A Time to Die, page 59
Sean waited and the minutes drew out, five then ten, each one a separate age. Then someone else yawned and stretched out on the left flank and immediately a third voice cautioned him to silence in an angry whisper.
‘Three of them.’ Sean memorized each position, and then withdrew as quietly and cautiously as he had come in.
On the edge of the forest Alphonso was waiting for him, and minutes later Matatu crept back to join them.
‘Three,’ Alphonso whispered.
‘Yes, three,’ Sean agreed.
‘Four,’ Matatu contradicted them both. ‘There is another one just below the bank.’ Matatu missed nothing and Sean accepted his estimate without reservation.
Only four Renamo in the ambush, Sean was relieved. He had expected more, but China must be spreading his men thinly to cover every path and every ford of the river.
‘No noise,’ Sean warned them. ‘One shot and we’ll have the entire army doing a war dance on our backs. Matatu, you take the one you found below the bank. Alphonso, the one in the reeds who spoke. I’ll take the two in the centre.’ He slipped the wire bangle off his left wrist and unrolled it, once more stretching and testing it between his hands to get the feel of it.
‘Wait until you hear my man blow before you strike yours.’ He reached out and lightly touched their shoulders, the ritual benediction, and then they separated and drifted away into the night, back towards the river.
The machine-gunner was exactly where Sean had left him, but as Sean moved in behind him a few scattered clouds obscured the stars, and Sean had to wait for them to clear. Every second’s delay increased the chance of discovery and he was tempted to work only by sense of touch, but he restrained himself. As the sky cleared, he was glad he had done so. The sentry had removed his cap and was scratching the back of his head; that raised hand would have blocked the wire and prevented a clean kill. There would have been a scream, gunshots, and every Renamo within miles would have come down upon him.
He waited while the sentry relieved his itch, and readjusted his cap, then as he dropped his hands. Sean reached forward and looped the wire noose around his throat in one swift wrap. In the same movement he hauled back with the full strength of both his arms and shot his right knee between the man’s shoulder-blades. The wire sliced through flesh and windpipe as though they were cheddar cheese. Sean felt the momentary check as the wire came up hard against the vertebrae of the neck, but he sawed with both hands, keeping all his weight on the wire, pushing with his knee.
The wire found the gap between the vertebrae and snicked clearly through it. The man’s head fell forward, and tumbled into his own lap and the man blew. The air from his lungs rushed out through the open windpipe, in a soft sigh. It was the sound he had told Matatu and Alphonso to wait for. He knew they would be taking their victims at this moment, but there was no sound until the man Sean had killed flopped forward and his carotid artery discharged onto the earth with a regular hiss like milk from the teat jetting into the bucket under the milkmaid’s practised fingers.
The sound alerted the fourth Renamo, the only one still alive, and he called out in a puzzled tone.
‘What is it, Alves? What are you doing?’
The question guided Sean to him, and he had the knife out of its sheath, holding it under-hand so the point went up at an acute angle under the man’s ribs. Sean pinned him down with his left hand, holding his throat closed to prevent him screaming, working the knife with his other hand, opening the wound, twisting and turning the blade with all the strength of his right wrist.
In thirty seconds, it was over. The last tremors shook the body beneath him and Sean released him and stood up. Matatu was already beside him, with his skinning knife ready. The knife and his hands were wet. His own work was done and he had come to help Sean, but it was not necessary.
They waited for a full minute, listening for any alarm, perhaps there was another sentry that even Matatu might have overlooked, but apart from the croaking of the frogs in the reed-beds and the whine of mosquitos there was no sound.
‘Search them,’ Sean ordered. ‘Take whatever we can use.’
One of the rifles, all of the ammunition, half a dozen grenades, spare clothing, all the food. They gathered it up swiftly.
‘That’s it,’ Sean said. ‘Dump the rest of it.’ They dragged the bodies down the bank and pushed them out into the current, then dropped the heavy machine-gun and the rest of the discarded equipment into the deep water beyond the reeds.
Sean glanced at his watch. ‘We are running out of time, we must bring the others across.’
Claudia and Miriam and the children were still in the reed-beds on the south bank where they had left them.
‘What happened? We didn’t hear anything.’ Claudia hugged Sean’s naked wet chest with relief.
‘Nothing to hear,’ Sean told her, and picked up the sleeping children, one on each arm.
Across the current, they formed a human stanchion, locking arms together, bracing each other against the heavy pull of the water that was as deep as Claudia’s chin. Without this support the women would have been swept away. Even with it the crossing was arduous and they dragged themselves onto the south bank near exhaustion.
Sean would not let them rest longer than the few minutes it took to dry Minnie and wrap her in a jacket they had looted from one of the dead Renamo; then he had them up again and chivvied them onwards into the forest.
‘We have to get clear of the river before sunrise. China will be back as soon as it is light.’
General China picked out the group of men on the riverbank at two hundred feet. As the helicopter slanted in towards them, the down-draught of its rotors furred the surface of the Save river with a dark ruffle.
The Portuguese pilot set the machine down at the edge of the forest on the south bank and China clambered out of the weapons cockpit and went striding down towards the river. Although his face was an expressionless mask, his anger boiled behind it and glinted in his eyes. He took the dark glasses from his breast pocket and concealed his eyes behind the lens.
The circle of men opened respectfully and China stepped through and looked down at the disembodied human head that lay on the muddy bank. It had been washed up amongst the reeds, the fresh-water crabs had nibbled it, and the water had leached the exposed flesh white and clouded the open eyes to opaque marbles, but the clean cut that had severed the neck was still as unmistakable as a hand-written signature.
‘That’s the white man’s work,’ China said softly. ‘His Scouts called it “wet work”, the wire was their trade-mark. When did it happen?’
‘Last night.’ Tippoo Tip tugged at his own beard with agitation. There had been no survivors of the ambush party, no one of which to make an example.
‘You let them get through,’ China accused coldly. ‘You promised me they would never cross the river.’
‘These dogs,’ Tippoo Tip snarled. ‘Those useless pigs.’
‘They are your men,’ China pointed out. ‘And men take after those who command them. Their failure is your failure, General.’
It was said in front of his own staff, and Tippoo Tip growled with humiliation. He had made the promise and failed, and he shook with anger. He glared round at his men, looking for a victim, but they dropped their eyes and their faces were abject and obsequious. There was no relief there.
Suddenly he drew back his foot and swung a vicious kick at the severed head. The steel toe-cap of his boot crushed in the pulpy waterlogged nose.
‘Dog!’ he shouted, and booted the head again, sending it rolling down the bank. He followed it shouting with anger, aiming wild kicks at it, until it bounced like a football and plopped over the bank into the river.
He came back to General China, panting with rage.
‘Very good, General,’ China applauded him ironically. ‘Very brave, what a pity you could not do the same to the white man.’
‘I had every crossing of the river guarded,’ Tippoo Tip started, and then broke off as he noticed the crudely stitched gash on China’s cheek for the first time and he grinned viciously. ‘You have been wounded. What misfortune. It wasn’t the fault of the white man, was it? Surely not. You are too cunning to let him injure you, General China, apart from your ear, of course.’
It was China’s turn to bridle with fury. ‘If only I had my own men here. These stupid dogs of yours couldn’t wipe their own backsides.’
‘One of your men is a stooge,’ Tippoo Tip roared back at him. ‘He’s running with the white man, my men are not traitors. I have them in my hands.’ He showed those great paws, shaking them in China’s face, and General China closed his eyes for a moment and drew a deep breath. He realized that they were on the brink of an irretrievable breach, a few more words like those exchanged and he would have no further co-operation from this great bearded ape. One day he would kill him, but he needed him today.
To day the most important thing in General China’s world was getting his hands on the white man, alive if possible, but dead if it had to be. Without Tippoo Tip’s help, there was no chance of that. His anger and retribution must wait for another time and opportunity.
‘General Tippoo Tip,’ his tone was conciliatory, almost humble, ‘please forgive me. I let my disappointment run over my good sense. I know you did your best for me. We are, both of us, victims of our own people’s incompetence. I ask you to ignore my bad manners.’
Tippoo Tip was taken off-balance as China had intended and the angry words died in his open mouth.
‘Even though these fools were unable to stop them, now at last we know exactly where they are. We have their fresh spoor, and a full day in which to follow it. Let us make the most of this opportunity. Let’s get this tiresome business over with. Then I, and my helicopter, will be entirely at your disposal for the more important task ahead of us.’
He saw that he had picked the right words. Tippoo Tip’s rage gradually gave way to that sly and avaricious expression that China knew so well.
‘I have already called up my best trackers,’ he agreed. ‘I’ll have fifty of my men on their spoor within the hour, men who can run an eland off its feet. The white man will be in your hands before the sun sets this evening. This time there will be no mistake.’
‘Where are these trackers?’ China demanded.
‘I have radioed.’
‘I will send the helicopter to fetch them.’
‘That will save valuable time.’
They watched the Hind rise and bear away northwards, low across the darkly flowing waters of the Save river. As it disappeared they both turned to stare towards the south.
‘You no longer control the territory south of the river,’ China pointed out. ‘These are the forests that you so cunningly relinquished to the Frelimo.’ He pointed at the dense stands of hardwoods that stood tall against the southern sky.
‘The river is my front line.’ Tippoo Tip conceded reluctantly. ‘But the nearest Frelimo forces are still many miles further south. My patrols cover this ground without interference from them. The men I am sending after the white man will catch him long before he gets into Frelimo-held territory.’ Tippoo Tip broke off and then pointed along the riverbank. ‘Ah, here they come.’ A long double file of heavily armed guerrillas came trotting down the footpath towards them. ‘Fifty of my best men. You will eat white chickens for dinner tonight. Don’t worry, my friend. They are as good as on your plate already.’
The two platoons of Renamo halted and fell out on the bank, waiting for their trackers. China was a good judge of troops. He walked amongst them, and he recognized in them that eagerness and enthusiasm tempered by discipline and professionalism that is the peculiar mark of first-class bush fighters. For once he agreed with Tippoo Tip. These were hard men who could be relied upon to get the job done. China beckoned the section leaders across to him.
‘You know who you are chasing?’ he asked, and they nodded. ‘The white man is as dangerous as a wounded leopard, but I want him alive. Do you understand?’
‘We understand, General.’
‘You have a radio. I want a report of your progress every hour on the command frequency.’
‘Yes, General.’
‘And when you have the quarry in sight, call me. I will come in the henshaw. I want to be there at the death.’
The section leaders looked across the river, their expressions alert, and moments later even with his impaired hearing, China picked up the whistle of the Hind’s turbos returning from the north.
‘If you do your job, you will be rewarded. But if you fail me, you will regret it. You will regret it deeply,’ General China promised them.
As soon as the helicopter landed the two trackers clambered down with alacrity from the small rear cabin and Tippoo Tip shouted at them and pointed to the outgoing spoor that Sean and his party had left.
Watching the trackers begin their task, China was even more confident of the outcome. These two were good. They made a quick cast ahead and then came back to the centre and squatted over the spoor, whispering together softly, touching the faint tracks with the supple wands of wild willow they each carried, intent as a pair of bloodhounds taking the scent of the chase. When they stood up again a change had come over them. They were determined and businesslike. They turned to face the southern forests and went away at a run.
Behind them, the two full platoons of camouflaged Renamo assault troopers fanned out into their running formation and set their pace to match the trackers.
‘The white woman can never keep up that speed,’ Tippoo Tip exulted. ‘We will overtake them before they reach the Frelimo lines, we will have them before the end of this day. This time they’ll not escape.’ He turned back to China. ‘Why don’t we follow them in the helicopter?’
China hesitated. He did not want to explain the Hind’s short-comings. It was better to let Tippoo Tip go on believing in its infallibility. He would not discuss with him the difficulty of bringing up sufficient fuel, nor the Hind’s limited range even with full tanks, nor the fact that his Portuguese engineer had warned him that the turbos were long overdue for service, that the pilot had already reported a malfunction and loss of power in the starboard engine.
‘I will wait here,’ he said. ‘When your men catch up with the white man, they will call on the radio. That is when I will follow them.’
China adjusted his dark glasses and sauntered across to the Hind. The pilot was waiting for him, leaning with assumed nonchalance against the camouflaged fuselage below the main cockpit.
‘How is the engine behaving?’ China asked in Portuguese.
‘It is beginning to surge and miss. It needs to be worked on.’
‘Fuel?’
‘Main tanks are down to quarter. However, I still have the auxiliary.’
‘The convoy of porters with the fuel will be at our forward base by tomorrow morning. The engineer can work on her tonight, but I have to have her on standby until dark. I’ll need her when they catch up with the runaways.’
The pilot shrugged. ‘I’ll fly her, if you are willing to take the chance on that engine,’ he agreed.
‘Keep a listening watch on the radio,’ China ordered. ‘With luck it will all be over in a few hours.’
Sean realized that Claudia could not maintain this pace much further. She was running just ahead of him so he could study the changes in her that privation and hard living had brought about. She was so lean and wispy that her scanty threadbare shirt flapped around her flanks, and the legs of her trousers had been reduced by thorns and razor-edged grass to a fringe of tatters that hung halfway down her thighs; below that, the length of her legs was exaggerated by their extreme thinness, yet somehow they had retained their elegant high-bred lines. However, the thorns and sharp grass had wrought havoc on the exposed skin of her arms and legs. It looked as though she had been scourged by a cat-o’-nine-tails, some of the scratches were healed, others scabbed over, but a few still bled.
Her hair had grown into a lank sweat-tangled mop that thumped between her prominent bony shoulder-blades with each pace, and her back was so thin that he could have counted the knobs of her vertebrae beneath her shirt. The perspiration had soaked through in a dark line down her spine, and hard exercise had firmed her buttocks into a pair of Indiarubber balls in the sun-bleached cotton pants; through a tiny three-cornered tear a tender flash of her white bottom winked at him with each pace. Her legs were floppy with exhaustion, throwing out sideways, and her ankles were loose and wobbled under her.
He would have to let her rest very soon and yet she had not complained, not once in all the long tortured hours since they had left the river, and he grinned fondly as he remembered the spoilt arrogant bitch that had stepped off the Boeing at Harare airport so many aeons ago. This was a different woman, tough, determined and with a spirit as resilient as a Damascus steel blade. He knew that she would never give up, she would keep going until she killed herself. He reached forward and tapped her shoulder.
‘Ease up, wench. We’ll take ten.’
When she pulled up she was unsteady on those long legs and he put an arm around her shoulders to steady her. ‘You’re a ruddy marvel do you know that?’ He eased her down to sit with her back against one of the leadwood trees and unscrewed the stopper on his water-bottle and passed it to her.
‘Give Minnie to me. It’s time for her chloroquine.’ Claudia’s voice was husky with tiredness. Sean swung the little girl off his back and placed her in Claudia’s lap.
‘Remember, ten minutes, that’s all.’
Alphonso had taken the break to rig the radio, Mickey was squatting on one side of him, Miriam on the other. They watched with fascination as he tuned the set and began searching the bands. There was the crackle and buzz of static followed by some faint extraneous snatches of Afrikaans, and then an excited voice speaking in Shangane, very close and loud.
