They were opposites in many ways, those two. Yet they understood each other.
Pete understood the feeling of restless post-war frustration which had compelled Rex—an ex-G.I. from Brooklyn, New York—to seek a life of violent action in the Foreign Legion.
And, in a general way, Rex appreciated why Pete had taken to the Legion after serving a short term of imprisonment in England for manslaughter.
A military and social code had then forced Pete to resign his commission in a famous English county regiment. But soldiering was his life. And the Legion was a natural refuge from the shambles of a smashed career.
A blending of two circumstances had brought them into the wineshop that evening. One of them was the fact that Rex had won a few francs in a lengthy and somewhat heated barrack-room card game. And Rex shared the usual American’s view that money, once acquired, ought to be spent as rapidly as possible. The other was a desire to combat the depression they both felt following the execution of Tovak. Tovak had been in their company. They had liked the quiet little Czeck. They had been horrified when an evil chance of fate put both of them into the firing squad.
Rex refilled their glasses from a rapidly emptying bottle. And he talked on about Tovak. But gradually Pete’s mind drifted. And it embraced the memory of another man who had been killed. The man he, Pete, had killed. An elderly man, who had walked into his car… There had been no chance of avoiding him. But the verdict was manslaughter. The jury had been impressed by the fact that Pete had taken a few drinks before leaving the mess. And the sentence was six months’ jail…
Pete lived it all again. Lines of strain seemed to etch themselves into his fine, almost delicate, features.
It was Rex who suddenly brought him out of the past and back into the present. Rex tapped his shoulder and said: “Snap out of it, bud. You’ve just told me to forget. Now I’m telling you to do the same.”
Pete smiled.
“Sorry. I’ll take my own advice.”
“I’m sure glad to know that. This party ain’t exactly happy.”
They smiled at each other and raised their glasses. And simultaneously they saw the woman in the doorway.
Most of the other customers saw her, too. The miscellany of legionnaires, Arabs and blacks, stopped drinking, smoking and talking to look at her.
It was not the fact that she was a European that caused the interest. Or the fact that she was well dressed. Or that her white linen frock emphasised the slim flow of her figure and the calm beauty of her face.
Women like her were not uncommon in Sadazi. They formed a big proportion of the more adventurous tourist parties, which came up from Oran. These tourists often visited the wineshops so that they could boast later of having been to a Legion advance base and slummed with real legionnaires.
And the legionnaires certainly had no objection to this. For such tourists usually entertained them to drinks and maybe handed them money.
She was alone. That was what caused the slightly astonished silence, which ended with a burst of gabbling discussion.
Very few tourists had the nerve or the stupidity to enter the native quarter alone, particularly at night. This lady was offering a persuasive invitation to robbery or worse.
She peered cautiously through the heavy, smoke-filled atmosphere, as though half hoping to see a familiar face. Then she gave an almost imperceptible shrug of her slim shoulders
Rex whistled long and softly. Then he whispered: “What d’you know…?”
“I know she’ll find herself in a lot of trouble if she’s not very lucky,” Pete said.
“Yeah. She’s a sensation hunter, I guess. You often find the type among giddy blondes. I remember in…”
His reminiscence was cut drastically short.
The trouble had already arrived. A black Ashanti started it.
There were many Ashantis in Sadazi. Most were descendants of the Gold Coast natives who had been abducted and brought hundreds of miles north by the old-time Moroccan slave traders.
Generally, they were industrious and peaceable—except when drunk.
And this Ashanti was very drunk.
He was a big man, like most of his people. His filthy, sweat-drenched European shirt was open to the waist, revealing an ebony black torso. It shimmered with strength.
The Ashanti put a huge hand on the woman’s elbow and grinned at her. She tried to step back, but his grip held her. She tried to twist sideways, but he put out his other hand and steadied her with that. He said something to her which neither Rex nor Pete could catch amid the hubbub. But she coloured and made another effort to break away.
It was a ridiculous, futile attempt. Like a child trying to wrestle with a man. The Ashanti’s grin widened and there was a gust of laughter from many of the customers. He let her writhe for a few seconds, enjoying a sense of primitive mastery. Then he pulled her to him and, without effort, slung her over his left shoulder. She tried to kick, but he held her legs below the knees. Her shoes clattered to the floor as the Ashanti turned and started to reel towards the table where he had been sitting with a couple of admiring Touareg Arabs.
Rex and Pete stood up. Rex said: “It looks like we’ve got ourselves a job.”
Pete did not answer. They moved quickly between the tables towards the Ashanti.
He was within a few paces of his own table, when they intercepted him. Rex had his hands bunched in his tunic pockets. Pete was lighting a stub of a cigarette.
Rex said quietly: “Okay, big boy. Put her down.”
Whether the Ashanti normally understood the complexities of the American idiom was doubtful. But in this case there could be no doubting Rex’s meaning.
A sudden silence in the wineshop was broken only by the gasping of the woman as she continued her useless struggle.
The grin faded from the Ashanti’s face. And now they were at close quarters Rex could see that it had the traditional cast of a brutalised thug. He was not typical of his race. His type appeared in all races and in all colours. The type that finds its greatest pleasure in inflicting suffering on the weak.
He tried to push past Rex.
Rex was no lightweight, but the Ashanti was much heavier and was the taller by a clear inch. He might have succeeded if Pete had not been there.
Pete had the English habit of doing most things casually—as though nothing was really worth bothering about. There was something very casual, but none the less effective, about the way a he slowly placed his heavy boot on one of the Ashanti’s thinly sandalled feet. Then, with meticulous detachment, he pressed down with all his weight.
The Ashanti came to an abrupt stop. He grunted with pain.
It was Rex’s turn to smile.
“D’you get the idea, bud?” he asked. “We want you to put the dame down.”
Pete maintained the pressure on his foot. The Ashanti’s lips twisted and his eyes showed more white than usual. But he still held on to the woman. There was a faint movement of chairs. The Ashanti’s drinking companions, the two Touareg Arabs, had risen and were coming up behind Rex and Pete. Each was fingering the folds of his burnous—fingering for a knife.
Almost immediately there was another and much louder scuffle from all parts of the wineshop. It was created by the dozen or so legionnaires who were at the tables. They advanced on the Touaregs.
It was probable that most of those legionnaires had very little sympathy with a white woman who was stupid enough to get herself into such a situation. But they had no intention of watching two of their comrades knifed in the back—which the Touaregs were fully capable of doing.