A Time to Die, page 42
When Joyful brought the tea to the bedside, on the tray with the mugs was an invitation from General China to dine in the mess that evening.
General China’s mess night was for Claudia and Sean less than an unqualified success, despite the general’s continued efforts to charm them.
The buffalo meat he served was tough and rank and the beer made the officers of the general’s staff loud and argumentative. The weather had changed and was close and sweltering even after dark and the bunker that served as a mess was thick with the smoke of cheap native tobacco and the odour of masculine sweat.
General China drank none of the beer, but sat at the head of the table ignoring the shouted conversation and hearty eating habits of his staff. Instead, he played the gallant to Claudia, engaging her in a discussion which she at first attempted to evade.
Claudia was unaccustomed to the table manners of Africa. She watched with an awful fascination as the stiff maize porridge was scooped from the communal pot in the centre of the table by many hands, moulded into balls between the fingers and then dipped into buffalo-meat gravy. Greasy gravy ran down their chins, and no attempt was made to moderate the conversation during mastication, so that small particles of food were sprayed across the table when one of them laughed or exclaimed loudly.
Despite the fact that she was still half starved Claudia had no appetite for the meal and it took an effort to concentrate on General China’s dissertation.
‘We have divided the entire country into three war zones,’ he explained.‘General Takawira Dos Alves is the commander of the north. He commands the provinces of Niassa and Cabo Delgado. In the south, the commander is General Tippoo Tip, and of course, I command the army of the central provinces of Manica and Sofala. Between us we control almost fifty per cent of the total ground area of Mozambique, and another forty per cent of the country is a destruction zone over which we are forced to maintain a scorched earth policy to prevent Frelimo growing either food for their troops or cash crops to finance their war effort against us.’
‘So the reports of atrocities that we have received in the United States are true then.’ He had engaged Claudia’s interest at last. Her tone was sharp as she accused, ‘Your troops are attacking and wiping out the civilian population in those destruction zones.’
‘No, Miss Monterro.’ China’s smile was icy. ‘The fact that we have moved the civilian population out of many of those destruction areas is unavoidably true, but all the atrocities, all the massacres and tortures, have been committed by Frelimo themselves.’
‘They are the government of Mozambique, why would they massacre their own people?’ Claudia protested.
‘I agree with you, Miss Monterro, sometimes it is difficult to follow the devious working of the Marxist mind. The reality is that Frelimo is unable to govern. They are unable to provide even basic protection to the civilian population outside the cities, let alone give them services of health and education and transport and communications. To draw world attention away from the total failure of their economic policies and their lack of popular support, they have provided the international media with a Roman holiday of slaughter and torture which they blame upon Renamo and South Africa. It is easier to kill people than to feed and educate them, and the anti-Renamo propaganda is worth a million lives, to a Marxist that is.’
‘You are suggesting that a Khmer Rouge style massacre is being conducted here in Mozambique by the government forces?’ Claudia was aghast, pale and perspiring with the noise and fug of the subterranean mess, and with the horror of General China’s explanations.
‘I am not suggesting, Miss Monterro, I am simply stating the literal truth.’
‘But, but, surely the world must do something?’
‘The world is uncaring, Miss Monterro. It has been left for us, Renamo, to try to bring down the heinous Marxist regime.’
‘Frelimo is the elected government,’ Claudia pointed out, but General China shook his head.
‘No, Miss Monterro, very few governments in Africa are elected. There has never been an election in Mozambique or Angola or Tanzania or any of the other gems of African Socialism. In Africa the trick is to seize power and hang onto to it at all costs. The typical African government plunges into the void left by the exodus of the colonial power and entrenches itself behind a barricade of AK 47 assault rifles. It then declares a one-party system of government which further precludes any form of opposition and it nominates a presidential dictator for life.’
‘Tell me, General China,’ Claudia raised her voice above the roar of conversation further down the mess table, ‘if one day, your military efforts succeed and you and the other generals of Renamo vanquish Frelimo and become the new government of this country, will you then allow free elections and a truly democratic system to evolve?’
For a moment General China stared at her in astonishment and then he laughed delightedly.
‘My very dear Miss Monterro, your childlike belief in the myth of the essential goodness of mankind is really rather touching. I certainly have not fought so hard and so long to gain power, simply to hand it over to a bunch of illiterate peasants. No, Miss Monterro, once we have the power it will remain safely in the right hands.’ He extended his own elegantly shaped hands, pink palms uppermost, towards her. ‘These,’ he said.
‘So you are every bit as bad as you say the others are.’ There were hot red spots of anger on Claudia’s cheeks. This was the man who had put chains on her wrists and incarcerated her in that vile pit. She hated him with all her strength.
‘I think you are actually beginning to understand at last, even through the haze of your liberal emotions. In Africa there are no good guys and no bad guys, there are simply winners and losers.’ He smiled again. ‘And I assure you, Miss Monterro, that I intend to be one of the winners.’
General China turned away from her as one of his signals officers ducked through the low entrance to the bunker and hurried down to the head of the table. With an apologetic salute, he handed the general a yellow message flimsy. China read it without change of expression and then looked up at his guests.
‘Please excuse me for a few minutes.’ China placed his beret at the correct angle over one eye, then stood and followed the signaller out of the bunker.
The moment he was gone, Claudia leaned across the table to Sean. ‘Can’t we get out of here now? I don’t think I can bear another moment of it. God, how I hate that man.’
‘Mess tradition doesn’t seem very strict,’ Sean murmured. ‘If we leave, I don’t think anyone is going to take offence.’
As they crossed to the doorway, there was a drunken chorus of suggestive catcalls and whistles, and they went up the steps with relief.
The night air had cooled and Claudia breathed it in deeply and gratefully. ‘I don’t know which was more suffocating, the fug or the dialectic.’ She breathed again, ‘I never expected Africa to be like this. It’s so confused, so illogical, it turns everything I know to be true upside down.’
‘But it’s interesting, isn’t it?’ Sean asked.
‘Like a nightmare is interesting. Let’s go to bed. At least that’s something I can believe in completely.’
They turned towards their dugout shelter, but General China’s voice halted them.
‘You aren’t leaving us so soon?’ And his tall lithe form came striding towards them out of the darkness. ‘I’m afraid I have disappointing news for both of you.’
‘You aren’t letting us go. You are reneging on our deal,’ Sean said flatly. ‘I knew this was coming.’
‘Circumstances beyond my control,’ China assured him smoothly. ‘I have just had a radio report from Sergeant Alphonso. As you know I was expecting his return this evening and he and his men would have escorted you and Miss Monterro safely back to the border, however . . .’
‘All right, let’s hear it from you, China,’ Sean snarled angrily. ‘What new scheme have you cooked up?’
General China ignored the accusation and the tone in which it was delivered. ‘Sergeant Alphonso reports that there is a massive build-up of enemy to the west of our lines. It seems that, emboldened by their gunships, Frelimo, backed by Zimbabwean contingents, are about to launch a full-scale offensive. We are probably already cut off from the Zimbabwe border. The territory that we once controlled seems certain to have been overrun by the enemy advance. Within hours it will become a battlefield, even now Sergeant Alphonso is fighting his way through and has taken some casualties. I am afraid you would not last long out there, Colonel. It would be suicide for you to try to reach the border now. You must remain under my personal protection.’
‘What the hell do you want from us?’ Sean demanded. ‘You are up to something, I can smell the stink of it from here. What is it?’
‘Your lack of confidence in my motives is very distressing,’ China smiled coldly. ‘However, the sooner the Hind gunships are destroyed, the sooner the Frelimo offensive will collapse and you and Miss Monterro will be returned to the civilized world.’
‘I’m listening,’ Sean told him.
‘You are the only one, you and Captain Job, who understand the Stinger. In this our interests coincide. I want you to train a select contingent of my men to handle the Stingers.’
‘That’s all you want?’ Sean stared into his face. ‘We train your men to use the Stinger, then you let us go?’
‘Exactly.’
‘How do I know you won’t move the goal posts again?’
‘You pain me, Colonel.’
‘Not nearly as much as I’d like to.’
‘It’s agreed then. You will train my men and in exchange I will have you escorted across the border at the very first opportunity.’
‘What option do we have?’
‘I’m so pleased that you are being reasonable, Colonel. It makes life much easier for all of us.’ His voice became crisp and businesslike. ‘We must begin immediately.’
‘You’ll have to let your staff sober up a little,’ Sean told him. ‘I’ll begin first thing tomorrow, and I’ll train the Shanganes under Alphonso and Ferdinand, if Alphonso makes it through the Frelimo offensive intact.’
‘How long will it take you?’ China wanted to know. ‘From now on every hour will be vital to our survival.’
‘They are bright lads and willing, I should be able to do something with them in a week.’
‘You will not have that long.’
‘I’ll have the Stingers in action just as soon as I possibly can,’ Sean retorted irritably. ‘Please believe me, General, I don’t want to hang around here a minute longer than I have to. Now we’ll bid you good-night.’ He took Claudia’s arm as he turned away.
‘Oh Sean,’ she whispered. ‘I have the terrible premonition that we are caught up in something from which we are never going to escape.’ And Sean squeezed her upper arm to make her stop.
‘Look up there,’ he ordered softly, and she raised her face.
‘The stars?’ she asked. ‘Is that what you want me to look at?’
‘Yes, the stars.’ They daubed the night as though a gigantic firefly had been crushed to death and its luminous essence smeared across the vault of heaven.
‘They calm the soul,’ Sean explained gently.
She breathed softly and deeply. ‘Yes, you are right, my darling. Tonight we have our love, let’s exploit it to the full and let tomorrow take care of itself.’
She felt safe and invulnerable under the tented mosquito netting. The lumpy grass-filled mattress had taken on the shape of their bodies and she did not notice the harsh touch of the canvas covering against her skin.
‘If we made love ten thousand times, it would still not have taken the edge off my need for you,’ she whispered, as she slipped over the edge of sleep.
She woke suddenly feeling the tension in his body against hers, and instantly he touched her lips to caution her to silence. She lay frozen in the darkness, not daring to move or breathe, and then she heard it. A soft scraping at the entrance of the dugout as the netting curtain was pushed aside and an animal passed through.
Her heart raced away and she bit her lip to stop herself gasping aloud as she heard the thing crossing the earth floor towards the bed. Its paws were almost soundless, just the faintest tick of grit compressed by the stealthy weight. Then she smelled it, the wild gamey smell of a meat-eating animal and she wanted to cry out.
Beside her, Sean moved suddenly, fast as a striking adder; he lunged through the mosquito net and there was a quick scuffle and squeal and she tried to crawl over Sean’s back to escape whatever it was.
‘Got you, you little bugger,’ Sean said grimly. ‘You don’t sneak up on me twice and get away with it. Now tell me I’m getting old and I’ll wring your neck!’
‘You’ll be young and beautiful for ever, my Bwana,’ Matatu giggled, and wriggled like a puppy caught by the scruff of the neck.
‘Where have you been, Matatu?’ Sean demanded sternly. ‘What took you so long, did you meet a pretty girl along the way?’
Matatu giggled again, he loved to be accused by Sean of dalliance and amatory exploits.
‘I found the roosting place of the henshaws,’ he boasted. ‘The same way I find where the bees have their hive, I watched their flight against the sun and followed them to their secret place.’
Sean drew him closer to the bed and shook his arm gently. ‘Tell me,’ he ordered, and in the darkness Matatu squatted down and tucked his loin-cloth between his legs and made little self-important throat-clearing and humming sounds.
‘There is a round hill, shaped like the head of a bald man,’ Matatu began. ‘On one side of the hill passes the insimbi, the railway, and on the other side the road.’
Sean propped himself on one elbow to listen and with his other arm, he encircled Claudia’s naked waist and held her close. She snuggled against him, listening to Matatu’s piping pixie voice in the darkness.
‘There are many askari around the hill with big banduki hidden in holes in the ground.’ Sean formed a vivid mental picture of the heavily garrisoned hilltop as Matatu described it to him. Beyond the outer defensive lines the gunships were laagered in separate sandbagged emplacements. Like battle tanks in hull-down fortifications, they would be impregnable, and yet they had only to rise and hover a few feet above ground level to bring into action their devasting Gatling-cannons and rocket pods.
‘Inside the circle of roosting henshaw, there are many gharries parked and white men in green clothes who climb on the henshaw and look inside them all the time.’ Matatu described the mobile workshops and fuel tankers and the squads of Russian mechanics and technicians needed to keep the helicopters flying. The training manuals had pointed up the Hind’s excessive requirements of service and maintenance, while those big Isotov turbo engines would guzzle Avgas.
‘Matatu, did you see railway gharries on the line near the hill?’ Sean asked.
‘I saw them,’ Matatu confirmed. ‘Those big round gharries full of beer – the men who ride in the henshaw must be very thirsty.’ Once many years ago, on one of his infrequent visits to the city with Sean, Matatu had seen a beer tanker disgorging its load at the main Harare beerhall. He had been so impressed that since that day he was utterly convinced that all tankers of whatever size or type contained only beer. Sean could not change his mind on this, Matatu would never accept that some of them actually carried less noble fluids such as gasoline and he always stared wistfully after any tanker they passed on the road.
Sean smiled now in the darkness at the little man’s fixation. Fuel for the gunships was obviously being railed from Harare in bulk tankers, and transshipped into smaller road tankers. It was ironic that the fuel was almost certainly being originally supplied by the South Africans. However, if the helicopter squadron was storing its fuel within the laager itself they were taking a grave risk. It was something to bear in mind.
Matatu remained at the bedside for almost an hour while Sean patiently drew from him every possible detail he could of the gunship laager.
Matatu was certain that there were eleven helicopters in the emplacements, which tallied with his own estimate. Of the original twelve, one had been destroyed in the collision with the Hercules.
Matatu was equally certain that only nine of the gunships were actually flying. Hidden on a nearby kopje, he had watched the helicopters sortie from their laager at dawn, return for refuelling during the day and at nightfall come in to roost. Sean knew that Matatu could count accurately to twenty, but after that, he became vague and any greater number was described progressively as ‘many’ or ‘a great deal’ and finally as ‘like grass on the Serengeti plains’.
So Sean was now fairly certain that two of the gunships had broken down and were probably awaiting spares, and he accepted Matatu’s figure of nine operational gunships, still a formidable force, quite sufficient to turn the tide of the looming battle against Renamo unless they could swiftly be put out of the action.
When at last Matatu had finished his recitation he asked simply. ‘Now, my Bwana, what do you want me to do?’
Sean considered in silence. There was really no reason why he should not bring Matatu in from wherever he was hiding up in the bush, allowing him openly to join the force of Shangane under his command as a tracker. However, he sensed that there might be some future advantage in keeping Matatu hidden from China’s cold reptilian gaze.
‘You are my wild card, Matatu,’ he said in English and then in Swahili, ‘I want you to keep out of sight. Do not let any of the men here see you, except Job and me.’
‘I heard you, my Bwana.’
‘Come to me each night as you have tonight. I will have food for you and I will tell you what to do. In the meantime, watch and tell me all you see.’
Matatu went so silently that they heard only the faint rustle of the netting at the entrance as he passed through.
‘Will he be all right?’ Claudia asked softly. ‘I worry about him. He’s so cute.’
‘Of all of us, he is probably the most likely to survive.’ In the dark, Sean smiled fondly after the little man.
