Leopard Hunts in Darkness b-4

by Wilbur A. Smith

  "Damn it, Sally-Anne, don't be clever," Craig whispered irritably. "Have you ever flown one of those?"

  "Not a Super Frelon, but I have five hundred hours on helicopters."

  "How long would it take you to start up and get moving, once you are in the cockpit?" Now she hesitated. "Two or three minutes."

  "Too long. "Craig shook his head.

  "What if we can pull the guards away from the clearing while Pendula starts up?" Tungata asked.

  "That might work," Craig agreed.

  "This is it then." Tungata set it out quickly. "I will track UP to the head of the valley. You take the girls down to the edge of the clearing. Got it?" Craig nodded.

  "Forty-five minutes from now," Tungata checked his wristwatch, nine, thirty exactly, I will start throwing grenades and firing with the AK. That should pull most of the Shana away from the clearing. As soon as the shooting starts, you head for the helicopter. When I hear the helicopter lift off, I'll run out on the open slope, there! He pointed up the valley. "Just below that rock sheet. The Shana will not have reached me by that time you can make the pick-up from there."

  "Let's do it." Craig passed Tungata the AK 47 and the spare magazines. "I'll keep the Uzi and one grenade." He took the sub machinegun from Tungata.

  "Take the diamonds also." Tungata shrugged out of the straps of the back pack and pushed it across to Craig.

  "See you later." Craig slapped his shoulder, and Tungata slid away down the slope.

  Craig led the two girls straight down along the spine of the hill, keeping in the scrub and broken rock. It was a relief to reach the tree-line, and discover a ravine that angled back along the edge of the clearing. They crept down it, Craig cautiously lifting his head above the bank to check their progress every few hundred feet.

  "This is as close as we can get to the helicopter," he whispered and the girls sank down, resting below the lip of the bank. Craig slipped out of the heavy pack and had another look over the bank.

  The helicopter stood out in the open, a hundred and fifty paces away. The pilot was squatting beside the landing-gear in the shade cast by the fuselage. The Super Frelon was a bulky, blunt, nosed machine, painted dull sage green. Craig sank down Again beside Sally-Anne.

  "VA-iat range does it have?" Craig asked in a whisper.

  "Not certain," Sally-Anne whispered back. "With full tanks about six hundred miles, I'd guess."

  "Pray for full tanks." Craig glanced at his Rolex. "Ten minutes." From his pocket he handed them each another slab of chocolate. A Sally-Anne's sweat had streaked the blackening on her cheeks. Craig mixed dirt and water from the bottle into a muddy paste and repaired her make-up. Then she did the same to him.

  "Two minutes." Craig checked the time, and glanced over the bank.

  The helicopter pilot stood up and stretched, then he climbed back into the Super Frelon.

  "Something is happening, "Craig murmured.

  The helicopter partially obscured his view of the tent across the clearing, but he could see that there was activity over there as well.

  A small group was leaving the tent. The guards were saluting and strutting about importantly, and then suddenly the rotors of the helicopter turned and the starter motor whirred noisily. Blue smoke fired from the exhaust vents and with a roar the main engine of the Super Frelon came to life.

  A pair of officers left the group in front of the tent and started across the clearing, heading for the helicopter.

  "We have got trouble," Craig muttered grimly, "they are pulling out." And then he started, "That's Peter Fungabera!" Peter was wearing the burgundy beret with silver leopard-head cap-badge, the bright rows of decoration ribbons on his chest, and the scarf in the opening of his battle smock Under one arm was tucked his swagger-stick. While he walked, he was in deep discussion with a tall, elderly white man whom Craig had never seen before.

  The white man wore a plain khaki safari jacket. His head was bare. His hair was cropped to the scalp and his skin had a peculiarly repulsive pasty white texture. He carried a black leather attache case which was locked to his wrist with a steel chain. He cocked his head to listen to Peter Fungabera's impassioned discourse as they walked towards the waiting helicopter.

  Halfway between the tent and the helicopter, the two of them came to a stop, and argued animatedly. The white man was gesticulating vehemently with his free hand. He was close enough now for Craig to notice that his eyes were so pale that they gave him the sightless stare of a marble bust. His skin was pocked with ancient scars, yet he was very much the dominating figure of the pair. His manner was brusque, almost contemptuous, as though he now regarded Peter Fungabera as superfluous, unworthy of his serious attention. Peter Fungabera, on the other hand, had the shattered look of a survivor of an air crash He appeared confused. His voice was raised so that Craig could hear its pleading tone, if not the actual words. This was hardly the man that Craig had known.

  The white man made a gesture of dismissal and, turning away from Peter Fungabera, started once more towards the helicopter.

  At that moment there was the crumping detonation of an exploding grenade and the two men in the clearing turned quickly to look up the valley in the direction from which the explosion had sounded. Now there was a burst of automatic AK 47 fire from the same direction and immediately the urgent shout of orders around the tent.

  Troopers began doubling along the edge of the clearing, heading up the valley.

  Another burst of automatic fire, and the attention of every man was focused in that direction. Hastily, Craig pulled the pack onto his back.

  "Come on!" he snapped. "You know what to do! The three of them scrambled out of the ravine and moved out into the clearing.

  "Don't hurry," Craig cautioned them softly. They kept in a compact group, moving quickly but purposefully over the open ground towards Fungabera and is companion.

  Craig took the grena4e from his pocket and with his teeth drew the pin. Helheld the grenade in his left hand.

  In his right he carried the Uzi, loaded and cocked and with rapid, fire selected. They were within five paces before Peter Fungabera, glanced around and his astonishment was almost comical as he recognized Craig, even under his mud mask.

  "At this range I can cut you in half," Craig warned him, lifting the Uzi to the level of Peter's belly. "This grenade is armed. If I drop it, it will blow us all to hell." He had to shout above the sound of the helicopter's engine.

  The white man spun to face him, and his pate arctic eyes were savage.

  "Go for the pilot," Craig ordered the girls and they ran to the fuselage port of the helicopter.

  "Now, both of you," Craig told the two men, "walk to the helicopter. Don't hurry, don't shout." Craig followed three paces behind them. Before they reached the helicopter, the pilot appeared in the open port, both his hands high above his head, and Sarah behind him with the Tokarev pistol in his back.

  "Get oud" Craig ordered, and with obvious relief, the pilot jumped down to the ground.

  "Tell them that General Fungabera is a hostage," Craig said. "Any attack will endanger him. Do you understand?"

  "Yes," the pilot nodded.

  "Now walk back to that tent. Walk slowly. Don't run.

  Don't shout." The pilot set off gratefully, but as soon as he was clear, he broke into a trot.

  "Get in!" Craig gestured to the port with the Uzi, but Peter Fungabera glared at him and his head sank down menacingly on his wide shoulders.

  "Don't do it." Craig backed off a pace, for there was an air of desperation about Peter Fungabera, the reckless quality of a man with nothing more to lose.

  "Move!" Craig ordered. "Get up that ladder! and Peter Fungabera charged at him. Almost as though he were courting death, he ran straight onto the muzzle of the Uzi.

  However, Craig was poised to meet him. He brought up the weapon and crashed the barrel across the side of Peter Fungabera's head with a force that dropped him onto his knees.

  As Peter went down, Craig swu
ng the Uzi back on to the white man, anticipating any move he might make.

  "Help him up the ladder, "he ordered, and although the white man was encumbered by the black attache case chained to his wrist, the menace of the Uzi was persuasive and he stooped over Peter Fungabera and lifted him to his feet. Still stunned by the blow, Peter reeled in the man's grasp. He was mumbling dazedly.

  It doesn't matter now, it's all over anyway."

  "Shut up, you fool," the white man hissed at him.

  "Get him into the helicopter." Craig prodded the Uzi into the white man's back, and the pair started towards the ladder.

  "Keep the gun on them, Sarah," Craig called and glanced over his shoulder. The helicopter pilot had almost reached the edge of the clearing. "Hurry it up," Craig snarled at them, and the white man shoved Peter Fungabera through the port and clambered up after him, with the black case dangling on its chain from his wrist.

  Craig jumped up into the body of the helicopter.

  "Over there! he ordered his two prisoners to the bench seat. "Strap yourselves in! "Then to Sarah, "Tell Pendula. to get going!" The helicopter lifted off and rose swiftly out of the clearing, and Craig tossed the grenade out of the open port. It dropped away and exploded in the forest far below.

  Craig hoped the explosion would heighten the confusion down there.

  Craig stood behind Peter Fungabera with the Uzi pressed to the nape of his. neck while with his free hand he reached over and pu&d the Tokarev pistol from the holster on Peter'shipt He thrust it into his own pocket, then he backed off and buckled on the engineer's safety straps at the doorway. As Sarah clambered down from the cockpit, he ordered her, "Cover them both!" and he leaned out of the port and peered ahead.

  Almost immediately, he saw Tungata. He was already out of the trees, just below the rock slope, waving both hands over his head, brandishing the AK 47.

  "Hold on! I'm going down for the pick-up," Sally Anne -voice squealed from the twoway speaker above Craig's head.

  The big helicopter dropped swiftly down towards where Tungata was waiting, and Sally' Anne steadied the machine and hovered above his head.

  All around Tungata the grass was blown flat by the down-draught and Tungata's stolen battle-smock rippled and whipped about his body. He threw the AK 47 aside and looked up at Craig. The helicopter sank down the last few feet, and Craig leaned out of the hatch and made an arm for him. Tungata jumped and they locked arms at the elbows and Craig swung him aboard.

  "Okay!" he yelled up at the speaker. "Go for it!" And they went bounding up into the sky so swiftly that Craig's knees buckled.

  At a little over a thousand feet, Sally' Anne went straight and level and turned onto a westerly heading.

  Tungata turned to the figures on the bench seat and checked. He stared at Peter Fungabera ferociously, but Peter slumped, still dazed and beaten, on the bench seat.

  "Where did you find them, Pupho?" Tungata asked huskily.

  "They are a little present for you, Sam." Craig handed him the Uzi sub machinegun "It's loaded and cocked. Can I leave you to look after this pair of beauties?"

  "It will afford me the greatest of pleasure." Tungata turned the gun on the two men sitting side by side on the bench seat.

  "I'm going to see how Pendula is making out." Craig began to turn away, but something in the way the captive white man was holding himself alerted him, and he turned back quickly. The white prisoner had used the confusion to unlock the steel cuff from his wrist, and now he hurled the black attache case across the hold towards the open port.

  In a reflex action, Craig threw himself to one side, likea basket-ball player intercepting a pass, and he got a hand to the flying case, deflecting it aside so that it missed the open doorway and clattered against the bulkhead. He dived for it and hugged it to his chest.

  "This must be a very interesting piece of goods," he observed mildly, as he stood up. "I'd watch that one, Sam, he is as tricky as he is beautiful, he advised.

  Lugging the case, Craig made his way forward and clambered up into the raised cockpit. He dropped into the co-pilot's seat next to Sally-Anne, and shrugged out of the pack that contained the diamonds. He wedged it securely beside the seat.

  "So you can fly this damned thing, after all, bird lady!" She grinned at him, her teeth very white in her blackened face.

  "I'm heading back towards the pan where we left the Land-Rover." "Good thinking how's the fuel?"

  "One tank full, the other three quarters we have plenty in hand." Craig placed the attache case in his lap and checked the locks. They were combinations.

  "How long to the border? "he asked.

  "We are making 170 knots, less than two hours better than walking home, isn't it?"

  "My oath!" Craig grinned back at her.

  With his claspknifelie ripped out the combination locks and opened the lid of the attache case. On top there were two spare shirts and a ball of socks, a bottle of Russian vodka half full, a cheap wallet containing four passports, Finnish, Swedish, East German and Russian, airline tickets for Aeroflot.

  "Well-travelled gentleman!" Craig unscrewed the top of the vodka bottle and took a swig. "Brrr!" he said. "That's the real stuff!" He passed the bottle to Sally-Anne and lifted the shirts. Under them were three green-covered folders, they were stamped with Cyrillic lettering and black hammer and sickle crests.

  "Russian, by God! The man is a Bolshie!" He opened the top folder and his interest quickened.

  "It's typed in English!" He read the top page, and became gradually immersed in the contents. He did not even look UP when Sally-Anne asked, What's it say?" He skimmed through the first file and then the other two. Twenty-five minutes later he looked up with a stunned bemused expression and stared unseeingly through the windshield.

  "I can hardly believe it," he shook his head. "They were so damned sure of themselves. They even typed it out in clear English for Peter Fungabera's benefit. No attempt at concealing it. They didn't even bother to use code names."

  "What is it?" Sally-Anne glanced sideways at him.

  "It just boggles the mind." He took another mouthful of vodka. "Sam has got to read these!" He stood up and balancing against the lurch of the helicopter, he dropped down into the hold and hurried back to Tungata.

  Tungata and Sarah sat opposite the two hostages.

  Tungata had used the spare seat-belts to truss them securely at wrist and ankles. Peter Fungabera seemed to have recovered a little, and he and Tungata were glaring at each other, arguing with the acrimony and deadly concentration of mortal enemies.

  "Cool that! Craig dropped onto the bench beside Tungata.

  "Give me the Uzi." Craig took it from him. "Now read what is in here!" He placed the attach.6 case on Tungata's lap.

  "Delighted to meet you, Colonel Bukharin," Craig said pleasantly. "You must be happy to be missing the Moscow winter?" He pointed the Uzi at his belly.

  "I am a senior member of the diplomatic corps of the United Soviet-"

  "Yes, Colonel, I have read your visiting card." Craig indicated the files. "On the other hand Colonel, am a desperate fugitive quite capable of doing you a serious injury if you don't shut up." Then he turned to Peter Fungabera. "I do hope you are looking after King's Lynn properly, remembering to wipe your feet and all that?"

  "You escaped me once, Mr. Mellow," Peter Fungabera said softly. "I don't make the same mistakes twice." And despite the gun in his hands and the fact that Peter was trussed up likea sacrificial goat, Craig felt a chilly little breeze of fear down his spine and he could not go on holding the smouldering gaze of hatred with which Peter Fungabera. fixed him. He glanced sideways at Tungata.