by Wilbur Smith
intently.
The group of big dun-coloured animals he was watching were a mile off
and moving steadily away into the mirage-fevered distance, but their
gracefully straight horns showed dark and lo the against the distant
sky.
Gino had the loaded Mannlicher in the rear seat and the Count jumped
down into the passenger seat beside the driver. Standing holding the
windshield with one hand, he gave his officers the Fascist salute, and
the Rolls roared forward, left the road and careered away,
weaving amongst the thorn scrub and bounding over the rough ground in
pursuit of the distant herd.
The beisa oryx is a large and beautiful desert antelope.
There were eight of them in the herd and with their sharp eyesight they
were in flight before the Rolls had approached within three-quarters of
a mile.
They ran lightly over the rough ground, their pale beige hides blending
cunningly with the soft colours of the desert, but the long wicked
black horns rode proudly as any battle standard.
The Rolls gained steadily on the running herd, with the Count
hysterically urging his driver to greater speed, ignoring the thorn
branches that scored the flawless sides of the big blue machine as it
passed. Hunting was one of the Count's many pleasures. Boar and stag
were specially bred on his estates, but this was the first large game
he had encountered since his arrival in Africa. The herd was strung
out, two old bulls leading, plunging ahead with a light rocking-horse
gait, while the cows and two younger males trailed them.
The bouncing, roaring machine drew level with the last animal and ran
alongside at a range of twenty yards. The galloping oryx did not turn
its head but ran on doggedly after its stronger companions.
"Halt," shrieked the Count, and the driver stood on his brakes,
the car broadsiding to rest in a billowing cloud of dust. The Count
tumbled out of the open door and threw up the Mannlicher. The barrel
kicked up and the shots crashed out. The first was a touch high and it
threw a puff of dust off the earth far beyond the running animal the
second slapped into the pale fur in front of the shoulder and the young
oryx somersaulted over its broken neck and went down in a clumsy tangle
of limbs.
"Onwards!" shouted the Count, leaping aboard the Rolls as it roared
away once again. The herd was already far ahead but inexorably the
Rolls closed the gap and at last drew level. Again the ringing crack
of rifle-fire and the sliding, tumbling fall of a heavy pale body.
Like a paper chase, they left the wasteland littered with the pale
bodies until only one old bull ran on alone. And he was cunning,
swinging away westward into the broken ground for which he clearly
headed at the outset of the chase.
It was hours and many miles later when the Count lost all patience. On
the lip of another wadi he stopped the Rolls and ordered Gino,
protesting volubly, to stand at attention and offer his shoulder as a
dead-rest for the Marmlicher.
The beisa had slowed now to an exhausted trot, but the range was six
hundred yards as the Count sighted across the intervening scrub and
through heat-dancing air that swirled like gelatinous liquid.
The rifle-fire cracked the desert silences and the antelope kept
trotting steadily away, while the Count shrieked abuse at it and
crammed a fresh load of brass cartridges into the magazine.
The animal was almost beyond effective range now, but the next bullet
fired with the rear sight at maximum elevation fell in a long arcing
trajectory and they heard the thump of the strike, long after the beisa
had collapsed abruptly and disappeared below the line of grey scrub.
When they had found another crossing and forced the
, Rolls through the deep ravine, scraping the rear fender and denting
one of the big silver wheel-hubs, they came up to the spot where the
antelope lay on its side. Leaving the rifle on the back seat in his
eagerness, the Count leapt out before the Rolls had stopped completely.
-Get one of me completing the coup de grace," he shouted at Gino,
as he unholstered the ivory-handled Beretta and ran to the downed
animal.
The soft bullet had shattered the spinal column a few inches forward of
the pelvis, paralysing the hindquarters, and the blood pumped gently
from the wound in a bright rivulet down the pale beige flank.
The Count posed dramatically, pointing the pistol at the magnificently
horned head with its elaborate face-mask of dark chocolate stripes.
Near by, Gino knelt in the soft earth focusing the camera.
At the critical moment, the antelope heaved itself up into a sitting
position and stared with swimming agonized eyes into the
Count's face. The beisa is one of the most aggressive antelopes in
Africa, capable of killing even a fully grown lion with its long rapier
horns. This old bull weighed 450 lb. and stood four feet high at the
shoulder while the horns rose another three feet above that.
The beisa snorted, and the Count forgot all about the levelled pistol
in his hand in his sudden desperate desire to reach the safety of the
Rolls.
Leading the beisa by six inches, he vaulted lightly into the back seat
and crouched on the floorboards, covering his head with both arms while
the beisa battered the sides of the Rolls, driving in one door and
ripping the paintwork with the deadly horns.
Gino was trying to disappear into the earth by sheer pressure, and he
was making a pitiful wailing sound. The driver had stalled the engine,
and he sat frozen in his seat and every time the beisa crashed into the
Rolls, he was thrown so violently forward that his forehead struck the
windshield, and he pleaded, "Shoot it, my Count. Please, my
Count, shoot the monster." The Count's posterior was pointed to the
sky. It was the only part of his anatomy that was visible above the
rear seat of the Rolls and he was shrieking for somebody to hand him
the rifle, but not raising his head to search for it.
The bullet that had severed the beisa's spine had angled forward and
pierced the lung as well. The violent exertions of the stricken animal
tore open a large artery and, with a pitiful bellow and a sudden double
spurt of blood through the nostrils, it collapsed.
In the long silence that followed, the Count's pale face rose slowly
above the level of the back door and he stared fearfully at the
carcass. Its stillness reassured him. Cautiously, he groped for the
Marinlicher, lifted it slowly and poured a stream of bullets into the
inert beisa. His hands were shaking so violently that some of the
shots missed the body and came perilously close to where Gino still
lay, producing a fresh outburst of wails and more mole-like efforts to
become subterranean.
Satisfied that the beisa was at last dead, the Count descended and
walked slowly towards a nearby clump of thorn scrub, but his gait was
bow-legged and stiff, for he had lightly soiled his magnificently
monogrammed silk underwear.
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In the cool of the evening, the slightly crumpled Rolls returned to the
battalion bivouac. Draped over the bonnet and across the wide
mudguards lay the bleeding carcasses of the antelopes. The Count stood
to acknowledge the cheers of his troops, a veritable triumphant
Nimrod.
A radio message from General De Bono awaited him. It was not a
reprimand, the General would not go that far, but it pointed out that
although the General was grateful for the Count's efforts up to the
present time, and for his fine sentiments and loyal messages,
nevertheless the General would be very grateful if the Count could find
some way in which to speed up his advance.
The Count sent him a five-hundred-word reply ending, "Ours is the
Victory," and then went to feast on barbecued antelope livers and iced
chianti with his officers.
Leaving the sailing and handling of the HirondeUe to his
Mohammedan mate and his raggedy crew, Captain Papadopoulos had spent
the preceding five days sitting at the table in his low-roofed poop
cabin playing two-handed gin rummy with Major Gareth Swales. Gareth
had suggested the diversion and it had occurred to the Captain by this
time that there was something unnatural in the consistent run of
winning cards which had distinguished Gareth's play.
The agreed fare for transporting the cars and the four passengers had
totalled two hundred and fifty of sterling.
The Captain's losses had just exceeded that figure, and Gareth smiled
winningly at Papadopoulos and smoothed the golden moustaches.
"What do you say we give it a break now, Papa old sport, go up on deck
and stretch the legs, what?" Having recovered the passage money,
Gareth had accomplished the task he had set himself, and he was now
anxious to return to the open deck where Vicky Camberwell and Jake were
becoming much too friendly for his peace of mind.
Every time Gareth had been forced by nature to make a brief journey to
the poop rail, he had seen the two of them together and they seemed to
be laughing a great deal, which was always a bad sign. Vicky was in
the forefront of any action,
passing tools to Jake and offering general encouragement, as he worked
at fine-tuning the cars and making last minute preparations for the
desert crossing or the two of them sat with Gregorius while amidst
great hilarity he gave them basic lessons in the Amharic language. He
wondered distractedly what else they were up to.
However, Gareth was a man sure of his priorities and his first concern
was to recover his money from Papadopoulos.
Having done so, he could now return to sheep-dogging Vicky
Camberwell.
"It's been a lot of fun, Papa." He half rose from the table,
folding the grimy wad of banknotes into his back pocket and gathering
the pile of coins with his free hand.
Captain Papadopoulos reached into the depths of the Arabic gown he wore
and produced a knife with an ornately carved handle and a viciously
curved blade. He balanced it lightly in the palm of his hand and his
single eye glittered coldly at Gareth.
"Deal!" he said, and Gareth smiled blandly and sank back into his
seat. He picked up the cards and cut them with a ripping sound and the
knife disappeared into Papadopoulos's gown once more as he watched the
shuffle intently.
"Actually, I do feel like a few more hands," Gareth murmured.
"Just getting warmed up, hey?" The slaver altered course as she
cleared the tip of the great horn of Africa and rounded Cape Guardafui.
Before her lay the long gut of the Gulf of Aden and a run of five
hundred miles westwards to French Somaliland.
The Hindu mate came down and whispered fearfully to his Captain.
"What troubles the fellow?" Gareth asked.
"He worries about the English blockade."
"A "So do I" Gareth answered. "Shouldn't we go up on deck? Deal,"said
Papadopoulos.
Below them they heard the steady thumping beat of the big diesel engine
begin, and the vibration of the propeller shaft spinning in its bed.
The mate had her under sail and power now, and the motion of the ship
changed immediately, the thrust of the propeller combining with the
push of the full spread of her canvas, and she flew towards the vivid
purple and pink flush of sky and piled cumulus cloud behind which the
sun was beginning to set.
The mate had set a course which would take him swiftly down the middle
of the Gulf, out of sight of Africa on his port side and Arabia on the
starboard. The HirondeUe was making twenty-five knots, for the sea
breeze was on her best point of sailing and a day and two nights would
see them in and out again. He sent one of his best men -to the
masthead with a telescope and he wondered which the English viewed more
sternly young black girls in chains or Vickers machine guns in wooden
cases. Mournfully he concluded that either of them would be lethal and
he shrilled at his masthead to keep a strict watch.
The sun was sinking with agonizing slowness, almost dead ahead and the
wind rose steadily, driving the Hirondelle on deeper into the gut.
Jake Barton wriggled out of the engine hatch of Miss Wobbly and grinned
at Vicky Camberwell who sat on the sponson above him swinging her long
legs idly, with the wind in her hair and the tan she had picked up in
the last few days gilding her arms and flushing at her cheeks. She had
lost the dark rings of worry and the paleness of fatigue, and looked
now like a schoolgirl, young and carefree and gay.
"That's the best I can do," said Jake, beginning to scour the black
grease from his arms with Scrubbs Ammonia.
"She's running so sweetly, I could take her out at Le Mans." Her knees
were at the level of Jake's eyes and her skirts had tucked up high. He
felt his heart stop as he glanced down the smooth length of her thigh.
Her skin had a lustre and sheen, as though made of some precious and
rare substance.
Vicky saw the direction of his gaze and brought her knees together
sharply, although a smile touched her lips. She jumped down lightly on
to the deck, steadying herself against the Hirondelle's rolling action
with a touch on the muscled hardness of his arm. Vicky thoroughly
enjoyed the admiration of an attractive male and Gareth had been
closeted in the Captain's cabin these last five days. She smiled up
at
Jake. He was tall but the bush of dark hair that curled around his
ears gave him the look of a small boy which was again quickly dispelled
by the strong jaw line and the fine networks of creases that radiated
from the outer corners of his eyes.
She realized suddenly that he was on the point of stooping to kiss her,
and she felt a delicious indecision the slightest encouragement would
set Jake on a violent collision course with Gareth and might seriously
endanger the whole expedition and the story she wanted so badly. At
that moment she noticed, as if for the first time, that
Jake's mouth was wide and rutI and his lips were delicately shaped for
the bigness
and hairiness of him. His chin and cheeks were blued with
a day's growth of beard and she knew it would feel rough and electric
against her own peach-smooth cheeks. Suddenly she wanted to feel that,
and she lifted her chin slightly and knew that he would read that want
in the sparkle of her eyes.
The masthead shrieked like a startled gull and instantly the
Hirondelle was plunged into frantic activity. The Mohammedan mate
echoed his shrieks, but at a higher volume, and his grubby robes
flapped around him in the wind. His eyes rolled in his dark brown
skull and his toothless moutth opened so wide that Jake could see the
little pink glottis dangling in the back of his throat.
"What is it? "Vicky demanded, her hand still on Jake's arm.
"Trouble," he answered grimly, and they turned as the door of the poop
cabin flew open and Papadopoulos rushed out with his queue twitching
like the tail of a lioness and his single eye blinking rapidly. He
still clutched a fan of cards in his right hand.
"One more card and I make gin!" he howled bitterly, and threw the
cards into the wind and grabbed the mate by the front of his gown,
shouting into his open but now silent mouth.
The mate pointed aloft and Papadopoulos dropped him and hailed the
masthead in Arabic, and Jake listened to the swift exchange.
"A British destroyer sounds like "Dauntless"," he muttered.
"You speak Arabic?" Vicky asked, and Jake stilled the question
irritably and listened again.
"The destroyer has seen us. She's altering course to intercept."
Jake looked quickly at the smouldering globe of the sun, the crinkles
around his eyes puckering up thoughtfully as he listened to the heated
argument in Arabic taking place on the poop deck.
"Are you two having fun?" Gareth Swales asked, smiling but with a
glitter in his eyes as he glanced significantly at Vicky's hand still
on Jake's arm. He had come out of the cabin as silently as a
panther.
Vicky dropped her hand guiltily and immediately wished she had not. She
owed Gareth Swales no debts and she answered his stare defiantly,
before turning back to Jake and finding him gone.
"What is it, Papa?" Gareth called up at the poop-deck, and the
Captain snarled, "Your Royal mucking Navy that's what it is." And he
shook his fist at the northern horizon. "The Dauntless she based at