The Best Ye Breed

XIX FINALE

“Don’t be silly. There is no such thing.”

The former Green Beret ignored that and spoke to El Hassan. “There’s eight of them in that there can. We was going to lay them down in a pattern. It was gonna cover all of Fort Laperrine and Tamanrasset. Just about everybody’d go. But you and these people here was the ones that counted. Including Miss Isobel. That’s what stuck in my throat. I been a mercenary for a long time, and I done some pretty bad things, but they just didn’t care who all got it, just so long as you did.”

Homer looked at Meg McDaid. “You knew about this?”

Her hand was at her mouth, her eyes wide, as she stared at the negro sergeant. “No. No,” she said unbelievingly. “And Bryan’s with them. He wouldn’t…” She came to a pathetic halt and said to Lon, “Do they know you took the grenades, or whatever you called them?”

Lon Charles shook his head. “They were hid in a special compartment built into the chassis of one of the lorries. They probably still don’t know they’re gone.”

Isobel said to Homer, as though indignant that he had even asked the question, “Of course Meg didn’t know about it. If she had, she wouldn’t have come over to us. Or, otherwise, would have immediately reported the existence of these fission things. I assume Lon means some kind of miniature atomic bombs.”

Homer Crawford took a seemingly regretful breath and said to Isobel, “All right. You’re our Vizier of Information. Immediately get in touch with those reporters and TV men, in fact get in touch with all the delegations from the developed countries. We’ll have an immediate conference here and expose the whole scheme, with both Doctor McDaid and Sergeant Charles testifying.”

“Then what?” Bey said deliberately.

Homer sent his eyes to his military head. “Then we’ll take after them, complete with TV and photographer coverage.”

Isobel hurried off on her mission.

Bey turned to Guémamaa and snapped in Tamaheg, “Assemble the Camel Corps!”

Homer held up a hand. “No.”

Bey, Cliff, Kenny and Jimmy Peters joined Lon Charles and Meg in staring at him.

“What do you mean?” Kenny demanded. “You said we were going after them.”

Homer nodded. “But not with a thousand men. There’s only twenty-three of them. Twenty-three of us will go after them. El Hassan and two of his viziers, you Cliff and you Kenny, and Guémama and nineteen of his picked camelmen. It’s time we taught a lesson to such elements as these white mercenaries. Armed with superior weapons and advanced vehicles such as armored cars and even aircraft, they’ve been murdering, looting, raping and butchering up and down Africa for decades, against blacks often armed with no more than spears and bush knives. The message got out that a handful of whites were worth hundreds of blacks. We’ll prove otherwise and we’ll do it before TV and newsreel cameras.”

“Okay,” Bey said. “But it’ll be El Hassan and three of his viziers and eighteen of the camelmen.”

“You’re wounded.”

“But not so badly that I’ll miss this hoedown,” Bey said defiantly.

“Seventeen of the camelmen,” Lon Charles said. “When this cat defects, he defects all the way. I never did like that bunch of bums.” He looked at Meg. “Only Doctor McDaid.”

Homer drew over a chart from a pile of papers on the table. “All right. Let’s get the preliminary tactics laid out. Sergeant, do you know where they’ll wait for this helio-jet?”

“I ought to. I found the place.” He came over and pointed it out. “It’s a little less than two miles north of town. Good terrain for a stand.”

“How are they armed?”

Bey said, “Half automatic rifles, half submachine guns. Four heavy machine guns.”

“No mortars?”

“Not that I know of.” Bey looked at Lon Charles.

The veteran mercenary shook his head. “No mortars. We considered them but didn’t think they’d look right for bodyguards.”

Homer nodded at that and said, “That helio-jet. Is it armed?”

“I never seen it,” Lon told him. “The officers did, but I didn’t. But it’s big enough to carry the whole bunch, so it’s probably big enough to have a coupla guns.”

“Or bombs, for that matter,” Bey said, scowling.

“All right,” Homer said. “We’ll go in similarly armed. We could, of course, stay back and lob mortar shells into them. Or even bring up a couple of the field pieces we captured from the Arab Union. But that wouldn’t look so good to the TV cameras.”

“For that matter,” Cliff said. “We’ve got some light tanks and armored cars. Now, that’s the way I figure wars should be run. You dash around in a tank while the other guy’s got nothing but a rifle.”

Homer grunted at him. “We’ll take our two flac rifles in to counter their machine guns and anything that might be in the aircraft but otherwise we’ll be armed the same way they are. Bey, start getting it organized.” He looked back to Lon Charles. “How good a man is this Major Sean Ryan?”

“The best,” Lon said flatly. “I never fought under him but I know his rep. He’s probably had more experience than any fighting man alive. But we got one thing going for us, far as he’s concerned.”

“What?” Kenny said.

“I left four bottles of cognac in his jeep. He’s a rummy.”

At that moment, Sean Ryan took another pull at the bottle he held in his hand and eyed the twenty soldiers of fortune gathered before him and Raul Bazaine. “You know most of the story,” he said. “But not all. Our employer expected us to carry out this assignment thinking on our feet, pulling it off any way we could.”

A big German snarled. “We boshed it. We didn’t make our play. We should have rushed that building they were in.”

“Without arms?” Bazaine sneered.

“We could have seized arms from the wogs, taken them unawares!”

Sean Ryan held up a hand. “Saul Saidi knew something like this might develop, that we might not get a chance to cut El Hassan and his people down with standard weapons. So he gave us an ace in the hole. Captain, get those rifle grenades.”

Raul headed for the nearest truck.

Sean looked about the area they were in. It was almost like an arena, somewhat rectangular in shape. The perimeter was somewhat elevated, the center a depression in which the helio-jet could sink, out of line of fire while landing and taking off.

He said, “All right. Three men each on the machine guns.” He indicated: “We’ll spot them there, there, there and there, on each point of this rectangle. Dig in but good and keep improving your entrenchments until they come up on us. If this comes to a fire-fight, they might bring in mortars or even artillery. We’ve got to last until the aircraft gets here. Portion out all of the ammunition between the four guns. We’re not going to be able to send runners back to the trucks after the action’s been joined.”

He took another heavy slug from his bottle, ignoring the resentful, thirsty, longing looks on the faces of the men.

He said, “The other eight men will dig in, with their rifles, two to a side. So far as we know, they don’t even know we’re here. We’ll wait until we spot the helio-jet coming. Then we’ll use our secret weapon.”

“What secret weapon?” the Frenchman who had confronted Lon Charles back in Algeria said, obviously voicing the unhappy thoughts of them all.

“We have a way of knocking out Fort Laperrine and Tamanrasset, taking El Hassan and his gang with them. Now, get your equipment, including your canteens, and especially your entrenching tools.”

They began moving off, to follow orders, muttering among themselves about the mysterious secret weapon. Sean Ryan returned to the jeep to get a fresh bottle. His instincts told him that this wasn’t going right.

Captain Raul Bazaine came up, his handsome face white. “That goddamned nigger,” he said. “That goddamned nigger.”

The mercenaries stopped and turned back to listen. Sean Ryan stopped twisting the top off his new bottle.

“What’s the matter?” he rasped.

“The cannister of mini-fission grenades—it’s gone. He’s the only one, besides us, who knew where they were, and what they were.”

The major closed his eyes in resigned pain. He finished opening the bottle and tilted it up. When he took it away from his mouth, he said, his voice on the slightly blurred side, “Where in the hell’s Captain O’Casey?”

“Tied up in the back of that lorry,” Bazaine gestured with his hand. “He wouldn’t have stood for using the grenades with his damned female pig there in the fort.”

“Turn him loose,” Ryan said wearily. “We can use every gun.”

His eyes went about the men and he said emptily, “The sergeant took the secret weapon. We’ve come a cropper. It’s our lives now. We’ve got to hold out until the aircraft gets here.”

The aggressive German said, “We can surrender.”

Bazaine laughed bitterly. “To Tuaghi?” he said. “You don’t know these Forgotten of Allah.” He turned and headed for the lorry to release Bryan O’Casey.

El Hassan lowered his binoculars and said to Lon Charles sourly, “You certainly know your terrain, sergeant. It looks as though that rectangle was bulldozed out especially for the purpose.”

“Sorry,” Lon said. “At the time I dint know I was going to be in on the party going up against it.”

Homer Crawford turned to the collected photographers. He said, “This should be the best covered action since the Normandy invasion. I hope the hell you’re well equipped with long range tele-photo lenses.”

They were, with binoculars as well. One American TV man lowered his and said, “There’ve probably been some photographic advances since you took your last snapshot, Professor Crawford.”

Kenny Ballalou, who had one of the heavy flac rifles over his shoulder and a Tuareg behind him carrying two cannisters of ammo for the deadly weapon said, “His Excellency is addressed as El Hassan,” and was ignored.

Homer said, “At least I hope you’re knowledgeable enough not to get in the line of fire. I wouldn’t want to see any of you take a hit.”

A French still-photographer, two Nikkon-Leicas around his neck, said laconically, “Some of our best have taken hits before, Professor. How are you going in?” He looked back over Guémama’s camelmen, all now on foot.

Homer said, “The Field Marshal will give you a rundown. He’s the tactician.”

Bey took over, pointing. “Our big job is to get the flac rifles close enough. We’ll work in toward that northern point of the rectangle. That’ll mean only one of their machine gun emplacements will have a clear line of fire. That other one on the west will be able to be brought to bear somewhat, but not as efficiently.”

“Suppose that they bring up one or more of their other guns?” a Britisher from BBC said, not taking his glasses away from his eyes.

“They won’t,” Bey told him, still staring out at the field where they were shortly to commit themselves. “It’ll never occur to them that we haven’t brought more men to bear than their own number. Major Ryan is an old hand. He’ll even suspect our attack is a feint. He’s got to keep the whole perimeter covered. Right now, they’re sweating blood; afraid of tanks, afraid of artillery, afraid of mortars. Guémama’s men will act as skirmishers, fanned out and advancing a few yards at a time, from cover to cover. They’ll try and keep the mercenaries pinned down so we can advance the flac rifles the same way. A flac rifle doesn’t have the range of those heavy machine guns but once it gets in, it’s more destructive. In spite of my protests, El Hassan will participate with one of the flac rifles. Vizier of Security Ballalou will carry the other. You men had better figure out your locations for your cameras. We’re moving in immediately.”

One of the newsmen said, “Why particularly the northern machine gun emplacement? That southern one looks weaker.”

Bey said, “Because their aircraft will probably come in from the north. We want to get at least one of the flac rifles in place to greet it.”

Meg came up to Homer Crawford. She and Doctor Smythe had improvised a field hospital including ten cots and an operating table. She said, an element of pathos in her voice, “My… fiancé is the tall one.”

Homer looked at her and said, “Yes, we know, Meg. And assume that he would have taken measures to attempt to prevent them from using the fission weapons.”

She turned and went back to Doctor Smythe who stood there at the cots, scowling at the prospect of more bloodshed. He had three teams of stretcher bearers on hand.

Guémama and his Tuaghi started over the rugged reg at a trot, spreading out as they went. Bey followed, half way between the two groups. He was armed solely with a holstered pistol. In his hands he carried a bull-horn.

One of the photographers, gathering up his equipment, said to Homer, “What’s that thing for?”

“He’ll be able to keep in touch with the riflemen as they advance.”

“Anything he says into that will be heard by the other side too.”

Homer smiled grimly, “I doubt if any of them speak Tamaheq.”

He slung the heavy flac rifle over a shoulder and motioned with his head to his ammunition carrier. Cliff, armed with a sniper’s rifle, complete with telescopic sight, took his place about ten meters to one side. He was Homer’s immediate cover, as Lon Charles was Kenny’s.

A movie photographer with a hand-held camera started after Homer and his two assistants. He was very nattily dressed in sports clothes, a sun helmet on his head.

Homer stopped and said, “Where the hell do you think you’re going?”

“With you.”

“It’s going to be a little hot where I’m going.”

The photographer looked him in the face and said, “It’s my job, Doctor Crawford. I’m from CBS.” He couldn’t have been more than in his mid-twenties.

Homer shrugged it off wearily and started ahead. “I hope you’re more experienced than you look,” he said. “Keep as near to the ground as you can get—whether you’re on your feet, running, or on your belly, crawling.”

Isobel came running up. She grabbed him quickly, missed his mouth and ran her kiss along his cheek. “Come back, Homer.”

He grinned a tense grin at her. “I’ll have to,” he told her. “I’ve got some unfinished business. You.”

He turned and headed after Bey’s men, bent low. Cliff flanked him to the right, running the same way. The posture of combat men running toward fire.

In the distance ahead, a machine gun stuttered. The Tuaghi skirmishers melted into the landscape, behind rock or desert bush, or into gullies.

“They’re just finding the range,” Homer called over to Cliff.

Fifteen minutes later, the three of them, including Homer’s ammunition carrier, were in a small wadi, peering over its rim. The desert seemed empty before them. They could hear Bey’s voice boom through the bull-horn. To the far left, a tribesman suddenly broke from his cover, scurried forward a few meters, and flopped behind a large boulder.

They were inching forward, crawling, wriggling on their bellies, making quick dashes. So far, so far as they knew, no casualties had been sustained.

Homer muttered, “That Major Ryan isn’t as sharp as the sergeant seemed to think. He shouldn’t move any of his heavy guns, but he could bring more of his riflemen over to this end of his entrenchments. At this stage, they’d probably be more effective than the machine guns.”

Cliff said, “Maybe Lon was right about that cognac. I wish the hell I had a nip of it right now.”

“Come on,” Homer said. “Let’s make a run for that next depression. We’re getting within range now. And by this time they’ve spotted the fact that we three, and probably Kenny’s crew, are carrying something bigger than a rifle. They’ll be laying for us.”

They sprinted for the hole he had indicated and barely made it. Slugs whistled above them.

“They’re experienced all right,” Homer muttered. “And damned good marksmen with that gun.”

To their right, a Tuareg jumped to his feet and made a dash and flopped down on his belly. The enemy gun had chattered again.

“They’re not being careful with their ammo,” Cliff said. “They must have plenty. Aren’t we near enough to take a pot at them with your flac rifle?”

“No,” Homer said, gauging the distance.

Cliff wriggled a bit higher and peered through his telescope. He adjusted it carefully, threw a cartridge into the breech, took his time aiming and squeezed off a round.

Homer looked over at him.

Cliff grinned and said, “They’re damn well dug in, but I just thought I’d remind them to keep their heads down.”

They could hear Bey’s voice booming over the reg again. Far to the left, they saw Kenny, his Tuareg ammunition carrier and Lon Charles, make a dash. They flopped down in a small cloud of dust.

“Jesus,” Cliff said in alarm. “Did one of them take a hit?”

Homer brought up his binoculars. “No. But they’re getting closer faster than we are. Let’s get to that next clump of rocks.”

“Wait a minute,” a voice from behind them said, short of breath. It was the photographer, who had been squirming along behind, ignored. His sports clothes were a rumpled and torn mess.

Homer and Cliff stared at him.

He said, bringing up his camera, “How about letting me get a few feet of El Hassan and his Vizier of the Treasury in action?”

Cliff closed his eyes and shook his head. He said. “What a way to make a living. Should I say cheese?”