popped up mustache in disarray and stained with lipstick.
'Jake, what the hell are we going to do?' And Jake told him in
nautical language which left no room for misunderstanding precisely
what he was about to do.
'don't mean that, I mean what are we going to tell old Toffee tomorrow?
Are we going to deliver the goods?' Gareth's companion reached up,
took him in a head lock and drew his mouth down again.
'Jake, for God's sake, concentrate on the problem,' he pleaded as he
was engulfed.
'I am, I am!' Jake assured him, rolling his eyes sideways to meet
Gareth's, but without interrupting his efforts with the plump blonde.
'How the hell do we get four armoured cars ashore on a hostile coast,
just for a start then how do we run them two hundred miles to the
Ethiopian border?' Gareth lamented, speaking out of the unemployed
corner of his mouth, and then something caught his attention. He
pulled free and raised himself on one elbow. 'I say, your companion
isn't a blonde after all. Extraordinary.' Jake glanced sideways and
grinned.
'And yours seems to be Scottish she's wearing a sporran, by God.'
'Jake, we've got to make a decision. Do we go or don't we?'
'Action first, decisions later. Let's engage the targets.'
'Right,' Gareth agreed, realizing the futility of discussion at this
moment. 'Driver advance.'
'Gunner. Traverse right. Steady. On. Independent rapid fire.'
'Shoot!' cried Gareth, and the conversation languished.
It was half an hour before it was resumed, with the two of them in
shirt sleeves, braces dangling and black ties discarded, poring over a
large-scale map of the East African coast that Madame Cecile had
produced.
'There's a thousand miles of unguarded coast line.' Gareth traced the
great horn of Africa in the light of the Petromax lamp and then ran his
finger inland. 'And this is marked as semi-desert all the way to the
border. We aren't likely to run into a crowd.'
'It's a hell of a way to make a living, 'said Jake.
'Are we going then?' Gareth looked up.
'You know we are.'
'Yes,' Gareth laughed. 'I know we are.
Fifteen thousand sovereigns say we have to.' ij Mikhael received their
decision with a curt nod and then asked, 'Have you planned yet how you
will accomplish this task? Perhaps I can be of assistance, I know the
coast well and most of the routes to the interior.' He gestured for
one of his advisers to spread a map upon the stateroom table. Jake ran
his finger across it, as he spoke.
'We thought to hire a shallowdraughted vessel here in Dares
Salaam, and make a landing somewhere in this area.
Then to load the cases on the cars, and, carrying our own fuel,
run directly inland to some prearranged rendezvous with your people.'
'Yes,' agreed the Prince. 'The basic idea is right. But I should
avoid British territory. They maintain a very intensive patrol system
to discourage the export of slaves from their territory to the East.
