by Larry Johns
“Mornin’,sir.” Brook. Bright and breezy and calling from somewhere beyond my ability to focus. I knuckled the gunge from my eyes. The men were already hard at it; pangas swinging, shovels digging. I tried to say Good Morning but it came out something like, “Gharzhaaa.” Dondo, the cook, shoved a tin of something into my hand and was gone.
Now Brook was yelling for someone not to do whatever it was he was doing. It looked like bedlam out there. I sat down on the step and ate. Slowly, the world came together
I should have realized that Brook was going to be the organizer. I sat on the step and watched him organizing. The “parade ground” turned into a parade ground in front of my very eyes.
Chop! Chop! Chop!
I leant forward and looked up. A man was up in the trees overhead, hacking away at the branches. I got an eyeful of dust for my pains. That would be a hole for the aerial balloon to ascend through. I had mentioned that to Brook yesterday. I finished whatever had been in the tin. I figured that if everyone else was managing to move and work, I should, too. I tossed the tin over my shoulder, stood up, stretched several times, then got stuck in.
Augarde and Bjoran, Brook told me, were already gone with their details. He showed me the roster he had worked out. To my knowledge, Camp-One had never worked to a roster. I looked around at the intense, organized activity and wondered how come.
I don’t remember too much about that second day, except that it was hell on wheels. Brook was everywhere with his damned clipboard, sorting out who did this and who did that, and when and with whom. I left him to it. Each to his own. But I began to see why Brook lamented his probable Staff posting so bitterly. He was born to it.
Augarde and his detail came in close to midday; the east track was clear and marked. Brook promptly waved his clipboard at him and told him what was to be done next. Augarde shot me a strange look. I shrugged and turned away. Work went on
I took Augarde’s jeep out along the east track. It was not a highway, but it was serviceable. I took the opportunity of going all the way to the river. There, you could look the sun full in the face. I stripped off and let the water wash me as clean as Congo river water can. When I got back to the camp, Bjoran was there. The west track was also navigable
“Hey, zur!” Bjoran hissed, taking me to one side. “What wit Brook? He in charge, or somet’ing?”
I said, “I promoted him sergeant major.” Spur of the moment.
Bjoran raised an eyebrow and looked perplexed. But he went off and did whatever it was Brook had told him to. It was odd how Brook’s simple request to draw up a roster had turned into something else entirely, all by itself.
Then, just before dusk on that second day, it was all over. I was amazed. The last pile of scrub had been cleared; the last hut was habitable; the equipment was stored, and the water purifying plant was filling the tank with water fit to drink. The blankets had been issued and weapons were cleaned. And the a/c unit in my portacabin, against my expectations, worked again. A hell it may have been, but now it was a tenable hell. And in the air, mixed with all the other smells, was the aroma of a curry that Dondo was throwing together, by way of our first real meal.
My portacabin was nigh on spotless, though such furniture as had remained there was in pretty poor shape. The radio table was a honeycomb of ant holes, but it took the weight; just. The old office swivel chair, one that had been in residence when I had first seen the place, had rusted into unswivelability. But you could sit on it. The floor, though age-blackened and in places rotted, did not collapse underfoot. Someone had even resurrected the old bunk bed. I vowed then that, on my next command, I would install a “Brook” right off.
It was time for the first contact with Luang.
With me in the cabin were Augarde and Bjoran. Brook had sent up the aerial balloon then gone off to do his SM thing, sorting out pickets and the first training schedule. Bjoran sat on the floor, his back against the aluminum wall, his AK resting in his lap. Augarde sat on my bunk picking his calluses. Both looked like men who had undergone an assault course; mud-caked from head to foot. I felt wholesome by comparison. I switched on the SSB and the dials came to life.
“Well,” said Augarde tiredly, “that works at least.”
Bjoran mumbled something inaudible about Brook. Sour grapes. I checked my watch. It was exactly midnight. I tuned in to Luang’s frequency and the carrier wave hissed out of the ‘speaker. I knew that Brown would be out there somewhere, listening. I thought; and this is where it really starts. There were a few moments of relative silence as we waited. Then, crystal-clear and startling, the ‘speaker burst into life.
“Parka! Parka! Parka!” It was not Luang’s voice. But it did not have to be. The code words were correct.
I lifted the microphone and went to transmit. “Base!”
“Query. Position?
I grimaced. They were using some old-style radio procedure. “Statement. Established.”
“Roger, base,” said the voice. “Next contact tomorrow. Secondary hour and frequency. Out!”
Short and sharp and necessarily so - to everyone but me! I flicked the switch and the dial lights faded. Camp-One, if little else in the greater scheme of things, was operational.
SEVEN
Jean-Paul Winterhoek forced his mind awake. Bluthen was at his bedside, shaking his arm, his face alive with urgency.
“What is it?” Winterhoek said throatily, pushing himself on to one elbow and squinting against the early morning sun that streamed in the windows.
“There’s a development, sir. It’s Vryburg! He leaves tomorrow morning!”
“What!”
“Tomorrow morning, sir,” Bluthen insisted. “He is to catch a flight to Libreville early tomorrow morning. From there Luang will fly him by helicopter to the Shama estate. It’s on, sir!”
Winterhoek tossed aside the bedclothes and swung his legs to the floor, feet automatically searching for the slippers Bluthen had provided. “What time is it now?”
“Six-fifteen, sir.”
Winterhoek cursed. “Damn! If we’d known this last night...”
“Yes, sir.” Bluthen handed him his dressing gown. “Twenty-four hours, sir. Do you think we can make it?”
Winterhoek slipped into the gown and strode out the door into the corridor. “We don’t think, major. We do!”
“But it’s broad daylight, sir.”
“Yes, yes, yes!” Winterhoek snapped testily. “I am aware of that! How quickly can we get Ryan to Kampala?” He stormed along the corridor dragging Bluthen in his wake.
“From take-off, sir, something over six hours. We have an Air Force jet waiting at Parys air base.”
“Six hours,” repeated Winterhoek, crossing the sunlit hall and throwing open the library door. “And what time is Vryburg’s flight?”
“Seven-oh-five tomorrow morning, sir. Almost exactly twenty-four hours from
this - “
“Yes, major!” Winterhoek cut in angrily. “You keep saying that! We’ll do it, dammit! Because we must! And we’ll take the girl in broad daylight if we have to!” He sat heavily in the desk chair and reached for the telephone. “But we may not have to...Dusk in Jo-burg is...when?” He was merely thinking aloud. “Close to five-thirty, eh? Very well.” He was fully conscious of the fact that to make a move against Walton in daylight would be to invite publicity. And any kind of publicity at all would wipe out the advantage of time. He lifted the telephone from its rest, still thinking aloud. “We take the girl at, say, six-o-clock, to be on the safe side; have her at the airbase by...what?” He glanced at Bluthen.
Bluthen overcame his instinct to shrug. “Say thirty minutes, sir.”
“Thirty minutes. Yes. Take off? Let’s say seven; allowing for hold-ups. Now, six hours flying time should put Ryan and the girl in Kampala by...by one in the morning.” He sat back momentarily in the seat. “You see, major? No need to panic. All we need is a smooth passage of events.” He leant forward and dialed a number. As he w
aited for the reply his fingers drummed an impatient rhythm on the desk. “Ah, George! Yes. Now listen. Tell the committee that it’s on as of this moment. I want clearances all along the line. Stress that, George! No hold ups of any kind. Not Jo-burg, not the destination, not anywhere! Is that clear? Good...What?..This evening. Dusk...No, we cannot...No! Do not discuss that on this line. I’ll call you later today on Sterile-Six...Yes...Fine. Goodbye, George.” He replaced the receiver. “Right, major. Get everyone together. I want a final briefing. And make damned certain that every single member of the opposition is covered; the Brits especially, and Luang’s rabble!”
*
For most practical purposes it can be said that when the sun is at its zenith over Greenwich, London, it is - for the British, the Moroccans and the Tunisians, and the Nigerians, among others - midday; close to lunchtime and people are thinking about filling their stomachs. Elsewhere in the world, at that particular moment in time and space, it could be late afternoon, or breakfast time, or any time at all, dependent upon where in the world you happen to be. The World Time Zone system was introduced with a shrinking, if not a fully shrunk, world in mind, to lend some kind of biological continuity to a life that was already complicated enough. And despite that which some jet-age travelers have to say about it, the system works. However, the WTZS can be a pain in the backside for people who just sit where they are. Especially in vast, longitudinally stretched countries like, for instance, the United States, where mid-afternoon for some, could be midnight for others.
In Brazzaville it was two in the afternoon, and the pot of intrigue and counter-plot was boiling nicely. Whilst in Washington, DC it was eight-o-clock on the morning of that same day, and Conrad Mitchell had only recently entered his office after experiencing a mental revelation on his way to work. He had enjoyed a full night’s sleep and was suffering no biorhythmic problems at all. Certainly not when he lifted a telephone and dialed a number.
The President of the United States, however, was currently sojourning, with members of his immediate staff plus a busload of FBI and CIA agents, in his mountain “retreat” up near the far-western Canadian border. There, it was only four in the morning and mister president, in order to take Mitchell’s call, had to be woken from the most mentally- and physically-beneficial segment of his night’s sleep.
“What, exactly,” asked the president, slurping at the coffee - black and hot - that one of his night-attired aides had just handed him, “and as concisely as possible, do we know?”
In his Washington office, the morning sun streaming in the windows, Mitchell steeled himself. He did not like talking to presidents. And if he had been asked to deliver to a congregation of nuns, little old ladies and holy order priests, a eulogy on this particular president, the best he could in all conscience have to say was that the man was an asshole - a bland, pussy-footing, vote-conscious, mostly un-conscious, bent-backed and too damned young asshole; one who would be remembered solely for his inability to recognize the obvious even when it was jabbed in his eye on the end of a marlin spike. “We know, mister president,” Mitchell began, “that the Congo is about to explode!”
“Zaire.”
“Pardon?”
“Zaire. The place is now called Zaire.” The president, at the other end of the very long line, gave a smirk as he took another sip of his coffee. He too was aware of the antipathy that existed - for God alone knew what reason - between himself and the head of the CIA.
Mitchell, in Washington, absorbed the first thrust of the invisible rapier, having recognized it for what it was. As much as he disliked the man, he had to make him realize the truth of what had to be done. “Yes,” he admitted, “Zaire.” He looked like a man who was hearing the same bad joke for the fiftieth time and was still expected to laugh.
“Right,” said the president, “let's call it what it is; the Congo is a different place altogether, now. But, do go on, Mitch.”
Oh, you horse’s arse! thought Mitchell. “Mitch," for chrissakes! Like they were long-lost buddies, or something. True, Mitchell did address the man as Sir, or mister president, But that was protocol, nothing more. There was no way, with the worst will in the world, he could call him “pal," or “shithead.” Not and get anything done he couldn’t.
“Yes, sir,” said Mitchell, biting hard on the bullet. “Well, I’m going to give it to you from the top. I am aware that you are up to date on some of these issues, but for the sake of -” How could he put this? He would like to have said: So that even an idiot like you can understand it. But he said, “- for the sake of continuity I’ll omit nothing.”
“Very wise.”
Some delicate sarcasm there. Fair enough. Mitchell gritted his teeth and continued. “We know that the British, in league with President Aaron Motanga, are trying to work a flanking action on the Chinese. We know that Motanga has somewhere in the region of three thousand hand-picked troops camped - digging in, actually - near the Lococo River. A place called the Isanga Valley. We also know that somewhere in the Congo Rift Valley - it is still called that, sir, on most maps - somewhere in there, is a large group of mercenaries.”
“How large?”
“We can only estimate that. But from all the reports we’ve been getting through, something in excess of two hundred; two-fifty men. And governments have been toppled by fewer - certainly in Africa.”
“Yes?”
Mitchell frowned at the telephone. Yes? That’s all? He went on, “Recent intelligence confirms that ex-president...” Oh, but that that term could be applied to the jerk I’m speaking to! “...Lumimba, from the time when the place was called the Congo, has come out of hiding.”
“Where?”
“Where is he now?”
“Was and is.”
“He was in the Sudan. Now he is in Pretoria.”
“Is South Africa involved? Primarily, I mean.”
Good question. “We don’t know. Yet!”
“The Sudan?”
“Could be. Certainly there is a strong connection.”
“Which is?”
“First off, the Sudanese air force, according to a report that is less than nine hours old, is now in possession of a whole squadron of un-liveried helicopters. Big babies, according to our man there. Skyhooks. Troop carriers. And their base is at a place called Tambura, right next door to the...to Zaire. It is a base, mister president, that used to have a whole squadron of fully liveried aircraft - but that now doesn’t. If you get my drift.”
“I get it - and the implications.”
Halle-bloody-lullya, thought Mitchell. The president went on: “Backing up a little bit, Mitch; what you’re saying is that president Motanga is aware of the existence of this mercenary army?”
Painstakingly, Mitchell told his president everything that was known and everything that had been guessed. At the conclusion, he said, “There’s been a double-cross, sir. The Chinese, in Brazzaville, seem as yet unaware of it.”
“But that’s supposition, Mitch. Perhaps they are unaware of it because it hasn’t happened. What is their Intelligence like in Central Africa?”
“Reasonably sophisticated, sir. But they’ve next to nothing in Zaire. And they do not have over-flight capabilities either. We do. So do the British and, of course, South Africa. Nothing in the intelligence field seems to have changed for them. It’s pretty much business as usual...However, it is from the over flights that we pick up most of the hard intelligence; Sat-Com surveillance, that kind of thing. The Chinese don’t have that advantage.” He added, “Sir...I am absolutely certain that a double-cross has gone down, and I am just as certain that the Chinese have yet to rumble it. When they do, of course, all hell will break loose. It’ll be a goddamn mess out there. We’ll - “
“But who,” the president cut in evenly, “is double-crossing whom? So far you haven’t answered that, Mitch.”
Oh, sweet Jesus! thought Mitchell. “The British, sir. They’ve pulled a fast one on the Chinese. That much we know. What we suspect
- but strongly - is that there is a third party in there somewhere, stirring the cauldron. It could be the Sudanese, it could be anyone. That’s not so desperately important; not at this time. What is important is that Central Africa is going to end up in utter bloody chaos, and I mean “bloody” both ways. And if that chaos trickles down south who knows where it will end! The one thing they don’t need down south, at this particular juncture, is any more bloody chaos. They’re only just beginning to find their feet.” Mitchell wanted to go on, but stopped himself. Global politics, per se, was not his problem. That, for better or for worse, was the domain of the man he was speaking to.
“Hmmm,” said the president thoughtfully. He had been on the verge of telling Mitchell to mind his own fucking business, but that would have been unseemly for a President of the United States. Had Mitchell made one more observation of that nature, however...”And you have something in mind to avert it?”
“I do, sir. But I have to say up front that, if left alone, Lumimba might just crawl back in through the rubble. And if that happens we - with respect, sir...” Gritted teeth. “...we would be right out in the cold...” He hurried on, “If you remember, mister president, we refused to grant the man sanctuary in this country...” Chew on that!
Several thousand miles away, the president flushed angrily. “Not this administration, Mitchell!” he spat, forgetting for the moment the labored pretense of familiarity.
Mitchell smiled to himself. The man was on the defensive. Best - only - place for him. “That, sir,” he replied as evenly as he knew how, “will not, also with respect, sir - will not impress Lumimba...” He pulled himself together. The private battle could wait. “So we end up with two possibilities, sir; either we do nothing, which itself has two results - one: Lumimba gets back into power. Or, two: chaos reigns supreme in Central Africa, and probably beyond. And we know which major power feeds on chaos, now that the Russian communists are more or less out of the picture. Our second route - the meat of this conversation, mister president - is a proposition that we now have to hand.”