Текст книги "The Dark of the Sun"

Автор книги: Wilbur Smith

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The Dark Of The Sun [047-066-4.8]

By: Wilbur Smith

Category: Fiction Thriller

Synopsis:

The bend in the road rushed towards them, just a few more seconds. Then

with a succession of jarring crashes that shook the whole body of the

car a burst of fire hit them from behind. The windscreen starred into a

sheet of opaque diamond lacework, the dashboard clock exploded powdering

Shermaine's hair with particles of glass, two bullets tore "through the

seat ripping out the stuffing like the entrails of a wounded animal.

"Bruce Curry is the leader of a mercenary band with the dubious support

of three white officers. His mission is to relieve a mining

town cut off by the fighting and to retrieve a priceless consignment of

diamonds. Ranged against his ill-disciplined unit are bandits,

guerrillas and hostile tribes that infest the land. But there is

another, even deadlier enemy, – one of his own men ...

"I don't like the idea," announced Wally Hendry, and belched. He moved

his tongue round his mouth getting the taste of it before he went on. "I

think the whole idea stinks like a ten-day corpse." He lay sprawled on

one of the beds with a glass balanced on his naked chest

and he was sweating heavily in the Congo heat.

"Unfortunately your opinion doesn't alter the fact that we are going."

Bruce Curry went on laying out his shaving tackle without looking up.

"You shoulda told them to keep it, told them we were staying here in

Elisabethville, – why didn't you tell them that, hey?" o Hendry picked

up his glass and swallowed the contents.

"Because they pay me not to argue." Bruce spoke without interest and

looked at himself in the fly-spotted mirror above the washbasin.

The face that looked back was sundarkened with a cap of close-cropped

black hair; soft hair that would be unruly and inclined to curl if it

were longer.

Black eyebrows slanting upwards at the corners, green eyes with a heavy

fringe of lashes and a mouth which could smile as readily as it

could sulk. Bruce regarded his good looks without pleasure. It was a

long time since he had felt that emotion, a long time since his mouth

had either smiled or sulked. He did not feel the old tolerant affection

for his nose, the large slightly hooked nose that rescued his face from

prettiness and gave him the air of a genteel pirate.

"Jesus!" growled Wally Hendry from the bed. "I've had just about a

gutsful of this nigger army. I don't mind fighting but I don't fancy

going hundreds of miles out into the bush to play nursemaid to a bunch

of bloody refugees."

"It's a hell of a life," agreed Bruce absently and spread shaving-soap

on his face. The lather was very white against his tan. Under a skin

that glowed so healthily that it appeared to have been freshly oiled,

the muscles of his

shoulders and chest changed shape as he moved. He was in good

condition, fitter than he had been for many years, but this fact gave

him no more pleasure than had his face.

"Get me another drink, Andre." Wally Hendry thrust his empty glass into

the hand of the man who sat on the edge of the bed.

The Belgian stood up and went across to the table obediently.

"More whisky and less beer in this one," Wally instructed, turned once

more to Bruce and belched again. "That's what I think of the

idea." As Andre poured Scotch whisky into the glass and filled it with

beer Wally hitched around the pistol in its webbing holster until it

hung between his legs.

"When are we leaving?" he asked.

"There'll be an engine and five coaches at the goods yard first thing

tomorrow morning. We'll load up and get going as soon as possible."

Bruce started to shave, drawing the razor down from temple to chin and

leaving the skin smooth and brown behind it.

"After three months of" fighting a bunch of greasy little Gurkhas

I was looking forward to a bit of fun. – I haven't even had a pretty in

all that time – now the second day after the ceasefire and they ship us

out again."

"C'est laguerre," muttered Bruce, his face twisted in the

act of shaving.

"What's that mean?" demanded Wally suspiciously.

"That's war," Bruce translated.

"Talk English, Bucko." It was the measure of Wally Hendry that after six

months

in the Belgian Congo he could neither speak nor understand a

single word of French.

There was silence again, broken only by the scraping of Bruce's razor

and the small metallic sound as the fourth man in the hotel room

stripped and cleaned his FN rifle.

"Have a drink, Haig," Wally invited him.

"No, thanks." Michael Haig glanced up, not trying to conceal his

distaste as he looked at Wally.

"You're another snotty bastard – don't want to drink with me, hey?

Even the high-class Captain Curry is drinking with me. What makes you so

goddam special?"

"You know that I don't drink." Haig turned his attention back to his

weapon, handling it with easy familiarity. For

all of them the ugly automatic rifles had become an extension of their

own bodies. Even while shaving Bruce had only to drop his hand to reach

the rifle propped against the wall, and the two men on the bed had

theirs on the floor beside them.

"You don't drink!" chuckled Wally. "Then how did you get that

complexion, Bucko? How come your nose looked like a ripe plum?" Haig's

mouth tightened and the hands on his rifle stilled.

"Cut it out, Wally," said Bruce without heat.

"Haig don't drink," crowed Wally, and dug the little Belgian in the ribs

with his thumb, "get that, Andre! He's a tee-bloody-total!

My old man was a tee total also; sometimes for two, three months at a

time he was tee total, and then he'd come home one night and sock the old

lady in the clock so you could hear her teeth rattle from across the

street." His laughter choked him and he had to wait for it to clear

before he went on.

"My bet is that you're that kind of tee total, Haig. One drink and you

wake up ten days later; that's it, isn't it?

One drink and – pow! – the old girl gets it in the chops and the kids

don't eat for a couple of weeks." Haig laid the rifle down carefully on

the bed and looked at Wally with his jaws clenched, but

Wally had not noticed.

He went on happily.

"Andre, take the whisky bottle and hold it under Old Teetotal

Haig's nose. Let's watch him slobber at the mouth and his eyes stand out

like a pair of dog's balls." Haig stood up. Twice the age of Wally – a

man in his middle fifties, with grey in his hair and the refinement of

his features not completely obliterated by the marks that life had left

upon them. He had arms like a boxer and a powerful set to his shoulders.

"It's about time YOU learned a few manners, Hendry. Get on your feet."

"You wanta dance or something? I don't waltz, – ask

Andre. He'll dance with you – won't you, Andre?" Haig was balanced on

the balls of his feet, his hands closed and raised slightly. Bruce

Curry placed his razor on the shelf above the basin, and moved quietly

round the table with soap still on his face to take up a position from

which he could intervene. There he waited, watching the two men.

"Get up, you filthy gutter-snipe."

"Hey, Andre, get that. He talks pretty, hey? He talks real pretty

"I'm going to smash that ugly face of yours right into the middle of the

place where your brain should have been."

"Jokes! This boy is a natural comic." Wally laughed, but there was

something wrong with . the sound of it. Bruce knew then that Wally was

not going to fight. Big arms and swollen chest covered

with ginger hair, belly flat and hard, looking, thick-necked below the

wide flat-featured face with its little Mongolian eyes; but Wally wasn't

going to fight.

Bruce was puzzled: he remembered the night at the road bridge and he

knew that Hendry was no coward, and yet now he was not going to take up

Haig's challenge.

Mike Haig moved towards the bed.

"Leave him, Mike." Andre spoke for the first time, his voice soft as a

girl's. "He was only joking. He didn't mean it

"Hendry, don't think I'm too much of a gentleman to hit you because

you're on your back. Don't make that mistake."

"Big deal," muttered Wally. "This boy's not only a comic, he's a bloody

hero also." Haig stood over him and lifted his right hand with the fist,

bunched like a hammer, aimed at Wally's face.

"Haig!" Bruce hadn't raised his voice but its tone checked the older

man.

"That's enough, said Bruce.

"But this filthy little-"

"Yes, I know," said Bruce. "Leave him!"

With his fist still up Mike Haig hesitated, and there was no movement in

the room. Above them the corrugated iron roof popped loudly as it

expanded in the heat of the Congo midday, and the only other sound was

Haig's breathing. He was panting and his face was congested with blood.

"Please, Mike," whispered Andre. "He didn't mean it." Slowly

Haig's anger changed to disgust and he dropped his hand, turned away and

picked up his rifle from the other bed.

"I can't stand the smell in this room another minute. I'll wait for you

in the truck downstairs, Bruce."

"I won't be long," agreed Bruce as Mike went to the door.

"Don't push your luck, Haig," Wally called after him.

"Next time you won't get off so easily." In the doorway Mike Haig swung

quickly, but, with a hand on his shoulder, Bruce turned him

again.

"Forget it, Mike," he said, and closed the door after him.

"He's just bloody lucky that he's an old man," growled Wally.

"Otherwise I'd have fixed him good." "Sure," said Bruce. "It was decent

of you to let him go." The soap had dried on his face and he wet his

brush to lather again.

"Yeah, I couldn't hit an old bloke like that, could I?" "No." Bruce

smiled a little. "But don't worry, you frightened the hell out of him.

He won't try it again."

"He'd better notv warned Hendry. "Next time

I'll kill the old bugger." No, you wont, thought Bruce, you'll back down

again as you have just done, as you've done a dozen times before.

Mike and I are the only ones who can make you do it; in the same way as

an animal will growl at its trainer but cringe away when he cracks the

whip. He began shaving again.

The heat in the room was unpleasant to breathe; it drew the perspiration

out of them and the smell of their bodies blended sourly with stale

cigarette smoke and liquor fumes.

"Where are you and Mike going?" Andre ended the long silence.

"We're going to see if we can draw the supplies for this trip. If we

have any luck we'll take them down to the goods yard and have Ruffy put

an armed guard on them overnight," Bruce answered him, leaning over the

basin and splashing water up into his face.

"How long will we be away?" Bruce shrugged. "A week – ten days'.

He sat on his bed and pulled on one of his jungle boots. "That is, if we

don't have any trouble." "Trouble, Bruce?" asked Andre.

"From Msapa Junction we'll have to go two hundred miles through country

crawling with Baluba."

"But we'll be in a train," protested

Andre. "They've only got bows and arrows, they can't touch us."

"Andre, there are seven rivers to cross – one big one and bridges are

easily destroyed. Rails can be torn up." Bruce began to lace the boot.

"I don't think it's going to be a Sunday school picnic."

"Christ. I

think the whole thing stinks," repeated Wally moodily." Why are we going

anyway?"

"Because, Bruce began patiently, "for the last three months the entire

population of Port Reprieve has been cut off from the rest of the world.

There are women and children with them. They are fast running out of

food and the other necessities of life." Bruce paused to light a

cigarette, and then went on talking as he exhaled.

"All around them the Baluba tribe is in open revolt, burning, raping and

killing indiscriminately. As yet they haven't attacked the town but it

won't be very long until they do.

Added to which there are rumours that rebel groups of Central

Congolese troops and of our own forces have formed themselves into bands

of heavily-armed shufta. They also are running amok through the northern

part of the territory.

Nobody knows for certain what is happening out there, but whatever it is

you can be sure it's not very pretty. We are going to fetch those people

in to safety."

"Why don't the U.N. people send out a plane?" asked Andre.

"No landing field."

"Helicopters?"

"Out of range."

"For my money the bastards can stay there," grunted Wally. "If the

Balubas fancy a

little man steak, who are we to do them out of a meal? Every man's

entitled to eat and as long as it's not me they're eating, more power to

their teeth, say?" He placed his foot against Andre's back and

straightened his leg suddenly, throwing the Belgian off the bed on to

his knees.

"Go and get me a pretty."

"There aren't any, Wally. I'll get you another drink." Andre scrambled

to his feet and reached for Wally's empty glass, but Wally's hand

dropped on to his wrist.

"I said pretty, Andre, not drink."

"I don't know where to find them, Wally." Andre's voice was desperate.

"I don't know what to say

to them even."

"You're being stupid, Bucko. I might have to break your arm." Wally

twisted the wrist slowly. "You know as well as I that the bar downstairs

is full of them. You know that, don't you?"

"But what do I say to them?" Andre's face was contorted with the pain of

his twisted wrist.

"Oh, for Christ's sake, you stupid bloody frog-eater – just go down and

flash a banknote. You don't have to say a dicky bird."

"You're hurting me, Wally."

"No? You're kidding!" Wally smiled at him, twisting harder, his slitty

eyes smoky from the liquor, and Bruce could see he was enjoying it. "Are

you going, BUcko? Make up your mind -

get me a pretty or get yourself a broken arm

"All right, if that's what you want. I'll go. Please leave me, I'll go,"

mumbled Andre.

"That's what I want." Wally released him, and he straightened up

massaging his wrist.

"See that she's clean and not too old. You hear me?"

"Yes, Wally.

I'll get one." Andre went to the door and Bruce noticed his expression.

It was stricken beyond the pain of a bruised wrist. What lovely

creatures they are, thought Bruce, and I am one of them and yet apart

from them. I am the watcher, stiffed by them as much as I would be by a

bad play. Andre went out.

"Another drink, Bucko?" said Wally expansively. "I'll even pour you

one." "Thanks," said Bruce, and started on the other boot.

Wally brought the glass to him and he tasted it. It was strong, and the

mustiness of the whisky was ill-matched with the sweetness of the beer,

but he drank it.

"You and I, said Wally, "we're the shrewd ones. We drink ,cause we want

to, not "cause we have to. We live like we want to live, not

like other people think we should. You and I got a lot in common, Bruce.

We should be friends, you and I. I mean us being so much alike." The

drink was working in him now, bluffing his speech a little.

"Of course we are friends – I count you as one of my very dearest,

Wally." Bruce spoke solemnly, no trace of sarcasm showing.

"No kidding?" Wally asked earnestly. "How's that, hey?

Christ, I always thought you didn't like me. Christ, you never can tell,

isn't that right? You just never can tell," shaking his head in wonder,

suddenly sentimental with the whisky. "That's really true?

You like me. Yeah, we could be buddies. How's that, Bruce? Every guy

needs a buddy. Every guy needs a back stop." "Sure," said Bruce.

"We're buddies. How's that, hey?"

"That's on, Bucko!" agreed Wally with deep feeling, and I feel nothing,

thought Bruce, no disgust, no

pity – nothing. That way you are secure; they cannot disappoint you,

they cannot disgust you, they cannot sicken you, they cannot smash you

up again.

They both looked up as Andre ushered the girl into the room. She had a

sexy little pug face, painted lips – ruby on amber.

"Well done, Andre," applauded Wally, looking at the girl's body.

She wore high heels and a short pink dress that flared into a skirt from

her waist but did not cover her knees.

"Come here, cookie." Wally held out his hand to her and she crossed the

room without hesitation, smiling a bright professional smile. Wally drew

her down beside him on to the bed.

Andre went on standing in the doorway. Bruce got up and shrugged into

his camouflage battle-jacket, buckled on his webbing belt and adjusted

the bolstered pistol until it hung comfortably on his outer thigh.

"Are you going?" Wally was feeding the girl from his glass.

"Yes." Bruce put his slouch hat on his head; the red, green and white

Katangese sideflash gave him an air of artificial gaiety.

"Stay a little, – come on, Bruce."

"Mike is waiting for me." Bruce

picked up his rifle.

"Muck him. Stay a little, we'll have some fun."

"No, thanks."

Bruce went to the door.

"Hey, Bruce. Take a look at this." Wally tipped the girl backwards over

the bed, he pinned her with one arm across her chest while she struggled

playfully and with the other hand he swept her

skirt up above her waist.

"Take a good look at this and tell me you still want to go! The girl was

naked under the skirt, her lower body shaven so that her plump little

sex pouted sulkily.

"Come on, Bruce," laughed Wally. "You first. Don't say I'm not your

buddy." Bruce glanced at the girl, her legs scissored and her body

wriggled as she fought with Wally. She was giggling.

"Mike and I will be back before curfew. I want this woman out of here by

then," said Bruce.

There is no desire, he thought as he looked at her, that is all

finished. He opened the door.

"Curry!" shouted Wally. "You're a bloody nut also. Christ, I

thought you were a man. Jesus Christ! You're as bad as the others.

Andre, the doll boy. Haig, the rummy. What's with you, Bucko? It's women

with you, isn't it? You're a bloody nut-case also!" Bruce closed the

door and stood alone in the passage.

The taunt had gone through a chink in his armour and he clamped his mind

down on the sting of it, smothering it.

It's all over. She can't hurt me any more. He thought with

determination, remembering her, the woman, not the one in the room he

had just left but the other one who had been his wife.

"The bitch," he whispered, and then quickly, almost guiltily, "I

do not hate her. There is no hatred and there is no desire."

The lobby of the Hotel Grand Leopold 11 was crowded. There Were

gendarmes carrying their weapons ostentatiously, talking loudly, lolling

against walls an dover the bar; women with them, varying in colour from

black through to pastel brown, some already drunk; a few

Belgians still with the stunned disbelieving eyes of the refugee, one of

the women crying as she rocked her child on her lap; other white men in

civilian clothes but with the alertness about them and the quick

restless eyes of the adventurer, talking quietly with Africans in

business suits; a group of journalists at one table in damp

shirtsleeves, waiting and watching with the patience of vultures. And

everybody sweated in the heat.

Two South African charter pilots hailed Bruce from across the room.

"Hi, Bruce. How about a snort?"

"Dave. Carl." Bruce waved. "Big

hurry now – tonight perhaps."

"We're flying out this afternoon." Carl

Engelbrecht shook his head. "Back next week."

"We'll make it then," Bruce agreed, and went out of the front door into

the Avenue du Kasai.

As he stopped on the sidewalk the white-washed buildings bounced the

glare into his face. The naked heat made him wince and he felt fresh

sweat start out of his– body beneath his battle-suit. He took the dark

glasses from his top pocket and put them on as he crossed the street to

the Chev three-tanner in which Mike Haig waited.

"I'll drive, Mike."

"Okay." Mike slid across the seat and Bruce stepped up into the cab. He

started the truck north down the Avenue du

Kasai.

"Sorry about that scene, Bruce."

"No harm done."

"I shouldn't have lost my temper like that." Bruce did not answer, he

was looking at the deserted buildings on either side. Most of them had

been looted and all of them were pock-marked with shrapnel from the

mortar bursts. At intervals along the sidewalk were parked the burnt out

bodies of automobiles looking like the carapaces of long-dead beetles.

"I shouldn't have let him get through to me, and yet the truth hurts

like hell." Bruce was silent but he trod down harder on the

accelerator and the truck picked up speed. I don't want to hear, he

thought, I am not your confessor – I just don't want to hear. He turned

into the Avenue I'Etoile, headed towards the zoo.

"He was right, he had me measured to the inch, persisted Mike.

"We've all got our troubles, otherwise we wouldn't be here." And then,

to change Mike's mood, "We few, we happy few. We band of brothers." Mike

grinned and his face was suddenly boyish. "At least we have the

distinction of following the second oldest profession – we, the

mercenaries. "The oldest profession is better paid and much more fun,"

said Bruce and swung the truck into the driveway of a double-storeyed

residence, parked outside the front door and switched off the engine.

Not long ago the house had been the home of the chief accountant of

Union Mini&e du Haut, now it was the billet of V section, Special

Striker Force, commanded by Captain Bruce Curry.

Half a dozen of his black gendarmes were sitting on the low wall of the

verandah, and as Bruce came up the front steps they shouted the greeting

that had become traditional since the United Nations intervention.

"U. N. – Merde!"

"Ah!" Bruce grinned at them in the sense of companionship that had grown

up between them in the past months.

"The cream of the Army o Katanga I He offered his cigarettes around and

stood chatting idly for a few minutes before asking, "Where's Sergeant

Major?" One of the gendarmes jerked a thumb at the glass doors that led

into the lounge and Bruce went through with Mike behind him.

Equipment was piled haphazardly on the expensive furniture, the stone

fireplace was half filled with empty bottles, a gendarme lay snoring on

the Persian carpet, one of the oil paintings on the wall had been ripped

by a bayonet and the frame hung askew, the imbuia-wood coffee table

tilted drunkenly towards its broken leg, and the whole lounge smelled of

men and cheap tobacco.

"Hello, Ruffy, said Bruce.

"Just in time, boss." Sergeant Major Ruffararo grinned delightedly from

the armchair which he was overflowing.

"These goddam Arabs have run fresh out of folding stuff." He gestured at

the gendarmes that crowded about the table in front of him.

"Arab" was Ruffy's word of censure or contempt, and bore no relation to

a man's nationality.

Ruffy's accent was always a shock to Bruce. You never expected to hear

pure Americanese come rumbling out of that huge black frame. But three

years previously Ruffy had returned from a scholarship tour of the

United States with a command of the idiom, a diploma in land husbandry,

a prodigious thirst for bottled beer (preferably Schlitz, but any other

was acceptable) and a raving dose of the Old Joe.

The memory of this last, which had been a farewell gift from a high

yellow sophomore of U. C.L. A returned most painfully to Ruffararo when

he was in his cups; so painfully that it could be assuaged only by

throwing the nearest citizen of the United States.

Fortunately, it was only on rare occasions that an American and the

necessary five or six gallons of beer were assembled in the same

vicinity so that Ruffy's latent race antipathy could find expression.

A throwing by Ruffy was an unforgettable experience, both for the victim

and the spectators. Bruce vividly recalled that night at the

Hotel Lido when he had been a witness at one of Ruffy's most spectacular

throwings.

The victims, three of them, were journalists representing

publications of repute. As the evening wore on they talked louder; an

American accent has a carry like a well-hit golf ball and Ruffy

recognized it from across the terrace. He became silent, and in his

silence drank the last gallon which was necessary to tip the balance.

He wiped the froth from his upper lip and stood up with his eyes

fastened on the party of Americans.

"Ruffy, hold it. Hey!" – Bruce might not have spoken.

Ruffy started across the terrace. They saw him coming and fell

into an uneasy silence.

The first was in the nature of a practice throw; besides, the man was

not aero-dynamically constructed and his stomach had too much wind

resistance. A middling distance of twenty feet.

"Ruffy, leave them!" shouted Bruce.

On the next throw Ruffy was getting warmed up, but he put excessive loft

into it. Thirty feet; the journalist cleared the terrace and landed on

the lawn below with his empty glass still clutched in his hand.

"Run, you fool!" Bruce warned the third victim, but he was paralysed.

And this was Ruffy's best ever, he took a good grip neck and seat of the

pants – and put his whole weight into it. Ruffy must have known that he

had executed the perfect throw, for his shout of

"Gonorrhoea!"

as he launched his man had a ring of triumph to it.

Afterwards, when Bruce had soothed the three Americans, and they had

recovered sufficiently to appreciate the fact that they were privileged

by being party to a record throwing session, they all paced out the

distances. The three journalists developed an almost proprietary

affection for Ruffy and spent the rest of the evening buying him beers

and boasting to every newcomer in the bar. One of them, he who had been

thrown last and farthest, wanted to do an article on Ruffy – with

pictures. Towards the end of the evening he was talking wildly of

whipping up sufficient enthusiasm to have a man-throwing event included

in the Olympic Games.

Ruffy accepted both their praise and their beer with modest gratitude;

and when the third American offered to let Ruffy throw him again, he

declined the offer on the grounds that he never threw the same man

twice. All in all, it had been a memorable evening.

Apart from these occasional lapses, Ruffy had a more powerful body and

happier mind than any man Bruce had ever known, and Bruce could not

help liking him. He could not prevent himself smiling as he tried to

reject Ruffy's invitation to play cards.

"We've got work to do now, Ruffy. Some other time."

"Sit down, boss," Ruffy repeated, and Bruce grimaced resignedly and took

the chair opposite him.

"How much you going to bet?" Ruffy leaned forward.

Bruce laid a thousand-franc note on the table; "when that's gone, then

we go."

"No hurry," Ruffy soothed him. "We got all day." He dealt the three

cards face down. "The old Christian monarch is in there somewhere; all

you got to do is find him and it's the easiest mille you ever made."

"in the middle," whispered the gendarme standing beside Bruce's chair.

"That's him in the middle."

"Take no notice of that mad Arab – he's lost five mille already this

morning," Ruffy advised.

Bruce turned over the right-hand card.

"Mis-luck," crowed Ruffy. "You got yourself the queen of hearts."

He picked up the banknote and stuffed it into his breast pocket.

"She'll see you wrong every time, that sweetfaced little bitch."

Grinning, he turned over the middle card to expose the jack of spades

with his sly eyes and curly little mustache. "She's been shacked up

there with the jack right under the old king's nose." He turned the king

face up.

"Look you at that dozy old guy – he's not even facin in the right

direction." Bruce stared at the three cards and he felt that sickness in

his stomach again. The whole story was there; even the man's name

was right, but the jack should have worn a beard and driven a red Jaguar

and his queen of hearts never had such innocent eyes. Bruce spoke

abruptly. "That's it, Ruffy. I want you and ten men to come with me."

"Where we going?"

"Down to Ordinance – we're drawing special supplies."

Ruffy nodded and buttoned the playing cards into his top pocket while he

selected the gendarmes to accompany them; then he asked Bruce, "We might

need some oil; what you think, boss?" Bruce hesitated; they had

only two cases of whisky left of the dozen they had looted in August.

The purchasing power of a bottle of genuine Scotch was enormous and

Bruce was loath to use them except in extraordinary circumstances. But

now he realized that his chances of getting the supplies he needed were

remote, unless he took along a substantial bribe for the quartermaster.

"Okay, Ruffy. Bring a case." Ruffy came up out of the chair and clapped

his steel helmet on his head. The chin straps hung down on each side of

his round black face.

A "A full case?" He grinned at Bruce. "You want to buy a battleship?"

"Almost," agreed Bruce; "go and get it." Ruffy disappeared into the back

area of the house and returned almost immediately with a case of Grant's

Stand awl"

fast under one arm and half a dozen bottles of Simba beer held by their

necks between the fingers of his other hand.

"We might get thirsty," he explained.

The gendarmes climbed back into the back of the truck with a clatter of

weapons and shouted cheerful abuse at their fellows on the

verandah. Bruce, Mike and Ruffy crowded into the cab and Ruffy set the

whisky on the floor and placed two large booted feet upon it.

"What's this all about, boss?" he asked as Bruce trundled the truck down

the drive and turned into the Avenue I'Etoile. Bruce told him and when

he had finished Ruffy grunted noncommittally and opened a bottle of beer

with his big white chisel-blade teeth; the gas hissed softly and a

little froth ran down the bottle and dripped onto his lap.

"My boys aren't going to like it," he commented as he offered the open

bottle to Mike Haig. Mike shook his head and Ruffy passed the bottle to

Bruce.

Ruffy opened a bottle for himself and spoke again. "They going to hate

it like hell." He shook his head. "And there'll be even bigger trouble

when we get to Port Reprieve and pick up the diamonds." Bruce glanced

sideways at him, startled. "What diamonds?"

"From the dredgers," said Ruffy. "You don't think they're sending us all

that way just to bring in these other guys.

They're worried about the diamonds, that's for sure!" Suddenly, for

Bruce, much which had puzzled him was explained. A half-forgotten

conversation that he had held earlier in the year with an engineer from

Union Mine jumped back into his memory. They had discussed the three