Bloody Passage - Jack Higgins [59]
It was still raining as we went down the path. Husseini opened the gate and started through with Wyatt; Masmoudi stood to one side for Simone. "After you, little flower."
She smiled in spite of herself, moving to pass him, and with a courtly smile still on his lips, he pushed her into me with all his force, jumped into the bushes and ran like hell, calling to Husseini at the same time. Wyatt came staggering back through the gate and Husseini took off across the square, zig-zagging furiously to avoid the possibility of a bullet in the back.
Not that there seemed much point. I grabbed Wyatt by one arm, "Right, make for those trucks while there's still time."
I was kidding myself, of course, for as we ran out of the gate and started across the square, four or five soldiers rushed out of the guardroom by the main gate.
There was a certain amount of confusion which was understandable enough when one considers that we must have looked at first sight like a group of their own comrades. And then Husseini dodged out of the shadows, yelling in Arabic and the fat was in the fire.
The nearest one to us loosed off a burst of his assault rifle on full automatic, firing from the hip a yard wide of us to the right, the bullets ricocheting from the cobbles. Hampered by Wyatt, who was leaning heavily on me, there wasn't a great deal I could do in return, but someone fired three or four shots from behind me that lifted the soldier right off his feet, slamming him back against one of the trucks.
His comrades retreated, firing wildly, and Langley and Nino both replied with long bursts that drove them back into the shelter of the parked trucks. Which left us still completely exposed. The sentry above the gate fired twice and far too close for comfort so I drew the Stechkin machine pistol I carried on my right hip from its wooden holster. As I'd set it on full automatic he got about fifteen rounds in reply for one pull of the trigger and fell off the wall into the entrance to the gateway tunnel.
Barzini grabbed Wyatt's other arm and we ran for the train, dragging him between us, Simone at our heels. We dropped him in the shelter of the first boxcar and Langley and Nino joined us, both firing short bursts from the hip to cover our retreat.
I crouched beside the track and peered through one of the wheels. It was a mess, no doubt about that. Soldiers appearing as if by magic from all over the place, some of them only half dressed, but all with rifles in their hands.
Bullets thudded into the boxcar and ricocheted from the wheels. Langley appeared beside me, grinning like a fiend. "Not so good, old stick. The best laid schemes, eh?"
A bullet clipped the woodwork just above his head, a splinter slicing his cheek like a razor. He put his fingers to it and looked at the blood and stopped smiling just like that.
"Bastards!" he said. "Bloody wog bastards! I'll give them something to think about."
He pulled one of the Sturma stick grenades from his belt, yanked the pin and lobbed it over the top of the boxcar towards the gate area. It landed on one of the trucks and fell between two of them. Someone cried out in alarm and several soldiers ran into the open. Langley jumped out of cover himself, laughing insanely and cut three of them down, firing from the hip.
A second later the grenade exploded, blowing one truck onto its side and then, like an instantaneous echo, its petrol tank went up, scattering chunks of metal, wood and burning debris far across the courtyard.
It was a scene from hell, flames everywhere, soldiers searching helplessly for cover, Langley and Nino firing steadily. A half naked woman staggered across the courtyard, screaming, and fell over a body. Husseini ran out of the shelter of the gateway to get her, firing a submachine gun with one hand. I could have shot him, but held my fire. He was a brave man, whatever