them away. If it had not been for the birds I would never have known
that they were there.' He clucked softly with reluctant admiration.
'Nimmur is a careful man. No wonder he has survived so long. He keeps
tight control. But even he must have water.'
Boris kept watching through the glasses as he tried to guess what Mek
Nimmur would do next. 'He has lost much time here by sheltering from the
heat. He will march again as soon as it is cooler. He will make a night
march,' he decided, as he looked at the sun again. 'Three hours until
dark. I must make my move before then. Once it is dark it will be
difficult to pick my targets.'
Before he stood up he wriggled back from the skyline.
He retraced his steps back along the Mountainside until a bluff shielded
him from the eyes of Mek Nimmur's sentries.
Then he started down. There was no goat track here and he had to make
his own going, but after a few false starts he discovered an inclined
rock shelf that afforded him a fairly easy path down the face. When he
reached the bottom of the gorge, he took careful stock of the lie and
run of the . stratum so as to be able to find it again in an emergency.
It was a good escape route, and he knew that he might soon be under
pursuit and duress.
It had taken him over an hour to negotiate the descent, and he knew that
he was running out of time. He reached the trail at the water's edge,
and started back along it towards Mek Nimmur's camp. He was in a hurry
now, but even then he was careful to take anti-tracking precautions. He
walked on the edge of the trail, stepping only on the stony ground,
careful to leave no sign of his passing.
But despite his caution, he nearly walked right into them.
He had not covered the first two hundred metres when in the back of his
mind he registered the low, mournful whistle of a pale-winged starting,
and almost ignored it until alarm bells sounded in his mind. The timing
was all wrong. The starling only gave that particular call at dawn when
it left its nesting site high up in the cliffs. This was late afternoon
down in the heated depths of the gorge. He guessed that it was a signal
from one of the scouts coming up the trail towards him. Mek Nimmur's
party was on the move.
Boris reacted instantly. He slipped off the trail, and ran back the way
he had come until he reathed the beginning of the pathway along which he
had descended the cliff. He climbed just high enough to be able to
overlook the trail. However, he realized that he had lost Much of the
advantage that he had built up by cutting across the mountain. This was
not the ideal ambush position, and his escape route was exposed to enemy
fire from below - he would be lucky to make it to the top. But the .
idea of abandoning his vengeance never occurred to him. As soon as his
targets were in'his sights, he would shoot from this stance.
However, he acknowledged to himself that Mek Nimmur had taken him by
surprise. Boris had not anticipated that he would move before the sun
had set. He had expected to be able to take up a position above the camp
in the thorn patch and to be able to get off two careful, well-aimed
shots before he was forced to run.
