Rawhide Down_ The Near Assassination of Ronald Reagan - Del Quentin Wilber [42]
The spare limousine raced after the president’s Lincoln.
* * *
AFTER RAY SHADDICK pushed Jerry Parr and the president into the back of the limousine and shut its door, his first impulse was to jump into the front passenger seat. One agent always rode shotgun in the presidential limousine, and Parr was already in the passenger compartment with Reagan. But Shaddick didn’t want to risk opening the door for another gunman; besides, all of Stagecoach’s doors were now locked tight and the president was secure inside. Shaddick turned and took a quick inventory of the scene: Brady was down and so were a cop and his man Tim McCarthy. Shaddick wanted to help them, but his job was to guard the president, not deliver first aid. He ran to the armored follow-up car.
He scrambled into the Cadillac’s front passenger seat and picked up the car’s radio handset. “We’ve had shots fired, shots fired,” he said. “There are some injuries.”
Shaddick told the driver of the follow-up car to pull away. As he did, two other agents jumped on board. One climbed through the open right rear door, picked up an Uzi, and took a position on the left running board. The other agent, who had sprinted alongside the departing presidential limousine, hopped on the opposite running board and was handed an Uzi by another agent inside the car. The car sped off, just seconds behind the presidential and spare limousines.
* * *
THE ASSAILANT’S GUN had only just stopped firing; it was still 2:27 p.m. Spectators ran for cover. Agents and police officers, revolvers in their hands, shouted warnings and instructions. Reporters pulled their notebooks out and began looking for people to interview. Television cameramen continued shooting video; photographers kept snapping pictures.
All around them, people were frightened and upset—a number of them were crying. Questions started flying through the crowd. Is this part of an exercise? Is the president all right? Are there other gunmen? Is this really happening?
Across T Street, spectators and bystanders stood frozen, staring in bewilderment at the scene and the fleeing limousines and cars. But one woman sprinted straight toward the melee. It was Carolyn Parr, who had been standing directly across the street when the world turned to chaos. As she ran, she prayed that Jerry was safe. Seeing an agent holding an Uzi and standing with his back braced against the hotel’s stone wall, she ran toward him.
“My husband!” she screamed. “My husband!”
The agent pointed up the street. “He’s with the Man,” he yelled, his submachine gun pointed into the air. “He’s okay! He’s okay! He’s in the car!”
CHAPTER 7
“I CAN’T BREATHE”
As the president’s limousine hurtled away from the Hilton, Jerry Parr glanced out the rear window. He counted three men down and wondered who had been hit. Turning, he noticed the telltale marks of a projectile’s impact on the right rear door’s bullet-proof window. Parr had no idea what was happening. Was this a terrorist attack? Was the world at war? It occurred to him that he might have been hurt, too, but he gave himself a quick once-over and decided he was fine. He took a deep breath, turned to the president, and helped him into the limousine’s right rear seat. Reagan sat slumped forward—he looked like an exhausted basketball player taking a breather on the bench.
“Were you hit?” Parr asked.
“No, I don’t think so,” Reagan said. “I think you hurt my chest when you landed on top of me.”
Parr quickly examined Reagan’s mouth and nose for damage or obstructions, then ran his hands along the president’s white shirt and through his hair. He felt nothing unusual. He inspected his own hands. No blood. Thank God.
Parr fumbled for the radio strapped to his belt, but it wasn’t there. In the scramble for the car, it had been ripped away from his earpiece and sleeve microphone. Parr swiveled to Unrue. “Give me the radio.