A God in Ruins - Leon Uris [135]
The girls were gone. Second time this week. He’d have to see about assigning a male orderly. Like today, he was having a difficult time with the arms and legs of his clothing.
Wreck felt better when he strapped on his pearl handled pistol. Shiiiiuuuuut! He didn’t have pants on, and the pistols fell to the ground.
A pounding on his door. Wreck managed to put both legs in one pant leg and fell flat on his face as he reached for the doorknob.
“You dumb son of a bitch!” Wreck greeted Sergeant Floyd.
“Sorry, sir, I got a call from outpost number seven over the center of the canyon. Dust is rising at the far end.”
“Why didn’t you say so!”
“I tried to phone you, but…you shot up the outside phone lines last night.”
“Call all stations, a double-red alert and move all personnel to the horseshoe posts.”
“I did that, sir.”
“What the fuck—who authorized you?”
Down the corridor, Red Peterson came out of his reverie. Maud was gone, but Jesus H. Christ, did that old girl give me a time when the ’lude kicked in. Was there any way Maud could teach some of that screaming and cursing to Greta? Sometimes Greta acted like the statues she portrayed on the stairs in Vegas.
The continuous sound of a racket filled the hallway. Maud, showered and dressed, came in and nodded toward the sounds of confusion.
Wreck slammed open their door. “We’ve got a problem!”
“Well, Christ, let me get my pants on.”
“There’s dust blowing up the canyon.”
“Hey, Wreck, dust is always blowing through the canyons.”
“Maybe it’s a herd of buffalo,” Maud ventured.
“There ain’t no goddamn buffalos, and there ain’t no goddamn wind.”
“Esteemed Personage,” Grand Militia Sergeant Floyd said, “maybe it’s cattle rustled from Mexico and being hidden in the canyon.”
“I don’t think so,” Red said. “You can’t drive a herd of stolen cattle clear through the state of Arizona and into Utah without being spotted. You there, Sergeant, get Wreck’s vehicle warmed up. We’re right behind you.”
They halted on the steep trail fifty yards below a rock-strewn summit. Wreck shifted into compound low to scale the hill. The hill won.
He came to the guard post where a dozen White Wolves had gathered and screamed at them to take up positions.
Red Peterson, meanwhile, scanned through binoculars. His wise old eye always searched for the patch of black gold. “Yeah,” he said softly, “I see them. They’re taking a rest stop at Bloody Gulch.”
“Who? How many?” Wreck cried.
“Wreck,” Red said softly, “I think you’d better get down there and meet them and either turn them back or let them through. Get rid of all that crap you’re wearing and look like a rancher.”
“You dumb son of a bitch,” Wreck screamed.
Red seized him and with one hand lifted him off the ground and held him, nose to nose. “No goddamn commander is going to run troops into a box canyon in broad daylight. If this was an attack by armed forces, you’d be obliterated in five minutes. Now, you get down there.”
“You!”
“Grand Militia Sergeant Buck Jones, sir!”
“Get your ass down there and turn those people around.”
“No, sir, I ain’t going.” Jones quivered. He was silenced by Wreck’s .45-caliber slugs. Wreck turned to the other patriots, who slunk off to their posts.
Peterson led Maud a few feet away. “We’re getting the hell out of here,” he whispered. “I’m grabbing one of their Uzi guns and clean this post out. When I open fire, get down the hill and into the Land Rover. He left the keys in the ignition.”
In the next agonizing moments, the cloud of dust stirred up again and spewed. Wreck was frozen…immobile. As fast as a lizard’s tongue, Red snatched the Uzi from a patriot and tried to slam a bullet into its chamber. It was stuck!
“You motherfucker!” Wreck Hudson screamed.
Red threw the weapon to the ground and shook his head, crying, “I brought in two hundred thousand of these guns, and I’ve got to get the one