The Seventh Scroll - Smith Wilbur - Страница 47

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their way to their own huts.

"Tessay has been in camp all day with him. There has been more trouble

between them. She told me that as soon as they get back to Addis Ababa

she is going to leave him.

She can't take any more of this."

"The only thing I find surprising is that she ever got mixed up with an

animal like Boris in the first place. She is a lovely woman. She could

pick and choose."

"Some women are drawn to animals," Royan shrugged.

"I suppose it must be the thrill of danger. Anyway, Tessay has asked me

if she can come with us tomorrow. She cannot stand another day in camp

with Boris on her own.

I think she is really afraid of him now. She says that she has never

seen him drink like this before."

"Tell her to come along, Nicholas said resignedly. "The more of us the

merrier. Perhaps we will be able to frighten the dik-dik to death by

sheer weight of numbers. Save me wasting ammunition."

It was still dark when the three of them left camp the next morning.

There was no sign of Boris and, when Nicholas asked about him, Tessay

said simply, "After you went to bed last night he finished the bottle.

He won't be out of his hut before noon. He won't miss me."

Carrying the Rigby, Nicholas led them tip into the weathered limestone

hills, retracing the path along which Tamre had taken them the previous

day. As they walked, Nicholas heard the two women talking behind him.

Royan was explaining to Tessay how they had sighted the striped dik-dik,

and what they planned.

The sun was well up by the time they again reached the spot under the

thorn tree on the lip of the chasm, and settled down to wait in ambush.

"How will you retrieve the carcass, if you do manage to shoot the poor

little creature?" Royan asked.

"I made certain of that before we left camp," he explained. "I spoke to

the head tracker. If he hears a shot he will bring up the ropes and help

me get across to the other side."

"I wouldn't like to make the journey across there." Tessay eyed the drop

below them.

"They teach you some useful things in the army, along with all the

rubbish," Nicholas replied. He made himself comfortable against the

thorn tree, the rifle ready in his lap.

The women lay close by him, talking together softly.

It was unlikely that the sound of their low voices would carry across

the ravine, Nicholas decided, so he did not try to hush them.

He expected that if it came at all, the dik-dik would show itself early.

But he was wrong. By noon there was still no sign of it. The valley

sweltered in the midday sun. The distant wall of the escarpment, veiled

in the blue heat haze, looked like jagged blue glass, and the mirage

danced across the rocky ridges and shimmered like the waters of a silver

lake above the tops of the thorn thickets.

The women had long ago given up talking, and they lay somnolent in the

heat. The whole world was silent and heat-struck. Only a bush dove broke

the silence with its mournful lament, "My wife is dead, my children are

dead, Oh, me! Oh, my! Oh, me!'Nicholas found his own eyelids becoming

leaden. His head nodded involuntarily, and he jerked it up only to have

it flop forward again. On the very edge of sleep he heard a sound, close

by in the thorn scrub behind him.

It was a tiny sound, but one that he knew so well. A sound that

whiplashed across his nerve endings and jerked him back to full

consciousness, with his pulse racing and the coppery taste of fear in

the back of his throat. It was the metallic sound of the safety-catch on

an AK-47 assault rifle being slipped forward into the "Fire' position.

In one fluid movement he lifted the rifle out of his lap and rolled

twice, twisting his body to cover the two women who lay beside him. At

the same time he brought the Rigby into his shoulder, aimed into the

scrub behind him from where the sound had come.

"Down!" he hissed at his companions. "Keep your heads down!'

His finger was on the trigger and, even though it was a puny weapon with

which to take on a Kalashnikov, he was ready to return fire. He picked

up his target immediately, and swung on to it.

There was a man crouched twenty paces away, the assault rifle he carried

aimed into Nicholas's face. He was black, dressed in worn and tattered

camouflage fatigues and a soft cap of the same material. His webbing

held a bush-knife and grenades, water bottle' and all the other

accoutrements of a guerrilla fighter.

"Shufta!" thought Nicholas. "A real pro. Don't take chances with this

one." Yet at the same time he realized that if the intention had been to

kill him, then he would be dead already.

He aimed the Rigby an inch over the muzzle of the assault rifle, into

the bloodshot right eye of the shufta behind it. The man acknowledged

the stand-off with a narrowing of his eyes, and then gave an order in

Arabic.

"Salim, cover the women. Shoot them if he moves.

Nicholas heard movement on his flank and glanced in that direction,

still keeping the shufta in his peripheral vision.

Another guerrilla stepped out of the scrub. He was all: similarly

dressed, but he carried a Soviet RPD light machine gun on his hip. The

barrel was sawn off short to make the weapon more handy for bush

fighting, and there was a loop of ammunition belt draped around his

neck. He came forward carefully, the RPD aimed point-blank at the two

women. Nicholas knew that, with a touch on the trigger, he could chop

them both to mincemeat.

There were other stealthy rustling sounds in the bush all around them.

These two were not the only ones, Nicholas realized. This was a large

war party. He might be able to get off one shot with the Rigby, but by

then Royan and Tessay would be dead. And he would not be far behind

them.

Very slowly and deliberately he lowered the muzzle of the rifle until it

was pointing at the ground. Then he laid the weapon down and raised his

hands.

"Get your hands up," he told the women. "Do exactly what they tell you."

The guerrilla leader acknowledged his surrender by coming to his full

height and speaking rapidly to his men, still in Arabic.

"Get the rifle and his pack."

"We are British subjects," Nicholas told him loudly, and the guerrilla

looked surprised by his use of Arabic. "We are simple tourists. We are

not military. We are not government people."

Be quiet. Shut your face!" he ordered, as the rest of the guerrilla

patrol emerged from cover. Nicholas counted five of them all told,

though he knew there were probably others who had not come forward. They

were very professional as they rounded up their prisoners. They never

blocked each other's field of fire, nor offered an opportunity of

escape. Quickly they searched them for weapons, then closed in around

them and hustled them on to the path.

"Where are you taking us?"Nicholas demanded.

"No questions!" The butt of an AK-47 smashed between his shoulder blades

and almost knocked him off his feet.

"Steady on, chaps," he murmured mildly in English.

"That wasn't really called for."

They were forced to keep marching through the heat of the afternoon.

Nicholas kept a check on the position of the sun and the distant

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