Firebreak

by Richard Herman

  “Amb,” Matt said, looking at the four sergeants standing by the pallet, “I think those guys are the combat repair team that came in on the C-Five. Why don’t you get ‘em down to Ramon and get our jet fixed. I’ll check in with the embassy.”

  “Love to.” Furry grinned. “That’ll give me a chance to pick a few more Israeli brains about the latest tactics they’re using.” Then the wizzo got very serious. “Matt, rule number four says ‘Know when to get the hell out of Dodge’ and I think it’s time for us to cut and run.” A rueful look crossed Matt’s face. He gave Furry an abrupt nod and drove off, leaving Colonel Walters behind.

  It took Matt over thirty minutes to find a phone and get through to Gold at the embassy in Jerusalem. The air attache’s reaction to Matt’s report was a low-pitched belly laugh. “I know ‘Ricochet’ Walters,” he said. “I’m not surprised they sent him here—he does look good on paper. I’ll get him replaced. Don’t worry, MAC’S got plenty of colonels who have a clue and can move cargo.

  “We’ve got an Army lieutenant colonel as an observer at Haifa,” Gold continued, “and the Israelis have asked for him on the Golan. I want you to go up there and replace him. He’ll brief you on what he’s been up to.” Matt copied down the detailed directions he needed to make contact, and when Gold told him to “Get going,” he ran for his car.

  The directions Gold had given Matt led him directly to the U.S. Army lieutenant colonel at the forward headquarters of Northern Command. He found the LC sitting in a mess tent, discouraged by his total lack of activity and usefulness. He explained how the Israelis kept him on a short leash and that he could probably learn more by reading press releases than by what he was seeing. “This is as far forward as they’ll let you get,” he warned Matt. Then he disappeared, hopeful that he would see more of the action on the Golan Heights.

  Within minutes, Matt discovered that the staff officers had no time for him but were not going to let him go anywhere. Late that night, he stood outside the main command bunker and listened to the distant whump of artillery. Occasionally, he could see a red glow light the horizon. This is stupid, he thought and decided that if he couldn’t go forward, he would go backward. “Or make an end run,” he mumbled to himself. Fifteen minutes later, he was on the outskirts of Haifa, heading for Shoshana’s apartment.

  The Tamirs’ large apartment was filled with children and four harried-looking grandmothers. One of the women spoke excellent English and explained how they had evacuated the children out of a kibbutz in the Huleh Valley at the base of the escarpment leading up to the Golan Heights. “They are not used to being cooped up like this,” she said as she collared a four-year-old who seemed intent on turning the balcony’s railing into a tightrope. Matt was able to piece together a connection between the kibbutz and Avi Tamir, but when he asked about Shoshana, he was greeted with absolute silence.

  “The Israeli penchant for secrecy,” he muttered. Finally, the women relented and told him to try the hospital. “Which hospital?” he asked. Again, he was greeted with silence.

  After he had left, the woman made a phone call and identified herself as Lillian. “The young American just left,” she reported. “Yes, he knows where to look.” She paused, listening to the voice on the other end. “No, I’m not stupid. I didn’t make it that easy for him.” She slammed the phone down, hoping it split the Ganef’s ear.

  Tara Tyndle recognized the signs immediately. The secretaries were huddled in a corner and whispering to themselves, exchanging worried glances. B. J. Allison was throwing a rare temper tantrum and they were seeking cover until she cooled down. Tara smiled at the secretaries. The youngest one, his boyish face now calm, knocked at Allison’s door and announced her. “Well,” Tara said, “you’ve certainly livened things up around here.” She gave her aunt a beautiful smile and sat down, crossing her long legs and making herself comfortable. “Would you like to hear about our mutual problem, Fraser?”

  “Fraser,” Allison snorted, “is not the problem. It’s that dumb Polack, Pontowski. Do you know what he’s done?” Tara knew better than to answer the question—Allison wanted to tell her. “Congress”—Allison was sputtering in her fury—“is going to give him the excess profits tax that he’s asked for.” The old woman paced her office while Tara waited. While Allison’s temper tantrums were legendary among the staff, she usually regained control within minutes.

  “You would think we were the enemy and not—” Allison had almost said “the Jews” but caught herself in time. She did not want Tara to think that she was a bigot, but she held deep-seated prejudices that had formed at an early age. “And if that’s not enough, he’s resupplying Israel, not that I’m surprised. Did you know his grandson is in Israel? If that’s not giving aid and comfort to the—” Again, she bit her words off. She had almost said “enemy.” “I can’t tell you how much it disturbs me that the Israelis have a President of the United States in their pocket.” Tara could sense that Allison was spinning down and would soon be rational. “If he’s notgoing to be sensitive to the true concerns of our country, then I’m going to have to see him removed.”

  A thoughtful look crossed Tara’s face. “I’m close to finding out how your money was funnelled into Pontowski’s campaign. There’s a key middle man.”

  “Hummm. How fortunate,” Allison said. She sat down and ordered tea. “The press is losing interest, what with all the news from the Middle East. We do need to provide them with a smoking gun.”

  A secretary knocked at the door and stood there, waiting to be recognized. “Yes?” Allison asked. The young man told her that a certain congressman was on the phone and would like an appointment. Allison turned to Tara and smiled. “Isn’t he that nice Jewish boy who—”

  “Yes, Auntie. He’s the spokesman for the Israeli lobby. Fraser was telling me that he is very unhappy with Pontowski.”

  Allison sensed an opportunity and she didn’t care why the congressman was in opposition to Pontowski. Just the fact that he wanted to talk to her was ample indication that all was not well between the Israeli lobby and Pontowski. “Oh dear, do you think he would like to know about illegal activities of our President?”

  “Perhaps.”

  “Of course I could never tell him myself. After all he is-”

  “Aunt Barbara, please be careful. He probably suspects that you’re feeding the press, maybe even the source of the money. How well are your tracks covered?”

  Allison’s soft southern accent never lost its charm and innocence. “I don’t make mistakes.” Then she smiled. “Dear, I don’t care to meet the young man, but perhaps you’d like to, ah, establish a relationship?”

  Tara Tyndle arched an eyebrow. “Really, Auntie! He is-”

  “Yes, I know but …”

  “Well, I suppose if it’s necessary.” The two women exchanged smiles, understanding each other perfectly.

  “He is rather handsome,” Allison allowed.

  The woman at the front desk of the first hospital Matt checked told him to talk with the ambulance drivers out back, next to the tents the army had set up. He tried to cut through the hospital, but the halls were jammed with wounded soldiers and civilians. One silent hall was filled with children engulfed in bandages and casts. He stood there trying to come to terms with what he saw. He had never thought of children being casualties of war. Then he realized that his rescue of the trapped girl in the basement had been the exception, not the rule.

  A weary nurse told him to leave or start helping. “We’ve got more coming in. … A rocket attack on Ofra on the West Bank … the Syrians keep hitting the West Bank settlements … I don’t know why. We’re taking the overflow and the ambulances should be here any minute.” There was no decision to be made and Matt went with the nurse.

  The first ambulance backed up to the tent the hospital was using to receive incoming casualties and Matt pulled the door open. The first stretcher out carried a badly burnt child that he guessed to be five or six. He couldn’t tell if it was
a boy or girl. An overpowering stench of charred flesh and antiseptic washed over him. He froze. “Move!” the nurse barked. Stung into action, he helped a teenage girl carry the stretcher into the tent to a waiting doctor.

  Matt lost count of the number of ambulances he helped unload and soon he found himself carrying the stretchers into nearby homes and office buildings as they ran out of space. Another ambulance pulled up and he stood there, wondering if the chain of shattered children would ever stop. This time, the last stretcher out held a body. Judging from the bandages, the child’s chin and lower jaw had been blown away. “Carry her to the morgue,” a voice commanded. “We need the stretcher here.” It was Shoshana.

  “What happened?” he asked, trying to come to terms with the carnage around him.

  “A direct hit on a shelter at a school,” she told him. “Probably a Scud rocket. The Patriots can’t get them all.” Shoshana looked at him and knew the inner turmoil that had to be ripping him apart. “Don’t think about it,” she said. “Just do something—anything.” Shoshana had been through the hell he was experiencing and had given him the only advice she could.

  Gently, Matt picked the small bundle up off the stretcher and cradled it in his arms. He looked up at her, fighting tears. “Don’t go. I’ll be back in a minute.” She watched him go and sank down on the rear edge of the ambulance and rested her head against the side panel. Four minutes later, Matt was back, still shaken. He sat down beside her and waited. “I was lucky to have found you,” he finally said.

  “I know,” she replied. Silence. He turned and looked at her. She had fallen asleep, still leaning against the side panel. He searched inside the ambulance until he found a blanket. Then he eased her onto the floor and spread the blanket over her, willing to wait.

  “Tamir!” a voice called. Matt realized he had been dozing and came alert. Shoshana had not stirred.

  “Over here,” he answered. A young woman in an unfamiliar uniform materialized out of the dark.

  “She’s needed. North this time.”

  “She’s bushed,” Matt protested.

  “Wake her,” the woman ordered.

  “I’m awake,” Shoshana said. “Where to?”

  The woman jerked a map off her clipboard and brushed past Matt. The two compared maps. “The Syrians counterattacked and are pushing down the coast. Heavy casualties. Get going.” Shoshana nodded and climbed into the passenger’s seat. She had to wake her partner, a slender, dark-haired thirty-six-year-old schoolteacher from Haifa, to start the engine.

  Matt shook his head, climbed into the back and closed the rear doors. Well, he thought, this is one way to see what’s happening up front.

  “We’re getting close,” Shoshana said. “I’m not going to wake Hanni yet. She drove most of the last run.” Her partner had crawled into the back of the ambulance when Matt took over the driving and had fallen into an instant sleep. Shoshana, much more familiar with the road, was navigating. The first light of dawn was etching the eastern sky, punctuated by momentary flares of artillery. The dull whumps of the big guns would follow seconds later.

  “There’s something I don’t understand,” Matt said. “Why were all those kids still in Ofra? They should have been evacuated out like the ones I saw in your apartment.”

  Shoshana stared into the night. “The government tried. But the settlers at Ofra are hard-liners and wouldn’t go. They’re afraid if they leave, the government won’t defend their homes and will pull back to a better defensive position. By not evacuating, they force the government to defend their homes.”

  “That’s dumb,” Matt said.

  “Not to the settlers.” She looked at him. “You don’t understand, do you?” He shook his head. “The settlers moved in after we occupied the West Bank during the 1967 war. Every one of those settlements is illegal.”

  “So why’s that illegal?”

  “We signed the Geneva Convention on Occupied Territories, which prohibits settlement.”

  Matt was astounded. “But it’s been going on for twenty-five years.”

  “The government encouraged it.”

  “That’s dumb” was all Matt could think of to say.

  “Not to many Israelis. They believe that all of Palestine belongs to them.”

  “How do you feel about it?” he asked.

  Shoshana stared into the night, too tired to discuss it further. “I just want the fighting to stop.”

  A large shadow loomed up in front of them and Matt slammed his foot onto the brake pedal, skidding the ambulance to a halt. The hulk of a burned-out Merkava tank was blocking the road. “Christ,” Matt mumbled. “I almost ran into it.” He jammed the gearshift into reverse and backed up to maneuver around the tank. As he eased off the road to the right and rounded the tank, he stopped again. “There’s someone next to the tank,” he said. “We better check on him.” He threw the door open and hopped out.

  “Don’t!” Shoshana shouted, jumping out after him. She knew what he would find and followed him. Matt was bent over the body of the Israeli tanker, not touching it. The scorched-black corpse was on its back, arms bent at the elbow, reaching up.

  “My God,” Matt whispered.

  She reached down and checked the identity tags of the corpse. “A colonel.” Then she looked inside the crew compartment at the rear of the tank. “Probably a brigade commander caught moving his command post.”

  “What in the hell happened?”

  “I don’t know,” she answered and pulled him back to the ambulance. “We’ve got to go. Our job is with the living.”

  Three kilometers down the road, they found five ambulances stopped in front of a low building. They pulled into line and Hanni got out and went inside. She was back within minutes. “We’re at the aid station,” she said, “but there’s no one to transport. They’re waiting for the medics to bring more in.”

  ”Why don’t you use helicopters for air evac?” Matt asked.

  “We do when we can,” Shoshana answered. “But we don’t have enough helicopters to go around, so we still use a lot of ambulances.”

  Matt walked inside the temporary aid station and was surprised to see many wounded men, some lying on the floor, others sitting and resting against the wall. Anger flared when he realized they could be transporting many of them. He walked into the next room. It was filled with even more seriously wounded. “What the hell?” he growled.

  A medic was giving a shot to one of the men and looked up. “Yank?” he asked, recognizing Matt’s fitigues.

  “Yeah,” Matt answered. “I just got here with an ambulance. Someone said there’s no one to transport. Why in hell aren’t we moving these guys?”

  The medic looked around. “Nothing anyone can do for them.”

  Matt’s face turned rock-hard. It was his first experience with triage.

  Matt pointed to the first room with the much less seriously wounded. “What about them?”

  “They’ll be going back in a few hours.” The medic shrugged.

  “Then why in hell can’t we move them now?”

  The medic looked at him for a moment before answering. “They’re going back to their units, where they’re needed.”

  Matt turned and walked out, determined to do something. Hanni was waiting for him. “You’ve got to go back. Shoshana found a stalled A PC, one of your M One-thirteens that we use for an ambulance up front. She’s got it started and we’re going forward.”

  “Why doesn’t she tell me to leave?”

  Hanni shook her head. “She couldn’t do that. Matt, you’re tearing her apart. She wants to be with you but—”

  “Come on, I’m going with you.”

  He and Hanni sat in the back of the M113 while Shoshana drove, working her way across a battlefield. Loud clangs echoed through the small compartment, deafening them when bullets ricocheted off the outer hull. “I thought vehicles with a red cross were protected under the Geneva Convention,” he yelled at the woman, glad that he was wearing a flak jacket a
nd a helmet.

  “You think that makes a difference to the Syrians?”

  The APC jerked to a halt. “Get out!” Shoshana yelled. “Syrian tanks!” Matt followed Hanni out, relieved to get out of the metal box and see what was going on around them. Shoshana had hidden them in a wadi, a dry streambed that had down-cut eight feet into the terrain. Matt could hear the distinctive clank of a tank coming from over the edge. It sounded like it was fifty meters away.

  Ahead of them, a squad of Israelis had dismounted from their M113 and were also hunkered down in the wadi. One of them held a Dragon antitank missile. The squad leader motioned for them to deep down as the clanking grew louder. Then the squad leader pointed at his eyes with forked fingers, then to Matt, then back down the wadi. Matt understood immediately what he wanted and ran back down the dry streambed until he was well clear of the clanking sounds. He poked his head over the edge of the wadi. Much to his surprise, he saw only one tank moving toward them and it was at least five hundred meters away. He looked for supporting troops and counted nine on the other side of the tank, moving along in its shadow.

  Since he didn’t know the hand signals to flash what he had seen, he ran back to tell them. The squad leader nodded and deployed five men to the left and the Dragon team down the wadi to where Matt had been. When they were ready, he raised his fist and pulled it down hard. The men on the far left popped up and sent a rain of fire into the soldiers beside the tank. Matt stuck his head over the edge and saw the turret traverse toward the five men. A hand grabbed the back of his flak jacket and pulled him back down. “Keep down,” the squad leader baiked. At the same time, the Dragon team on the right swung the missile over the edge and fired. The boom of the missile hitting the tank washed over them. “That was our last one,” the sergeant told him. “We’ll be lucky to get him.”

  Matt fell down to the bottom of the arroyo and held on to his helmet as the tank continued to fire. Then a hand grabbed his flak jacket and jerked him to his feet. The squad leader pushed him in the direction of the Dragon team. Matt tired to find Shoshana but had lost both her and Hanni. Another soldier kept pushing him along until they were past the Dragon team and well away from the APCs. “Knocked off a track, but the bastard’s still firing,” the sergeant said.