‘Oh, I think we can find a use for them both. Let’s get inside.’ Revell led the way. ‘I’ll brief the Grepos now. Have two men relieve Andrea and tell her to bring Kurt and the others to the kitchen. We have to move fast before we lose the light.’
Only Burke and Dooley were available, all the others were busily engaged in checking and setting up the weapons in the six-wheeler.
‘Just remember, you two. We’re moving out in a matter of minutes, don’t start anything. I don’t want to shout and have you trot down the stairs with your tongues out and your pants round your knees. Have you got that, do I make myself clear?’
‘Very loud, extremely clear, Sarge.’
‘And you as well, Dooley.’
‘Sergeant Hyde, sir. I hear every word. I promise not to let them seduce me. I shall also keep a tight hold on my weapon.’
‘Funny man.’ Misgivings flooded over Hyde, but there wasn’t the time to change the arrangements. ‘Follow me.’
‘That one, I think.’ Dooley stuck his hand down the front of his pants and unashamedly rearranged his rapidly expanding self. The object of his attention did not reciprocate his interest, she yawned. ‘Oh fuck me…’
‘No thanks.’ Burke declined the invitation. ‘…look at them, have you ever seen such a wanked-out bunch of old hags in all your life.’
‘Not all at once, no.’
Becoming impatient Dooley crossed to the women. They all avoided his eye, and his attempts to pull one of them from the herd. ‘How about you, you fancy a quick one?’ He addressed the remark to the youngest, she shook her head. The words hadn’t meant anything, but the question was a familiar one and she understood its tone.
‘Shit. I don’t bloody believe it.’ Dooley pounded his fist into the crumbling piaster on the wall, and left a row of indents. ‘I’m in a brothel, a real live fucking brothel, and all the tarts are on strike. Bloody hell, the sodding unions are killing everything.’ He grew desperate. ‘Come on, one of you, any of you.’ From various pockets he extracted all his worldly goods; two packets of cigarettes, twenty marks, mostly in change, and a cheap lighter. ‘You can have all this.’ Again the fist battered at the fabric of the building.
Burke scanned the women. They looked terrible. He’d seen rough before, but not like this. ‘Back off mate. You’re better not poking one of these, look at them, they’re red-raw.’ He indicated a middle-aged individual who was slouched in such a way, with one foot tucked partially under her, that she was completely exposed. ‘What this lot need is a jai of Vaseline, not another cock.’
‘I’ll skin the major. Why’d he let those scabby GDR cruds have a go. They’ve screwed it up for us.’
‘For you, you mean, I’m not touching one of them. The Ruskies don’t have them inspected regular like we do. I bet you there’s more pox to the square fanny in this room than anywhere else in the whole of the Zone.’
‘I’d have risked it, whatever shape their fannies were. Did you see that piece with the major? She’s not with this mob.’
‘I saw her.’ Burke was glad the conversation was changing tack, even if only slightly. ‘Nice, if you like them hard. She looked the sort that if you woke up beside her in the morning, the first thing you’d do would be to check she hadn’t bitten your balls off in the night.’
A low growl escaped from Dooley. ‘Christ, what I wouldn’t give for something like that.’
‘Not a chance for the likes of us, maybe not for the major either. She’s something special. I don’t know what sort of bloke she’d go for, but he’d have to be at least as hard as her.’
‘OK, you two.’ Revell put his head around the door. ‘Herd this lot downstairs and stay with them. Keep them out of trouble, and keep them out of the way.’
‘What are we going to do with them. Major?’
‘We’re letting them go, Burke. If we leave them here the Russians will practise nastiness on them; but if they scatter into the camps they’ll never be found.’ With that he was gone, clattering back down the stairs and out to the truck. ‘They’ll get a hell of a reception in the camp if they’re dressed like this.’ Lots of bare flesh bulged at Burke from every quarter. ‘You hang on here. I’ll find their rags.’
As the door closed behind Burke, Dooley sighed his contempt and frustration. ‘Useless bloody lot. You wouldn’t know a good cock if you saw one. Move over, you scabby cows, I want to sit down.’
The filthy lumpy mattress felt good after hours on the thinly padded bench in the skimmer. As the whores parted to make room for him a large warm breast brushed his arm and smooth satin rustled.
‘All I wanted was a bloody good fuck.’ Absently his hand went out to the nearest backside and slid beneath it. His forefinger played in the fabric covered crevasse. A hand landed on his knee and began to slide up his thigh. Other hands came at him, and he just sat there. ‘It’s no good, you’re wasting your time. You’re too late by five minutes and eight inches.’
The door flew open and an avalanche of variously coloured clothes and underwear preceded Burke’s return. ‘Hello there. You look like you’re nicely settled.’
‘No way. At this moment I couldn’t stuff a shitty olive. Marvellous, ain’t it.’ Pushing aside the hands that sought to hold him back, Dooley got up and walked to the pile. ‘Here, come and get this lot on.’
There was a mad scramble as the women fought to salvage their own things and steal all they could of everyone else’s. Dooley had to put his large boot to several similarly dimensioned behinds before he succeeded in reducing the row they were making.
Burke was repulsed rather than sexually aroused by the sight, of the fighting women. Huge rumps, hobbling breasts, all were on show in abundance and had no effect on him.
The major shouted from downstairs and the two men began to propel the women along the corridor while they were still fumbling, hopping and contorting to finish dressing.
‘No one would ever believe this.’ His erection had completely disappeared. Dooley knew it without checking. ‘I ain’t never gonna tell anyone about this, not ever. I spend fifteen minutes in a brotheclass="underline" the first five I’m trying to grab a broad, the next five I’m trying to keep a load of whores from finding out that I’m not ail I’d like to be and was five minutes before, and the last five I’m forcing them to get dressed and chucking them out. I just don’t like myself at the moment. Maybe m a year I’ll have forgotten all about it; the hell I will.’
Andrea was coming down the stairs.
‘There you are.’ Revell steered her to the women. ‘Tell them to get down to the camp and lose themselves, and don’t take no for an answer. I want them out right now.’
He started up the stairs. In a crazy way he’d be doing the Russian a favour. If the Soviet security services got him to tell the whole story, and they would, including how he had given the enemy an inch-by-inch description of the workshops, then the last few hours of his life would be very painful and unpleasant.
Cradling the 12 gauge assault-rifle Hyde had brought him from the skimmer, he climbed to the top of the building. It would be best if he fired right away, from the door of the attic: no need to make a ceremony of it. He paused at the door, laid the heavy twenty-shot weapon on the floor and took out his pistol. The weight of the silencer unbalanced the Colt and he had to consciously counteract it.
As he put his hand to the door, he paused again, and checked that the safety catch was off. The air held a smell he hadn’t noticed before, like, like overdone meat. Dismissing it from his mind he pushed open the door.