bullet - my God, Ben, my God!’ He shook his head. ‘You frightened me, you crazy bastard. You frightened the hell out of me.’ He put his arm around my shoulder and led me back to the vehicles.
MacDonald was still moaning softly. We lifted the side of the Land-Rover, Louren and I between us. MacDonald screamed as the troopers drew him out from under the vehicle. His legs were twisted at an odd angle and his face was very pale, his tan a dirty brown over it and little beads of sweat dewed his upper lip.
I left Louren to administer morphine and try to splint the badly shattered bone, and I went across to where Xhai still lay.
The entry hole was a blue black pucker in the centre of his back, there was no bleeding from it. Yet he lay in a puddle of thick gelatinous blood, and I knew what hideous damage the exit of the bullet from his chest must have caused. I did not turn him over. I could not bring myself to do it, but his head was twisted sideways and I squatted beside him. With my fingertips I closed the lids over those staring Chinese eyes.
‘Go in peace, little brother,’ I whispered.
‘Come on, Ben. They’ll be back. We must hurry,’ Louren called.
Two of our troopers were dead, and the sergeant rolled them in their blankets.
‘The bushman also,’ I told him. He hesitated, but then he saw my expression and went quickly.
We rolled the third vehicle back onto its wheels and while the troopers lifted our dead and wounded aboard, Louren and I checked it out. Two of the tyres were shot through, the petrol tank was riddled, the steering box was severed by a bullet and another had shattered the engine sump cover. Oil poured from it, stinking in the heat.
Quickly Louren placed the sergeant and the three remaining troopers in a defensive perimeter amongst the fever trees and we pushed the crippled Land-Rover into the lee of the wrecked vehicles giving ourselves some cover to work behind.
There was a tool box in MacDonald’s Land-Rover. We changed the wheels as quickly as a pair of Grand Prix mechanics, cannibalizing from the wrecks. As we tightened the last wheel bolts the sniping began. It was long range, from the far ridge a quarter of a mile away. They had learned their lesson well, and kept a respectful distance now. Our troopers answered, blazing away with the two heavy machine-guns to discourage them further.
In the middle of a fire fight Louren and I worked, greasy to the elbows. Smearing skin from knuckles on sharp steel in our haste, burning blisters into our skin on the red-hot manifold and exhaust system.
We pulled the sump cover off the capsized Land-Rover, and lay on our backs with hot oil dripping into our faces as we bolted it back onto our vehicle. The gasket was torn, it would leak, but it would hold oil long enough to get us clear.
Louren changed the steering-box, while I found a cake of soap in my pack and plugged the bullet holes in the fuel tank. As we worked, I blessed the Chinese artisans who had manufactured those shoddy weapons on the far ridge, with their limited range and accuracy.
We refuelled and replaced the engine oil, standing by necessity fully exposed to the marksmen on the hill, forcing ourselves to work methodically and trying to shut from our ears the terrifying sound of passing shot.
Louren jumped into the driver’s seat, and pressed the starter; it whirled dismally, on and on, and I closed my eyes tight and prayed. Louren released the starter button and in the silence I heard him swearing with bitter vehemence. He tried again, the battery was weakening now, the whirring of the engine slowed and faltered.
A stray bullet smashed the windscreen spraying us with glittering glass fragments. Louren was still swearing. In despair I glanced at the setting sun, only half an hour or so of daylight left. In the darkness the hyenas would come down from the ridge. As though they had read my thoughts the fire from up there intensified. I heard a bullet whine away off the metal of the Land-Rover. Louren jumped out of the driver’s seat and opened the bonnet again; as he worked I shouted across to Ndabuka.
‘Why aren’t you firing, Sergeant? You are letting them have target practice. Keep their heads down, dammit!’
‘The ammunition is almost finished, sir,’ he called back, and a coldness closed about my guts. No ammunition, and darkness coming on fast.
Louren slammed the bonnet closed, and ducked back into the driver’s seat. He looked at me through the shattered windscreen.
‘Say another prayer, Ben. The last one was no damned good.’ And he pressed the starter. It wheezed wearily but the engine would not turn.
‘We’ve had it, Ben,’ Louren told me. ‘Both the other batteries are
‘Sergeant - all of you. Shove,’ I shouted. ‘Come on, help me.’
They ran to me at the rear of the Land-Rover.
‘Try her in second,’ I shouted at Louren, and a burst of bullets kicked around my legs stinging them with fragments of stone.
We threw our combined weight on the Land-Rover and it bumped over rough ground, back towards the river.
‘Now,’ I shouted at Louren. The Land-Rover juddered and slowed and we hurled ourselves against it, keeping it moving against compression.
It fired once. ‘Keep going!’ I gasped. And abruptly the engine roared into life and we howled with triumph.
‘Climb on,’ Louren yelled and swung the Land-Rover back towards the trail, but I ran beside him.
‘Matches!’ I panted.
‘What?’
‘Give me your matches, damn you.’ I snatched them from his hand and ran to the tangled wreckage. Gasoline was dribbling from one of the ruptured tanks and I flicked a match at it. The sucking, roaring torrent of flame licked across my face singeing my eyelashes away, and I turned and ran after the Land-Rover, scrambling in over the
