The Senator turned back to face Myles. He knew where he needed to go. Through his eye contact he indicated he was prepared. The Senator controlled his breathing, as if he was gearing up for his last fight. He was ready.
Myles’ face thanked the Senator again. It was time.
Then Myles raised the bayonet and started to lurch toward the Senator. Roosevelt turned his back and ran away as fast as he could. Straight towards the vehicle.
At first the audience cheered. Myles had run the Senator out of the arena. They watched as the Senator jumped over the stone boundary which marked the edge of the decaying Roman circle. Roosevelt seemed to be fleeing for his life. Close behind was Myles, holding the bayonet firmly in his hand and thrusting it towards the Senator. The old American had been beaten by the young Brit.
They hollered and whooped.
Then they started to realise: the two men were not just running out of the arena. They were running towards the vehicles. Their vehicles.
Myles maintained the pretence of chasing the Senator for as long as he could. The Somalis were checking themselves. Had the Westerners tricked them?
The Senator just reached the Toyota. Myles was yards behind.
Then gunfire scattered towards the two men, just missing them and kicking up dust from the desert.
Myles turned to see Juma’s men running towards him. Most were lowering their AK-47s, ready to fire.
Juma himself was the only one not moving. He seemed to have been most shocked by Myles’ and the Senator’s trick. ‘Kill them both,’ he called to his men.
Myles ducked into the cabin of the vehicle as fast as he could. Keys were dangling from the ignition. Myles fumbled with them before he managed to turn them. The Toyota’s engine whirred into action.
He was about to crank the gearbox when the windscreen was shot through and shattered in front of him. Myles had to shield his eyes as glass exploded all around him.
Then a single word cut through the noise. ‘Juma.’ It was the Senator’s voice.
Myles turned to see the old man standing behind the rear wheels of the Corolla. Roosevelt was holding a rocket-propelled grenade to his shoulder.
Juma’s men paused. The pirate who had been firing at the windscreen relaxed his trigger hand and looked uncertain. Most of the others just stood still. They were waiting to see what the Senator did with his weapon, or whether Juma would renew the order to attack.
The Senator called over the chaos. ‘Let’s talk this through, Juma,’ he said.
Myles could see that Roosevelt was sweating. He had repositioned the sight of the RPG launcher to his eye, trying to ensure he had a clear shot. He flexed his fingers on the trigger mechanism.
Juma’s voice shouted out from the back, hidden by a wall of his men. ‘We can talk if you want to.’ His voice sounded as though he was still gloating. ‘Do you have any final words, Senator?’
The Senator’s breathing was strained. He kept the rocket trained on the bulk of Juma’s men as he prepared his reply. ‘Juma, I’ll let your men live if you let me and the Englishman go,’ he bargained.
There was a silent pause. Then Juma replied with a phoney laugh. ‘So you want to negotiate with us “terrorists”, Senator?’
The Senator called back, shouting over the back of the Toyota. ‘Juma, this is your last chance. Let us go or I’ll fire.’
Juma paused slightly before he replied. Eventually he came back with, ‘Will you let us settle in the United States?’
The Senator paused also. ‘We can talk about that,’ was the reply.
‘We’re talking about that now, Mr Senator Roosevelt. Yes or no — will you let us settle, Senator? If you won’t give a clear answer now, when we have you at gunpoint…’
Juma’s words trailed off, overtaken by a bizarre whooshing noise.
It was the sound of a rocket-propelled grenade shooting through the air. The Senator had fired.
The RPG blasted into the ground in front of Juma’s men. Myles and the Senator were knocked back by the fireball. Fragments from the casing of the rocket flew towards them. Instinctively they ducked, allowing the vehicle to take the shrapnel.
Smoke and flames caused chaos. Myles glanced towards the crater where the grenade had exploded. Dead bodies and limbs were mangled with screaming flesh: but some of Juma’s men were still alive. Myles could also hear the clatter of automatic weapons being cocked.
Myles turned back to the car, but the engine had stopped. He turned the ignition again — nothing.
He tumbled out to see the Senator had almost fitted another rocket onto the launcher.
Then, behind the Senator came a voice they all knew. ‘Stop now.’ It was Juma.
Although Myles could not see Juma himself — the car was in the way — he could see the Senator, and could tell the Senator was facing him. Juma’s voice was even and unstrained: he had not been hurt by the explosion, and Myles guessed the pirate leader’s Kalashnikov was pointing straight at Sam Roosevelt’s head. Juma was probably twenty or thirty metres away, but it was close enough to be sure of a kill.
Senator Sam Roosevelt looked down at the rocket-propelled grenade launcher he held in his hand. He hadn’t had time to fit the new missile head on properly. The grenade was only loosely attached.
Slowly, the Senator rotated the launch tube until it was upside down. He was pointing the missile towards the ground.
The Senator turned to look at Myles. He had a resigned look on his face, but also a sense of urgency, as if he was warning Myles. There was something he wanted Myles to do.
Myles tried to understand, but the Senator couldn’t use words to say what he meant — he would have been heard by Juma. The Senator was trying to point somewhere with his eyes. What did he mean?
The Senator made the expression again. Myles tried desperately to make sense of it.
Then the Senator squared back to Juma. ‘You asked me whether I had any last words,’ he said. ‘Well I don’t. Last words are for fools who haven’t said enough during their lifetime.’
Something about the Senator’s tone and manner had changed. The power balance between him and Juma had tipped again. Myles knew what the Senator was about to do.
In those last moments, Myles crouched. He tried to protect himself. He was tense with anticipation, unsure whether he would survive what now seemed inevitable. Was there anywhere he could hide?
He looked around. Finally, he saw where the Senator’s eyes were pointing…
Moments later came the explosion — far larger than the first. The Toyota was tossed sideways. The survivors of the first grenade, and the bodies of those whom it had killed, were blown into the air. Even Juma was knocked off his feet, and the gun flew from his hands.
But the sixty-nine-year-old Senator, war-hero and twice Presidential hopeful, who was far closer than anyone else to the centre of the blast, knew none of this. He had finally escaped his captives. Indeed, he had killed many of them off.
His last act had confirmed his refusal to give in to terrorists.
The Senator had proven his determination with his life.
Fifty-Eight
Juma was dazed: he had been thrown down against the desert floor by the blast. His body was still in shock from the pressure of the explosion. Air had been forced from his lungs and it took him time to recover his breath.
But he had been lucky: he had just been far enough away when the grenade detonated. Although fragments from the outer casing had shredded some of the warlord’s clothes, his wounds were only superficial. One side of his body was grazed and bleeding, but that was all. Once he had gathered his senses, Juma was largely unharmed.