The Dark of the Sun - Smith Wilbur (читать книгу онлайн бесплатно полностью без регистрации .TXT) 📗

Ruffy. "My guess is there'll be some dying before tomorrow." But the

fear of death was submerged by physical discomfort. Bruce had almost

forgotten that they were going into battle; right now he was more

worried that the leeches which had worked their way through the openings

in his anklets and were busily boring into his lower legs

might find their way up to his crotch. There was a lot to be said in

favour of a zip fly, he decided.

"Let's get out of this," he whispered. "Come on, Ruffy.

Tell your boys to keep it quiet." He worked in closer to the shore and

the level fell to their knees once more. Progress was more noisy now as

their legs broke the surface with each step and the papyrus rustled and

brushed against them.

It was almost two o "clock when they reached the causeway. Bruce left

his men crouched in the papyrus while he made a stealthy reconnaissance

along the side of the concrete bridge, keeping in its shadow, moving

doubled up until he came to dry land on the edge of the village. There

were no sentries posted and except for the crackle of

the flames the town was quiet, sunk into a drunken stupor, satiated.

Bruce went back to call his men up.

He spread them in pairs along the outskirts of the village.

He had learned very early in this campaign not to let his men act

singly; nothing drains an African of courage more than to be on his own,

especially in the night when the ghosts are on the walk-about.

To each couple he gave minute instructions.

"When you hear the grenades you shoot at anybody in the streets or at

the windows. When the street is empty move in close beside that building

there. Use your own grenades on every house and watch out for Lieutenant

Hendry's men coming through from the other side. Do you understand?"

"It is understood."

"Shoot carefully. Aim each shot - not like you did at the road bridge,

and in the name of God do not hit the gasoline tanker. We need that to

get us home." Now it was three o'clock, Bruce saw by the luminous

figures on his wristwatch.

Eight hours since they had left the train, and twenty-two hours since

Bruce had last slept.

But he was not tired, although his body ached and there was that gritty

feeling under his eyelids, yet his mind was clear and bright as a flame.

He lay beside Ruffy under a low bush on the outskirts of Port

Reprieve and the night wind drifted the smoke from the burning town down

upon them, and Bruce was not tired. For I am going to another rendezvous

with fear.

Fear is a woman, he thought, with all the myriad faces and voices of a

woman. Because she is a woman and because I am a man I must keep going

back to her. Only this time the appointment is one that I cannot avoid,

this time I am not deliberately seeking her out.

I know she is evil, I know that after I have possessed her I will feel

sick and shaken. I will say, "That was the last time, never again." But

just as certainly I know I will go back to her again, hating her,

dreading her, but also needing her.

I have gone to find her on a mountain - on Dutoits Kloof Frontal, on

Turret Towers, on the Wailing Wall, and the Devil's Tooth.

And she was there, dressed in a flowing robe of rock, a robe that fell

sheer two thousand feet to the scree slope below. And she shrieked with

the voice of the wind along the exposed face. Then her voice was soft,

tinkling like Aft

*ad cooling glass in the Berg ice underfoot, whispering like nylon rope

running free, grating as the rotten rock moved in my hand.

I have followed her into the Jessie bush on the banks of the Sabi and

the Luangwa, and she was there, waiting, wounded, in a robe of buffalo

hide with the blood dripping from her mouth. And her smell was the

sour-acid smell of my own sweat, and her taste was like rotten tomatoes

in the back of my throat.

I have looked for her beyond the reef in the deep water with the demand

valve of a scuba repeating my breathing with metallic hoarseness. And

she was there with rows of white teeth in the semicircle of her mouth, a

tall fin on her back, dressed this time in shagreen, and her touch was

cold as the ocean, and her taste was salt and the taint of dying things.

I have looked for her on the highway with my foot pressed to the

floorboards and she was there with her cold arm draped round my

shoulders, her voice the whine of rubber on tarmac and the throaty hum

of the motor.

With Colin Butler at the helm (a man who treated fear not as a lover,

but with tolerant contempt as though she were his little sister)

I went to find her in a small boat. She was dressed in green with plumes

of spray and she wore a necklace of sharp black rock. And her voice was

the roar of water breaking on water.

We met in darkness at the road bridge and her eyes glinted like

bayonets. But that was an enforced meeting not of my choosing, as

tonight will be.

I hate her, he thought, but she is a woman and I am a man.

Bruce lifted his arm and turned his wrist to catch the light of the

fires.

"Fifteen minutes to four, Ruffy. Let's go and take a look."

"That's a good idea, boss." Ruffy grinned with a show of white teeth in

the darkness.

Are you afraid, Ruffy?" he asked suddenly, wanting to know, for his own

heart beat like a war drum and there was no saliva in his mouth.

"Boss, some questions you don't ask a man." Ruffy rose slowly into a

crouch. "Let's go take a look around." So they moved quickly together

into the town, along the street, hugging the hedges and the buildings,

trying to keep in shadow, their eyes moving everywhere, breathing quick

and shallow, nerves screwed up tight until they reached the hotel.

There were no lights in the windows and it seemed deserted until

Bruce made out the untidy mass of humanity strewn in sleep upon the

front verandah.

"How many there, Ruffy?"

"Dunno - perhaps ten, fifteen." Ruffy breathed an answer.

"Rest of them will be inside."

"Where are the women - be careful of them."

"They're dead long ago, you can believe me."

"All right then, let's get round the back." Bruce took a deep breath and

then moved quickly across the twenty yards of open firelit street to the

corner of the hotel. He stopped in the shadow and felt Ruffy close

beside him.

"I want to take a look into the main lounge, my guess is that most of

them will be in there," he whispered.

"There's only four bedrooms," agreed Ruffy. "Say the officers upstairs

and the rest in the lounge." Now Bruce moved quickly round the corner

and stumbled over something soft. He felt it move against his foot.

"Ruffy!" he whispered urgently as he teetered off balance.

He had trodden on a man, a man sleeping in the dust beside the wall. He

could see the firelight on his bare torso and the glint of the bottle

clutched in one outflung hand. The man sat up, muttering, and then began

to cough, hacking painfully, swearing as he wiped his mouth with his

free hand. Bruce regained his balance and swung his rifle up to use the

bayonet, but Ruffy was quicker. He put one foot on the man's chest and

trod him flat on to his back once more, then standing over him he used

his bayoneted rifle the way a gardener uses a spade to lift potatoes,