The Dark of the Sun - Smith Wilbur (читать книгу онлайн бесплатно полностью без регистрации .TXT) 📗
grief, warm rain in the darkness. And the darkness was complete. Once
Bruce touched the top of his nose with his open palm, but he could not
see his hand.
He used a staff to keep contact with the steel rail that ran beside him,
tapping along it like a blind man, and at each step the
gravel of the embankment crunched beneath his feet. The hand of the man
behind him was on his shoulder, and he could sense the presence of the
others that followed him like the body of a serpent, could hear the
crunch of their steps and the muted squeak and rattle of their
equipment. A man's voice was raised in protest and immediately quenched
by Ruffy's deep rumble.
They crossed the road and the gradient changed beneath Bruce's feet so
that he had to lean forward against it. They were starting up the Lufira
hills.
I will rest them at the top, he thought, and from there we will be able
to see the lights of the town.
The rain stopped abruptly, and the quietness after it was surprising.
Now he could distinctly hear the breathing of the man behind him above
the small sounds of their advance, and in the forest nearby a tree frog
clinked as though steel pellets were being dropped into a crystal glass.
It was a sound of great purity and beauty.
All Bruce's senses were enhanced to compensate for his lack of sight;
his hearing; his sense of smell, so that he could catch the over-sweet
perfume of a jungle-flower and the heaviness of decaying wet vegetation;
his sense of touch, so that he could feel the raindrops on his face and
the texture of his clothing against his body; then the other animal
sense of danger told him with sickening, stomach-tripping certainty that
there was something ahead of him in the darkness.
He stopped, and the man following him bumped into him throwing him off
balance. All along the line there was a ripple of confusion and then
silence. They all waited.
Bruce strained his hearing, half crouched with his rifle held ready.
There was something there, he could almost feel it.
Please God, let them not have a machine-gun set up here, he thought;
they could cut us into a shambles.
He turned cautiously and felt for the head of the man behind him, found
it and drew it towards him until his mouth was an inch from the ear.
"Lie down very quietly. Tell the one behind you that he may pass it
back." Bruce waited poised, listening and trying to see ahead into the
utter blackness. He felt a gentle tap on his ankle from the gendarme at
his feet. They were all down.
"All right, let's go take a look." Bruce detached one of the grenades
from his webbing belt. He drew the pin and dropped it into the breast
pocket of his jacket. Then feeling for the crossties of the rails with
each foot he started forward. Ten paces and he stopped again. Then he
heard it, the tiny click of two pebbles just ahead of him. His throat
closed so he could not breathe and his stomach was very heavy.
I'm right on top of them. My God, if they open up now, inch by inch he
drew back the hand that held the grenade.
I'll have to lob short and get down fast. Five-second fuse too long,
they'll hear it and start shooting.
His hand was right back, he bent his legs and sank slowly on to his
knees.
Here we go, he thought, and at that instant sheet lightning fluttered
across the sky and Bruce could see. The hills were outlined black below
the pale grey belly of the clouds, and the steel rails
glinted in the sudden light.
The forest was dark and high at each hand, and - a leopard, a big golden
and black leopard, stood facing Bruce. In that brief second they stared
at each other and then the night closed down again.
The leopard coughed explosively in the darkness, and Bruce tried
desperately to bring his rifle up, but it was in his left hand and his
other arm was held back ready to throw.
This time for sure, he thought, this time they lower the boom on you.
It was with a feeling of disbelief that he heard the leopard crash
sideways into the undergrowth, and the scrambling rush of its run
dwindle into the bush.
He subsided on to his backside, with the primed grenade in his hand, the
hysterical laughter of relief coming up into his throat.
"You okay, boss?" Ruffy's voice lifted anxiously.
"It was a leopard," answered Bruce, and was surprised at the squeakiness
of his own voice.
There was a buzz of voices from the gendarmes and a rattle and clatter
as they started to stand up. Someone laughed.
"That's enough noise," snapped Bruce and climbed to his feet; he found
the pin in his pocket and fitted it back into the grenade. He groped his
way back, picked up the staff from where he had dropped it, and took his
position at the head of the column again.
"Let's go," he said.
His mouth was dry, his breathing too quick and he could feel the heat
beneath the skin of his cheeks from the shock of the leopard.
I truly squirted myself full of adrenalin that time, Bruce grinned
precariously in the dark, I'm as windy as hell. And before tonight is
over I shall find fear again.
They moved on up the incline of the hills, a serpent of twenty-six men,
and the tension was in all of them. Bruce could hear it in the footsteps
behind him, feel it in the grip of the hand upon his shoulder and catch
it in the occasional whiffs of body smell that came forward to him, the
smell of nervous sweat like acid on metal.
Ahead of them the clouds that had crouched low upon the hills lifted
slowly, and Bruce could see the silhouette of the crests. It was no
longer utterly dark for there was a glow on the belly of the clouds now.
A faint orange glow of reflected light that grew in
strength, then faded and grew again. It puzzled Bruce for a while, and
thinking about it gave his nerves a chance to settle. He plodded
steadily on watching the fluctuations of the light. The ground tilted
more sharply upwards beneath his feet and he leaned forward against it,
slogging up the last half mile to the pass between the peaks, and at
last came out on the top.
"Good God, Bruce spoke aloud, for from here he could see the reason for
that glow on the clouds. They were burning Port Reprieve.
The flames were well established in the buildings along the wharf, and
as Bruce watched one of the roofs collapsed slowly in upon itself in a
storm of sparks leaving the walls naked and erect, the wooden sills of
the windows burning fiercely. The railway buildings were also on fire,
and there was fire in the residential area beyond the Union
Mini&e offices and the hotel. Quickly Bruce looked towards St.
Augustine's. It was dark, no flames there, no light even, and he felt a
small lift of relief.
"Perhaps they have overlooked it, perhaps they're too busy looting," and
as he looked back at Port Reprieve, his mouth hardened.
"The senseless wanton bastards!" His anger started as he watched the
meaningless destruction of the town.
"What can they possibly hope to gain by this?" There were new fires
nearer the hotel. Bruce turned to the man behind him.
"We will rest here, but there will be no smoking and no talking."
He heard the order passed back along the line and the careful sounds of
equipment being lowered and men settling gratefully down upon the gravel
embankment. Bruce unslung the case that contained his binoculars. He
