Savages

by Shirley Conran

  Harry said, “We have not yet agreed to the contract terms, or the details of the special arrangements. As you know, my colleagues in Pittsburgh are not used to this type of negotiation. It takes time for them to arrange such payments. Our laws are strict.”

  For half an hour Harry smoothly stalled the negotiations, without seeming to do so. It was finally agreed that the two men would next meet in two days’ time, on March 17, which would give the Pittsburgh people plenty of time to make up their minds. It also gave Harry plenty of time to think up other reasons to stall signing the contract, which would legally commit Nexus for the next ten years.

  The President stood up to indicate that the interview was over. He said, “Oh, by the way, we don’t want you to disappear again, Mr. Scott. You’d better have a military escort until you leave the island.”

  Harry said politely, “Thank you, but I have two armed Nexus bodyguards.”

  The President knew that this stubborn Australian idiot could not move either far or fast without his being aware of it, so he shrugged. “As you wish.”

  Harry’s latest Smith and Wesson was returned to him as he left the palace.

  Rather than ask for an escort back to his hotel, since he’d just refused one, Harry decided to walk back. It was broad daylight and he was armed.

  As he headed toward town, Harry pondered the meaning of Raki’s recent behavior. Raki had made it clear from the beginning that the Nexus disappearances were not his responsibility because they occurred on the day before Raki returned to power. But why had Raki not told Harry that traces of the women had been found? Presumably because, if the women were alive, then it would become Raki’s responsibility to find them. If the women had escaped from imprisonment in some secret jungle camp, then perhaps the Nexus men were still there. So it would also become Raki’s responsibility to search for them.

  Why hadn’t he? Why had the sighting of the women been dismissed as a rumor?

  There was another puzzle. Why had Raki played hard-to-get from November until early March, then suddenly wanted to negotiate immediately on March 15—three days after the women were reported alive? Any fool could see that the incidents were related, but Harry couldn’t figure out how.

  As he trudged down the tree-lined avenue toward town, the burning sun caused Harry to regret his decision to walk. By the time he had passed the last barbed-wire-encircled Colonial house and approached the rundown buildings of the town, his safari jacket and trousers were soaked with perspiration. He wished that he had telephoned for a car, but that would have meant hanging around that sinister mauve palace until the vehicle arrived from Mount Ida.

  Harry rounded a bend in the road and found himself staring into the eyes of a group of khaki-clad soldiers. Their brutal eyes looked back at Harry, not with hatred but with blank stares that were more frightening. It was, of course, a ransom roadblock.

  Surrounded by at least a dozen young thugs, Harry dared not to draw his gun.

  One man, taller than the rest, stepped forward and grunted, “Money.”

  Harry remembered that he’d spent all his cash on those two bloody expensive pigs that morning, and that he’d given all his cigarettes and his watch to the Katanga tribesmen.

  He said, “I have nothing. But I can get money. You come with me to my hotel. I give you plenty money quick.”

  “You no money? You white man, no money?”

  “No.”

  Harry felt a violent pain in the kidney. A rifle butt hit the side of his head. Somebody punched him in the stomach.

  Then he was lying in the filth of the street, his knees drawn up to protect his belly and his arms over his head as they started to kick him.

  * * *

  Harry couldn’t open his eyes properly. Through swollen slits he could see dirty, whitewashed bricks. His gun had disappeared, of course. His clothes had been stripped from his body. When he tried to lift his hand to his nose, which was bleeding, it felt as if his fingers had been broken.

  Harry forced his eyes open. The light was dim, but he saw excrement-smeared concrete before him. He decided not to move just yet. He would concentrate on breathing. He would try to ignore the overpowering musky smell of closely packed human bodies and ordure.

  When he had his breathing under control, more or less, he made an effort to sit up. This was difficult, because a naked body lay slumped across his legs. Harry could also feel, and smell, another dank, warm body beneath him.

  He recognized his surroundings. He was in one of the cagelike cells in the Queenstown police station. Three naked black men shared the cell with him. Two were unconscious, and an old man crouched in a corner in a kind of stupor. In other cells, people were groaning and someone was crying. Harry felt the unseen presence of many beaten, broken bodies.

  Harry tried again, and eventually succeeded in sitting up. Painfully, he eased his legs from beneath the man who lay across them. Crawling on one hand only, he moved around until he faced the black bars, beyond which he could see the police sergeant’s desk. The light outside was fading fast, so it must be about six o’clock.

  Harry felt his nose. Yes, they’d broken it.

  The door opened. Two men, wearing khaki, dragged in another man, groaning, his ragged shirt covered in blood. Someone shouted. The soldier who sat behind the police sergeant’s desk stepped to the right, beyond Harry’s line of vision.

  Harry heard a key scrape in a lock and hinges creak. The man with the bloody shirt was dragged across the floor like a sack of garbage and heaved inside a cell. He heard a shriek, the sound of a snapping bone, a howl, then abrupt silence.

  Harry sat slumped with his head hidden on his knees. He didn’t want them to realize that he was conscious. He reckoned that, for the moment, he should be as near invisible as possible. He was very thirsty, but he felt far too ill to feel hungry.

  As it was now dark outside, Harry figured he had been missing for about three hours. He wondered when his absence would be noticed. Probably not until the following morning, when Ron Chang was to drive Harry to the airport, where the helicopter would be waiting for him.

  At that point, Mrs. Chang would telephone Kerry, who would telephone the palace, who would report the time he had left and that he had refused a military escort. Shit, how could he have been so stupid? Whereupon Kerry would probably tear down to the central police station—here—to report that Harry was missing.

  It would take Kerry ten minutes to get to the Mount Ida airstrip. No, damnit! The Bell would be at Queenstown Airport waiting for Harry, and Johno would have taken off at first light, so Kerry would have to drive in. On that road, it might take over an hour to cover the twenty-seven miles to town, so the earliest he could hope to see Kerry was after eight o’clock tomorrow morning.

  It seemed a long time to wait.

  In one of the adjoining cells, Harry could hear groans and odd thumping, squelching noises. Someone was being systematically beaten.

  Fourteen hours to go, thought Harry. The man who had been lying in front of him groaned, recovered consciousness, vomited over Harry’s feet and collapsed back on the concrete.

  The groans next door stopped abruptly. Were they beating prisoners at random, just for the hell of it? Very possible.

  Peeping under his arm, Harry had previously counted four soldiers moving in the front area of the police station, but now he could only see the one hunched over the desk, drumming the heels of his boots on the decrepit chair and paying absolutely no attention to what was going on behind him.

  Two hours passed.

  The front door opened. In the light of a naked lightbulb, Harry saw the captain who had been waiting for him earlier that day at the Mount Ida office. Trimly dressed, the officer stepped forward, pointed his swagger stick at the man behind the desk and spoke sharply. The soldier didn’t stand up but nodded in reply, then jerked his thumb over his shoulder toward Harry’s cell.

  The officer walked over and looked down between the bars. Politely he said, “Mr. Scott?”
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  Through swollen lips Harry said, “Glad to see you again.”

  “Can you stand up?”

  “I don’t think so.”

  The captain called sharply over his shoulder. The soldier at the desk sauntered over with a bunch of keys. Slowly, casually, he unlocked one section of the bars. The officer spoke brusquely and pointed his swagger stick at Harry. The soldier entered the cell and kicked one of the unconscious blacks out of his way.

  Suddenly Harry found the strength to stand unaided.

  Not quite. He fell forward, clutched at the bars for support, then winced as pain shot through his left hand and arm.

  The captain said, “The President was informed that you had been arrested for failing to produce your passport when requested. He sent me to take you back to your hotel. I have a jeep outside.”

  * * *

  Thank God Raki had been tailing him, Harry thought. Slowly and with great concentration, he walked up the wooden steps of the veranda toward the warm glow of light behind the windows of the Presidential Hotel. The captain did not assist him, but stood waiting until Harry had staggered through the front door.

  “Mr. Scott!” Mrs. Chang stood up and shrieked, “Bobby! Freddy! Towels!”

  Through split lips, Harry mumbled, “Do you think the boys could help me to shower? Please call Mount Ida. And call a doctor.”

  SATURDAY, MARCH 16

  There was a knock, and Mrs. Chang’s secretary, Freddy, appeared in the doorway of Harry’s room. Behind him were the first rays of the morning sun. Turning his head, Harry winced in pain.

  Freddy proffered a red plastic tray, upon which was a glass of vile strong tea, the medicine prescribed by the doctor, and a bill. Freddy rubbed one big toe against the other and looked apologetic. “New house rule. All guest pay bill every morning or bugger off.”

  Harry thought, If you’re the only hotel in town, nobody can argue your terms. With difficulty, he wrapped a towel around his waist and headed for the outside bathroom. Harry’s nose and his left hand were in plaster casts, and he was in considerable pain.

  On the veranda, Harry almost collided with Bill, the retired planter. Bill was clutching two opened cans of beer.

  “I say, old man, lost your pajamas?” Bill asked. “Good God, have you had an accident?”

  “Sort of,” Harry said.

  “Have you heard the news? For the first time in living memory, old man, this hotel is closing! I don’t know where I’ll go. Ronald Chang is already bolting the top-floor shutters. No breakfast was served this morning. I’ve just grabbed a couple of beers and some peanuts from the bar. Can I get anything for you? Are you sure you’re all right?”

  “I’m fine. Had a spot of trouble at a roadblock, but there’s a good Chinese doctor at St. Mary’s Hospital. Why is the hotel closing so suddenly?”

  “Because of yesterday’s commotion. Haven’t you heard?”

  Harry shook his head.

  “Some drunken soldier shot a priest in St. Mary’s Cathedral. One of the congregation bellowed out, ‘Soldier go! Raki go!’ Within minutes the whole congregation was shouting and stamping.” Bill took another swallow of beer. “Army troops from the barracks were sent to the church to empty it. Apparently they didn’t have much respect for religion.”

  “Anyone hurt?”

  “One or two. Then the entire congregation rose up and either took to the bush, went home to mother or headed for the Central Mountains.

  “And Sandy left when he heard that other people were joining the group along the way. They’re avoiding the roads, of course. Don’t want to be machine-gunned from above or shot by armed madmen in military trucks.”

  He emptied the beer can, aimed it at a chicken in the backyard below, then said, “Bless my soul, look down there!”

  From the river, a small boy was running up the muddy garden path. He cried excitedly, “Misis Chang! Misis boat b’long you i come long warra bilong kisimu long carim you feller i go long place b’long you long hill.”

  Bill said, “Good God! Ma Chang’s doing a bunk to her house in the Central Mountains. She’s got a coffee plantation up there.” He leaned over the veranda and stared down.

  Beyond the depressed bougainvillea and straggling plants that surrounded the bald back lawn of the Presidential Hotel, a small crimson motorboat appeared on the river. It drew up to the rickety wooden landing stage of the garden.

  From the back door, below the veranda, the majestic bulk of Mrs. Chang appeared. She wore purple satin pajamas, wraparound dark glasses and a large straw sun hat with a green silk bow. In either hand, she carried a red leather attaché case.

  Slowly, Mrs. Chang waddled down to the landing stage, followed by Freddy and Bobby, who were laden with luggage.

  With some difficulty, Mrs. Chang was lowered into the front seat of the crimson launch. Freddy fitted a green silk parasol into a slot behind Mrs. Chang’s seat, so that she sat in its shade, and the fringe kept away the flies. The back seat of the little launch was quickly piled high with two wicker picnic baskets, a hat box and some very old, expensive luggage, pasted with labels of ancient steamers and world-renowned hotels.

  Having seated Mrs. Chang beside the driver of the launch, her two secretaries then settled themselves, cross-legged and holding hands, in the stern. The heavily laden little vessel slowly set off upstream.

  On the veranda, the scarecrow night watchman had appeared. He grinned at Harry. “Misis Chang go walkabout. Big trouble quicktime Queenstown, master.”

  Harry nodded. He reckoned that Mrs. Chang was a more reliable barometer of trouble than the head of the CIA.

  The crimson launch disappeared behind a bend in the river.

  “Didn’t you say you had a plane?” the old planter asked Harry. “Would there be room for me? It looks as if trouble is about to start.”

  “Or end?” Harry suggested.

  “It might be the end for Raki.”

  “But the beginning for Mindo, and for Paui,” Harry said.

  The old planter said sadly, “There’ll always be another Raki.”

  “And there will always be another Mindo,” Harry said, firmly.

  “How will this affect you blokes up at Mount Ida?”

  “If Mindo is going to head a revolution, we’d be delighted,” Harry said. “He’s a straight shooter. He knows what we want and we know what he wants, so we should be able to agree to a simple, straightforward deal.” Harry added to himself, But this time with no special arrangements. Harry guessed that Mindo would refuse an all-rights deal and would insist on a top Australian mining lawyer to handle his negotiations.

  The hotel name board that usually hung above the front door was now propped against the wooden railing at the end of the veranda. Painted upon it in apple-green on blue was “Freedom Hotel.”

  The night watchman saw Harry looking at it. He said, “New name belong hotel today.”

  Beyond the name board, at the end of the veranda, Ronald Chang appeared. He started to supervise a couple of boys who were fitting shutters to the windows as fast as they could.

  The watchman nodded upriver. “Good time go walkabout,” he said.

  33

  WEDNESDAY, MARCH 20, 1985

  The ominous blood-red streak on the horizon softened into pink, then blue, as the sky lit up. Annie wanted to shut her eyes. She didn’t want to wake up. It was their eighth day at sea, and for the last two the women had been without water.

  She didn’t want to see Suzy curled up in the bottom of the dinghy, babbling and defenseless, nor the faces of the other women before the sun forced them to put on their khaki hoods. She couldn’t bear the sight of the emaciated, sunken flesh, the jutting cheekbones, the expressionless, bloodshot eyes, the twitching, split, swollen lips.

  They had drawn lots for the job, and Annie had drawn the longest piece of rattan. She had no choice, she knew that. They had all agreed that if the executioner couldn’t do her job, she would become the victim. During her sleepless night Annie
had considered accepting the sentence of death instead, but then remembered her four children. Suzy had no children. And anyway, they all doubted that she would ever recover.

  A bony foot prodded Annie’s thin back. Patty croaked, “Annie, you’re the goddamn leader. Do it! The sooner you do, the sooner you’ll be through with it. I’ll help you.”

  Annie pulled herself up to a sitting position and looked at the other women, slumped against the sides of the dinghy. She saw running sores and blisters on claw-thin hands, where the flesh had been exposed to the roasting sun. Their uniforms hung over shrunken breasts and shriveled skin, the cloth draped over protruding pelvic bones.

  Patty tied Suzy’s hands and feet with rattan. She met with no resistance. As Suzy mumbled to herself, Carey looked on and wept.

  “Get your fish knife out and get it over with,” Patty urged Annie, as she picked up the bailer. “Concentrate on a fast, clean jugular cut, and she’ll never feel it.”

  With dread, Annie pulled out her long bladed fish knife.

  But Suzy did feel it. She arched her back and screamed, a high, thin shriek.

  Patty knelt beside Suzy to catch the dark red blood that spouted from her neck. Thirst was more acute than hunger and had to be satisfied first, before they could eat.

  Suzy flopped, then lay still in the bottom of the boat.

  Patty plunged her face in the bailer and drank deeply. Annie expected her to be nauseated. Patty wasn’t. Dripping blood from her chin, she passed the bailer to Annie.

  Looking down and avoiding each other’s eyes, the four women drank the blood fast, before it congealed. There wasn’t as much as they had expected. They swallowed it as best they could, drinking what they could first, then taking turns to lick the clots from the bailer.

  Patty cut Suzy’s wrists free; her arms flopped by her sides like a Raggedy Ann doll’s. Then Patty freed her feet.

  “Help me,” Patty croaked to Silvana.

  With shaking hands the two women undressed Suzy, then Patty looked up at Annie and snapped, “Now the flesh. Quick!”