Mitla Pass - Leon Uris [60]
“Are there Egyptian planes out there or not?” Gideon asked.
“We’ve got some unidentified blips. The Israelis are up patrolling. We’ll know soon. We’re not supposed to be cooperating with them, but we’re bending the rules.”
“Sorry about what I said,” Rich said.
“I’d like it better if you didn’t believe what you told me,” Gideon answered, and left.
ONE-FORTY A.M. The Israelis reported that no hostile craft were in their air space or off the coast.
A distant drone was heard, causing an instantaneous stir as everyone staggered to their feet and strained to hear. They’re coming! They’re landing!
Six awkward-looking C-119 Flying Boxcars were followed in by three Globemaster C-124s, opening their jaws to swallow up the refugees.
Gideon carried Penelope while Valerie guided a staggering Roxanne to the outside where they were counted off. He went back and returned with the seabags. An airman assisted them up the ramp. Val, Penny, and Roxanne were buckled in on folding canvas seats, twenty to a side. The airman tapped Gideon on the shoulder, indicating it was time to leave.
“Happy landing, baby,” Gideon said.
Val just nodded. Gideon started down the ramp.
“Gideon!” she called. He turned. “I love you,” she said.
For some reason people had become uncomfortable with all the Israeli coins in their pockets which they couldn’t spend anyhow. A bucket was passed around and soon it was half filled. An airman handed it to Gideon on the tarmac. In a moment the ramp was pulled up into the craft and the jaws of the plane clamped shut.
Runway lights shot on long enough for the planes to push skyward and disappear.
THE AMERICAN BOXCARS and Globemasters cleared the Israeli coast and turned toward Athens into heavy squalls that sent them into violent plunges. People began vomiting. Completely fatigued, Val held on to the girls, white-lipped, fighting her own nausea. Rain found its way into the cabin, adding to the misery. Unsecured luggage skidded and banged about.
“Mommy!”
“It’s all right, honey. Hang in there!”
GIDEON CLOSED the living-room blinds tightly by unrolling the canvas sash, lit a candle, and picked up a packet of letters overlooked during the packing.
Grover Vandover came from the girls’ room, where schoolbooks were open, beds turned down, bathroom in slight disarray as if someone had just taken a shower. Everything in place but the people gone. Like a mining town abandoned after a sudden disaster.
Gideon tried to coax some food into Grover Vandover. No dice. He took the dog’s temperature: 104°. His most urgent business was to get the animal into Tel Aviv to the vet.
“Come on, buddy, let’s get some sleep,” he said to Grover. His bedroom was in disorder from the speed with which they had packed. The bed rumpled from her afternoon nap. He stared at it. It had been a good old bed.
“I can’t stay here,” he mumbled.
He put Grover in the car and took the short drive to the Accadia Hotel. It loomed on its cliffside setting like the grim white elephant it had become. No abandoned Scottish castle was eerier, and it was made more so by the low muffle of the sea.
Gideon opened a side door, put his fingers over the flashlight to cut its beam, and edged down to the basement to the fuse boxes. If I throw the wrong switch I could light up the whole damned place, he thought. He decided against it.
Gideon and his dog took a long, dark, scary walk up four stories in pitch blackness to his office. He bolted the door behind them and lit some candles.
A flash of dreaded loneliness returned. He reached for the phone to call Natasha but remembered the switchboard was closed. Gideon snuggled beside his dog on the couch but his eyes were wide open. He stared at a print on the wall as though he had never seen it before, then rolled to his feet, yawned his way to the desk, and poked through the mail. A letter from his father.
Gideon stared at his father’s envelope. He opened it.
My Dearest Son,
My wits have come to an end. Ten days without so much as a line, a comma. Ignoring and torturing me in such a way, I assure you,