Power of the Sword - Smith Wilbur (электронная книга TXT) 📗
I have to be here when he wakes, I have to be the one to tell him. I owe him that much at least. outside the tent the jackals yipped at the dawn, and when the first glow struck through the canvas, Shasa woke again, and asked immediately, David? I'm here, Shasa. 'It hurts like hell, Davie, but you told me it's going to be all right.
I remember that, you did tell me, didn't you? Yes, that's what I said. We'll be flying together soon, won't we, Davie boy? The old team, Courtney and Abrahams back in business? He waited for the reply, but when it did not come Shasa's tone changed. I'm not blind, am I? We will be flying again? You are not blind, David said softly. But you won't be flying again. You're going home, Shasa. Tell me! Shasa ordered. Don't try and spare me, that will only make it worse. All right, I'll tell you straight. The bullet burst your left eyeball. The doctor had to remove it. Shasa lifted his hand and touched the left side of his face disbelievingly.
You will still have full vision in the right eye, but you won't be flying Hurricanes again. I'm sorry, Shasa. Yes, Shasa whispered. 'So am I. David came to visit him again that evening. The CO has put you up for the DFC. You'll get it, for sure. That's charming of him, Shasa said. Bloody charming. And they were silent for a while, then David spoke again.
You saved my life, Shasa. Oh shut up, Davie, don't be a bore., 'They are flying you down to the coast tomorrow morning in the transport Dakota. You'll be in Cape Town for Christmas. Give Matty and the baby a kiss for me, you lucky sod., I'd change places any day, Shasa told him. But we'll give you one hell of a party when you come home. Is there anything I can do for you, anything you need? David asked as he stood up.
As a matter of fact, there is. Do you think you could get your hands on a bottle of whisky for me, Davie? The commander of the submarine straightened up from the eye-piece of the telescope and nodded to Manfred De La Rey.
Look, please! he said, and Manfred took his place at the telescope, pressing his forehead against the rubber pad and staring into the lens.
They were lying two miles offshore and on the surface it was late evening. The sun was setting behind the land.
Do you recognize the landmarks? the U-boat commander asked in German and Manfred did not answer immediately, for he found it difficult to speak. His emotions were too strong, five years, five long years since he had set eyes on this beloved coast, and his joy was abundant. He knew that he could never be truly happy anywhere but in his Africa.
However, the intervening years had not been unhappy.
There had always been Heidi, and in this last year his son, Lothar, named after his own father. The two of them had formed the pivot of his existence. And there had also been his work, two tasks running side by side, each of them demanding and utterly fulfilling.
His law studies had cuhninated in a Master's degree in Roman Dutch Law and International Law at the University of Berlin.
There had also been his military preparations. Sometimes these had kept him from his new family for months at a time, but now he was a highly trained and dedicated operative of the German Abwehi. He had acquired unusual and diverse skills. He had become a radio operator, and an expert in explosives and small arms; he had made ten parachute jumps, five of these in darkness, and he could pilot a light aircraft; he was versed in cipher and coding, he was a deadly marksman with rifle or sidearms, an exponent of unarmed combat, a trained assassin, both body and mind honed to a razor's edge of preparedness. He had learned the art of persuasive public speaking and rhetoric, and had studied the political and military structures of South Africa until he knew all the vulnerable areas and how to exploit them. He was now ready in every way that he and his masters could foresee for the task that lay ahead of him. Not one man in a million, he knew, would ever have an opportunity such as he was being given, the opportunity to mould history and to turn the detestable order of the world upon its head. Greatness had been thrust upon him, and he knew himself equal to that challenge.
Yes, he replied in German to the U-boat commander, I recognize the landmarks. He had spent one happy, carefree summer holiday on this sparsely populated stretch of the southeastern coast of Africa. Here Roelf Stander's family owned five thousand hectares, and five miles of this fore-shore.
Manfred and Roelf had fished from that rocky headland, pulling the big silver kabeljou from the creaming green surf that broke over the black boulders. They had climbed that low range of hills to hunt the speckled bushbuck amongst the flowering ericas and magnificent blooms of the wild protea shrubs. In that quiet cove with its rind of smooth yellow sand they had swum naked, and afterwards lain on the beach to discuss the future and fantasize about their
own particular roles in it. There below the hills, gleaming in the last rays of the sun, stood the whitewashed walls of the small holiday cottage in which they had lived.
Yes,he repeated. This is the rendezvous. "We will wait for the agreed time, the U-boat commander said, and gave the order to lower the periscope.
Still two miles offshore, the submarine lay twenty metres below the surface, suspended in the dark waters with its engines stopped, while above it the sun sank below the horizon and night fell over the African mainland. Manfred went down the narrow passageway to the tiny cubicle he shared with two of the U-boat's junior officers and began his final preparations for landing.
In the weeks since they had left Bremerhaven, he had come to hate this sinister craft. He hated the cramped quarters and the close intimate proximity of other men, he hated the motion an the ceaseless vibration of the engines. He had never become accustomed to the knowledge that he was locked in an iron box deep under the cold oceanic waters, and he hated the stink of diesel and oil and the reek of the other men trapped down here with him. He longed with all his soul for the clean night air in his lungs and the hot African sun on his face.
Quickly he stripped off the white rollneck jersey and the navy blue peajacket and dressed instead in the worn and shapeless clothing of a country Afrikaner, a bywoner or poor white squatter. He was still darkly tanned from his training in the mountains and he had allowed his hair to grow out over his collar and his beard to become thick and curly, adding many years to his age. He looked at himself now in the small mirror on the bulkhead above his bunk.
They will never recognize me, he said aloud. Not even own family. He had dyed his hair and beard black, the same colour as his eyebrows, and his nose was thickened and twisted. It had never set properly after the American Cyrus Lomax had broken it in the Olympic final, and one eyebrow was lumpy and scarred. He looked entirely different from the young, clean-cut, blond athlete who had sailed from Africa five years before. He pulled the stained felt hat low over his eyes and nodded at his image with satisfaction, then turned from the mirror and went down on his knees to reach the equipment that had been stowed beneath his bunk.
It was packed in rubber waterproofed containers and sealed with tape. He checked off each numbered package on his list, and a German seaman carried them away and stacked them at the foot of the ladder in the submarine's conning tower.
Manfred checked his watch. There was just time for a quick meal and then he would be ready. The bosun called him from the galley, and with a mouth still full of bread and sausage, Manfred hurried to the U-boat's control room.
There are lights ashore. The captain stood up from the periscope and gestured Manfred to take his place.
It was fully dark on the surface and through the lens Manfred picked out immediately the three beacon fires, one on each horn of the headlands and one on the sheltered beach.
