“Franklyn - Curry,” Bruce tapped back. “Train unserviceable.
Motorized transport stranded without fuel. Port Reprieve road. Map reference approx-” He read the numbers off the sheet on which he had noted them.
There was a long pause, then: “Is U. M.C. property in your hands?”
The question was delicately phrased.
“Affirmative,” Bruce assured him.
“Await air-drop at your position soonest. Out.”
“Message understood. Out.” Bruce straightened from the telegraph and sighed
with relief.
“That’s that, Ruffy. They’ll drop gas to us from one of the
Dakotas. Probably tomorrow morning.” He looked at his wristwatch.
“Twenty to one, let’s get back.” Bruce hummed softly, watching the double tracks ahead of him, guiding the Ford with a light touch on the wheel.
He was contented. It was all over. Tomorrow the fuel would drop from the Dakota under those yellow parachutes.
(He must lay out the smudge signals this evening.) And ten hours later they would be back in Elisabethville.
A few words with Carl Engelbrecht would fix seats for Shermaine and himself on one of the outward-bound Daks.
Then Switzerland, and the chalet with icicles hanging from the eaves. A long rest while he decided where to start again.
Louisiana was under Roman-Dutch Law, or was it Code Napoleon? He might even have to rewrite his bar examinations, but the prospect pleased rather than dismayed him. It was fun again.
“Never seen you so happy,” grunted Ruffy.
“Never had so much cause, Bruce agreed.
“She’s a swell lady. Young still - you can teach her.” Bruce felt his hackles rise, and then he thought better of it and laughed.
“You going to sign her up, boss?”
“I might.” Ruffy nodded wisely.
“Man should have plenty wives - I got three. Need a couple more.”
“One
I could only just handle.”
“One’s difficult. Two’s easier. Three, you can relax. Four, they’re so busy with each other they don’t give you no trouble at all.”
“I might try it.”
“Yeah, you do that.” And ahead of them through the trees they saw the ring of trucks.
“We’re home,” grunted Ruffy, then he stirred uncomfortably in his seat. “Something going on.” Men stood in small groups. There was something in their attitude: strain, apprehension.
Two men ran up the road to meet them. Bruce could see their mouths working, but could not hear the words.
Dread, heavy and cold, pushed down on the pit of Bruce’s gut.
Gabbled, incoherent, Sergeant Jacque was trying to tell him something as he ran beside the Ford.
“Tenente Hendry - the river - the madame - gone.” French words like driftwood in the torrent of dialect.
“Your girl,” translated Ruffy. “Hendry’s done her.”
“Dead?” The question dropped from Bruce’s mouth.
“No. He’s hurt her. He’s - you know!”
“Where’s she?”
“They’ve got her in the back of the truck.” Bruce climbed heavily out of the car. Now they were silent, grouped together, not looking at him, faces impassive, waiting.
Bruce walked slowly to the truck. He felt cold and numb. His legs moved automatically beneath him. He drew back the canvas and
pulled himself up into the interior. It was an effort to move forward, to focus his eyes in the gloom.
Wrapped in a blanket she lay small and still.
“Shermaine.” It stuck in his throat.
“Shermaine,” he said again and knelt beside her. A great livid swelling distorted the side of her face. She did not turner face to him, but lay staring up at the canvas roof.
He touched her face and the skin was cold, cold as the dread that gripped his stomach. The coldness of it shocked him so he jerked his hand away.
“Shermaine.” This time it was a sob. The eyes, her big haunted eyes, turned unseeing towards him and he felt the lift of escape from the certainty of her death.
“Oh, God, he cried and took her to him, holding the unresisting
frailty of her to his chest. He could feel the slow even thump of her heart beneath his liquid. He drew back the blanket and there was no blood.
“Darling, are you hurt? Tell me, are you hurt?” She did not answer. She lay quietly in his arms, not seeing him.
“Shock,” he whispered. “It’s only shock,” and he opened her clothing. With tenderness he examined the smoothly pale body; the skin was clammy and damp, but there was no damage.
He wrapped her again and laid her gently back on to the floor.
He stood and the thing within him changed shape. Cold still, but now burning cold as dry ice.
Ruffy and Jacque were waiting for him beside the tailboard.
“Where is he?” asked Bruce softly.
“He is gone.”
“Where?”
“That way.” Jacque pointed towards the southeast. “I followed the spoor a short distance.” Bruce walked to the Ford and picked up his rifle from the floor. He opened the cubby hole and took two spare clips of ammunition from it.
Ruffy followed him. “He’s got the diamonds, boss.”
“Yes,” said
Bruce and checked the load of his rifle. The diamonds were of no importance.
“Are you going after him, boss?” Bruce did not answer. Instead he
looked up at the sky.
The sun was half way towards the horizon and there were clouds thickly massed around it.
“Ruffy, stay with her,” he said softly. “Keep her warm.” Ruffy nodded.
“Who is the best tracker we’ve got?”
“Jacque. Worked for a safari outfit before the war as a tracker boy.” Bruce turned to Jacque. The thing was still icy cold inside him, with tentacles that spread out to every extremity of his body and his mind.
“When did this happen?”
“About an hour after you left,” answered
Jacque.
Eight hours start. It was a long lead.
“Take the spoor,” said Bruce softly.
The earth was soft from the night’s rain and the spoor deep trodden, the heels had bitten in under Hendry’s weight, so they followed fast.
Watching Sergeant Jacque work, Bruce felt his anxiety abating, for although the footprints were so easy to follow in these early stages that it was no test of his ability, yet from the way he moved swiftly along - half-crouched and wholly absorbed, occasionally glancing ahead to pick up the run of the spoor, stooping now and then to touch the earth and determine its texture - Bruce could tell that this man knew his business.
Through the open forest with tufted grass below, holding steadily south by east, Hendry led them straight towards the Rhodesian border.
And after the first two hours Bruce knew they had not gained upon him.
Hendry was still eight hours ahead, and at the pace he was setting eight hours” start was something like thirty miles in distance.
Bruce looked over his shoulder at the sun where it lay wedged between two vast piles of cumulonimbus. There in the sky were the two elements which could defeat him.
Time. There were perhaps two more hours of daylight.
With the onset of night they would be forced to halt.
Rain. The clouds were swollen and dark blue round the edges. As
Bruce watched, the lightning lit them internally, and at a count of ten the thunder grumbled suddenly. If it rained again before morning there would be no spoor to follow.
“We must move faster,” said Bruce.
Sergeant Jacque straightened up and looked at Bruce as though he were a stranger. He had forgotten his existence.
“The earth hardens.” Jacque pointed at the spoor and Bruce saw that in the last half hour the soil had become gritty and compacted.
Hendry’s heels no longer broke the crust. “It is unwise to run on such a lean trail.” Again Bruce looked back at the menace of gathering clouds.