Games of State

CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO

As soon as he saw the gun, Bob Herbert threw his car into reverse and crushed the hand controlled gas pedal down. The sudden backward acceleration threw him hard against his shoulder harness, and he cried out as it snapped tight against his chest. But the bullets from the van missed the driver's seat, pelting the hood and the front fender as the car rocketed away. Herbert continued moving away, even after his vehicle's right rear side struck a street light and caromed off, skidding onto the road. Oncoming cars braked fast or swerved to avoid him. The drivers shouted and blasted their horns.

Herbert ignored them. He looked ahead and saw the front-seat passenger of the van lean out the window. The man trained the gun on Herbert.

"Sons of bitches don't give up!"! Herbert yelled. Slowed because he had to do everything by hand, Herbert slammed the gas pedal down and spun the steering wheel to the left.

Then he braced himself against the wheel with his left arm.

Racing ahead, he quickly covered the fifteen feet which separated him from the van. He rammed the van's left rear fender. Metal twisted and screamed as they collided, the van was thrown forward, and Herbert swung his Mercedes into the street. Still pressing hard on the gas, he raced past the driver's side and sped ahead.

Traffic had now stopped well behind them and pedestrians were running away in all directions.

Then Herbert remembered the cellular phone. He scooped it up. "Mike, are you still there?" "Christ, didn't you hear me shouting?" "No. Jesus, now I got two continents mad at me!" "Bob, what's—" Herbert didn't hear the rest. He dropped the phone in his lap and swore as a tram turned onto the street in front of him. Speeding up, he swept around it, putting the tram between him and the van. He hoped the gunman didn't shoot the tram out of frustration and sheer cussedness.

Herbert retrieved the phone. "Sorry, General, I didn't hear that." "I said what's going on?" "Mike, I've got these lunatics with guns who decided we had to have our own private Grand Prix in Hanover!" "Do you know where you are?" Rodgers asked.

Herbert glanced in his rearview mirror as the van screeched around the tram. "Hold on," he said to Rodgers.

He set the phone down on the passenger's seat and put both hands on the wheel as the van shot onto the road. As it raced after him, Herbert looked forward. Hanover was a blur as he raced onto Lange Laube, made a few quick turns, and was on Goethe Strasse. Fortunately, he realized, traffic was lighter than it might have been at this hour because people had stayed out of town during Chaos Days.

Herbert heard Mike Rodgers's voice coming from far away. "Shit!" he said, snatching up the phone as he sped ahead. "Sorry, Mike. I'm here." "Where exactly are you?" Rodgers asked.

"I've got no idea." "Can you see any signs?" Rodgers interrupted.

"No," he said. "Wait, yes." His eyes fixed on a street sign as it whipped past. "Goethe Strasse. I'm on Goethe Strasse." "Hold on," Rodgers said. "We're bringing a map up on the computer." "I'll hold on," Herbert said. "Man, I've got nowhere to go." The van spun onto Goethe Strasse, clipped a car as it did, then accelerated. Herbert didn't know whether these jerks had some kind of legal immunity, zero brains, or just a lot of mad, because they obviously weren't giving up. He figured they were pissed because he was an American and a handicapped man, and he'd stood up to them. That kind of behavior simply could not be tolerated.

And of course, he thought, there isn't a policeman in sight. But as the officer back at the Beer-Hall had said, most of the Landespolizei were tied up watching other meeting places and events. Besides, no one expected a car chase in the middle of the city itself.

Rodgers came back on. "Bob— you're okay there. Get onto Goethe Strasse and continue east if you can. It's a straight run to Rathenau Strasse, which runs south. We'll try to get help to you over there—" "Shit!" Herbert cried again, and dropped the phone.

As the van got closer, the gunman leaned from the window and began firing low, at the tires. Herbert had no choice but to drive into the less-crowded oncoming lane, the lane heading into town. He quickly put himself out of range.

Cars swung out of his way as he raced ahead.

Suddenly, his flight was halted and his orientation rattled as he thumped hard into a pothole. Pinwheeling a half-turn toward the oncoming van, Herbert tapped the brake and took command of the spin. The van shot past him as he stopped facing west, facing the way he'd come.

The van screamed to a stop some fifty yards behind him.

Herbert was back within range. He grabbed the phone and hit the gas.

"Mike," he said, "we're goin' the other way now. Back along Goethe to Lange Laube." "Understood," Rodgers said. "Darrell's on the phone too. Stay cool and we'll try to get you some help." "I'm cool," Herbert said as he glanced back at the roaring van. "Just make sure I don't end up cold," he said.

He looked in his rearview mirror and saw the gunman reloading his weapon. They weren't going to give up, and sooner or later his luck would run out. As he looked in the mirror, he saw the wheelchair and decided to get in front of the van, press the button to activate the bucket, and dump his wheelchair under their wheels. It might not stop them, but it would certainly cause some damage. And if he lived, he'd have fun filling out the requisition form for a new one.

Reason for Loss. He thought of the only essay section of form L-5. "Dropped it from a speeding car to foil neo-Nazi assassins. " Herbert slowed, let the van come closer, then pressed the button on the dash.

The rear door remained closed as a singsongy female voice informed him, "I'm sorry. This device will not operate while the car is in motion. " Herbert slammed his palm on the gas pedal and sped up. He watched the van closely in his rearview mirror, staying dead-center in front of them as much as possible so the gunman wouldn't have much of a shot from the side window.

Then he saw the gunman put his foot to the windshield and push it out. The glass flew up and away in a fluid sheet, then shattered into countless, jagged pellets as it hit the road.

The man poked the gun out and sighted on the car. He fought to steady his weapon in the whipping wind. It was a nightmarish sight, a thug riding shotgun in a van.

Herbert only had a moment to act. He smashed his hand down on the brake, the Mercedes stopped suddenly, and the van rear-ended him hard. His trunk folded up and in like a ribbon. But above it, he saw the gunman tossed forward. The man was thrown at the waist across the lower portion of the window frame. The gun flew from his hands, onto the hood of the van, and slid over the side. The driver was also thrown ahead, his chest colliding hard with the steering wheel. He lost control of the van, though the vehicle stopped as his foot slipped from the gas.

Herbert's only wound was another unpleasant scrape across his chest, inflicted by the shoulder strap.

There was a moment of clear silence, broken by cars honking from far off, and people approaching cautiously, yelling to other people to get help.

Not sure that he had put the car or its occupants out of commission, Herbert pressed down on the gas to get away.

The car didn't move. He could feel his tires racing, but he could also feel the tug of the two fenders locked together.

He sat still for a moment, realizing for the first time how his heart was racing as he wondered if he could get himself and the wheelchair out.

Suddenly, the van bellowed back to life. Herbert felt a rough tug and looked in the rearview mirror. A new driver had taken the place of the old one and had shifted into reverse. Now he moved ahead, then shifted back, then jerked ahead.

Trying to shake me loose, Herbert thought, even as the vehicles unhooked. Without stopping, the van continued to back up. It sped off, then turned a corner and vanished.

The intelligence officer sat gripping the steering wheel, trying to decide what to do. In the distance, he heard the siren which had sent the neo-Nazis on their way. One of those loud ones which made the Opel police cars sound like Buicks. People began coming up to the window and speaking to Herbert softly, in German.

"Danke, " he said. "Thanks. I'm all right. Gesund Healthy." Healthy? he thought. He thought of the police coming to question him. German police were not famed for their friendliness. At best, he would be treated objectively. At worst.

At worst, he thought, the police station has a couple of neo-Nazi sympathizers. At worst; they put me in prison. At worst, somebody gets to me in the middle of the night with a knife or a length of steel wire.

"Screw that," he said. Thanking the onlookers again and politely urging them to get out of the way, Herbert quickly shifted gears, picked up the phone, and set off after the van.