The beam reached out into a cavernous interior, with a curved roof of concrete sections which came down almost to ground level on either side. The shelter certainly looked as though it had been used to store ammunition, but now it contained not a thing.
‘Drawn blank at the first one,’ I reported to Pav.
‘What was there in it?’
‘Two thirds of three fifths of fuck all.’
‘Try the others, then. How many are there?’
‘Six. Will do. Nothing moving on the road?’
‘Negative.’
We kept trying, with equal lack of success. Stringer drove the pinkie slowly forward across the front of the complex as we forced open one set of doors after another. We’d just reached the fifth when Pav suddenly came on the air with, ‘Stand by. There’s a heli approaching.’
‘A heli! Jesus, where is it?’
‘Coming up from the south, along the line of the road. It’s going to miss us, but I’d say it’s heading your way.’
‘Roger. How far out is it?’
‘Three ks max. You’ve got about a minute.’
‘Roger.’ I looked quickly round. There were no big trees to provide us with cover.
‘Inside!’ said Stringer.
Without another word all three of us put our shoulders to the door and forced it open wider. The rollers ground and groaned, but the gap was just big enough. Danny leapt back into the driving seat, reversed, lined up the pinkie and crawled it in. But could we close the door again? We pulled like lunatics, but the rollers, jammed with rust and sand and sundry shit, wouldn’t move.
We stood in the doorway, gasping from the effort. It was too late to do a runner. We were trapped. We could already hear the distant scream of a turbine. By the sound, the chopper was very low. We held our breath as the noise swelled to a roar and the thudding beat of a rotor buffeted the air. If the aircraft passed in front of the store sheds, the crew was bound to see the pinkie; if it passed behind the hill into which the bunkers were dug, they’d probably miss us. For a few seconds we waited breathlessly, weapons at the ready. Then, suddenly, the storm of noise was diminishing, and I knew we were safe for the time being.
I ran out into the sunlight and just got a glimpse of the aircraft, big and heavy and painted dun grey, as it disappeared over the horizon. A moment later it reappeared in the distance, turning right-handed. Instinctively I ducked, but then I realised that, with the heli banked towards us, the crew couldn’t see in my direction. As I straightened up, it went in to land, somewhere beyond the skyline, and the scream died away as the pilot cut his engines.
‘It’s landed,’ I told Pav. ‘Did you get a proper look at it?’
‘It’s a Hind. There was a guy sat in the open door with a gympi, but that was all I could make out.’
‘It’s got to be a recce,’ I said. ‘I bet Muende’s on board. He’s come to check out the site. I’m bloody sure of it. I’m going after him.’
‘Eh, Geordie!’ said Pav, sharply. ‘Chill out!’
‘What d’you mean?’
‘You sound as if you’ve gone all hyper. Take it easy. Don’t tangle with that machine-gunner, or we’ll not see you again.’
I didn’t reply to that, but I demanded of Stringer, ‘What’s he on about?’
‘He’s right,’ said Stringer, coolly. ‘You’re letting it get to you.’
All at once I was angry: angry with Pav, angry with Stringer — who was a dozen years younger than me, for Christ’s sake — angry with the whole situation. I had a sharp ache in the back of my head. I glared at my companions, trying to fight down feelings of rage and frustration.
‘All right,’ I said savagely. ‘What do we do, then? Just let them fuck off with their loot?’
‘No,’ went Stringer. ‘I’ve had an idea.’ He pointed back along the semi-circle of doors, and said, ‘Look at those.’ He was indicating the pinkie’s tracks, which showed up like a dog’s bollocks, freshly printed in the dust and sand. ‘If the heli takes off in the same direction it landed, and swings back low towards its original course, there’s a bloody good chance the crew will see our wheel-marks. If they do, they’ll wonder who the hell’s got in here. There’s no way they can leave without investigating.’
‘So we’d better shift our arses out of it?’
‘Yes, but bait the trap. Leave the pinkie inside, so there’s only one set of wheel-marks. None leading away. That’ll screw them. Deploy with our weapons into the scrub opposite. Then, if the heli lands out there in the open, we can whack the crew from behind when they get out to see what’s happening.’
‘Stringer,’ I went. ‘Your name should be Einstein. Fucking brilliant!’
My anger evaporated as we shifted the pinkie to one side of the shed, away from the line of the open door, grabbed our weapons and belt-kits, and put through another call to Pav, explaining our plan.
‘We’ll be off the air while we’re away from the vehicle,’ I told him. ‘Call you as soon as we’re back. Wait out.’
We scuttled out across the open area and took up firing positions on the edge of the dunes, well concealed under swathes of long grass, seventy metres from the door, only thirty or forty from where the chopper was likely to land.
We didn’t have long to wait. I’d just looked at my watch and seen that it was after midday. We should be calling Hereford. Then we heard the heli’s engines start up. The roar deepened as the aircraft took off, and we could tell by the change in the note that it had turned in our direction. We’d loaded grenades into our 203s, but I’d told the others not to smack the chopper unless it looked like getting away from us. My aim was to make sure of Muende, if he was on board, and, if he wasn’t, to grab the crew and find out what the plot was.
By the noise, the heli pilot was aiming to pass behind us, very low. Twisting my stiff neck to the right, I peered through the grass and saw the aircraft skimming the dunes. Shit, I thought. He’s too low to see the wheel-marks. He’s going to miss them. For a few had seconds, I thought he had. Then the engine scream changed note and stopped moving. The thudding beat of the rotor increased. The pilot was hovering. The crew must have seen the fresh tracks in the dirt on the road.
Now they were coming back. I had a momentary panic that they’d fly right over our heads, and the downdraught from the rotor would expose us by blowing away our grass camouflage. With my left hand I gathered a bunch of long, dry stems and pulled them down over my back, holding them in place. In fact, the pilot was following the trail we’d laid. He flew back above the road, turned over the side-track, heading for the first of the bunkers, then swung towards us along the front of the complex and went into a hover directly between us and the open door. Never had I had a more tempting target in my sights: one grenade into the flight-deck — curtains.
Sand and dust boiled up in dense clouds as the Hind settled in to land. It was all that airborne shit that gave us our chance. If the ground had been clean, I’m sure the pilot would have kept his engines turning and burning for a rapid take-off. As it was, he obviously didn’t want all that rubbish sucked into his intakes, and he shut down.
‘Danny,’ I said.
‘Aye.’
‘Stringer and me will deal with anyone who gets out. The pilot’s your business. I don’t want him dead or hurt. Just under control. Okay?’
‘Fine. I’ll sort him.’
The rotor blades drooped as they swung slower and slower, gradually winding down. The dust cloud began to disperse. Through it we saw movement, figures emerging from the belly of the aircraft. Moments later four of them were walking towards the open door. I was amazed that they didn’t make any attempt at a tactical approach. I expected two or three to go down and cover the others as they went for the door, but no. They were so far from any battle zone they just weren’t expecting trouble. Maybe they thought some crazy farmer had been using the bunker to store maize. Whatever main weapons they had, they’d left them in the chopper, and were armed only with holstered pistols. In any case, they moved as a loose bunch, two blacks and two whites, all bareheaded, all in DPMs bar the taller white who was wearing a light-blue overall. I didn’t need binos to tell me that neither of the blacks was Muende. Both were youngish guys with short black hair, walking springily, far darker and slimmer than the rotund rebel leader.