He looked around him slowly. The silence was eerie. He took a long drag on the cigarette and looked at his watch again. Eight fifty-eight. He cursed his anxiety. There was no reason for it. But still the uncertainty lingered. He looked round again, this time taking more notice of his surroundings. Then he saw it: his informant's car, a blue Fiat. It was parked next to the wall and almost hidden from view by the red Studebaker beside it. He exhaled sharply and managed a faint smile. Typical of his informant to take such precautions.
He ground his cigarette underfoot and walked slowly towards the Fiat. He could see his informant behind the wheel. Why hadn't he shown himself?
Mobuto dismissed the question; at least he was there. He reached the Fiat and leaned over to peer through the driver's window. The man's throat had been cut from ear to ear, soaking his shirt and trousers in blood. Mobuto recoiled in horror, stumbling back painfully into the Studebaker's wing mirror. He felt his stomach heave and he retched against the wall. He remained doubled over for several seconds before slowly straightening up and wiping the sweat from his forehead.
Then he heard a sound behind him. He turned, his eyes wide with fear. Two men stood behind the Studebaker. Both were dressed in blue overalls. One had blood on his sleeve. The killer? He was about to speak when he noticed a movement out of the corner of his eye. He was still turning when the cosh struck him behind the ear.
Then nothing.
Zimbala's main prison, La Tambier, was less than ten minutes' drive from the centre of Habane. It took its name from the district in which it was located. It had been built when Alphonse Mobuto first came to power and quickly became known throughout the country as La Boucherie, the Butcher's Shop, because of the number of anti-government dissidents who were tortured then murdered there by the feared and hated Security Police. Jamel Mobuto's first two decrees on taking office had been to free all political prisoners being held there and the immediate dismantling of the Security Police. Now, ironically, its most notorious prisoner was Le Boucher, Tito Ngune, the head of the
Security Police for the last twenty-three years. There had been cries for his public execution but Jamel Mobuto had made it quite clear that Ngune would be tried and, if found guilty, sentenced to life imprisonment. He refused to continue the legacy of executions which had been symptomatic of his father's regime.
Ngune lay on the single mattress in the corner of his cell. He was a stocky fifty-eight-year-old with grey hair and a small goatee beard which looked as if it had been stuck on to his chin with glue. His face and body were a mass of bruises after he had been attacked at his home by a forty-strong mob who were preparing to lynch him in the remains of his once beautiful garden when the military had arrived and bundled him into the back of a police van and brought him to La Tambier.
He sat up gingerly and looked slowly around the cell. All those years of unswerving loyalty to Alphonse Mobuto and this was all it had brought him. Mobuto had always had one weakness, his family. Although he publicly renounced Remy and repealed the law making Jamel his natural successor, he had always refused to allow Ngune's men to touch them. But, unknown to Mobuto, Ngune had tried on three different occasions to have Jamel killed. Each attempt had ended in failure. He certainly had guts, Ngune had to give him that. Anyone else who had dared to criticize either Mobuto or his Government was immediately arrested and taken to La Tambier or to the now abandoned Branco prison in Kondese, the second-largest city situated in the south of the country. None of them ever left.
A jackhammer started up somewhere beyond the prison walls. It had become a familiar sound over the last couple of days. At first it had been an irritation but now he had grown strangely accustomed to it — a break from the monotonous silence that filled the prison. He had wondered what they were doing out there. Digging up the road? Or tearing down part of the prison? It was certainly feasible under Jamel Mobuto's new liberal leadership. Not that it mattered. It was all academic to him now. But it still interested him, if only to put his mind at rest. He reminded himself to ask one of the guards when they brought him his next meal…
Michael Sibele had known for the last two days why the gang of workmen was busy outside the main gates: repairing a burst mains pipe. He had been the guard on duty at the gate for the last week. It was his last day. Tomorrow he would return to his duties inside the prison — with mixed feelings. He had enjoyed the workmen's company but he would also be grateful to get away from the noise of the machines, especially the incessant throbbing of the jackhammers. The workmen had offered him ear plugs but his commanding officer had forbidden him to wear them. So he just had to put up with the noise. Well, only a few hours to go…
One of the workmen broke away from the group and approached him. Sibele knew him only as Johnny. His real name was Thomas Massenga, once Ngune's right-hand man, who had been on the run since Jamel Mobuto came to power. It was only when he got closer that Sibele saw the blood on the sleeve of his blue overall. Massenga pulled a
Mini-Uzi from inside his overall and shot Sibele at point-blank range.
The bulldozer which had stood dormant for the past two days coughed into life and rumbled towards the prison gates. Two guards, who had been alerted by the gunfire, ran towards the gates. Both were armed with FN FAL semi-automatic rifles. Massenga shot them before they could fire at the bulldozer. It smashed through the gates, tearing them off their hinges as though they were made of plastic. Massenga gestured to the other six men who immediately followed him into the prison compound, each carrying a Mini-Uzi.
The skeleton staff were no match for Massenga and his team of ex-Security policemen. The fighting was over within a minute and they were able to make their way down to the cells. The two guards outside Ngune's cell threw down their weapons when challenged by Massenga. They had no option. Massenga took the keys from one of them and unlocked Ngune's cell door. He hurried over to where Ngune lay and crouched anxiously beside him, horrified at the sight of Ngune's discoloured, swollen face. Immediately he ordered two of his men to carry Ngune then locked the two terrified guards in an adjoining cell. Discarding the keys, he then led the way back to the front of the prison. He glanced at his watch. They had made good time. Although the telephone wires had been cut minutes before the assault he knew the authorities would still have been alerted and were almost certainly on their way to the prison at that very moment.
A black van reversed through the shattered remains of the main gate and the back doors were thrown open. Ngune was helped into the back of the van and placed gently on a palliasse with his head resting on a pillow. Massenga closed the doors then climbed into the cab beside the driver who engaged the gears and pulled out into the road.
The plan was to change vehicles on the outskirts of Habane then continue on to Kondese where hundreds of men, mostly ex-Security policemen loyal to Ngune, were waiting to launch a crushing offensive against Jamel Mobuto's inept, and disorganized, government troops, many of whom had only joined up when the new regime was instated. And with a team of assassins awaiting Jamel Mobuto's arrival in America, it would only be a question of days before Tito Ngune was inaugurated as the new President of Zimbala.
It was a plan that couldn't fail.
The New York Police Department, which was responsible for security at John F. Kennedy Airport, had drafted in fifty men for the arrival of Jamel Mobuto's delegation in America. Fifteen snipers, each with Mi6 rifles (and infra-red night scopes), were positioned at strategic points overlooking the runway while another fifteen, in plainclothes, mingled freely with the crowds inside the terminal building itself. A section of runway had been cordoned off that afternoon by the remaining twenty policemen who had strict orders not to allow anyone through without an official pass. The authorities were determined not to take any chances, not with so much at stake. Whitlock had driven to the airport a couple of hours before the delegation was due to arrive to ensure that all the security measures had been put into operation. He had been satisfied with the arrangements. He glanced at his watch. The two hours were almost up and, according to air-traffic control, the presidential plane would land on schedule.