Black Pearl (29 page)

Richard heaved his right arm inwards, simply jerking Anastasia out of her stasis and past his chest. She staggered, fell sideways, and disappeared through the wall of roots to land at Abiye's feet, holding the last of the safety line, which was now looped round Richard's waist. Still counting up past three hundred, Richard unslung his rifle and his little backpack, throwing them both after the Russian woman. Then he was securing the loop on place with a sailor's speed and dexterity, never taking his eyes off Ivan and completing his knot with the same swiftness as the Russian could strip a Kalashnikov. Then he jumped.

Abiye and Oshodi were not quite as quick-thinking as he – or perhaps they were just confused by the sheer bloody lunacy of his action. But whereas he had hoped to land on Ivan – ideally – or on the hyacinth barge at least, they jerked the line tight early and nearly cut him in half. Richard all-but upended, legs, kicking, hands reaching downwards, body swinging away downstream into the gorge towards the waterfall. His feet hit the hanging branches and he kicked off like a swimmer at the turn. Then they loosened him and he swung downwards and outwards, penduluming back upstream, beginning to come upright once again, his vision filled with Ivan's shocked face shouting something – as though he could be heard amid this Armageddon of sound. At the last minute Richard jerked his head aside so they slammed into each other chest to chest. He wrapped his arms and legs around the Russian and felt Ivan do the same.

The pressure of the rope around Richard's waist became almost unbearable and they slammed back into the hanging branches. There was an instant of stasis. Richard felt the crushing pressure on his back and chest combine with an agonizing pain around his waist that was sliding relentlessly up towards his already squashed short ribs. And the most overwhelming deluge of foul, black water that seemed intent on drowning him, crushing him and tearing him apart all at the same time. Then Ivan had the presence of mind to reach one hand up and grasp the rope. No sooner had he managed to relieve that agony around Richard's waist than the pressure at his back eased too. The massive wash of water fell away. The water hyacinth vanished suddenly enough to set the pair of them swinging wildly between the vertical walls of the gorge.

‘Hang on
TIGHT
!' Richard bellowed at Ivan's shoulder, and was rewarded by feeling the muscles crushed against his cheek tense. He strained every muscle in his arms and legs as though trying to crush the life out of the man he was endeavouring to rescue. The rope holding them fell off the trunk and they were pitched down towards the roaring water as the tree itself tumbled away behind them. Richard saw the last of it pitch-poling over the edge like a caber tossed by a giant as he span helplessly, his toecaps seemingly just above the writhing waters. The rope slammed sideways as well as downwards and this time it was Ivan's turn to cushion his companion as they hit the rock wall of the gorge. But the stone had been hollowed out by the relentless water. There was enough of an overhang to ease the impact and no sooner had they hit than they were swinging out again and soaring upwards as Abiye's team stopped playing slow motion tug of war and went for the world speed record instead.

As they came up to the lip of the overhang, there were suddenly arms reaching down, hands grasping them, pulling them up to safety. Richard was content to be pulled over the grassy edge like a broken puppet and to lie gasping on the ground for a moment or two, simply glad to be alive. And it seemed that everyone else was happy to let him do this, for they were all grouped round Ivan. After a while, Richard lifted his hands to his waist and began to pull the knot apart. When the rope was free, he sat up and found Ivan up on one elbow, looking at him with a battered grin. The Russian looked terrible. He had clearly been badly beaten. The grin was simian – through split and swollen lips – and gap-toothed. He had been shot – just above the right hip, and just above the right ear, if nowhere else – though neither wound looked all that serious. ‘You look like shit,' he said to Richard, his words slurred. And Richard realized with some surprise that he could hear. The wild rush of water had quietened.

‘You look pretty crappy yourself.' He grinned. ‘But it's good to see you too. What's going on up there?'

‘Give me a moment to catch my breath,' answered Ivan, ‘and I'll show you. It only took me five minutes or so to get down here, should be a quick stroll back up. As long as the wound in my side holds out.' As Anastasia registered this, she gestured to Ado and Esan, who vanished into the jungle.

‘But they'll be expecting us,' said Abiye, clearly worried.

‘I doubt it,' said Ivan. ‘As far as I know they have no idea you're coming. And they've got to reckon I'm dead. I mean, how in hell's name could anyone have survived that?' He gestured at the easing spate of the river.

They formed into a straggling line and Ivan led the way, but Abiye and Oshodi soon joined him, forced at last to use their matchets and leave a trail. And not without reason. The jungle on either side was so dense that neither the soldiers nor the Amazons felt too keen to wander off and disappear into it as they had done with the secondary forest on the slopes below the city. It was as though they had really entered Ngoboi's realm now, and the deadly god lurked in every shadow, behind every tree, ready to weave his fatal magic – some of which the two youngsters were carrying when they returned. Both had handfuls and mouthfuls of medicinal herbs, which their teeth had crushed into thick poultices. These they packed on to the wound in Ivan's side, binding them in place with ribbon-thin lengths of creeper.

Richard was a little slower to move off than the rest. He was soaking. His boots were full of water. He wanted to empty them and ease his clothing or it would start to chafe before it was dry. Besides, there was his gun to check and his little backpack to collect. So it was that he found himself, unusually, at the rear of the column. And there, equally unusually, was Anastasia.

‘Thank you,' she said.

‘For what?' he asked gently.

‘For pulling me across and for pulling that big ox up. He is too macho to say it himself, but he knows you saved his life. As I know you saved mine.'

‘I was in the right place at the right time,' he said. ‘Anyone who cared about you would have done the same.'

‘Ah. But that's the problem, isn't it? Who else is there who cares for us?'

R
ichard and Anastasia quickly worked their way back up towards the front of the column. And it remained a column behind the three men hacking their way through the undergrowth. For this, at last, was the jungle proper. The trees were all as tall as the lone lookout tree on the far bank, and as the fallen giant that had carried them over here. The canopies above roofed vast shadowy spaces hung with ivies, creepers and lianas, studded with parasitic orchids as red as vampires' blood. The huge areas between were floored with bushes the size of tanks and man-high ferns, dripping with condensation as the heat went past forty degrees and the humidity past one hundred per cent. Distances became vague with wavering heat-haze and with mists as grey as the webs of massive spiders. The wind seemed to echo as though in restless caverns and there was everywhere a stirring of mysterious, invisible life. Or something other than life. Sinister, threatening, unearthly, inimical to humanity. Ngoboi's realm, filled with his lethal magic.

Richard and Anastasia arrived at the head of the column just in time to hear the details of what was going on at the lake. ‘We walked straight into a trap,' Ivan said shortly. ‘It was embarrassing. We thought we were chasing Odem and the makeshift Army of Christ and there we were suddenly surrounded by General Bala Ngama and half the regular army of Congo Libre. With a good deal of their air support command in back-up, once the trap was sprung.'

‘Why didn't they kill you?' asked Abiye, awed.

‘Two reasons,' shrugged Ivan. ‘One: they wanted us as labour. That lake is a dangerous mother. Han Wuhan's Chinese workers are dying like flies and terrified of the place. But the other reason was your father, Nastia. He fronted them all off. Said
did they know who he was?
More importantly, did they know what he was
worth
? Which is why it turned out to be important that President Fola had sent the renegade Minister Ngama to oversee the project. Made him a general if you can believe it! Because the answer was
YES
! Ngama knew exactly what your father was worth, down to the last kopek. He was doing business with him right up to the moment President Chaka sacked him.'

‘So he let you live and put you to work,' said Richard. ‘That was lucky.'

‘You could say that.' Ivan shot Richard a thoughtful look. ‘There's something bad about that lake. The Chinese workers, engineers and what-have-you are all falling sick. Some of them are dying. It was the sight of one of them going over the dam that gave me the idea for my own escape attempt. This end of the lake is dammed, as you know. The floods damaged the system, so the Chinese engineers tried to fix it at first. Then, when they discovered they didn't have the equipment or the time so they started blowing the system up in series, letting the water out in a succession of surges like the one I came down on. Reducing the water level while they use choppers to get rid of the water hyacinth – choppers with grabs that heave it up and drop it into the jungle.'

‘We saw choppers working on the lake,' Richard said.

‘Not just working. Once they cleared an area near the dam, they brought in attack helicopters with floats. They've a regular little air force up there.'

‘But you saw one of the workers go over the dam,' prompted Anastasia, bringing Ivan back to his original focus.

‘Yeah. There's only the main dam left now. They have it rigged but they're waiting before they finish it off. They're still working on the down-slope side. Upslope are the old Japanese pearl fisheries and they've been told to stay clear of those while Ngama and Fola work out what half a million huge black pearls will fetch if they're released carefully on to the jewellery market. That's why they're waiting. Max is advising them on that, too, needless to say. That's where they have us corralled. But, long story short, I was working up by the dam when I saw the strangest thing. This young Chinese engineer was up there on the dam itself, laying charges or checking circuitry or whatever, when suddenly the water beside him started boiling. The air wavered, like a really intense heat haze. And he just pitched over and was washed away. The guards saw it and ran over, but he was gone downstream so fast they didn't even have time to raise the alarm. So I thought to myself: Ivan, if you're going to go, then that's the way to do it. And I started planning how to get myself up there.'

‘There was no other way?' asked Anastasia.

‘No. They have a pretty effective little gulag up there. Razor wire, guard towers. At least they let us sleep in tents. Feed us on what they give the army.'

‘And how are they treating you?' asked Anastasia, her voice gentle at last.

‘My face, you mean? I've had worse. I got worse when I was earning the red beret. But by and large if you're square with them, do what they tell you and don't talk back then this sort of thing doesn't happen to you.'

‘But there's no way out other than over the dam?' persisted Richard.

‘Not that we've found. And shit, the wire works both ways. Keeps us
in
, and keeps whatever's out there
out
.' He shivered. It wasn't cold.

‘Whatever's
out there
…' said Richard, frowning.

‘In the jungle. That's where Odem's men are. Odem's men and more. Ngoboi – but not just Ngoboi, you know? There's other stuff out there. Panthers. Leopards. Some of the men have seen them. We've all heard them.'

‘If Odem's men can make it out there, then so could you,' countered Anastasia. ‘You came up here to take down the Army of Christ and now you're scared of some tosser dressed as Ngoboi!
What the fuck
, Ivan!'

‘What does Mako say?' asked Richard. ‘He knows the jungle best.'

‘Mako doesn't say anything,' said Ivan shortly. ‘Ngoboi cut his tongue out. They have him crucified in the middle of the camp. Every now and then another bit of him gets chopped off. Or peeled off. A finger, an ear, a nostril. The skin of his forehead. But they won't let him die.'

‘And none of you can help him out?' sneered Anastasia. ‘Find some way …'

‘No,' said Ivan shortly. ‘Every now and then Ngoboi comes round trying to decide who's turn is next when Mako goes. Everyone has a vested interest in keeping the poor bastard alive.'

That conversation was enough to silence all of them and they remained quiet through the next couple of hours as the three men at the front slashed with brutal energy through the jungle undergrowth. While Richard walked his mind was racing, constructing, testing and discarding plans of action. And every now and then he would ask Ivan something. ‘So, only one dam left standing, Ivan?' was Richard's first question. Ivan nodded. ‘But they have it rigged?'

‘As I say, that was what the engineer who went over was doing.'

‘OK.' He added after ten minutes, ‘and how much water hyacinth is left?'

‘Looks like about half,' Ivan shrugged.

‘But the lake is only half full now – so it's pretty tight-packed still?'

‘At the far end it is. The end by the dams is clear.'

‘That's where they have their attack helicopters on their floats?'

‘Yes.' Ivan looked ready to add more detail. But several more minutes passed.

‘Anything else? Boats? RIBs? How do they cross the lake?'

‘Couple of RIBs, now you mention it. But they mostly use the choppers.'

Richard nodded. Lapsed into thought. Then, ‘Where do they get the fuel?' he asked suddenly after a few more minutes.