by Chris Ryan
In spite of his orders not to cause unnecessary damage, the attackers had shot the place to pieces. The blockhouse was still smouldering, and a far bigger fire was blazing out of the fuel store: barrels of diesel had ignited and were sending a column of dense black smoke boiling high into the sky. The dredging machinery had ground to a halt. The doors of the main building, big enough to admit trucks, had been blown off their guide-rails and were hanging drunkenly. The corrugated-iron walls were riddled with bullet holes. No other prisoners had been taken. Bodies lay everywhere, most of them relatively intact, but several hacked into bloody lumps in an orgy of killing. Away to our left some of the Alpha guys were smashing their way into the single-storey block.
I grabbed the first two men we came to, and said, ‘You two, guard this prisoner.’
They looked a bit shattered, so I added, ‘Just stay here and keep him covered until I get Major Mvula.’
The air inside the main building was full of dust and smoke. Through it I made out inner walls — the secure area, a windowless box maybe fifteen feet high, with the conveyor belt from the dredger arm coming high over it and down through the ceiling. The place was full of men running around screaming and shouting.
‘Joss!’ I yelled. ‘Where the fuck are you?’
Any answer he may have given was drowned out by a volley of shots, deafening inside the steel walls, as somebody emptied his magazine into the locks on one of the secure unit’s doors, trying to blast his way in.
‘Joss!’ I roared. ‘Get these guys under control. Get ’em out of here!’
It took him a few minutes to impose his authority, his men were on such a high. But in the end he managed it. Once all the shouting died down, it became possible to talk.
‘Listen,’ I told him as we stood in the main doorway. ‘We’ve got one white prisoner outside. Take charge of him, and keep a good eye on him. We’ll need to interrogate him to find out what the hell’s been going on. And get some of your guys moving. We know three enemy at least made a breakout and got away to the south. There may have been more. The defenders may have broadcast an SOS before we took out the radio. A counter-attack may come in. Send out clearance patrols to check our immediate surroundings. Get people digging in on the perimeter. Leave the .50 section where it is, across the river, but bring the rest of your guys over soonest. You need an immediate resupply: ammunition and rockets.’
Joss nodded. But somehow he looked strange. His eyes were half closed, as if he’d just taken something or had a big drink. Suddenly I realised that in the heat of the moment I’d given him a stream of orders. Had I offended him?
‘Look,’ I said. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to tell you what to do. I was just saying what I thought ought to be done.’
‘Fine, fine,’ he said, but he sounded vague.
‘Another thing. See that single tree on the rock up there? There’s two bodies just this side, of it. Let’s get them brought in. First, though, I need some men in here with me and Phil, to help clear the secure area. Can you spare me five?’
I had a feeling I’d blown our relationship, and I wasn’t sure whether he was going to detail anybody to help.
The next few minutes were tense. Inside, the dust was settling, but the heat was horrendous, like in an oven. I took off my Bergen and began sorting some det cord. The walls of the secure area looked pretty solid: there were concrete blocks on the outside, and I expected there’d be a lining of steel on the inside. The door was as solid as the wall, with a heavy-duty lock — a serious, precision-made combination job, with three dials. The bullets fired at it had bounced off, leaving practically no marks. Phil took one look at it, and said, ‘We’ll not pick that bugger.’ So I made up a charge with a couple of ounces of PE, and I was taping it in position when five guys shambled in.
‘Thank God,’ I muttered to Phil. ‘He’s still on side.’
I turned to the Kamangans, and said, ‘Okay, I’m going to blow the door. I expect some of the mine staff to be inside. Once the door’s open, I want you to go in and round up anyone who’s in there. All right? Take prisoners. No shooting unless you’re fired at first. Understood?’
The senior man, a corporal, nodded.
‘We’re going to need these people to get the machinery going again,’ I said. ‘That’s why it’s important — no killing.’
With everyone round the corner out of the way, I cracked off the charge. Inside the tin walls, the noise and shock-wave were stupendous. The door swung ajar. Beyond it, black darkness. We needed torches. For a few seconds I stood with my back flattened against the outer wall, listening. Wild yells were still coming from the direction of the bungalow, but inside the building there was silence, except for the noise of water splashing. Then came a sudden rumble, a shuddering noise and a hum as, somewhere in the depths, a small engine started up. An emergency generator. Lights came on, dim and flickering.
Immediately inside the main door I could see a small, box-like cubicle partitioned off, with a window in the side — the place where workers were checked in and out. Peering cautiously in, I found the rest of the first room was empty — a kind of air-lock. I beckoned the others after me and slipped through the door.
Going into that enclosed space reminded me of a week I’d once spent on an aircraft carrier, when a simulated battle was being fought and the whole ship was sealed against nuclear, biological or chemical attack. Now I got the same feeling of instant claustrophobia, intensified by the fact that the air-conditioning system had gone down and the room was stiflingly hot.
With the five Kamangans lined up covering me, I tried the door in the far wall. Locked. But this was a flimsier affair altogether. Det cord round the lock and handle would sort it. Phil moved the Kamangans out of the way along one wall while I taped some cord into place.
I was on the point of cracking it off when suddenly I heard a movement on the far side. Somebody was fiddling a key into the lock. I whipped back against the wall, pulling my pistol out. The handle turned and the door opened slowly, inch by inch, as though the person pushing it was scared of what might lie beyond. There was a scuffling sound, as if several people were milling about. Then a hand appeared, and the sight of it amazed me, because its skin was white.
I stood transfixed as the owner emerged into view: an aged white ghost of a man, bent and shuffling, bald on top of the head, with a few wisps of long grey hair straggling down over his ears and white stubble bristling from his cheeks. He was wearing a filthy yellow T-shirt that hung loose over his bony shoulders, and even filthier grey trousers, with the remains of a pair of tennis shoes lashed round his bare feet. He looked as though he’d just risen from his grave, so deathly pale was his complexion.
When I made a sound, and he turned and saw me, he started, as if I’d stuck a knife in his ribs, and gave a croak of ‘Mon dieu!’ For a second I wasn’t sure what he’d said. I’d expected something in English, and didn’t recognise the French. Before I could answer, he buckled at the knees, and the next thing I knew he was stretched out full-length, face down on the deck, still in the doorway.
‘Pull him through!’ I snapped at Phil. ‘Get this door shut.’
In a flash I whipped out the key, closed the door and locked it from the outside. We dragged the old guy through the ante-room and sat him up against the wall in the main building, where the heat wasn’t quite so devastating. He looked even closer to death, but when I poured the contents of a water-bottle over his head, he came round.
As his eyes opened, I said, ‘Take it easy. You’re all right.’
Phil handed him another bottle with the top open, and asked, ‘Who are you?’
‘Boisset,’ he replied. After a long swallow, he added, ‘François Boisset.’
‘You’re French?’
‘Belgique.’
‘Belgian! You speak English?’
‘A little.’
‘What are you doing here?’
‘Je suis I’ingénieur… I am the engineer. I am in command of
the machin, the machinery. You are who?’
‘British,’ I told him. ‘We’re helping the government forces.’
‘L’armée du gouvernement? Dieu merci!’
Even in the dim light of the shed, the old man was having trouble with his eyes, screwing them half shut.
‘You seem very weak,’ I said. Maybe the blacks had been starving him. ‘Are you hungry?’
‘Hungry? No.’ He sounded surprised. ‘I am a prisoner. Since more than a year I am a prisoner of these Afundis. In one whole year I have not seen daylight.’
In short sentences, often lapsing into French, he told his story. When the rebel forces took over the mine, they’d shot most of the staff. But they’d kept him and a few key workers to run the machinery. He himself had spent most of the time confined to a cell inside the secure area, only being brought out when something went wrong and his specialist knowledge was needed. Having no radio, he’d completely lost touch with the outside world.
‘So who’s inside the works now?’ I asked.
‘Seven men. Four workers, three Afundi guards.’
‘Do they have weapons?’
‘Two Afundis only.’
‘Can you talk to them in their own language?’
‘Of course. They sent me out to see what was happening.’ A gleam came into his watery blue eyes as he added, ‘So, for the first time, I have the key!’
I looked at Phil. ‘Listen,’ I said. ‘Those guys have got to come out. I don’t think the Afundis are going to have much chance once they get outside, but there’s no way they’re stopping in there.’
‘Salauds!’ exclaimed Boisset with surprising force. ‘Je m’en merde.’
At that moment, Joss appeared in the main doorway.
‘Eh,’ I called. ‘Come here a minute.’ Turning to Boisset, I said, ‘This is the commander of the government force.’
Joss was pouring with sweat, but so spaced out that he didn’t seem to register the fact that an extra European had appeared. ‘Oh wah!’ he went when I told him the score. ‘Bring them out. We’ll deal with them.’
‘Okay,’ I said to Boisset. ‘Tell them to come out, and say they’ll be all right.’
With a fine Gallic shrug, he said, ‘Pourquoi pas?’
The old fellow seemed suddenly rejuvenated. He heaved himself to his feet, lurched, steadied himself and turned back to the door.
‘You send them out,’ I told him. ‘We’ll wait here.’
In he went, calling out in Nyanja. Less than a minute later he was back at the head of a little procession. We hardly needed him to tell us which of the Africans were which. The first four looked downtrodden and apprehensive, and were wearing filthy T-shirts, shorts and flip-flops.
‘The workers,’ I said, and when he nodded, I motioned them to one side of the room. ‘Stand over there.’
The last three were altogether different. Dressed in bush shirts and DPM bottoms, they had an arrogant look about them, and two carried AK47s. I’m afraid Boisset had told them that during the battle their own side had beaten off the attackers, and they thought they were walking out to a celebration. When they saw Phil and me standing there, they did a terrific double-take, but by then it was too late. In a flash our escort cut off their retreat, grabbed them, and wrenched their weapons off them. They also removed a large bunch of keys from the boss figure, and hustled all three out into the open.
Exactly what happened next, we never knew, but our ears told us enough. The three may have tried to do a runner. They may have just stood near the main doorway. All we heard was a burst of yelling, a volley of gunfire, very loud and close, and another roar of shouts and cheers.
Boisset looked at me and nodded, muttering, ‘C’est fini.’ Then he turned to the mine workers and said something in Nyanja. For a moment they didn’t believe him, and he had to repeat himself, using different words. Then the message got through, and suddenly all four were transformed from zombies into human beings, laughing and joking like they’d just got a year’s extra pay.
‘These men have not been outside, either,’ Boisset told me. ‘Not for more than a year.’
‘You can go out in a minute,’ I said, magnanimously. ‘But you’d better wait till the excitement dies down. This wouldn’t be a good moment. Now, how much damage has been done to the mine?’
‘Il me faut… I must make checks. The main problem is loss of power. The generators have stopped.’
‘That’s because the fuel tanks have been ruptured.’
‘C’est ça?’
‘Yeah. The fuel depot’s on fire.’
‘No wonder we are en panne.’
At my request Boisset took the keys and led us on a quick tour of the mine. He showed us the machine room, where the conveyor belt came in from the river inside a big metal pipe and spewed its load onto a series of wire-mesh trays which normally had water washing through them. Huge fans suspended from the roof should have been keeping the air on the move, he explained, but with the loss of current they’d stopped, and the heat was formidable.
‘Normally, the sieves are agités.’ He held out a hand palm-down and moved it rapidly back and forth. ‘The washed aggregate passes this way, into this next room.’ He unlocked a door and let us through. ‘Here, more washing, more shaking. Enfin…’ He unlocked yet another door. With only the emergency lamps flickering, the light was very dim. ‘Here, we are in the most secure area — and there are the diamonds.’
‘Diamonds?’ said Phil, scornfully. ‘Where?’
‘These.’ Boisset reached down and scooped up a handful of what looked like gravel from the floor of a stainless-steel tank. ‘Normalement we have bright light.’ He squinted up at the spotlamps close overhead. ‘Specialist workers can see them easily. Look, this is one.’
Between finger and thumb he held up what looked like a crumb of broken glass, the size of a pea, which flashed brilliantly when he turned it.
‘Yeah,’ I went, suddenly remembering something I’d read. ‘Guys with eyes like the shithouse rat stand here and pick them out.’
A faint smile lit up Boisset’s face. ‘C’est vrai. But it is expert work.’
‘Does this mine sometimes produce big stones?’ I asked.
‘Mais oui! We have had diamonds so large.’ He held his thumb and forefinger at least an inch apart.
‘Like an egg,’ I said. ‘One that size must be worth millions.’
‘Of course. One stone like this would finance an entire civil war.’
Beyond that final sorting room lay a kind of laboratory, with raised benches on which the diamonds were sorted, and beyond that again a strongroom where they were stored. Apparently, an aircraft came in every week to lift out the loot.
‘What sort of plane?’
‘Myself, I have never seen it. But I am told it is of medium size. It always bring ten or twelve soldiers. A change for the garrison. Also it has a guard in case of attack.’
‘And where does it go?’
‘Sometimes to South Africa. Sometimes to Sentaba, the camp where General Muende has his headquarters.’
‘General now, is he?’
‘Leader of the Afundi rebels. Yes.’
‘Has he ever been here?’
Boisset shook his head.
Without the primitive air-conditioning, the heat was becoming impossible.
‘Let’s get back into the open,’ I suggested.
Boisset locked up behind us and led us back. As we passed the open sinks, I was sorely tempted to scoop up a handful of the diamond-laden gravel and stuff it into one of the pouches on my belt kit. Then I thought, set an example! and carried on. Boisset diverted to show us the squalid little apartment in which he’d been held prisoner: two tiny, windowless rooms, with a cold tap and a hole in the floor for a bog. It seemed a miracle that he’d stayed sane.
‘What did you eat all the time?’ Phil asked.
‘Filth. Whatever they brought me. My stomach has been very bad.’
Poor old bugger,
I thought. On impulse, I asked, ‘How old are you?’, and I was shocked when he answered, ‘Fifty-two.’ From his appearance I’d have given him seventy at least.
‘What about the keys?’ I asked. ‘You’d better hand them to Joss. Major Mvula, his name is. He needs to get a guard on the secure zone. There he is, coming now.
‘Joss,’ I went. ‘Meet a great survivor.’
I explained who Boisset was, and what he’d done. Now Joss seemed in a raging hurry, far less friendly than usual. He greeted the Belgian in an off-hand way and made no enquiries about how he was feeling. Instead, he said, ‘Water, man. What’s the water situation?’
‘We get it from the river,’ Boisset answered. ‘Naturally, it has to be filtered before use. The purification plant runs on electricity…’
Joss seemed to be only half listening. Without paying much attention to the answers, he fired off a whole lot of questions about how long it would take to get the mine up and running again. Then he ordered Boisset to draw up a list of any spare parts that would be needed. The old man listened meekly enough, then shuffled off.
‘Listen,’ I said to Joss as he moved away. ‘That guy’s had a hell of an ordeal. He needs looking after.’
Joss glared at me, and said, ‘So does the mine.’
His attitude was starting to piss me off. But also I was worried. His emotional state seemed to be veering about. I had the feeling he might do something stupid at any minute. Hadn’t we just helped him recapture the damned place? But it wasn’t the moment to start anything, so I just asked, ‘Okay. What’s the drill, then?’
‘We’ve been in touch with Mulongwe. The relief aircraft’s coming down in the morning.’
‘So when will you want to move on?’
‘Maybe tomorrow evening.’
‘That’s fine.’
I walked out into the blazing sunshine. Then, on impulse I turned back into the building and sought out Boisset again. By then he was checking the big generators, which, as we thought, had shut down from fuel starvation.
‘I’m sorry,’ I began. ‘That guy wasn’t very polite.’
The Belgian gave a shrug, which said, ‘That’s Africans.’