Diamonds Are But Stone

by Peter Vollmer

  I could smell her heat, and was acutely aware of her nearness. I felt myself grow hard. It was not that she was coming on to me; it just seemed the natural thing to do, as if it always should be like this. I took one hand off the wheel, placing it on the side of her head and then letting my fingers slide down her hair and neck until I tentatively touched the swell of her bosom. I heard her sigh.

  We spoke no more until we arrived in the hotel’s parking lot. We walked hand-in-hand to the elevator tower, our gait quick, as if driven by some sense of urgency. Just as the elevator doors closed, another couple squeezed in and while we two just stood stoically there, the others were all over each other, their ultimate intention obvious.

  Maria closed the door behind us and turned round. I took her in my arms, and we kissed passionately, grinding our lips together, her tongue probing mine, her pelvis thrust hard against me. She took my hand and placed it on her breast and I grabbed her bottom with my other hand and, drew her hard against me, and held her there. I kissed the smooth soft swell of her breasts.

  “Madre Diaz,” she whispered.

  We unbuttoned each other’s clothes quickly letting these drop to the floor. She stepped back from me clad only in her underwear and unclasped her bra, slowly removing it, freeing her breasts - they were magnificent, jutting out like a ledge. A long groan from deep inside my throat escaped me - I stepped forward, took a breast in my mouth, and with my tongue rolled the erect and hard nipple. She moaned in my ear.

  I scooped her up and carried her to the bed, laying her down to and then quickly removed the rest of my clothing as she slipped off her thong. We lay then next to each other kissing. My hand slid down her body and disappearing between her thighs, I further aroused further by her wetness.

  “Please... now!” she begged in a hoarse whisper.

  It was not long before our worlds exploded in an incandescent sense of pleasure and oneness.

  Chapter Nine

  I left the hotel suite at two in the morning and arrived back at my bungalow about an hour later.

  Of course, my relationship with Francine now suddenly loomed large. I had that distinct feeling that I was sinking fast towards an abyss from which I would be unable to extract myself. I felt guilty, ungracious and unclean - unclean not in the literal sense but rather that I had besmirched a relationship of mutual trust and love.

  I really was as if I’d never been in love with Francine, certainly not that all-consuming love that is supposed to be the nearest thing to nirvana. Yes, my relationship with her was warm and comfortable; she was a wonderful companion, even-tempered and understanding. Neither had I looked upon our relationship as a convenient sexual interlude until I stumbled on something else.

  As I approached my front door, I saw a small folded piece of paper jammed in a crack in the door panelling.

  Was here at 11.30 - you still weren’t home. You shouldn’t work so hard! Phone me tomorrow. Love you, F

  Another wave of self-reproach swept over me. How was I to deal with this new situation? I didn’t want to hurt her. I didn’t know whether I merely lusted after Maria or whether it was more than that. Damn it! I hardly knew the woman!

  What I did know was that Francine was a wonderful woman - I would never want to hurt her, no matter what!

  Frustrated, I tore the note off the door. I would have to deal with this tomorrow.

  I arrived at the office half an hour late, which was unusual. Shirley greeted me with raised eyebrows and a pointed look at the wall clock. I ignored her. Gavin was already seated in his office. The moment I walked in, Gavin came through the adjoining door and then closed my office door, checking that we were alone.

  “Morning,” he said with some contempt. “You’re late. Did you have a long night?”

  I ignored his question, not sure whether I was supposed to read something into his remark. I was not about to let him judge me. I too looked around to make sure that we could not be overheard.

  “Don’t let your imagination run away with you. Maria is only in the country for five weeks or so. She says that if we are to retrieve the cases we should do so now... that’s why she’s here. Apparently, the ceasefire between the MPLA, Cubans, and UNITA, not to forget South Africa, is working, well... sort of, but it could collapse at any time. Patrols, particularly in the south-western corner of the Cuando Cubango province near Jamba should be non-existent, or so she says, although I don’t entirely believe that - none of the bastards trusts each other. But, she says we must realize that this may be the only opportunity we’ll have for a long time. She, and that probably means the CIA, think that civil war will soon break out again. The mere fact that Savimbi is hanging onto his diamond mines shows that he is not prepared to hand over everything to the new government, although some of his soldiers are now slowly being integrated into the new Angolan armed forces,” I spoke quickly, trying to get everything across before anyone interrupted us.

  Gavin stared at me for a moment.

  “And how do you propose we do this? Has Maria got a plan?”

  “No, she hasn’t. It’s up to you and me to come up with something. I think that we must fly in and out; there is no other way of tackling this - no hiking through the bush. That’s too damn dangerous - too many patrols and don’t forget the landmines,” I replied.

  For a second my mind dwelt on Kowalski’s fate. It sent a shudder of fear through me.

  “That airstrip on which you crashed the Hawker Siddeley, do you think it is usable?” he asked.

  “I doubt it, but may be with a STOL aircraft - really short take-off and landing capabilities. That might just do it. It’s the anthills that are the problem -the critters build the damn things so damn fast, especially during the summer.”

  I took the seat behind my desk.

  “I take it we’re not going to use any of our own aircraft?” Gavin asked.

  “You’re damn right; they’re not insured for that type of operation and certainly not for a flight to Angola - that’s a bloody war zone.”

  Gavin stared out through the office window watching a Learjet take-off, chewing on his lip.

  “Mmm, the best aircraft would be a Russian Antonov-2; there are quite a few of them operating in Angola, the Cubans brought a couple across. An Antonov in Angola would not look suspicious,” he said quietly, not quite sure how I would respond to his suggestion.

  “Gav! That’s a good idea,” I replied enthusiastically. “Where can we get hold of one?”

  The An-2 is an extraordinary aircraft. Some rave about the Russian Bolshoi ballet. With me it’s Russian aircraft; these are the best air-workhorses in the world. Rugged is an apt description. That’s what an Antonov-2 is; besides it can seat twelve and land at thirty-five miles an hour within six hundred feet with a 4700lb payload. It’ll take-off in less than that.

  Gavin started laughing, happy to have come up with a possible solution.

  “You won’t believe this! Some guy bought a few in Eastern Europe after the Soviet exodus and brought them back to Johannesburg Rand Airport. I hear he is offering one or two for sale - hasn’t had any takers yet - you know the South African attitude towards anything made in the USSR. The price isn’t bad either, considering that each is being offered with a brand new spare radial engine still in the damn packing case. We can have Mike go through and check it out - get a COA[1] for it.”

  “Grand idea. Christ! An An2 in Johannesburg,” I said. I marvelled at the news. “The damn plane’s a brilliant choice for this job - a biplane with a thousand horsepower engine and a good load capability... though maybe a bit slow, heh? Did you know that they say that if the wind blows hard enough, you can fly it backwards - a bloody piece of Russian ingenuity, I tell you,” I added with some avidness.

  “All right, I’m going to make some enquiries. Hey, people are going to think we’re nuts. We’re have to just say
we buying it for fun, not work - something for ourselves to use on fishing and hunting trips and generally just messing around. Okay? Our own sports plane.”

  “Sure, sounds good. If you think the price is right, take an option.”

  Well, we bought the plane and at a fair price: Gavin had haggled the price down. He flew it to Lanseria from Rand Airport. I had to laugh when I first saw it: it was painted a drab dark green and sported an enormous Soviet red star on both sides of the rudder and CCCP in large letters on its fuselage. This alone drew a few onlookers. And all the instructions and instrument labels were in Russian!

  Mike Holloway subjected the plane to a meticulous inspection, going through it slowly, harrumphing, and snorting on the occasions that he saw the odd thing or two.

  Well, Mike,” I asked. “What do you think?”

  He rolled his eyes. “God, this thing comes out of Noah’s Ark. Huge rubber bands activate the bloody slots! Can you believe it....that Russian engine upfront is a downright copy of an American Pratt & Whitney from World War Two!”

  I interrupted him. “How long to get a COA[2], if your whole crew works on it?”

  He rubbed his chin with his fingers. “Two weeks... what’s the rush?”

  “Never mind, that’s all the time you’ve got - remember!”

  He gave me a dirty look and walked away. He wasn’t happy; he considered himself part of the family.

  Gavin and I thought it best that we meet with Maria in her hotel, far away from prying eyes.

  Maria opened the door to us. I introduced them. I was immediately aware of Gavin’s furtive glances as he appraised Maria, no doubt wondering what I saw in this woman. I had told him little about her. She was dressed in jeans with a white top, the décolletage quite revealing. I thought this had to be a Cuban trait, some breast must always show. From the surreptitious glances he gave her, it seemed Gavin agreed.

  Maria produced the CIA map she had previously mentioned and I must say it impressed me. It was to a scale of 1:50,000 and showed everything; elevations, tracks, roads and, of course, the rivers, and airfields. In the right hand top corner, it was stamped “SECRET”.

  “Impressive,” Gavin said. Maria merely smiled.

  I pointed out the airfield at Luina and then the approximate position where the briefcases were buried.

  “That field’s only five thousand feet long and look, the map indicates that it is not usable - trees and bush growing on it.” I said.

  “Look across the river on the Zambian side. There’s a road through the bush running parallel to the river. I’m suggesting we fly to Luina; make a slow, careful inspection of the runway from the air and if we can’t land, we land the plane on the other side, the Zambian side. Here, what’s the place’s name...Simjembela. We put it down on the road. The road straight and flat, and free of trees along the edges... a piece of cake for the An2.”

  Gavin and Maria looked at me in disbelief.

  “How would we cross the river?” Maria asked.

  I smiled. “We don’t - we pay, or bribe, whatever, the locals on the Zambian side to take their dugouts across with a few men. Maybe one of us goes with, we clear the runway - all they need is pangas - the bush, and trees are young and can’t be big. We just have to flatten the anthills. We need no more than twelve to fifteen hundred feet in which to land and get airborne again. We probably could do the job in a day.”

  “What about the briefcases?” Gavin asked.

  “We don’t go near them. We prepare everything - get the whole lot ready for extraction. Then we look and listen and make sure all is safe and that we’ve raised no suspicions. If everything is okay, we move in like Flint - in and out like a flash.”

  I was sure the grin on my face must have told them that I thought it a brilliant plan.

  “What about the police on the Zambian side?” Gavin asked.

  “The nearest station is over fifty miles away. They probably only patrol there once a month. If they do suddenly pitch up, we fake an engine problem. In fact, I’m thinking we should file a flight plan for a trip to Zambia to some nearby lodge in Zambia, then there’s nothing wrong if we put the plane down on Zambian soil. Of course, all our papers must be in order. What do you think?”

  They both nodded their heads in dubious agreement.

  “Just remember, that river is full of bloody crocs and hippos,” Gavin added. “Christ! In and out like Flint... where the hell does that expression come from?”

  I met with Francine the following evening. As promised, I had phoned and we’d decided on a quiet dinner at my place. Of course, I had made a point of never mentioning the briefcases, but that was the only piece of information about my past that she was not party to. She knew the rest.

  My vague reply as to what I’d been doing the night she left the note on my door did not go unnoticed; my lack of candour concerned her, although she never pressed me.

  The evening was warm. We decided to eat on the porch, an ultra-violet light hanging from the ceiling keeping the insects at bay, zit-zitting regularly as it fried the insects that were drawn to it. This was tucked away in a corner; you didn’t want the dead insects anywhere near the table. Francine had insisted on something light so we settled for two tuna steaks grilled over an open fire with an Italian salad. We shared a crisp dry white wine.

  We tried to get into a movie on the pay-channel but eventually retired to the bedroom, Francine rolling into my arms so we would make love; this was the usual scenario if we had not been together for a few days.

  I went through the motions but whether it was because Maria was on my mind or a guilty conscience was inhibiting me, the magic just seemed to elude us.

  Afterwards she lay snuggled up to me, her head partially resting on my chest.

  “What’s with you tonight?” she quietly asked. “Really mediocre foreplay, which normally you excel at, then bim-bam and a lousy finish..., is there a problem?”

  God, I thought, was it that obvious?

  “I’m just feeling a little off.” I said.

  Worse still, she believed me and snuggled even closer, like a mother would do to comfort her baby.

  I felt awful.

  Mike and his boys had done a magnificent job. On the fourteenth day, Mike strode into my office and slid the An2’s new South African logbooks over my desk, opened to display the newly issued COA.

  I stepped out of the offices and walked over to the hangar with him to inspect the aircraft.

  Any previous reference to Russia had been removed. The An2’s tailplane now proudly displayed our company logo and its new South African registration was painted in white on the fuselage and wings. The drab green colour had been retained. That it was a Russian aircraft did not bother me; most of the indigenous population along the Cuano River really did not know one type of aircraft from another. At best, all they would know was that it was South African registered.

  “Take the company logo off,” I said.

  “What the hell for?” Mike blurted unable to hide his astonishment.

  “It’s private - it belongs to Gavin and me.”

  He just shook his head in frustration.

  Gavin flew the aircraft to Alldays. I insisted that to be properly prepared, we had to load an inflatable Zodiac raft with a thirty horsepower outboard engine as well as two quadcycles. I thought it was imperative that we have mobility on the ground - the quads were ideal. The cargo area in the An2 can easily accommodate these.

  Alldays is a town in South Africa close to the Botswana border, which serves a large community of cattle ranchers and game farms. The area also has a large police presence with a few army units, because of the occasional terrorist incursions into the country to lay landmines. The airfield was subject to twenty-four hour security, which insured that the aircraft and its contents were safe. I collected Gavin in
Alldays in the Piper Seneca and brought him back to Lanseria, leaving the An-2 on Allday’s airfield.

  Chapter Ten

  After collecting Maria at the hotel, we arrived at Lanseria Airport at three in the morning. As we approached the gates that led to the apron, Maria hid behind the seats of my SUV. I didn’t want anybody to know that a woman accompanied us. The security merely waved us through without even checking.

  It was Friday, the start of a three day long weekend in South Africa. That had given us the opportunity to tell Shirley and the others, including Francine, that Gavin and I were taking a well-earned break and were going tiger fishing at on the giant Kariba Dam.

  We had also told the office that we had hired out the An2 to a group of Americans who were on safari in Botswana and Zambia. We were unsure of the duration but they would sort this out on their return.

  Nobody seemed at all suspicious.

  Hidden from any prying eyes behind the hangar, we loaded our kit into the Cessna Caravan. We didn’t take much, just a holdall each. Except Maria: she had quite a large and heavy aluminium case and when Gavin asked as to its contents, she told him to mind his own business, this in a friendly manner.

  The flight to Alldays was uneventful. We landed just as the first light of dawn began to spread over the flat bush landscape below.

  Within an hour of landing the Cessna, I taxied the An2 to the end of the runway ready for take-off. Gavin had insisted that I pilot, as I had a lot more experience on this type of STOL aircraft, whereas most of his experience was confined to jets. The aircraft was a tail-dragger, that is, it had no nose-wheel and taxied with its nose stuck up in the air. Modern light aircraft have narrow cockpits, well, comparatively speaking, the An2 has a cockpit akin to a cabin cruiser’s, but utilitarian in design - there was nothing aesthetic about it. Everything had a function. All the Russian instructions and instrument labels were now blocked over with black-and-white dyna-tape displaying the equivalent English name for the instrument, the work of Mike, and his men. The quads and the deflated raft were lashed to the cabin floor. Maria took a seat directly behind Gavin.