Juggernaut

CHAPTER 9

It was an uneasy night. Nothing more happened to disturb us, but very few of us got a full night's sleep; there was a great deal of coming and going to the chuck wagon, much quiet talking in the darkness, a general air of restlessness. The day had been packed with incident, a total contrast to the normal slow, tedious routine, and nobody knew what the next day would bring except they could be sure that the routine was broken.

The rig had reached the valley where the tanks had been hit, and was resting there. Kemp had no intention of moving it until we knew much more about what had happened in Kodowa, and Sadiq had taken him off at first light to look at the road. I had elected to stay behind.

Talk over breakfast was sporadic and I could sense the crew's tension. Certainly I knew they had been discussing their own safety and the chances of their coming through the conflict unscathed, with less than full confidence, and I suspected that Johnny Burke and Bob Sisley were pushing the shop floor angle rather hard. That could bear watching. I began to put some words together in my mind, against the time when I'd have to give them reasoned arguments in favour of doing things my way. They weren't like Sadiq's army lads, trained to obey without question.

Ben Hammond had gone with Kemp to look at the road. McGrath and three or four of the men were still playing with the tank, which they had cheerfully but firmly refused to turn over to the military until they had tinkered with it for a while longer. The others, including myself, were doing nothing much; everything looked remarkably peaceful and normal if one ignored the three tanks piled up in the gulley by the roadside.

When the interruption came it was heart-stopping.

There was. a mighty rush of air and a pounding roar in our ears. Men sprang to their feet like jack-in-the-boxes as five air force jets screamed overhead at low altitudes, hurtling up over the ridge beyond us.

'Christ!' A pulse hammered in my throat and my coffee spilled as I jerked to my feet.

'They're attacking!' someone yelled and there was a dive for cover, mostly under the shelter of the rig itself, which would have been suicidal if an attack had followed. But no missiles or bombs fell. The formation vanished as suddenly as it had appeared. Men resurfaced, staring and chattering. Soldiers grabbed belatedly for their rifles.

'Was it an attack?' Ritchie Thorpe asked me. Having driven up with me he'd been tacitly appointed the position of spokesman.

'No. They were going much too fast. I'm not sure they were even aware of us.'

'Where do you think they're going?'

'God knows.' I felt as if we were on a desert island, with no news getting through. 'Are you sure you can't raise anything on the radios? Any local station?'

'Sorry, Mister Mannix, It's all static. Everything's off the air, I think. Mister Kemp said he'd call in on the half-hour, so I'll be listening in then. Maybe he'll have some news for us.'

There was a distant roar and our faces snapped skywards again. One of the jets was returning, but flying much higher, and as we watched it made a big sweeping circle in the sky and vanished in the direction of the rest of the formation. For a moment it seemed to leave a thin echo behind, and then I stiffened as I recognized what I was hearing.

'Bert. There's another plane. A small one. Can you see it?'

He too stared round the sky.

'No, but I can hear it.' He raised his voice to a shout. 'Any of you see a light plane?'

Everyone stared upwards, and three or four of them scrambled up onto the rig for a better vantage point. It was Brad Bishop on top of the commissary truck who first shouted, 'Yes, over there!' and pointed south.

A moment later I'd seen it too, a small speck of a plane flying low and coming towards us. Longing for binoculars, I kept my eyes glued to the approaching plane and felt a jolt of recognition. I'd never been a flier myself, and though I'd logged hundreds of hours in small company planes as well as in commercial liners I had never developed an eye for the various makes, but this one I definitely knew.

'It's the BE company plane,' I called out. 'We've got visitors.'

'Where can they land?' Thorpe asked me.

'Good question. Kodowa's got a town strip somewhere but I don't know if it's going to be usable. He can't land here, that's for certain.'

But that was where I was wrong.

It wasn't an intentional landing, though. As the plane came nearer we recognized signs of trouble. It was flying in a lopsided, ungainly fashion. A thin trail of smoke came from it, and the full extent of the damage became visible. Part of the undercarriage was missing, and the tailfin was buckled out of alignment.

'She's going to crash.'

'Do you think the jets attacked her?'

I said, 'No — too high, too fast. That was a ground attack. Damn it, she's not a fighter plane, not even armed!'

We watched in alarm as it began a wobbly circle over the bush country, slowly spiralling downwards.

'Bring up the water carrier!' I shouted, and sprinted for the hire car. Three or four others flung themselves in beside me. The car was ill-equipped for bouncing off the road into the bush but with the Land Rover gone there wasn't much choice. The water tanker and some of the military stuff followed. I concentrated on charting the course of the stricken plane and on avoiding the worst of the rocks and defiles in front of me. The others clung on as they were tossed about, leaning out of the car windows in spite of the choking dust clouds to help keep track of the aircraft.

Soon it dipped to the horizon, then went below it at a sharp angle. I tried to force another fraction of speed out of the labouring car. The plane reappeared briefly and I wondered if it had actually touched down and bounced. Then it was gone again and a surge of dust swirled up ahead.

My hands wrenched this way and that to keep the car from slewing sideways in the earth. I brought it joltingly through a small screen of thorn bushes and rocked to a halt, and we looked downhill towards the misshapen hulk that had been airborne only moments before., We piled out and started running. The danger of fire was enormous. Not only would the plane erupt but the bush was likely to catch fire, and we all knew it. But there was no fire as yet, and the plane was miraculously upright.

As we got to the plane a figure was already beginning to struggle to free himself. The plane was a six-seater, but there were only two men visible inside. Our men clambered up onto the smashed wing and clawed at the pilot's door. The water tanker was lumbering towards us and Sadiq's troops were nearer still; I waved the oncoming vehicles to a halt.

'No further! Stay back! If she burns you'll all be caught. No sparks — don't turn your ignition off,' I shouted. 'Wilson, you and Burke start laying a water trail down towards her.'

As one of the big hoses was pulled free and a spray of water shot out, the door was pulled open and the two men inside were helped out. I ran back to the car and brought it closer. One of the plane's occupants seemed to be unhurt; two of our men were steadying him but he appeared to be walking quite strongly. The second was lolling in unconsciousness, carried by Grafton and Ron Jones. As they came up to my car I recognized both new arrivals.

The unconscious man was Max Otterman, our Rhodesian pilot. The other was Geoffrey Wingstead.

Max Otterman was in a bad way.

He'd done a brilliant job in bringing his plane down in one piece, upright and more or less intact, but at a terrible cost to himself. His left arm was broken, and he had contusions and cuts aplenty, especially about the face in spite of goggles and helmet. But there was something more drastic and this none of us was able to diagnose for certain. He recovered consciousness of a sort in the car as we drove him and Geoff Wingstead back to the rig site, moving as gently as possible. But he was obviously in great pain and kept blacking out. We got him bedded down in the rig's shade eventually, after letting Bishop have a good look at him. Bishop had first aid training and was pretty useful for day-to-day rig accidents, but he didn't know what was wrong with Otterman, apart from being fairly sure that neither his neck nor his back was broken.

It was the most worrying feature so far of a very worrying situation.

Wingstead was in good shape apart from one severe cut on his left shoulder and a selection of bruises, but nevertheless both Bishop and I urged him to take things very carefully. He saw Otterman bedded down, then sank into a grateful huddle in the shade with a cold beer to sustain him.

The men tended to crowd around. They all knew Geoff, naturally, and it was apparent that they thought a great deal of their boss. Their astonishment at his unorthodox arrival was swamped in their relief at his safety, and curiosity overrode all.

Presently I had to appeal to them to leave him for a while.

'Come on, you guys. He doesn't exactly want to give a press conference just this minute, you know,' I said. I didn't want to speak too sharply; it would be unwise to trample on their good will. But they took my point and most of them moved a little way off.

Wingstead said, 'I'll have to thank everybody properly. You all did a damned good job, back there.' His voice was a little shaky.

'None better than Max,' I said. 'There's plenty of time, Geoff. Time for questions later too. Just rest a bit first.'

In fact I was aching to know what had brought him up to us, what he knew and what the situation was that he'd left behind him. Kemp and Sadiq should hear it too, though, and one account from Wingstead would tax him quite sufficiently. So I went a little way off, and saw Wingstead's head droop forward as he surrendered to the sleep of exhaustion. I was anxious for Kemp to rejoin us. He seemed to have been gone for ever, and I was eager to give him our latest piece of dramatic news. But it wasn't until nearly noon that we saw Sadiq's escorted car returning, and I walked down the road to intercept them.

'Neil. There's a pack of problems up ahead of us,' said Kemp.

'We haven't done too badly ourselves.'

Kemp's eyes immediately flashed to the rig. 'Problems? Have you been having trouble?'

'I wouldn't quite put it that way. Look, I'm damned keen to hear what you've got to tell, but I guess our news has priority. We've got visitors.'

'Who — the army?'

Sadiq had got out of the car and already had his glasses unslung, scanning the road. I knew he wouldn't see the plane from where we were standing, though. I'd have preferred to discuss the latest developments with Kemp alone, but Sadiq had to be told: he'd find out fast enough in any case.

'No. We were overflown by some air force planes but I don't think they were looking for us or had any business with us. But a small plane came up a while ago. It crashed — over there.' I waved my hand. 'It had been shot up, I think. There were two men on board and we got them both out, but one's badly hurt.'

'Who the hell are they?'

'You're going to like this, Basil. One's your boss. And he's in pretty fair shape.'

'Geoffrey!' As with the men, astonishment and relief played over Kemp's face, and then alarm. 'Who was with him — who's hurt?'

'It's our pilot, Max Otterman. He made a damn good landing, probably saved both their necks, but he's in a bad way. The plane's a write-off.'

It was sensational stuff, all right. They were both suitably impressed, and had more questions. After a while I managed to get rid of Sadiq by suggesting that the guarding of the plane was probably not being done to his satisfaction. He went away at once, to go and see for himself. Kemp would have gone along too but I detained him.

'You can look at the wreckage later.'

'I want to see Geoff and the pilot.'

'One's sleeping and the other's damn near unconscious. You can't do a thing for either just yet awhile. I'd rather you briefed me on what you've found out down there.'

Kemp said, 'The road is in good shape right up to the environs of Kodowa. The town is in a hell of a mess. It's been strafed and it's almost completely burnt up. The people are in shock, I'd say, and they certainly won't be much use to us, and there's not enough of us to be much use to them. It's a pretty ghastly situation. You're right it is a war.'

It was as much of an apology as I'd get.

'We didn't go right in because we got a lot of opposition. They felt ugly about anyone in uniform, and Sadiq didn't have enough force with him to do much about it. But we'll have to go back in eventually. Look, did Geoff say anything to you?'

'Not yet. I didn't let him. I want to hear his story as much as you do, but I thought he should rest up and wait for you to come back. Where's Ben Hammond, by the way?'

Kemp made a despairing gesture. 'You'll never believe it, but the damned troop truck broke down on the way back. String and cardboard army! Nobody knew what to do about it except Ben, so he's still out there doing a repair job. Should be along any moment, but Sadiq said he's sent some men back to give them support if they need it. There's nobody on the road. They shouldn't have any trouble.' But I could see that he was worried at having been persuaded to leave Ben out in the middle of the bush with a broken down truck and a handful of green soldiers. I didn't think much of the idea myself.

'He'll be OK,' I said hopefully. 'You'd better get yourself something to eat — and drink.'

'By God, yes. I could do with a beer.' He thought for a moment and then said, 'On second thoughts, no. We'd better go gently on our supplies from now on. I'll settle for a mug of gunfire.'

We exchanged humourless smiles. The slang term for camp tea had suddenly become alarmingly appropriate.

Ben turned up two hours later, hot, sticky and desperate for sustenance. Kemp broke into the newly-rationed beer stores for him; we hadn't yet told the men about this particular form of hardship and Kemp was not enjoying the prospect. Wingstead had slept steadily, and we didn't want to waken him. Otterman, on the other hand, seemed worse if anything. He tossed and muttered, cried out once or twice, and had us all extremely worried.

There must be doctors in Kodowa, but God knows how we'll find them, or whether they'll be able to help,' Kemp said fretfully. He was concerned for Max, but he was also disturbed by the increasing rate of entropy about us. The rapid breakdown from order to chaos was something he seemed ill-equipped to cope with.

'What do you plan to do?' Hammond asked Kemp.

'Go on into Kodowa this afternoon, with enough chaps of my own and of Sadiq's to make a reasonable show of solidarity. We have to locate their officialdom, if any, and find out the precise facts. And we're going to need food, and water — they ran a hell of a lot out of the tanker — and medical help. I'd like you both to come and I'll choose a few of the others.'

We were interrupted by Sandy Bing, coming up at the run.

'Brad says will you come, Mister Kemp. Mister Wingstead's awake.'

'Be right there.'

The awning had been strung up at the rig's side and under it Geoff Wingstead was sitting up and seemed a lot brighter. He reached up to pump Kemp's hand with obvious pleasure.

'You're all OK, then?' he said.

'Yes, we're fine. Problems, but no accidents,' said Kemp.

'I had to come up here and see for myself how you were doing. But I can't fly a plane and Max…' He broke off for a moment, then went on. 'Well, he's quite a fellow. They tell me he's in a bad way. Can we get help for him?'

Briefly, Kemp put him in the picture concerning the situation up ahead at Kodowa, or as much of it as we ourselves knew. Wingstead looked grave as we recapped the events of the past couple of days.

Finally he said, 'So we're OK for fuel, not too good for water, food or doctors. Well, you may not know it all, but you can probably guess that you're a damn sight better off here than if you had stayed in Port Luard. At least you're all alive.'

'Is it that bad?' I asked.

'Bloody bad. Riots, strife, total breakdown of authority. Shooting in the streets. Looting. Docks burning, police helpless, military running amok in every direction. All the usual jolly things we see on the nine o'clock news.'

'Oh, great. No getting out for us benighted foreigners, I suppose?'

'In theory, yes. But the airport's in rebel hands and the commercial planes aren't coming in. Kigonde's off somewhere trying to rally his army. I heard that Ousemane was dead, and that Daondo's managed to slip out of the country — which figures. He's a smart one, that lad. But none of the news is certain.'

Kemp, Hammond and I stared at him as he reeled off the grim facts.

'It's a shambles, and I don't quite know what we're going to do about it. I had to get up here, though. Guessed you'd not be getting regular news bulletins and might feel a bit lonely without me.'

Too true, Geoff. We all feel much better now,' I said sardonically, and he grinned at me. 'Yes, well, it didn't seem too difficult at first. I asked Max if he was game and he couldn't wait to give it a bash. And we'd have done all right, too, only…'

He paused for a moment.

'We'd seen the air force types streaking about here and there, taking no notice of us. And quite a lot of ground movement, tank troops, armoured columns and so on, but no actual fighting once we were clear of Port Luard.'

'How did you achieve that, by the way?'

'Oh, real Boy's Own stuff. It'll make a good tale one day. Anyway we figured we'd catch up with you about Kodowa. You're nicely to schedule, Kemp, by the way. My congratulations.'

Kemp snorted

'We reckoned to land there and cadge a lift back to you. There hadn't been any sign of the insurrection, you see, so we thought it was quieter up here. And then… it all happened at the same moment. I saw you, saw the rig parked and we started to come in for a closer look… there were some military trucks quite close and I wasn't sure if it was your official escort or not. And then there was this almighty slam and jerk and Max said we'd been hit. Christ, I… still can't really believe it. We hadn't seen any planes, couldn't believe we were being attacked. Max was superb. I think he was hit by a bit of metal, because he was already bleeding when he decided he had to put us down. It was a marvellous show, wasn't it, Neil? You saw it happen, didn't you?' 'Yes. It was great.'

He lay back against the pillow. 'I can fill you in with lots of detail about what's going on back in Port Luard, but I'm afraid I've come up here without a thought in my head about getting you all out,' he said apologetically. He was looking a little faded, I thought. I decided to let him rest, but perhaps in a more optimistic frame of mind.

'We've got a plan, haven't we, Basil?'

'You have?'

'Oh, yes,' Kemp said, playing along stoutly. 'Neil's idea really, and it's a very good one. We've every reason to think it may work. Look, I think you'd better rest up a bit. We're not going anywhere for what's left of today, not with the rig anyway. And the more rest you have now the more use you'll be to us tomorrow.'

Out of Wingstead's earshot we stopped and took a simultaneous deep breath.

'Do you think what I think?' Kemp asked.

'I do,' I said grimly. 'What I'd like to know is whether half of our gallant captain's men are rebels, or whether it was all nicely official from the start. Sadiq couldn't have known that Geoff was coming, but he may have left blanket orders to stop anyone who tried to get to us. He's inclined to be over-protective. Alternatively, he's got traitors in his ranks and doesn't know it.'

'Or he's one himself.'

'I don't think so. In that case he'd have immobilized us quite easily, long before this.'

'Are you going to ask him?' Hammond asked.

'Not yet. I think we should string him along a little. I suggest that we say nothing of this to anyone, and go ahead with the plan to inspect Kodowa a little-more closely. We need Sadiq for that, and as long as we keep alert, we may as well make the most use of him we can.'

When we breasted the rise and looked down, my first thought was that the problem was not that of getting beyond Kodowa but into it. Much of the town was still burning.

The central core of Kodowa consisted of two short streets running north and south and two intersecting streets running east and west. None of them was as wide or as well made as the great road on which we'd been travelling so far. This was the modern, 'downtown' area. The biggest building was three storeys high, or had been. Now it and most of the others lay in rubble on the streets.

The rest of the town had been of the local African architecture. But palm thatch burns well, and mud walls crumble with ease, and it looked as though a little section of hell had been moved into that valley. I don't know if the local authorities ever had any fire regulations, but if so they hadn't worked. Flames, driven by a wind which funnelled up the valley, had jumped across the streets and there wasn't going to be much left when the fires finally died., Sadiq said, They have killed this place.' His voice sounded bitter.

I twisted in my seat. I was driving with Sadiq because Kemp and I had planned it that way. Kemp had packed the Land Rover and the car with his own men so that there was no room for me. The idea was that I should be at hand to keep an eye on Sadiq.

Where the road narrowed as it entered the town it was blocked by a slow moving line of ramshackle traffic, beat up old cars and pick-up trucks, bullock carts and bicycles, all moving outwards, and slowed even more by one large limousine which had stalled right across the road. Sadiq drove off the road and unhooked his microphone. I got out and went towards the stalled car. The hood was up and two men were poking about under the bonnet, one a Nyalan and the other one of the Asiatic merchants who seem to monopolize so much of small retail business all over Africa. In this case he was a Syrian.

I tapped him on the shoulder. 'Get this car off the road. Push it.'

He turned a sweaty face to me and grimaced uncomprehendingly. I made gestures that they should shift the car and he shook his head irritably, spat out a short sentence I didn't understand, and turned back to the car. That was enough. I leaned over his shoulder, grabbed a handful of wiring and pulled. The only place that car could go now was off the road.

The Syrian whirled furiously and grabbed my shoulder. I let him have a fist in the gut, and he sprawled to the ground. He tried to scramble to his feet and clawed under his coat for some weapon so I kicked him in the ribs and he went down again just as Sadiq came up, unfastening the flap of his pistol holster.

'You have no right to attack citizens, Mister Mannix,' he said angrily.

I pointed to the ground. A heavy cosh had spilled out of the Syrian's jacket and lay near his inert hand.

'Some guys need a lot of persuading,' I said mildly. 'Let's get this thing out of here.' The other man had vanished.

Sadiq's pistol was a better persuader than my voice. He grabbed four able-bodied men out of the milling throng and within three minutes the road was cleared. As he reholstered his pistol he said, 'You believe in direct action, Mister Mannix?'

'When necessary — but I'm getting too old for brawling.' In fact the small display of aggression had done me the world of good. I'd really been needing to let off steam and it had been the Syrian merchant's bad luck to have been a handy target..

'I would prefer you do no more such things. For the moment please stay with your own men. Tell Mister Kemp I will meet him in the central square soon.' He was off before I had a chance to respond.

I pushed through the crowds and found our Land Rover parked at the intersection of the two main roads. Dozens of distressed, battle-shocked people milled about and smouldering debris lay everywhere. Our eyes watered with the sting of acrid smoke. Broken glass crunched under our boots as we picked our way through the rubble. The Nyalans shrank away from us, weeping women pulling their bewildered children from our path. It was incredibly disturbing.

It became obvious pretty soon that there was no one in charge; we saw no policemen, no soldiers apart from Sadiq's own troops, and no sign of a doctor, a hospital or even a Red Cross post. Attempts to get sensible answers from passers-by proved useless. Presently, utterly dispirited, we decided to withdraw.

The stream of refugees thinned out as we left the town but there were still a lot of them, going God knows where. But I was interested and pleased to see that on the outskirts Sadiq had set up the rudiments of a command post, and slowly his troops were beginning to bring order out of the chaos, reuniting families and doing a little crude first aid of their own. A makeshift camp was already taking shape and people were being bedded down, and some sort of food and drink was being circulated. It made me feel more confident about Sadiq.

We left him to get on with it. Our men were ready enough to give assistance, but we were not welcome and what little we had to offer wouldn't go nearly far enough. Kemp was anxious to keep our unit together; the crew were his responsibility and he was still thinking in terms of the safety of the rig. We drove back to our camp site in the dusk feeling very depressed.

Kemp went to give Wingstead an edited version of what we'd found. I settled down for a quiet cigarette while waiting for the meal that Bishop was preparing for us, and into the silence McGrath and Ron Jones settled down alongside me. Two cigarettes and one foul pipe glowed in the dusk.

'A hell of a thing, this,' Ron Jones said presently. The Welsh lilt in his voice seemed more pronounced than in full daylight. 'Shouldn't we be back there helping?'

'We can't do much,' I said. 'And I don't think Captain Sadiq really wants us. If he needs us he knows where we are.'

'We could spare them a bit of food, though.'

McGrath snorted.

'There could be five thousand people out there, Ron, and none of us is Jesus Christ. Five French loaves and two lobster tails?' I asked.

McGrath said, They get wind of our food stocks and they'll mob us, as like as not. I'd be happier with a gun in my fist, myself.'

'I don't know if you're right. Nyalans are peaceable folk. A gun may not be such a good idea. People tend to get the wrong impression when armed foreigners wander about taking part in someone else's war.'

'I'd still be happier with a gun in my cab,' he said. 'One of those Russian Kalashnikovs that the black lads carry, maybe. Better still, a Uzi like Sadiq has in his car.'

I glanced at him. 'You're observant.'

'It pays. I told you I was in the army once myself.'

'What rank?'

He grinned. 'Never more than sergeant. But I made sergeant three times.'

Ron Jones laughed. 'I never had the pleasure of army life,' he said. 'This is my idea of something to watch on the telly, not be caught in the middle of.'

Wingstead had said something similar. I reflected that a lot of men of my age were comparative innocents, after all.

McGrath said, 'Not this mess, maybe. But there are worse lives.' In the twilight he seemed even bigger than he looked by day, a formidable figure. He tamped down his pipe and went on, 'I've seen sights like this before though, many times, in other countries. It's all right for the soldiers but for the civilians it's very sad indeed. But there's nothing you or I can do about it.'

I had seen it before too. I thought back to my young days, to Pusan and Inchon, to the wrecked towns and refugee-lined roads, the misery and the squalor. I didn't want to see it ever again.

McGrath suddenly dug his elbow into my ribs.

'There's someone out there — with a white face. I think it's a woman!'

He scrambled to his feet and ran into the growing darkness.