to find their own children in the throng. Some villagers had managed to collect a pathetic bundle of possessions, but most of them were empty-handed.
The two yellow bulldozers rolled down off their low trailer beds with engines pulsing and blue diesel smoke blowing from the exhaust stacks.
One of them swung in a tight circle with a track locked, and lowered the massive frontal blade. Gleaming in the afternoon sunlight the blade sliced into the wall of the nearest but and the thatched roof collapsed.
Beauty! Bonny murmured. I couldn't have staged it better.
That was an incredible shot! The women were wailing and ululating, that peculiar chilling sound of African grief. One of the men broke away and ran towards the cover of the nearest field of sorghum. A soldier shouted a warning at him, but he put his head down and ran faster. A short burst of automatic rifle-fire popped like a string of fire-crackers and the man collapsed and rolled in the dust and lay still.
A woman screamed and ran towards the fallen body carrying an infant strapped in a shawl on her back and an older child in her arms. A soldier barred her path with a bayoneted rifle and turned her back towards the truck. I got it!
Bonny exulted. The whole thing. The shooting and all. It's in the can.
Shit, this is great! The soldiers were drilled and ruthless. It all went very quickly. Within half an hour the entire populace of the village had been rounded up, except for the fishermen still out on the lake. The first truck, fully loaded, pulled away, heading back the way it had come.
The huts were collapsing one after the other as the two bulldozers moved down the rows. God, I hope I don't run out of film, Bonny muttered anxiously. This is a once-in-a-lifetime chance. Daniel had not spoken since the operation had begun. He was part of Africa. He had seen other villages wiped out. He remembered the guerrilla camp in Mozambique. Since then he had seen Renamo rebels work over a village, and he had witnessed forced removals by the minions of apartheid in South Africa, but he had never grown hardened to the suffering of the African people. He was sick to his guts as he watched the rest of the little drama unfold.
The remaining fishing-boats ran in unsuspectingly to the beach, where the soldiers were waiting to drag the crews ashore. The last truckload of villagers rolled away in a column of red dust, and as soon as it was out of sight, one of the yellow bulldozers waddled down on to the beach and swept the abandoned fishing-boats into a pile, like firewood kindling.
Four soldiers brought the body of the old man and the one who had tried to escape, carrying them by ankles and wrists, dead heads lolling backwards. They tossed them on to the funeral pyre of shattered hulls and torn sails. One of the soldiers hurled a lighted torch of thatch on to the top of the pile. The flames took hold and burned so fiercely that the soldiers were driven backwards, holding up their hands to protect their faces.
The bulldozers crawled back and forth over the remains of the huts, flattening them under the steel tracks. A whistle shrilled and the soldiers formed up quickly and re-embarked into the waiting troop-carriers. The yellow bulldozers crawled back on to their transporters, and the entire column wound away.
After they had gone, the only sound was the hushed whisper of the evening breeze along the cliff face and the distant crackle of the flames. Well, Daniel tried to keep his tone neutral, the site is clear for the new casino. Taffari's investment in happiness for his people is secure. . . his voice broke. He could not go on. The bastard! he whispered. The murderous bloody bastard. He found that he was shaking with anger and outrage. It required an immense effort of will to bring his emotions under control. He strode to the edge of the cliff overlooking the beach. The gunboat was still anchored out in the deeper water in the middle of the bay and the Zodiac was drawn up on the beach with one of the soldiers guarding it, but Captain Kajo and the other sailor were no longer asleep on the sand. it was obvious that they had been awakened by the sound of gunfire and activity in the destroyed village.
Daniel looked around for Kajo and picked him out at last.
He was climbing the cliff face half a mile away, and it was clear from his manner that he was agitated. He was searching for them, stopping every few minutes to shout through cupped hands and peer about him anxiously.
Daniel ducked back out of sight and snapped at Bonny. Nobody must know that we shot that footage. It's dynamite. Gotcha! she agreed.
Give me the tape. I'll take care of it, in case they want to check what you've filmed.
Bonny ejected the tape from the camera and handed it over.
He wrapped it in a jersey and stuffed it into the bottom of his rucksack. All right, let's get out of here before Kajo finds us.
He must never guess that we saw what we saw. Bonny gathered up her equipment swiftly and followed Daniel as he cut inland away from the remains of the village and the lakeshore. Within minutes they were into the tall grass and scrub of the savannah.
Daniel circled back through the elephant grass and scrub until he reached the lakeshore again near the mouth of the bay, opposite Fish Eagle Island. They scrambled down the cliff to the beach and Daniel paused to let Bonny catch her breath. I don't understand how they let a film crew loose in the area on the very day they were going to wipe out the village, she gasped. Typical African screw-up, Daniel told her.
Somebody forgot to tell somebody else. The last coup attempt they made in Zambia, one of the conspirators broke into the radio station and announced the revolution while all his co-conspirators were still in barracks eating breakfast. He had the wrong day.
It was supposed to be the following Sunday. AWA. Are you ready to go on?
Bonny stood up. AWAF she asked. Africa Wins Again, Daniel smiled grimly. Let's go! Assuming a casual manner they set off side by side along the firm damp sand at the edge of the water.
They could see the beached Zodiac in the distance, but the demolished village was still hidden by the bulge of the cliff face.
They had not covered more than two hundred yards before Kajo hailed them from the cliff top. They stopped and looked up at him, waving as though they had only just noticed him for the first time. He's peeing in his pants, Bonny murmured. He doesn't know if we witnessed the raid or not.
Kajo came pelting down the cliff path, slipping and sliding on the steep places. He was out of breath when he reached the beach and confronted them.
Where have you been? he demanded. Out at the point, Daniel told him.
We filmed the casino site. Now we are going down to film the hotel site at the river mouth, where the fishing village is-'No! No! Kajo grabbed Daniel's arm. That is enough. No more filming. We must go back to the boat. it is finished for today. Daniel shrugged off his hand and argued with him for a while. Then finally, with a show of reluctance, he allowed himself to be led towards the Zodiac and ferried aboard the gunboat.
