Nick shot at the machine gunner first and threw himself across the path. The expected scream sliced through the air... but the gun chattered and the forest path threw up little chunks of dirt over Nick’s head and shoulders. He fired again, and bullets slammed into the tree behind his ear. The revolver spat. Nick aimed the dart-cane inches to the right of the spitting flame and flung himself sideways in a twisting roll. The revolver spat again even as the machine gunner moaned and dropped, and a bullet ploughed into the fleshy part of Nick’s left thigh. He managed to stifle a grunt as his eyes watched the two men fall into a tangled heap and twitch together in a sort of strange love scene and then lie quiet.
He dragged himself to his feet and listened. Wind in the trees and a nightbird calling, soaring high into the air as if the world had no ceiling and the night was for beauty and love... Nick forced his aching body to walk quietly down the path to the tiny gate next to the big barred one. He was alone with the night and Mirella’s expensive car. And he could feel the blood oozing down his shoulder and trickling down his leg.
The urge to get into that car and drive away like a bat out of hell was almost overpowering.
But Mirella was dead, and so were two four six eight God knows how many other people, and he had been seen leaving her apartment earlier in the evening, and if he went back in her car without her... But he was bleeding and aching in two places and it was hard enough to think, let alone to walk, and what difference did it make, anyway? He had been with her, Ambassador Nicholas Carter, and people — people like cops and big fat government officials — would talk and accuse and there’d be God knows what kind of international stink... Yeah, but she could have dropped him off before coming out here. Who was to associate him with this mess in the woods if he left the car here and — and what? And got back into town like a well-behaved Ambassador, that’s what. But Christ, how? It would take hours to walk, and his leg was murder.
Nothing to it, Carter. There is no pain. Jesus loves me this I know ’cause my Yoga tells me so.
He was a mile away from the battle scene before his dazed mind stopped arguing with itself. Ambassador Carter would have to disappear, and his disappearance would look more authentic if he were not seen driving back into town in Mirella’s big car. He walked another mile along the fringe of the narrow road before stopping to rest and listen. No sound but a quiet chirping and the faintest rustle of a breeze. No action from the Baako farmhouse, if there had ever really been a farmhouse. Nick pulled out his shirttails, tore off as wide a strip as he could without completely baring his chest, and wadded most of the cloth against his bleeding thigh. The rest he combined with his handkerchief to fashion a crude dressing for his shoulder. When he buttoned his jacket it looked almost as though nothing was amiss, except for the two holes and the two dark stains. In the dark, no one would ever notice. He hoped.
He breathed deeply before moving on. Fortunately his feet were tough from years of barefoot walking on the shale, the burning sand and pebbles of AXE’s practice grounds, and from even more years of putting his training to the test. The only thing that really bothered him was his thigh, and here the cane came in handy. His progress to the main road was rapid and almost painless, although he knew he must be losing far too much blood for a man with a walking tour ahead. Maybe, at some point he could hitch a ride...
A car swished past him on the highway, heading out of town. He went on walking, hugging the shadow of the trees, relying heavily on the cane but using it carefully so that he would not leave a giveaway trail of puncture marks in the earth. A truck roared by, toward the city. Ten minutes later it was followed by a car. Then nothing for a half hour.
His leg was beginning to feel the strain. Nick stopped for a few moments to draw breath and give himself a lecture on the non-existence of pain. It had taken Mirella almost an hour to drive from her place to the side road and the barred gate. That meant he had something like forty-five miles to go, or about a day’s walk. Flag a passing car? What passing car? Anyway, that would be just as bad as roaring into town in the flashy car. He chewed over the disadvantages of a hijack, presuming anything came along to be hijacked, and discarded the idea. He started walking again. His thigh complained with every step. Three or four cars passed him during the next forty-five minutes. He ignored them all and stayed beneath the trees, walking endlessly as if on some nightmarish treadmill. And then, at last, he heard a sound he hadn’t dared hope for — the slow clip-clop of horses’ hooves and the creaking of cartwheels. It was coming from behind him, heading in the direction of Dakar.
He waited until he could see it coming toward him on the road. It was an open cart piled high with produce, and its driver was nodding over the reins. Surely he wouldn’t mind giving a stranger a ride into town, especially if he didn’t know...
The cane. Too bad, but it was too closely associated with Ambassador Carter to be allowed to come with him. He carefully unloaded its deadly contents and slid the darts into his wallet. Then, as the cart drew almost abreast, he scraped a groove into the earth, buried the cane and covered it with leaves. The cart had passed him. He threw himself into a loping run alongside the road and had almost made it when he saw the headlights behind him. The shadows covered him again until the big sedan had thundered by, and then he ran along the road behind the cart until he had caught it with his finger tips and could feel it pulling him. Gradually he increased his weight upon it, and when he felt completely in control of its pace and his own muscles, he pulled himself up onto it and lay flat. There had been no jolt, he knew, no sudden increase of weight to alert the driver or his horses.
Nick burrowed into the piles of bulging sacks and made himself relax. The market opened at four-thirty... this fellow would be late if he didn’t get cracking. As if on cue, the fellow yawned mightily and lashed out with the whip. The cart’s pace increased comfortably. Nick drowsed a little, then sat up very cautiously and put on his shoes. Might as well be ready to enter the city with his boots on.
Occasional cars passed them on both sides, but if anyone saw the huddled, sack-covered form on the back of the cart, they couldn’t have cared less. It was a common enough way to travel and rest, and the slightly-lightening darkness made his evening clothes look like any other set of rags.
When he saw the wattle-and-daub huts of the suburban villages gliding by on either side, he knew that he was close to journey’s end.
The false dawn was already beginning to mellow the sky when the cart clip-clopped into the city’s back streets and wound its way toward one of the market places. Nick stayed with it until he saw the pre-dawn traffic thickening, and slid silently off the back of the slowing cart when it turned a corner into a cobbled street. He walked several blocks toward the city center and then slowed into a late-night stagger. Near one of the smaller hotels he flagged a sleepy taxi driver and directed him, in a drink-sodden voice, to the Hotel Majestic. The lobby was almost deserted and no one paid any attention to him when he rolled in and headed for a call box.
The Hotel Senegal took its time about answering him and putting him through to Ambassador Carter’s room. Hakim finally answered in a sleepy voice. Nick chose his words carefully.