The Dark of the Sun

"It's of no importance."

"It was an impertinence," Bruce demurred.

"It doesn't matter." Bruce stopped the car and opened his door.

He walked out on to the wooden jetty towards the pump house, and the

boards rang dully under his boots. There was a mist coming up out of the

reeds round the harbour and the frogs were piping in fifty different

keys. He spoke to the men in the single room of the pump station.

"You can get back to the hotel by dark if you hurry."

"Oui, monsieur," they agreed. Bruce watched them set off up the road

before they went to the car. He spun the starter motor and above the

noise of it the girl asked: "What is your given name, Captain Curry?"

"Bruce."

She repeated it, pronouncing it'Bruise', and then asked: "Why are you a

soldier?"

"For many reasons." His tone was flippant.

"You do not look like a soldier, for all your badges and your

guns, for all the grimness and the frequent giving of orders."

"Perhaps

I am not a very good soldier." He smiled at her.

"You are very efficient and very grim except when you laugh. But

I am glad you do not look like one," she said.

"Where is the next post?"

"On the railway line. There are two men there. Turn to your right again

at the top, Bruce."

"You are also very efficient, Shermaine." They were silent having used

each other's names.

Bruce could feel it again, between them, a good feeling, warm like new

bread. But what of her husband, he thought, I wonder where he is, and

what he is like. Why isn't he here with her?

"He is dead," she said quietly. "He died four months ago of malaria."

With the shock of it, Shermaine answering his unspoken question and also

the answer itself, Bruce could say nothing for the moment, then: "I'm

sorry."

"There is the post," she said, "in the cottage with the thatched roof."

Bruce stopped the car and switched off the engine. In the silence she

spoke again.

"He was a good man, so very gentle. I only knew him for a few months but

he was a good man." She looked very small sitting beside him in the

gathering dark with the sadness on her, and Bruce felt a great wave of

tenderness wash over him. He wanted to put his arm round her

and hold her, to shield her from the sadness. He searched for the words,

but before he found them, she roused herself and spoke in a

matter-of-fact tone.

"We must hurry, it's dark already." At the hotel the lounge was filled

with Boussier's employees; Haig had mounted a Bren in one of the

upstairs windows to cover the main street and posted two men in the

kitchens to cover the back. The civilians were in little groups, talking

quietly, and their expressions of complete doglike trust as

they looked at Bruce disconcerted him.

"Everything under control, Mike?" he asked brusquely.

"Yes, Bruce. We should be able to hold this building against a sneak

attack. De Surrier and Hendry, down at the station yard, shouldn't have

any trouble either."

"Have these people," Bruce pointed at the civilians, "loaded their

luggage?"

"Yes, it's all aboard. I

have told Ruffy to issue them with food from our stores."

"Good." Bruce felt relief-, no further complications so far.

"Where is old man Boussier?"

"He is across at his office."

"I'm going to have a chat with him." Unbidden, Shermaine fell in beside

Bruce as he walked out into the street, but he liked having her there.

Boussier looked up as Bruce and Shermaine walked into his office.

The merciless glare of the petromax lamp accentuated the lines at the

corners of his eyes and mouth, and showed up the streaks of pink scalp

beneath his neatly combed hair.

"Martin, you are not still working!" exclaimed Shermaine, and he smiled

at her, the calm smile of his years.

"Not really, my dear, just tidying up a few things. Please be seated,

Captain." He came round and cleared a pile of heavy leather-bound

ledgers off the chair and packed them into a wooden case on the floor,

went back to his own chair, opened a drawer in the desk, brought out a

box of cheroots and offered one to Bruce.

"I ca

These last few months have been very trying. The doubt. The anxiety."

He struck a match and held it out to Bruce who leaned forward across the

desk and lit his cheroot. "But now it is all at an end; I feel as though

a great weight has been lifted from my shoulders." Then his voice

sharpened. "But you were not too soon. I have heard within the

last hour that this General Moses and his column have left Senwati and

are on the road south, only two hundred kilometres north of here. They

will arrive tomorrow at their present rate of advance." "Where did you

hear this?" Bruce demanded.

"From one of my men, and do not ask me how he knows.

There is a system of communication in this country which even after all

these years I do not understand. Perhaps it is the drums, I

heard them this evening, I do not know.

However, their information is usually reliable."

"I had not placed them so close," muttered Bruce. "Had I known this I

might have risked

travelling tonight, at least as far as the bridge."

"I think your decision to stay over the night was correct.

General Moses will not travel during darkness - none of his men would

risk that - and the condition of the road from Senwqti after

three months neglect is such that he will need ten or twelve hours to

cover the distance."

" I hope you're right." Bruce was worried. "I'm not sure that we

shouldn't pull out now."

"That involves a risk also, Captain," Boussier pointed out.

"We know there are tribesmen in close proximity to the town. They have

been seen. They must be aware of your arrival, and might easily have

wrecked the lines to prevent our departure. I think your original

decision is still good."

"I know." Bruce was hunched forward in his chair, frowning, sucking on

the cheroot. At last he sat back and the frown evaporated. "I can't risk

it. I'll place a guard on the causeway, and if this Moses gentleman

arrives we can hold him there long enough to embark your people."

"That is probably the best course," agreed Boussier. He paused, glanced

towards the open windows and

lowered his voice. "There is another point, Captain, which I wish to

bring to your attention."

"Yes?"

"As you know, the activity of my company in Port Reprieve is centred on

the recovery of diamonds from the Lufira swamps." Bruce nodded.

"I have in my safe" - Boussier jerked his thumb at the heavy steel door

built into the wall behind his desk - "nine and a half thousand carats

of gem-quality diamonds and some twenty-six thousand carats of

industrial diamonds."

"I had expected that." Bruce kept his tone non-committal.

It may be as well if we could agree on the disposition and handling of

these stones." "How are they packaged?" asked Bruce.