19.
AFTER THE BIKE TOUR they headed back to the hostel. Anthony had to take care of some errands and said he was going to stop off and use the Wi-Fi in the room to write his friend John to see if they were any closer to each other.
Spencer went to wait for him in the hostel bar.
He sat down, thinking more about Christy’s advice. It nagged at him. When he ordered his beer, he decided to ask the bartender for his thoughts on skipping France.
Two stools down, another patron interrupted. “Where you headed next?”
Spencer looked over. This man was out of place. In his midfifties at a youth hostel, his hair was long and ratty, everything he wore was leather and a little too tight. His voice raspy, with an accent that was hard to understand and harder still to place, but that Spencer assumed was German.
“We’re supposed to go to France, then finish in Spain,” Spencer said. “The thing is, people keep saying to skip France. We’re all most excited for Spain anyway.”
“And Amsterdam?” His voice was so raspy Spencer had to lean closer to try and make out what he was saying.
“No, no Amsterdam. We’ve thought about it, there’s not enough time.”
The man shook his head. “Make time for Amsterdam.”
Spencer considered him. He looked like the kind of guy who’d lived hard and aged faster than his years, then tried to offset the wrinkles by growing long hair and dressing . . . courageously.
“Oh yeah?”
“I just got back from there with my band.”
“You—sorry?”
“Band, my band, we were just in Amsterdam.
“Oh! You’re in a band? What kind of music?
“Hard rock mostly.”
“Wow. Are the other members all German?”
“Not German,” he growled. “I’m from Sweden.” He pulled from his beer. “But I tell you, one of my favorite things to do when we go up there,” Spencer leaned in close to try and make out what he was saying, “we get some truffles and head out to the countryside. And you know what I do then?”
Spencer humored him. “What?”
He smiled, milking the pause. “Nothing. I don’t do anything. I just look around.”
Spencer laughed. “That doesn’t sound too bad.”
“You know what else they have? Even if you don’t do all the drugs like I do, they have the nicest people in the world there. And most of them speak English, by the way.” Then he winked. “Beautiful women too. And history.”
Spencer nodded. He could feel himself warming to the idea. The plan shifted in his mind.
“My friend, forget about France. Go to Amsterdam. You have to go.”
Behind him the door opened. Anthony slipped in and took the stool next to him. “Making friends?”
“Yeah. And listen, I think we need to change our plans.” He looked down the bar at his new friend.
“Anthony waved at the bartender. “Oh yeah?”
“Yeah. I think we need to go to Amsterdam.”
WITH THE BARREL FACING Spencer’s head, the gunman pulls the trigger. Spencer hears the click. He’s still alive—how? How many times has he almost been shot? Will the man pull the trigger again? Alek already has his hands over the gunman’s hands, wrenching the pistol away before he can try to shoot Spencer again. Spencer sends strength to his arms to try and squeeze the man into being still, but something yellow flares across his vision—light glinting off a blade. The pistol is gone now, but Spencer is still trapped, and as the blade comes arcing back all he can do is duck into the gunman’s neck. He feels cool contact, a dragging across his neck, sees more blood, then their bodies move in opposite directions and Spencer catches a glimpse of his own thumb over the gunman’s shoulder. A bolt of fear courses through him. That’s bone—I can see my bone. His thumb is bent backward and sliced almost completely off, so he doesn’t recognize it at first; it’s not totally his own, and it feels like he’s watching someone else’s body in a movie. Spencer hears himself yelling, feels himself struggling, feels the desperate need to create space between their two bodies. He hears himself yell, “He’s got a knife!” and flops his body to kick the gunman away, driving the man forward into the middle of the aisle.
Where Alek and Anthony are standing, ready for him.
Spencer scrambles to his feet.
Alek is ready on his left.
Anthony ready on his right.
The gunman crouches in the middle.
The four of them just stand for a moment. Three friends and a terrorist. No one knows what to do now. They stand there in the aisle, and a look of recognition passes between Spencer and the rest, as if all four of them in that moment acknowledge the same thing—So this just got awkward.
A beat passes. Spencer is suddenly conscious of an alarm inside the train. When did that start? The noise is awful, aggravating, too much. Has this been going all along?
Another moment passes.
Anthony swings at the gunman first, driving him back toward Alek who jabs twice, and then they’re all swinging at him, trying to pummel him into submission, but he won’t go down, until Spencer feels a new flood of rage and gets his good hand around the man’s back, palms his head, and levers it down, slamming it against the table. Alek jumps on to help pin him down, and the gunman squirms violently, again the wiry strength that surprises Spencer.
“Stop!” Alek yells, putting the pistol right up against the man’s head. He doesn’t stop; he rotates powerfully, Spencer leans in, using his weight to try and keep his head down against the table. The man torques so hard it seems like he might spin his body right off his own head.
“Stop struggling!” Alek yells again. “Stop! Stop moving! Stop resisting!”
Spencer knows what’s about to happen. He can see it as if it already has. Alek is going to shoot him while Spencer holds him down. His head is going to fly all over me.
Alek cocks the pistol back.
Spencer thinks, We are about to execute this man.
Alek pulls the trigger.
Nothing.
Alek cocks the gun to load a round into the empty chamber. This time he offers the gunman no chance. He holds it up to the man’s head, and pulls the trigger again.
Again the gun does not go off. The man’s struggling kicks into an even higher gear. Now Spencer grabs him around the shoulders, spins him around and jumps backward again, again flying across the seat, again trying to work his forearm under the man’s chin, wedge it in against his neck, compress the arteries, choke his brain of blood.
Spencer can’t see.
He has a second wind now, but it won’t last much longer. Blood is running down his face from the wound on his forehead that has swollen his eye almost totally closed, down his neck from a wound he can’t yet see, his hand is soaked in blood from his nearly severed thumb. None of the weapons seem to work, so there’s no way to subdue the terrorist, and now the box-cutter blade is nowhere to be seen.
The gunman is punching him again, arcing his fists back and up into Spencer’s face.
“You don’t have it,” he hears Alek yell, his best friend trying to guide him to a better chokehold. “Get it deeper.” Spencer adjusts, still can’t choke him, then, a memory: the jujitsu group in Portugal, the lieutenant colonel yelling at him, “Put your hooks in, put your hooks in! It’s not just the arms, it’s the legs!” Spencer shimmies his heels up over and in between the gunman’s legs, and he pulls, begins to slow the gunman’s torquing, and feels his forearm set satisfyingly under the gunman’s neck, right where it fits, a puzzle piece finally settling into place.
He leans back and squeezes hard, using his weight to tighten the chokehold, which now feels snug.
Fists keep coming back so Spencer leans into them, taking the punches, keeping his hold tight, trusting his training, trusting Alek, until he thinks he can feel the punches begin to weaken, and soon the gunman’s hand is just dragging, open palmed, over Spencer’s face.
Then he’s asleep. The alarm wails.