reluctant feet sliding in the loose earth.
"Jake, what are you doing?" she protested, but he ignored her.
"We'll mount the guns. It won't take long." He was planning through
his rage, as he dragged them back along the wadi to where the cars were
parked beyond the caves.
Vicky and Gregoflus were helpless in the ferocity of his grip, swept
along by his strength and his anger.
"Vicky, you will drive for me. I'll serve the gun," he told her.
"Greg, you drive for Gareth." Jake's breathing was shallow and fast
with his rage. "We can only man two cars, one we will use as a
diversion you and Gareth swing south along the back of the ridge and
that will keep them busy while Vicky and I pick up Sara and as many of
the others as we can find alive." The two of them listened to him, and
were swept forward with a fresh urgency. As they ran back along the
wadi, a final brief storm of machine-gun fire and exploding mortar bomb
preceded the deep aching silence which now fell over the desert.
The three of them turned the final bend in the course of the wadi and
came upon a scene of utter pandemonium.
The ravine was filled solidly with those who had escaped the Italian
fire struggling to load their possessions, their tents and bedding,
their chickens and children, on to the panicky bellowing camels and the
skittering braying mules and donkeys.
Already hundreds of riders were galloping away, climbing the sides of
the wadi or disappearing into the labyrinth of broken ground. New
widows wailed in the uproar and their grief was catching, the children
shrieked, and whimpered in sympathy, and over it all hung a blue miasma
of smoke from the cooking fires and dust from the trampling hooves and
milling feet.
The four cars stood in their solid orderly rank, aloof from the masses
of humanity, gleaming in their coats of white paint with the vivid red
crosses emblazoned upon their sides.
Jake pushed a way through for them, towering head and shoulders above
the throng, and when they reached the nearest car Jake grasped Vicky
about the waist and swung her easily up into the sponson. For a moment
his expression softened.
"You don't have to come," he said. "I guess I went a little mad then,
you don't have to drive Gareth and I will take one car." Her face was
deathly pale also, and there were deep bruised smears under her eyes
from a night without sleep and the horrors of the slaughter. Her tears
had dried, leaving dirty smears down her cheeks, but she shook her head
fiercely.
"I'm coming," she said. "I'll drive for you."
"Good girl," said Jake. "Help Gregorius top up. We will need full
fuel tanks. I'll get the Vickers." He turned away, shouting to
Gregorius. "We'll use Miss Wobbly and Tenastelin Vicky will help you
refuel." A detail from the Ras's personal bodyguard were already
bringing the wooden cases of weapons and munitions out of the storage
cave as Jake arrived. Each case was carried between four straining
troopers to where the camels knelt.
It was then lifted into the pannier on each side of the hump and
hastily lashed down.
"Hey, you lot." Jake came up with a group carrying a crated Vickers.
"Bring that along this way." They paused in understanding until Jake
made unmistakable signs, but at that moment a captain of the guard
hurried up to intervene. After one shouted exchange Jake realized that
the language barrier was insurmountable. The man was obstinate and
time was wasting.
"Sorry, friend," he apologized. "But I am in a bit of a hurry," and he
hit him a roundhouse clout that ended the argument conclusively and
sent the man flying backwards into the outstretched arms of two of his
men.
"Come along." Jake pushed the guards with the crate towards where the
cars stood. The thought of Sara lying out there in the valley was
driving him frantic. He imagined her bleeding slowly to death, her
bright young blood draining away into the sandy soil and he hustled the
two men forward through the press of animals and human beings.
As he came up, Gregorius was swinging the crank handle on Miss Wobbly
and the engine caught and ran smoothly as Vicky eased back the
ignition.
"Where is Gareth? "Jake shouted.
"Can't find him," answered Gregorius. "We'll have to go in one car,"
and then both of them swung round at the familiar bantering laugh.
Gareth Swales was leaning nonchalantly against the side of the car,
looking as unruffled and calm as ever, his hair neatly combed and the
tweed suit as immaculate as if it had just come from his tailor.
"say," smiled Gareth, crinkling his eyes against the drift of blue
smoke from the cheroot between his lips. "Big Jake Barton and his two
eager ducklings about to take on the entire Italian army." Vicky's
head appeared in the driver's hatch.
"We've been looking for you," she shouted furiously.
"Ah," quoth Gareth lightly. "We will now hear from the Girl Guides
Association."
"Sara is out there." Gregorius ran to Gareth. "We are going to fetch
her. You and I will take the one car, Vicky and Jake the other."
"Nobody is going anywhere." Gareth shook his head, and Gregorius
seized the lapels of his suit and shook them urgently. "Sara. You
don't understand she's out there! We have to fetch her." say, old
lad, would you mind unhanding me, "murmured Gareth and removed
Gregorius" hands from his lapel. "Yes.
We know about Sara, but--2 Vicky yelled from the driver's hatch.
"Leave, him, Gregorius. We don't need anyone who is afraid-" and
Gareth straightened up abruptly, his expression grim and his eyes
snapping.
"I have been called many things in my life, my dear young lady. Some
of them justified, but nobody has ever called me a coward."
"Well, there is always a first time, buster," shouted Vicky, her face
crimson with anger and streaked with dirt, her blonde hair ruffled and
hanging into her eyes and she pointed one quivering finger at Gareth,
"and for you this is that first time!" They stared at each other for a
moment longer before Lij Mikhael strode between them, his dark face set
but commanding.
"Major Swales is acting on my express orders, Miss Camberwell. I have
ordered that the cars and all my father's troops will fall back
immediately."
"Good God, man." Vicky transferred her anger from Gareth to the
Prince. "That's your daughter lying out there."
"Yes," said the Prince softly. "My daughter on the one hand my country
on the other.
There is no doubt which I must choose."
"You're not making sense, "Jake interposed roughly.
"I think I am." The Prince turned to him and Jake saw the dark torment
in the man's eyes. "I cannot make a hostile move, it's what the
Italians are seeking. An excuse to attack in full strength. We must
turn the other cheek now, and use this atrocity to win world
support."
"But Sara," Vicky interrupted. "We could pick her up in a minute."
"N
o." The Prince lifted his chin. "I cannot show the , enemy these
new weapons of ours. They must remain hidden until the time is right
to strike."
"Sara, cried Gregorius. "What of Sara?" "When these machines and the
new guns are safely on their way back to the Sardi Gorge, I shall ride
out myself to fetch her body," said the Prince with a simple dignity.
"But until then my duty must come first."
"One car," pleaded Gregorius. "For Sara's sake."
"No, I cannot use even one car," said the Prince.
"Well, I can," snapped Vicky and her tousled golden head disappeared
into the driver's hatch, the engine roared and Miss Wobbly shot forward
scattering men and animals before her, and swung in a tight sliding
right-hand turn towards the course of the wadi.
Unarmed and alone, Vicky Camberwell was going out to face the machine
guns and the mortars, and only one man amongst them acted swiftly
enough.
Jake shouldered the Prince aside and sprinted across the circle of the
car's turn, coming alongside a moment before it plunged into the narrow
ravine. He got a grip on one of the welded brackets abaft the engine
cowling, and although his shoulder joint was almost wrenched from its
socket, he swung himself up and fell belly down across the sponson.
Clinging grimly on to the leaping, jouncing vehicle, he dragged himself
forward until he could peer down the driver's hatch.
"Are you crazy?" he bellowed, and Vicky looked up and gave him a
fleeting but angelic grin.
"Yes. How about you?"A heavier impact came up through the chassis of
the car and momentarily drove Jake's breath from him so he could not
answer. Instead, he clawed his way up the side of the turret, almost
losing four fingers as the loose hatch cover slammed closed at another
leap of the car.
Using all his strength, Jake lifted it again, and secured the retaining
catch before he scrambled down into the cab.
He was only just in time, for at that moment Vicky drove the car at
full throttle out into the valley.
The sun was clear of the horizon now, smearing long dark shadows across
the golden sands. Dust and smoke from the mortar barrage still drifted
in a stately brown cloud over the ridge, and the bodies of the dead
were thrown at random across the bare plain. The women's dresses made
bright splashes of colour against the monochrome of the desert.
Jake swept a swift glance around the ridge that commanded the plain,
and saw that many of the Italian troopers had left their trenches. They
wandered in small groups around the edges of the slaughter ground, and
their movements were awed and timid green troops still not hardened to
the reality of open wounds and twisted corpses.
They froze in attitudes of surprise as the car burst out of the wadi,
and flew on usty wings towards the nearest waterhole. It took many
seconds for them to move, and then they turned and pelted for their
earthworks, tiny figures in dark uniforms with legs and arms pumping in
frantic haste.
"Turn broadside," yelled Jake. "Show them the crosses!" and Vicky
reacted swiftly, swinging the car into a tight lefthander that had her
up on two wheels, sliding broadside in the sand, displaying to the
Italians the huge scarlet crosses on the hull.
"Let me have your shirt," Jake yelled again. It was the only white
cloth they had with them. "I need a flag of truce!"
"It's all I have on," Vicky shrieked back. "I'm bare underneath."
"You want to be modest and dead?" howled Jake. "They'll start
shooting any moment now." And she steered with one hand as she
unbuttoned her shirt front and leaned forward in the seat to yank the
tails out of her skirt. She shrugged out of it and reached up into the
turret to hand him the bundled shirt. Each time they hit another bump,
Vicky's breasts bounced like rubber balls, a sight that distracted Jake
for a hundredth part of a second before chivalry and duty recalled him
and he stood high in the turret, arms stretched above his head,
streaming the white shirt like a flag, balancing with a sailor's legs
against the wild antics of the car.
To the hundreds of men who lined the parapet of the Italian trenches
Jake displayed two emotive symbols, the red cross and the white flag,
symbols so powerful that even men in the white-hot must of the blood
lust hesitated with their fingers still curled about the triggers of
the machine guns.
"It's working," shrieked Vicky, and swung the car on to its original
heading, almost throwing Jake from his precarious roost in the turret.
He dropped the shirt and clutched wildly at the coamings of the turret,
the shirt floating away like a white egret on the wing.
"There she is," Vicky cried again. The carcass of the white stallion
lay dead ahead, as she braked hard and then pulled the car to a
standstill beside it, interposing the armoured body of the car between
the pile of bodies and the watching Italians on the ridge.
Jake dropped down into the cab and crawled back to open the rear double
doors of the car, knocking open the locking handles as he called over
his shoulder.
"Keep your hatch battened and don't, for chrissakes, show your head."
"I'll help you," Vicky stated boldly.
"The hell you will," snapped Jake, tearing his eyes off her magnificent
chest. "You'll stay where you are and keep the engine running." The
Spitting grit from his mouth, he crawled swiftly to the carcass of the
white horse. Close up, the hide was shaggy and flea-bitten, dappled
with faint patches of chestnut. On this pale background the bullet
holes were like dark red mouths where already the metallic blue flies
clustered delightedly.
The stallion lay heavily across Sara's lower body, pinning her face
down to the earth.
The naked boy child had been hit by one of the hooves as the horse
fell. The side of the tiny bald skull had been crushed, a deep
indentation above the temple into which a baseball would have fitted
neatly. There was no chance that he still lived and Jake transferred
his attention to the girl.
"Sara," he called, and she lifted herself on her elbows, looking back
at him from huge terrified dark eyes. Her face was smeared with dust,
the skin shaved from one cheek where she had slid against the ground,
exposing the pale pink meat from which lymph leaked in clear liquid
beads.
"Are you hit? "Jake reached her.
"I don't know," she whispered huskily, and he saw that the satin of her
breeches was soaked with dark blood. He placed both feet against the
carcass of the horse and tried to roll it off her legs, but the dead
weight of the animal was enormous. He would have to stand, taking his
chances with the guns.
Jake came to his feet and felt the cold fingers of fear brush lightly
along his spine as he turned his back to the nearest Italian trenches
and stooped to the horse.
Crouching with his weight balanced evenly on the ba
lls of both feet, he
took the tail and the lower hind leg of the animal; lifting and turning
with all his strength, he began to roll the carcass off Sara's legs and
pelvis. She cried out in pain, such a sharp high-pitched shriek that
he had to stop.
She was praying incoherently in Amharic, weeping slow fat tears of
agony that cut tunnels through the pale dust on her cheeks.
Jake panted, "Once more I'm sorry," and he braced himself. At that
moment Vicky yelled from the car.
"Jake, they are coming! Hurry, oh God, please hurry!" Jake swung
around and ran to the car, peering over the high engine compartment.
With a long plume of pale dust boiling out from behind it, a large open
vehicle crowded with armed men was dropping swiftly down towards them
from the ridge.
"My God," grunted Jake, screwing up his eyes against the low blinding
rays of the morning sun. "It can't be!" But even at that range in the
dust and bad light, there was no mistaking the gracious and dignified
lines of a Rolls-Royce.
Jake was seized by a feeling of unreality that amid all this horror
appear something of such beauty.
"Hurry, Jake." Vicky's voice spurred him on, and he ran back to the
dead horse, seized its hind legs and began wrestling it on to its back
with the girl's agonized cries as an accompaniment.
Grunting and straining, Jake lifted the horse by main strength until it
was balanced critically along its spine with the legs pointed loosely
at the morning sky, and now he could hear the approaching engine-beat
of the Rolls and the faint but excited voices of its occupants. He
denied the temptation to look around again and, instead, let the
carcass flop heavily over on to its other flank, freeing the frail body
of the child-woman beneath it.
Still panting with his efforts, Jake dropped on one knee beside her.
She was hit in the upper leg, he saw at once, the entry wound was six
inches above the knee, and when he felt swiftly for a bone-break, there
was another quick flood of dark crimson blood that poured warmly over
his fingers and drenched the slick satin of her breeches afresh. Jake
found the exit wound in the inside of her thigh, but knew by feel and
instinct that it had missed the bone. Still, she was losing blood
heavily and he inserted a forefinger into the tear in her breeches and
ripped the cloth cleanly to the ankle; he pulled it up exposing her