the check-point. Natalia spoke. “This checkpoint is staffed by KGB—and the army too, but the main staffing is a KGB