‘You’ll have to leave some men here, though,’ inserted Robin. ‘Just in case.’
Anastasia felt herself frowning at Robin. Couldn’t they rely on her Amazons? If only she had been with Ivan, she thought, she and her girls would have seen the danger. Would have known how to avoid disaster …
‘Sergeant Tchaba and a really reliable squad. Augmented, perhaps,’ agreed Kebila. Then he continued, ‘There’ll have to be a big enough squad to mount some kind of back up in the jungle as well. The Russians are all very well, but so far all they have demonstrated any real talent for is dying.’ He sighed. Then he seemed to shake himself, and his expression lightened. ‘But let’s hope for the best. They are fit and strong. Well supplied and well armed. Colonel Mako knows the jungle, even if he is not Poro. And Senior Lieutenant Yagula seems competent enough. We’ll trust them to survive. To keep Odem occupied. And we’ll trust Stalingrad to keep the river safe. What else can we do?’
‘That will answer everything for the time being, I think,’ agreed Richard, then he continued with hardly a pause. ‘Caleb Maina will bring Volgograd straight here with the wounded, take your men aboard and head downriver. You might make it to Granville Harbour before dawn with any luck. But now I think of it, the choppers might be quicker for those not needing bed-tending. Especially as there’s an excellent medical facility at Malebo, and Sanda’s frigate Otobo might be there too — and Volgograd might want to pull in if push comes to shove. But a chopper would get you home even faster than a Zubr, Colonel. If Volgograd’s here by sunset or soon after, you could sort things out, get on your chopper and be at police headquarters before midnight.’
‘I’ll get ready. We’ll decide final details when Volgograd arrives.’
‘In the meantime, Otobo can stay at Malebo, ready to support Stalingrad if Odem tries to break out of the jungle and cross the river — or to support you in Granville Harbour if there really are serious riots,’ continued Richard, confirming Kebila’s thoughts. ‘Or to support Sergeant Tchaba, Anastasia and the rest of us here if anything else goes wrong.’
‘Right,’ said Kebila decisively. ‘I’ll get busy.’ And he turned away from them, tacitly dismissing them.
‘Are you all right?’ Robin asked Anastasia. ‘You went very pale there.’
‘I’m fine,’ snapped Anastasia. ‘Thank you.’
‘You can probably speak to Ivan soon, after Colonel Kebila’s finished,’ persisted Robin gently. ‘He’ll be busy by the sound of it, but they have their cell phones — until the batteries die, at any rate. I’m sure he’d make time for a quick word with you. Then you can check whether he’s all right.’
Anastasia stopped, frozen with an uncontrollable reaction to Robin’s innocent words. She was suddenly so full of rage that she had to let it out or simply erupt like Karisoke. ‘Speak to Ivan! Why would I want to speak to Ivan? Why should I even care whether that big oslayob’s alive or dead?’ she shouted and stomped off, leaving Richard and Robin looking after her in simple wonder.
‘Wow!’ exclaimed Richard. ‘Is it just me — or is that love?’
‘Very funny!’ spat Robin. ‘What’s an oslayob?’
‘As I understand it, the word oslayob suggests someone is a very close friend indeed of various members of the equine family. And I’m not talking about teenage girls and ponies.’ He shook his head and gave a lopsided grin. ‘Like I said, it looks like love to me!’
But Robin wasn’t so sure. All things considered, it might well be hate.
The next time Richard and Robin saw Anastasia, she was pounding out into the farmland at the head of her team of Amazons, her expression as black as thunder. Ado and Esan were at her shoulders and twenty Amazons behind them, barely looking more cheerful.
The afternoon was wearing on. Volgograd was due soon after sunset and Kebila had got his men ready to depart either aboard the Zubr or aboard the Super Pumas. Tchaba’s augmented command of twenty experienced soldiers were finishing an early supper preparing to take over the night patrol after the rest of their companions had gone. Kebila was leaving them a good range of transport — a sixteen-seater Zodiac with extra fuel in case they needed to go on the water, a truck in case they needed to go upcountry, a chopper — engineer and pilot, fuel and spares. And an equally impressive range of arms and equipment, from MANPAD portable rocket systems to the SA80 assault rifles with the under-barrel grenade launcher he had just bought for his whole command, along with tents, a field kitchen, cooks and makeshift mess hall as well as any other supplies and support he felt they needed, for all in all they were too large a contingent to rely on the orphanage’s accommodation, supplies or kitchens. But it was clear to Richard that the departing colonel did not really view Tchaba and his men as much more than a guard unit — certainly not a front-line combat unit, for all his protestations. And, in Richard’s own mind at least, they were nothing like a match for Anastasia and her Dahomey Amazons.
In the face of the bustle in the camp, Richard and Robin joined the orphans for dinner once again and enjoyed a powerful fish and groundnut maafe — a stew accompanied with starchy, dough-like cassava fufu and klouikloui crisp fried rings of peanut butter. Halfway through the meal, Anastasia and her girls, and Ado and Esan returned, drenched in perspiration but in no better frame of mind. They dumped their packs and their weapons in a corner much to the disgust of the priest and the nuns, then they sat together hunched in a circle with their backs to most of the rest of the room, sharing a big bowl of the fufu which they rolled into balls and dipped in the maafe stew as they whispered.
Kebila arrived soon after to inform Richard and Robin that Volgograd had arrived. So the rest of the evening was a whirl of embarkation and departure. Both the Russians and Caleb’s Zubr crew had battlefield-trained medics but all the wounded were too severely hurt to move. So Kebila filled his Super Pumas with his troops and whirled away, while Volgograd inflated her skirts again and swept downriver with the rest of the colonel’s command. Richard and Robin got to bed earlier than usual. Exhausted, they went straight to sleep.
Richard woke at midnight, certain that something was going on. He reached across and felt Robin’s hip. She rolled over and snored quietly. But he was certain he had heard an almost silent movement. The quietest of groans. In the pitch blackness he swung his legs out of bed and padded towards the door. It took him a moment to find it and feel his way down to the handle. Then he opened it and peered into the corridor. Silence. Stillness. The whole camp seemed at rest. He crept back to bed, and eventually fell asleep.
But he found that he wasn’t surprised to find out in the morning that Anastasia, Ado, Esan and the Amazons had vanished, along with the Zodiac Kebila had left behind. And a good deal of the arms and equipment Tchaba’s men had been supplied with.
Forest
‘I cannot go,’ said Tchaba. ‘My place is here. And, besides, my foot …’ He did not add, you stole my lucky boots. But he was thinking it, decided Richard.
‘Then who can you send?’ asked Richard. ‘Who’s your next best man?’