A Time to Die - Smith Wilbur - Страница 162

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"Cut out that sort of bullshit," he warned Job.

"Without me you might have a chance," Job insisted. "If you have to drag this stretcher-"

"We've got twelve hefty Shanganes," Sean pointed out.

"Better some of you get through than all of us die. Leave me, Sean. Save Claudia and yourself."

1419 in getting angry." Sean stood up and said to Claudia, "We leave in ten minutes."

They traveled cautiously southward all that day. It was an intense relief not to have to watch the sky for the Hind gunships, although out of habit the Shanganes occasionally turned their faces upward. The closer they drew to the railway fine, the slower their progress became, and they spent much of their time hiding in the dense wild ebony thickets and clumps of jesse until Matatu came ghosting back to assure them the coast was clear and lead them onward.

In the late afternoon Sean left the main party hiding in a bushy. and went forward with Matatu. He was gone for almost two ravine hours, and the sun was setting when he reappeared silently and suddenly at Claudia's side.

"You startled me!" she gasped. "You're like a cat."

"The railway line is only a mile ahead. The Frehmo guards seem itary traffic to be in a state of confusion still. There is a lot of mil on the line and a great deal of panicky activity all around. The crossing is going to be a trifle tricky. As soon as the moon comes up, I'll go up and take another look."

While they waited for the moon, Alphonso rigged the radio aerial and made his scheduled contact with General China's headquarters.

"The dove is in flight." He gave the prearranged code so China would believe that Sean and his party had crossed the border.

After a brief pause, presumably while he relayed the message, the radio operator came back to Alphonso with the order to return to river.

Alphonso acknowledged and signed off.

the main base on the "They won't expect nw'to arrive back for another two days."

Alphonso grinned as he packed up the radio. "It will be that long before they start getting suspicious."

As the moon pushed its bald silver pate above the trees, Sean and Matatu slipped away into the forest to make a final reconnaissance of the railway line. A mile south of their position they found the place where the line crossed a narrow stream. Although the stream contained only a few shallow puddles, the banks were thick with riverine bush that would afford them good cover. Originally the bush must have been cleared for a hundred yards on each side of the line, but secondary growth had been allowed to spring up to waist height. 391

"Sloppy Frelinio bastards" Scan muttered. "That will give us some cover, and we'll stay in the river-bed."

The main line crossed the stream over an embankment and culvert. There was a guard post on the approaches, fifty yards up track from the culvert. While Sean watched through his bmocuIan, a Frelimo sentry, his AK rifle slung on his back, sauntered ! ! down to the bridge over the culvert. He leaned on the guardrail and fit a cigarette. The glow of the cigarette marked his progress as he ambled back to the guard post. He seemed to Sean to be a little unsteady on his feet, and when he reached the guard post, a faint ripple of fenumne giggles carried to where Sean and Matatu lay.

"They are having a party," Sean chuckled.

"Palm wine and jig-jig," Matatu agreed enviously. In the moonlight he held up his right hand with his thumb trapped between his first two fingers. "I would like some of that myself "You randy little bugger." Sean tweaked his ear. "When we get to Johannesburg, I'll stand you to the biggest, fattest lady we can Bush out." Matatu's taste in amour ran to the mountainous. "Like Sherpa Tensing on Everest," Sean often remarked.

The distractions with which the railway guards had provided themselves promised to make their crossing easier. Sean and Matatu withdrew quietly and started back to where they had left the rest of the party.

They had been gone for three hours, and it was a few minutes before midnight as they approached the camp. At the head of the ravine Sean paused to give the recognition signal, the liquid warble of a fiery-necked nightjar. He didn't want to be shot by one of Alphonso's Shanganes. He waited a full minute for the reply.

When it did not come, he repeated the signal. Still there was silence, and he felt the first tickle of alarm.

Instead of going straight in, they circled the ravine cautiously, and in the moonlight Matatu picked up unexpected spoor and squatted over it, frowning with alarm.

Sean whispered. "Who? Which way?"

"Many men, our own Shanganes!" Matatu lifted his head and pointed to the north. "They are going out, leaving camp."

"Outgoing?" Sean was puzzled. "Doesn't make sense, unless--I Oh, God!

No!"

Swiftly, quietly, he closed in on the camp. The sentries he had set before he left were gone, their posts deserted. Sean felt panic rise in a wave that threatened to suffocate him.

"Claudia!" he whispered, suppressing the urge to shout her name aloud. He wanted to rush into the camp and fiW her, but he drew a series of deep breaths and fought back the panic.

He slipped the AKM on to fully automatic and went down on his belly, creeping in. The five Shanganes he had left asleep in the of the ravine were gone, and all their equipment and weapons gut had disappeared. He went on and made out the shape of Job's stretcher in the dappled moonlight; beside it, exactly as he had left her, was Claudia's body wrapped in a blanket, but just beyond her another body lay sprawled. In the moonlight he saw the sheen of wetness on the back of the man's head.

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