The Flame Tree by Richard Lewis

Author:Richard Lewis
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers
Published: 2004-07-28T16:00:00+00:00

The helicopters arrived just as the security guards were down to their last line of defense, firing off surgical gloves filled with supersticky rat glue. A number of the rioters were already stuck to the pavement, Ismail included. He finally had to pry himself out of the stolen Reeboks, leaving the shoes glued to the asphalt.

Sheldon yelled, “Get in place, everybody, we’re on a countdown now.”

Isaac got into his assigned place on the lawn. From the sky came a whirring. The first helicopter was on its landing glide, the whomping of its blades growing more visceral as it angled toward the big white “H” painted on the lawn. The helicopter became very big very quickly. A long boom jetted out of its nose. Stubby pods extended from underneath large square windows. A funny-looking tail rotor tilted off the vertical.

It blasted a hurricane at the ground.

When the helicopter was still six feet in the air, seven marines in combat gear jumped from its rear door, rolling on the grass to break their fall. Three raced to the alley gate, while another three darted to the northern wall, in time to face two of the rioters who had been hoisted over by the hands and shoulders of their comrades outside. Upon seeing marines in full battle dress charging down on them, they lifted their hands in panicky surrender. They were swiftly and professionally trussed by two of the marines while the other jumped up with athletic vigor and used his rifle butt to smash two pairs of hands appearing at the top of the wall. Howls of pain rose from the other side.

The seventh marine was an officer. Sheldon ran up to the marine officer in a half crouch and shouted under the din of the chopper engines, “Boy, am I damn glad to see you. Cutting it pretty close there, I say.”

The officer nodded. “First load up,” he bellowed.

The schoolkids scurried out to the helicopter in two lines, supervised by Uncle Jimmy, Aunt Janice, and Miss Augusta. These three adults also boarded with them. The helmeted crew chief of the chopper got them seated and secured and then turned his attention to their luggage, which Sheldon, Joe, and the marine officer were passing on hand to hand. The officer made an “okay” sign with his fingers to the crew chief. The rear ramp lifted off the ground, like a jaw closing shut. The helicopter’s blades sped up, and the metal body underneath them lifted off the ground in a mind-numbing noise that diminished quickly as the chopper flew off.

The quiet was deafening.

At the gate the faces of the rioters reappeared. A hail of stones came in over the compound wall. So did a Molotov cocktail in a Coca-Cola bottle. It did not break. One of the marines picked it up and made quick eye contact with the marine beside him. The second man grinned and nodded. The first marine tossed the bottle high in the air over the wall. The second marine tracked it with his rifle.

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