Leopard Hunts in Darkness - Smith Wilbur (книга бесплатный формат .TXT) 📗
Captain Nbebi opened the map-case that he was holding on his knees and took out a bottle of fiery locally made cane spirits. He passed the bottle over the front seat to Craig. Craig waved it brusquely aside, but Timon Nbebi insisted, and Craig took it with ill grace. He unscrewed the cap and swallowed a maud-dul, then exhaled the fumes noisily. It brought tears to his eyes, but immediately the fireball in his belly spread out through his blood, giving him comfort. He took another swig and passed the bottle back to Sally-Anne. She shook her head.
"Drink it," Craig ordered, and meekly she obeyed. She had stopped weeping, but the fits of shivering still persisted.
The spirits made her cough and choke, but she got them down, and they steadied her.
"Thank you." She handed the bottle back to Timon Nbebi, and the politeness from a woman who had been so recently degraded and humiliated was embarrassing to all of them.
They reached the first roadblock on the outskirts of the town of Bulawayo, and Craig checked his wrist-watch. It was seven minutes to three in the morning. There were no other vehicles waiting at the barrier, and two troopers stepped out from behind the barricade and came to each side of the Land-Rover. Timon Nbebi slid back his window and spoke quietly to one of them, offering his pass at the same time. The trooper examined it briefly in the beam of his flashlight, then handed it back. He saluted, and the barrier lifted. They drove through.
Bulawayo was silent and devoid of life, only very few of the windows were lit. A traffic-light flashed green and amber and red, and the driver stopped obediently, although the streets were completely deserted. The engine throbbed in idle and then above it, far off and faint, came the popping sound of automatic rifle, fire
Craig was watching Timon Nbebi's face in the rearview mirror, and saw him wince slightly at the sound of gunfire. Then the light changed and they drove on, taking the south road through the suburbs. On the edge of the town there were two more road-blocks and then the open road.
They ran southwards in the night, with the whine of the tyres and the buffet of the wind against the cab. The glow from the dashboard gave their faces a sickly greenish hue and once or twice the radio in the back crackled and gabbled distorted Shana. Craig recognized Peter Fungabera's voice on one of the transmissions, but he must have been calling another unit, for Timon Nbebi made no effort to reply and they drove on in silence. The monotonous hum of engine and tyres and the warmth of the cab lulled Craig, and in a reaction. from anger and fear he found himself dozing.
He awoke with a start as Timon Nbebi spoke for the first time, and the beat of the Land-Rover's engine altered.
It was dawn's first light. He could see the silhouette of the tree-tops against the paling lemon sky. The Land-Rover slowed and then swung off the main tarmac road onto a dirt track. Immediately the mushroom smell of talcum dust permeated the cab.
"VAlere are we?" Craig demanded. "Why are we leaving the road?" Timon Nbebi spoke to the driver and he pulled to the side of the track and stopped.
"You will please step out," Timon ordered, and as Craig did so, Timon was waiting for him, seeming to help him down but instead he took Craig's arm, turned it slightly, and before Craig could react to the icy touch of steel on his skin, Timon had handcuffed both his wrists. It had been so unexpected and so expertly done that for seconds Craig stood bewildered with his manacled hands thrust out in front of him, staring at them. Then he shouted, "Christ, what is this?" By then Timon Nbebi had handcuffed Sally-Anne as quickly and efficiently, and ignoring Craig's outburst, was talking quietly to his driver and the two troopers. It was o quick for Craig to follow, although he caught the to Shana words "kill" and "hide'. One of the troopers seemed to protest and Timon leaned through the open door of the Land-Rover and lifted the microphone of the radio. He gave a call sign, repeated three times, and after a short wait was patched through to Peter Fungabera. Craig recognized the general's voice despite the VHF distortion.
There was a brief exchange, and when Timon Nbebi hung the microphone, the trooper was no longer protesting.
Clearly Timon Nbebi's orders had been endorsed.
"We will go on,"Timon reverted to English, and Craig was roughly hustled back into the front seat. The change in their treatment was ominous.
The driver threaded the Land-Rover deeper and deeper into the Thorn veld, and the morning light strengthened.
Outside the cab, the dawn bird chorus was in full voice.
Craig recognized the high clear duet of a pair of collate barbers in an acacia tree beside the track. A brown hare was trapped in the beam of the headlights and lolloped ahead of them with his long pink ears flapping. Then the sky began to bum with the stupendous colours of the African dawn and the driver switched off the headlights.
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"Craig, darling. They are going to kill us, aren't they?" Sally-Anne asked quietly. Her voice was clear and firm now. She had conquered her hysteria and was in control of herself again. She spoke as though they were alone.
"I'm sorry." Craig could find nothing else to say. "I should have known that Peter Fungabera would never let us go."
"There is nothing you could have done. Even if you had known."
"They'll bury us in some remote place and our disappearance will be blamed on the Matabele dissidents," Craig said, and Timon Nbebi sat silent and impassive, neither admitting nor denying the accusation.
The road forked, the left-hand track barely discernible, and Timon Nbebi indicated it. The driver slowed further and changed to a lower gear. They bumped along it for another twenty minutes. By then it was fully light, the promise of sunrise flaming the tip tops of the acacia.
Timon Nbebi gave another order and the driver turned off the track and drove blindly through the waist-high grass, skirting the edge of a grey granite kopje, until they were entirely screened from even the rudimentary bush track that they had been following. Another short order, and the driver stopped and switched off the engine.
