"But do you not see?" continued the
police officer. "They sound
like explosives. Look like detonating am-
munition, but they are neither. They are
only show. Semblances of something else.
Real in themselves but only an illusion
of another reality. Not dangerous at
all."
"So?"
"That is precisely what you are being
asked to give. The semblance, not the
reality. You have only to pretend. In a
short, simple ceremony with but a few
words that you know are only an illusion.
Not dangerous at all. And very polite."
"Wrong-o!" roared Hawkins. "Everybody
knows what a firecracker is; nobody'll
know I'm pretending."
al
"Between the two of us, I must
differ. It is nothing more than a
diplomatic ritual. Everyone will
understand, take my word for it."
"Yeah? How the hell do you know
that? You re a Peking cop, not a
Kissing-ass."
The Communist fingered the box of
firecrackers and sighed audibly. 'I
apologize for the minor deception,
General. I am not with the People's
Police. I am second vice-prefect for
the Ministry of Education. I am here
to make an appeal to you. An appeal to
your reason. However, the rest is
quite true. You are under house
arrest, and the patrols outside are
policemen."
"I'll be goddamned! They sent me a
lace-pants." Hawkins grinned again.
"You boys are worried, real worried,
aren't you?"
The Communist sighed once more.
"Yes. The idiots who started this
thing have been shipped to mining
collectives in.Outer Mongolia. It was
lunacy; although I'll grant them you
were a temptation, General Hawkins.
Have you any idea the volumes of
scurrilous attacks you've made on
every Marxist, Socialist, and, forgive
me, even vaguely democratically
oriented nation on the face of this
earth? The worst examples I should say
best examples of demagoguery!"
"A lot of that crap was written by
the people who paid me to speak',"
said Hawkins, a bit reflectively. And
then he quickly added, "Not that I
didn't believe it! Goddamn, I
believe!"
"You're impossible!" Lin Shoo
stamped his foot as a child might.
"You're as insane as Lu Sin and his
band of growling paper lions! May they
all crack many rocks and fornicate
with Mongolian sheep! You are simply
impossi
Hawkins stared at the Communist both
at the furious expression on his face
and the brightly colored box of
firecrackers in his hand. He had made
a decision and both of them knew it.
"I'm also something else, slant
eyes," said the lieutenant general,
approaching Lin Shoo.
"No! No! No violence, you idiot " It
was too late for the Communist to
scream. Hawkins had grabbed the cloth
~9
of his tunic, pulled him swiftly off
his feet and chopped Lin Shoo beneath
the mandible.
The vice-prefect of the Ministry of
Education slumped instantly into
unconsciousness.
Hawkins grabbed the box of
firecrackers out of Lin Shoo's hand
and raced around the lacquered table
into the sleeping quarters. He grabbed
the blanket nailed across the window,
folded back a tiny section on the edge
and looked outside at the rear of the
house. There were the two policemen
chatting-calmly, their rifles at their
sides. Beyond them was the sloping
hill that led down to the village.
Hawkins released the blanket and ran
back into the main room, dropping
immediately to his hands and knees and
scrambling obstacle-style toward the
front door. He stood up and silently
opened it a crack. The two flanking
policemen were about forty feet away
and were as relaxed as the troops in
the rear. What's more, they were
looking down the descending road,
their attention not on the house.
MacKenzie took the brightly colored
box of firecrackers from under his
arm, ripped off the lightweight paper
and shook out the connecting strings
of cylinders. He wound two separate
strands together, twisted both fuses
into one, and removed his World War II
Zippo from his pocket.
He stopped; he sucked his breath,
angry with himself. Then, holding the
strands of firecrackers at his side,
he walked casually past the windows
into the bedroom and removed his
holster and cartridge belt from
another nail in the thin wall. He
strapped the apparatus around his
waist, removed the Colt .45 and
checked the magazine. Satisfied, he
shoved the weapon into its leather
casing as he walked out of the
bedroom. He circled the armchair in
front of the Han Shu mantel, stepped
over the immobile Lin Shoo and
returned to the front door.
He ignited the Zippo, and held the
flame beneath the twisted fuse, then
opened the door and threw the entwined
strands onto the grass beyond the
porch.
Closing and bolting the door softly
and swiftly, Hawkins dragged a small
red lacquered chest from the foyer and
forced it against the thick, carved
panel. Then he raced 23
into the sleeping quarters and pulled
back a small section of the window
blanket and waited.
The explosions were even louder than
he remembered made so, he guessed,
from the combined strands bursting
against one another.
The guards at the rear of the house
were jolted out of their lethargy;
their weapons collided in midair as
each whipped his off the ground.
Rifles in waist-firing position, the
two men raced toward the front of the
house.
- The moment they were out of sight,
Hawkins yanked down the blanket,
crashed his foot into the thin strips
of wood and thinner panes of glass,
shattering the entire window. He
leaped through onto the grass and
started running toward the fields and
the sloping hill.
Al
CHAPTER THREE
At the base of the hill was the main
dirt road that circled the village.
Like spokes from a wheel, numerous
offshoots headed directly into the
small marketplace, in the center of
the town. A semipaved thoroughfare
branched outward tangentially from the
circling road and connected with a
pac
ed highway about four miles ffi the
east. The American diplomatic mission
was twelve miles down that highway
within Peking proper.
What he needed was a vehicle,
preferably an automm bile, but
automobiles were practically
nonexistent outside the highest
official circles. The People's Police
had automobiles, of course; it had
crossed his mind to double back around
the hill to find Lin Shoo's, but that
was too risky. Even if he Lund it and
stole it, it would be a marked
vehicle.
Hawkins circled the village keeping
to the high ground above the road.
They would be coming after him. He
could stay in the hills indefinitely,
that didn't bother him. He had
bivouacked underground in the
mountains of Cong-Sol and Lai Tai in
Cambodia for months at a time; he
could live in the forests better than
most animals. Goddamn, he was a prol
But it was also pointless. He had to
get to the mission and let the Free
World know what kind of enemy it was
sucking up to. Enough was enough,
goddamn itl They could send out radio
messages, barricade the whole complex,
and fight it out until the offshore
carriers sent in air strikes to
pinpoint pulverize, even if it meant
blowing up half of Peking. Then the
copters could come in and get them
out.
as
Of course, the civilians would shit
in their pants, but he would control
them. Teach the fancy pants how to
fight. Fight! Not talk!
MacKenzie stopped his fantasizing.
Below to the right, coming around the
bend in the road about a quarter of a
mile away was a lone motorcycle. On it
was a shee-san police official, a kind
of Chinese state trooper. The answer
to a prayer!
Hawkins rose from the tall grass and
started scrambling down the hill. In
less than a minute he was at the edge
of the dirt border. The bike was still
around the curve out of sight, but he
heard it coming closer. He threw
himself down on the dirt in the middle
of the road, drawing his legs up to
appear smaller than he was, and lay
perfectly still.
The motorcycle's engine roared as the
driver came around the curve, then
sputtered as it skidded to a stop.The
shee-san got off the bike and whipped
out the kickstand. Hawkins could hear
and feel the quick footsteps as the
trooper approached.
The shee-san bent over him and
touched his shoulder, recoiling at the
recognition of the American uniform.
Mac moved. The shee-san shrieked.
Five minutes later Hawkins had
stretched the shee-san's tunic and
pants over his rolled-up trousers and
shirt. He slipped the trooper's
goggles over his eyes and put on the.
ludicrously tiny visor hat, using the
chin strap to hold it in place, a
cloth pimple sitting on the crew-cut,
grayish black hair. Fortunately for
his sense of well-being, he had a
cigar. He chewed the end to its
desired juiciness and lighted up.
He was ready to ride.
The diplomatic attache ran into the
director's office without saying a
word to the secretary or even knocking
at the door. The director was
threading his teeth with dental floss.
"Excuse me, sir. I've just received
the instructions from Washingtonl I
knew you'd have~to read them!"
The director of the diplomatic
mission, Peking, reached for the cable
and read it. His eyes widened and his
mouth 26
opened in astonishment. A long strand
of dental floss, caught in his teeth,
extended down to the desk.
He saw the roadblock cutting off his
entry onto the Peking highway. It WAS
about three quarters of a mile down
the semipaved thoroughfare; a single
shee-san patrol car and a line of
troopers stretching across the road
was all he could distinguish through
the fogged-up goggles.
As he drew nearer, he could see that
the guards were shouting to each
other. One trooper stepped in front of
the line and began waving his ride in
the air hysterically back and forth,
a signal for the approaching rider to
stop.
There was only one thing for it,
thought Hawkins. If you're going to
buy a goddamned grave, buy it bigl Go
out with all weapons on repeat-fire,
blazing barrels of thunder arrd
lightning; go out with the screams of
the Commie bastards ringing in your
earsl
Goddamnl He couldn't see for the
Bucking dust, and his goddamn foot
kept slipping off the tiny fucking gas
pedal.
He slapped his hand to his holster
and pulled out the .45.
He couldn't focus worth shit, but by
Christ, he could squeeze the trigger!
He did so repeatedly.
To his astonishment the shee-san did
not fire back; instead they dove into
the mounds of dirt and sand, screaming
like hysterical piglets, scampering
into and over the mounds of dirt,
burying their asses from the firepower
of his single .45 weapon.
Goddamn! Disgracefull
Unless his goggles were playing
tricks with the dirt and cigar smoke
and the onrushing blurs, even the
trooper in front an officer, by
Christ; he had to he even he didn't
have the balls to fight back.
An officer!
MacKenzie kept the bike at
top-throttle and exhausted the clip of
the .45. He careened up and over a
mound of dirt and sand and cascaded
onto a sloping hill of grass. As the
bike was in midair he glimpsed the
blurs of screaming heads beneath him
and wished to hell he had more ummo.
He twisted the handlebars violently so
he could angle down and zoom
diagonally back toward the road.
27
Goddamn! He hit the surface againl
He'd broken through the barricade! He
was barrel-assing onto the Peking
highwayl
The eat concrete was a joy. The
spinning wheels of the motorcycle
hummed; the wind rushed against his
faces clear, intoxicating blasts of
clean, dustless air which forced the
smoke of his cigar into whirling
pockets around his ears. Even the
goggles were clear now.
He took the next nine miles like a
star-spangled meteor through an
unknowing Chincom sky. Another mile
and he would turn into the northern
sid
e streets of Peking. Goddamn! He
was going to make it! And then, by
Christ, the Commie bastards would find
out what an American counterstrike
wasl
He raced the bike through the
crowded streets and careened off the
curb at the entrance to Glorious
Flower Square, the final stretch to
the mission which stood at the end of
the small plaza, fronting the street
in alabaster, Oriental splendor. There
were, as usual, crowds of PeWngers and
out-of-/owners milling about, waiting
to catch glimpses of the strange, huge
pink people that came and went through
the white steel doors inside the
medium^sized compound.
It wasn't much of a compound at
that; there was no brick wall or high
metal fence surrounding the mission.
Only a thin latticework of decorative
wood, lacquered against the elements,
enclosing the clipped grass lawn that
fronted the steps.
The protection was in the windows
and- doors: iron grillwork and steel.
MacKenzie rewed the bike's engine to
maximum, figuring the noise would part
the throngs of onlookers.
It did.
The Chinese scattered as he raced down
the street.
And Hawkins damn near fell off the
bike's saddle at what he saw in front
of him; what in a sense was rushing
toward him at goddamn near fifty miles
an hour on that short stretch of
pavement in Glorious Flower Square.
There were three sets of wooden
barricades elongated horses in front
of the closed latticework gate1 Each
horizontal plank was a foot or so
above the other, forming a 28
receding escalator wall of thick
boards backed up by the delicate,
filigreed fence.
Standing in a line at port-arms were
Robert Ludlum - Road To Gandolfo.txt Page 4