A Time to Die - Smith Wilbur - Страница 77

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A quarter of a-mile to the right-hand side of the nearest rock portal of the valley, there was a route that looked as though it might just go, but it wouldn't be easy without a companion and lacking even basic rock-climbing equipment. He would be burdened by the rifle and his pack, and he would have to make the attempt in the dark. To go out on that exposed cliff in daylight would be to invite a little AK target practice.

Through the binocular lens he picked out a rocky buttress that was faulted like a fire escape. It seemed to offer a way around the overhanging section of cliff, and above that it led to a narrow horizontal ledge running several hundred feet in either direction.

ir From that ledge there appeared to be two possible routes to the top of the cliff, one a narrow crack or chimney and the other an open face down which grew the exposed serpentine roots of a huge ficus tree that stood tall and massive against the skyline. The roots crawled and twined against the sheer red rock like a nest of mating pythons, forming a ladder to the top of the cliff.

Sean glanced at his wristwatch. He had three hours to rest before it was dark enough to make the attempt, and suddenly he felt exhausted.

He realized that it was not only the physical exertion of the chase but also the emotional drain of having glimpsed Claudia and Job in the Renarno column and the parting with Matatu.

He anti tracked meticulously back off the ridge and searched for a secure place to hole up during what was left of daylight. When he found a hidey-hole among rock and scrub with a safe line of retreat, he loosened his bootlaces to rest his feet but kept the rifle in his lap and slumped down over it. He munched a maize cake and protein bar from his emergency pack and drank a few careful mouthfuls from his water bottle.

He knew he would wake when the sun touched the horizon. He closed his eyes and almost instantly fell asleep.

On the journey back to Chiwewe camp, Matatu led Pumula at a steady trot. They kept going through the night and the next afternoon stopped to refill their water bottles in the marsh where they had spotted Tukutela from the air.

Pumula wanted to rest. Matatu did not bother to argue with him. He faced toward the west and went away at his swaying trot on his skinny knob-kneed legs so Pumula was forced to follow.

They crossed the border between Mozambique and Zimbabwe during t dark hours of the night and ran into the safari camp in the middle of the following afternoon.

The consternation caused by their arrival was tremendous. In his agitation, the chef even forgot to don his tall cap and snowy apron before rushing out of his hut to greet them and demand the news of the mambo.

Matatu left Pumula to hand over Sean's written message and answer the barrage of questions. He went to his hut and curled up like a puppy on his bed, an ancient iron frame with a lumpy coir mattress, a gift from Sean and his most treasured possession. He slept through all the subsequent excitement, even the chef bellowing into the microphone of the VHF radio, attempting by volume alone to reach Reema in Harare, almost three hundred miles distant.

ISO

April, When Matatu awoke, he had slept five hours. The camp was dark and silent. He repacked the small leather pouch that was his only luggage, retrieved his remaining store of precious snuff from under his mattress, and refilled the horn that hung around his neck.

He crept quietly from the sleeping camp. When he was well clear, he straightened up and faced toward the east.

"Silly little bugger," he said happily and began to run, going back to his rightful place beside the man he loved more than a father.

Sean woke with the first chill of evening in the air. Ahead the cliffs of the escarpment were fading into the smoky purple dusk. Sean stretched and looked around for Matatu. When he remembered he was gone, it gave him a physical jolt in the pit of his stomach. He tied his bootlaces and drank again. When he stoppered the water bottle, he held it to his ear and shook it. Still half full.

He opened the breech of the.577, slipped the cartridges out of the twin chambers, and exchanged them for two others from the loops on his bush jacket. He squeezed an inch of black camouflage cream from the crumpled tube and rubbed it over his face and the backs of his hands. That completed his preparation and he stood up and moved quietly up the slope.

He spent the last twenty minutes of daylight glassing the entrance to the valley and the top of the cliffs through his binoculars.

As far as he could see, nothing had changed. Then he studied and memorized the route up the cliff face.

As the night spread its cloak over the escarpment, he slipped quietly over the ridge and crept tip toward the base of the cliff. The bush grew dense and tangled there, and it took him much longer than he had anticipated to reach the rocky wall. It was almost completely dark by then, but he was able to identify the starting point of the climb by a small bush growing in a crack of the cliff that he had marked through the binoculars.

Sean had never used a carrying sling on his rifle. It could be mortally dangerous in thick bush when the sling caught on a branch just as a buffalo or wounded elephant began its charge. He lashed the short-barreled weapon under the flap of his backpack with his sleeping bag. The butt stuck out on one side of his shoulders and the muzzles on the other, making an awkward unbalanced load. He went to the cliff face and laid his hands on it, getting the feel of it. The stone was still hot from the sun and the texture was smooth, almost soapy, under his fingers.

Before the war, rock climbing had been one of his passions. He loved the risk, the terror of the open face and drop sucking at his heels. He had climbed in South America and Europe as well as on the Drakensberg and Mount Kenya. He had the requisite sense of balance and the strength in his fingers and arms. He could have been one of the top international climbers but for the intervention of the bush war. However, he had never attempted a climb like this before.

His boots were soft velskoen without reinforced toes. He had no ropes, no anchorman, no pitons or carabiner, and he would be opening this route in darkness, barely able to see the next hold above, following a pitch he had studied from a mile distant, going blind on red sandstone, the most treacherous of rock.

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