movement out there had altered. Suddenly he saw the unmistakable shape
of a Fiat transport emerge from the dust bank, and move ponderously
back towards him. Through the glasses the men who clung to the canvas
roof were all staring back in the direction from which they were coming
at speed.
He panned the glasses slowly and saw another truck lumber out of the
dust-mist headed back towards him. One of the soldiers on its roof was
aiming and firing his rifle back into the obscuring clouds and his
comrades, clinging to the roof about him, were frozen in attitudes of
trepidation and alarm.
At that moment, Castelani heard something which he recognized
instantly, his skin prickling at the distant ripping tearing sound.
The sound of a British Vickers machine gun.
His eye sought the direction, turning swiftly to the right flank of the
extended Italian column which seemed now to be rushing back towards him
in confused and completely disordered retreat.
He picked up the tall hump-backed shape instantly, standing high on the
open plain, coming in fast with the strange bounding motion of a
rocking horse, cutting boldly into the flank of the mass of
soft-skinned Italian transports.
'Unlimber the guns,' shouted Castelani. 'Prepare to receive enemy
armour.' The Vickers machine guns in the turrets of the two armoured
cars had ball-type mountings. The barrels could be elevated or
depressed, but they could not traverse more than ten degrees to left or
right, this being the limit of the ball mountings' turn. The driver
had of necessity to act as gun-layer, swinging the entire vehicle to
Within the limited traverse aim of the gun, or at least bring it of the
mounting.
The Ras found this frustrating beyond all enduring. He would select a
target, and shout in perfectly clear and coherent Amharic to his
driver. Gareth Swales, not understanding a word of it, had already
selected another target and was doing his best to line up on it while
the Ras delivered a series of wild kicks at his kidneys to register his
royal right of refusing to engage it.
The consequence of this was that the Hump wove a crazy,
unpredictable course through the Italian column, spinning off at sudden
tangents as the two crew members shouted bitter recriminations at each
other, almost ignoring the sheets of rifle fire that thundered upon the
steel hull from point-blank range, like hail on a galvanized roof.
Priscilla the Pig, on the other hand, was doing deadly execution.
She had missed her first burst fired at the speeding Rolls, and it had
ducked away behind the screen of dust and bucking trucks. Now,
however, Jake and Gregoritis were working with all the precision and
mutual understanding that had developed between them.
'Left driver, left, left,' called Gregorius, peering down the open
sights of the Vickers at the truck that roared and bounced along a
hundred yards ahead of them.
'All right, I'm on him,' shouted Jake, as the vehicle appeared in the
narrow field of his visor. This was a perforated steel plate that
allowed only forward vision but once Jake had the truck centred, he
