Authors: Anthony Price
Latimer obeyed automatically: he was still holding the rifle, and all he had to do was to release his foothold on the slope to slither backwards down it, almost noiselessly along the tramlines of his earlier passage.
Down by the water’s edge the trees which had protected them with their overhang now obscured his view inconveniently. But the big tree was still there to protect him, and he shrank against it: raising the rifle as he did so.
Safety catch off!
The snarl of the outboard motor came closer—
It was bolt-action. He worked the bolt, and an unfired round sprang out.
The sound changed, almost dying away altogether, and he caught a blur of movement through the leaves as he slammed another round into the chamber.
It wasn’t real: it wasn’t happening to him
—
It was a shallow-draught punt-like boat, with one man at the back controlling it, and another standing up halfway along, with an assault rifle in his hands, scanning the river ahead of him.
They thought they’d got their man—they were slowing on the spot where Kingston had been netted—they were turning towards him—the moving target suddenly steadying—
Beyond reality and unreality, Latimer thought
and they were right: they had got their man
—and thought of Kingston behind him as the sights zeroed exactly on the armed man’s chest and he squeezed the trigger—
oh, so gently, so very gently
—
The rifle kicked and deafened him, and the man was plucked out of the punt as though pulled from behind, with his own weapon spinning up into the air. And he was already working the bolt again desperately as the engine snarled again, and the man and his gun hit the water in two splashes, one tremendous and one hardly noticeable, but both distracting him as he fired again—
Missed, damn it!
The boat was accelerating, and weaving, and the leaves were already unsighting him as he worked the bolt once more, and fired again, and missed again, and worked the bolt again—
No! Useless
—but he had fired before the message reached his brain—
useless
—
His ears were ringing, but the great splash in the river was smoothing itself out into widening ripples, just as it had done when Kingston had been hit: even as he watched the dancing sunlight on it winking at him it was already becoming innocent again, as though nothing of enduring interest had occurred—as though all that had happened had been a man falling out of a boat, over-balancing as he might have done on the Cherwell or the Isis on any summer’s afternoon at Oxford.
But this time the man didn’t shoot up out of the river again blowing water and shaking spray from his hair and swearing and laughing in the same breath to hide his embarrassment, as he had once done beside the meadows: this was another river in another time—
There were sounds outside him, he could hear them calling him back … not only the departing racket of the outboard motor knocking echoes up and down the valley, but also Kingston’s voice from behind recalling him.
He pushed himself away from the bank and up the slope again, on heels and elbow, away from the no-longer-innocent flash of sunlight on the water.
“You got him?” Kingston’s voice was hoarse.
“Yes.” But that wasn’t quite true. All these years, such things had been academic, and carefully vague. Now he had to be exact. “One of them.”
“One’s enough. They won’t try that way again.” Weak approval. “Next time they’ll come over the top.”
Next time
? He turned towards Kingston.
“You did jus’ fine.” The black face had a stretched look, with the sweat on it standing out on dry skin. “They’ll come slow, an’ they’ll be scared shitless … Ain’t no one likes to get killed, even when he knows why … So they’ll come
real
slow.” Kingston lay back carefully. “We got some time now.”
Time to do what? He stared at the rise and fall of the bloodstained black chest. What was the point of buying time which they would have to repay in full?
Kingston stirred. “You get up here, Oliver man.” He waved the pistol, summoning Latimer back to the security of the outcrop. Then he nodded and grinned. “Okay?”
Latimer surveyed the negro uneasily. Apart from the hole in his chest and the useless arm there was blood soaking through the tightly-stretched jeans on his thigh, which he had not noticed before, although he couldn’t see any wound.
“Yes, Mr Kingston.” In the circumstances the man’s attempt to encourage him was belittling, however admirable. “But how are you? Is there anything I can do?”
Grin. “Winston.”
Latimer frowned. “Winston?”
“Winston … That’s my name. Like … Oliver
St John
Latimer—Winston
Spencer
Mulholland—okay?” Nod. “My Pa was a Yankee nigger, but my Ma was from Kingston— a
British
nigger … When I was in Savimbi’s army, there was this Pole who’d got an ol’ British passport … An’ he used to say to me,
‘Vinston, my fren’, ve British most stick togezzer’
—you dig that?”
Winston Spencer Mulholland
?
Latimer tried to smile. “Is there anything I can do?”
“Not a thing, man. I’d like a big drink of river-water, but I don’t think that’ud be a good idea.” Winston-Kingston thought for a moment. “Maybe if you could wipe my face …?”
Latimer felt in his pocket. His handkerchief was already soaking wet, if not exactly ice-cold.
“That’s great …” Winston approved the clumsy treatment. “For a little fat guy, you’re okay, Oliver. I’m jus’ sorry I’m not going to collect on you.”
“You’re not?” Latimer didn’t know whether it would be better to leave him alone, or to encourage him to talk. But he seemed to want to talk.
“Hell, no!” The same irrepressible grin: the man would die grinning, if he got a chance! “They’ll take us … If Joe was around they’d have done it already. But … they’ll try coming over the top … An’ then they’ll get smart, an’ flank us … Maybe roll grenades down, to scare the shit out of us … Won’t do us any harm—they’ll just go on rolling … But they’ll scare us.” He nodded calmly at Latimer. “Real pity, when you’re so valuable.”
Latimer opened his mouth, but no words came.
He tried again. “I am … am I?” Only that wasn’t really the question. “Why?”
“’Cause Miz Lucy had second thoughts.” Kingston became mockingly-serious. “Like the soldier got a medal for saving this girl from a fate worse than death … An’ they ask him how he won it, an’ he sez ‘Hell, ah changed ma’ mind’ … So I’m drivin’ along, mindin’ my own business, an’ she overtakes me in the Volvo, an sez ‘We can’t do it to him, Winston’ … An’ I sez to her ‘We jus’ done it to him, Miz Lucy—why not?’ An’ she sez to me ‘Because he’s not David Audley, Winston’.” Kingston rolled his eyes at Latimer. “If you ask me, I think
she
thinks you’re
cute
, Oliver—like tall girls sometimes take a shine to little fat guys … No offence?”
“No offence,” said Latimer automatically. She had bloody-well killed them both, but that was all he could think of saying.
“Uh-huh … Maybe you should take a look over the top—okay?” Kingston eased himself slightly.
“Are you all right?” Latimer leaned forward with the damp-warm handkerchief.
“I’m fine.” The negro nodded the filthy rag away. “I don’t really hurt yet … Take a look, man—we got a big score to settle, remember!”
Latimer lifted his head slowly above the rock. And then lowered it, and shook it.
Kingston-Winston nodded. “I told you! They are
scared
, man—they reckon we’re a real mean combat group, so they not queuing up to win any medals, you can bet on that!”
One little fat guy
…
and one dying black man,
thought Latimer bitterly:
it would be funny if it was not so finally ridiculous.
“You were saying … she changed her mind?” He had to keep Kingston talking—and he had to stop himself thinking.
“She sure as hell did.” Nod. “An’ that wuz my big—
big
—mistake, Oliver man … I should have said ‘Well, you hire the US Marines, Lucy honey. ’Cause I’m not goin’ into that Confederate-KGB hornets’ nest for any cute little fat man.’” Pause … slow shake. “But I was
greedy
—an’ that’s the whole trouble with private enterprise—when it’s tax-free it makes a man
greedy
… So I said, ‘That’s a bad scene in there—I go in there, it’s a double-contract when the banks open tomorrow.” Another shake. “That was
a mistake
, man!”
“Yes.” It had been several sorts of mistake, thought Latimer: whatever Joe had actually planned to do it had been a mistake. “Yes, I can see that.”
“Damn right!” This time it was a nod. But it was a nod which was cut off in mid-nod by a sudden spasm of pain. “I … I should have asked
treble
… A man can get hisself
hurt
, doing deals on the side—
greed makes you careless
, the Pole used to say,
so you multiply the fee by the risk to inhibit the contract
—okay?”
The man was weakening, and he was also beginning to ramble into aspects of their predicament which really didn’t matter. Although … since their predicament was terminal, nothing really mattered now, thought Latimer bleakly.
But there was still a vestige of curiosity.
“Why is Sion Crossing so dangerous, King—
Winston
?” He leaned towards the negro.
The black chest expanded. “You don’t know?”
“You tell me, Winston.” Latimer took another look over the rock.
“Man … they say this ol’ guy … Robbins … Roberts …
Robinson
—” The eyes closed.
For a moment Latimer thought he’d gone. But then the chest expanded again. “Robinson?”
“Gen’l Robinson … his army out there—” The eyes opened again, focussing on Latimer “—but I guess you know better now, eh?”
Robinson? Who the devil was Robinson? He thought wildly of Cookridge, smooth and authoritative … And then—
the old guy
—was that the frightened old man back in the house? Was he Robinson?
Another name hit him again suddenly, from out of the recent past and from the recesses of much more distant memory, both of which had been overlaid by other things—
Macallan
?
Nothing he had ever read or heard of was ever quite forgotten, that was his skill and the source of his confidence.
“Macallan, Winston—Macallan?”
Winston—Kingston—grinned. “Bill Macallan, huh?”
Long ago … long ago … hadn’t William Macallan been the CIA man they’d sacked? The one who’d worked with Audley on some ultra-secret business? It had all been carefully hushed-up, but—
“What about him, Winston?”
“Shit, man!” Winston started to chuckle, and then checked himself. “This is all his idea—don’t you get it? Cash-money in advance on the contract—you still don’t get it?”
What had he read recently about Macallan? It was something utterly unimportant among the digests and bulletins which came to him by routine from outside his terms of reference, which he skimmed through in the last half-hour of every working day, as a matter of careful duty.
“Mac—” It came to him: the imperishable imprint of the photocopied page, which he’d consigned to the shredder with all the other dross, which could always be summoned up again from the computer if he needed it. “Macallan’s dead, Winston—”
Not just the cold certainty of memory cut him off, but also a dreadful certainty of the future:
he had thought that these woods had frightened him because of his knowledge of the fear and death they had witnessed in the past. But, could it be
…
could it really be
…
that this red earth also carried the imprint of the future for those who were about to experience it
—
of his own death as well as Kingston’s?
No. That was impossible! “Macallan’s dead, Winston.” He refused to believe what he was thinking. “He’s
dead
.”
Lopsided nod. “Damn right, he is! But his money’s in my woman’s account, man—an’ that sure as hell isn’t dead!”
Latimer stared at him, trying to encompass the idea of Macallan’s death and his living money.
“Hell … it don’t matter now, anyway,” said Kingston conversationally. “But … we get Audley here, Bill Macallan sez—we get him here, snooping in Sion Crossing, an’ he gets wiped out … an’ we leave a trail a mile wide … an’ then the Yankee trash in Washington gotta take notice of that—no way the Brits gonna lose
him
, an’ let it go …” The eyes rolled at Latimer, still bloodshot but no longer bright. “Only, it was you, Oliver, an’ I’m real sorry ’bout that—sorry for both of us … But I guess we both got careless, an’ that’s the way it goes man …” The negro seemed to struggle for an instant with that thought, as though he wasn’t quite resigned to its philosophical implications. “Still … we gonna shit them up between us, Oliver man—we really gonna shit them up, eh?”
Something registered outside Latimer, beyond Winston Spencer Mulholland. But, at the same time, something broke inside him in total bitterness.
He had once heard Mitchell tell of the volunteers of his 1914-18 War—the cream of all those nations which had been poured out in the mud of the trenches—all the glory of the arts and the sciences, lost with men like Asquith’s son
pro patria.
But he wasn’t even going to die like that, with even that excuse for dignity
—
he was going to die because of bad judgement, as a substitute for a mere decoy.
The sound outside him came through, and he knelt above the stone, raising himself.
There were men out there—away to his left, and above him—one of them was just a few yards away—
Oh, Jesus!
He started to lift the rifle in his hands. But then a sobbing irrational rage with himself threw down the rifle and plucked the Ingram from the leaves, fumbling with it as he raised it.
The thing bucked and burped convulsively as he squeezed it, and bits of tree fragmented as the man in front of him seemed to dissolve in the flying pieces.
He swung the thing towards a second man, further away, and squeezed it again, but it only jerked at him for a fraction of a second, and then became inert.
He squeezed it again, but it was useless, and he heard himself cry out in panic as he threw it down, reaching for the rifle again.