Assignment Black Gold (2 page)

Lubinda Marine Oil operated on a shoestring, Durell thought.
Only one drilling rig had been towed offshore so far, and it stood idle, just
beyond the horizon of the South Atlantic. There was a fine model of the rig,
Lubinda Lady I, on a polished mahogany table near the desk. The miniature was complete
with derrick,
drawworks
, engines, and pumps, a
submersible offshore jack-up rig designed to raise the huge hull above the
action of the waves. There was even a tiny stack of drill pipe, racked in
stands beside the drill.

Durell moved past the model to the window. There was no
sound or movement from the bush outside.

“Mr. Durell?”

Hobe Tallman came into the room. The small man, whose thin
hair was the color of sand, peered out of the study window. His face was pale
in the lurid light.

“What do you make of our chances, Mr. Durell?”

“I don’t know. You’re more familiar with local conditions
than I.”

“I had no idea the Apgaks were active this week. I’d never
have invited you here it I thought it might be dangerous.”

“Who’s watching the front
ot
the
house?”

"Betty’s alert.”

Durell said, “Can she fire a gun?”

“She’s a crack shot. She’s responsible enough.” Hobe took a
deep, uncertain breath. “I’m sorry about the things she said to you. Naturally,
it’s unfair to assume you would sacrifice yourself by going out to those
murderers.”

“Is she drinking now?”

Hobe said, “She drinks too much. But you have to understand
hor. This isn’t her milieu. Hardly anyone’s, for that matter. She’s been
nervous and upset lately, that’s all. She’ll get over it.”

Durell looked levelly at the smaller, older man. “Perhaps I
should give myself up to them, rather than endanger you and your wife.
Obviously, they only want me.”

“I don't understand it.” Hobe peered carefully out of the
window. “Maybe they‘ve given up and gone.”

“Not likely. They’re still waiting. The question is, how do
they know about me and why do they want me? I arrived in Lubinda just this
afternoon. I went to the hotel, registered, had lunch, walked around, went to
Matty’s office, looked for Brady Cotton. Then I took a nap and you and
Betty offered to drive me out here. How do they even know my name?"

Hobe shrugged narrow shoulders. “The Apgaks have
sympathizers in the government. Spies in your hotel, perhaps.” Tallman licked
his lips. “I don’t like this quiet. They usually come with a rush, get it over
with.”

“I thought Lubinda was happy with independence.”

“We think the Apgaks are financed by Maoist Chinese.
Like the guerrillas in Angola. Russia probably tries to buy dissent here, too.
They don‘t want to see the new government work out as a liberal democracy.
There was a short and vicious civil war when independence was declared. A lot
of good people were killed. It stopped our drilling, of course, only a week
after we’d spudded in and proved the DHC—the
downhole
comparability. The home office back in Houston is raising hell. But
there’s nothing I can do, for the moment.”

Hobe paused suddenly, raised his rifle as if he saw
movement out beyond the window, then lowered it with a shake of his round head.
His voice was suddenly blunt.

“Just who are you really, Mr. Durell?”

“I’m a man looking for a friend.”

“You mean Brady Cotton? They tell me you’re his lawyer as
well as his friend. Everybody says Brady has come into a lot of money.”

Durell nodded, watching the window. “His aunt died in New
Orleans.” There was still no sound from outside. The fire-gutted Mercedes
was just a shell. It would be a long walk back to Lubinda. He said, “Your bush
telegraph is pretty good, Hobe."

Hobe shrugged. “There’s nothing to do here except gossip.
News travels fast. I was surprised when you asked to see me this afternoon.”

“They tell me you and Brady play chess together.”

“Sometimes.”

“Any idea where he is?”

“Oh, he‘ll hear the good news and come running. He’s
probably out in the bush toward Namibia, trying to scrape up artifacts and
native sculpture for his export shop.”

“What about Brady’s wife?”

Hobe’s face changed slightly. “She’s probably with him.

Katherine is quite a gal.”

“Katherine? Kitty?”

“Right.”

There was a sudden scream from Betty, guarding the windows
and veranda of the living room.

Durell had been with those besieged before. People reacted
oddly to the knowledge of entrapment, that they were cut off by others
determined to kill them. Hobe Tallman seemed to be all right. But his young,
voluptuous wife was something else.

Glass crashed as a flaming bottle was hurled into the
house. It landed at the girl’s feet, the wick sputtering. Betty Tallman stood
frozen, her rifle lowered. Durell dived for the bottle, snatched it up,
threw it outside through the broken window, all in one swift gesture. The
bottle burst among the flower beds fronting the veranda. There was a yell
of rage from the dark bush. The lurid flames leaped high for a moment as
the gasoline exploded.

“Get down!” Durell yelled.

The woman did not move, staring aghast at the red darkness
outside. Durell caught her arm, felt her softness, breasts yielding against
him. He threw her to the floor. At the same moment, bullets slashed through the
window, breaking furniture, shattering a vase, splintering across a table,
thudding into the opposite wall.

Betty shuddered under him. “Oh, my God, they’re going to
kill us all!”

“Take it easy. Stay down.”

“Why don‘t you go out there?” she whimpered. “Then maybe
they‘ll leave us alone. Go out there now! Before they burn us all!”

There was random firing all around the house now. From
the kitchen came the thud of Henrique’s heavy rifle. Hobe’s gun sounded
from the study. It was impossible to hold them off. There were too many exposed
windows, too many blind points to the bungalow, to cover them all.

“Durell!”

The shout came again from the jungle. Durell thought he
would remember that voice, arrogant, amused, a bit impatient.

“We have no quarrel
with the Tallmans, Durell! Do you want them to die because you are a coward?”

Durell turned to the woman.

“Do you know who is out there?”

“It’s Lopes Fuentes Madragata.”

“The leader of the Apgaks himself?”

She said, “You must be pretty important.”

“I’m only a lawyer looking for Brady Cotton.”

“Oh, sure. All the way from the States.”

“It’s a lot of money that he’s inherited.”

Her eyes changed. “Really? Good for Brady.”

“Do you know where he is?"

“Nobody‘s seen him for a week. Are you going out there? Are
you going to let Madragata call you a coward?” She laughed uncertainly. “A
lawyer, huh? But pretty good with a gun. I bet you didn’t expect this when you
came here with your briefcase full of legal documents.”

“Durell!"

Durell flattened his back against the wall near the
window and called, “I’m coming. Give me five minutes!”

Chapter 3.

Hobe said, “You mustn‘t mind Betty.”

“I don’t."

“You don’t have to go out there. They’ll kill you. I don’t
understand why they've chosen you—and you’re obviously not going to explain-but
I’m asking you to stay in here with us. Maybe we can hold them off somehow.”

“Not a chance.”

“Maybe help will come—”

Durell interrupted. “Have you anything heavier here than
your rifles?"

”I’m afraid not.”

He took a knife from the kitchen, aware of Henrique’s eyes
rolling white in his brown face. The garden beyond the glass-paned door was
quiet and empty and shadowed. He palmed the knob, opened the panel a few
inches, waited. Nothing happened. Hobe breathed heavily behind him, but said
nothing more to discourage him. Durell held his gun up, opened the door a few
inches wider and slipped outside.

The warm, humid air of the tropical night hit him in the
face like the soft slap of a hot, steamy towel. He watched the hedgerow of tall
bamboo at the far end of the garden, then ducked low and ran for its shelter.
Something moved to his left, but he wasn't sure what it was. He went over the
wall at the end of the rose garden with a long. sliding motion, and rolled into
the mucky ground among the thick bamboo canes.

Nothing happened. A night bird called. A tiny lizard
scrabbled away near his hand. He waited. The smell of the burned-out car clung
to the quiet air. Overhead, through the spiky bamboo leaves, the stars seemed
to reel in the velvet African sky. For a moment, he smelled the sea. A coconut
frond clattered in a transitory breeze. After thirty seconds, he crawled to the
right, out of the bamboo, near the ropy base of a wild rubber tree. It was over
three miles down the road to the nearest scattered houses of Lubinda. He heard
the trickle of water from a stream, oozing through the mud toward the wide
sweep of the Lubinda River’s estuary, Then a man said something, in Apgak, so
close at hand that he might have been at his elbow. It was a trick of the night
air. The voice came from across the road, twenty yards from the rubber trees.
There was a brief, annoyed reply. Then silence again. A moment later he heard
the snick of a cartridge being shot home in a rifle chamber. They were watching
the front of the Tallman bungalow, expecting him to come out there.

Two men trudged through the brush, moving his way.

Long ago. as a boy in the Louisiana delta country, Durell
had become familiar with the bayous, with the ways of the hunted and the
hunter. He had learned his lessons well from his Grandpa Jonathan. Old Jonathan
had been one of the last of the Mississippi riverboat gamblers; he know men and
their greed, their faults and strengths, as few did. Durell had learned the tricks
of doubling buck like a fox, of suddenly standing at bay to disconcert the
slavering hunting dogs. He stood absolutely motionless in the deep shadow of
the old trees.

The two men would pass within three feet of him.

Their weapons shone clearly in the starlight. One man was
black, with deep tribal scars like welted beads On his forehead and cheeks. He
carried an AK-47 Russian-made automatic rifle. The other man was taller,
with a brown face and straight black hair that betrayed a Portuguese heritage.
He wore a rather swashbuckling outfit of bandoliers, a bolstered
revolver, a pinkish shirt, and white duck pants that were a mistake for night
combat. A straw hat with a wide brim and pink fabric band was tilted back on
his head. His grin showed fine white teeth. He would have been handsome by any
standard.

They were too sure of themselves.

The man with the hat suddenly switched to Portuguese. “You
should have stayed in your position.
Fengi
. He will
try a trick. This man is very clever, very dangerous—”

Durell hit the black low in the belly, stopping from around
the thick bole of the rubber tree. The black man grunted and the AK-47 dropped
from his hand. Durell slashed down at his bowed head. smacking his gun against
the others scalp. then swung about lightly on his feet. The other man had
jumped sidewise, trying to bring his weapon up. Durell shook the kitchen knife
into his left hand and slammed his gun into the man’s stomach.

“Madragata?”

White teeth gleamed. “Ah, Durell. You will not shoot, eh? My
men will hear and come fast. They will cut you into little pieces,
senhor
.”

“The knife is silent.”

“
Sim
."

"So hold still.”

“I obey,
senhor.”
 
The man’s tone was low and mocking. Then he
suddenly snaked to the left, away from the knife, and brought his rifle up. His
bandolier made small clicking sounds. Durell slashed with his gun butt at the
man’s wrist, heard the bone crack, heard the quick hiss of pained breath.
Madragata was as quick and slippery as a snake. His rifle fell and his knees
bent as he tried to come up under Durell’s guard. Durell lifted his knee, got
under the man’s jaw, heard and saw Madragata’s head snap back, eyes gleaming
suddenly as his face lifted to the black sky. He went over backward, his thick
black hair all awry under the headband he wore beneath his straw hat. The hat
itself rolled on its brim into the hush. Durell dropped his weight on him,
knees bent, slamming into the man’s gut. Madragata’s breath went out with a
rush. His eyes rolled. Durell caught his hair, hauled him up to a sitting position.

“Be quiet!”

“
Sim
.
Yes.”

He looked at the house. It was dark and quiet. A few flames
flickered on the front lawn from the exploded gasoline bottle. Through a gap in
the trees he saw the starlit glimmer of the Lubinda estuary, dark and hostile.

“Where are your other men?”

“In front of the house. By the river.”

“How many?"

“Fifteen,
senhor
.”

"You lie.”

“Six was all I could manage on short notice.”

“That‘s better."

“Have you killed
Fengi
?”

“He’ll be all right. I’m not in Lubinda to kill anybody. So why
do you want me?”

“You are an American imperialist spy," Madragata
clutched at his belly. Even in pain, he looked somehow handsome and dashing. “I
think you have broken something in me,
senhor
.”

“Not likely. What makes you think I am a spy?”

“You ask for Brady Cotton.”

“So?”

“Ah, you will die unpleasantly,
senhor
. My belly hurts me very much.”

“What about Brady Cotton?”

“You come here to look for him. He has vanished, no? So you
are like him. A spy, working against the people’s revolution and supporting our
so-called democracy. It is a farce. Our president is a tool of the old colonial
masters. We shall not rest, we shall not sleep, we will kill and kill and kill,
until true independence comes to us.”