by Chris Ryan
‘Stop!’ I roared. ‘You fucking bitch! Tell them to leave him alone!’
I’d have done better to keep quiet. A second later, Inge was on her feet, limping down off the stage, coming at Whinger, jabbing at his face with her nails.
‘See!’ she screeched. ‘He is burned! Because he was inside! He knows the diamond, where it is. He has hidden it in a special place.’
The next thing I knew, she’d started pulling patches of dead or dying skin away from Whinger’s cheek. ‘Tell!’ she shouted. ‘Tell!’
Doped though he was, Whinger gave a roar and rocked away from her, knocking Genesis over sideways.
‘This is the one who knows!’ she cried, turning back to Muende. ‘Quite sure! He tells us! I make him tell us!’ With her long nails she peeled off another flap of skin and threw it towards the side of the hut. Again Whinger bellowed like a wounded bull.
That was too much. With all my strength I lunged forward and sideways. The chair I was tied to brought me down almost in my own length, but I had enough forward impetus to head-butt the woman in the flank and put her flat on the deck. Immediately a rush of guards swarmed over me, kicking and stamping at my head and body. By the time they hauled me upright again I was bleeding freely from nose and scalp. One trickle ran down the middle of my forehead into both eyes, blurring my vision.
I could see enough to know that Muende was on his feet, drinking again. He held the bottle high for several seconds, gulping. Then he smacked it down on the table and lurched towards us. Inge was also on her feet, bent and gasping, holding her ribs, white in the face. I reckoned she was coming for me, but she was confused, and thought it was Whinger who’d attacked her. She screamed at him from close-up, but this time in Afundi, or whatever African language she was using. Then she turned and screamed at Muende.
The noise and the drink seemed to get to him, and he too suddenly began yelling orders. The whole room erupted into movement, a nightmare scrummage. Two or three men cut Whinger free from his chair, picked him up bodily and carried him to the stage, where they laid him flat on his back on the table and held him down. The poor bugger made no effort to resist: he hardly knew what was happening. Muende lurched round the far side of the table, bent over the prostrate figure until his face was nearly touching Whinger’s chest, and flung his arms out, sweeping them round and back as if swimming breaststroke. Three times he did it, giving loud grunts: ‘Uh! Uh! Uh!’ Then he stepped back and his place was taken by another man brandishing a machete. Its curved blade gleamed in the lamplight as he raised it aloft. I thought he was going to whack Whinger’s head off with one downward sweep, so I gave an almighty roar and tried to surge upright again. My reward was a stunning blow on the back of the neck, a rabbit punch delivered with the butt of a rifle, which put me down and out for several seconds.
Perhaps it was a mercy in disguise. When I came round on the deck, the whole room was buzzing with noise. Our guards were chattering with excitement. Through a forest of legs I could see half the platform and part of the table. Inge was standing over it with her mouth gaping in a wolf-like grin of triumph, holding out a hand. A black hand passed her a long, thin strip of what looked like dark meat, shiny and dripping. She took it between finger and thumb and handed it to Muende, who raised it high over his head and lowered it into his mouth.
I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. My eyes were still cloudy with blood. I blinked again and again, trying to clear them. The result was that I made out a tangle of grey, slippery intestines sliding down over the side of the table, reaching to the floor. The coils were moving, twitching. My gorge rose and my stomach heaved up into my mouth, but there was nothing to come up except bile. I lay gasping for breath. God almighty. What I’d seen was Whinger’s guts. They’d disembowelled him. Did they think he’d swallowed the diamond and was hiding it in his gut? No. Jesus Christ! They were eating his liver. Was he still alive? I hadn’t heard him yell out. Had they cut his throat? Or coshed him?
It’s a terrible thing to pray that your oldest, closest mate is dead. But I did then. I wished him dead with all my might so that he wouldn’t suffer any more. I told myself that he was going to die anyway, from his burns. I closed my eyes and felt sweat break out all over my upper body. Then I started to shudder uncontrollably. One of the blacks gave me a couple of kicks, but I couldn’t stop shaking.
It was anger that came to my rescue, sheer rage at what these people had done. As the shudders subsided I seemed to go cold with fury and the desire for revenge. At the first opportunity I got, I was going to kill this man. The woman, too. The woman first. In a flash my hatred of her had become all-consuming. Whether I shot her full of holes or blew her into vapour, I’d make fucking certain she never saw Windhoek again.
My head, neck and jaw were aching, but my mind had cleared. From what Muende had said, the big diamond must have been on board the Beechcraft. How in hell had it got there? The answer came in a flash: the woman and her South African escorts had picked it up from the mine. That’s what they’d been doing. That’s where they’d just come from when we first saw them. That would account for the course the aircraft had been on. They’d just cleared the ridge, coming away from the river, and were heading west. Her spiel about flying from Mozambique had been a load of bollocks. She was Muende’s courier. On his behalf, with his instructions, she’d been trying to smuggle the stone out of Kamanga, away to Namibia or South Africa.
Would it have survived the crash? Yes. Diamond is one of the hardest stones on earth, well able to withstand fire. In any case, the fiercest blaze had been in the wings, around the fuel tanks, and if the stone had been stowed in the cabin, or the luggage compartment in the nose-cone, it would have escaped the hottest flames.
Lying on the floor, I shut my eyes, and tried to shut my ears to the repulsive gurgling, slurping noises coming from the stage. So much for an education at West Point. Whatever it had taught Muende, it hadn’t stopped him being a cannibal.
I needed a plan. The start of it was simple enough. Without my help, he and his sidekick might search for weeks before they found the wreck. Only I could locate it quickly. If I offered to lead them to the site, they’d have to accept – and somehow, on the way, I’d call in the rest of the lads to knock them off.
I was racking my brain to think how we could make contact when a sudden recollection drove into my plan like a dagger: my GPS. The thieving soldier bastards at the convent had nicked it. And in it, marked as Waypoint Seven, was the precise location of the crash. Anyone who realised that Waypoint Seven was the vital spot, and understood how the device worked, could make his way directly to the place. The GPS would give him bearing and distance to target – a dead giveaway.
They had Whinger’s GPS as well. Or did they? No – we’d left it behind with the rest of his kit in the mother wagon. And anyway, I was pretty certain he’d never punched in a waypoint for the plane; he’d been too busy trying to come to terms with his burns. The only other GPS with the coordinates in it was Mart’s. Who’d got mine by now? With any luck, some dickhead of a black squaddie, who would run the batteries down by trying to figure out how it worked, and have no means of recharging them.
For a few moments, chasing possibilities in my mind, I’d managed to attain a state of more or less suspended animation. I was brought back to reality by scraping, bumping noises. By squinting sideways I could see that men were dragging Whinger’s body out through the door. Instinct screamed at me to go after it, take possession of it, to hold it, keep it. Reason told me none of that was possible. Reason said the only way Geordie and Genesis could get out of this alive would be to appear to cooperate.
Gen! Where the hell was he? From my position on the floor, I couldn’t see him. He’d done nothing to provoke Muende, but I hadn’t heard a sound from him, and I was afraid they’d knackered him as well. At last I was dragged upright and dumped back on a chair, arms down over the back once again. There was Gen, right beside me, where he’d always been. He’d had a good bea
ting, too. Except where it was blooded, his face was sheet-white and had a stricken look, as if it had been frozen by cold. But his lips were moving. Was he muttering out of sheer terror, or was he saying a silent prayer?
Muende was back in his chair, wiping his chin with a handkerchief. There was blood down the front of his swish tunic, but he looked more in control than before, as if the act of eating had left him calmer. Inge, the bitch, was also back in her seat. The sight of her sent a new current of anger racing through me, but I steeled myself to remain cool, to negotiate rather than argue, to ignore the filthy deed they’d just done.
Muende cleared his throat loudly, and said, ‘Now, the diamond was in the plane.’
‘Please,’ I begged. ‘You have to believe me. We never saw it.’
I was talking with a lisp, due to the fact that my lower lip was swollen and split on the left side.
‘You must explain,’ I went on, obsequiously. ‘We don’t know what happened. Did your friend here collect the diamond from the mine at Gutu to take it out of the country?’
The woman started as if she’d been stung in the arse by a scorpion, and said, ‘Who has told you that?’
‘Nobody. I put two and two together.’ When she didn’t answer, I went on: ‘If you’d told us to start with, it would have saved all this.’
‘Then the diamond is where?’
‘I don’t know. I told you, we never saw it.’
‘But you went to the aircraft.’
‘Yes. But I never got into it. The only one who did was Whinger. And now you’ve killed him, he can’t tell you anything.’ I nodded in the direction his body had disappeared. ‘We didn’t have time to search the plane. It was far too dangerous. Fuel was leaking everywhere. We knew there was going to be an explosion any second. It was touch and go. Getting you out was the bravest thing I’ve ever seen anyone do.’
She took that with a stony face. She didn’t know whether or not to believe me. I could have been lying to cover myself. On the other hand, she’d seen for herself that Whinger had suffered horrific burns. To put the ball in her court, I asked, ‘Where was the diamond?’
‘In the front. A special compartment.’
‘The nose-cone?’
‘Yes.’
‘Well, I can tell you this much. After the crash that part of the aircraft was crumpled but intact. I expect it’s still inside. How big was it?’
She glanced at Muende before answering. ‘Like this. Like a ball for golf.’ She held her finger and thumb more than an inch apart.
‘In a special container?’
‘Yes. A box of steel.’
Muende had been listening intently. Now he asked her something in dialect, and she translated, ‘You can find the aircraft again?’
‘I think so.’ I didn’t want to sound too confident. ‘It should be possible, provided we can get into the right area, north of the river.’
‘You can drive to it with the car?’
‘No.’ I shook my head. ‘The ground’s too rough. The site’s on the side of a mountain, all rocks and small cliffs. We’ll have to walk the last few kilometres.’
Again she conferred with Muende.
To make the journey sound more difficult, I said, ‘It would be best if we could go back to Gutu and retrace our route from there.’
‘That is not possible. Government forces have captured the mine.’
Acting dumb, I shrugged my shoulders, and said, ‘In that case, I don’t know.’
Didn’t the bitch realise where she’d been, after all? Or was she playing some deep game?
‘Well,’ I went. ‘If you can get me back into the area, I’ll do my best to find it.’ Apparently as an afterthought, I added, ‘Of course, if the general has a helicopter, that would make it easier.’
‘He has one, but it is broken. Now, show us.’
She spoke to one of the bodyguards, who stepped forward and unfolded a map, laying it out on the table. Two guards hoisted me up, chair and all, and carried me forward.
In the dim lamplight the map was hard to read, and with my hands tied behind me I couldn’t indicate, so I had to operate by remote control. When Inge put the tip of a pencil on Gutu, all I could say was, ‘Up. Up. Now, left. More. Up again.’ Soon she was pointing to an area well north of where the Beechcraft had gone in, on the wrong range of hills.
‘Now you must be getting close,’ I told her. ‘All right, on that slope there. I should say that’s about it.’
‘So,’ she went, ‘we work out a route.’
‘Keep the party small,’ I warned her. ‘We’ll be in enemy territory and we don’t want to attract attention.’
‘Of course,’ she agreed.
Muende, who seemed to have relapsed into a stupor, roused himself, and said, ‘How do we know you’re telling the truth?’
‘You don’t,’ I said. ‘But you will when we get to the plane. The diamond must still be there.’
‘Your friend.’ Muende jerked a hand towards Genesis. ‘Why doesn’t he talk?’
‘He wasn’t at the plane. He never saw it on the deck, because he didn’t get anywhere near it. You can keep him out of this.’
I looked at Gen and saw he was about to say something, but I cut him off by grunting, ‘Cool it.’ If he started telling the general he’d sinned in the eyes of God and man, he could easily crack off another but of thuggery.
Once again, Inge spoke to Muende in dialect. Then she faced us, and said, ‘So, at first lighting tomorrow, we go. All together to find the diamond.’
‘Suits me,’ I went. ‘And if we find it? What then?’
‘You will be free. But tonight you will remain prisoner.’
‘We need some water,’ I told her. ‘Both of us.’
‘That can be arranged.’
With that, we were cut away from our chairs and dragged off, leaving the boss figure slumped at his table. The electricity system was still down, and only a few fires and lamps flickered round the compound in the warm darkness. By then I realised I’d pissed myself during the beating: my left trouser leg and sock were soaked.
The next we knew, we were in a proper lock-up. One guy stood with the barrel of a rifle in the small of my back while two others cut away the ropes round my arms and replaced them with metal handcuffs, which bit into my wrists. Then, with my arms still behind me, they made the cuffs fast with a short length of chain to a shackle mounted in the wall. Somebody else fixed Gen up the same, to the next shackle, a couple of metres away.
Our gaolers went out, but they didn’t lock the door, and I felt sure they’d be back in a moment. Sure enough, in came the guy who’d escorted me, carrying a mug or cup.
‘You want drink?’ he said, and shoved the mug hard into my face, so that the metal rim grated across my front teeth. Being thirsty as hell, I took a sip. It was fresh piss, with a hot, acid stink. I went phworrrh! and spat out the little I’d taken in.
‘Don’t touch it, Gen,’ I went.
The guy didn’t even offer the mug again. He didn’t speak any more. He just threw the contents into my face, went out, and rattled some locks into place behind him.
Gen gave him a minute to get clear, then said quietly, ‘How are you doing, Geordie?’
‘Fucking awful,’ I answered. ‘How about you?’
‘Not great. My ribs are in a mess. I’ve shat myself, too. Are you hurt much?’
‘I’m hurt, but I think it’s only bruises. Fucking stiff neck, too.’
‘Can you sit on the floor?’
‘Not a chance,’ I told him. ‘Can’t reach.’
‘Me neither. Kneel?’
‘Just.’
‘Ditto. We’re in for a long night.’
We’d hardly got a glimpse of our surroundings, and now we were in almost total darkness. The only glimmer of light came in through a ventilation space left between the top of the walls and the roof, high above our heads. The opening was a perfect entrance and exit for mozzies, which were soon whining in to attack us
. I could feel that the wall was made of bare concrete blocks, and by scraping with my boot I could tell that the floor was earth, but that was all we knew.
Soon I realised we weren’t alone. Rustling noises started up on the other side of the room, and at first I thought they were being made by another prisoner, maybe as his last gasp from thirst and hunger. Then I heard some squeaks as well, and I said, ‘Fucking rats!’
‘Yeah,’ Gen went. ‘I just had one run over my foot.’
By their noise, the rodents were everywhere – not only at floor level, but around the roof as well. For some time we were both silent, busy with our own thoughts. Try as I might to banish the image, my mind kept returning to the horrific sight of Whinger’s innards sliding down in coils over the side of the table. After a bit, I said, ‘Gen, did you see how they killed him?’
‘The guy with the machete slit his belly open and carved out the liver. That was what killed him. Loss of blood.’
‘Thank God I was on the deck when that was happening. I never saw it. I never heard him shout, either.’
‘I don’t think he made a sound. He must have been unconscious already. They’d given him some battering. I don’t reckon he felt a thing.’
‘Gen, these people are fucking animals.’
‘No, Geordie. They’re lower than animals. Animals don’t behave like that.’
‘Fair enough,’ I agreed. ‘But if I get the slightest chance, am I going to level the score!’
‘“Life for life,”’ Genesis intoned in his singsong Welsh, ‘“eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burning for burning, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.”’
‘Who said that?’
‘It was God, giving the law to Moses in the Book of Exodus.’
‘That’s what it’s going to be for me.’
‘But that was the Old Testament, Geordie. Jesus said the opposite. He said, “Turn the other cheek.”’
‘That can’t apply to someone who did what this guy did.’
‘Geordie, that man’s mad. He was also pissed out of his mind.’
