by Julian Beale
They enjoyed a glass or two of champagne before they sat down. Then Pente recited a special grace of his own creation, looking around as he did so to embrace them all. The food was excellent and the wines peerless. Ursula administered and Bill Evans assured their privacy from his watching post in reception. When coffee and liqueurs had been circulated, David called for a moment’s silence while he brought them up to date.
‘Our fleet has sailed. The “Orphans Angel” left Hong Kong on schedule with her full complement of crew and passengers, nearly three thousand in total. We attracted some outstanding press coverage as you will have seen. Her voyage, which some journalistic bright spark has dubbed “Mission of Mercy”, seems to have caught the global imagination and getting under way just before Christmas has given a further boost. We have published the schedule and the dates, so the world is informed that “Orphans” will be putting into five different ports and countries down the West coast of Africa over the next nine months and we have got correspondence with all five to prove she is expected. Only we know that she’ll be delayed into all but one.
‘Her journey is uneventful so far and the captain told me earlier today that they have all settled down together. The ship is now in the Pacific and closing on Cape Town where Fergus will join her by helicopter. He will be flying out to Cape Town tomorrow and can tell you this evening that the embarkation of the Strike Force was complicated, but no worse than anticipated.
‘The “Hope” did have some problems which delayed her arrival into Felixstowe and had us sweating a bit. But they managed to make up time in loading her there and she’s made a good passage since. We know that she’ll make the rendezvous with the others.
‘So far, so good. Now for the rest of us, the original plan is unchanged. Martin and Ruth are staying here of course. Fergus goes tomorrow which leaves me and Aischa, Alexa and Hugh, Felix, Pente, King and Ursula. The eight of us fly out of London Stansted on New Year’s Eve. We’ll have plenty of space. Hugh has bought us a Boeing 747. It’s not new and it’s unusual as it’s a short bodied model designed for both passengers and cargo. That will be useful as we have a bit of kit to take with us, a couple of vehicles and a whole lot of medical supplies in particular. The aircraft came fitted out with a cabin full of sophisticated communications gear which will be useful to us. Also with a flight crew, led by an experienced chief pilot called Arnie Schwartz, a South African who is quite a character. Hugh and I had no choice but to tell him what we’re about. It was a risk, but he had to know and we think we‘ve struck lucky. Arnie is delighted and now, so am I.’
David paused to sip at his port and his silence denoted that he was ready for questions. But overall, the prevailing mood was of a weary resolution: let’s get on with it for all that we’re scared of what the future holds. That goes for me also, thought David to himself.
They broke up before midnight, going their separate ways and conscious that they were now bound together, for better or worse. In the back of the company Range Rover the following day, Aischa took his hand and squeezed in comfort as the chauffeur piloted them through Knightsbridge ablaze with the Christmas lights, over Hammersmith flyover and onto the motorway to Heathrow. They were going home to Lisbon for a few days before returning to spend a night with Oscar and Anna in their draughty old house outside Hereford.
And then.
FERGUS CARRADINE — New Year’s Day 2000
Fergus spent a sleepless New Year’s Eve because one of the two lifts from hold to flight deck on the ‘Dawn’ went unserviceable and the engineer who could fix it was being carried on the ‘Angel’. Typically of Carradine, he didn’t waste time wondering at the cause of this cock up, but concentrated on sorting it out. And they did, but only just before daybreak after the technician had been trying to give advice over a mobile phone whilst in an inflatable ploughing through heavy swell from ship to ship. Then the omens got worse. The first aircraft away was a Chinook, perhaps a little overloaded for the flight conditions. It crabbed off the deck and clipped a container in passing. The container was pushed over the side of ‘Dawn’ and the chopper had to ditch a mile away. All the guys on board were saved, but only at the cost of time and effort. The machine and its load went down of course, so all this meant that they were behind schedule with some loss of assets.
After this poor start, he was mighty relieved that everything went exactly to plan. They were lucky in some things, but Fergus held to the belief that you make your own luck and he had ensured this through nit-picking planning and rigorous, repeated training until all his people were as near perfect in their roles as could be achieved.
There were others outside his immediate control. Patrick Nugumu and the advance team had been in place for weeks and were careful to draw no attention to themselves. They were thorough also, refining their observations to identify the hard targets which the Strike Force needed to hit first. The docks, so the three ships could come in to unload. The large barracks just out of town. The Presidential Palace, for obvious reasons but also because it was so near the base for the praetorian guard, the regime’s best troops, who were quartered just half a kilometre distant. Then there was City Hall, both radio stations, the main bus depot and the single TV transmitter. There was also the airport, but that was to come in for attention a little later.
Fergus had been preoccupied with how to get himself from ship to shore. He wanted to direct matters from the quayside, but was reluctant to leave his command and it was essential that ‘Dawn’, with the Strike Force, and ‘Hope’ remained out of sight over the horizon until ‘Orphans Angel’ had received her welcome to enter harbour. He cudgelled his brain for alternatives and his best hopes were rewarded. As the first light of a new century was brushing the waves, Alec Singleton, Master of the ‘Angel’ sent a message announcing their arrival to the authorities. He received a polite response saying he was expected, but please to wait an hour until the pilot boat from the harbour could come out to greet him. This gave Fergus ample time to gather a small team and transfer to the ‘Angel’, so it was from her deck that he saw his first view of the city which was to become Century before that day was out.
It was also from the ‘Angel’ that he called in the first wave of Apaches, followed as fast as they could get airborne by the Chinooks carrying his fighting troops. The helicopters were screaming in as Verity Blades, the ace Kiwi girl, executed her brilliant, brave idea that called for all her demolition skills. She blew the overpass bridge which took an access road from the main highway up to the Palace. The effect was to box in both the President and his crack guards. It wouldn’t hold them for long, not with byways around, but for long enough to cause confusion and to disrupt command. It was a subject for much debate during planning, but Verity proved her expertise, taking out a three metre strip to leave a clean gap too wide to jump but easy to close again with temporary roadway.
By 1000 hours, Fergus was in position on the quay. His command post was formed by two small containers, pre prepared with communications and lifted in by the first Chinook. He was accompanied by his personal staff including Rory Trollope as his ADC and they were ringed by troops flown in to provide protection. By the same time, the ‘Angel’ had berthed and Strike Force personnel had taken over the Harbour office to give guidance to the ‘Dawn’ and the ‘Hope’, both vessels being now in view from land and approaching fast. On board the ‘Angel’, a carefully phrased announcement in the cinema, on radio and in print was being circulated amongst the Orphans personnel to inform and to advise that no one was yet permitted to leave the ship. There was dramatic noise all around, but little opposition. The truth was that most of the invaders and more of the residents had no idea of what was taking place. It was exactly this confusion on which Fergus was counting to encourage take over without bloody confrontation, but he knew it couldn’t last. The first news of fighting reached him when Patrick screeched to a halt and hopped out of a scruffy old van which he had commandeered. Patrick had been watching the main barracks, just out
of town, while his son was observing activity around the Palace from a safe distance.
Their news was not surprising, but not good either. Despite Verity’s bomb, at least a hundred troops from the Palace Guard had made their exit via the bush tracks which ran north off the hill to link up with the City ring Road. They must have organised themselves, because he had seen them link with a much larger group in a convoy of trucks driving from the direction of the barracks. Patrick took over to describe what he had seen.
Oswanje Camp, the barracks, was hard hit by the Apaches in their first attack, using rockets to create maximum mayhem and drama. They were followed immediately by Chinooks, dropping the Strike Force as the machines hovered and returning to the Dawn for more. Patrick reported that the scene was chaotic and Fergus was not surprised. Oswanje was the camp for enlisted men, largely untrained and ill-disciplined who would be panicked by the crash and thunder of the Apaches, and easily contained by the far smaller number of his own, professional force. The greater worry was posed by a smaller number of men who moved off smartly, forming themselves into sections and climbing into their transport.
Patrick had his adopted son Jonah with him. They had arrived before first light at a minor, back gate into the camp, driving in a truck loaded with baulks of timber. They had retreated higher and further back into the bush from where Patrick could watch the action through his field glasses. As matters progressed, he manoeuvred their vehicle closer, planning to drop the timber over this camp exit. He had not expected to confront any of the President’s elite soldiers but now it was plain that those organising themselves were just that. He watched them through the glasses. Perhaps they made up a relief detachment which slept at Oswanje for want of space at the Palace. Whatever, they moved surely and calmly, and there were not a few: he counted a hundred plus.
Time was pressing. Patrick abandoned his plan for barricading the gate. He retreated to hide in the bush, but since that was low and skimpy, he reckoned Jonah would be better concealed by the baulks of wood. He shouted at him to get in the truck and poor Jonah, young man mountain but pretty simple with it, did precisely what he was told.
The first vehicle carrying the President’s Guard came barrelling up the rough track from the camp and burst through the light mesh gate without stopping. Outside, however, it found Jonah standing with his thumb out. The driver took him for one of their own as in all the chaos there were few of them in uniform and he slowed up just enough for Jonah to jump for the tailboard and be hauled inside before the vehicle took off followed by five others with soldiers packed in and hanging on however. Jonah had done as he was told: ‘Get in the truck!’
At that point, there was nothing which Fergus could do about Jonah. His hands were full with matters of moment and he couldn’t allow himself to be distracted. One look told him that Patrick understood, despite his personal anguish. Fergus asked for any further detail on the escapees and Patrick remembered a sixth truck at the tail of the column, closed in and down on its axles: weapons and ammunition. Fergus worried. It now looked that there were close to two hundred of their best fighting men on the loose and he couldn’t afford too many of his own to go in search. He needed them to keep the hundreds of riff raff soldiers pinned down. He asked about Patrick’s other two sons: one was at the television station, the other well out of the city at Bolongula, where the power station was located. Both were waiting to guide in Strike Force teams.
‘Stay with me, Patrick’, Fergus instructed before turning to Rory, ‘time you were on your way. Hook up with Simon and get going.’
They were just entering the next and critical phase. Hugh’s Bertie the Boeing was carrying David Heaven and party as well as a section of twenty-four from the Strike Force. There was cargo on board as well and young Arnie Schwartz at the controls. They left London Stansted as late as permitted by CAA rules, but that was still going to put them in too early, so Arnie filed a flight plan for N’Djamena, Chad and they laid over there for a few hours. They were timed to arrive overhead the airport at noon and to land after that.
Simon Goring was their most experienced commando. Backed up by Rory Trollope and three more, he travelled out to the airport in one of the Force Land Rovers which had rolled off the ‘Dawn’, by now in harbour. They worked fast, leaving their vehicle, cutting the perimeter fence and moving quietly in on their target. The management at the airport had no idea that the control tower was in enemy hands as the Boeing was cleared to land and rolled down the runway onto the apron.
Then things changed. From the Captain’s seat, Arnie Schwartz saw activity all around the terminal building and three trucks drove onto the apron, jerking to a halt and spilling out armed troops who started to surround his aeroplane. He reported to Goring in the Tower and alerted the leader of the Strike section on board. The word had got out and someone out there was competent to respond. Arnie left the cockpit to tell his passengers to stay put. He couldn’t see the action but guessed that his soldiers were jumping from the cargo access door at the rear, engaging as they hit the ground with support coming from Simon Goring’s team way up in the tower.
Arnie urged David Heaven and party onto the floor of the aisles and they huddled together as the plane took sporadic hits from the fire fight which was blazing all around, continuing for what seemed like eternity. David lay there with his arm around Aischa, wondering if it was all going to end here. They had Hugh’s great feet in their faces. Then suddenly, there was silence, followed by the appearance of Goring who had swung himself through the cargo hatch and came padding through to them. He had lost two, with three lightly wounded. They had killed many more and the remainder had run. The entire airport was now under Strike Force control.
David Heaven’s party arrived at the Presidential Palace — immediately renamed Founder’s Hill — at dead on 1400 hours as scheduled.
By then it was clear that the city was taken. There was little more resistance. The ‘Orphans Angel’ was berthed, the ‘Dawn’ and the ‘Hope’ both tied up. The utilities were secure, communications were under control and the helicopter base was established. The good news was that the provisions and the helping hands were rolling out and starting to win a welcome. There was much evidence that the former President and his coterie had left in a rush: doors left open, furniture awry, cupboards half full of abandoned possessions, an empty safe and papers everywhere — including those which had survived the half-hearted fire which someone had tried to light in front of the garage block. David had no idea why they had panicked, how they had travelled or to where. It really didn’t matter.
As planned, they deployed the Strike Force contingent which had arrived with them to clear and check the large mansion and its outbuildings, then to provide personal protection as they settled to work, cathartic after the shock of the gun battle at the airport. Felix Maas took over the dining room and started to assemble information on progress, Hugh Dundas went down to the harbour to confer with the Captain of the ‘Angel’, Aischa went with Pente to visit the city hospital, King stayed with David who found himself a position within the grand entrance hall from which to work. Alexa toured the main building with Ursula, noting what was where, deciding that it was well named as Founder’s Hill, and finding some members of the staff who had been left behind and were amenable to instruction from a new management: she was reminded of Aischa’s prediction.
David’s first imperative was to make contact with Martin Kirchoff in London. He was relieved to get through to him immediately.
‘You’ve been reported on the news, David,’ Martin told him, ‘The BBC, but radio only so far: nothing on the TV. I guess it’s as you expected. Now we’re in the new century, all anyone wants to hear about is if the world’s computers are still working, so a coup in West Africa isn’t attracting much attention.’
David smiled at King who was listening in at his side. It was what they had hoped to hear. David broke the connection and turned to congratulate Fergus who had just arrived with Patrick to join them.
Fergus looked grim, grabbing a seat while he briefed them on the situation at Oswanje Camp. As he finished a terse account, David looked towards King and spoke to them all.
‘Add in those who got away from the Palace fighting and that could mean nearly three hundred armed men, drawn from the best they ever had here. We don’t know where they’ve gone and we don’t know what they’ll do next. Am I right?’
‘Plus they have their boss in charge. This is their Guard of Honour, right?’ it was a statement from King.
Patrick chipped in, ‘They’ll go home, Suh, to the place they call Panje. They’ll be there now.’
‘Where the hell is Panje?’ David asked, bellowing for Felix to join them. He arrived at the run and didn’t need his notes to supply the answer.
‘Panje is the name for both a place and a tribe or sect, ’he told them, ‘It’s a large group of rocks about 170 kilometres north east of here in the foothills which climb towards the central plateau. Panje was the meeting point over hundreds of years for the hard fighting men from the mountains who used to come together for some bonding and witchcraft before raids into the fertile country stretching down the coastline. Panje came to mean not just the place, but also the people, a name to identify the most feared and violent of the warrior class. From the mid 1960’s, succeeding Presidents here — only three as you know — encouraged a myth to grow up around Panje, fermenting the superstition that true Panje are a breed apart, with invincible strength and a sort of inner eye for divining the truth. They are an elite, ideal to provide the classic Praetorian Guard, a bit like the Tonton Macoutes in Haiti. This type of voodoo cult is extremely effective in a poorly educated and down trodden society. All it needs is to be rigidly disciplined and given enough leash to ensure that the general population rolls its eyes in collective terror of attracting the wrong sort of attention.’
