Zofia met me at the bottom of the slope. She knelt in the sand and touched the green canvas bundle. “I’d like to see his face,” she said. There was no point in refusing her. I felt around until I found Miernik’s head, and pulled the canvas aside. His eyes were rolled back so that only the whites showed, and his mouth was gaping, with black blood on the teeth. “Leave him a minute,” Zofia said. She went to the Land Rover and came back with a jerry can of water; she leaned away from its weight, carrying it on her thigh. She poured water on a cloth and washed Miernik’s face. We covered him and dragged him to the Land Rover. Zofia helped me lift him into the back. I lashed him down so he wouldn’t bounce around, and wrapped the roof canvas around his bloody feet. Zofia scrambled in with Miernik and sorted out the sleeping bags and the food; she packed these under her feet in the front seat.
As nearly as I could make out, we were about forty miles west of the road that runs through the Tabago hills from Malha in the north to El Fasher. The map showed a long dry wadi alongside the road. I drove eastward and in an hour or so we found the stream bed. Its floor was fairly smooth, with great cracks running through the gritty dried mud. The Land Rover could make twenty-five or thirty miles an hour over this ground. I hoped we could make the El Fasher road by dark. I planned to continue driving until we got back to the palace. Miernik had already been dead for some time, and perhaps it was his ghost that whispered worriedly in my ear about the danger of corpses in a hot climate.
84. REPORT BY COLLINS.
A servant fetched me from my room before lunch on 15th July and led me to a parlour in the Amir’s wing of the palace. There I found Prince Kalash and Ilona Bentley, together with a rather light-skinned Sudanese who was introduced to me as Chief Inspector Aly Qasim, of the Special Branch at Khartoum. I recognized Qasim as the man to whom Prince Kalash had spoken after our audience with the Amin a few days before. Prince Kalash told me that Miernik had wandered into the desert, or perhaps had been kidnapped by “bandits” while inspecting some ruins in the Tabago Hills that morning. It was feared that Miernik’s life was in danger. Christopher and Zofia Miernik had gone out in a Land Rover, by themselves, to search for the missing man. “I am responsible for this contretemps,” Prince Kalash said. “Of course I should be in the search party, but my cousin here has convinced my father that I should remain in the palace.” He appeared to be genuinely embarrassed, an entirely new mood for Prince Kalash. The attitude of Ilona Bentley was equally out of character. She sat on a stool with a handkerchief in her fist, her eyes reddened and her hair somewhat dishevelled. Miss Bentley was obviously (rather too obviously, I thought afterwards) fighting for self-control.
2. Chief Inspector Qasim stated that he wished to interview us. I asked if he was acting in an official capacity. “A disappearance is a police matter, and I am a policeman,” Qasim said. His manner was cold but correct.” He asked me when last I had seen Miernik, and I told him the night before. Had Miernik mentioned his intention of accompanying Prince Kalash this morning? No. Qasim wrote down the answers to these pointless questions in a notebook. He asked Miss Bentley the same set of questions-with more revealing results for me, at least. Ilona Bentley had seen Miernik just before his departure; she had observed him and Prince Kalash from her window as they got ready to climb into a Land Rover parked in the central courtyard. She had run out of the palace, hoping that they might take her with them. “It’s tedious, hanging about one’s room all day. If there was to be a lark of any kind, I wanted to go along. Prince Kalash refused to consider it. I thought it beastly of him. There was a bit of an argument, as Prince Kalash will recall.” Qasim said: “A friendly argument, I expect?” Prince Kalash answered: “It was a spat. Ilona is a wilful girl. You can ignore that incident, Aly.” Qasim was by this time staring fixedly at Miss Bentley’s bare thighs. “One never knows what small bit of evidence will crack the case,” he said in a voice filled with sexual innuendo. “I will write it down.” He did so. Prince Kalash glowered at Qasim’s bad form. “Then write down that she forgave us before we left,” Prince Kalash said. “She wished us a happy day. In fact she went back to her room and fetched a camera for Miernik. She hung it around his neck and-I hope this will not drive you wild with envy, Aly-she kissed him good-bye. Miernik agreed to take pictures of the ruins for her. Miss Bentley is an enthusiastic photographer.” To Miss Bentley I said: “I hope it wasn t your new Leica, Ilona.” “No,” she said, “it was an old camera I carry as a spare.”
3. During the remainder of the day there was a great deal of activity at the palacemen coming and going, Prince Kalash occupied every moment with his father and Qasim. It was obvious that something more important than Miernik’s disappearance was worrying them. Qasim had arrived in a police helicopter, and he frequently dashed out of doors, leaped into the aircraft, and clattered away for an hour or two. When I protested to Kalash about the danger to Christopher and Zofia Miernik, he shrugged. “Paul is quite able to take care of himself,” he said. “I think they’re in no great danger. And they won’t be alone out there for very much longer.” He refused to elaborate on this last statement. When, the following morning, Christopher had not returned, I asked to see the Amir. It was my intention to demand that a party be sent after the American. Apart from the competitive aspect of the situation, I was anxious about him. Unlike Miernik, Christopher had no bona fides that would impress a band of Communist guerrillas. The Amir regretted that he could not see me. Whilst I was waiting in an anteroom of the Amir’s suite, Qasim entered-accompanied by a lieutenant-colonel of the parachute regiment in battle dress. Qasim smiled agreeably and said: “Good day, Captain Collins. We hope to have some news of your friend soon.” Qasim was pleased with himself for having let me know, with that reference to my army rank, that he had a file on me. At about ten o’clock that night, Prince Kalash came to my bedroom. “Nigel,” he said, “I have some rather distressing news. Paul had a radio with him, and he was supposed to contact me morning and evening so that we might keep track of him. There was no word from him this morning, nor again this evening. Perhaps he is out of range, or trying to transmit from low ground. But I think not. I think he may be having some difficulty.” The true dimensions of this incredible muddle became apparent to me. I spoke angrily: “Well, then, we’d better go out and find him. Really, Kalash, the situation is intolerable. First Miernik is carried off by a lot of cutthroats, and then you permit Christopher to go out alone-with a girl, Kalash-and lose him too. It’s too stupid. I’m beginning to believe you’re willing to get us all killed in this damned desert.” Prince Kalash then said a very curious thing: “Not all of you, Nigel,” in a tired voice. “Be ready to leave at dawn. The boy will wake you up.” He strode out of the room.
4. At dawn on 17th July I went outside to find Prince Kalash and Chief Inspector Qasim standing by the helicopter. Qasim opened the door and gestured for me to get in. I sat in the back with a silent Prince Kalash. The pilot, very smartly turned out in starched khaki, buckled our safety belts for us. He asked Kalash’s permission to touch him, but not mine. The helicopter lifted off very rapidly and headed north. “We have searched all this ground,” Qasim shouted, “but there is no sign of any of your friends. If they were there, we would be able to see them from the air. However, we will look again. Keep an eye out and tap the pilot on the shoulder if you see anything.” The terrain was a perfect blank-eroded bare hills and wadis, an occasional patch of stunted trees. I saw nothing. At the end of an hour, the pilot put the machine into a steep climb, and then hovered at about four thousand feet. Qasim squirmed round in his seat and pointed out the left-hand window. Below us, as if drawn on a map, lay a large blue lake shaped like a bird’s claw. A battle was being fought in the space between two of the toes. Scores of parachutes blew over the floor of the desert. Soldiers skirmished towards an encampment in which a half-dozen large striped tents were afire; as we watched, a row of vehicles under camouflage netting went up in flames like a string of firecrackers. Inside the camp, men in native robes were running about through a heavy mortar barrage, firing off rifles. These men had no cover of any kind and they were being knocked over rapidly by the exploding mortar bombs and by small arms fire from the attacking troops. The soldiers advanced on three sides, firing automatic weapons and heaving a prodigious number of grenades; they seemed to be taking almost no casualties. Some of the men in the camp threw down their weapons and attempted to surrender. They were shot out of hand. In less than fifteen minutes, the fight was over. Qasim watched its progress with guffaws of delight; Prince Kalash looked on with indifference. Qasim spoke in Arabic into a microphone. Someone on the ground must have told him it was safe to land, for he gestured at the ground with an arrogant thrust of his thumb, and we went down.