Recoil

4

Sunday, 11 June

05:58 hours

We’d left the house nearly an hour ago and I was feeling good, even if my cell hadn’t made a squeak all night. At least I was getting closer to where I needed to be. We’d driven through the golf course, past security and out on to the metalled road in pitch darkness. We’d turned off after twenty minutes, and for the last ten Sam’s shiny new company BMW X5 had been bouncing along a dirt track. A sliver of light was peeping over the horizon.

Behind the blacked-out windows, we listened to an early-morning talk-show. The only other sound was the gentle hum of the air-conditioning. The station said there was a festival and wine-tasting up in Stellenbosch this afternoon, but I knew at least three people who wouldn’t be going. By the time the organizers were pulling the first cork, Sam, Lex and I should be on the Rwanda–DRC border and less than fifty K from Nuka.

I breathed in the aroma of brand new leather. Sam and I had spent the evening being served roast beef and fine wines. He seemed to have become a bit of a connoisseur. I couldn’t believe the transformation – but not everything about him had changed. He still thought God had created the earth, and that he needed to save everyone’s souls. Even the DVD we watched after dinner was a fund-raiser he’d put together.

I believed him when he said that the house, even the BMW, meant nothing to him. We’d spent all night talking about how he’d stayed in Africa after the 1985 job and worked for different aid organizations. Not once did he ask me about Zaïre; there were no more leading questions.

I suddenly realized I had to talk to him. ‘Sam?’

‘What?’ He adjusted the air.

‘The thing that happened on the heli, the boy . . . I need to talk about it.’

‘I know.’ He kept looking straight ahead.

‘I couldn’t hold him. I need you to know that. The little fucker was too slippery.’

‘I know.’

‘I couldn’t help Annabel. That fucking arsehole Standish, you see what he did?’

Sam nodded. We hadn’t talked about him all night. It was just as well. I’d still be honking and banging the table.

‘After the boy fell it was too late – I couldn’t get off the heli in time.’

‘I know that too.’

‘So why do I feel so guilty?’ I paused. ‘Do you know that too?’

‘Because you can’t get the sight of those kids’ corpses out your head. I do know that, because I can’t either. That’s why my life has been here ever since. I want to make up for killing those children. I want to make sure the ones who are still alive don’t have to suffer like the ones we killed. But you don’t have to feel guilty, Nick. We didn’t know. This is just my particular way of dealing with it.’

‘Thanks.’

‘No thanks needed, son. Do you want to know what happened to the others?’

‘No,’ I lied. I’d always wanted to know about the boy.

‘Really?’

‘I know Annabel didn’t make it. Not sure I’m ready to hear the rest.’

We rounded a bend in the dirt track. ‘OK. Just let me know when you are.’ Sam tapped the wheel. ‘In the meantime, this is us.’

I could make out a cluster of breezeblock buildings, topped by a couple of antennas and a sat dish. The rest of the skyline was dominated by the massive silhouettes of two four-prop Antonov An12s.

The Russian version of our C130 Hercules, the An12 had the same shape as most tactical transport aircraft, essentially a huge tube with a ramp at the back. The only real differences were the amount of glass in the nose, which made it look like a Second World War Heinkel bomber, and the pair of 23mm cannon protruding from the rear of the fuselage – it looked like Donald Duck’s bill had been stuck on the aircraft’s arse.

The rear ramp was down on the nearest. Three or four trucks milled around, loading up what I assumed was the cargo Lex had been waiting for.

The ageing Antonovs were relics from the bad old Cold War days. They were now dotted around every ex-Communist African country you could name, and a good few you probably couldn’t. As we got closer it was clear that this faded dark green monster had come from Mother Russia: it still had a big red star on the tail fin.

Sam knew what my next question was going to be and laughed. ‘They look weird, don’t they? Lex got the pair on the cheap. One working,’ he pointed to the second aircraft, at the side of the strip, ‘and that one for spares. Low mileage, one careful lady owner. You know the sort of thing.’

We drove to the rear of the building and pulled up alongside a black 4x4 Porsche. Sam shook his head. ‘Lex’s penis extension. A bit too flash for me.’ He jumped out. The sun hadn’t cleared the treeline yet and it was still a bit chilly.

I followed him to the back of the BMW. He lifted the tailgate and pulled out his green daysack with a blue, hard-plastic wheelie suitcase, the sort that fits into overhead lockers. It was so new it still had the sale tag on the handle.

I threw my holdall over my shoulder. ‘Does he charge for excess luggage as well?’

Donald’s bill jutted out over a truck that was backed up to the ramp. The 23mms were still in place. The early-morning sun glinted off the scratched Perspex canopy and the oversized belts of brass link inside.

Lex jumped down to greet us. He shoved a sat phone into its belt carrier, rubbed his hands and inspected the sky. ‘Turned out nice again, eh?’ For people working in hot climates, it was the oldest cliché in the book, but it still made me smile.

I glanced beyond him at the long aluminium containers being stowed in the belly of the aircraft. They were offloaded on to pallet trolleys then hauled up the ramp. By the looks of it, each one weighed a ton. ‘What’s the cargo, Lex?’

‘Just food, water, that sort of stuff. General shit. It’s a fresh day for the lads. I tell you, I’ve got enough steak in the back there to open a restaurant chain.’

‘How many people work for this mining company, then?’

He turned away. ‘Don’t bore me with that stuff, man. Me, I just play with the joystick. No names, no pack drill.’

He jumped back on the ramp and disappeared. I wanted to ask Sam what was really in the containers, but thought better of it. They weren’t full of prime fillet, that was for sure.

The BMW and the Porsche were being driven away. ‘Doesn’t Lex come back here after he drops off?’

‘He’s got to go elsewhere.’ One of the engines began to whine. ‘And I’m not due back for a few weeks myself.’

The stench of aviation fuel filled my nostrils and a flock of startled birds lifted from the trees as the other three engines sparked up. The truck moved away and I followed Sam up the ramp. My trainers crunched on the layer of dark red grit that covered the floor. It looked as if the other place Lex had been going to was Mars.

The interior was stripped of all essentials, not that it would have left the showroom with too many in the first place. There were no seats and no padding over the alloy skin of the fuselage. It was stacked to head height with aluminium containers and plastic iceboxes.

I pointed at a big blue one. ‘Don’t tell me. Steaks?’

‘Yeah. Steaks, eggs – and it’s a dry job, but on a fresh day we have a few beers.’

I spotted several cases of Castle. Sam grinned. ‘Aye, I’ve done the PRI shop.’

The engines coughed and all four props spun. The PRI was a shopping system we used in the Regiment, but I’d never had a clue what the initials stood for. All I knew was that every garrison had one, and if you were in the field and it was a fresh day, people would go off to the PRI and come back with half a supermarket. Normally you’d get a fresh day in every seven or ten; you could ask for your Colgate and Ambre Solaire on top, and the bill would be raised at the end of the trip.

A loadmaster squeezed between us and the containers, a big pair of cans over his ears and a boom mike in front of his mouth. He yanked on all the webbing straps to check.

‘How many guys working, Sam?’

‘Not enough, Nick. Not yet.’

The ramp lifted with an electric whine. The loadmaster plugged his cable into a socket in the fuselage and spoke rapidly into his mike. I guessed Lex was at the other end.

The four props came up to speed.

Through one of the round portholes I could see a cloud of dirt getting kicked up behind. No wonder they’d had their shiny new vehicles taken away.

Sam threw me a bundle of green parachute silk and para cord and unwound one of his own. It was like being back in the Regiment, in the back of a C130, except that, with only two of us, there wasn’t going to be a fight for prime position. This was normally anywhere over the ramp, because there was nothing stacked on the floor there, and you had enough room for the hammock to sag and swing.

The props screamed and the aircraft shuddered. We rumbled down the airstrip.

I leaned close to Sam’s ear. ‘How long’s it going to take?’

‘Seven hours.’ He had to shout. ‘Might as well get your head down.’

Tactical aircraft like these things only required about seven hundred metres of runway. Within seconds the rumbling eased as the undercarriage lifted off the ground.