Cry Wolf - Smith Wilbur - Страница 30

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it stretched an area of low red sand hills. Thankfully Jake increased

speed and the column sped towards a sunset that was inflamed by the

dust-laden sky until it filled half the heavens with great swirls of

purple and pink and flaming scar lets The desert wind dropped and the

air was still and heavy with memory of the day's heat.

Each vehicle drew a long dark shadow behind it and threw up a fat

rolling sausage of red dust into the air above it.

The night fell with the tropical suddenness that is alarming to those

who have known only the gentle dusks of the northern continents.

Jake calculated that they had covered less than twenty miles in a day

of travel and he was reluctant to call a halt, now that they had hit

this level going and were bowling along with engine temperatures

dropping in the cool of night and the drivers" tempers cooling in

sympathy. Jake took a bearing off Orion's belt as the easiest

constellation, then he switched on the headlights and looked back to

see that the others had followed his example. The lights threw a

brilliant path a hundred yards ahead of Jake's car, giving him plenty

of time to avoid the odd thick clump of thorn scrub, and occasionally

trapping a large grey desert hare, dazzling it so that its eyes blazed

diamond bright before it turned and loped, long-legged, ahead of the

car, seemingly unable to break out of the path of light, dodging and

doubling with its long floppy ears laid along its back, until at the

last instant it ducked out from under the wheels and dived into the

darkness.

He was just deciding to call a halt for food and drink, with a possible

further march later that night, when the sand hills dropped away

gradually and in the headlights he saw ahead of him a glistening white

expanse of perfectly level sand, as smooth and as inviting as the

Brooklands motor-racing circuit.

Jake changed up into high gear for the first time that day, and the car

plunged forward eagerly for a hundred yards before the thick hard crust

of the salt pan collapsed and the heavy chassis fell through, belly

deep, floundering instantly so that Jake was thrown violently forward

at the abrupt halt, striking his shoulder and forehead painfully on the

steel visor.

The engine shrieked in the frenzy of high revolutions and lifting

valves before Jake recovered himself, then slammed the throttle

closed.

He dragged himself from the turret to signal a halt to the following

vehicles, and then mournfully clambered down to inspect the heavily

bogged vehicle. Gareth walked out across the snowy surface of the

pan,

and stood beside him surveying the damage silently.

"Let him make one crack " Jake thought through the mists of his anger

and frustration. He felt his hands curling into big bony hammers.

"Cheroot?" Gareth offered him the case, and Jake felt his anger

deflate slightly.

"Good place to camp tonight," Gareth went on. "We'll see about hauling

her out in the morning." He clapped Jake's shoulder. "Come on,

I'll buy you a warm beer."

"I was waiting for you to say something,

anything but that and I would have swung on you. "Jake shook his

head

grinning with surprise at Gareth's perception.

"You think I didn't know that, old son?" Gareth grinned back at him.

Vicky woke in the hours immediately after midnight when human vitality

is at its lowest, and the night was utterly silent except for the

gentle sound of one of the men snoring. She recognized the sound from

the previous evening, and wondered which of them it was.

something like that could influence a girl's decision, she thought,

imagine sleeping every night of your life in a saw mill.

It was not that which had woken her, however. Perhaps it was the cold.

The temperature had plunged in that phenomenal temperature range of the

desert, and she drew her blankets tighter over her shoulder and settled

to sleep ,again when the sound came again and she shot upright into a

rigid sitting position.

It was a long-drawn rolling, rattling sound, quite unlike anything she

had ever heard before. The sound rose to a pitch which clawed her

nerves, and then ended in a series of deep gut-shaking grunts. It was

so fierce and menacing a sound that she felt the slow ice of terror

spreading through her body. She wanted to shout to the others, to wake

them, but she was afraid to draw attention to herself and she sat

frozen and wide-eyed in the next silence waiting for it to happen

again.

"It's all right, Miss Camberwell." Vicky started at the quiet voice.

"It's miles away. Nothing to worry about." And she looked round to

see the young Ethiopian, still wrapped in his blankets watching her.

"My God, Greg what on earth is it?"

"A lion, Miss Camberwell,"

Gregorius . explained, obviously surprised that she did not recognize

such a commonplace sound.

"A lion? That is a lion roaring?" She had not expected it to sound

anything like that.

"My people say that even a brave man is frightened three times by a

lion and the first time is when he hears it roar."

"I believe it,"

she whispered. "I truly do." And she picked up her blankets and went

to where Jake and Gareth slept on, undisturbed. She lay down carefully

between them, and felt a little easier that the lion had now a wider

choice, but still she did not sleep, Count Aldo Belli had retired to

his tent with the sincerest and firmest resolve that in the morning he

would press forward to the Wells of Chaldi. The General's pleas had

touched him. Nothing would check him now, he decided, as he composed

himself to sleep.

He woke in the utter dark of the dog hours to find that the

Chianti he had drunk at dinner was now exerting internal pressure.

Where a lesser man might have slipped without ceremony from his bed to

deal with this problem, the Count did things in greater style.

He lay back on his pillows and let out a single loud bellow, and

immediately there was the frantic activity in the night, and within

minutes Gino had arrived with a bull's-eye lantern, hastily dressed in

a camel-hair gown, and tousle-haired and owl-eyed with sleep. He was

followed by the Count's personal valet and his galloper, all in the

same state of freshly awoken bewilderment.

The Count stated his physical needs, and the dedicated group gathered

around his bed solicitously. Gino helped him up as though he were an

invalid, the valet held a dressing gown of quilted blue Chinese silk,

embroidered with ferocious scarlet dragons, and then knelt to place a

calf-skin slipper on each of the Count's feet, while his aide hastened

to kick the Count's personal guard awake and fall them in outside the

tent.

The Count emerged from the tent and a small procession, well armed and

lighted, filed down to the latrine which had been dug exclusively for

the Count's personal use. Gino entered first and checked the small

thatched edifice for snakes, scorpions and brigands. Only when he

emerged and declared it safe did the Count enter. His escort stood to

attention and listened respectfully to the copious outpouring taking

place within until they were interrupted by the sky shaking

earth-rattling, heart-stopping roar of a male lion.

The Count shot from the latrine, his face a startled glistening white

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