Zambezi

by Tony Park

  Juma lifted the foot of the coffin and, between them, they raised the box out of the ground and dropped it on the edge of the grave.

  ‘Shall I disarm the grenade, boss?’ Juma asked.

  ‘We haven’t time now. We can do that once we get them into the aircraft. Hurry, let’s get her into the Land Rover.’

  The two men lifted the coffin again and, backs bowed with the weight, carried it to the open tailgate of the four-by-four. ‘Right, let’s get the VIP,’ Hassan said.

  Miranda strained to hear their brief exchanges. Juma had always given her the creeps. She was surprised that Hassan mentioned another person. A VIP? She had the grenade tucked between her thighs now, her hands down over her crotch. When he eventually opened the lid it would take him only a second to notice that his trap had been disarmed. She would have to strike immediately.

  At first, as Miranda thought in the coffin about the chain of events that had led to this, she had cried. Afterwards, as she worked on unfastening the device he had set to kill her, she became angry at what he had done to her and mad at herself for falling for him. Miranda wondered if he intended to use her for propaganda or ransom purposes. Also, she thought of her father. Was Hassan gunning for him as well? She tried to put herself in Hassan’s shoes, to imagine how she would feel if he had used her to get information that eventually led to the death of her dad or mom. She had been so eager to follow in Chris Wallis’s footsteps and to succeed as an ‘asset’ that she hadn’t thought through all the possible consequences of her decision and the tasks she had carried out. Now she just felt stupid and afraid.

  There was a scraping noise next to her and something bumped against the box. A vehicle engine started and she felt the vibrations of the motor through her back and bottom. She rocked from side to side as the vehicle started to move along a bumpy track.

  If there was another person in the same predicament as she, a second prisoner in a coffin, then his or her casket would probably be rigged to explode as well. She needed to find a way to warn any potential rescuer, in the event that she was killed in her bid to thwart Hassan and Juma. She felt for the metal banding again and slid out one of the nails that held it in place.

  After a while – she couldn’t tell how long – the vehicle turned off the track onto smoother ground.

  It came to a halt.

  ‘Open the aircraft up. I’ll check on the pair of them. I don’t want them waking up in midflight,’ she heard Hassan say.

  They must be at an airstrip. Inside her coffin Miranda reached between her legs and picked up the grenade. She tugged a little on the pin, testing its resistance. As her hands were tied she worried that she would be unable to pull it all the way out. Again she recalled an old war movie and slowly moved her hands to her mouth.

  Hassan took his Leatherman from its belt pouch and flipped out a screwdriver blade. He crouched over the casket and undid the screws fastening the lid of Miranda’s coffin, then hooked his fingers under the lip of the cover. Gently, he raised it a few centimetres.

  Miranda had pulled the oxygen mask from her face. She smelled the sweet, dry night air. Even though it was dark outside she still had to blink a couple of times to get used to the comparative brightness cast by the moon and stars. A hand moved under the lid, feeling for the string. She felt the free end of the cord brush her torso as he unhitched it. Miranda tensed and, clutching the grenade, pressed her knuckles against the lid.

  She heard Juma say, ‘Ready here, boss.’ His voice sounded muffled. Perhaps he was inside the aeroplane.

  ‘OK. I’ll just check on the girl,’ Hassan replied.

  This was it. She pressed her hands against the coffin lid, and when she felt Hassan start to lift it, she shoved up as hard and as fast as she could. She glimpsed the moment of shock on his face and heard him yelp as the edge of the wood slammed into his nose. Then he was gone, tumbling back over the edge of the pick-up’s tray, to the ground.

  Miranda sat bolt upright and looked either side of her. She blinked again and saw Juma, wideeyed, inside an aircraft – bin Zayid’s plane. Of Hassan, there was no sign, although she had heard him cry out. She raised the grenade to her mouth again, bit down on the pin with her teeth and yanked the device away from her. She swung her bound hands to the right, then back to the left, letting go of the grenade at the end of the movement, sending it straight through the open door of the Cessna.

  Hassan dragged himself to his feet. He moved to the back of the four-by-four, his face clouded with confusion and shock at the sight of her sitting up in the coffin staring at him.

  ‘Grenade!’ Juma yelled.

  Miranda had no idea how long it would take for the bomb to go off. She lay back down inside the coffin and prayed it would be soon.

  Hassan, blood pouring from his broken nose, started to turn to escape the blast. Juma was too far back inside the aircraft to get out in time. He groped blindly around the floor of the aircraft looking for the grenade. It was within his reach, only a few centimetres from his face, when the blast hit him.

  The metal casing of the device and the crimped coils of wire wound around the explosive core were designed to shatter on detonation. The flying shards and the force of the blast took off most of the African’s head.

  Hassan dived for the ground, but the fuse had been set to three seconds: not enough time for him to reach the comparative safety of the dirt. While Juma, the Cessna and the side of the Land Rover absorbed most of the blast and the fragments, Hassan’s left arm and the exposed side of his torso suddenly felt as though they had been pierced by a dozen red-hot needles. He fell and writhed in the dust, his ears ringing from the blast.

  Miranda felt the Land Rover rock as a spray of metal projectiles thudded into its side panels. The tray of the pick-up and the thick wooden walls of the coffin saved her from the shrapnel, but the blast temporarily deafened her.

  After a moment she pushed open the lid of the coffin, which had been blown closed, and sat up once more. She brought her knees up and tried to stand, but her limbs were tired and cramped and she fell on her first attempt, landing sprawling across the coffin next to her. She smelled fuel and saw aviation gas draining from a dozen holes in the high wing of the Cessna. Good, she thought. The interior of the aircraft was a gory mess of blood and chemical-smelling smoke. The seats and part of the instrument panel had been peppered with shrapnel, and Juma’s blood and brains coated the cabin walls and windows.

  She turned away quickly, shaking her head to clear her hearing. Behind her, in the back of the Land Rover, was a pack. Strapped to its side was a hunting knife in a sheath. She crawled across the unopened casket and reached for the weapon. She slid it out and began sawing through the rope binding her ankles. As the strands parted, the blood returned to her numbed feet, stinging them.

  She looked up and saw Hassan staggering to his feet. He lunged for her, but she leaped over the opposite side of the vehicle. She winced and cried out as her feet hit the ground. She dropped to one knee and rammed the knife into the front driver’s-side tyre. The air exploded with a loud hiss.

  ‘Bitch!’ Hassan cried.

  ‘What do you want with me, Hassan?’ she said, brandishing the knife in front of her with her bound hands.

  ‘You’ll pay for this,’ he said.

  She bobbed her head up and looked in the front of the vehicle. There, between the seats, was an assault rifle with a curved magazine. She dropped the knife and reached for it, but Hassan, despite his wounds, was quicker than she. He leaned across the passenger’s seat and grasped the stock of the AK-47 just as Miranda’s fingers reached it. He cocked the rifle and pointed it at her.

  ‘Don’t move and don’t say a word.’

  He walked around the front of the vehicle, all the while keeping the barrel pointed at her. Miranda looked around her, but she was trapped again. At least I got one of them, and disabled his vehicle and aircraft as well, she thought.

  Hassan looked inside the Cessna and up at the leaking fuel tank. H
e shook his head. ‘Think you’re clever, don’t you?’

  She smiled at him.

  Hassan drew back the rifle, reversed it and lashed out at her, catching her in the stomach with the butt. Miranda gasped, doubled over in pain and dropped to her knees. He grabbed a fistful of her hair and dragged her to her feet again. Tears streamed from her eyes.

  ‘Don’t dare mock me, Miranda, or things will get worse for you.’

  ‘Can’t… get… much worse,’ she stammered.

  ‘Oh, yes it can, baby Just wait and see.’

  Miranda fought to regain her breath and watched as Hassan inspected the Land Rover. The vehicle had taken a load of shrapnel but would probably still start. He swore, however, when he examined the spare tyre. As with many safari vehicles the fifth wheel was mounted inside the rear cargo area for easy access, and bolted to a sidewall. The top third of the tyre protruded above the top of the wall and this had been riddled with shrapnel. It was soft to the touch. With two flat tyres the vehicle was virtually useless. She was proud of how she had stopped him, but very scared. It wasn’t over yet.

  ‘So, now we walk,’ he said. ‘But first I need to shut that pretty mouth of yours.’ He pushed Miranda to the ground, on her back, and planted his boot on her belly to stop her from moving. He reached into his pack and pulled out a roll of duct tape, laid down his rifle, tore off a strip of tape and fastened it across her mouth. He leaned close to her, until his lips were only a few centimetres from her face. ‘Pull it off and I’ll shoot you, understand?’ She nodded.

  He looked at the second coffin and raised the butt of the AK-47 to his shoulder, aiming at the head of the box. Miranda looked up and saw what was happening. Hassan was going to kill whoever was in the second coffin. She rolled onto her side and managed to stand. She started to run.

  Hassan noticed her movement with his peripheral vision and turned and pointed the rifle at her back. ‘Miranda! Stop or I’ll kill you now!’

  Miranda sprinted as fast as her stiff legs and aching feet would allow. She expected the bullet to ram into her any second. She wondered how much it would hurt, and if she could survive it.

  Hassan heard the sound of an approaching vehicle. Miranda was in the trees now on the edge of the airstrip. He had to catch her. Cursing himself for hesitating, he set the selector switch on the AK-47 to automatic, aimed at the head of the coffin again and pulled the trigger. One shot rang out, then the weapon jammed. He grabbed the magazine to remove it and noticed the metal was hot. He held it up to the moonlight to inspect it and saw for the first time that the rifle had been hit by three fragments of metal from the grenade. The shrapnel had probably severed the spring inside the magazine that fed bullets into the chamber. More bad luck.

  He tossed aside the useless magazine and snatched up the canvas chest rig containing his spares.

  The vehicle engine noise was louder now. He had to run if he was going to catch Miranda. He hoped that either the one shot he had fired or the booby-trapped grenade still inside the coffin would finish off the general.

  The pain in his arm and side was becoming more intense. He tried to wiggle his fingers and found that, while he still had full mobility, the action made his wounds hurt more. Blood oozed from the holes in his side, staining his ragged shirt. Painful as they were, the fragments were just below his skin and had not come close to any major organs. He shrugged into the chest rig and ran after Miranda.

  Chapter 26

  Jed crouched by the open grave and waved to the others to join him.

  ‘They’ve gone,’ he said, ‘by vehicle. Tracks of two men, by the look of it.’

  Chris and Harold Jones, the surviving CIA agent from the downed helicopter, stood at the edge of the hole.

  ‘Only one hole, Jed,’ Chris said, stating the depressing fact that was on Jed’s mind.

  ‘He could have had both coffins buried in the one grave,’ he countered. ‘It’s deep enough.’

  ‘I hope you’re right,’ she said.

  ‘What now?’ asked Jones.

  ‘We follow the tracks. Wylde said there was an airfield on the ranch. I’m betting these tracks will lead us there.’ Jed pulled Wylde’s walkie-talkie from the pocket of his fatigue trousers and called the lodge owner’s head scout, who was driving a Land Rover onto bin Zayid’s ranch. ‘Do you know where the airfield is on this ranch, over?’ he said into the radio.

  ‘Yes, sir. The road back to the lodge goes via the landing strip,’ said the scout above the noise of his Land Rover’s engine.

  ‘Meet us there. We think the suspects are headed that way. Be careful. Out.’

  They moved as fast as they dared, at a slow jog. Jed kept his rifle up high, the butt on his shoulder, his thumb on the safety catch, ready to return fire immediately. He figured bin Zayid was on the lam now, and that the terrorist’s top priority would be to get off the ground. Still, he looked down every few steps in case a trip wire had been strung across the road.

  ‘Down,’ Jed hissed when they heard the crump of an explosion.

  ‘Grenade?’ Chris asked.

  ‘Yeah. Not too far ahead, maybe three hundred metres or so. You ever been in combat, Jones?’

  ‘No, sir.’

  ‘Well, it’s game on, son. Stay low, pick your target and aim low. Remember, he’s got hostages with him,’ Jed said. ‘If you shoot my daughter, I’ll kill you. OK?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  They pressed on, faster now. Jed’s heart belied his calm exterior. It felt as though it would burst from his chest. A vein throbbed hard in his neck. He tried not to think the worst.

  The crack-thump of a gunshot. ‘AK-47,’ Jed said. ‘Close. Don’t worry, Jones, it wasn’t fired at us.

  Not yet, at least. Fan out, line abreast, on my left and right. Don’t get ahead of me, though. That looks like the airstrip ahead.’

  From his pocket he heard the radio break squelch. ‘One this is two, over,’ the African voice said.

  ‘Go, two.’

  ‘Explosion and gunfire on the airstrip. I’m in the trees at the north end. I can see an aircraft and a vehicle. Some smoke drifting this way. No sign of any people, though.’

  ‘Hold where you are,’ Jed ordered. ‘We’re moving in from your right. Be prepared to put down covering fire on my command, over.’

  ‘Roger, one. Two, out.’

  ‘OK, showtime,’ Jed said. They ran across the width of the airstrip. Jed motioned with his hand for Chris and Jones to hold and cover him once they were a hundred metres from the aircraft and Land Rover. He moved forwards alone.

  The smoke had cleared, but the smell of fuel was still strong. Jed saw the punctured wing tank, the flat tyre on the Land Rover and the ruined spare. He smelled blood and saw the ghastly spatters on the interior of the damaged Cessna. He steeled himself for what he would see inside. The sight was shocking, but he breathed a sigh of relief that the body was not Miranda’s. He waved for the others to join him and called in Wylde’s scouts on the radio. He peered into the rear tray of the Land Rover pick-up and saw the two caskets – one open and one closed. He didn’t move.

  ‘Shit, let’s get that coffin open,’ Jones said, climbing into the truck. ‘There’s a bullet hole in it.’

  ‘Wait!’ Jed barked. ‘I’ve lost one man to a booby trap already tonight.’

  ‘Jed, there’s blood on the inside lining of this one,’ Chris said, leaning into the back of the vehicle so she could better inspect the empty coffin. ‘It looks like an arrow, painted in blood.’

  Jed pulled out his Leatherman. With the penknife blade he lifted a flap of torn cloth lining at the tip of the bloody arrow. ‘Anyone got a flashlight?’

  ‘Here,’ said Jones, taking a small torch from his pocket.

  ‘There’s something scratched in the wood.’ Jed focused the beam of light and read aloud:

  ‘Grenade inside. Lift lid two inches and unhook string. Am alive. MBL.’

  ‘Miranda!’ Chris said.

  Jed didn’t know h
ow to feel. He had been mentally preparing himself to find Miranda’s body in the unopened coffin. Now it looked like she was missing again, and probably wounded. ‘She must have disarmed her own trap and killed the other guy.’

  ‘Gutsy lady,’ Jones said.

  Wylde’s two scouts pulled up in their vehicle and inspected the shattered aircraft. ‘It is hard to tell, because of the wounds to the head, but by his build I would say this is Juma. He works for Hassan bin Zayid,’ one of the men said.

  ‘Same guy that tried to kill me, probably, but he’s history’ Jed rapidly unfastened the screws in the closed coffin lid with his Leatherman. ‘Stand back, all of you.’

  When the second screw was out he lifted the lid just wide enough to get his hand inside. He felt the lanyard attached to the grenade and unhooked it from the lid. It was a simple but effective trigger. He hoped there were no more surprises inside. Jed raised the lid. He recognised the face immediately.

  ‘It’s Calvert. He’s been shot.’

  Branches whipped Miranda’s face and thorns scored her arms and legs as she blundered through the thick bush. Her bare feet were studded with prickles, but she ignored the pain. She had no idea where she was heading. Her only aim was to outrun Hassan and find somewhere to hide. A tree would be the safest place, from him and from the wild animals that lived on his reserve.

  She came to a narrow creek and splashed into it. The muddy bottom of the watercourse sucked at her feet, but the cool slime temporarily soothed her punctured soles. Behind her, she heard twigs snapping under his heavy footfall.

  Miranda followed the creek around a bend. She thought that running through it would throw him off her trail. She left the smelly water and scrambled up a bank. The spoor of zebra and various antelope species were clearly embedded in the grey mud. This was obviously a favourite spot for game to drink. She noticed a beaten path through the grass, a trail probably made by elephant and now used as a highway to and from the water by other creatures. It would be harder for Hassan to pick up her tracks on the beaten pathway She started to run, then pitched forwards into the dirt, letting out an involuntary yelp as she fell. Someone or something had grabbed her around the ankle.