When he got back to the cave he said to the girclass="underline" "You know that I'm going to have to leave you here alone for a time?"
She was busy preparing a meal over a small gasoline stove. A hissing Coleman lantern cast a fitful white light through the little cavern. Mija was pale, with little blue shadows beneath her eyes. Nick sensed that she was afraid — afraid of everything but himself. Perhaps he had been wrong to bring her — but it had seemed the one sure way to keep her alive.
Mija said: "I understand, Nick darling. You have made it very straight, the instructions. When the caravan goes you will go with it — I follow in six hours. I remain behind in the jeep until I see your flare — the AXE flare. Or until you join me. If — if you do not come back I go to Urfa and turn myself to the TSP — the Turkish Secret Police."
Very matter of factly Mija served up two tin plates loaded with canned hash. "The TSP will send me back to Istanbul, yes? And sooner or later they, the dope people, will kill me! No?"
Nick patted her shoulder. "No. It won't come to that. Not if my plans go well. They're going to be so damned busy trying to put Humpty Dumpty together again that they won't have any time for you."
Mija frowned. She patted the red beret into place and sat down on a rock beside him. "Humpty Dumpty? I do not get him — it?"
Nick rested his hand on the firm soft flesh of her knee. He could feel the warmth of her through the heavy twill. "Never mind. It will be all right. I'll turn the jeep and head it back down the ledge. All you'll have to do is go back the way we came and pick up the caravan's trail. Just be sure to stay six hours behind us. Now let's eat and go to work. I'll need your help — and your opinion. I've never impersonated a Kurd before."
"Would it not be better," the girl said, "to wait until the real Kurds arrive? Then you will be able to see how they look."
N3 nodded. "You are right, of course. Out of the mouths of babes."
The Kurds came into the gorge the next morning just after sunrise. It was a clear, fine day with great gusts of wind scouring the cliffs. Nick lay in a crevice where two great boulders formed a natural port-hole, and studied the Kurds through his powerful glasses.
There were a lot of them. At a rough estimate over a hundred. Their small black tents dotted the gorge floor like mushrooms. They had horses and camels and a large herd of goats. The goats were to be driven ahead of the caravan to detect mine fields along the Syrian border. If the goats were blown sky high the caravan would simply double back and try at another place.
He heard Mija crawling up behind him. She kissed his cheek and settled down beside him. "Let me have the glasses, please? I have never seen a wild Kurd."
He handed her the binoculars. "Be my guest, honey. Try not to go into shock. They are just as fierce as they look!"
Mija looked. He felt her shiver. "Ugg… I have heard much of these people, now I see that I have heard the truth. They are — how you say? Primitive?"
"You can," said N3, "say that again! Truly the forgotten of Allah! The old Sultans used them as Cossacks, you know. Killing, to a Kurd, is all in the day's work."
Somewhat like an agent for AXE, he thought sardonically. An agent with the rank of KILLMASTER. Was there any real difference?"
The day wore on. Nick remained to study the Kurdish camp. Mija went back to the cave to rest.
When the wind was right — it kept backing around — Nick could hear the bleating of the goats and the hoarse complaining cries of the camels. The Kurds themselves lazed about, drinking something that he guessed was fermented goats milk and playing as, their mterminable card game that was much like poker. He watched them kill a goat and eat the meat nearly raw, searing it for a moment or two over the fire.
The Basque, Nick conceded, picked his shock troops well. The Kurds, though fanatic Moslems, were natural enemies of Syrians and the Turk. Better smugglers could not be found. They would fight to the death and, if they were taken alive, would never talk. Mousy had vouched for that, back in the Hole. Nick pushed that thought away hastily — he did not want to think about Mousy!
After another hour of careful study Nick crawled back to the cave and began to make up for the job ahead. From the big rhino hide suitcase he took the garments furnished at a moment's notice by Ankara. He decided against a turban, donned a combined shawl and hood instead. It would be cold tonight and the shawl would help mask his face.
N3 was a long-head as were most Kurds, and with his face stained a dark walnut he should get by. He spoke no Kurdish — an oversight which he thought he might point out to the AXE planners, if he ever got back — and so he would have to be a mute. He practiced now by making horrible sounds in his throat and pointing to his mouth, until Mija told him to shut up. He was getting on her nerves.
Nick put on the felt boots and the long padded jacket, which was sufficiently dirty and smelled badly enough to be the real thing. Mija sniffed and made a face. "Uhhhh… you are of a terrible odor. I am almost glad you are going."
"Goats," said Nick. "Goats and camels and bloody meat and a little dung thrown in. They all wipe their hands on their jackets, like so…" and he illustrated. "It's no wonder they come to smell after a time. And these clothes are the real McCoy, Ankara told me. They came off a dead Kurd."
Mija began to look ill. "Please, Nick! I am not of the strong stomach. Let us get on with it. I will put on the beard now, yes?"
"Might as well," he said resignedly. "It'll itch like hell, but no help for it. Get the spirit gum — and hand me that dagger."
He thrust the long curved dagger into his sash. Around his wrists he wound several yards of dirty white cloth — a Kurd carries his own bandages into battle. When Mija had carefully pinched and patted the short black beard into place she got a mirror from the pile of supplies and let him have a look at himself.
"Christ!" said N3. "1 ought to pass. I look horrible enough!"
The Basque arrived just before sunset. Nick, watching with the glasses from the boulder screen, understood now how the man got around so well in rough country. Half tracks! Two half tracks and a Land Rover truck! They came out of the west and stopped at the mouth of the gorge where it entered the Edessa Pass.
The leader of the Kurds, a tall fierce hairy man, left the little encampment of black tents and went toward a small, dun colored trailer attached to the Land Rover. The door of the trailer opened and the Basque came out. A bright ray of the setting sun fell full on the man's face. N3's jaw muscles tightened as he studied the man through the glasses. The next man I kill!
The Basque had the look of a dissolute bulldog. He was squat and powerful, with the wide sloping shoulders of a boxer and a concave face and a flattened nose. He was wearing high lace boots, riding breeches, and a leather windbreaker. He was carrying a heavy automatic in a holster slung from a web belt. So powerful were the binoculars that Nick could see the butt of the pistol clearly — Colt .45, 1911 model. A gun that had been invented to stop amoks in the Philippines. Nick patted the Luger nestling in his belt beneath the padded jacket. Wilhelmina was a match for any .45!
He watched as the Basque handed a small packet to the leader of the Kurds. Money, no doubt. Then the Basque was giving swift orders and the Kurds were going to work, converging on the half tracks and the Land Rover. The Kurds formed a line and each man was laden with a sizable burden, a square bale wrapped in burlap and wire strapped. Good organization, admitted the spying N3. The Syndicate operated like any efficient business — even to killing. And this appeared to be a massive shipment! More and more of the bales were hauled out of the half tracks and the Land Rover and carried by the sweating Kurds to the camels groaning and moaning in resentment as they were loaded.