Remember by Barbara Taylor Bradford Page A

blood, were desperately trying to move the victims so that they could get them to the hospitals and morgues as quickly as possible.
    They were using all kinds of makeshift stretchers, Nicky even saw one
    made out of a door ripped from a telephone booth and tied to two long pieces of iron pipe. Several buses had been pressed into service as ambulances, and so had pedicabs and carts. Most of the injured were being taken to Xiehe Hospital, which was fairly close to Changan, since it was located in one of the streets immediately behind the Beijing Hotel.
    In contrast, the square appeared to be peaceful enough when Nicky went back there at three-forty-five on the morning of June 4. Yet after only a few minutes in the square she felt the tension in the air. It was a most palpable thing, and underlying the tension was the smell of fear.
    The troops had moved in, and were positioned at the far end.
    Near the Goddess of Democracy statue she saw lines of soldiers drawn up. They stood staring at the square, their faces cold, cruel, brutal, with rifles in their hands, ready to charge on their own people when the order was given.
    As soon as she reached Clee, who was hovering near the monument, he told her there were machine guns positioned on the roof of the Museum of Chinese History on the eastern side of the square.
    “They’re efficient, aren’t they?” she said sarcastically. And then she noticed that some of the students on the monument were busy writing, and she tugged at Clee’s sleeve. “What are they doing?” she asked.
    Clee sighed and shook his head. “Yoyo told me they’re writing their wills.”
    Nicky turned away, swallowing, and felt the prick of tears behind her eyes. She struggled for self-control, the more emotional the situation and the story, the cooler she must be.
    Clee had noticed her reaction, and put an arm around her. “It’s a lousy world we live in, Nick, and you know that better than anybody. ” “Oh, Clee. Some things are really hard to take.”
    “Yes.” She gave him a halflhearted smile and then said briskly, “Well, our job is to see that the world knows about this. Where is Yoyo?”
    “I saw him talking to Arch a little while ago. That singer, Hou Dejian, and a couple of other leaders have been on the loudspeakers, asking the kids to leave in an orderly fashion.”
    Clee stopped short as the lights in Tiananmen Square went out.
    “Now what?” Nicky said.
    “The worst, I suspect,” Clee answered grimly. “Those lights didn’t fail, they’ve been turned off.”
    In a moment the loudspeakers on the monument began to crackle, a disembodied voice said something, and then the volume increased and music began to play.
    “It’s the Internationale’!” Clee exclaimed. “Christ, I wonder what the kids will do now?”
    “Leave, I hope,” Nicky said.
    But as the words of the famous revolutionary workers’ anthem rang out across the square, Nicky knew the students would not do so.
    She could see, even in the dim light, that they simply sat there, listening to the music, motionless, unshakable, proud in their resoluteness. As soon as the record ended it was played again, and it was repeated several more times during the course of the next twenty minutes.
    Nicky and Clee conferred quietly from time to time and talked with other journalists, everyone expected the military attack to begin at any moment, and they steeled themselves for the confrontation between the students and the troops. Another half hour passed, nothing occurred—and then, suddenly, the lights in front of the Great Hall of the People were turned on dramatically, flooding that side of the square with the most powerful and brilliant illumination.
     
    Almost simultaneously the loudspeakers came alive once again and several people spoke, but neither Nicky nor Clee could understand what was being said. Then a British journalist standing nearby told them, “The leaders are urging the students to quit the square. They’re