The Survivalist 02 - The Nightmare Begins (4 page)

"We're about eight or ten minutes out of El Paso. It doesn't look like it was hit. But it wasn't what you might call the gentlest town in the world before the war, I remember. Juarez is right across the bridge from it over the Rio Grande."

"We going into Mexico?"

"No—not unless I can't avoid it. Those paramili-tary troops we locked horns with were bad enough to worry about and they're on our tail by now again. Probably had a radio, right?"

"Yeah," Rubenstein said, looking thoughtful a moment. "Yeah, I think they did."

"Well, we might have a reception waiting for us up ahead. But in Mexico we could have federal troops on our tails—they do their number a hell of a lot better. With the guns and the bikes and whatever other equipment somebody might imagine we had, we'd have everybody and his brother trying to knock us off to get it. I don't know if Mexico got caught up in the war or not, but things might be awful rough down there."

"Well," Rubenstein said, "maybe we should skip El Paso entirely."

"Yeah, I've thought of that," Rourke said slowly, still staring down the highway. He lit one of his cigars and tongued it to the left corner of his mouth. "I thought about that a lot on the road the last few miles. But I haven't seen any game since we got started, have you?"

Rubenstein looked at him, then quickly said, "No—me neither."

Rourke just nodded, then said, "And that baby food I snatched isn't going to make more than a day's rations for both of us. And you're right, it does taste kind of pukey. We need food, we're almost out of water and we could use some more gasoline. I wouldn't mind scrounging some medical instru-ments if I could find them. I've got all that stuff at the retreat, but it's a long way getting there still."

"You never told me," Rubenstein asked, staring down the highway trying to see what Rourke was staring at so intently. "Why do you have the retreat? I mean, did you know this war was going to happen, or what?"

"No—I didn't know it," Rourke said slowly. "See, I went through medical school, interned and every-thing. I'd always been interested in history, current events, things like that." Rourke exhaled a long stream of gray cigar smoke that caught on the light breeze and eddied in front of him a moment before vanishing into the air. "I guess I figured that instead of training to cure people's problems, maybe I could prevent them. Didn't work out though. I joined the CIA, spent some years there—mostly in Latin America. I was always good with guns, liked the out-of-doors. Some experiences I had with the company sort of sharpened my skills that way. I married Sarah just before I got out. I was already writing about survival and weapons training—things like that. I settled down to writing and started the retreat. The more friction that developed between us, the more time and energy I poured into the retreat. I've got a couple of years' worth of food and other supplies there, the facilities to grow more food, make my own ammo. The water supply is abundant—I even get my electricity from it. All the comforts—" Rourke stopped in midsentence.

"All the comforts of home," Rubenstein volun-teered brightly, completing the sentence.

"Once I find Sarah and Michael and Ann."

"How old is Michael again?"

"Michael's six," Rourke said, "and little Annie just turned four. Sarah's thirty-two. That picture I showed you of Sarah and the kids is kind of off—but it was a kind of happy time when I took it so I held on to it."

"She's an artist?"

"Illustrated children books, then started writing them too a couple of years ago. She's very good at it."

"I always wanted to try my hand at being an artist," Rubenstein said.

Rourke turned and glanced at Rubenstein, saying nothing.

"What do you think we'll run into in El Paso?" Rubenstein asked, changing the subject.

"Something unpleasant, I'm sure," Rourke said, exhaling hard and chomping down on his cigar. He unlimbered the CAR-15 with the collapsible stock and three-power scope and slung it under his right arm, then cradled the gun across hs lap. He worked the bolt to chamber a round and set the safety, then started the Harley.

"Better get yours," he said to Rubenstein, nodding toward the German MP-40

submachinegun strapped to the back of Rubenstein's bike.

"I guess I'd better," the smaller man said, pushing his glasses up off the bridge of his nose. "Hey, John?"

"Paul?"

"I did okay back there, didn't I—I mean with those paramilitary guys?"

"You did just fine."

"I mean, I'm not just hangin' on with you, am I?"

Rourke smiled, saying, "If you were, Paul, I'd tell you." Rourke cranked into gear and started slowly along the shoulder. Rubenstein—Rourke glanced back—already had the

"Schmeisser" slung under his right arm and was jumping his bike.

Chapter Six

Sarah Rourke reined back on Tildie, her chestnut mare, pulling up short behind Carla Jenkins' bay. Sarah watched Carla closely, and the little girl Millie astride behind her. To Sarah Rourke's thinking, Carla handled a horse like she handled a shopping cart—she was dangerous with either one. Leaning over in the saddle, Sarah glanced past Carla to Carla's husband, Ron, the retired army sergeant to whom she had temporarily entrusted her fate and the fate of the children. The children . . . she looked back over her shoulder at Michael and Annie sitting astride her husband John's horse. The big off-white mare with the black stockings and black mane and tail was named "Sam," and she reached back and stroked Sam's muzzle now, saying to the children, "How are you guys doing? Isn't it fun riding Daddy's horse?"

"His saddle's too big, Momma," Michael said.

Annie added, "I want to ride with you, Mommie. I don't like riding on Sam—she's not soft." Annie looked like she was going to cry—for the hundredth time, Sarah reminded herself.

"Later—you can ride with me later, Annie. Now just be good. I want to find out why Mr. Jenkins stopped." Sarah turned in her saddle, standing up in the stirrups to peer past Carla again. She couldn't see Jenkins' face, just the back of his head, the thick set of his shoulders and neck, and the dark rump of the appaloosa gelding he rode.

"What's the problem, Ron?" Sarah asked, trying not to shout in case there were some danger ahead.

"No problem, Sarah, at least not yet," Jenkins said, not turning to face her. Hearing Ron Jenkins call her by her first name still sounded odd to her, but she reminded herself she had never called him Ron until a few days ago when he and his wife and daughter had come to the farm and asked if she wanted to accompany them. They moved slowly, the Jenkins family, and Ron Jenkins had meticulously avoided every possible small town between them and "the mountains" he kept referring to. But they were already in the mountains, she realized, and she wondered if Jenkins' enigmatic references had been to the Smoky Mountains of Tennessee rather than the mountains of northwestern Georgia. Leaning back in the saddle, trying to press her spine against the cantle to relieve the aching, she realized that if Jenkins intended to take them out of Georgia she would not go. On the chance that her husband, John, was still alive—and somewhere she told herself, as she had told the children repeatedly, that he was— chances would be slimmer of his finding them if they left the state and the area around the farm. She knew that her husband's survival retreat was in these mountains somewhere, and if they stayed in them it would only be a matter of time, if—
when
, she reminded herself—he came for them, before they would meet. But the farther Jenkins took her away from the northeast Georgia farm she and the children had called home before the night of the war, the slimmer the chances would be.

They had viewed some towns from a distance, and many had looked as though they had been looted and burned. Once, several hours back, they had hidden quietly as a gang of brigands, on motorcycles and driving pickup trucks, had gone down along a road they had been about to cross.

Sarah's mind flashed back to the night of the war, and to the morning after and the gunfight when she had killed the men and the woman who had tried to harm her and the children. Her spine shivered and she twisted involuntarily in the saddle, her eyes drifting to the much modified AR-15 rifle she had taken from one of the dead men. Her husband's Colt .45 was still in the trouser band of her Levis and she shifted it—the automatic was rubbing against her flesh and it hurt.

Checking the reins for Sam knotted to her saddle horn, she loosed them again and pulled her hus-band's horse after her as she passed Carla Jenkins' bay and rode up alongside Ron. "What is it, Ron?" she asked again.

"Down there—another town," he answered.

Sarah looked where he pointed, catching a loose strand of hair and tucking it under the blue and white bandanna covering her head. Her hair felt dirty to her—she had not washed it since the morning before the war. There hadn't been enough water and there hadn't been any time.

It was already nearly dusk and she couldn't see clearly at first in the sunlight-obscured shallow valley below them, but after a moment, as her eyes became more accustomed to the dimness, she could make out the scene unfolding there. It was the brigand gang they had seen several hours earlier. The faces were strange when she had seen them from quite close then, but even discounting that, she had known they were not from the area. People in Georgia were, by and large, good-natured, gentle people. As a northerner in a strange part of the country she had learned that years earlier. And these men and women in the small town below them were not gentle. Some of the old frame houses on both ends of the main street were already afire. The bulk of the gang of brigands was in the center of the town. Looking down into the shallow valley, she was too far away to make out individual actions, but—rather like large ants—she could see them moving from store to store in the small business district. Because of the clearness of the mountain air, she could even hear the sounds of smashing glass from the shop windows. She could hear shots as well.

"Those people were fools to stay in their town," Jenkins observed to her.

"Well, can't we do something, Mr. Jenkins?" The formality of the way she addressed him shocked her.

"Well, Mrs. Rourke," and his voice emphasized her name, "I'm no weapons expert like your husband was."

"Is—Mr. Jenkins."

"I doubt that. I think he bought it during the war. Atlanta I figure is just one big crater right now and you said yourself he was supposed to be landin' there. But I ain't like him whether he's alive or dead—I'm just an army veteran tryin' to get along. I can handle a gun as good as the next man, but I'm not about to go racin' on down there and be a hero 'cause all I'll be is dead and you and my wife and daughter and your kids then is gonna be just on your own. And that ain't right. I got a responsibility to my family and to your family. And I take that pretty serious."

Involuntarily almost, she reached across and pressed Jenkins' hand. "I'm sorry," she said softly. "You've right, I guess."

She glanced back over her shoulder and noticed Carla Jenkins staring at her.

She took her hand away from Ron Jenkins' hand.

"What are we going to do, then?" she asked him.

"I think we're gonna just sit tight up here and see which way them folks decides to go after they finish their business down there. Then we'll move out in the opposite direction. Carla's got a sister up in the Smokies there around Mount Eagle and I reckon that should be a pretty safe place to go."

"But that's in Tennessee, Mr. Jenkins—I can't go there!"

"Mrs. Rourke. Now listen," and Jenkins for the first time faced her, turning in the saddle and getting eye contact with her. "I don't know what's under that scarf and all that hair and everythin' and hidin' there in the back of your pretty little head, ma'am, but you can't just sit out here in the mountains and wait for your husband to appear out of nowhere now and rescue you. You got them two kids to look out for same as I got my wife and daughter. Once things calm down a might after everythin' gets settled, you can always look for your husband then. But if you decide on stayin' in these mountains with the likes of them down here," and he gestured toward the pillaging in the town below them, "you ain't gonna last a day—and that's a pure fact."

"But my husband will never find us in Tennessee."

"Your husband is dead, Mrs. Rourke—and I wish you'd wake up and see that."

Sarah Rourke looked at him suddenly, pulling the bandanna from her head, realizing it was giving her a headache. She said, her voice low and even, "John is alive, Mr. Jenkins. I've been telling that to my children and I believe it myself. He spent his whole life learning how to stay alive and I know he did somehow. And I know that somewhere now wher-ever he is he's thinking about me and about Michael and Annie and risking everything to get back here to us. And I'm not going to betray him and run out. I'm not. He's alive. John is alive and you can't tell me otherwise, Mr. Jenkins. And I'm not going to Tennessee with you or anyone else."

She twisted the bandanna in her hands, then stared down into the valley. As the sunlight ebbed, she could see the fires at both ends of the town much more clearly.

Chapter Seven

All Ron Jenkins had said to her and to his wife, Carla, was, "I'm goin' on down into that town there. I won't need my horse—you keep it close by and saddled and ready. I figure they might have some water and some other things down there I reckon we could use just as soon as letting them down there to rot."

Carla Jenkins had thrown her arms around her husband and tried to stop him, but one thing Sarah Rourke had learned about Ron Jenkins was that once he made up his mind he wouldn't change it. She remembered her own husband being like that, but now, since the night of the war and her experiences that following morning, she felt that perhaps she should have changed hers. She had hated the guns he kept, practically called him a fool for building and stocking his survival retreat. Yet, guns had kept her alive so far, and now the survival retreat she had loathed the thought of seemed to her a sort of haven of normalcy as she sat there in the dark, huddled with the children, their heads on her lap.