Sean stood up and went across to where Alphonso was already rigging the radio aerial.
this is Banana Tree." The response to Alphonso's first call was so strong and clear that Sean started.
Alphonso adjusted the gain and then thumbed the microphone and gave another fictitious position report, as though he were still on the return march to the river area.
There was a pause, filled only by the drone and crackle of static.
Then another voice came equally clear and loud. "Let me speak to Colonel Courtney!" The intonation was unmistakable, and Alphonso looked up at Sean.
"General China," he whispered. He offered Sean the microphone but Sean pushed it aside and frowned with concentration as he waited for the next transmission.
In the silence that followed, Claudia left Job's side and crossed quickly to Sean. She squatted beside him and he placed his arm around her protectively; both of them stared at the radio.
"The deserters," she said softly. "China knows."
"Listen!" Sean cautioned. They waited.
Very well. " China's voice again. "I can understand that you do not wish to reply. However, I will presume that you are listening, Colonel."
All their attention was on the radio, and Job opened his eyes. He had heard every word China spoke quite clearly, and he rolled his head.
Alphonso had left his pack and webbing piled on his blanket not ten paces from where Job lay. The butt of the Tokarev pistol protruded from the side pocket of the pack.
"You have yet to disappoint me, Colonel." China's voice was mellow and affable. "It would have been too simple and totally unsatisfying if you had merely blundered into the arms of the reception committee I had arranged for you at the Zimbabwean border."
Job eased himself up on his good elbow. There was no pain, merely a sensation of weakness and drowsiness. The morphine was working. It was difficult to think clearly. He focused all his attention on the pistol, and he wondered if Alphonso had chambered a round. He began to move toward it, extending his legs, digging in his heels, then lifting his buttocks clear, and jackknifing his legs.
He made no sound, and all the others were concentrating on the voice from the radio.
"So the game is still on, Colonel-or should we rather call it the hunt? You are a great hunter, a great white hunter. You glory in the pursuit of wild animals. You call it sport, and you pride yourself on what you term "fair chase." Job was halfway across the clearing. There was still no Pam, and he moved a little quicker. At any moment one of them might turn Ins way and see him.
"I have never understood your white man's passion for this pursuit. To me it always seemed so pointless. My people have always believed that if you want meat, you should kill it as efficiently and with as little effort as possible."
Job reached the pile of equipment on Alphonso's blanket and stretched out to touch the hilt of the pistol. When he tried to withdraw it from the pocket, his fingertips were numb and it slipped from his hand, but instead of clattering on the hard earth, the pistol dropped soundlessly onto a fold of the blanket and he saw with a rush of relief that the action was cocked and the safety catch engaged. Alphonso had loaded it, ready for instant use.
Behind him China's voice still echoed from the radio set: "Perhaps you have corrupted me, Colonel. Perhaps I am acqumng your decadent European ways, but for the first time I understand your passion. Perhaps it is simply that at last the game is big enough to excite me. I wonder how you must feel at this change of role, Colonel. You are the game and I am the hunter. I know where you are, but you don't know where I am. Perhaps I am closer than you believe possible. Where am 1, Colonel? You must guess. You must run and hide. When will we meet, and how?"
oh settled his fingers carefully around the butt of the Tokarev.
He lifted it and was surprised by the effort it required. He placed his thumb upon the slide of the safety catch, but it would not budge. He felt panic rising in him. His hand was too weak and numb to move the slide forward into the firing position.
"I do not prorruse you "fair chase," Colonel. I will hunt you in my own African way, but it will be good sport. I promise you that at least."
Job exerted all his strength and felt the slide of the safety catch begin to move under hiNhumb.
"The time is nowtighteen hundred hours Zulu. I will call you on this frequencya't the same time tomorrow, Colonel-that is, if we have not already met. Until then watch the sky, Colonel Courtlook behind you. You do not know from which direction I they, will come. But be sure I will come!"
There was a faint click as China unkeyed his microphone. Sean reached over and switched off the radio set to conserve the battery.
None of them spoke or moved, until another, sharper metallic click broke the silence. To Sean the sound was unmistakable, the sound of a safety catch being disengaged, and he reacted instinctively, pushing Claudia flat and whirling round to face it.
For a moment he was paralyzed. Then he screamed, "No! Job, for Christ's sake! NO!" and hurled himself forward like a sprinter from the blocks.
Job was lying on his side facing Sean, but well beyond his reach.
Sean drove himself across the space that separated them, but he seemed to be wading through honey, sticky and slow, it impeded his movements. He watched Job raise the pistol, and he tried to prevent him by the force of his gaze. They were looking into each other's eyes, Sean trying to dominate and command her, but Job's eyes were sad, filled with a deep regret and yet unwavering.
Sean saw him open his lips and heard the muzzle of the pistol click against his teeth as Job thrust it deeply into his mouth and closed his lips around the muzzle, like a child sucking a Popsicle.
Sean reached out desperately, straining with all his strength to reach Job's pistol hand and rip the stubby black barrel out of his mouth. His fingertips had just touched Job's wrist when the pistol fired. The sound was muffled, damped down by the flesh and bone of Job's skull.
In his extremity of effort, Sean's vision was enhanced to unnatural clarity, and it seemed that time had been suspended so that everything happened very slowly, like a movie reel run at half speed.
Job's head altered shape. It swelled before Sean's eyes like a rubber Halloween mask filled with high-pressure gas. His eyelids flew wide open, and for an instant his eyeballs bulged from their sockets, exposing a wide rim of white around their dark irises, then rolling upward into his skull.
His shattered head changed shape again, elongating backward, stretching his skin tightly over his cheekbones and flattening his nostrils as the bullet drew the contents of his skull out through the back of his head, whiplashing his neck to its full stretch so that even in the aftermath of the shot, Sean heard the vertebrae creak and click.
Job was jerked backward, his arm flung away from his head in a debonair salute, the Tokarev pistol still gripped in his clenched fist, but Sean was quick enough to catch him before his mutilated head hit the hard earth.