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  children who may have survived the war; I do not know. If you capture him,

  I should be interested in meeting him. But that is your affair."

  "Yes, Comrade General. That is my affair." Rozhdest-venskiy dropped his

  cigarette to the marble floor and started to grind it out beneath the heel

  of his boot.

  "But this is my headquarters building, Colonel; pick up that cigarette."

  "Bat surely, a prisoner used for janitorial service can—"

  "That is not the point; pick it up."

  The boyish smile was gone from Rozhdestvenskiy's face. He hesitated a

  moment, then stooped over and picked up the cigarette butt, holding it

  between two manicured fingernails. "Will there be anything else, Comrade

  General?"

  "No—I think not." Varakov turned and started back

  across the main hall toward his office without walls.

  Thousands of troops were moving inland to escape the raging storm fronts

  assaulting the eastern coast of what had been the United States—regrouping

  and searching, he hoped. That Natalia would be safe as long as she was

  with John Rourke, Varakov took as a fact. It was after that—with this

  Rozhdestvenskiy-—that Varakov worried about her safety.

  "Catherine!" He called out the name before he remembered he had told her

  to go and rest. He shrugged, deciding he would do the same thing himself.

  There might not be time for it in the future.

  His hands stabbed into his pockets as he walked away from his office and

  he stopped once, glancing back over his right shoulder. The offensive

  SS-Hke KGB officer was gone from view. Varakov smiled, remembering the ego

  satisfaction he had given himself in making Rozhdestven­skiy pick up the

  cigarette. He realized as he glanced once more at the mastodons that he

  would likely pay for it, too, and perhaps so would Natalia.

  Rourke's knuckles were white, Ms fists bunched on the yoke now as the

  twin-engine cargo plane skimmed low over over the icy roadway, his

  starboard engine hope­lessly iced. His mind went back to the only other

  time in his life he had crash-landed a plane—the in the New Mexico

  desert on the Night of the War. He remembered Mrs. Richards, her husband

  gone in the destruction of the West Coast, her compassion in caring for

  the dying captain, her tireless help that long night while they had fought

  to keep airborne—then her death when the had—Rourke wrenched back on

  the controls, trying to keep the nose up. The brakes held, but the plane

  started to skid as it hit the ice- and snow-covered road. "Get your heads

  down!" Rourke shouted to Paul, strapped in near the midsection, and to

  Natalia in the copilot's seat beside him.

  "John!"

  Rourke didn't look at her; he was feeling the tendons in his neck

  distending, his body suddenly cold, the air temperature finally getting to

  him. The plane was going out of control. He worked the flaps to

  decelerate, the brakes starting to slow him as well now. The straight-

  away stretched for perhaps another quarter-mile yet and if he slowed the

  craft too quickly the skid would become uncontrollable. The aircraft

  zigzagged under him, the tail of the craft whipping back and forth across

  the three-lane width of Kentucky highway. The straightaway was rapidly

  running out. Eyes squinted against the glare of the plane's lights on the

  snow, he could see ahead of him where the road seem to end, to curve in a

  sharp S-bend, running to his left. The plane coasted right across the icy

  road, toward the drop-off on the far end of the S-bend, a meager metal

  guardrail there and beyond it, from what Rourke could see, a drop.

  Two hundred yards, perhaps less. Rourke controlled the plane with the

  flaps, the braking action worsening the skid. Rourke reached across to

  Natalia, punching the release button on the seat harness, grabbing her by

  the left shoulder, shouting back along the fuselage, "Paul— we're bailing

  out—get the cargo door and jump for it— jump as far out as you canl"

  Rourke didn't wait to see that the younger man was complying, but grabbed

  Natalia, shoving her roughly ahead of him toward the fuselage door.

  "John!" Rourke glanced to his left. Rubenstein was struggling with the

  seat belt, its buckling mechanism apparently jammed. "Save yourselves!"

  Rourke glanced toward Natalia; the Russian woman was already working the

  handle on the cargo door with her left hand, in her right hand something

  metallic gleamed—a knife. She reached the butt of it out to Rourke. Rourke

  snatched it from her hand, wheeling, the aircraft's lurching and bumping

  throwing him toward Rubenstein. Collapsing against the fuselage, Rourke

  reached the knife blade under the webbing strap across

  Paul's left shoulder, sliced it; then, as he started for the leg strap, he

  could feel the rush of arctic-feeling air, hear the slipstream. The

  fuselage door opened. Rourke's borrowed knife slashed apart the last of

  the restraints.

  The knife still in his right hand, he snatched at his CAR-, yelling to

  Paul, "Jump for it, Paul—go on!"

  As Rourke was moving toward the door, the younger man was already on his

  feet, the Schmeisser in his right hand; Natalia was starting to jump.

  Rourke, at the fuselage door, wheeled, reaching toward his strapped-down

  Harley, cast a glance at it because it would likely be the last, and

  snatched his leather jacket. He turned and dove, the snow slamming up

  toward him as he rolled onto the road surface, his left shoulder taking

  it, aching as he hit, the rear stabilizers sawing through the air toward

  him as he flattened himself, .the tail of the fuselage passing inches over

  his head.

  He followed it with his eyes for an instant, then pushed himself to his

  feet, slipping on the ice, running, lurching forward. He could see

  Natalia, lying in the middle of the road, Paul running toward her. Rourke

  heard it, the wrenching and groaning of metal. He wheeled, skidding on the

  heels of his black combat boots across the ice, to watch as the plane

  crashed through the metal roadside barricade and disappeared over the

  side. He waited— there was no explosion. But there wasn't much hope

  either, he thought. Three people, one jacket, a rifle with no spare

  magazines and a submachine gun with no spare magazines. A few pistols. He

  looked into his hand—and a Bali-Song knife. He turned, starting back

  toward Natalia.

  But like a little girl after taking a spill on an ice rink, she sat, legs

  wide apart, her right hand propping her up, her left hand brushing the

  hair back from her face,

  hair already flecked with snow. Beside her Rubenstein crouched, as if

  waiting.

  Rourke stopped walking, a yard or so from her still. He held up the knife.

  "Never told me about the Bali-Song knife."

  She only smiled. Rourke glanced back where the plane had disappeared; if

  anything could be salvaged, it would have to wait. The leather jacket was

  bunched in his left hand along with the CAR-. He approached Natalia,

  squatted down beside her, and draped the coat across her shoulders. She

  was already shivering, as was Paul Ruben-stein. And so was
Rourke. . . .

  "I had the Bali-Song for a long time. For some reason I didn't carry it

  when you found me in (he desert. I don't remember why- But I took it with

  me to Florida, just in case.

  "Are you good with it?" Rourke asked her, shivering.

  "Yes. If my hands weren't so cold—I could show—" She shook from the

  freezing air temperature; sub-freezing, perhaps close to zero, Rourke

  thought as he started down the side of the embankment, carefully, slowly,

  for the rocks that formed the purchases for his hands and feet were

  ice-coated. "Be careful, John."

  "Once I get down there, I can snake up a rope; then you and Paul can join

  me and at least we'll have some shelter—unless it looks like it's going to

  blow or some­thing."

  "I can—" Rubenstein began.

  "You stay with Natalia. If I break every bone in my body doing this, I

  want someone in one piece to take care of her." It was getting dark as

  Rourke started climbing again, the aircraft still some thirty feet below

  him, its portside wing broken in two, the starboard engine

  snagged in a clump of rocks some fifty feet farther below it and

  half-obscured now by snow.

  Rourke's hands were numb as his fingers played along the glistening

  iced-over rocks, his shoulder still ached from where he'd hit the road

  surface, and one desire suddenly obsessed him—to urinate. Rourke's right

  foot edged down, then his left. The left slipped as loose shale under him,

  crusted over with ice, broke away from the dirt that had held it. His

  fingertips dug into the rock sur­face against which they pressed as his

  right foot braced against the coated rock against which only the toes now

  pressed.

  "John—I'm coming down," Natalia shouted.

  "No—I'll be—" Rourke swung his left leg out, finding a purchase against a

  gnarled stump of bush growing out of the dirt embankment. "I'm all right."

  Rourke edged his right hand down onto a lower ledge of rock, then his left

  foot, then his left hand, then his right foot. Slowly, methodically, his

  kidneys screaming at him to let go, he kept moving.

  His hands were numbed to the point where he could barely sense the rocks

  under his fingertips, and his feet were becoming chilled as well. A

  numbness was setting into his thighs. But the plane was nearer.

  He glanced up once; Natalia and Paul, peered down at him, over the edge.

  The thought crossed his mind that even if one of the bikes had remained

  serviceable, how would they ever get it up to the road surface? And the

  freak storm—when would it end?

  The plane was a few yards away from him now, across a wide break in the

  ground and below the break, a drop of seventy-five feet or more. Rourke

  settled himself against the rocks, checking his footing, then awkwardly

  because

  of the narrowness of the ledge, swung his left leg around behind him,

  found a purchase for the left foot, then simultaneously swung his left arm

  out and around, twisting his body. He moved his feet slightly, firming the

  position he had, his back now against the rocks and dirt of the

  embankment. The snow, falling in larger, heavier flakes, covered his

  shoulders, lingered on his eyelashes-freezing him.

  The jump to the opposite side of the break in the ground was only ten or

  eleven feet. But there was no running room. He would simply hurtle his

  body off the ledge and that would be it.

  He sucked in his breath hard, glancing up one nfiore time; he couldn't see

  either Natalia or Paul cleariy because of the heaviness of the snowfall.

  "Now!" he rasped, pushing himself away from the embankment wilh his hands.

  His knees slightly flexed as he half-jumped, half-fell forward, his

  fingers reaching out. His righl hand, then his left touched the opposite

  side of the open space, his hands clawing at the dirt and loose rocks

  there. His hands slipped, his thighs slamming down hard against the

  surface of the ground, his body starting back down the incline, slipping.

  He couldn't dig in his heels—his feet dangled in the air. As he started to

  slide backward, he spread-eagled his arms, his fingers clawing for a

  purchase on the ice-coated ground. A rock—he held it, then the rock

  dislodged and he was slipping again.

  His left hand snaked behind him, snatching for the A.G. Russell Black

  Chrome Sting IA he carried in the little inside waistband holster. His

  fingers closed stiffly around it as he slipped toward the edge, his left

  arm swinging around his body in a wide arc. The point of the Sting IA bit

  deep into the ground, penetrating the ice. His right

  hand grasped for the knife handle as well now, both fists bunched around

  it; his body below the breastbone dangled in midair.

  He sucked in his breath, flexing his arm muscles as he tried pulling

  himself up. There wasn't time; the knife was already slipping from the

  soft dirt beneath the ice, and his cold-numbed fingers were slipping from

  the slick steel of the knife's handle.

  "No!" Rourke heard the shout come from his lips and for the first time

  became conscious of it. Summoning all his strength, he drew himself up.

  The knife slipped from the dirt; his body lurched forward, onto the ice

  and snow. He rolled, flattening himself, the knife still clutched in his

  left fist.

  He couldn't see through the snow now to the road thirty feet above, but

  through the whiteness he heard a voice. "Answer me, John—John!" It was

  Natalia.

  "I'm all right," Rourke shouted back, already starting to edge across the

  ice.

  Two yards from the still intact fuselage, he stood up, slowly edging

  forward. He started into the plane, but stopped.

  His stiff right thumb and first finger worked at his zipper; there was

  something more important than inspecting (he plane that instant. . . .

  He stood inside, shivering with the cold, but at least out of the wind.

  Natalia's borrowed motorcycle, a vintage BSA, had been the first of the

  three, farthest forward in (he fuselage; the other two bikes had hammered

  against it in the crash. It was twisted, as was the underside of the

  fuselage where apparently the craft had gouged against a large rock, or

  one of the supports for the steel guardrail.

  But his own jet black Harley-Davidson Low Rider appeared undamaged, as was

  the bright blue Low Rider he had found for Paul Rubenstein after the

  younger man's motorcycle had been abandoned to lighten the plane during

  the Florida evacuation.

  With effort, still shivering, he got Rubenstein's bike aside so he could

  get to his own. The Lowe Alpine Systems Loco Pack was still strapped in

  place behind the seat. Rourke got to it, opening one of the pockets. There

  was a red-and-silver Thermos Space Blanket, the kind larger than the

  original disposable models developed for the astronaut program. The silver

  reflective side toward him, he wrapped the blanket around his shoulders,

  leaning heavily against one of the fuselage ribs. Rourke rammed his hands,

  palms inward, down inside the fr>nt of his trousers, warming them against

  his testicles to reduce the numbness o( his fingers
so he could move them

  well enough to work. He stood there, the blanket around him, his hands

  starting to get back feeling, his eyes flickering from one part of the

  fuselage to another— the damage.

  The plane was a total loss, as he had realized it would be from the first

  moment he had decided to abandon it, when stopping it on the ice-slicked

  road surface had proven impossible. It would have been unlikely that the

  iced and stalled engine could have been successfully repaired in any

  event. It had been the single-engine landing that had caused the problem

  with stopping in the first place—not enough power. Aside from Natalia's

  motorcycle, everything that was important seemed rela­tively unscathed.

  He could move his fingers more now, so he withdrew his hands from inside

  his pants, then quickly started

  going through his things and the packs of Natalia and of Paul Rubenstein.

  . . .

  A pair of vintage, heavy leather Kombi ski gloves on his hands, a

  seen-better-days gray woolen crew-neck sweater on over his shirt, Rourke

  fed out part of the climbing rope from his pack, a rock secured to the

  free end. "Stand back from the edge up there—got a chunk of rock on the

  end of this for weight."

  "Understand," Paul Rubenstein's voice called back through the snow. Rourke

  still could not see sufficiently well through the heavily falling snow to

  view the road surface above him. He started swinging the free end of the

  rope, the end weighted with the rock, feeding out more and more of the

  line. He made the toss, then heard the sound of the rock slamming against

  something metallic—one of the supports for the guardrail? The rope slacked

  and he started reeling it back in. He would have to try again. . . .

  On the fourth try, the weighted end of the rope didn't move. "Paul—look

  for it!"

  For a moment, there was no answer, then Rubenstein's voice responded,

  "I've got it, John."

  Rourke nodded to himself, then shouted, "Secure it to something really

  sturdy—have Natalia help you!" He waited then. Telling Paul to get