other around the shoulders, as though he was a sleeping child. The
shells were falling heavily about him as Gareth ran back for cover,
carrying the Ras's unconscious form across his chest.
Jake Barton heard the crumping explosion of the shells, and shouted up
at Gregorius, 'What are they shooting at now?' Gregorius climbed
higher out of the turret and peered back. The crushed hull of the Hump
would have been unnoticed at that range, just another speck like a
clump of camel-thorn or an amorphous pile of black rock.
Indeed, both men had looked at it fifty times in the last few minutes
without recognizing it, but the shell bursts, which began to leap about
it in fleeting graceful ostrich feathers of dust and smoke, drew
Gregorius's eye immediately.
'My grandfather!' he cried . anxiously. 'They have been hit, Jake.'
Jake swung the car and halted it, clambering out of the hatch, blowing
dust from the lens of his binoculars and then focusing them. The
picture of the destroyed car leaped into close-up and he recognized
instantly the two distant figures, one in tailored tweeds, the other in
flowing robes and swirling skirts; the two of them were locked together
breast to breast and for an unbelieving moment
Jake thought they were doing a Strauss waltz in the midst of an
artillery barrage. Then he saw Gareth lift the Ras off the ground and
stagger with him to the shelter of the overturned car.
'We must rescue them, Jake,' Gregorius exclaimed passionately.
'They will be killed out there, if we do not.' Perhaps it was the
telepathic transfer of Gareth Swales's suspicions, but Jake experienced
the sudden guilty prick of temptation. At that moment he knew he
loved
Vicky Camberwell, and there was an easy way to clear the field.
'Jake!' Gregorius called again, and suddenly Jake felt himself so
sickened by his own treacherous thoughts that there was a hollow
nauseous feeling in the centre of his gut, and he felt the swift flow
of saliva from under his tongue.
'Let's go,' he said, and dropped down into the driver's hatch. He
swung Priscilla the Pig in a tight skidding turn and ran straight for
the forest of shell-bursts.
They drew no fire, the Italians were concentrating on the stationary
target and they seemed to be making better practice as they figured the
range. It was a matter of seconds before the Hump took a direct hit,
and Jake pressed the throttle flat to the floorboards, but Priscilla
the Pig chose this moment to show her true nature. He felt her baulk,
and the note of her engine changed momentarily, missing and stuttering,
power falling off then suddenly she picked up again and roared onwards
at full power.
'Good little darling. 'Jake peered ahead through the visor, and swung
slightly out to the left, to come in under cover of the Italians'
own shell-bursts and the capsized hull of the Hump.
A shell burst directly ahead, and Jake weaved the big car expertly
around the gaping smoking crater, pulled in sharply and spun around to
a sliding halt, facing back the way he had come, ready for a quick
pull-away. He was hard up under cover of the destroyed hull, partially
