Fright can be a very good aphrodisiac. Her mouth was as hungry as mine. Her body moved under my hands in a long undulating caress.
It was a long time before we collapsed, spent. But we couldn’t stay here. We stood up and I kissed her forehead. In the truck again, I smiled. “Feel better?”
She nodded, lying back relaxed with her eyes closed. Because of stopover in the forest there was plenty of light when we reached the precipice. I told Tara to keep her eyes closed for the next half mile. Of course, she opened them immediately, looked over the edge, and some of my good work was spoiled. She sat rigid, pale, but with her head high, chin up. Tara Sawyer was O.K. in my book.
We scraped along the cliff, gears whining, and then were past the danger point, on the last long lap of the footpath. My thoughts switched to Dr. Fleming.
We lurched up to where the road petered out, left the truck and climbed. I discovered something I hadn’t noticed on the trek down. The path went up one side of a steep ravine; behind the edge, on the far side, were caves where the overflow of the tribe made its homes. No one appeared to be in at the moment.
The thick plank gate of the fortress was closed. It didn’t budge when I shoved and I used the butt of the Luger on it, yelling for Noah to let us in. It was a few minutes before I heard chains clank and timber lifted out of sockets. Then the gate swung inward and the man in the white robe waved us through.
Tara looked at the long frame open-mouthed; he backed so the gate could be closed and barred again.
Noah welcomed the girl with gentle courtesy, told us Dr. Fleming was improving, then went on to the bad news.
“Our communication line went silent last night so we have had no word from the lowlands since you left. Can you tell me how the situation is developing in Port of Spain?”
Obviously, that the old resort hotel at the edge of town was more than simple camping grounds for the tribe’s visits to town. It had to be a nerve center for reports gathered in the capital, the starting point for the messages that had been relayed to the drums. If there had been no recent messages, that meant Jerome had raided the place.
Tiredness washed through me. I’d been on the move too long. This old fortress had been impregnable against kings, ships and ancient scaling parties from the sea. But today we only had my Luger and a handful of ammunition, Mitzy Gardner’s little gun, and a few cases of dynamite. Not much against a modem army. My guts quaked with weariness and I leaned against a corner of the thick rock wall to sketch in the picture for the old man. I finished by telling about my plans for the dynamite.
“I should’ve blown that cliff while I was there,” I confessed. “But I didn’t think of it then and it’s too far away to do it now. Jerome will be up that way with jeeps sometime today. I want to mine that trail, and I’ll need porters.”
Noah picked out a labor crew while I introduced the girls. Mitzy took Tara in tow to find her a place to sleep.
Eight
The porters carried the dynamite from the truck. They took the open half box into the fortress and left one full crate for planting above the shore road. Before I left the truck, I took the rotor out of the distributor so no one else could start it.
I mined the trail with dynamite, rigging fuses so a single man could explode each charge independent of the others. While I worked, I heard drums within the fortress; these were not messages but deep-throated ceremonial sounds. Noah, I suspected, was drumming up courage in his entourage.
It was broad daylight by the time I finished. I was out of steam and starved when I dragged in through the gate. There was indeed a ritual in full swing.
The sacrificial fowls were already killed and boiling in a pot. Dancers were circling it with spears and painted shields. They had great gear to face a bazooka with. Noah came out, saw me and sent women to tug me to a drumhead table. They sat me on a stump of pulpy wood and brought food, half an avacado stuffed with wild papaya and shredded pineapple soaked in lime juice, a gourd of shellfish, a cocoanut filled with white rum, sugar syrup and more lime. It was subtle going down, but in my depleted condition the mixture would knock me out soon.
Trying to stay awake long enough to finish eating, I concentrated on what I was supposed to be doing here. My job was to put Fleming in the presidential chair and keep him there unharmed. There was no doubt of his popularity with the people, he could win an election hands down. But most of them had no arms or military training. They might be willing to fight for him, but they were no match for Colonel Carib Jerome and his professionals. And Russia’s Big Brother stance didn’t help.
I don’t know when I blanked out. Next thing I knew Noah was shaking me awake. I lay in a cool, dim room; the shadow line at the door put the sun at mid-afternoon. I had left a man on the trail as a spotter. He would hear approaching cars a long distance off, with plenty of time to warn us. He was here behind Noah now, excited.
When I sat up, the old man said, “The army has reached the truck.”
I was wide awake now. “How many?”
“He can’t count,” Noah spoke for the spotter. He says “Many. Many.”
I got up and trotted to the gate. They must have started up the trail by now and I wanted to be sure they hadn’t discovered or evaded the dynamite. The war dance was over and people who had gone to their caves were hurrying back to the fort.
Passing Dr. Fleming’s room I hauled up short. He stood in front of the door between the two girls, on one foot, the splintered leg bent back in a hammock. There were no angry red streaks snaking up his bandaged arm, no gray under the rich chocolate of his face. There wasn’t time to look into it further now, but Fleming’s recovery amazed me. I put it out of mind and went on, listening for sounds as I turned down the path. If they were advancing fast enough, I might walk into them.
I hadn’t heard a thing by the time I reached the fuses. This was in a natural clearing and over the trees I could see the truck at the bottom of the ravine a quarter of a mile below. The thirty or so men lounging around the truck had not yet started up. I wondered why. Then I heard a sound behind me and Mitzy was there with the explanation. Just what I needed.
“There’s another attack, Nick. Boats are coming into the cove, a lot of them.”
That at least answered why the bunch below wasn’t on its way. It was a pincer move, radio-controlled to start on the fortress from two directions at the same time. I put an arm around the girl’s shoulder.
“Can you obey orders?”
“It’s been my life’s work. What do you want me to do?”
I pulled her down to the ground, showed her the fuses, and gave her my lighter, explaining what to do.
“The path is mined between those two points.” I pointed to them. “The fuse on the right will blow the lowest charge three minutes after it’s lit. The progression moves to the left, with the charges twenty feet apart. When the advance group reaches the turn, start the first bum. I hope that’s all you’ll need but some soldiers are pigheaded. Take your time setting them off. But stop them.”
“A bloody pleasure.” She gave me her lips and I got the notion she was saying goodbye. “Good luck with the armada.”
I grinned. “Well make it. Just keep the faith with Noah.”
I sounded far better than I felt. We were not equipped to stand off a prolonged siege on two fronts. I would do what I could with the realities, but my bones told me it would take a miracle for any of us to survive the day.
I got back to the gate as fast as I could. The scene inside had changed in the short while I’d been away. The tribe was busy. A bucket line passed stones the size of a skull from a stockpile and up the ladders set against the low continuous roof. Other bucket lines led into rooms at the two outer corners of the fortress. They were setting up concentrations of firepower at those points.