both of you we'd never make it over the mountains," and they saw what
torture the words caused her.
Another bullet clanged against steel. "We can take only one more."
"Spin you for it." Gareth had the silver Maria Theresa on his thumb
and he grinned at Jake.
"Heads," said Jake and it spun silver in the sunlight and Gareth caught
it in the palm of his good hand and glanced at Jake..
"It had to come your turn at last." Gareth's grin lifted the corners
of his mouth. "Well done, old son. off you go." But Jake caught the
wrist, and twisted it. He glanced at the coin.
"Tails," he snapped. "I always knew you were a cheat, you bastard,"
and he turned away towards Vicky. "I'll cover the take-off,
Vicky, I'll keep Priscilla between you and the Eyeties as long as I
can." Behind him, Gareth stooped and picked up a stone the size of a
gull's egg out of the grass.
"Sorry, old son," he drawled. "But I owe you two already," and
tenderly he tapped Jake above the right ear with the stone held in the
cup of his hand, and then dropped the stone and caught him under the
armpits as his legs sagged and he began to collapse.
He put his knee under Jake's backside and with a heave boosted him
headfirst and unconscious through the cabin door. Then he put his foot
on Jake's protruding posterior and thrust him farther into the cramped
cabin until he could slam and lock the door.
Rifle-fire pounded and crashed against the screening hull of
Priscilla. Gareth reached into his inside pocket and pulled out the
pigskin wallet. He dropped it through the side window into Vicky's lap
as she sat at the controls.
"Tell Jake if I'm not there on the first to cash the Lijs cheque and
buy You a bottle of Charlie from me, and when you drink it,
remember I really did love you,-" Before she could reply he had turned
and darted back to the armoured car and scrambled up into the driver's
hatch.
Like a team in harness, the car and the little blue aircraft ran side
by side down the open field and the Italian fire drummed against the
steel hull of the car.
Then slowly the heavily laden aircraft drew ahead of the speeding car,
but by then they were beyond effective rifle range, and as Vicky felt
the Puss Moth come alive and the wheels bumped clear of the rough turf,
she glanced quickly backwards.
Gareth stood in the driver's hatch, and she saw his lips Move as he
shouted after her, and he lifted his bandaged arm in a gesture of
farewell.
She did not hear the words, but she read them upon his lips.
"Noli il legitimi carborundum," and saw the flash of that devilish
buccaneer smile, before the aircraft lifted away from the earth and she
must turn all her attention back to it.
are th halted Priscilla at the edge of the field and he stood in the
hatch, shielding his eyes with his good 3hand, and watched the little
blue aircraft climb laboriously into the thin mountain air.
Again it caught the sun and flashed as it turned unsteadily towards the
gap in the mountains where the pass led up into the highlands.
His whole attention was fixed on the dwindling speck of blue, so that
he did not see the three CV.3 tanks crawl out of the main street of the
village five hundred yards away.
He was still staring upwards as the tanks stopped, rocking gently on
their suspensions, and the turrets with the long Spandaus traversed
around towards him.
He did not hear the crash of cannon for the shell struck long before
the sound carried to him. There was only the earth stopping impact and
He lay on the earth beside the shattered hull, and he felt downwards
with his good hand, for there was something wrong with his stomach. He
groped down, and there was nothing where his stomach should have been,
just a gaping hole into which his hand sunk, as though into the soft
warm flesh of a rotten fruit.
He tried to withdraw his hand, but it would not move.
There was no longer muscular control, and it grew darker.
He tried to open his eyes and then realized that they were wide open,
staring up at the bright sky. The darkness was in his head, and the
cold was in his whole body.
In the darkness and the icy cold, he heard a voice say in Italian,
"E marta he is dead." And he thought with mild surprise, "Yes, I am.
This time, I am," and he tried to grin, but his lips would not move and
he went on staring up at the sky with pale blue eyes.
He is dead," repeated Gino.
"Are you certain?" Count Aldo Belli demanded from the turret of the
tank.
"Si, I am certain." Warily the Count climbed down the hull.
"You are right," he agreed, studying the man. "He is truly dead. "Then
he straightened up and puffed out his chest.
"Gino," he commanded. "Get a picture of me with the cadaver of the
English bandit." And Gino backed away, staring into the viewfinder of
the big black camera.
"Chin up a little, my Colonel," he instructed.
Vicky Camberwell brought the Puss Moth out over the final crest of the
pass, with a mere two hundred feet to spare, for the small overladen
aircraft was fast approaching its ceiling.
Ahead of her, the highlands stretched away to Addis Ababa in the south.
Below her passed the thin raw muddy bisecting lines of the
Dessie road. She saw the road was deserted. The army of Ethiopia had
passed. The fish had slipped through the net but the thought gave her
no pleasure.
She turned in her seat and looked back, down the long gloomy corridor
of the Sardi Gorge. From the cliffs on each side of the gorge, the
rain waters still fell in silver white waterfalls and muddy cataracts
so that it seemed that even the mountains wept.
She straightened up in her seat, and lifting her hand to her face she
found without surprise that her own cheek was wet and slick with
tears.
FB2 document info
Document ID: 0333d4fd-a2e7-48ac-8fc5-5763af42be40
Document version: 1
Document creation date: 8.4.2012
Created using: calibre 0.8.10 software
Document authors :
Wilbur Smith
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