By this time he had less than two metres to fall and he landed in a heap, but with the gun in his hands. He got off a short burst with it, and saw the men standing there take cover.
In the brilliant beam he had almost a flashlight picture: of the fire vehicle’s driver staring out of the window; of the man at the ladder mechanism gaping at him; of the jeep, its offside doors standing open.
Two armed men had been positioned by the jeep, both now down on the ice and peering at him from underneath the car. One was yelling at him, he could see the mouth going but couldn’t hear what it said. The man had his gun levelled, so Porter shot him and saw the man punched back flat on the ice; and in another soundless moment saw the other man wriggling his gun out from underneath, and he put a burst into him too.
The driver of the jeep was still in it; he now saw his legs emerging. He put two single shots near them, tore the gas mask off and yelled, ‘Stay where you are! Get back in!’ He could just, now, above the ringing in his ears, hear his own voice, and he saw the legs go back in.
He crawled to the offside door, poked the gun in, and kept it on the man while he pulled himself in.
‘Don’t shoot me,’ the man said.
He was very frightened.
‘Just drive.’ He had the gun at the man’s chin.
‘Drive where?’
‘To the line — get going!’
‘We can’t make it. They’ll blow us to pieces!’
‘I’ll blow you to fucking pieces!’
He fired under the man’s chin, shattering the window.
The man was trembling very badly, but he put the car in gear, and moved, bumping over something.
He said shakily, ‘Give yourself up — they won’t kill you. There’s orders not to kill you. We can never make this.’
This seemed very likely. From nowhere jeeps had come spinning — from the left, from the right.
‘Go faster!’
‘We’re going as fast as we can.’
Maybe they were. He wasn’t seeing too well. When he looked ahead his left eye couldn’t see the man beside him. (This was because his left eye was in the eyrie, blown out by the stun-grenade.) The other jeeps were not going any faster: they had come out fast, trying to cut them off, but seemed now only able to keep pace and automatic fire was coming from them. He understood they were not trying to hit him but to immobilise the car. The firing was at the engine, at the wheels.
And some of the half-tracks ahead, he saw, were moving. Their headlights were on and their searchlights now came blindingly on. The ones that weren’t moving had also begun firing; puffs of smoke came from them, and a few metres ahead the ice began to erupt: small grenades, propelled grenades — again intended evidently just to stop the car.
The effect of the grenades was to detach the jeeps closest to him, which turned rapidly aside — giving them, so it seemed, a final lucky burst, for the car jerked suddenly and slewed, the driver wrestling with the wheel as they tilted and slithered round in a complete half-circle.
‘We’re hit, they’ve got us — give it up now!’
‘Keep going!’ His balance, his spatial sense had gone; couldn’t tell which side was down. ‘Where are we hit?’
‘Your side — we’re all down there. See it!’
He took a look, and saw they were down. ‘Give it left wheel,’ he said, and turned back and saw the man was no longer at the wheel. He was no longer in the car. His door was open and he had flung himself out.
‘Jesus Christ!’ The back doors too were open, and now banging to and fro as a jeep struck them. He got his gun up and put a burst in the jeep’s windshield. The magazine ran out with this short burst and he levered himself, in great pain, behind the wheel. His right knee was now in torment, no movement in the leg. He carried the leg over the seat and got his other foot down.
The car hadn’t stalled, was still slowly circling, in first gear. He stepped on the accelerator, shuffled his foot to change gear and straightened out. Two more jeeps had slammed into him and his lights had been shot out. But there was light enough, he didn’t need lights; and in the frantic minutes had barely even noticed the collisions.
One wheel was dragging in the soft surface ice, and the steering was heavy. He had little speed and now was being banged again and again by the jeeps. In the brief interval when he’d appeared to stop, the RPG firing had ceased and the jeeps had closed in. But now, straightened out and on track again, he saw the grenades restarting, the jeeps again sheering away.
The moving half-tracks had come closer, their searchlights dazzling him. He saw the intention was to ram him, to catch him between two of them. He pressed the pedal to the floor, squeezed the last bit of speed and found, with the motion, the wheel dragging less, the steering coming lighter. He didn’t turn away, went directly at the converging lights, waited till he was almost at them, and spun the wheel. But now, hammer blows coming from his left eye, his distance was all out, and he was jolted out of his seat as he hit the rear end of one. He clutched on to the wheel as the car lurched left, right, skittering on the ice.
His foot had come off the pedal, and he found it again, hunching back in the seat. Firing had started behind him, a hail of it hitting the rear end, low down. And ahead now, perhaps no more than two hundred metres, the stationary half-tracks were puffing at him, the ice spuming up. But they were far apart, he saw, a gulf apart, and the line of torches in between was wavering. They could not fire at him, not in the car, could only try to stop the car.
He aimed at the gap between two half-tracks, saw the men on the ice there scattering, turning carefully to fire — and he was through. But Jesus, Jesus — caught once more! Now, at the last, another wheel. The car dragged, slithered. He was through the waiting line, but crippled, two tyres at least gone. And the half-track engines were now roaring into life behind him; an iron voice rasping over a bullhorn there.
‘Stop! Stop while you can! You’ll be blown off the ice!’
He kept going: swearing, coaxing, willing the thing to move. He was moving, moving, six or seven miles an hour maybe, the wheels churning, moving only when zigzagged. His eye, his knee were now alight with white fire — the ice also alight, lit up, spuming with small geysers popping in front of him.
Distantly now there were other lights, racing about. The American side, surely not far now. With nothing following him — and he was sure nothing was or it would easily have overtaken him — he thought he must now be over the international line.
[In fact he was not yet over it. The vehicles behind had been ordered to remain 250 metres from the line, and this they did; a fact confirmed by watching American helicopters. But they had also been ordered to continue firing up to it, and this too they did; the subject of later official complaint.]
For the men on the half-tracks the job was now very difficult. Even at one hundred metres RPGs could not hit a target with any great accuracy. And this target, a man in a vehicle, was not to be hit — at least not with a grenade — but only halted. The only way to halt him now was to hit his engine. If this could be achieved before he reached the line, men could go out on skis and get him. Probably at this time some small mortars were used.
The geysers that had been popping in front of the slowly zigzagging vehicle now came closer; and with his zigzag now established and predictable, they scored, and a cheer went up.
‘Hit! Stopped him! Okay, boys, go out there.’
The boys went out there, but to their consternation the target, though stopped, did not remain stopped.
The thing had landed with a whoosh, a metallic clang and a cascade of glass. The clang was the ripped-apart hood of the jeep, sections of which, and of the grenade, came through the shattered windshield and into Porter. The furnace in his head roared briefly and went out, leaving him in the dark. It had also bounced his foot off the pedal, stopping the car.