how deep it went in.' He turned back to Captain Barnard. 'Can you
move, lad?'
The young man tried to smile, then coughed in agony. 'It feels like the
damned thing is buried in my heart. Like a sword ... swear to God. Go
on.'
General Steyn's neck flushed red. 'Nonsense, lad, you're coming with
us.'
'Don't move me, sir,' Captain Barnard gurgled. 'Please don't.'
General Steyn looked ready to twist off the head of the man who had
caused this pain. Setting his mouth in a grim line, he drew a .45
caliber pistol from Captain Barnard's belt and placed it carefully in
the young man's hand. 'If it gets too bad,' he said tersely, 'you know
what to do.' The general swallowed the lump in his throat. 'I'll be
back for you, Barnard. You have my solemn word. Stand fast.'
General Steyn turned and squeezed his broad shoulders back through the
door of the driver's compartment. His bluff face was swollen with
emotion. He looked hard into Hauer's eyes. 'If it's a war they want,'
he said, his voice trembling, 'then it's a bloody war they'll get.' He
-drew his own pistol and jerked back the slide.
'Into the house, lads!'
Pieter Smuts staggered away from the Vulcan and wiped the blood out of
his eyes with his shirtsleeve. A dozen slivers of armored glass had
been driven into his face by Hauer's slugs. He crouched beside Hess's
wheelchair.
'They've breached the outer walls, sir. I don't know who's inside that
armored car, but they must be friends of the Jew.'
Hess grimaced. 'Who could it be but Captain Hauer?' he wheezed.
'I told you never to underestimate an old German soldier. Hauer
obviously outsmarted Major Graaff! Damn the man! A German! A German
attacking me!'
'We can still stop them, sir.'
'How?'
'If I order our bunker gunners to cease firing, the Libyans will advance
and kill anyone left alive outside the shields.'
'True,' Hess said thoughtfully. 'But then the Libyans will be inside
the house.'
'But not inside the shields. Not near you-not near the weapons.'
Hess hesitated, realizing that the order would mean certain death for
Ilse, Linah, and all of the servants. 'Do it,' he said finally.
Smuts pressed a button on his console and issued the order.
Outside, the rattle of the bunker guns stuttered, then died.
In the eerie silence, Major Ilyas Karami ordered three quarters of his
remaining commando force down the slope.
The rest he held back to transport the howitzer. The battle was not yet
over, and he did not intend to lose it through overconfidence.
The prize was too great.
Alan Burton rolled back over the lip of the Wash and slid down the muddy
wall into darkness. Juan Diaz lay halfburied in the mud-and-bramble
shelter Burton had built at the bottom of the ravine.
Diaz's wounds had developed an unpleasant odor, and his eyes were pale
yellow slits. Burton leaned close to his ear.
'I've got our return tickets, lad. Can you make it?'
'si, ' Diaz whispered.
'There's a big jet up there, an airliner, but it's too heavily guarded.
There is also a lovely little Lear that looks like a bloody Turkish
brothel on the inside. That's our bird.'
Grunting in pain, the little Cuban heaved himself to his knees, pushing
away Burton's helping hand. 'Let's go, English,' he rasped, forcing a
grin. 'Not enough senoritas on this beach.'
It took the two men ten minutes to climb out of the Wash and cover the
eighty meters to the Libyan Learjet. Burton had to carry Diaz the last
third of the way. Instead of putting the Cuban on board the jet,
however, Burton trudged to the edge of the asphalt runway and dropped
him there. Diaz yelped as the pain of his wounds hit him.
'Sorry, sport,' Burton panted. 'But this is the safest spot for the
time being.'
'What?' Diaz exclaimed, finally guessing Burton's intent.
'But the plane is right there!'
'Sorry, lad. I told you if I got half a chance I'd have another go at
the house. When those rug-peddlers started shooting, they gave me just
that. From my point of view, sport, unless I do the job I was sent here
to do, that jet isn't an escape route for me. It's just a taxi back to
purgatory.
Diaz muttered a stream of Cuban profanity.
'Come along now, Juan boy, Crawl into that brush over there.
Wouldn't want those blighters over there to catch you out here alone.'
Burton pointed up the runway to where Major Karami and his men struggled
in the dusk. 'Cut your balls off with a bloody scimitar, they would.'
When Diaz had settled himself in the tall grass, Burton said, 'I know
you can reach that jet on your own, sport. I wouldn't want you to leave
without me. You wouldn't do that, would you?'
The Cuban pulled a wry face. 'Yesterday I would have,' he admitted.
'But last night you saved my life, English.
Cubano don't forget that, eh? You go play hero. Diaz be here when you
get back.'
Burton took a last look the Lear-his solitary means of escape-then he
tossed Diaz his wristwatch and gave him a roguish grin. 'If I'm not
back in forty minutes, sport, it's bon voyage to you with my best
wishes.'
Diaz shook his head and lay back in the scrub grass. Burton unslung his
submachine gun and started back toward Horn House.
Hauer charged out of the Arinscor and into the marble reception hall
with the South Africans on his heels. Gadi brought up the rear.
The young Israeli ran straight to the corpses.
As
recogni them.' '
'Look, said General Steyn, pointing to the rectangular black shield
blocking the main elevator. 'That must be the way to the gun tower.'
'And the bomb,' Gadi murmured.
