"How are you planning to catch them?" Sally-Anne demanded.
"It will be very much a matter of opportunity, and what we will do depends necessarily on Bada's actions. We have to try and make a physical connection between him and the consignment. We will watch both the vehicle carrying the contraband and his Mercedes, and as soon as they come together, we will pounce-" Peter Fungabera emphasized this act of pouncing by slapping his leather, covered swagger-stick into the palm of his hand with a crack likea pistol shot, and Craig found that he was already so keyed up that he started nervously and then grinned sheepishly at Sally' Anne
The radio set crackled and the side-band hummed, then a disembodied voice spoke in Shana, and Captain Nbebi acknowledged curtly, and glanced across at Peter.
"It's confirmed, sit. BJda is moving north on the Karoi road at speed."
"All right, Captain, we can go up to condition three," Peter ordered, and strapped on the webbing belt with his bolstered sidearm. "Do you have anything from the surveillance teams on the Tuti road?" Captain Nbebi called three times into the microphone, and was answered almost immediately. The reply to his question was brief.
"Negative at this time, General, he reported to Peter.
"It's still too early." Peter adjusted his burgundy-red beret to a rakish angle, and the silver leopard's head glinted over his right eye.
"But we can begin moving into our forward positions now." He led the way through the french doors onto the veranda.
"Me helicopter crew saw him, quickly dropped their -te hatch.
cigarettes, ground them out and vaulted up into d Peter Fungabera climbed up into the fuselage and the starter -motor whined and the rotors began to spin overhead.
As they settled down on the bench seats and clinched their waist, belts Craig asked impulsively the question that had been troubling him, but he asked it in a voice low enough not to be heard by the others in the rising bellow of the main engine.
"Peter, this is a full-scale military operation, almost a crusade.
Why not merely hand it over to the police?"
"Since they fired their white officers, the police have become a bunch of heavyhanded bunglers- then Peter gave him a rake-hell smile and after all, old boy, they are my rhino also." The helicopter lifted off with a gut-sliding swoop, and its nose rotated onto a northerly heading. Keeping low, hugging the contours, it bore away, and the rush of air through the open hatch made further conversation impossible.
They kept well to the west of the main northern road, not risking a sighting by the occupants of the Mercedes.
An hour later, as the helicopter hovered and then began its descent to the small military fort at Karoi, Craig glanced at his wristwatch. It was after four o'clock.
Peter Fungabera saw the gesture and nodded. "It looks as though it's going to be a night operation, "he agreed.
The village of Karoi had once been a centre for the white, owned ranches in the area, but now it was a single street of shabby trading-stores, a service station, a post office and a small police station. The military base was a little beyond the town, still heavily fortified from the days of the bush war with a barbed-wire surround and sloped walls of sandbags twenty feet thick.
The local commandant, a young black 2nd lieutenant, was clearly overawed by the importance of his visitor, and saluted theatrically every time Peter Fungabera spoke.
"Get this idiot out of my sight," Peter snarled at Captain Nbebi, as he took over the command post. "And get me the at est report on Bas position."
"Bac a passe trou Sinoia twenty-three minutes ago.
Captain Nbebi looked up from the radio set.
"Right. Do we have an accurate description of the vehicle?"
"It's a dark blue Mercedes 280 SE with a ministerial pennant on the bonnet. Registration PL 674. No motorcycle outriders, nor other escort vehicle. Four occupants."
"Make sure that all units have that description and repeat once more that there is to be no slooting. Ba( a is to be taken unharmed. Harm him and we could well have another Matabele rebellion on our hands. Nobody is to fire at him or his vehicle, even to save their own lives. Make that clear. Any man who disobeys will have to face me personally." Nbebi called each ugit individually, repeated Peter's orders and waited while they were acknowledged. Then they waited impatiently, drinking tea from chipped enamel mugs and watching the radio set.
It crackled abruptly to life and Timon Nbebi sprang to it.
"We have located the truck," he translated triumphantly.
"It's a green five-ton Ford with a canvas canopy. A driver and a passenger in the cab. Heavily laden, well down on the suspension and using extra low gear on the inclines. It crossed the drift on the Sanyati river ten minutes ago, heading from the direction of Tuti Mission towards the road junction twenty-five miles north of here." "So, Bada and the truck are on a course to intercept each other," said Peter Fungabera softly, and there was the hunter's gleam in his eyes.
aw the radio set was the focus of all their attention, each time it came alive all their eyes instantly swivelled to it.
The reports came in regularly, tracing the swift progress of the Mercedes northwards towards them and that of the lumbering truck, grinding slowly down the dusty rutted secondary road from the opposite direction. In the periods between each report, they sat in silence, sipping the strong over-sweetened tea and munching sandwiches of coarse brown bread and canned bully beef.