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Tungata hurled him backwards across the cabin, and Peter hit the rear bulkhead. He slid down it and rolled onto his side, pulling up his knees into the foetal position, and under the crushing eight of defeat and capitulation he moaned quietly an covered his head with both arms.
Craig climbed unsteadily up into the cockpit, and sank into the co-pilot's seat.
"What the hell is happening?" Sally' A
"Nothing serious. I only just managed to stop Sam killing Peter Fungabera."
"Why did you bother?" Sally-A
"Darling, can you get a radio co
"I'll have to go through Joha
"I don't care how just get Morgan Oxford on the blower." Joha
t "Report your position, Kilo Yankee Alpha."
"Northern Botswana--2 Sally-A
"What is the number you wish to co
"Hold on." And in less than a minute Morgan Oxford spoke through the static.
"Oxford here. Who is this?" Sally-A
"MOrgan, it's Craig, Craig Mellow."
"Holy shid" Morgan's voice became strident. "Where die hell are you? All hell is breaking out. Where is Sally A
"Morgan, listen. This is deadly serious. How would you like to interrogate a full colonel of Russian intelligence, complete with his files of pla
"Don't say anything else. just give me a rendezvous point." "These are map references-" Craig read off the map coordinates that Sally' A
"Wait ten! "This time it was shorter. "Dawn tomorrow." 'llnderstood,"Craig acknowledged. "We will be waiting."
"Over and out." He handed the microphone back to Sally-A
"Border crossing in forty, three minutes," she told him.
"That mud pack suits you. I'm begi
"And you, beautiful, are a racing certainty for the cover of Vogue!" She blew the hair off her nose and stuck her tongue out at him.
hey crossed the border between Zimbabwe and Northern Botsw asa and seventeen minutes later they saw the kired Land-Rover standing exactly where they had left it on the edge of the wide white salt pan
(my God, Sarah's buddies are still there that's constancy for you." Craig made out the two tiny figures standing beside the vehicle. "We'd better warn them, or when they see die government markings they are going to start shooting." Sarah called down to the waiting Matabele through the sky-shout" loud hailer as they approached, reassuring them, and Craig saw them lower their rifles as the Super Frelon sank lower. He could make out the beatific grins on the upturned faces of the two young Matabele.
Jonas had shot a spring buck that morning, so there was a feast of broiled venison steaks and salted maize cakes that evening, and afterwards they drew lots for guard duty over the two prisoners.
They first heard the drone of an approaching aircraft when it was still pearly half-light the next morning, and Craig drove out onto the pan in the Land-Rover to light the smudge fires. It came in from the South, an enormous Lockheed cargo plane with US Air Force markings. Sally A
"They are really taking us seriously," Craig murmured, as the Lockheed lowered itself to earth.
"It has amazing short take-off and landing capability," Sally-A
"Like five sardines from a can," Craig observed, as they went forward to greet them. The visitors all wore tropical t.
suits, white shirts with button, down collars and neckties and they all moved with athletes" balance and awareness.
"Sally-A
"Son of a gun!" Morgan Oxford exclaimed. "That's General Fungabera Craig, are you out of your mind?"