by T. M. Deans
The motor was a small two-stroke engine. I had to be sure that the gas had been mixed with oil. Next I needed guns and ammo. There was a machine pistol hanging above the cot where the big man had been sleeping. I also needed water, food, a knife and anything else I thought could come in handy. Then I thought that if I make it to shore I wouldn’t have any money. I grabbed their wallets. I’d go through them later, and might find a clue to who they were as well. Lucky the weather was good no whitecaps, just gentle rollers. Not more than five footers. I was making a pile of my survival gear by the door, when I heard a grown. Lana was coming to.
“So you’re alive”
“What happened, and where is everybody?”
“We crashed and they’re all dead except for us. I’m sorry I don’t have time to tell you about it now. This tub is about to sink and I have to leave. So it’s been nice knowing you.”
“Jack. You’re not going to leave me like this are you?”
“Of course I am darling. Why not? After all you did betray me.”
“Jack, if you leave me like this it will haunt you for the rest of your life. Besides you need me.”
“Really? And why would I need you?”
“Because you’re seeping blood. You’ve been shot.”
“That’s your friend’s blood.”
“You’re bleeding in the back also.”
I pulled my shirt up. Shit. She was right. I had a hole in me right about where love handles would be if I had some. I reached around the back. There was blood. It seemed like the bullet had made an exit wound, but I couldn’t be sure. With all the excitement and maybe some of the residue from the drugs I had been given, I hadn’t felt the wound. She was right. I would need her to help me with doctoring it.
“Okay Lana, I’ll take you aboard, but one wrong move from you and I will not hesitate to kill you. Do you understand that?”
“Completely Jack.” I slipped the cuffs off her and told her to get a rope and tie it onto the motor, and lower it down to me into the boat. I didn’t want to take any chances on losing it overboard. I had to trust her completely for now. There was no other choice. She lowered the motor and the gas can. I hooked it up and cranked it a few times. It started up. Leave it to an Evinrude.
I told her get a duffel bag and put in whatever food and water she could find. Also we needed a couple of life jackets, plus two warm coats and two hats in case we don’t make it to shore. I told her to hurry and get all the medical supplies she could find.
The hull was listing over more all the time. A few minutes later I yelled to Lana to get in quick. She didn’t hesitate and started to lower herself into the boat. She was no sooner in when the fuselage started to roll down under the water, with the remaining pontoon we were still tied to. It started to roll up and over pulling the raft with it. We were about to be hanging from the bow or worse. She was struggling with a hook to undo it, but there was too much pressure on it. I yelled for her to cut it and gave her a knife. She cut the rope just in time.
I motored out about 100 yards and stopped to get my bearing. It didn’t appear that the plane was going to sink.
Lana asked, “Do you think that maybe we should stay with the plane? It might be safer than trying to get to shore. If a boat or plane came by, they would probably see us.”
I thought about it for second.
“No it’s an offshore wind right now. The longer we wait the farther out to sea we will be. Also the weather could change.”
I didn’t know if the pilot had sent out a Mayday. Rescue would be good but by whom. No we needed to try to make it to shore. I motored up closer to the pontoon and emptied a clip from the machine pistol into it, a little below the waterline. If the plane didn’t sink, it wouldn’t do to have whoever had set this whole thing up find all the dead bodies, except for Lana and me. We could see land off in the distance. It was hard to tell how far away, maybe as much as 20 miles. There were certainly no towns, no lights, nothing at a distance we could see. I pointed the bow to shore and tried to steer as straight a course as possible to conserve fuel.
“Jack, let me put a temporary bandage on you. You’re still leaking.
“How about you Lana, how are you doing?”
“Considering everything, other than a headache and sore wrist from flopping around chained to the bunk, I’m fine. So jack what happened back there after you knocked me out? That was a good move. I underestimated you.”
I told her how it went down.
She said, “Impressive. They told me you had been in the army, but I think you’ve had more experience than just that.”
I did not answer.
“Lana, tell me everything you know. What is this all about?”
“Alright Jack. I will tell everything I know, but it’s really not much. I don’t know why they want you, but they want you alive. They made an attempt to snatch you in Paris. They didn’t tell me what happened, but it failed.”
“That’s very interesting. I’ll tell you what happened. I thought they were trying to rob me and I ended up killing them both.”
She said, “Well that makes me feel a little better, but that’s what happens when you send men to do women’s work. At least I did get you, even if I couldn’t hold on to you”.
“Well darling, that’s only because they didn’t have a beautiful rack like you do.”
“We were supposed to meet a ship tomorrow morning, where we would be offloaded. I was to get off at the next port north. That’s all I know.”
“Wait one minute. Why were you still with them? You did your job. You should’ve been paid and taken off. That doesn’t make sense”
“You’re right. But they botched it getting you out of the hotel. A hotel employee saw them carrying you to the van. I had to leave with them since I had been seen with you for several days. It wasn’t safe for me to hang around in South Africa. Why don’t you let me take over? You look like you’re about to pass out. When we get close to shore I’ll wake you.” I wasn’t about to argue.
42
ON THE BEACH IN THE JUNGLE
“Jack wake up. We are almost there. Are you okay?”
“Yeah I’m good. I needed that. Thanks.”
We changed places. I asked her if she had seen any lights at all. She wasn’t sure, maybe one light. We were close now. We came up on a big sandy beach. The offshore wind held, so there were hardly any waves breaking on the shore.
I said, “Lana, be ready with the bowline. I’m going to gun it as fast as I can to get us up on the beach as far as possible. The minute we stop, jump out with a rope and pull.”
I timed it just as the wave was coming in and went for it. We ran up on the beach. She jumped out and started pulling the boat up. I tried to tilt the motor up but it wouldn’t go. The waves started to pull us back out. The motor shaft buried itself in the sand and started to spin the bow around. I jumped out to help. When the saltwater found my wounds it felt like I had received an electric shock. I was able to push the boat around and we got it safely up on the shore.
I said, “Were going to jettison the boat. It won’t do us any good. It’s almost out of gas. I don’t want it to be seen. Take everything out. Don’t leave anything that floats.”
We unloaded it and pushed it back a little ways into the water. I put some rocks in it, and punched small holes in the air chambers with my knife. The wind would blow it out with the weight of the rocks and the motor, and hopefully would sink it. The tree line was close. We hauled up our belongings and went far enough into the jungle so we wouldn’t be seen from the water. It was as far as I could go.
Lana changed my bandages and did a proper job of binding me up.
“You are lucky Jack. The bullet didn’t hit any vital organs and it exited.”
I was out cold by the time she had said the “d” in exited. When morning came, Lana was already up and had a small fire going making some coffee.
“Ready for some coffee, Jack?”
“You must be a magician
.”
“No I just grabbed some instant packets and a small pot. You could say I had faith that you would get us to shore. How do you feel?”
“I think the bleeding stopped. You did a good job. Thank you.”
“I’ll check the bandages again when you’re ready. If you’re not leaking we better save what bandages we have left.”
I looked to the sea. The wind had changed from offshore to on. There was no sign of our raft, the plane, or any ships. So at least that was comforting.
“Lana. Tell me everything you can think of to help us figure out where we are, and what to do next.”
“After I drugged you, we got you into a van. That’s when the hotel employee spotted us.”
“Why did you wait three days to drug me?”
“Several reasons. One, they weren’t ready. Two, I was feeling you out waiting for the right moment. Three, I was having fun with you darling. We switched vans once and then drove to a private airport. We took a plane flight, and then the next day switched to the seaplane. If you hadn’t killed everyone and crashed the plane, we would have landed by a ship and offloaded. Everything was planned out except for the employee spotting us, and me having to come along for the ride. I suppose if you think about it, if I hadn’t come along and gotten careless, you might not have escaped. We wouldn’t be here having this romantic jungle experience together. So perhaps you can find in your heart to forgive me a little.”
“I wish I had a map. I can’t imagine where we are, except off the Atlantic coast of Africa. Not a single clue as to why they wanted me, who they were, or where we were going.”
“Only that they wanted you unhurt and in good condition. I got the impression that their interest in you was from something that happened a long time ago. They were pretty closed mouth Jack. I’m sorry. That’s all I can tell you.”
“Lana. You realize that you are probably out of favor with them, and they have gone through a lot of money and trouble to get me. It’s not over yet. I don’t know if the pilot got a Mayday out. I would think so, which means the ship was probably listening and knew that either we were having mechanical problems or I had taken control. We have no way of knowing how much he got through to them, so let’s assume that they know what happened. I’m hoping that the plane is on the bottom. If they should capture us, it would be in their best interest to get rid of you. We’re in the middle of a god knows where jungle, without a clue as to where we are, with all kinds of dangers that could arise. Our only hope for survival is to watch each other’s back. Can I trust you?”
“Everything you just said is absolutely correct, and yes you can trust me. We’ve been on the same side since last night Jack. You have my word.”
I replied, “Talk about strange bedfellows. I have a feeling you’ll need this,” and I handed her back her Beretta.
“We should get back farther in the jungle. I don’t like all the tracks we left on the beach. They could be spotted from a plane.”
We packed up our meager supplies and started walking inland. We only went a short way when we came upon a dirt road, not much of the road, but a road.
“Well this is encouraging. You said you thought you might have seen a lone light way up ahead to the north when we were coming in last night. I think that’s the direction we should head. This road certainly will make things easier.”
There were some very old vehicle tracks heading south. At least sometime in the past a vehicle used this road.
I was hot. I was moving slowly. After about an hour and a half, Lana wanted to check my wounds. I needed to rest. We found a small stream coming down out of the jungle and followed it up a little ways until we found a decent spot for a camp. We would have to spend at least one night here to give my bullet holes a chance to close up.
By afternoon, some storm clouds had rolled in and it looked like we were going to get rain. We moved back a little further to where there was a rock overhang. We thought it would probably keep us dry.
I was about to ask her how she got in her line of work, when we both heard a rustling noise in the underbrush. It was coming our way. We both stayed perfectly still. A small pig like critter went past without seeming to notice us.
Lana looked at me, “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
“Yes but we don’t know who might hear a shot.”
“Give me the knife.”
She found a piece of wood that would suffice as a shaft for a spear. She then took some of the rope we had, unbraided it, and fastened the knife to the shaft. She walked off in the direction of the critter.
About 20 minutes later she came back to our little camp holding dinner. I was very impressed. I told her my father would be very pleased to have seen this. We had to take a chance on a fire. We moved around to the other side of the rock outcrop hoping that if anybody did come down the road, they would be less likely to see our fire. I couldn’t believe how hungry I was, but then again I hadn’t really eaten in three days.
“I see that you’re more than just an everyday assassin. What was it military?”
“Yes, a special branch of the royal Marines, something like your Navy Seals. I went in as a combat medic, but had to go through all the regular training. I got tired of all the bullshit, everybody hitting on me. Even the polite advances got to be old. I always scored higher than 80% of the men in almost everything, I was always held back. Then when there was an officer I would not let into my pants, he would always find a way to make things hard on me. I was getting pretty sick of the whole thing, but it wasn’t like I could just quit. A situation came up that gave me an out, and I took it. I faked my death. No body. No trace. I didn’t have any family so it didn’t matter. I did have all the training that I would need for my present employment. Bottom line was I enjoyed putting bullets into people much more than taking them out. So now, you know my secret. I hope you can understand why you can trust me.”
“Lana you better do something with the guts of that critter. It could attract predators.”
“What do you think is here that’s a danger to us?”
“Probably big cats, big snakes, little snakes, and crawling things; but most of all, people.”
Even though there was wood, we didn’t feel safe keeping a fire going.
“We better cuddle up Jack, to conserve body heat. It wouldn’t be good for you to get a chill.”
The coat that she had grabbed for me was from the big Arab. It was more like a sleeping bag on me. I had to lie on my left side. We zipped up the coat halfway. She crawled in so it was covering both of us. Her back was to my front. I slipped my right arm over her, and took her breast in my hand.
“Jack what are you doing?”
“My hand was cold so I thought your breast surely must be also.”
“And Jack is that your pistol poking me in the back?”
“Why yes Lana it is.”
“I hope it’s not chambered.”
“Actually my dear it has been chambered for you since the day I met you.”
“Well I would be going against everything they taught me in medical school if I were to let you have your way with me. For tonight at least. Sleep well Jack.”
I fell asleep thinking life certainly is strange.
The night passed without any attacks from two, four legged, or flying and crawling things. When morning came, Lana started cooking up the rest of the meat before it spoiled.
“Listen Jack, I know we should get moving. I fear that if we start walking today though, your wounds could open up or get infected. I think we should camp one more day. It’s healing nicely, but it really should have a week. We have to give it a chance to close up. Besides I only have enough dressing for one more time.”
“You’re probably right. I succumb to your wisdom. After you finish cooking at least lets change camps. We will follow this creek up further just to be on the safe side. We’ll walk in the creek bed to cover any tracks. If anyone comes by, the rain would’ve probably washed out our tracks on the road
at least.”
We made our way up the creek bed far enough that it would be safe to have a fire. I told Lana that if I lived to tell this tale, I would say how the wounded warrior lay in repose, while his mate went hunting and brought down with her bare hands another pig like creature to feed her Lordship.
“Jack, you tell a tale like that and I will see to it that you don’t live.” She threw me a piece of meat from the fire.
That night we had the same sleeping arrangement. However, Lana would not agree to me showing her how well I had been healing. We did find a way to pleasure each other without putting my wound in harm’s way.
43
FOUR BAD MEN IN THE JUNGLE
The next morning we broke camp and walked back to the road heading north. The road followed the coastline. It would meander up and down hill, which made the going a little bit harder and more strenuous for me. After maybe 4 miles or so of slow going, we stopped to take a break. We hadn’t seen or heard a soul, but that was about to change. Up ahead was a white Jeep. It was one of those old long ones. Four black men were standing around it. They appeared to be relieving themselves. They were headed our way. It wouldn’t be long before they were upon us.