The convoy stuck to the backstreets, avoiding the main thoroughfares. After several quick turns they hit the government district on the western side of Marafeni. The downtrodden huts were replaced by crumbling colonial villas and modern-looking office blocks. The wealthier part of town. But only just. There were signs of decay here, too, in the cracked pavements and potholed roads, the neglected gardens.
Bowman checked the console again: 23.55. A few more minutes until we hit the palace.
The convoy slung a left past the German Embassy and hit down a wide street lined with restaurants and state banks. Two hundred metres further to the west was the presidential palace. From a distance, in the semi-darkness, Bowman couldn’t pick out many details. There was an outer guard post, an inner gate. A high security wall surrounded the compound with guard towers spaced at regular intervals. Beyond the wall stood the palace itself, as white as icing sugar on a cake.
Two bodies were slumped on the ground next to the guard post. Dressed in the uniform of the Presidential Guard.
‘Shit,’ Loader muttered.
Bowman felt his stomach drop.
We’re too late.
The convoy cautiously passed the outer guard post and started down the driveway. It ran on for a hundred metres towards a wide carriage circle in front of the presidential palace. Which looked like a renovated colonial villa, with a porticoed entrance, surmounted by a pediment with the Karatandan coat of arms in the middle: a lion and a snake locked in a fearsome struggle in front of a pair of crossed spears, below a plentiful fruit tree. A gold dome rested on top of the roof. The palace was situated at the northern side of the compound, backing on to the ocean. To the south, eighty metres away, Bowman saw a couple of smaller buildings. From the maps he’d studied at Nice, he knew that these structures housed the guard barracks and servants’ quarters. A service road ran from the barracks to a secondary gated exit in the south-eastern corner of the compound.
The palace grounds were strewn with abandoned equipment: body armour, helmets, canteens, boots. And dead bodies. Bowman counted at least half a dozen of them, their shapes faintly visible in the glow from the security lights. They were all dressed in the dark-grey uniform and green berets of the Presidential Guard.
‘Jesus . . . ’ Loader said. ‘What the fuck happened?’
The rear brake lights on the Hilux suddenly flared as the pickup halted. Bowman quickly stamped hard on the brakes, the Land Cruiser skidded and lurched to a stop half a metre behind the Hilux. To their rear, the Unimog driver had also stopped.
‘What are those idiots doing now?’ Loader said angrily.
Bowman didn’t reply. Beyond the red ghost-like flare of the Hilux brake lights, he spied movement. Fifty metres away. Four figures, near the entrance to the palace.
Not members of the Presidential Guard.
Not friendlies.
The Machete Boys.
Twenty-Two
It took Bowman half a second to identify the four figures at the entrance to the palace. They were dressed in a strange mishmash of cargo shorts, athleisure and brightly coloured T-shirts, their AK-47 rifles slung casually over their shoulders. Therefore, not soldiers or police. All four men wore amulets around their wrists. Animal paws hung from chains draped around their necks. They had small leather pouches tied to ropes around their waists, their chests, their biceps. Presumably containing coins or buttons or other magical items.
Gris-gris, Mavinda had said. Good luck charms. Worn by the Machete Boys to protect them from bullets and other dangers.
A splinter group. More like a gang than soldiers.
Three of the Boys were hauling loot out of the palace. One guy in a replica Portugal football jersey carried a bronze bust the size of a bowling ball. A second man with a red bandana tied around his head gripped the gilt frame of an oil painting. Next to him, a third bloke in a garish pink T-shirt was lugging a wooden chair. They carried their stolen treasure over to a battered truck parked at the eleven o’clock position on the carriage circle. A fourth kid, no older than sixteen or seventeen, bare-chested and wearing flip-flops, leaned against the side of the truck, swaying drunkenly as he swigged from a bottle of whisky.
The guy with the bandana caught sight of the convoy in the driveway. He stopped dead and shouted at his mates, and then Pinkie and Portugal dropped the loot they had been carrying, and Flip-Flops wheeled round to see what they were looking at.
The four Machete Boys had a sudden decision to make. The biggest decision of their lives. Possibly the last, depending on the outcome. They could stand and fight. Or they could turn and run.
The rebels unslung their assault rifles. Going for the first option. Brave, but stupid.
In the Land Cruiser, Casey reacted fractionally quicker than the rest of the team. She flipped her door open, jumped down and raised her Colt rifle at the Boys. ‘Put your guns down! Hands in the air!’
The Boys ignored her. They had already made up their minds. They weren’t going to abandon their goods. They were going to stand and fight.
Bandana and Portugal let rip first, firing from the hip as they emptied a couple of wild bursts at the Land Cruiser. Three rounds missed the target completely, slapping into the tarmac eight or nine inches short of the wagon. Two other bullets struck the grille in a shower of flying sparks. A sixth round glanced off the bodywork near Casey, forcing her to dive for cover behind a statue of the president, two metres to the right of the driveway.
Then Pinkie discharged a third burst. Slower reactions, but a marginally better marksman. Two bullets glanced off the ground at the spot where Casey had been standing a moment earlier. Another round ricocheted off the statue, taking off a chunk of the president’s face.
In the Land Cruiser, Mallet, Bowman, Loader and Webb instantly snatched up their rifles. They didn’t need to
