Assignment- Tyrant's Bride

by Will B Aarons

  "Why isn’t she with you? I hold you responsible,” Ogwang persisted.

  "It seemed a good idea to see who was in here, first.”

  "Well, now you know.”

  "Look;” Dager said, and rubbed red, chapped hands, "if it’s old Smythe bothering you, what difference does it make now? What is done is done: you can’t bring him back. Our mission is infinitely more important than the life of one man.” Dager wore a holstered .45 Colt automatic on a web belt, Durell noted.

  "V/as he alone?” he asked. "Where’s the rest of the family?”

  There was an embarrassed silence. "The mother is at the bottom of the well.” Ogwang’s tone was brutal.

  "There is a daughter,” Dager said.

  "Locked in her bedroom,” Ogwang added. His smirk was shared by his men. Their eyes glittered on Durell, spoiling for a fight.

  "No she isn’t,” a woman’s voice said. "I turned her loose.”

  Durell turned and saw Ogwang’s beautiful Eurasian mistress, Indrani. He heard Ogwang’s feet slam against the tile flooring when he swung them down from the table.

  "What are you saying, woman?” Ogwang demanded.

  "Did you think I would let you keep her?”

  "She was not for me,” Ogwang complained. "She was for my men.”

  "You call them men?” Contempt flared in her eyes. "I know what is best for you, Albert. I released her some time ago.”

  "My God!” Dager cried. "She will alert the whole army!”

  Indrani seemed unconcerned, as long as she had removed the real danger. Durell wondered how she could dread competition for Ogwang: she looked more wildly lovely than ever, with her panther-green eyes and rippled cascade of black silken hair. Her attire was the same as the men’s, but on her it was something else, he thought. In slender garments patterned for men, her sensual roundings tested buttons and seams in unforeseen and exciting ways.

  Durell said, "I promised I’d look after General Ogwang; didn’t you trust me?”

  "Hapana,” she said, and shook her head.

  He turned to Ogwang. "It was all I could do to persuade Kabakaliya Teresa to join you, under any circumstances. I thought you agreed to leave Indrani behind.”

  "I do what I please,” Ogwang said sullenly.

  Durell turned to Dager. "How could you let this happen?”

  "What could I do about it? Besides, no one told me another woman would be involved.”

  Durell blew a short, angry breath. "There’s no time to argue about it. Where is your gear?”

  "Upstairs,” Dager said.

  "Better round it up.” Dager headed quickly for the stairs. "General?”

  Ogwang regarded him with drooping mouth.

  "On your feet, general.”

  "I am thinking, Mr. Durell.”

  "What are you thinking, general?”

  Ogwang nodded mysteriously, rubbing his paunch. "Tactics,” he said.

  Durell drew a deep, skeptical breath, and decided to think further before replying. Then Indrani, who had briefly vanished, hurried back and began raking the pile of loot from the kitchen table into a pillowcase she had found. She saw the way Durell stared at her as the stuff rattled into the bag. "This is ours,” she said, her tone defensive.

  "Wrong. It belongs to the Smythes. Those lucky enough to be alive.”

  General Ogwang said: "Money will be scarce for the Ndolo side, Mr. Durell.”

  "You are asking me to believe that will go to the Ndolo cause?”

  "Don’t you trust me?”

  "Leave it here,” Durell said. His tone was blunt.

  Ogwang and Indrani exchanged glances and backed off. She tossed the pillowcase aside, and it struck the floor clattering. Durell usually avoided making moral judgments, but they were inescapable sometimes, in this business no less than in any other. Now he felt a dark, sick weight in his chest for what had been done in this house, because it could be a foretaste of Ogwang’s methods, should his side luck into power. He tried not to think about it, however, because, for now, his interest was just in holding the party together until they reached Kipora, the Ndolo capital. Then he would have done his job, his agency and country would have done their best, and it would remain only for the Ndolo to make what they could of it against the mortal threat of President for Life Field Marshal Azo Ausi.

  A crash brought Durell’s thoughts back to the present, as Dager tossed six knapsacks over the banister. Ogwang’s men gathered them up, giving one to Ogwang and another to Indrani.

  "I’ll go get Teresa,” Durell said.

  "No need, Cajun.”

  It was Wells, striding into the kitchen with Teresa and Mkondo. It seemed for a moment as if everyone had stopped breathing, waiting for explosions. Wells made an effort to draw attention away from the two women. "So, the senator got you aboard, after all,” he said to Dager.

  "Hello, Wells,” Dager replied, refusing to be baited.

  All eyes went back to the two women, with a sweating Ogwang trapped in between. Indrani’s face was eager, like that of a stalking cat. "Albert,” she said, "aren’t you going to introduce us?”

  "Kabakaliya Teresa, this is—”

  "I know who she is,” the stately Teresa broke in. "Did you think I hadn’t heard?”

  "Bitch,” Indrani spat, unable to contain her hatred. Teresa looked about, her big brown eyes calm. "Will someone remove this unpleasant person from my sight?”

  Indrani worked her claws, baring strong little teeth, but Wells interposed himself. "We don’t have time for this,” he said. "Troops are coming up the lane.”

  20

  "When we saw them turn off the highway, we came on in,” Wells said.

  "Troops!” Dager sounded disgusted. "The daughter: she must have brought them.” He ran from the kitchen toward the front of the house, evidently to have a look.

  Durell cursed sharply. "How many, Willie?”

  "Too many. A couple of truckloads. About a mile away.”

  Lightning flickered in the window, and thunder rumbled distantly, audible now. A breeze had sprung up, and leaves made splashing sounds against the house. It would take the trucks a few minutes to get here, climbing the rutted, twisting lane. Durell judged he had time to capitalize on their arrival.

  Wells said, "Come on, Cajun. Let’s get out of here.”

  "They would expect that,” Durell said.

  "Sure, and they would expect to catch us, and their chances are getting better every minute we stand here jawing.”

  Ogwang spoke. "We will ambush them. Right, Mr. Durell?”

  "Exactly,” Durell said.

  "You’re crazy,” Wells said.

  Dager called from another room. "I see their headlights.”

  Ogwang’s face shone with approval. "We shall stand and fight. I am the strategist. I am the general.” He was clearly in his cups.

  "You have rifles,” Durell said.

  "Of course. And plenty of ammunition.”

  "Then we await your orders.”

  A stupefied silence followed. It did not surprise Durell. He ended it gracefully, politely asking: "May I make a suggestion, sir?”

  "Certainly.”

  "Put your men upstairs with the rifles, where they can command a greater field of fire and cover the trucks when they pull into the driveway. The rest of us, with only sidearms and shotguns, will hold our fire until the survivors charge at short range.”

  "That will show them!” Ogwang laughed. "Good. Do it!” He bawled an order to his men, waved them upstairs.

  Durell could hear the trucks growling up the hill. He thought they must be nearly there. "Mkondo,” he said, "get a shotgun from the gun rack in there.” He pointed, and told Wells: "Show him.” The two hurried from the kitchen, and he turned to General Ogwang, who sat with his elbows on the table. "You must get out of the house, sir.”

  He cut off the general’s protest. "You are too valuable to expose to fire. You must get to Kipora: that is what this has all been about.”

  O
gwang got to his feet. "Ndio, yes, you are right, Mr. Durell. Where . . .?”

  "Down the hill, toward the river, as straight as you can go. Wait for us about halfway.”

  "Very well.” He started for the rear door.

  "Sir?”

  "Yes?”

  "You’ll have to take the two ladies with you.” Ogwang’s eyes bugged. "Both of them?”

  "There is no one else to do it.”

  Dager called: "They are nearly here. We’d better do something.”

  Teresa held her chin up. "I refuse to go anywhere with that—that girl.”

  Indrani inhaled with a hiss. "At least I haven’t been sleeping with nyama, the butcher.”

  Teresa’s eyes blazed. "You are impudent!”

  "I’ll show you!” Indrani lunged for the taller woman, murder glaring in her eyes.

  Durell stepped in, caught her, spun her around. She strained against his hold only briefly, as she and Teresa held each other’s stare like angry cats. "There is no time for this now,” he said. "You two will have to settle your differences later. It’s all yours, general.”

  Ogwang’s sodden face showed worry. "Behave yourselves,” he said. "Act with dignity. Come.”

  A few seconds later Wells came through with Mkondo, who sported a double-barreled 12-gauge shotgun. The African’s wizened face wore an expression of fierce delight. "Where do you want us?” Wells said, and hefted his pistol.

  "Right here,” Durell said.

  "In the kitchen?” His tone was puzzled.

  Durell found bourbon among the bottles on the table, swallowed eagerly, savored the heat that churned in his gut. He made his face blithe. "Yes. Here,” he said.

  Gunshots erupted from the floor above, as Ogwang’s men opened fire.

  Dager burst into the kitchen. His lips were bone-white, eyes wide. "The trucks are here,” he shouted.

  Tension came through Wells’ voice. "Shouldn’t we find firing positions?” he asked.

  Durell shook his head as the firing heated up and slugs shattered windows and smacked the piaster. "Let the general and his women get farther down the hill, before we catch up to them. We’ll ease out in a minute.”

  Wells’ tone went sour. "You mean we’re leaving Ogwang’s boys in the lurch?”

  "We don’t owe them anything.”

  "You didn’t intend to fight—this was just a trick to strip Ogwang from his men.”

  "They weren’t supposed to be here.”

  The firing had become so heavy that all three were on their hands and knees, sweating an assault that was bound to come through the doors at any time, breathing plaster dust.

  Dager said he agreed with Durell’s imaginative solution. "I’ve seen them in action. I wouldn’t exactly call them ideal traveling companions, not for staying out of trouble.”

  "You want Ogwang to have that gang with him on the way to Kipora?” Durell asked Wells.

  "No, but...” Wells’ voice was uncertain.

  "Especially the way you feel about Teresa?”

  Wells’ eyes showed abrupt acceptance. At that moment a tremendous explosion jarred the floor, and Durell’s ears felt packed with cotton and his nostrils with plaster dust.

  "What are we waiting for? Let’s get out of here,” Wells said. He coughed and spat.

  "I want Ogwang to be far enough from the house so that by the time we get to him without his men, he’ll see it’s hopeless to turn around and come back.” The gunfire was heavier, very close to the house, and the crash of boots against the front door bammed and banged beyond the wall. There were shouts. A stench of hot smoke. Gunshots. It seemed like an hour, but less than a minute had elapsed since the first shot was fired. "Let’s go now,” Durell said.

  They made a file of darting shadows, ducking out the kitchen door, across a slate patio in the trembling wash of light thrown by the burning roof. Durell worried that the rear of the house would be covered, but the ambush evidently had disorganized the troops enough to delay that, initially. Enormous thunderclouds filled the African night, blinking and rumbling as they ran. A fresh wind staggered the trees, twisted their tops, spun leaves through the air. The three of them churned through a hedge and ran on down the hill amid shimmering coffee trees that poured a fragrance of jasmine from their white blossoms. As he passed a bean-filled drying shed, Durell’s gaze swung briefly back toward the house, and he saw that the wind had blown the fire into a yellow monster that raged and clawed over the roof. Sparks twirled in long banners. A dim glow lighted the hillside. There was no more gunfire.

  They ran on, stumbling in the shadows, picking their way. Then Ogwang came out of the trees, along with Mkondo and the two women. Durell spoke, gasping for breath. "Better keep moving, sir.”

  "Right.” Then he checked himself and asked: "Where are my men?”

  "Back at the house.”

  "You left my men up there to die?”

  "That depends on their luck.”

  "You betrayed me!” Ogwang yelled, the wind ripping at his words. His flat face twisted into a hateful mask. The flames of the house gleamed like gold in his eyes, on his teeth, and he rushed him. Durell sidestepped the lumbering charge almost casually, and General Ogwang tripped and sprawled headlong in the grass. Indrani, who appeared to have thrown away her knapsack in her flight, ran to help him up, kneeling by his side. Her green eyes flared at Durell. "Brute!” she shouted.

  Durell ignored it. "The river is this way, sir,” he told Ogwang, and led off.

  "Hey!” It was Wells, who now brought up the rear. "I hear them,” he said.

  The party stopped as one, listening in the wind and thunder. There came voices, the rattle of equipage. Lightning branched and forked, and then they saw flashlights up the slope, winking and weaving among the black forms of coffee trees.

  "They’re coming after us,” Dager said, and the group drew closer together.

  "They’ve picked up our spoor, man,” Ogwang observed. He seemed fully sober, now.

  Durell called back to Wells. "Lead the party down to the boat, Willie. Keep them single-file, so we don’t leave footprints all over the hillside.”

  "What about you?” the black field agent replied.

  "I’ll slow them down.”

  "Be careful. Let’s go,” he told the others, and they began filing away.

  Durell called Mkondo, who had kept by Teresa’s side. The old terrorist came out of the shadows, still carrying the double-barreled shotgun he’d found in the house. "The rest of you hurry, now,” Durell told them.

  He held Mkondo’s arm, keeping him there until the others were gone, then hefted his Breda 12-gauge and patted Mkondo’s gun, and said: "Ambush.”

  Mkondo grinned and shook a rootlike fist back at the house.

  "Shoot and run to the river,” Durell told him.

  Mkondo patted the stock of his weapon and frowned ferociously. "Shoot,” he parroted.

  "And run,” Durell repeated. He led Mkondo into the trees beside the path on one side, stationed him there, then hid himself on the other a few yards downhill, to avoid firing directly at him.

  He waited, confident of Mkondo’s experience and skill in these matters.

  The clouds thundered and boomed dryly, and the wind sang across the hillside, but it was still down amid the leaves and branches, close to the ground. He smelled the grass; a frightened bird made a sparrowlike twittering in the foliage.

  The sound of their boots came through everything else.

  Twenty yards and closing.

  They were spread across the trail, not single-file but bunched nicely, behind their tracker. Durell could not have said how many there were, amid the changing shapes of the foliage.

  He stretched himself prone, aimed up the trail.

  You either thought about nothing, or everything in a flash, at a moment like this. He kept his mind empty, squeezing the trigger.

  The 12-gauge exploded like dynamite, its muzzle flash momentarily blinding, and its recoil slammed his shoulder. The thund
er came in two sharp booms, and he realized that was Mkondo firing. The flickering sky revealed a hellish scene in quick, stop-motion takes, as if by a strobe light. The troops were screaming, running, diving for cover in total confusion. Durell feverishly blasted his remaining three rounds, swinging his aim first right and then left at the terror-struck mob.

  He slid away, watching. At a safe distance he jumped up and hurtled on down the hill, crashing through branches. The military rifles opened a ragged return fire, but were shooting blindly. Durell reloaded as he ran, thumbing fresh cartridges into the gun’s magazine. He wondered where Mkondo was, and if he was all right.

  Branches slapped his face, tugged at his grimy blue suit, and the wind blew a gale. In the receding distance everything was noisy confusion. Lightning cracked and thunder pounded across the rutted sky. He could not see where he was going. The wind made everything seem alive. Grotesque black forms jumbled and scrambled, mingling phantom shapes in all the wild dances of this primitive and violent land.

  The firing behind him sputtered, ended.

  They would recover their wits and regroup, he thought. He was not extremely concerned. The river was a lightning-flared mirror a few hundred yards down the slope: they could not catch him now.

  He came out of the coffee trees, darted to the left, across a brief border of open field, then broke through a tree line onto an unpaved cart track that followed the river.

  Abruptly, a soldier loomed out of the blowing darkness.

  There was no time to think: he shot from the hip.

  The soldier’s head exploded, and his beret was sent sailing into the charged air.

  Durell crossed to the other side of the track, slid into tall grass, waited a second. He surveyed both directions, trying to see, but could pick out no one else. It must have been a lone sentry, not part of a patrol.

  Others normally would be posted within shouting distance. . . .

  As if born with the thought, a shouted name came like a rag on the wind. It must have been that of the slain sentry. The call came again, urgent and alarmed, and other shouts, too, descending the hill. Then, out of the brush:

  "Sam Durell?”

  That would be Mkondo. "Over here,” Durell called, against the wind. He breathed a sigh of relief for the old man, as Mkondo skipped across the cart track and joined him. The storm brought whoops from the hillside, reminding of the savage origins from which many of Field Marshal Ausi’s troops had sprung.