The pilot climbed, flipped to the right instead of the left, and began another circuit, positioning the aircraft for a stern-to-bow attack. The cannon shells, this time, would pass straight down the middle of the trawler.
“Yosef, what is going on? The woman has been wounded by splintered wood!” shouted President Aineuf, who poked his head up the ladder from below.
“Stay down, Mr. President! We are heading for the beach.
Pack up any food and water you can find. We are going to need it!”
The head disappeared.
“Here he comes again!”
Cannon shells ripped into the engine compartment. The private who had fired the first rounds at the aircraft dove to the right directly into the path of the thirty-millimeter shells, which cut him in half. His top torso fell overboard.
The legs collapsed slowly. What remained of his body tumbled forward, sending blood and a wad of intestines flooding onto the deck.
The bridge looked as if it had been through a frenzied chain saw attack. The small half-roof was gone. Tattered bits of smoking wood swung from the sides. No windows remained. Sergeant Boutrous stood miraculously unscratched as he spun the helm, lining the bow dead-on to the beach about five hundred meters ahead. No dirty windows obscured his vision. Yosef shook his head, amazed the sergeant was alive with so much damage around him.
Sergeant Boutros pushed the throttle forward as far as it would go. From the engine compartment the diesel noise increased as the motor strained to provide more speed.
Yosef gripped a nearby railing as the fishing trawler picked up a couple more knots.
“Corporal Ghatan, Corporal Omar!” Yosef shouted, releasing the railing and waving his arms at the Palace Guardsmen.
“Prepare to abandon ship or whatever it is that sailors do when they run like hell!”
The fighter jet turned right again.
White smoke trickled out of the boat’s engine compartment.
By the time the aircraft finished its circuit for another attack, dark billowing smoke poured from the engine room.
“Colonel, we’re slowing down!” yelled Boutrous, shifting the throttle back and forth, trying to keep the engine going.
The wind blew the smoke to the left, obstructing Yosef’s vision.
“Swing that wheel as far to the right as it will go!”
The boat started a slow turn to starboard into its smoke.
The cannon shells whistled through the smoke. Two shattered the bow. The others missed the boat entirely.
“Keep it pointed toward the beach!” The beach was about two hundred meters away.
Sergeant Boutrous whirled the helm, hand over hand, to offset the strong riptide. A sharp current pulled the boat south, helping them close another hundred yards. Yosef hoped the fading momentum of the boat would carry them to the beach. Less than a hundred meters from the beach, the engine sputtered, coughed, and died.
“He’s leaving! Praise be to Allah!”
Yosef shielded his eyes as he scanned the sky for the Mig-29. The contrail caught his attention. The aircraft was heading west toward Algiers. Fighter aircraft used a lot of gas in combat. Yosef suspected his party’s luck was due more to lack of petrol than to Allah.
The boat lurched, nearly throwing Yosef off his feet, as it crunched onto the sand beneath the outgoing tide. They would have to wade the remaining twenty meters to shore.
Perfect targets if the aircraft returned.
“Come on, everyone. Overboard.”
Sergeant Boutrous jumped down from the bridge area.
“Sergeant, take three men up there above the beach and see where we are.”
Boutrous pointed to Corporal Ghatan and two other Guardsmen.
“Come on!” One after the other they jumped overboard into knee-high waves. Seeing their weapons would be in no danger from the water, they lowered them from over their heads and slugged through the sucking tide to the beach.
President Aineuf emerged, leading the woman; a bloodsoaked bandage hastily wrapped around her head covered her left eye. The president carried the wailing child.
“Amir, Amir,” she said when she saw the body of her husband, then she began the oddle-ooping titter common of grieving Bedouin women. She hiked up her dress and started to the bridge, but Yosef grabbed her arm.
“No, he is dead. Remember him as he was. You do not want to see what he looks like now.”
“But he was my husband. What will I do without a husband?”
“You are young. But you won’t grow older if you stay here.” He tugged her to the side of the boat. Corporal Omar, his weapon slung across his back, stood in the water helping everyone down from the wallowing craft. Yosef helped the wounded woman over the side to the waiting corporal.
Yosef took the baby from the president and passed the boy to the woman.
“Mr. President, it is your turn.”
“Why did the aircraft leave. Colonel?” Aineuf asked, lifting his leg and straddling the low railing.
“Don’t know. Probably running low on gas, Mr. President.
What we can be sure is that he reported our location to his headquarters. I think your earlier prediction may come true. Helicopters or troops or both are probably heading our way. We have to move. You’d think they’d still be sleeping this early in the morning.”
Corporal Omar reached up and helped President Aineuf down into the water.
President Aineuf looked up at Yosef.
“Seems to be a new era. Colonel. Maybe we should have spent more time awake. If we had, maybe Algeria would still be Algeria.”
Yosef turned away and crossed the deck. Now was not the time to argue politics. He glanced back to see Corporal Omar lift the president between the linked arms of two Guardsmen. The two carried Aineuf to the beach and stood him up on moist sand.
Yosef ran below and grabbed the two bags President Aineuf had stocked from the limited larder on board. He looked at the doorway leading to the deck. Where to now, was the question.
He rushed up the ladder and tossed the bags to Corporal Omar below, who immediately headed toward the beach.
Yosef looked around the boat one last time before he, too, jumped. He was the last to reach the beach. Ahead, several Guardsmen surrounded President Aineuf, helping him over the dunes. A shout from the top of the crest caught Yosef’s attention. He shielded his eyes from the sun.
Sergeant Boutrous waved, urging him to hurry. Yosef jogged to catch up with the president and the other Palace Guards.
“What now. Colonel Yosef?” asked the president, his question coming between short, rapid breaths.
“Mr. President, we have to keep moving. We can expect company soon and we need to get as far away from here as we can.”
President Aineuf stumbled, but was caught by Yosef on his left and Corporal Omar on the right.
They climbed the short, winding trail to the top of the hill, taking it slow because of the president, though their lives depended on speed.
“Colonel, I feel I am an encumbrance. Unlike the Palace Guards, I am an old man. I am beginning to realize how old I am. I think, without me, you may make Tunisia or some other safe abode. With me, I am afraid it will only be a matter of time before they catch us.”
“Mr. President, soldiers are paid to risk their lives in defense of their country. You are our country and our responsibility.”
President Aineuf shook his head.
“No, Colonel, countries always survive. It is the people in them who change.
The rebels would voice the same opinion that you do. They love our country as much as we do. It is just that they have such a rigid opinion on what is right and what is wrong that they lack the humanity to accept others’ rights to their differences — the freedom to express yourself, even when it differs from the government.” He stumbled again. Aineuf put his hand on Yosef’s sleeve.