Again it caught the sun and flashed as it turned unsteadily towards the
gap in the mountains where the pass led up into the highlands.
His whole attention was fixed on the dwindling speck of blue, so that
he did not see the three CV.3 tanks crawl out of the main street of the
village five hundred yards away.
He was still staring upwards as the tanks stopped, rocking gently on
their suspensions, and the turrets with the long Spandaus traversed
around towards him.
He did not hear the crash of cannon for the shell struck long before
the sound carried to him. There was only the earth stopping impact and
the burst of shell that hurled him from the hatch.
He lay on the earth beside the shattered hull, and he felt downwards
with his good hand, for there was something wrong with his stomach. He
groped down, and there was nothing where his stomach should have been,
just a gaping hole into which his hand sunk, as though into the soft
warm flesh of a rotten fruit.
He tried to withdraw his hand, but it would not move.
There was no longer muscular control, and it grew darker.
He tried to open his eyes and then realized that they were wide open,
staring up at the bright sky. The darkness was in his head, and the
cold was in his whole body.
In the darkness and the icy cold, he heard a voice say in Italian,
'E marta he is dead.' And he thought with mild surprise, 'Yes, I am.
This time, I am,' and he tried to grin, but his lips would not move and
he went on staring up at the sky with pale blue eyes.
He is dead,' repeated Gino.
'Are you certain?' Count Aldo Belli demanded from the turret of the
tank.
'Si, I am certain.' Warily the Count climbed down the hull.
'You are right,' he agreed, studying the man. 'He is truly dead. 'Then
he straightened up and puffed out his chest.
'Gino,' he commanded. 'Get a picture of me with the cadaver of the
English bandit.' And Gino backed away, staring into the viewfinder of
the big black camera.
'Chin up a little, my Colonel,' he instructed.
Vicky Camberwell brought the Puss Moth out over the final crest of the
pass, with a mere two hundred feet to spare, for the small overladen
aircraft was fast approaching its ceiling.
Ahead of her, the highlands stretched away to Addis Ababa in the south.
Below her passed the thin raw muddy bisecting lines of the
Dessie road. She saw the road was deserted. The army of Ethiopia had
passed. The fish had slipped through the net but the thought gave her
no pleasure.
She turned in her seat and looked back, down the long gloomy corridor
of the Sardi Gorge. From the cliffs on each side of the gorge, the
rain waters still fell in silver white waterfalls and muddy cataracts
so that it seemed that even the mountains wept.
She straightened up in her seat, and lifting her hand to her face she
found without surprise that her own cheek was wet and slick with
tears.
