presumed was some local pop song.
The man said something in identification, nodding to the radio, and it was Deaken’s turn to smile and nod with a complete lack of understanding. The dashboard clock was smashed, robbed of its hour hand, and Deaken travelled with his left arm twisted across his lap so he could count away the time. It was exactly thirty minutes from the moment of his pickup to their arrival at the top of an incline above a small township huddled in a protective valley not more than a mile away. Deaken sat forward eagerly as they descended, taking note of the outlying fields and the irrigation stream and the needle spires of more than one church.
The French influence remained, with the place-name visible despite the chipped paint, secure on its rusting pole.
“Kaolack!” shouted Deaken in despair.
The driver smiled and nodded.
Carre had gone ashore from the Bellicose, ostensibly to pick up Deaken from the Royale, but really to limit the time with the captain, prolonging his absence as long as possible before returning. When he made his way onto the ship from the quayside, he saw the bowser cables being lifted away on their umbilical lines. Erlander was on the bridge wing.
“Where the hell’s our passenger?” he said.
“I sent a car,” said Carr6. “He wasn’t there.”
“We’re refuelled and revictualled,” said the captain.
“Should I check with Athens?” Carre welcomed the opportunity of getting away from the ship again.
Erlander shook his head. “I’ve already done so by radio. I’ve been told to make it an on-the-spot decision.”
There was a shout from the deck signalling the final freeing of the fuel lines, and Erlander led the way into his day cabin. He poured two glasses of gin, topping both lightly with water. Carre picked up the jug, adding another inch.
“What are you going to do?” said Carre”. He had never before earned as much on the side as he had from Makimber. He was unsure whether to hoard the dollars, in the expectation of the conversion rate going up, or change them at once. It was a lot of money to move at one time and risk alerting the currency controllers. And if that happened he would have to bribe his way out of trouble. He would shift just a little at first, he decided. It was a warm feeling, to be rich. It justified the present unease.
Erlander walked to the starboard side of his cabin, looking out over the quay. The early morning activity was slowing in the full heat of the day, the shore cranes bowed with inactivity, stevedores and harbour workers grouped in the warehouse shade or trailed to the liquor stalls. “Did this fellow tell you what he had to do?” he asked.
“Just sail with you.”
The captain turned back into the room. “What authorization did you see?”
“I told you.”
Erlander was a man who knew he sailed on the shaded side of every route, never properly believing the manifest listing on any voyage. It was a risk he took consciously, for the money which Levcos paid. Despite which, he was a careful man, running a clean, efficient ship with a reliable professional crew, never exposing himself to unnecessary danger. The preposterous sailing instructions and the presence of a man who had constantly to be duped with false positions and speeds constituted precisely the sort of conditions which Erlander had until now succeeded in avoiding. Which was why he was pleased the man had not turned up. And why he had lied to the agent about making contact with Athens. There would be contact, but not yet.
“We sail at noon,” said Erlander. “I’ll wait until then. But no longer.”
One hundred and twenty miles away Deaken was agreeing to double the price if the taxi driver could get him from Kaolack to Dakar in time.
Greening and Leiberwitz stood watching Levy and Karen walking in the garden and Leiberwitz said, “Look at them! Mooning like youngsters.”
Greening looked sympathetically at the bearded man. “It must be difficult for you, involved in the family,” he said.
“That’s not my first consideration.”
“What then?”
“I don’t think Levy is capable of leading us anymore.”
“He’s not let his relationship with the woman interfere so far,” said Greening.
“I don’t think he can be trusted anymore to make dispassionate decisions,” said Leiberwitz. “What are you saying?” “That it’s time someone else took over.”
23
Deaken chose a Peugeot with the best bodywork and least tattered upholstery, hoping that the engine would be in matching condition. The taxi driver was a mulatto, so there was a bridge with French. Fighting against the impatience and despair that swept through him when the man told him how far they were from Dakar, Deaken still insisted the car be checked at a service station for oil and water, and to fill the petrol tanks. Having escaped once from the wilderness, he didn’t want to be trapped there again.
The Kaolack market was at its busiest, the streets crowded with unhurried people and obstructing animals. The driver forced his way through with his hand constantly on the horn. It took ten minutes to clear the township, but the car was moving easily with no sound of strain from the engine, and Deaken felt a prick of hope. They actually accelerated on the gradient from the town, and by the time they had reached the played-out ribbon of the Dakar road, the speedometer was flickering at 130 kilometres.
Deaken anxiously scanned the dashboard, ensuring that all the temperatures and levels were reading properly. Between the driver’s hands the steering column jarred from imbalanced wheels, but it did not seem to worry him.
Deaken eased back against the sticky upholstery, recognizing the surrounding countryside and then what he believed to be the tree outcrop where he had hidden. Freed from the stomach-tightening anxiety and with nothing to do except sit, Deaken examined the events of the previous night. It certainly hadn’t been a simple backstreet mugging. There had been no attempt at robbery, not until those last few moments when they hauled him from the car. Bwana mkubwa, he remembered. Who was the big man they had kept talking about? Underberg possibly, but Underberg wouldn’t have attempted to keep him off the Bellicose. It was Underberg’s idea that he sail, to ensure the freighter’s return. Azziz then? No. There was no logic in that, because Azziz wanted him aboard as well. And he had seen the thugs Azziz employed. Evans and his trained mercenaries wouldn’t have allowed such an amateur, panic-ridden escape. Had Azziz ordered him stopped, he would have been stopped. So it was another unanswered question, to be filed away with all the rest.
The plain ended at last, the landscape becoming stubbled with isolated trees and then thicker vegetation. Occasionally there were villages, clusters of mud-walled huts with corrugated metal roofs set out along the highway, staffed by scattering chickens and round-eyed, pot-bellied children. Deaken noticed that the fuel was already half gone and that the water-temperature gauge was twitching up towards the amber-coloured danger area. He gestured towards it and the driver nodded. “Diourbel in fifteen kilometres,” he promised.
Halfway, guessed Deaken, maybe slightly less. Sixty miles then. He checked his watch again. Could he hope to do sixty miles in an hour and ten minutes?
“How’s the road, beyond Diourbel?” he demanded.
“Good,” said the driver, shrugging in what appeared to be immediate contradiction.
Deaken realized the man didn’t know. “Noon,” he said. “I must be in Dakar by noon.”
“No problem.”
But there was, Deaken knew. No road in Africa, certainly not this part of Africa, was good enough to allow the sort of speed necessary to cover sixty or more miles in just over an hour, even if the overstrained, overheated engine could maintain a good average. The idea came abruptly to Deaken, his first reaction one of excitement, quickly followed by that of annoyance because it was so obvious and hadn’t occurred to him earlier in Kaolack. When the taxi pulled into the service station, he leaped out before they came to a halt, and ran into the office,
