“
“Mahdi, how fast can that refugee caravan walk through the desert?”
“If they left their women and children behind, twenty or more miles a day, but they are bringing their families. That would cut their progress in half.”
“Good.” The refugees moving so slowly tempered Gianelli’s haste and changed his plans slightly. “Send out scouts to track them. It shouldn’t be too difficult. We’ll remain in camp until they get a few days ahead of us. That way we won’t trip over them when we leave. That also gives us more time to get another fuel truck from Khartoum.”
“Mr. Gianelli, if there are that many people at the mine, we’re going to need more water too,” Joppi remarked.
Giancarlo opened his laptop again and began a list. “Water, fuel, what else?”
The three of them worked for an hour, refining the list. By the time they had finished, they had the provisions to sustain the camp for several weeks without resupply. After that, they would start to bring stores from Sudan, which wasn’t a problem given Gianelli’s influence. In addition to his support to the rebels, he also maintained contacts with the government in Khartoum, working both sides of the civil war.
Gianelli concluded their meeting. “Mahdi, send out those scouts now, have them take a hand radio to report their progress. I’m going to order the rest of the equipment and supplies from Khartoum and make the necessary security arrangements. Joppi, you just make damned sure your men are ready to go.”
“Yes, sir,” both men said in unison. In the bizarre twist of Joppi Hofmyer’s racism that made him hate the group but not the individuals, he held the tent fly open for Mahdi as they left the screened enclosure.
Valley of Dead Children
It was just before dusk when Habte, Selome, and Gibby arrived in the Valley of Dead Children on the half- loaded tractor trailer. Five minutes after the rig had crossed the secret bowl of land and trundled to the head gear, a bright yellow excavator tracked onto the plain, its hydraulic arm coiled to the boxy, rotatable cab. The operator had been forced to clear away part of the ancient landslide at the valley’s entrance to allow the truck access to the mine site. Rather than reload the cumbersome machine, he’d driven it to the former Italian installation.
Wind whipped the dust of their progress across the landscape, eddies and gyres forming and collapsing in their wake. At the camp, both vehicles were shut down, and silence rushed in on them. Habte quickly followed Selome out of the truck, and he dodged into the main bunkhouse. Returning outdoors, he shielded his eyes against the red sun nestled on the western rim of the bowl and scanned for Mercer. The Toyota Land Cruiser was gone and there was no sign of him.
“Gibby,” he called, and the boy scrambled off the trailer. “This is the right place. Where’s Mercer?”
“I don’t know,” Gibby admitted. “He said he was going to wait here for us. He was upset that the mine was empty and seemed eager to talk to us. I can’t guess where he went.”
Habte ignored a creeping sense of alarm when Selome and the two hired drivers joined them. “What’s wrong?” she asked.
“Mercer should have met us. But I don’t see him.” They walked over to the head gear, both peering into the inky depth of the abandoned mine.
“Could he have been that upset?” Selome put to words the fear both were thinking.
“No,” Habte replied sharply. “I just wanted to see down there for myself.” He turned away from the pit. “It’ll be dark soon. We should make camp.”
“Where’s the Toyota?”
“Mercer must have gone off exploring. He took the camping gear from the bunk house. I doubt we’ll see him tonight.”
“Will he be okay?” There was something deeper than friendly concern in Selome’s question.
Habte recognized it even if she did not. “He knows Africa. He’ll be fine.”
An hour passed while they removed their camping gear from the tractor trailer. Selome spent more time looking across the horizon for a telltale plume of dust than helping Habte and the others. They ate dinner in the old bunkhouse by the hissing light of hurricane lamps, but there was little conversation. The men fell sleep long before Selome. She lay awake, her ears straining for the first hint of an engine’s beat. But eventually she, too, dozed off.
Mercer swept into the cabin after midnight, waking everybody. His face and clothing were filthy, his hair matted with so much dust it looked like he wore a sand-colored skull cap. He was exhausted, his eyes closed to near slits, and he slumped gratefully to the ground near the camping stove. Lamps were quickly lit, and in their glow Mecer spooned the remains of their dinner onto the plate, avoiding the questioning looks they all gave him.
“Where have you been?” Selome finally asked, her voice full of emotion.
Mercer smiled at her. She was still a mystery, but he could feel her concern was genuine.
“If at first you don’t succeed…” He grinned, then turned to Habte. “Any problems getting the gear?”
“We had to use the excavator to build a temporary ford over the Adohba River. It was flooding and we won’t get the vehicles back across until it loses its swell. The good news is, we saw no signs of trouble in town. It is possible the Europeans have given up.”
“No. They just don’t know where we are.” Mercer sopped up the last of his food with a piece of
“Gibby tells me you went down into the mine.” Habte’s statement invited an explanation.
“Yeah, it’s a bust. They never hit the kimberlite, and Lord knows, they dug enough tunnels.” Mercer accepted a cup of thermos coffee from Selome.
“This is the mine everyone is interested in?” Habte asked. It was obvious to them all that Mercer wasn’t as upset as Gibby had led them to believe.
Mercer rested his back against the wall, struggling to keep his eyes open, an enigmatic smile on his face. “Oh, someone’s interested, all right. I just don’t know who.”
“What do you mean?”
“There are two groups after us, right? And considering what Habte saw in Asmara and what I saw in Rome, they don’t play well together. I think one group is after this mine, and the other wants something else entirely.”
“Like what?” Selome asked quickly.
“Like another mine,” he said, enjoying the astonished looks. He’d figured it out yesterday and had spent today testing his theory. “I’ll explain everything in the morning,” he sighed. “It’s been one hell of a day, and right now I need some sleep.” He was snoring softly before Habte could extinguish the lamps.
Mercer roused them at dawn and hustled them to get moving. He’d already made coffee and laid out bread and butter for breakfast. “We’ve got a full day ahead of us and sunshine is wasting.” He offered no explanation to his good mood.
The owner of the excavator was the first Eritrean out of the old camp building, and when he saw Mercer seated in the cab of his machine, he started yelling, windmilling his arms to get him back off the vehicle.
“What’s he saying?” Mercer asked Habte, who had come outside, drawn by the angry shouts.
“He says you are not qualified to operate his excavator. He must work it at all times.” Habte was fumbling with a pack of wooden matches to light his first cigarette.
“Ask him if I can give him a demonstration of my qualifications,” Mercer laughed.
The driver agreed to the request, and Mercer remounted the tracked excavator. The engine gauge showed the machine had been worked for several thousand hours and he doubted it had seen much maintenance in its long life, but it fired at the first turn of the key. He dismounted as the engine warmed, and he took the matches from Habte.
“I’ll give them right back,” he promised. He secured one of the wooden matches to the longest steel tooth on the excavator’s bucket with some tape he’d found in the cab. He eyed the ground for a second before asking Habte to move a few feet closer to the excavator.
