Juggernaut

CHAPTER 26

By late afternoon the next day the lakeside was in a state of barely controlled turmoil. Tethered to the shore as close as possible without grounding lay the first 'B'-gon. It was held by makeshift anchors, large rocks on the end of some rusty chains. A gangplank of half-sectioned logs formed a causeway along which a truck could be driven on to the raft. Beyond it lay the second raft, just finished.

Nyalans clustered around full of pride and excitement at seeing their home-made contraptions being put to use. A few had volunteered to come with us but Sadiq had wisely vetoed this idea. I don't think he was any happier about us either but here he had no choice.

From the rig patients and nurses watched with interest. Our intention was to have the truck ready on board rather than manoeuvre it in the dark of the following morning.

'Why a truck at all?' Wingstead had asked. 'If you take Kanjali there'll be transport in plenty there for you. And there'll be no means to unload this one.'

'Think of it as a Trojan Horse, Geoff,' I'd said. 'For one thing it'll have some men in it and the others concealed behind it. If the rebels see us drifting towards them then all they'll see is a truck on a raft and a couple of men waving and looking helpless. For another, it'll take quite a bit of equipment, weapons and so on. They'll be safer covered up. It's not a truck for the time being, it's a ship's bridge.'

Hammond approved. He was the nearest thing to a naval man we had, having served in a merchant ship for a short time. I had appointed him skipper of the 'B'-gon. 'Inside the cab I've a much better view than from deck.'

There was a fourth reason, but even Hammond didn't know it.

The gangplank was ready. Kemp as load master beckoned the truck forward. The driver was Mick McGrath. It was going to be a ticklish operation to get the thing safely on board and he was the best we had, apart from Hammond himself. Zimmerman disappeared behind the truck as McGrath started to drive down the shore.

There was a sudden high grinding scream from the truck's engine and the vehicle lurched, bucked and came to a standstill. McGrath's face, looking puzzled and annoyed, appeared at the cab window. Voices shouted simultaneously.

'Christ, watch out! The rear wheel's adrift! 1'

McGrath jumped down and glared at the damage. One tyre was right off its axle and the truck was canted over into the dust, literally stranded.

'Fetch the jacks!' he called.

I said, 'No time — get another truck. Zimmerman, go drive one down here! You men get cracking and unload the gear.' I gave them no time to think and Kemp, always at his best in a transport crisis, was at my elbow. Considering that I'd anticipated the accident and he hadn't, he coped very well. Swiftly he cleared a path through the littered beach so that a second truck could get around the stranded one and still be able to mount the causeway. An engine roared as Zimmerman returned with the replacement.

Antoine Dufour sprang forward, his face suddenly white.

'No! Not that one — that's my truck!' he yelled.

His vehemence startled the men around him.

'Come on, Frenchie, any damn truck'll do,' someone said.

'Not that one!'

'Sorry, Dufour; it must have been the nearest to hand,' I said crisply. Dufour was furious but impotent to stop the truck as it passed us and lined up precisely at the causeway. Zimmerman leapt out of the cab for McGrath to take his place, but Dufour was on top of him.

'You not take my truck, by God!' He lapsed into a spate of French as he struggled to pass Zimmerman who held him back.

Tack it in!' Kemp's voice rose. 'Dufour, ease off. This truck's part of the convoy now and we'll damn well use it if we have to.'

I said urgently, 'McGrath — get in there and drive it on fast.'

He looked at me antagonistically.

'There are other trucks, Mannix. Let the Frenchy alone.'

'Will you for God's sake obey an order!' I hadn't expected opposition from anyone but Dufour himself. McGrath's eyes locked with mine for a moment and then he pushed his way past Dufour and Zimmerman, swung himself aboard and gunned the motor. He slammed the truck into gear and jerked it onto the causeway. Then common sense made him calm down to inch the truck steadily onto the oddly-shaped 'B'-gon raft. The thing tipped under the weight but to our relief did not founder, and although water lapped about the truck's wheels it was apparent that we had a going proposition on our hands. The cheer that went up was muted. The onlookers were still puzzled by Dufour's outburst.

Kemp got men to put chocks under the truck's wheels and make lashings fast. The gear was loaded. Then the raft was hauled further out to lie well clear of the bank.

I turned my attention to Dufour.

He had subsided but was pale and shaken. As I passed Zimmerman I gave him a small nod of approval, then took Dufour's arm.

'Antoine,' I said, 'come with me. I want a word.'

As we walked away he stared over his shoulder at his truck where it rode on our ridiculous raft offshore and out of his reach.

We stopped out of earshot of the others.

'Antoine, I apologize. It was a dirty trick to play.'

'Monsieur Mannix, you do not know what you have done,' he said.

'Oh yes I do. You are thinking of your secret cargo, aren't you?'

His jaw dropped. 'You know?' 'Of course I know. Zimmerman found it and told me. It's his trade, don't forget. He could probably sniff out gelignite at a mile.'

Dufour stared at me appalled. I had to reassure him on one point at once.

'Now, listen. I don't care a damn why you have the stuff. Or where you got it. It's no bloody business of mine. But right now that stuff you've got is the best weapon in our whole arsenal, and to get ourselves and everyone else out of this mess we need it.'

'Oh, my God.' As he looked at me and I saw a bitter smile on his face. 'Gelignite. You want to use my truck to blow up the enemy, yes?'

'I hope not. But it's a damn good threat. Harry Zimmerman will pass the word around, and the assault team will know that we've got a bomb out there. It'll be like pointing a cannon. The rebels have no weapon that can reach us, and we've got one that can devastate them. That's why we have the second 'B'-gon along; if we need to we evacuate the first, aim it at the landing point and let her rip. Now do you understand?'

'Suppose I told you the gelignite was worthless.'

'Don't try. We need it.'

He sat down as if his knees had given way. After a couple of minutes he raised his face and said, 'Yes, I understand. You are a clever man, Monsieur Mannix. Also a bastard. I wish us all luck.'

Back at the camp I put my affairs in order. I wrote a personal letter to leave with the Doctor, and gave Sam Kironji an impressive-looking letter on British Electric notepaper, promising that my company would reimburse him for all expenses and recommending him for a bonus. This I implemented with a cash bonus of my own which impressed him even more.

Wingstead and I discussed the rig. If we took the ferry the convoy would move to Kanjali so that the patients could be transferred. And there the rig would have to be abandoned.

'We have to be careful of Kemp, though,' Wingstead said. The rig means a lot more to him than to me. It's extraordinary; personally I think he's been bitten by the juggernaut bug as hard as any of the Nyalans.'

'I wonder what they'll do when it grinds to a halt and we abandon it,' I said idly.

'Go home again. It'll probably end up in their mythology.'

'And the rig itself?'

'Whoever gets into power will engage someone to. drive it up to Bir Oassa, I suppose. It'll be an interesting exercise in international finance, sorting out the costs and legalities involved. But I'll tell you one thing, Neil, whoever takes it it won't be me. I've had it here. I'll sell it to the best offer.'

'And what then?'

'Go back home with Kemp and Hammond and build a better one. We've learned a hell of a lot out here.'

'Stick to hydroelectric schemes in Scotland, will you?'

He laughed. 'That's the way I feel now. As for later, who knows?'

For the second day running we embarked in the chill small hours to sail down the Katali River to Kanjali. I felt very apprehensive. Yesterday had been an unnerving experience for anyone untrained in guerrilla warfare. Today was terrifying.

The two 'B'-gons were barely visible. We used the runabout as a tender, poling it over the dark water to lie alongside the 'B'-gon on which stood the darker bulk of the truck. We scrambled aboard, passing our weapons up to be stowed in the truck.

Hammond and his work team had lashed the two 'B'-gons together, slotting hexagon shapes into one another, adding a couple of 'A'-gons here and there and assembling the thing like a child's toy.

The truck barely fitted on the after section, a foot of space to spare around it. With its high rear section and flat forward deck it was a travesty of the ferry at Kanjali. Aft on a crossbeamed structure Hammond had mounted Sam Kironji's outboard motors; one was a seven horsepower job and one six, which meant they were close enough in motive power not to send us in a circle. He had a man on each throttle and would control their speed and direction from the cab of the truck.

We were all very quiet as we set off.

We'd made our farewells, temporary ones I hoped. Dr Kat said that Lang might not live to see Manzu. I wondered how many of us would.

I had one curious experience on the journey. I hadn't forgotten McGrath's belligerence on the beach, and twice since he'd jibbed at instructions in a way that I could only think of as petulant. He wasn't just important to the success of our mission, he was vital. I had to find out what was bothering him.

'McGrath, I want to talk to you.'

He turned away.

'Now!'

I moved crouching away from the others and felt some relief that he followed me. We made our way forward, where small waves broke coldly over our faces.

'Mick, what the hell is eating you?' I asked.

He looked sullen. 'Nothing. I don't know what you mean,' he said. He didn't look at me.

'If you've got a gripe for God's sake say so.'

'We're not in the army, Mannix. You're not my officer and I'm not your bloody sergeant.'

'Oh Jesus!' I said. 'A goddamn prima donna. What's your beef?'

'Stop bloody ordering me about. I'm fed up with it.'

I took a deep breath. This was crazy.

I said, 'Mick, you're the. best driver we've got. You're also the nearest thing we've got to a soldier, and we're going to need your know-how more than anyone else's, even Sadiq.'

'Now don't think I'll jump when you say so, Mannix, just for a bit of flattery,' he said. To my disbelief his tone was one of pique.

'OK, McGrath, no flattery. But what's really eating you?'

He shrugged. 'Nothing.'

'Then why go temperamental on me? You've never been afraid to speak your mind before.'

He made a fist with one hand and banged it into the other. 'Well, you and me were friendly, like. We think the same way. But ever since Makara and that bit of a fight at the bridge, you've hardly said a word to me.'

I regarded him with profound astonishment. This tough and amoral man was behaving like a schoolboy who'd been jilted in his first calflove.

'I've been goddamn busy lately.'

There's more to it than that. I'd say you've taken a scunner to me. Know what that means, Yank?'

'I don't know what the hell you're talking about. If you don't take orders I can't trust you and I won't let this whole operation fall apart because of your injured feelings. When we arrive at Kanjali you stay back on the raft. Damned if I'll entrust Bing or anyone else to your moods!'

I rose abruptly to go back to the shelter of the truck. He called after me, 'Mannix! Wait!'

I crouched down again, a ludicrous position in which to quarrel, and waited.

'You're right. I'm sorry. I'll take your orders. You'll not leave me behind, will you?'

For a moment I was totally lost for words.

'All right,' I said at last, wearily. 'You come as planned. And you toe the line, McGrath. Now get back into shelter or we'll both freeze.'

Later I thought about that curious episode.

During his stint in the army and presumably in Ireland too he had never risen in rank; a man to take orders, not quite the loner he seemed. But the man whose orders he obeyed had to be one he respected, and this respect had nothing to do with rank or social standing. He had no respect for Kemp and not much for Wingstead. But for me, perhaps because I'd had the nerve to tackle him directly about Sisley's murder, certainly because he'd sensed the common thread that sometimes linked our thoughts and actions, it seemed that he had developed that particular kind of respect.

But lately I had rejected him. I had in fact avoided him ever since we'd found the body of Ron Jones. And he was sensitive enough to feel that rejection. By God, Mannix, I thought. You're a life-sized father figure to a psychopath] Once again as we neared Kanjali dawn was just breaking. The sky was pinkish and the air raw with the rise of the morning wind. Hammond instructed the engine handlers to throttle back so that we were moving barely faster than the run of the current. Before long the two bulky outlines, the ferry and the buildings on the bank, came steadily into view. Sadiq gave quiet orders and his men began handing down their rifles from the truck.

Hammond brought us close to the bank some way upstream from where he intended to stop, and the raft nuzzled into the fringing reeds which helped slow its progress. A dozen men flung themselves overboard and splashed ashore carrying mooring lines, running alongside the raft until Hammond decided to go no further. I thought of his fear of crocodiles and smiled wryly. The noise we were making was enough to scare off any living thing and I could only pray that it wouldn't carry down to the men sleeping at Kanjali.

We tied up securely and the weapons were handed ashore. Hammond set his team to separating the two parts of the raft into their original 'B'-gon shapes and transferring the two outboards to a crossbeam on the section without the truck. This was to be either our escape craft or our means of crossing to Manzu to seek help in handling the ferry.

Once on shore I had my first chance to tell Hammond privately about Dufour's truck. 'Harry saw six cases of the stuff, and checked one to be sure. If we have to we're going to threaten to use it like a fire ship. Harry's got a firing mechanism worked out. He'll come back here, set it and cut the raft free.'

'It might float clear before it goes off, Neil,' Hammond said. His horror at this amateurish plan made me glad I hadn't told him about it sooner. 'Or run aground too soon. The firing mechanism might fail. Or blow itself to smithereens and never touch Kanjali at all!'

'You know that and I know that, but will they? We'll make the threat so strong that they won't dare disbelieve it.'

It was a pretty desperate plan but it was all we had. And it didn't help that at this point Antoine Dufour approached us and said, 'Please, Monsieur Mannix, do not put too much faith in my cargo, I beg of you.' He looked deeply troubled.

'What's the matter with it? If it's old and unstable we'll have to take our chances,' I said brusquely.

'Aah, no matter.' His shrug was eloquent of distress. I sensed that he wanted to say more but my recent brush with McGrath had made me impatient with other men's problems. I had enough on my plate.

Sadiq and his men moved out. The rest of us followed, nervous and tense. We moved quietly, well down in the cover of the trees and staying far back enough from Sadiq's squad to keep them in sight until the moment they rushed the buildings. We stopped where the vegetation was cut back to make way for the landing point. I had a second opportunity to look at the moored ferry where it was caught in the sun's first rays as though in a searchlight beam.

This time I recognized what had eluded me before.

This was no modern ferry. It was scarred and battered, repainted many times but losing a battle to constant rust, a valiant old warhorse now many years from its inception and many miles from its home waters. It was an LCM, Landing Craft Mechanized, a logistics craft created during the war years that led up to the Normandy landings in 1944. Developed from the broad-beamed, shallow-draughted barges of an earlier day, these ships had carried a couple of tanks, an assortment of smaller vehicles or a large number of men into action on the sloping European beaches. Many of them were still in use all over the world. It was about fifty feet long.

What this one was doing here on an inland lake up an unnavigable river was anybody's guess.

I turned my attention to Kanjali, lying below us. There were five buildings grouped around the loading quay. A spur from the road to Fort Pirie dropped steeply to the yards. Running into the water was a concrete ramp, where the bow of the ferry would drop for traffic to go aboard. A couple of winches and sturdy bollards stood one to either side. Just beyond was a garage.

The largest building was probably the customs post, not much bigger than a moderate-sized barn. Beyond it there was a larger garage, a small shop and filling station, and a second barn-like building which was probably a warehouse.

Sadiq's men fanned out to cover the customs post front and rear, the store and warehouse. Our team followed more hesitantly as we decided where to go. Kemp, Pitman and I ran to our post, the landing stage, and into cover behind the garage. Thorpe was at my heels but I told him to go with McGrath and he veered away.

We waited tensely for any sounds. Kemp was already casting a careful professional eye on the roadway to the landing stage and the concrete wharf beside it on the shore. It was old and cracked, with unused bollards along it, and must have been used to ship and unship goods from smaller craft in the days before the crossing had a ferry. But it made a good long piece of hard ground standing well off the road, and Kemp was measuring it as another staging post for the rig. The steep spur road might be a problem.

We heard nothing.

'Shall I go and look?' Pitman asked after several interminable minutes. I shook my head.

'Not yet, Bob.'

As I spoke a voice shouted and another answered it. There were running footsteps and a sudden burst of rifle fire. I flattened myself to peer round the corner of the garage. As I did so an unmistakably male European voice called from inside it, 'Hey! What's happening out there?'

We stared at one another. Near us was a boarded-up window. I reached up and pounded on it.

'Who's in there?'

'For God's sake, let us out!'

I heaved a brick at the window, shattering glass but not breaching the boards that covered it. The doors would be easier. We ran round to the front to see a new padlock across the ancient bolt. Then the yard suddenly swarmed with figures running in every direction. There were more rifle shots.

I struggled vainly with the padlock.

Kemp said, 'They're on the run, by God!'

He was right. A few soldiers stood with their arms raised. Some slumped on the ground. Others were streaking for the road. Someone started the Volvo but it slewed violently and crashed into the side of the warehouse. Sadiq's men surrounded it as the driver, a Nyalan in civilian clothing, staggered out and fell to the ground. The door to the main building was open and two of our soldiers covered as men ran across the clearing and vanished inside, Bishop, Bing, McGrath and I thought Kirilenko, en route I hoped for the radio.

Sadiq's men were hotfoot after stragglers.

Neither Kemp, Pitman nor I were directly involved and within five minutes from the first shout it was all over. It was unnerving; the one thing my imagination had never dared to consider was a perfect takeover.

Hammond came away from one of the trucks grinning broadly and waving a distributor cap. Sadiq was everywhere, counting men, posting sentries, doing a textbook mopping up operation. We went to join the others, leaving whoever was in the locked garage to wait.

'Christ, that was fantastic. Well done, Captain! How many were there?'

Hammond said, 'We reckon not more than fourteen, less than we expected.'

'Any casualties?'

McGrath was beside me, grinning with scorn. 'Not to us and hardly to them. A few sore heads, mostly. Those laddies were half asleep and didn't know what hit them. A few ran off, but I don't think they'll be telling tales. They thought we were demons, I reckon.'

I looked around. Several faces were missing.

'Bing?' I asked.

'He's fine, already playing with that dinky radio set of theirs. Brad and Ritchie are with him,' McGrath said., 'The Volvo's had it,' said Hammond, 'but the other vehicles are fine. We can use them any time we want to. They didn't even have a sentry posted.'

It wasn't too surprising. They had no reason to expect trouble, no officer to keep them up to the mark, and probably little military training in the first place. I said, 'We've found something interesting. There's someone locked in the garage by the landing. There's a padlock but we can shoot it off.'

We gathered round the garage door and I yelled, 'Can you hear us in there?'

A muffled voice shouted back, 'Sure can. Get us out of here!'

'We're going to shoot the lock off. Stand clear.'

One of Sadiq's men put his gun to the padlock and blew it and a chunk of the door apart. The doors sagged open.

I suppose we looked as haggard and dirty to the two men who emerged as they looked to us. Both were white, one very large and somewhat overweight, the other lean and sallow-skinned. Their clothing was torn and filthy, and both were wounded. The big man had a dirtily bandaged left arm, the other a ragged and untreated scabby gash down the side of his face. The lean man took a couple of steps, wavered and slid gently to his knees.

We jumped to support him.

'Get him into the shade,' Kemp said. 'Fetch some water. You OK?'

The big man nodded and walked unaided. I thought that if he fell it would take four of us to carry him.

I left Kemp to supervise for a moment, and took Sadiq aside.

'Are you really in full command here?' I asked. 'What about the men who ran off?'

'They will probably run away and not report to anyone. But if they do I hope it will be a long time before others get here.'

'Do you think it's safe to bring the convoy here? If we can work the ferry we won't have any time to waste.' Already hope was burgeoning inside me. Sadiq thought in his usual careful way before replying.

'I think it is worth the chance.'

I called to Kemp. 'Basil, take your team and get back to Kironji's place. Start shifting the convoy. Leave the fuel tanker and the chuck wagon. Bring the rig and tractors, and cram the rest into a truck or two, no more.'

The two newcomers were being given some rough and ready first aid. Bishop had found the food stores and was preparing a meal for us, which was welcome news indeed.

I went back to squat down beside the recent prisoners.

'I'm Neil Mannix of British Electric, and this mob works for Wyvern Transport. We're taking stuff to the oilfields… or were when the war started. The soldiers with us are loyal to Ousemane's government. We're all in a bit of a fix, it seems.'

The big man gave me a smile as large as his face.

'A fix it certainly is. Bloody idiots! After all I've done for them too. You're American, aren't you? I'm pleased to meet you — all of you. You've done us a good turn, pitching up like this. My name's Pete Bailey, and it's a far cry from Southampton where I got my start in life.' He extended a vast hand to engulf mine. Good humour radiated from him.

His hand bore down on the shoulder of his companion. 'And this here is my pal Luigi Sperrini. He talks good English but he doesn't think so. Say hello, Luigi, there's a good lad.'

Sperrini was in pain and had little of his friend's apparently boundless stamina but he nodded courteously.

'I am Sperrini. I am grateful you come,' he said and then shut his eyes. He looked exhausted.

Tell the lads to hurry with that food,' I said to Bishop, and then to Bailey, 'How long were you two guys locked in there?'

'Four days we made it. Could have been a little out, mark you, not being able to tell night from day. Ran out of water too. Silly idiots, they look after their bloody cattle better than that.' But there didn't seem to be much real animosity in Rim, in spite of the fact that he and his companion seemed to be a fair way to being callously starved to death.

I braced myself for the question I most wanted to ask.

'Who are you guys anyway? What do you do?'

And I got the answer I craved.

'What do you think, old son? We run the bloody ferry.'