‘Don’t move! Throw down your weapons, and no harm will come to you!’
Hoskins was on his knees by the chasm, fumbling with something on the ground. As Jones watched, a fuse sputtered into life. Hoskins sprang to his feet with remarkable agility, his round face sweating and triumphant, even in defeat.
‘Do as I say!’ he screamed. ‘Pull your men back, or we’re all done for! In ninety seconds this cliff will blow apart. None of us will stand a chance!’
The sparking end of the fuse vanished over the edge of the chasm. One of the Africans began to wail in fear and collapsed into a crouching position, head in hands, rocking back and forth. His terror was infectious; others of the group, apparently preferring to be shot rather than blown up, made a bolt for it. Sharply, Jones ordered his men to let them go.
Within seconds, all of Hoskins’ men had deserted him. He stood alone at the edge of the chasm, trembling visibly as the seconds ticked away. The fuse was out of his reach now; he could not have extinguished it, even if he had wanted to in his desperation.
‘For Christ’s sake!’ he cried hoarsely. ‘We’ll all be blown sky-high!’
‘That’s a chance we’ll take,’ Jones shouted. ‘Make a move, and we’ll kill you anyway.’
Hoskins, seized now by mortal terror, took a few shambling steps to his right. A light machine-gun chattered, throwing up a fountain of earth and stones at the terrified man’s feet. He cried out and dropped to his knees.
The last few seconds ticked away. On the cliff-top, there was no sound except for the racking sobs that came from the huddled figure etched starkly in the searchlight’s glare.
Danglin’ Jones rose from his position behind the rocks and walked slowly over to the miserable Hoskins. Contemptuously, he prodded the man with the toe of his boot.
‘All right,’ he said. ‘You can get up now.’ Hoskins stirred, whimpering and Jones wrinkled his nose as a sudden stench hit his nostrils. Hoskins had fouled himself in his abject terror. ‘Come on, you fat bastard, get up!’ Jones ordered, his voice sharper.
Hoskins struggled to his knees and stared up at the para-troop officer, mouth agape. ‘It didn’t go off,’ he stammered. ‘Nothing happened. I’m alive.’
‘That, unfortunately, is a fact,’ Jones told him. ‘And no, it didn’t go off. Boxes filled with stones don’t really explode all that easily.’
‘Stones?’ Hoskins shook his head in bewilderment, uncomprehending. Jones sighed. ‘That’s right, stones,’ he said. ‘You poor idiot, we’ve been watching you and your men stuffing that chasm full of explosives for the past two nights. After you’d gone, my chaps just lifted out the boxes, removed the stuff that goes bang, replaced it with stones and then put the boxes back again.’
Hoskins recovered some of his composure, and the tone of his voice showed ebullience. ‘Why did you wait ’til now?’ he snarled. ‘If you’ve been spying on me for two nights, why didn’t you spring your little surprise earlier?’
Jones grinned. ‘I never have liked springing surprises too soon,’ he said. ‘Wanted to catch you in the act of lighting the fuse.’ He gave Hoskins a sharp kick in the ribs. ‘Now, get on your feet. There are people at HQ who would like a word with you.’
Leaving his men to round up Hoskins’ fleeing accomplices, Jones, accompanied by an NCO, shepherded his prisoner along the steep track that wound its way down the cliff face to the valley below. A Land-Rover, summoned by radio, was waiting for them, and a fast drive through the night brought them to the airfield. The sky was growing light by the time they arrived.
Yeoman was in Operations, together with Swalwell and Sampson, when Jones shoved the blubbery Hoskins through the door.
‘Got ’im,’ Jones said simply.
‘So I see,’ Yeoman commented. ‘God, he stinks. You might have cleaned him up a bit first. Open a window, somebody.’
He looked at Hoskins, feeling sympathy despite himself for the abject figure.
‘What made you do it?’ he asked quietly. ‘We know about your background, but that doesn’t matter. You had a good position here, and you were trusted. So why?’
‘Money, of course,’ Hoskins commented miserably. ‘A lot of money. A million pounds in gold, to be exact.’
‘Is that what Nkrombe promised you?’ Yeoman wanted to know. The other nodded.
‘It was more than just a promise. He let me have an advance, a big one. I needed to recruit men, you see. Fifty pounds was more than most of them had seen in a lifetime. They came over to my side without much trouble.’
‘So it was your men who tried to kill me?’ Again, Hoskins nodded, barely perceptibly. ‘Yes. I hadn’t reckoned with you being sent here. I thought that if I had you killed, it might cause just enough confusion to let me carry out my plan — or rather Nkrombe’s plan — and get away with it. But things went wrong.’
‘You can say that again,’ Yeoman said. ‘What did you do with the rest of the money you received? If you tell me you dished it out to your renegade troops, I just won’t believe you.’
A flash of triumph came into Hoskins’ eyes, and vanished just as quickly.
‘It’s where nobody can touch it,’ he said. ‘No matter what you do to me, short of killing me, you can’t stop be being a very rich man one day.’
‘We know where your money is, Hoskins,’ Sampson com-merited drily. ‘It’s in a Swiss account, and you’re right — nobody can touch it but you. You can use some of it to buy yourself a wheelchair when you come out of prison, because that’s what you’ll be travelling in. You’ll be put away for a long time, a very long time indeed. Then again,’ he added thoughtfully, ‘you might not survive for very long in a Warambe jail.’
Hoskins blanched, and his eyes now showed naked fear. ‘What do you mean, a Warambe jail?’ he stuttered. ‘For God’s sake, you can’t do that to me. I’m a British citizen. I’ll be sent for trial in England, and — ’
‘No, you won’t,’ Sampson interrupted. ‘You are a servant of the colonial administration of Warambe, so you will be court martialled here. You are a traitor, and as such deserve to be executed, but that would be far too merciful an end for you. A lengthy prison sentence will be far more appropriate. After all, the jail in Warambe is full of former acquaintances of yours. Doubtless you will have a great deal to talk about.’
Hoskins’ face was a picture. What Sampson said was quite true. Over the years, Hoskins had succeeded in imprisoning many men who had opposed him, using trumped-up charges. The extent of the corrupt way in which he had wielded power in Warambe was only just beginning to come to light. The full realization of what would undoubtedly happen to him if he were to be thrown into prison among those men was written large in his eyes.
Letting out a sob, he suddenly launched himself at Yeoman, grabbing for the latter’s holstered pistol. Yeoman sidestepped neatly, and Swalwell’s outstretched foot brought Hoskins to grief, sending him sprawling on the floor with a crash.
Yeoman had had enough. He summoned two armed guards and indicated the grovelling Hoskins. ‘Take him away and put him in the cooler,’ he ordered. ‘He can keep our American friend company for a while, until we make up our minds what we are going to do with the pair of them.’ Hoskins, wailing protests, was dragged away.
‘Wretched fellow,’ Swalwell said. No further comment seemed necessary.
More reports were coming in from the river defences. With the spreading dawn, the action seemed to be dying away. In the key sectors, the Kerewatan forces appeared to be pulling back from the river. Those which had managed to cross over to the east bank under cover of darkness were now being heavily engaged by British units, fighting in the jungle, and quantities of prisoners were being taken.
As dawn broke over Kerewata, the Colonel brought his band of mercenary pilots to cockpit readiness. He was aware that something had gone wrong with Nkrombe’s plan to destroy Warambe’s uranium mines, for word of success should have reached the airfield HQ by now. Nevertheless, the planned withdrawal of th
e Kerewatan raiding forces was in full swing, and despite the fact that there had been no contact with Nkrombe since the previous evening he decided to go ahead and fly air cover over the river, more in the hope that the British might offer combat with their Hunters than out of any real desire to protect the Kerewatans.
He was the first to take off, accompanied by the two South Africans. Clouds hid the rising sun, so there was no fierce glare to contend with as they began their patrol along the river.
Below them, on the few roads that led from the river to the interior, Kerewatan troops straggled in a disorderly procession. Here and there, small craft dotted the river as raiding parties made their escape; the British appeared to be letting them go unmolested. The three Sabre pilots kept on scanning the eastern sky, but there was no sign of any opposition; the Hunters did not seem to be airborne. The Colonel wondered why. It was not like the British — and certainly not like their commanding officer, whom he knew of old — to sit on the ground when there was a prospect of action.
A second flight of Sabres arrived to take the place of the original three, which returned to base. Immediately after landing, the Colonel sought out Koppejans, whose mercenary troops were now solidly entrenched in defensive positions around the airfield perimeter.
‘No sign of any trouble?’ the Colonel asked. The Belgian shook his head.
‘None. I’ve been sending out patrols some distance along the road into town, but they report no sign of Nkrombe’s men. It’s as though the whole Kerewatan army has gone to ground — apart from the fellows you saw retreating. There’s been no word from my chaps at Nkrombe’s residence either, which worries me. We heard a couple of bursts of machine-gun fire coming from the direction of the town sometime during the night, but that might not mean anything; maybe the Kerewatans were just getting drunk and letting off steam.’
‘Maybe.’ The Colonel remained unconvinced. ‘I think that something is brewing,’ he said. ‘It’s like the calm before the storm. All right — from now on there’ll be no more patrols along the river. I’m keeping all my aircraft here, fuelled and armed, ready to take off instantly if we find ourselves with a fight on our hands.’ He frowned, then said, ‘There’s something I don’t understand. We both suspected that Nkrombe was about to unleash his forces against us. I’m beginning to think that we have done him an injustice. Maybe the Kerewatan army is about to turn on its master. If that is the case, I’m prepared to fight to save his neck, for one reason alone — he owes me a great deal of money, and I won’t get it if he’s dead.’
‘I agree,’ Koppejans said. ‘I hate to think how my boys will react if I have to tell them that they won’t be getting any wages because someone has strung up the boss.’
He paused and looked out across the airfield towards where his men held their positions. ‘I ought to send a fighting group into Kerewata to find out exactly what is going on,’ he said, ‘but I don’t want to deplete the defences here. Besides, my men would probably be ambushed.’
The Colonel had a brainwave. ‘What we need is some air reconnaissance,’ he stated. ‘I’ll take the Cessna, the one the South Africans brought with them. You can come along with me, if you like, or send one of your officers.’
‘I’ll come myself,’ Koppejans told him. ‘Anything’s better than playing this waiting game. And two pairs of eyes are better than one, as the saying goes.’
They were airborne twenty minutes later, the Colonel having first issued orders that no more Sabre patrols were to be flown, but that the pilots were to remain at readiness to go into action if the airfield came under attack.
The Colonel stayed at low level, following the road that led from the airfield to Kerewata town. Within minutes the Cessna’s occupants saw signs of movement by the roadside, several hundred feet beneath the little aircraft’s wings. Koppejans pointed.
‘There,’ he shouted, ‘trucks! And some armoured cars, too. They look to be stationary, but they are all pointed towards the airfield.’
The words were scarcely out of his mouth when tracers came snaking up towards the Cessna from machine-guns mounted on the turrets of the armoured vehicles. Hastily, the Colonel sheered off and circled the convoy at a safe distance.
‘Well,’ he commented grimly, ‘at least we know who our enemies are.’ He radioed the airfield, warning the men there to stand by for an impending attack, then resumed his course for Kerewata.
The streets of the provincial capital were deserted. The Colonel circled the town twice, then flew low over Nkrombe’s residence. It was only then that he and Koppejans saw the bodies, sprawled in the courtyard.
Chapter Nine
THE SPECIAL FORCE’S MISSION TO CAPTURE NKROMBE would never be detailed in anything other than the most secret report. This is how it unfolded.
The first task of de Salis and his men, after crossing the river, was to commandeer some transport. It proved to be unexpectedly simple. Stealing like black shadows through the forest, they heard the sound of voices, and the sound brought them to a spot beside a road. On it stood a solitary truck, and beside it two Africans crouched, warming themselves at a small fire. They were laughing and joking with each other, and they passed into oblivion happily, with perhaps only a momentary flash of astonishment as they died.
De Salis’ men hid the bodies carefully in the undergrowth, then piled into the truck as their commander slipped into the driver’s seat and started the engine. They discovered that the vehicle carried crates of ammunition; its crew must have been on their way to the battle at the river when they decided to halt, either because they were not immediately needed or because they were afraid to go near the fighting that could be heard in the background. Either way, they had paid for their decision with their lives.
From his meticulous study of the available maps of Kerewata, de Salis knew that the road they were on led directly to the provincial capital. Turning the vehicle round, he set off through the night at a steady thirty miles per hour. The men in the back kept their weapons cocked and ready, and occasionally they thought they might have need of them, for they passed other trucks; however, the occupants of the latter, dim shapes in the gloom, only waved and shouted out what sounded like friendly greetings. There was never a suspicious challenge.
Not, at least, until they reached the town.
De Salis halted the vehicle briefly on the outskirts and glanced over his shoulder, through the hole in the flap at the rear of the cab.
‘What’s in those ammo boxes?’ he asked into the darkened interior.
‘Grenades, mostly,’ was the reply. De Salis nodded in satisfaction. ‘Good. Make sure you’ve got them handy. We might need to toss a few around on the way in.’
The truck rumbled slowly past the pitiful shanties that littered Kerewata’s suburbs. It was still raining, which was to de Salis’ advantage; they passed plenty of troops, but the latter were huddled around their fires with blankets over their heads, more interested in keeping dry and warm than in looking up to stare at the mud-spattered vehicle that lurched by.
Things began to change as the truck drew nearer the centre of the town. As the vehicle rounded a corner on the approach to the central square where Nkrombe’s residence stood, its headlights picked out a barrier stretched across the road. The barrier, constructed from overturned carts, was manned by several African soldiers who crouched behind it as the truck crawled forward, only their heads and shoulders visible, weapons at the ready.
De Salis did not hesitate. ‘I’m going through!’ he yelled, and rammed his foot down on the accelerator pedal. As the vehicle shot forward, the NCO sitting next to de Salis in the cab leaned out of the window, machine-pistol in hand, and sprayed the road-block. Seconds later, the snub-nosed truck smashed into the middle of the barrier with a terrific jolt, hurling the carts aside in a welter of splintered wood. The Africans ran for their lives and were shot down in their tracks.
De Salis could see, now, the full extent of what was happening in the square in front of Nkromb
e’s residence, and for a moment was gripped by the sick awareness that he and his men might be too late.
The scene before him was straight out of the worst possible nightmare. The square was crowded with Nkrombe’s African troops; it was impossible to count their numbers. Most of them seemed to be drunk, capering around the square with bottles in their hands, discharging firearms indiscriminately into the air. The noise was frightful; it was small wonder that no-one had noticed the truck’s brutal passage through the road-block, nor heard the gunfire.
In the centre of the square four stakes had been erected. A man — a white man — was impaled upon each one, writhing and screaming in agony. De Salis knew at once that they must be the mercenaries who had been guarding Nkrombe. To add to their torment, fires had been lit at the base of each stake.
Sickened, de Salis turned to the NCO beside him. ‘Shoot those four men as we go past,’ he ordered. There was no need to issue any orders to the men in the back of the truck. They knew what to do.
De Salis headed flat out for the gates of the residence, on the other side of the square. Beside him, the NCO opened fire; the tortured bodies on the stakes jerked and went limp. From the back of the truck, the other men hurled grenades into the throng. Explosions cracked out in rapid succession and shrapnel sprayed across the square, scything down screaming men. De Salis drove straight through a group of Africans, who bounced off the truck like peas.
Behind the speeding truck, utter confusion reigned. The African troops, stupefied by drink, were milling around in terror, tripping over the bodies of their dead and dying comrades. The confusion was the Special Force’s principal ally; it would give them time enough, perhaps, to carry out the task in hand.
The gates of the residence were wide open and unguarded. De Salis drove through and slewed the truck round, bringing it to a halt behind a wall where it would be sheltered from any gunfire.
The Special Force’s drill was well rehearsed. Even before the vehicle halted, men were jumping down from the back and running over to the gateway, taking cover among the shadows and setting up light machine-guns to cover every approach across the square, which was now deserted except for its litter of sprawling bodies and the lifeless figures of the mercenaries, dangling on their burning stakes. Others disappeared into the darkness, their task to check out the exterior of the residence and to deal with sentries, if there were any.
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