by Robb White
The tank rumbled on, and then, with one track locked, Jason spim it around so that the long, thin-barreled cannon pointed toward the troops in ranks; pointed over the heads of the men of the band playing away.
Guns, awkward in his mask and feathers, was still studying the heavy Nambu machine gun mounted behind a littie barrier of steel plate. He had already figured out the cannon.
The dust was still all around them and, as an afterthought, Jason had turned the selector up to full rich and left the tank's engine running, so that it was now pouring out gouts of black exhaust.
The Rebel was helping Jason get the mask back on (they left Adam's mask over the head of the dead crewman).
The rest of the parade of vehicles went streaming past the halted tank, their dust flowing into the black of the exhaust.
The tank motor roared at half-throttle, the engines of the other vehicles roared out of the doud of dust, the band played.
No one heard the shot except Adam. . . .
The pilot thought at first that it was the tank passing by, but as the tank went on and then
slewed around and stopped, but the plane kept shaking, he wondered what else could be making it shake that way.
The pilot looked out the side window and saw a tall, half-naked Caucasian running carefully along the wing. The man was bleeding from a wound in the side; he seemed to have infected sores on his arms and legs; he had not shaved and looked, to the pilot, insane.
The pilot got the pistol out of its holster and aimed it at the running man, resting his arm on the edge of the cockpit window. He aimed well and fired.
The impact of the bullet spun the Caucasian around in a weird, awkward dance, and the pilot thought that he feU, as a cloud of dust swept up over the wing and obscured everything for a moment
Then, when the dust cleared, the man was no longer on the wing and the pilot decided that the shot had IdUed him and he had faUen and rolled o£E the wing. The pilot got up out of the seat, ducked low in the cramped cockpit, and went aft so that he could look out the window and under the wing.
ADAM NEVER SAW the pilot aiming the gun out of -the cockpit window. He was running along the wing, watching for the httle lines of the wing ribs and at the same time watching Jason wheel the tank around and stop it. Everything was going fine. There would be the dust of the other vehicles to
conceal them, and now black smoke was pouring out of the tank.
Adam thought, now for the first time, that they really had a chance to get into the plane—all of them.
And then something hit him. It struck him as soHdly as a swinging baseball bat or a speeding car would strike. He felt himself being spun completely around by whatever hit him. But then he was facing toward the open side door of the plane again. Through the dust and the sudden dimness of his eyes he could only see it as a dark, rectangular place in the gray, darkening air. He went toward it without knowing that he was now down on his hands and knees, a great flow of blood staining the silver wing.
Thought, the recognition of all things, feeling, the sense of time and distance—all of these were fading out of Adam. Now he was face down, pulling himself along with his hands, pushing himself with knees growing steadily weaker. He did not feel the dark coolness of the inside of the plane, but that was as far as he could go. He stopped there in the aisle of the plane. His last thought was that he should rest a moment now. Rest, and then go on.
BOOK FOUR
The VaUey of the Shadow of Death
ADAM Land, wounded to the point of death, was Lawakened by a sound. The sound, being different and closer than the other sounds around him, struck through to the mechanism of his brain, as yet unwounded, and woke him up.
He found that he was slumped, half sitting, with his back against some metal object. His bare and bloody legs and feet stretched out awkwardly down what appeared to be a narrow corridor. Blood was pouring from some wound in his body, and there were flies around him.
There was light coming from somewhere, but the place was fairly dark and cool.
Perhaps, he thought, he was in some sort of church, for there were pews, thickly padded, on each side of the aisle he lay in.
There was a window, and through it he could see the tops of green palm trees, the fronds waving to him in the wind.
He was in a church. Or perhaps lying in the aisle of an airplane.
An odd thought, like a complete little cloud drifting in an empty sky, floated into and across and out of his mind. He thought: I am the only American left ahve on this island. Something has happened to all the rest, and I am the only American left ahve anywhere in the world. If this is true, he thought, then I am the only person who knows what it feels hke to be an American. The only person who knows how to be an American.
Then he said to himself, 'Td better not die. Not because I'm important, but because what I know is important. No, I'd better not die."
Then that thought drifted away and he wondered again what had waked him up. There was music coming from somewhere, but that had not waked him. It seemed to him that it had been a voice. A voice close to him and, now remembering it, full of menace.
Adam looked then at the details of his situation. He was hurt, for blood was coming out of him and the flies were buzzing around, Hghting and flying again. Purposeless, they seemed. But there had been purpose in the voice which had awakened him, purpose and threat.
There were some shoes near him. Shoes with high uppers; shoes such as they wore in Texas and the Air Corps—boots almost.
White trousers were above the shoes, and above the trousers was a white jacket with a pretty red sash across it.
Adam raised his head a httle higher. The pilot
THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH 239
was standing there looking down at him, a pistol in his hand.
To Adam the pilot looked small and—mean. He would have preferred an enemy of great height and strength and, even with the gift of death, dignity. Not this little meanness, like a bad-tempered httle feisty dog.
It wasn't really the enemy in his white clothes and pretty sash.
It was the pistol.
Even the pistol was of no statm-e, and it was shoddily made and badly put together, the parts of it not fitting properly, the trigger guard screwed on, and the screw slots burred by carelessness. There were even rusty spots on the enemy's pistol, and Adam doubted if the action worked with the creamy smoothness of a marine's gun.
It was not good, Adam thought. The enemy was small and mean, and his pistol was mean and rusty and, the marines said, made a disagreeable, angry Httle yelp when it fired. It had none of the power and authority of a Colt .45, none of that arm-jarring slam of the .45.
But it could kiU you, this little gun. And it was going to kill him.
Adam remembered now what had awakened him. It had been the enemy saying, in English, "American, you die."
Adam could do nothing. His wounds held him with simple weakness against the seat, all of his strength having drained out of him. He could not raise his hand, nor draw up his legs to rise from the floor. It took aU his strength just to raise his
head high enough so that he could look beyond the pistol to the face of the enemy.
Above the immediate silence between him and the enemy Adam heard the band playing, the tank motor running, even the pounding of the surf. But no voice.
It was not right.
Adam looked at his enemy and said in the enemy's own oddly soft and singsong language; said it aloud and with authority: "I will not die in this contemptible fashion!"
So he tried to rise to his feet, but was struck down again.
Adam heard the explosion of the gun so close to his head that it added a small, sharp hurt to all the pain. Then a slow darkness moved toward him, covered him, pressed him completely down into his own blood on the floor.
"T s Adam dead?" Jason asked as he and the Rebel X rolled the dead pilot off of Adam. They were still wearing the masks and feathers as they pulled Adam up off
the floor and got him into one of the plane's seats.
"I think so," the Rebel said, pulling his mask off and throwing it away.
"No, he's breathing. Adam! Adam!"
Guns was climbing into the plane now, the mask striking against the doorframe and falling back out of the plane.
"Lock the door!" the Rebel said to Guns. "Then see if there're any guns. Adam's hit bad."
THE VALLEY OF THE SRADOW OF DEATH 241
"Help me," Adam said and tried to point, his hand feeble as it waved toward the cockpit.
Jason and the Rebel got him under die arms and knees and carried him forward through the plane. They hurt him getting him into the pilot's seat, but he did not feel it. Jason got into the copilot's seat and leaned over to Adam. "Tell me what to do, Adam!"
The cockpit was spinning slowly around, spinning and spinning. But then, gradually, it stopped going all the way around and just rocked gentiy from side to side.
"Mixture . . ." Adam said, his voice trailing off to nothing, then coming back, ". . . rich . . ." "Where is it? Where, Adam? WhereF' Jason's voice sounded far away to him as he sat staring at the instruments, which continued to rock slowly back and forth.
"Can he see?^ the Rebel asked, standing behind the seats. "Can he think?"
Adam looked at the graceful little symbols, little red and black symbols which, to him, looked as though drawn on the instrument panel by a child. A nice, orderly child, Adam thought.
He found the symbol for the mixture setting and tried to push it. Jason put his hand on top of Adam's and together they pushed the control forward.
"Props . . . fuU r.p.m." Adam looked and found the symbol and Jason pushed the two levers to the stops.
"Unlock controls/' Adam said, pointing to the lock.
"Roll out controls.**
"Unlock instruments."
"The flaps . . ." Adam said, trying to lean over so that he could see the handles.
"This it?" Jason asked.
"No. That's throttle. There . . . over there."
"All the wayr
"All the way/* Adam said. "Now that/' he said, pointing. "Turn it. And hold it . . . No, wait! Put your feet on those pedals. Push hard. Now turn."
Outside, the port propeller quivered, jerked, stopped, jerked again, revolved once, stopped, revolved again, and then suddenly, with a gush of flame and smoke, began to spin.
"Cowl flaps . . . where?" Adam asked, studying tlie symbols. "There . . . stream cowl flaps. Is everybody in?"
"Everybody in. Can you fly it, Adam?"
"Now turn that one. Push on the pedals.**
Both propellers spun now.
Trim tabs, Adam thought. Where are the trim tabs? He couldn't find them. No, there they were, in the wrong place.
Now Adam put his bloody hand on the throttles and tried to push them forward, but his hand, sHppery with blood, would not stay on the red knobs of the throttles. Again Jason put his hand on top of Adam's. "Stay with it, Adam," Jason said. "You're going real good. Stay with it."
"Can we go?" the Rebel asked. "They're coming.**
"V^e can go," Adam said.
WHEN Guns had climbed into the plane and had seen Adam, he remembered other men he had seen as seriously wounded. He remembered the effect of such massive wounds. Some men so hit could not function at all, and died. Others of, Guns always thought, sterner caHber could function, but not for long, and they could not sustain it. For a moment they would be capable of clear and rational thought; then, as though engulfed in the pain of the wound, they would drift out of the world and be no good for the purpose at hand.
Adam was terribly wounded. If he could function at all, it would be a miracle. If he could not. Guns had decided, then the plane was no place for him, Guns.
Guns had decided to go back to the tank. If Adam could get the plane started, there would be time for Guns to get back aboard. In the tank he could, perhaps, give Adam the extra time he would need.
As Jason and the Rebel picked Adam up and started toward the cockpit with him. Guns backed out of the plane's door, closed it, and locked it.
Guns had knocked off the mask he had been wearing as he got into the plane, and now it was lying on the ground, the grim face of the mask facing up.
It had an odd effect on Guns. He stopped for a moment to look at it and then to look down at himself, the cloak of feathers concealing his U.S. marine fatigues.
Guns lacked the mask away and ripped off the feathers. Then he felt again that he was a marine.
He ran, keeping close to the plane, ducking under the tail of it, and then ran on, stooped low, toward the tank. He went up the side of it still on the run, his bare feet stepping from the warm coral runway to the roller pin, to the track guard, to the deck, to the edge of the hatch. Then he was down inside the tank whose engine was stiU roaring, making everything rattle.
Guns looked out of the machine-gun slit, studying his field of fire.
The plane was parked, headed into the wind, on the side of the runway and about halfway down the length of it. Between the tail of the plane and the concrete control tower Guns squatted beside the machine gun in the tank. The rest of the vehicles had gone on and were now drawn up in front of the parading troops.
Guns looked over at the plane. The propellers were not moving, there was no sound from it.
The tank was facing the troops, and Gims could see now that the oflBcers were beginning to suspect something. They were running aromad, shouting and pointing, or were gathered in groups staring at the tank and the plane and arguing.
The band dribbled to a stop.
His field of fire was from the comer of the control tower to the plane's elevator. Guns was satisfied with it.
He checked the machine gun and threaded the belted ammo into it, hand-cranldng a round into the chamber and leaving the gun ready. Then he
THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH 245
Studied the aiming mechanism of the long cannon sticking out of the tank's turret and now pointing straight at the men of the band. He would use the cannon only if the situation got organized and they unlimbered some of the artillery which was now still hooked to the tractors and caissons. The machine gun would have to do all the work. Guns decided—if any work had to be done.
There was still no sound, no movement from the plane. He doubted now if Adam was still aHve. He had had the gray look of death when Guns had looked at him, and death was not far away.
But, Guns decided, he would not start this thing. He looked at the men in their white imiforms. Let them start it, he decided.
He wished that the Rebel and Jason would get out of the plane and get over here in the tank. They'd come in handy when the scuffle started. Jason on the cannon, the Rebel on the other machine gun, and him on this one. The three of them would be hard to handle—for a little while.
Guns could tell now that some officer over there was making a decision, and sure enough, some of the troops got their rifle butts up off the groimd and started loading them.
Now, with about a dozen soldiers walking in front, a httle group of officers followed and the whole detail started toward the plane.
Behind this little group the rest of the troops began to mill around, nobody knowing what to do.
Guns knew exactly what to do. He checked the ammo belt to see that it was feeding straight
into the gun and was lying in nice, even folds in the cans.
Then he bent down over the gun and looked along it to the right side. First he got the ring sight in good focus and then let it blur as he brought the walking group up sharp. He still had a litde time before they would be in a position where he could rake them with the shortest burst, so he looked over at the troops, searching among them until he found the little guy he had seen get out of the plane. Guns didn't know what he was—admiral, general—but he'd been taught that the best way to mess up a bunch of troops was to get rid of the oflBcers, starting, if you could, with the top brass and working down.
It wa
sn't going to be hard. Guns decided. The oflBcers all wore those fancy sashes. Imaginel
Now the party advancing on the plane was close to it and the riflemen were beginning to deploy, getting ready to give the brave oflBcers some cover as they moved on to the plane.
Poor Jason and the Rebel would be caught in there like rats.
Guns let the people blur again and started the slow squeeze, his other hand on the gun in case it wanted to cHmb, his shoulder and chest jammed up hard against the curved butt of the thing.
This machine gun didn't have the satisfying crash of the big .50's in the Marine Corps tanks, but. Guns had to admit, it had a higher rate of fire. He was wasting ammo at this high rate, so he got oflF the trigger.
The empty brass was bouncing aU over the tank as he swung the gun fast around and got the ad-
THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW OF DEATH 247
miral or general, or whatever he was, in the sight and let go with one round.
It was a good, accurate gun. Guns saw the admiral or general go down, so then he sprayed the group around him with a short burst before swinging the gun back to cover the approach to the plane.
Guns was surprised to see one of the plane's propellers begin to turn over.
Adam must be alive, he thought. The Rebel and Jason weren't smart enough to figure out an airplane, much less this one. He had to admire Adam. Hit like that it was hard to think, hard to get things done. But now the other prop was spinning.
And the fun was over. Guns had panicked them for a little while, but now they were breaking for cx)ver; stuff was hitting the tank, making him feel as though he were inside a big tin drum. He spotted three of them down on the ground setting up a tripod with a light machine gun on top of it. He wiped that and then gave the whole outfit a hosing. This put them down for a moment, so, just in case, he cranked the cannon around and up and sent a round through the glass vvdndow of the control tower.