Jake laughed. “It has to be Bob,” he said.
The helicopter did a quick pass by the barricade, and Jake saw an arrow streaming down.
“What the hell? He's shooting arrows at them?”
There was a loud explosion where the arrow hit, the blast big enough to throw several of the refrigerators around.
Jake laughed out loud. “C-4!” he said. “They've put C-4 on the arrows!”
The helicopter made another pass. This time Jake and John could see tracer bullets coming from the cargo door. There was also a second arrow fired, and another explosion.
Some of the men at the refrigerator barricade started shooting back at the helicopter, but the M-240 in the cargo door of the Huey was too much for them, and those who weren't killed began running. The Huey chased down the runners, and fired again, until the area was completely cleared of any would-be bandits.
“That old man can handle it, can't he?” John said.
“Patriots one, this is Goodnature, do you copy?”
“Goodnature?” Jake replied.
“It was my call sign in Vietnam. I figured I may as well use it again,” Bob said.
1
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“It had probably been forty years, at least, since he'd flown, but he handled that Huey like he had just stepped out of it the day before,” Jake said, finishing the story.
“I'm not surprised at all,” Tom said. “I've learned to take the measure of a man pretty quickly, and Bob Varney rates high in my book.”
“This place is spooky,” Deon said.
A freshening breeze blew up, and bits of trash, itself an incongruous sight on a military base, whipped by.
“Listen,” Jake said. “Do you hear that? Sounds like a distant bugle.”
The others listened, and sure enough, they could hear a high-pitched hum. It was Mike who pointed out that it was the wind passing through a gutter.
“All right, Tom, take us to the gold,” Jake said, and the four men got back into the two vehicles, but this time Tom was driving the minivan, and Deon was following behind, in the truck.
They drove by the golf course, by the building that was, at one time, the Fort Campbell Officers' Open Mess, then down a narrow blacktop road until they reached a fenced-in area.
UNAUTHORIZED PERSONS
NOT ALLOWED
BEYOND THIS POINT
The sign was still legible, though kudzu vine had nearly taken it over, as it had taken over the high chain-link fence itself. The gate was open and off the top hinge, so that it was hanging at an angle. When they drove through they saw several bunkers, the mounds overgrown with weeds.
Jake had been concerned as to how hard it would be to get into the bunker when they got there, but he saw that the doors to all the bunkers were missing.
“That's good,” Jake said. “We won't have any trouble getting in.”
“I'm sure all the bunkers have been gone through, and cleaned out of anything they might have held,” Tom said. “I just hope . . .”
Tom didn't have to finish his comment, because Jake knew exactly what he was about to say.
“Yeah, I know what you mean. I hope so as well.”
“There it is,” Tom said, pointing.
“You're sure that's the one? They all look alike to me.”
Tom chuckled. “I'm not likely to forget where I hid forty million dollars, now, am I?”
They stopped in front, then got out of the car. Deon and Mike got out of the truck.
“Deon, you and Mike get your weapons and stand by. I haven't seen anyone, but it's better to be safe than sorry.”
“Roger that,” Deon said, and walking to the back of the truck, he opened the panel that let him reach between the floors, and pulled out a couple of M-4 rifles that had been secreted there.
“All right,” Tom said. “Let's see if anyone has been here.”
To provide light, Tom took a Coleman lantern inside, lit it, and set it on the side of the bunker opposite the wall where he had hid the gold. He and Jake then took axes into the bunker. Tom blew on his hands, rubbed them together, and swung the first blow.
Outside Deon and Mike could hear the steady thump of the axes from within the bunker.
“Damn, I hope this isn't all for nothing,” Deon said.
“Yeah, you and me . . . Hold it,” he said. He stuck his head in through the open door of the bunker. “Jake, someone's comin'!”
Tom and Jake started back outside, but Jake stopped him. “Wait,” he said. “They're going to want to know what we're doing in here. Grab up some of that sheet lead we've pulled down, and take it outside.
Jake and Tom, each carrying a piece of sheet lead, stepped outside.
“Deon, Mike, get behind the bunker and keep them covered. I'll try and talk us out of it. If things start to go south, open up.”
“Right,” Deon said, and he and Mike moved quickly to get behind the bunker, managing to get out of sight before the car arrived. When the car stopped, four men got out. Jake was relieved to see that they weren't SPS, but were local police.
“What are you two doing here?” one of them asked.
“Obey Ohmshidi!” Jake said, and he and Tom gave the salute.
“Obey Ohmshidi,” the policeman said. “I'm going to ask you again. What are you doing here?”
“We're stripping lead off the walls of the bunkers. We can get three Moqaddas per pound back in Nashville. And it doesn't take that much lead to make money. I figure, if we strip down all these bunkers, we'll likely come up with a thousand pounds. That's three thousand Moqaddas!”
“What makes you think you can just come in here and start stealing this lead?”
“Imam Malik gave us permission,” Jake said.
The policeman had a look of confusion on his face. “Who is Imam Malik?”
“What? You don't know who the blessed Imam Malik is? He has been appointed by the Great Leader as the caliph of all abandoned military bases. I can't believe you don't know who he is.” Jake pulled out his cell phone, punched in a few numbers, then held it to his ear. He waited for a moment, then began talking.
“Obey Ohmshidi, oh noble Caliph. The peace of Allah be upon you. This is your humble servant, Jake Lantz. We are removing the lead as you requested, Imam, but some men have stopped us. I don't know, I'll ask.”
“What is your authority for stopping us,” Jake asked. Then, before the policeman could answer, he put the phone back to his ear. “What's that? You want to speak to their leader? I'll ask.”
“Who is your leader? The Imam wants to talk to him.”
“I . . . uh . . . that's all right,” the policeman said, holding up his hand. “You go right ahead.”
“Imam, they have said that we can continue to strip the lead. Oh, wait.”
“The imam wants to know if he has to personally give you the order.”
“No, no, that isn't necessary,” the policeman said. “Tell the Imam, I wish Allah's blessings upon him, I don't wish to disturb someone as important as he is. We'll be going now.”
“Obey Ohmshidi,” Jake repeated, saluting again. This time all four police responded with the salute. Then, they got back into the car and drove away.
“Ha!” Tom said as they watched the dust swirl up from behind the car as it headed, quickly, for the gate to the compound. “Who did you actually call?”
“Nobody,” Jake replied with a chuckle. “I just poked in a few numbers. I didn't hit âsend.'”
“Remind me never to play poker with you. That's as cool a bluff as I've ever seen run.”
Deon and Mike were laughing as well, when they came back around front.
“Okay, let's get the gold,” he said.
It took another fifteen minutes of chopping before Tom let out a triumphant shout.
“There it is!” he said. “There's the first gold bar!”
Less than one hour after they found the first gold bar, they had every bar out, and safely tucked away between the floors of the truck. It was late afternoon when they drove back out through gate 5, then turned south on 41 for the long drive back home. This time, though, their cargo wasn't wood, it was gold. Tom and Deon were in the truck, Jake and Mike were following behind.
“I've been doing some figuring,” Mike said. “As near as I can figure, we have about fifty five million Euros here.”
“Fifty five million,” Jake said. He nodded. “I think we'll be able to get our economy going with that.”
C
HAPTER
T
WENTY
Fort Morgan
Â
“For the time being, I don't think we should let anyone beyond out little group here know about the gold,” Bob said when Jake and the others returned with the truck.
“Where will we keep it?” Deon asked.
“We'll make a vault here, in the fort, and keep it there,” Bob said. “I'm sure James can build us a place for it.”
“What we have to do now, is establish an exchange system, and issue our own currency,” Jake said. “But I admit, I'm not sure how to go about that.”
“I don't see it as any problem. We did it in the army with MPCs,” Bob said. “We could use that as our guide.”
“MPCs?” Jake asked.
“Military payment certificates. When we got paid in Vietnam, we weren't paid in dollars, we were paid in scripâcertificates that were good only on the military basesâbut one dollar in MPC was equal to one dollar U.S. And, we could exchange them for Piasters. The MPCs were accepted by the soldiers, because they were backed by dollars. We can do the same thing here, but back our currency with gold.”
“Yes,” Jake said. “And I think we should call them dollars.”
“How about, Freedom Dollars?” Bob suggested.
“Yeah, Freedom Dollars. I like that,” Jake said.
Â
Youth Confinement and Enlightenment Center 251
Â
Jane Poindexter was sound asleep when she was awakened by her teacher, Miss Mugambwe.
“Come girl,” Miss Mugambwe said. “Get dressed.”
“Why?”
“Don't ask questions, just do as I say.”
“Why aren't you waking the others?”
Miss Mugambwe slapped Jane hard.
“Ow! That hurt!”
“Then do as I say, and don't give me any backtalk.”
Jane reached for her burqa.
“You won't be needing that,” Miss Mugambwe said.
“What should I wear? All my clothes have been taken from me.”
“You'll wear this.” The woman handed Jane a very sheer nightgown, so sheer that you could see through it.
“I don't understand.”
“You don't need to understand. All you need to do, is do what I tell you to do.”
Jane took off her sleeping gown, then reached for her bra and panties.
“You won't be needing that.”
“Miss Mugambwe, I don't like this. I don't know what is going on, but I can't leave this barracks wearing only this, and nothing under it. Why, you can see right through it.”
“This is your wedding night.”
“What? Wedding night? I'm only fifteen years old! I don't want to get married!”
By now several of the other girls had been awakened, and although they overheard the conversation, they were too frightened to do anything, so they lay in their beds, quietly, praying that nobody came for them.
Except for one girl.
Barbara Carter was seventeen years old, the oldest girl in the barracks. She had been thrust into a position of leadership by virtue of her age, and had willingly taken on the responsibility. She lay quietly until Miss Mugambwe took Jane out. Then she got out of bed, put on her burqa, and slipped out of the barracks.
Hiding in the shadows, she watched the cabin into which Miss Mugambwe took Jane, then, when the coast was clear, she moved quickly to the boys' barracks.
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Eddie was asleep when he felt someone pushing on his shoulder. “What?” he asked.
“Shhh.”
In the dark over his bed, Eddie saw a burqa-clad figure, and he sat up quickly.
“Jane? What are you doing here?” he whispered harshly.
“I'm not Jane,” Barbara said quietly. “But Jane is in trouble.”
“What sort of trouble?”
“Shh. Come with me. Be quiet.”
The air was rent with snoring and heavy breathing, and it didn't appear that anyone was awakened.
Eddie got up and quickly pulled on a pair of trousers, then put on his shoes. That done, he and Barbara left the barracks, walking as quietly as they could.
“What is it?” Eddie asked, once they were outside. “What's going on?”
“Jane has been selected to be a bride tonight.”
“To be a bride? What are you talking about?”
“You haven't received any classes on the
Moqaddas Sirata
rites of marriage?”
“No, I don't know what you are talking about.”
“What I'm talking about, is Jane is going to be raped tonight, unless we can do something to stop it.”
“What the hell! I'll kill any son of a bitch that tries.”
“You may have to,” Barbara said. “But whether you kill him or not, once you interfere, you won't be able to stay here. They'll punish you and Jane.”
“Thanks for telling me. Who are you? No, wait,” Eddie said. “Don't tell me. If I don't know who you are, I'll never be able to tell them who helped me, no matter what kind of torture they put me through.”
“She's in that cabin,” Barbara said.
“Thanks. Now, go, get out of here while you can,” Eddie said.
“You are a good person, Eddie. God be with you,” Barbara said as she turned and slipped back into the dark night, her black burqa making her invisible within a few steps.
Eddie moved up to the side of the cabin, then looked in through the window. He saw his girlfriend, her young, nude body, being tied hand and feet to a bed. The person tying her was obviously a woman, as she was dressed head to toe in a burqa. A beardless man, dressed in the forest-green uniform of the SPS, was standing by the bed watching, his face contorted by lust.
“That's good enough. Leave her now. You can come back for her in about an hour.”
The woman bowed, then started toward the door.
Eddie waited outside the cabin, behind a tree, and as the woman walked by, he stepped out in front of her and brought her down with a powerful roundhouse right to her head.
With the woman knocked out, Eddie quickly stripped her of her burqa, then he put it on, and went back to the cabin. Opening the door he stepped inside, just in time to see the man dropping his trousers.
“What are you doing here?” the man asked angrily as he saw, what he assumed to be Miss Mugambwe coming back into the cabin. “I told you to leave us now.”
Eddie pointed toward the corner as if the woman had forgotten something, and when the man looked around to see what it was, Eddie picked up a chair and brought it crashing down over his head. The man went down, but Eddie didn't stop. He hit him several more times until he was sure he had killed him.
Jane had been looking on in frightened and confused silence.
Eddie pulled off the burqa.
“Eddie!” she said.
“Shh. We're getting out of here,” Eddie said. “As soon as I get you untied, put this on.”
Eddie worked quickly to undo the ropes at her hands and feet. Then, when she was free, she slipped into the burqa. As she was doing that, Eddie went through the pockets of the man he had just killed. His ID card identified him as Troy Dawson, Captain of the Mobile Branch of the SPS. He also found car keys, and that gave him an idea.
Quickly, Eddie stripped the man. Then, taking off his own trousers, he put on the SPS uniform. By the time he was finished dressing, Jane was sitting on the foot of the bed, now wearing the burqa, but not the scarf and veil.
“Eddie, what are we going to do?” Jane asked.
“He's got a car out there somewhere,” Eddie said. “As soon as we find it, we're going to get out of here.”
“Are we going home? Oh, I so much want to see mama again.”
“I'm sorry, Jane, we can't go home. That'll be the first place they look for us.”
Dawson had also been wearing a pistol, and Eddie strapped that on as well.
“Let's go,” he said. “Be quiet. When we leave here, don't say a word.”
Once outside, Eddie reached out for Jane's hand as they hurried through the night. At least twice during their move through the darkness, Eddie and Jane had to stop and get behind a tree or a shrub, to avoid detection by roving guards. Then, when they reached the parking lot, Eddie raised the remote key up and clicked it. He saw the lights flash on one of the cars.
“There is it,” he said quietly.
Taking Jane by the hand, he guided her through the parking lot to the car, a black Buick. On the door were the letters SPS, above the stylized “O” that was now the national symbol. The doors had been unlocked by the remote, and he and Jane slipped into the car. Eddie started the car and drove toward the gate. To his pleasant surprise, the car had a remote device that opened the gate automatically as they approached.
“Where are we going?” Jane asked.
“We can't go to Mobile, but I have a place in mind that's not far.”
“Where? No matter where we go, we'll be caught and brought back here.”
“No we won't, not with what I have in mind. I overheard some of the SPS talking about a group of people down at Gulf Shores who have sort of broken away from the others. That's where we're going to go.”
“If they've broken away from the others, you won't be welcome wearing that,” Jane said.
Eddie chuckled. “If I take this off, I'll be in my underwear.”
“Just take off the jacket,” Jane suggested.
“Yeah, that's a good idea.”
Stopping the car alongside the road, Eddie pulled off the shirt. A couple of minutes later, when he drove onto the bridge across Weeks Bay, he tossed the uniform jacket into the water.
“I wish I had something else to wear,” Jane said.
“We'll find something for you to wear when we get there,” Eddie promised. “At least you won't have to wear that damn bee keeper's screen over your face.”
Jane laughed. “Bee keeper's screen.”
They made it from the confinement camp to the Intracoastal Canal on Highway 59 in just over half an hour. The permanent bridge had been destroyed, but had been replaced by a pontoon bridge. It was still dark as they approached, and Eddie stopped the car about one hundred yards short of the bridge.
“What are we stopping for?” Jane asked.
“I don't expect we'll get a very warm welcome in this car,” he said. “We'd better walk the rest of the way.”
“All right.”
Leaving the car, Eddie and Jane walked toward the canal, but they were stopped about twenty-five yards short of the bridge by two armed men. One of them raised a bullhorn.
“Both of you, put your hands up.”
“Eddie, I'm scared.”
“This can't be any worse than what we've already been through, can it? Put your hands up, like the man said.”
“Yeah, I guess you're right.”
“Advance slowly,” the guard with the bullhorn ordered.
As Eddie and Jane got close enough, it was easy to see that they were both very young.
“Damn, they're just a couple of kids,” one of the guards said.
“He's wearing a pistol,” the other said.
“I'll take the pistol out,” Eddie called to them.
“No, don't touch it. Just advance slowly.”
Eddie and Jane walked on up to the gate.
“Who are you?” the other guard asked.
“My name is Eddie Manning. This is my friend, Jane Poindexter.”
“What are you two doing here?”
“We escaped from YCEC 251,” Eddie said.
“You escaped from what?”
“Youth Confinement and Enlightenment Center, number 251,” Eddie explained.
“What is that? I've never heard of it.”
“You haven't heard of the youth confinement centers?”
“No.”
“Everyone between the ages of six and seventeen have been put in confinement camps. There's one at Camp Beckwith. That's where Jane and I were being held before we escaped.”
“Are you serious? Everyone between six and seventeen has been rounded up?”
“Yes.”