The Adventures Of Indiana Jones (63 page)

“Hold on. We’re going in.”

At five hundred feet Indy saw a paved road. It was their only hope, their only choice at all, in fact, because that was where the plane was headed. He did his best to stabilize the craft, and they belly-flopped onto the road. The plane skidded out of control and crashed into the parking lot of a roadside tavern.

Indy was shaken by the impact, but still managed to crawl out of the plane. He helped Henry out. “You all right, Dad?”

“I’m in one piece, I think,” he said as they stumbled away from the plane.

Indy knew they had to get away as fast as possible. He spotted a customer who was about to drive off, and signaled him. As the man stepped out of his car, Indy leapt behind the wheel. He circled around the parking lot, picked up Henry, and shoved down hard on the gas pedal.

The man chased after them, shaking his fist and shouting. A moment later, the Messerschmidts screamed low, guns blazing. Through the rearview mirror, Indy saw the car owner dive headfirst off the road and roll down a ditch as the fighters strafed the parking lot, ripping holes through the parked cars.

Indy shoved the throttle down and gripped the steering wheel tightly with both hands. He concentrated on the road as Henry twitched and turned and fretted.

“Are we out of the woods yet?”

“Hope so.”

Indy heard the peculiar roar of a Messerschmidt again and glanced into the side mirror. One of the fighters was swooping toward them.

“Oh, shit.”

“What is it?”

Gunfire ripped through the car, miraculously missing Indy and his father. As the Messerschmidt screeched away, beams of sunlight streamed into the car through the bullet-riddled roof.

“Good Lord,” Henry moaned. “Take me back to Princeton. This is no way to live.”

The whine of the second Messerschmidt raised the hair on the back of Indy’s neck. “Here comes the other one.”

Then he saw a tunnel cutting through the mountainside. He slammed his foot against the gas pedal and raced for it. But the fighter bore down on them, its machine guns chattering.

They sped into the tunnel, out of the range of the guns. “Let’s stay in here,” Henry said.

But even the tunnel wasn’t safe. An instant later, they heard a resounding crash. The Messerschmidt couldn’t pull up in time. It slammed into the mouth of the tunnel, the mountain shearing off its wings. The fuselage rocketed like a bullet down the muzzle of a gun. Sparks flew as it scraped the pavement and sides of the tunnel. Then the fuselage burst into flames.

A fireball grew in the rearview mirror, gaining on them. The accelerator was flat against the floor; the car was going as fast as it could. Indy leaned forward, as if the thrust of his body could somehow speed up the car. He gripped the steering wheel so tightly, his knuckles turned white.

Just as the fireball was about to slam into them, the car flew out of the tunnel. Indy swerved sharply to the shoulder of the road and struggled to maintain control of the car. The flaming fuselage shot past them, struck a tree, and exploded.

Indy swung back onto the road and raced into a wall of flames and greasy smoke. He shot out the other side, eyes wide, heart slamming against his chest.

Henry looked as if he was on the verge of a stroke. “They don’t come any closer than that.”

“Don’t count on it,” Indy said as he saw the other Messerschmidt screaming out of the sky toward them.

The fighter dropped a bomb; it exploded in the road directly ahead of the car, missing it by several feet. Indy turned the wheel hard to the right. The car smashed through a guardrail and bounced down an embankment. For several seconds they were airborne. It was all over, he thought, and squeezed his eyes shut.

As quickly as the car had pitched off the road, it landed with a thud, sinking into the soft sand of a deserted Mediterranean beach. The two men staggered out of the car. Indy held his head where he had cracked it against the steering wheel. There wasn’t another person in sight for miles. The beach was populated by sea gulls, which had turned the sand into a virtual snowfield of white, feathered bodies.

Indy heard the deadly sound again and looked back, to see the Messerschmidt coming in for yet another pass. Father and son exchanged a wordless glance. They didn’t even think about running. There was no place to hide.

Indy checked his gun. It was empty.

The fighter was coming in low, less than a hundred feet over the surf.

Suddenly Henry ran toward the sea gulls, waving his hands. He was a madman, screaming, shouting.

The gulls took to the air en masse, thousands of them rising in fright, wings beating the air just as the Messerschmidt howled overhead, its machine guns spitting, tearing into the beach, kicking up sand.

Then the fighter and the sea gulls met. It was a massacre. Hundreds of gulls were shredded apart by the whirling propeller blades. A feathery, white-and-red puree smeared the windshield and clogged the engine.

The Messerschmidt stopped firing just short of Indy and Henry. Its engines sputtered. The plane stalled and disappeared beyond an embankment.

A brief moment later an explosion shattered the silence. Smoke and flames rose in the distance.

Indy sank into the sand, completely drained.

Henry walked back to him and sat down next to him. “I remembered Charlemagne. ‘Let my armies be the rocks and the trees and the birds in the sky.’ ”

Indy gazed off into the distance toward the burning fighter. “Good advice then; good advice now.”

T
HE SAME DAY
Indy and Henry were fleeing Germany, Marcus Brody arrived by train at Iskenderun. He was utterly exhausted and wished he was back home in New York in the safety of his museum. The problems he faced in his everyday life seemed minor to the frustrations he had already experienced on this trip. And who knew what was ahead for him and Sallah.

That is, if he even found Sallah.

He should have arrived at least a day earlier, but he had taken the wrong train out of Venice and found himself in Belgrade before he realized it. There, he wasted another day in confusion before finally boarding the right train. He had traveled nonstop through the day, the night, and half the following day. He was finally here, and as he disembarked from the train, he sensed that his bold proclamation that he would find the Grail Cup was brash and unrealistic.

His eyes burned as he moved along the railway station platform, through a crowd of Hatayans and Arabs. Bodies in flowing robes blurred into a collective mass. They seemed part of some mysterious coordinated activity, and only he, Marcus Brody, stood apart, confused and out of place. He rubbed his throbbing eyes. What he wanted most of all was a hot shower, a good meal, and about twenty hours of sleep.

He felt anxious and depressed because he had failed Indy and Henry. He should have found the Grail by now, or at least been close to it. Instead, he couldn’t even find Sallah. But he was a scholar and a museum director, not a geographer . . . not an explorer. And certainly not an adventurer.

He needed a guide.

“Mr. Brody! Marcus Brody!”

He looked up, amazed to see Sallah making his way through the crowd toward him. He was so relieved by the familiar face, he almost threw his arms around Sallah. That was something he would never even consider doing in New York or in his native London.

“Old fellow, it’s good to see you!” You have no idea how good, Sallah.

They shook hands; then Sallah embraced him. Brody patted his back, although his arms barely reached halfway around him. He blushed and grinned sheepishly, embarrassed by the public show of affection.

“Marcus, where have you been?” Sallah held Brody at arm’s length and looked him over. “I’ve been waiting for you here. I’ve been worried.”

Sallah was a bear of a man with black hair and eyes and distinctive Mediterranean features. His rich baritone voice and hearty laugh went a long way toward making Brody feel better, as did his reputation for loyalty. He was known for his fierce dedication to his friends and as a formidable enemy to anyone who opposed them.

“I was turned around for a while. Is Indy here?”

Sallah shook his head. “No, I thought he would be with you.”

Now Brody didn’t feel so bad. He had still managed to beat Indy here. “He’s been delayed.”

“Ah, yes. Delayed.” Sallah laughed. He picked up Brody’s luggage with such ease, the bags could have been empty. “Perfect British understatement, that,” he added with a grin.

They left the station and emerged in an open-air market. Vendors’ carts were everywhere, and people were shouting and waving their wares. The smell of ripe fruit and vegetables baking in the warm sun swirled around Brody, making him nauseous and dizzy. He felt as though he’d stepped off onto another planet and longed for the quiet solitude of the museum, for the cool silence of the artifacts that were entrusted to him. This, he thought, was not his world, not his way of life.

Sallah said everything they had discussed when Brody had called him in Cairo was ready, and he was anxious for the journey to begin. “As soon as we—” He stopped in midsentence. Two thugs in trench coats were blocking their path.

“Papers, please,” one of them said in a foreboding tone, and held out his hand.

“Papers?” Sallah nodded. “Of course. Have one right here. Just finished reading it myself.”

Sallah took out a newspaper from under his arm and shoved it in front of the agents’ faces.
“Run!”
he hissed at Brody.

Turning to the men, he grinned and waved the newspaper. “The
Egyptian Mail.
Morning edition. Lots of good, timely news.”

Brody frowned at Sallah. “Say again?”

“Run!”
This time he yelled it.

Brody spun but didn’t even move a step before one of the men grabbed him by the collar and pulled him back. Sallah bulldozed into both thugs with a flurry of punches. Bystanders scattered, and vendors’ stands were overturned as the fight spilled into the open-air market. Fruits and vegetables fell to the ground and rolled away. Spools of costly silk and colorful cotton tumbled into the mud.

Brody pushed his way through the excited, chattering crowd. He tried to come up with a plan to help Sallah, but nothing came to mind. He didn’t have the strength to overpower either man, and besides, Sallah
had
told him to run. He threaded his way through stalls, past vendors, and finally took refuge in a doorway.

He could still see the fighting and spotted Sallah just as he bumped into a camel. The impact stunned him long enough for the thugs to lunge at him. But Sallah quickly recovered and slapped the camel on the nose. The ornery beast jerked its head back and unleashed a huge gob of spit that splattered in one of the thug’s faces. Sallah raced away, and Brody waved his arms, hoping to catch his eye.

Sallah raised a hand in recognition and cut toward him, jabbing a finger at a darkened doorway at the top of a ramp. A curtain hung over it. “Get away, fast! Go!”

Brody didn’t feel particularly disposed toward hiding there, but Sallah kept shouting. So Brody stepped out of the doorway and ran up the ramp. He slipped behind the curtain and peeked out. In the moment Sallah had turned his attention from the thugs, they had caught up with him. They pounced on him like animals, pounding him with their fists and short, heavy clubs. But Sallah wasn’t fighting back. He was still waving frantically at Brody and yelling something he couldn’t understand.

Nearby, a couple of Nazi soldiers moved in to back up the thugs. Brody knew Sallah didn’t have a chance. He hesitated, wishing he could do something for his friend, but knew it was useless. He didn’t want to look any longer. He ducked behind the curtain and turned around. Before he realized where he was, he heard metal doors slamming shut behind him. He was inside a truck, and on the wall was a red-and-black Nazi banner.

Sallah lifted his head. He hurt all over, he was bleeding, dust filled his nostrils. The thugs were gone, but they had captured their target after all. Brody had misunderstood him and run right into the Nazis’ grasp instead of away from it. Now the truck had disappeared—with Brody in it.

One day later, in a center of a courtyard in Iskenderun, the sultan of the region was seated on his royal chair. It was purple and high-backed and made the sultan appear larger than life. He was an aloof-looking man with eyes that somehow defined his royal bearing. His full beard was silky white and fell to his chest. He wore a deep-red coat embroidered with golden braids on the front and sleeves, and ornate epaulets on the shoulders. His midsection was wrapped in a wide, gold-and-red sash, and his hat was flat-topped and cylindrical and matched his coat.

He was surrounded by his minions, and standing before him was an American he had met more than once in his travels. “What can I do for you, Mr. Donovan? As I told you the last time we talked, I am not interested in selling any works of art.”

Donovan nodded. “I understand that. Your Highness, I have something I’d like to show you.”

He handed the sultan the missing pages of the Grail diary. “These pages are taken from the diary of Professor Henry Jones. They include a map that pinpoints the exact location of the Grail Cup.”