weakness anded her and she found herself weeping resignation overwhelm
softly and hopelessly in the darkness.
er swollen lids, \&Then she looked up again through oonlight for her to
see that the grave there was sufficient was now so deep that the two
men still digging in it were out of her line of sight. Spadefuls of dirt
flew over the lip of the hole and splattered on to the growing pile. Her
and sauntered over to the guard left her side for a momen edge of the
hole. He looked down in it and then grunted.
"Good. That is deep enough, Call the lieutenant." The two soldiers
scrambled up out of the grave, then off into gathered up their tools and
weapons and traipsed the darkness of the grove. Chatting amicably
amongst wards where the truck was themselves they headed back to parked,
leaving Tessay and her guard.
the cold and with terror, She lay there shivering with puffed while her
guard squatted at the lip of her grave and her on his cigarette. She
thought that if she could get ton for feet she could kick him into the
hole and make a ru ut when she tried to sit up her it, back through the
trees. movements were stiff and slow, and she he no feeling in her
hands or feet. She tried to force herself to move, but at that moment
she heard Lieutenant Hammed coming from the truck and she slumped back
in despair, rch. He flashed it Hammed was carrying an electric to down
into the grave.
ugh."
"Good," he said loudly. "That is deep eno He switched off the torch and
said to the man guarding Go back and wait at the truck. When her, "No
witnesses.
come back with the others to help me you hear the shots, fill the hole."
over his shoulder and disap The guard slung his rifle JI peared amongst
the trees. Hammed waited until the man was well out of earshot, then he
came to Tessay and hoisted her to her feet. He pushed her to the edge of
the grave, and then she felt him fumbling with her clothing. She tried
to lash out at him, but her arms were still bound behind her.
"I want your shanitna." He pulled the white woollen cloak off over her
shoulders, and then went with it to the edge of the grave, He jumped
down into the hole and she heard him scuffling about in the bottom.
His voice came back to her, speaking softly. "They must see something
here. A body-'
He climbed back beside her, puffing with the exertion, and stepped
behind her. She felt the touch of cold metal on the inside of her
wrists, and then he was sawing at the leather thong. She felt her bonds
fall away, and she gasped at the pain as the blood poured back into her
numb hands.
"What are you doing?" she whispered in confusion. She looked down into
the grave and saw the pale shamnia arranged to look like a human body.
"Are you going-'
"Please don't talk," he instructed her softly, as he took her by the
shoulder and led her back amongst the trees.
"Lie here." He pushed her down and made her lie flat, with her face to
the ground. He began piling dead leaves and fallen branches over her.
"Stay here! Do not try to run. Don't. move or speak until we are gone."
He flashed the torch briefly over the mound of dead branches to make
certain she was covered, then he left her and hurried back to the
graveside, unbuckling the flap of his pistol holster as he went. Two
spaced pistol shots cracked out in the night, so loud and unexpectedly
that she jumped and her heart raced wildly.
Then she heard Hammed shout, "Come, you men.
Let's get this thing finished."
They trooped back into the grove, and she heard the sound of their
spades and the thump of earth clods falling into the grave.
nant," a voice
"I cannot see what I am doing, lieute complained. "Where is your
torchlight?"
"You dorA need a light to fill a hole," Hammed snarled.
"Get on with your work. Tramp that loose soil down. I don't want anybody
stumbling on this place."
She lay quietly, trying to stop the wild tremors that shook her body. At
last the sound of the shovels let up, and she heard Hammed's voice
again.
"That will do. Make certain you leave nothing here.
Back to the truck!'
Their footsteps and their voices died away. At a distance she heard the
truck engine whirl and fire. The headlights shone through the trees as
the truck backed and filled, turning in the direction from which they
had come.
sound of the engine had died away Long after thee pile of dead
completely, she continued to lie under the tree shaking with the cold
and weeping branches. She was St. elief.
silently with exhaustion and pain and softly and off herself and Then
slowly she pushed he branched it to pull crawled to the trunk of the
nearest tree. She, used and then stood there, swaying weakly herself up
to her feet, in the darkness. elmed her. "I have it was only then that
guilt overwh betrayed Mek," she thought sickeningly. "I have told everyI
must get back to thing to his enemies. I must warn him him and warn
him-'
treetrunk and She pushed herself away from the ds the track.
blundered back through the darkness towar he only means of ascertaining
if they had solved Taita's codes correctly was to play out BE&
the moves he had listed. They went very through the tunnels of the maze,
stepping out the carefully moves that he had noted and marking then-' on
the walls in white chalk figures.
There were eighteen moves set out on the winter face of the stele. Using
Royan's first interpretation of the symbols, they were able to advance
through twelve of theseL. Then they found themselves at a dead end,
confronted by a blank stone wall and unable to make the next move.
"Damnation!" Nicholas kicked the wall, and when this had no effect he
hurled the chunk of white chalk at it. "I wish I could get my hands on
that old devil. Castration would be the least of his worries."
"Sorry." Royan scraped the hair back out of her eyes.
thought I had it right. It must be the figures in the second column. We
will have to invert them."
"We will have to start again,'Nicholas groaned.
"Right at the very beginning," she agreed.
"How do we know when we have finally got it right?
he wanted to know.
"If by following the clues we art ive at one of the winning
combinations, a bao equivalent of checkmate, on precisely the eighteenth
move. There will be no logical move after that, and we can assume we
have worked through it correctly."
"And what will we find if we ever reach that position?"
"I will tell you when we get there." She smiled at him sweetly. "Cheer
up, Nicky. It's only just starting to hurt."
Royan inverted the values of the second and third numbers of Taita's
notations, taking the first as the cup value and the second as the file
value. This time they completed only five moves before they were stymied
and could proceed no further.
"Perhaps out assumption about the third symbol being the change of level
is incorrect?" Nicholas suggested. "Let's start again and give that the
second value."
"Nicky, do you realize just how many possible combinations there are,
given the three variables?" She was at last starting to waver. "Taita
has assumed an intimate knowledge of the game. We have only the
sketchiest notions of how it was played. It's like a grand master trying
to explain to a novice the intricacies of the King's Indian Defence."
olas embroidered the simile. "At this
"In Russian!" Nich rate we are getting nowhere in a hurry. There must be
some other way of approaching it. Let's go over the epigrams Taita stuck