“The answer could be that he is impatient,” continued Uncle Dpap. “As you say, he is afraid of competition, and being ambushed. But I think he has a very large amount of weapons and ammunition sitting somewhere that he must get rid of. To take the time to sell it piecemeal — you see he has us do all the work.”
“It may be.”
“And he is greedy. That, of course, goes without saying. Greed is impregnated in these men’s souls. It is a universal disease, but the men who sell weapons have it very strongly. It is one reason they do not live very long lives. Something to consider, Tilia.”
She straightened her back and lifted her shoulders, determined to remain stoic and not answer him.
“You will have to think of leaving your Uncle Dpap and the rest of your family sometime,” said Dpap, suddenly wistful. He looked over at her, admired her form. She had a regal face. In another time, she could have been queen.
“We have work to do,” she told him, her words and tone exactly echoing what he would have said had she suggested something silly.
Uncle Dpap chuckled and went back to the phone, screwing it together. When he was done, he handed it to her.
“There is another possibility we haven’t considered,” he said. “Perhaps it is the Iranians who are really behind this.”
“They back Colonel Zsar.”
“Yes. They give him much money. But Zsar has trouble bringing people to his side. If we joined with him, then he would have a good core force.”
“And Red Henri?”
Red Henri, in Uncle Dpap’s opinion, was a crazy man, not to be trusted to remain sane for more than a few minutes at a time. But his men were well-trained. They would be a valuable addition to any force.
Uncle Dpap had turned down several overtures from the Iranians. Their religion made him nervous.
But not as nervous as running out of ammunition did. The danger was not just from the government forces, but from the other rebel bands, who coveted his village and other resources.
“Red Henri would not join in an alliance with either of us,” said Uncle Dpap. “He is content to herd his goats in his own way. But Zsar we could deal with. Go to him and tell him about my meeting. Tell him I do not trust this Mr. Kirk, and do not recommend a meeting yet. But maybe he will give us all a good price. Tell him I am open to buying bullets for the best price. As I have always been.”
“If we tell Zsar that, he is sure to tell the Iranians.”
“Exactly.”
20
Boston insisted on collecting the submachine guns from the mercenary bodyguards as soon as they got back to Base Camp Alpha. Nuri thought it was unnecessary, and maybe a little foolish, in effect telling the men that they didn’t trust them. But Boston didn’t care. He didn’t trust them, and he saw no reason to be cute about it.
The men didn’t complain. After a big lunch beneath the tent pavilion that served as their mess hall, Boston set them out in a picket watch around the perimeter, with two of his Whiplash people as supervisors. The blimps would see anyone who approached in plenty of time for them to be armed.
To a man, the mercenaries believed Danny was an arms dealer, something Nuri had been careful to hint at but not say explicitly when they were hired. They assumed that the trenches were part of whatever story Danny needed to give the authorities so he could operate here without problems. They were all illiterate, and had no idea what dinosaurs were, let alone how paleontologists worked. Their prime concern was money, and they were being paid plenty of that to keep their curiosity in check. As long as they were kept busy, they wouldn’t be a problem.
The question was how to keep them busy. Boston suggested holding training sessions. Danny nixed that idea.
“That’s all we need. Better trained soldiers of fortune.”
“They could use the discipline.”
“Come up with something else.”
Boston finally decided that he would use the soldiers to dig the trenches, making them look a little more realistic. The initial response was unenthusiastic.
Then Hera came up with an idea.
“Ten dollars to the first man who finds dinosaur bones,” she said.
Once she explained what dinosaur bones were, there was no trouble getting volunteers.
Even before Danny and his men arrived back at base Camp Alpha, Tilia was driving to Colonel Zsar’s fortress on the other side of the hills. She’d chosen two men to go with her — one, because he was the biggest man in the troop, and the other because he was the best shot. She had no illusions, however, that they would be able to protect her if things went bad. All three of them would die, with luck quickly.
Tilia carried two pistols in bandoliers across her chest, and a sawed-off elephant gun besides. If she had to fight, she would reserve one bullet for herself.
They had to pass through a small village in the shadow of the hills to reach Colonel Zsar’s stronghold. She had been there only once before, more than a year ago. The changes astounded her. The village had been a complete wreck, most of its buildings still destroyed from a raid three years before by Ethiopian forces, who at the time were angry with Colonel Zsar as well as the legitimate Sudanese government. Stones lay at the edges of the street; foundations were cluttered with weeds and windswept sand. Perhaps two dozen people lived in the surviving shanties, ramshackle structures built of cardboard and other refuse on the southern end of town.
Those were gone now. In their place was a village of prefab trailers, five dozen arranged in a tight rectangle just off the main road. On the other side of the road, where the abandoned foundations had been, sat three steel buildings, barns where cattle were kept and milk processed. Three milk trucks, with gleaming tanks, were lined up in the yard next to them. Fifty head of cattle grazed in the fields beyond.
Tilia was tempted to stop the Jeep and talk to the people. If the Iranians had brought this prosperity, there would be no question of allying with them. But it was getting late, and she wanted to be sure to conclude her business with Colonel Zsar before nightfall.
Colonel Zsar’s fortress was embedded in a cliff, centered around a pair of caves dug out by successive generations of fighters and smugglers. Tilia’s Jeep was observed well before she came to the checkpoint leading to the stronghold’s entrance. Jeeps were not plentiful in the area, and though the colonel’s forces had little interaction with Uncle Dpap’s, it was quickly recognized. The colonel was alerted, and gave his permission for the vehicle to proceed.
Seeing that there were two men — as far as they were concerned, the woman didn’t count — the guards at the gate decided there would have to be six escorts. Two men sat on the hood of the vehicle, two clung to the rear fender, and two others trotted behind.
Tilia drove the truck up a steep, serpentine dirt road, passing three different sandbagged machine-gun emplacements before reaching a parking area in front of one of the caves. Once again she was surprised. There were a dozen white pickup trucks in the lot, all nearly brand new. Belts of bullets crisscrossed the guards’ chests, and there were extra boxes near a sandbagged gun emplacement covering the entrance to the building — if the colonel’s forces were experiencing a bullet shortage, he was doing his best to hide it.
A man in a flak vest met them at the door.
“Your weapons,” he demanded.
Tilia’s escorts looked at her. She nodded, but did not hand hers over.
“Your gun, miss,” said the man.
“My gun stays with me.”
“You are just a woman,” he said, with obvious disdain. “Why do you think you deserve such a privilege?”
“You are afraid of a woman?”