Oath Bound - Book V of The Order of the Air (35 page)

“So what good is this going to do?” Lewis repeated. “Don’t get me wrong, we’ll take the film to your friend, but I don’t see what it’ll do. Unless you’re trying to recruit mercenaries? Some kind of help?”

He sounded entirely too interested in that last option, Mitch thought. His cigarette was almost gone, and he lit another from the butt before he ground it out.

“If the man on the street knew what was happening, it would be different,” von Rosen said. “Ethiopia is a member of the League of Nations, and if the League can’t, or won’t, defend its members, then everyone is in worse danger of war. Even the blindest man can see that much. And so we have to show them. Get them angry, get them involved. Force the governments — France, Britain, even Germany — make them take notice and rein in the Italians.”

It won’t happen, Mitch thought, but the words took too much effort. No one was going to go to war for an African nation, particularly when the Italians looked like they were already winning. “We’ll take the film,” he said, and von Rosen took a deep breath, visibly steadying himself.

“Then I’ll finish what I was doing. The more evidence the better.”

Mitch nodded again, watching the count stride away. The sun was at the top of the line of trees to the west of the field, their shadows stretching toward the camp. A group of women had built a fire and a couple of soldiers carried what looked like a laundry boiler toward them. A baby was crying inside the barracks, and another joined it; the westerly breeze raised a brief swirl of dust from the runway’s beaten dirt.

“You sure you’re all right?” Lewis asked, and Mitch shook himself.

“I’m ok,” he said. “How about you?”

“Not hurt.” Lewis’s smile was wry. “I don’t think I was down there long enough, and Al and that Red Cross doc got a pretty good decontamination system going right away. But I wish to God I’d gotten at those bombers.”

“Me, too,” Mitch said, and was surprised by the sudden wave of anger. And then it was gone, drained out of him like water from a broken jug, and he was left shaking and empty. He looked away, afraid Lewis might see, and was relieved to spot Alma emerging from the barracks. He lifted his hand to wave her over, and she veered toward them. She had changed her clothes, too, was wearing shorts and a man’s undershirt that hung halfway to her knees.

“How are things?” Lewis asked, but his eyes were only for Alma.

“I’m fine,” she said, though she didn’t look it. “And we’ve got most of the wounded treated. There are some, though… But Dr. Biniam is doing what he can. We’re going to have to stay the night. There’s no one to help us cart the gas, and it’s too late to start now anyway.”

“And you’re needed,” Lewis said.

Alma nodded. “That too.”

And that was Alma for you, Mitch thought. She’d do what she had to do, and do it well. “If we leave first thing in the morning, we can make it back to the Cat in time to take off in daylight. If the weather’s clear, we won’t have any trouble following the Nile, and that’ll mean a dawn landing in Cairo, more or less.” But a night flight, and that was always trouble.

“We’ll decide later,” Alma said, and Mitch nodded, happy to let her make the decisions. He lit another cigarette, his eyes stinging, and settled himself to wait.

I
t was obvious that no one was going to leave Camp Coleman that day. Colonel Tedesse had brought his men back to the camp at the first sign of the attack, and they were now bivouacked on the far side of the airstrip. The hangar and the part of the airmen’s barracks that wasn’t being used as a makeshift hospital had been given over to the refugees from the village. Someone had found a couple of awkward square tents that looked as though they were lef tover from the first Italian war back in the 1890s, and set them up behind the hangar, and Iskinder had insisted that Alma and her crew take one of them. Alma had protested — she should stay in the hospital to help Dr. Biniam — but Iskinder had taken her arm.

“It will make everyone more comfortable if we know where all the foreigners are tonight. And in any case, you should get a good night’s sleep, if you’re going to fly out tomorrow.”

That was inarguable, but there was something in Iskinder’s expression that made her hesitate. “Trouble?”

“I don’t know yet.” Iskinder sighed. “Very possibly. I am waiting for word from headquarters — I’ll let you know if it’s anything you need to worry about.”

There was no arguing with that, and Alma retreated to the tent with the others. Luckily, there was plenty of mosquito netting, and they were able to roll back the canvas flaps to let in as much of the cool night air as possible. One of the women brought around a plate stacked high with rounds of spongy bread and a bowl of lentil stew, and Alma divided it scrupulously among the three of them. Half a dozen bonfires were burning, marking the centers of various campsites; in contrast, they had only a battered kerosene lantern, and despite Lewis’s careful tending, it cast only a fitful light. It was getting chilly as the night deepened. Alma shivered, and Lewis fetched a blanket from one of the cots and draped it over her shoulders.

“We’re going to have to go back tomorrow,” Mitch said. He was sounding better than he had before, but he was still sitting a little back from the light, the ember of his cigarette waxing and waning in the dark. “I reckon we can make it on the gas we have.”

“Probably.” Alma wrapped her arms around her knees. The blanket smelled of sweat, and felt as though it was woven from wire — goat hair, maybe — but at least it was warm. She wanted to stay. Dr. Biniam had done a good job training some of the villagers, but she’d had a lot more experience, particularly with gas and bullet wounds. Her presence would be useful. And yet. She had other responsibilities now, to Stasi and the children, to Tiny Foster, to Gilchrist Aviation, to Floyd Odlum and even Henry Kershaw. And of course to Mitch and Lewis: as magister and as the chief pilot, it was her job to bring them home.

She leaned back against the end of the nearest cot, resting her weight carefully until she was sure it wouldn’t shift. Not that it was an easy choice, exactly, but it was an obvious one, a necessary one. And that meant she had to think about the flight back. Mitch was right, they had enough fuel for the trip back, though she would have liked to top up the tanks just to be on the safe side. A night flight had its dangers, but if she just flew northwest, she would find the Nile, and the combination of enormous river and the stark divide between it and the desert should be an obvious enough signpost. The moon was waxing, nearly full; if the weather was reasonably clear, there shouldn’t be a problem.

But of course she didn’t have a current forecast. When they left Bahir Dar — was it only this morning? The forecast then had been for high pressure and few clouds, but she’d been hoping to get an update from Iskinder’s people, and she’d certainly been planning to leave before now. The weather could change in the blink of an eye, and a night flight with heavy cloud, no moon, and no navigational beacons was a recipe for disaster. On the other hand, a late-night landing in Alexandria carried risks of its own, especially if the weather was less than perfect.

“Penny for your thoughts,” Lewis said, and leaned one shoulder companionably against hers.

“Thinking about how to get us home,” she answered, and felt him shift.

“About that…”

Before he could say anything, Mitch looked up sharply. Alma followed the line of his gaze and saw Robinson walking toward them, two women at his heels, carrying a tray of cups and one of the odd bulbous coffee pots.

“Colonel,” she said. It was too chilly to get up, but she freed one hand to wave generally at the floor. “Please, make yourself at home.”

“I thought you all might like some coffee,” Robinson answered. “And I also wanted to say thanks. You all were a big help there today.”

“We should have done more,” Lewis said. “If I’d known what those damn bombers were carrying —” He broke off, shaking his head, and Robinson seated himself easily on the floor. The first woman set down the tray of cups and disappeared; the second began pouring, tracing rhythmic circles over the closely-packed cups.

For an instant, Robinson looked bleak. “Yeah.”

“Bastards.”

Alma could feel the leashed anger in Lewis’s shoulder, and touched his arm. He looked warily at her, but subsided. Mitch said, “Your boys did well, too.”

“For kids with an average of twenty hours’ flight time and no combat experience at all —” Robinson sighed. “No, not bad. And nobody got killed, though we’ve got a lot of work to do to patch up all the bullet holes.” He waved at the coffee cups. “Please, help yourselves.”

Alma chose a cup and a healthy spoonful of the coarse dark sugar, and sipped it carefully, grateful for the warmth. “We’re going to want to be leaving tomorrow.”

“I figured.” Robinson nodded.

“The main thing I need is a weather report,” Alma began, but something was moving in the dark outside the tent, a shadow passing in front of the nearest fire that resolved itself to Iskinder, Colonel Tedesse at his side.

“Colonel,” Iskinder said, and for all that he sounded perfectly calm, Alma could see the tension in the way he held himself. “We have a radio message from brigade headquarters. The Italians have broken through and are heading south. We’re going to need to evacuate Camp Coleman.”

Robinson visibly swallowed a curse. “How long do we have?”

“Seventy-two hours at most,” Tedesse said. “My men and I must be on the road sooner if we’re to get the guns somewhere useful. I’d advise you to do the same.”

Robinson nodded. “We can ferry the planes out of here — we’ll have to do it in stages, but we can manage, especially if von Rosen can collect his trimotor. What about the rest of the people, the folks from the village?”

“That’s why we’re here,” Iskinder said.

“We can’t take everyone,” Alma said. “I assume you’re thinking of ferrying them to Bahir Dar? It would take us a couple of days, and I — we have to be back in Alexandria in three days. We just don’t have the time. We can certainly take the wounded, and the women with children —”

“Most of them can go by boat,” Tedesse said. “It’s been done before. Though you are right that we need your help.”

“There are wounded here that can’t be treated in Bahir Dar,” Iskinder said. “And also one or two people who are related to persons of importance, people who must not fall into Italian hands lest they be used against us. Alma, can you take them to Cairo? To the embassy there?”

Alma sat very still, the numbers dancing in her head. “How many?”

“Ten, twelve? Fifteen at the outside. Plus children.”

“How many children?”

“Seven children, four of them wounded. The rest adults.” Iskinder reached for one of the cups of coffee and drained it.

Fifteen adults, seven children, plus the four-person crew. Some of the wounded would be on stretchers, too, which would take up space even if it didn’t add weight. A full load of fuel, plus a minimum of food and water just in case. Tight, she thought, it would be very tight, and she’d need every inch of the lake for the takeoff, never mind the landing… “Yes. We can do it.”

She saw the relief in Iskinder’s face, and in Tedesse’s, and added hastily, “It’s not going to be comfortable, and we’re really going to need that fuel, Colonel Robinson’.”

“I’ll give you everything I can spare,” Robinson said.

“Thank you,” Iskinder said. “I knew I could rely on you.”

T
he conversation went on for a while longer, logistics and fuel consumption, weather reports and whether or not Khartoum could be persuaded to keep a beacon lit for them even if they weren’t going to land, how much baggage the refugees had and how much they could fit onto the Catalina. Lewis listened with half an ear, watching the kerosene in the lamp burn lower, the anger that had filled him since they landed burning with as steady a flame. He knew what he ought to do — what he wanted to do — knew, too, that Alma would forgive him, would understand better than most why he had to do it. It was leaving them in a bad place, of course, short the one person who could double as both a pilot and the flight engineer, but Tiny knew what he was doing. They could make it back to Alexandria with just three in the crew. There was no telling how he could get back to Europe — if he survived, which wasn’t exactly a sure thing, not given the equipment Robinson had at his disposal — and he couldn’t help thinking of Dora, looking up at him with Alma’s smile. But surely it would be worth the risk if he could do something to stop the bombings, to save other children. Surely it was what any good man would do, if he had the necessary skills. Surely it was what Diana had called him for. He closed his eyes for a moment, seeking that center, that certainty, but he felt only the anger and grief that had filled him since the afternoon.

At last the coffee cups were all empty, and Iskinder pushed himself to his feet. “My suggestion would be to start for the lake as soon after sunrise as possible. It will take longer for our people to get there, but you can at least check out the plane and get some rest before you start loading.”

Alma nodded. “All right. And if you can see if Khartoum will help —”

“I can’t promise anything,” Iskinder answered, “but I’ll try.”

“I’ll definitely have a weather forecast for you first thing,” Robinson said. “And I’ll send any updates with the refugees.”

“That would be a help,” Alma said.

Lewis rose to his feet, too, aware that both Mitch and Alma were looking at him uneasily. He managed a smile for Alma, and ducked under the tent flap, lengthening his stride to catch up with the other men. “Colonel! Ras Iskinder. Could I have a word with you?”

They both turned, Iskinder with a frown, Robinson with a wary smile. “What can I do for you, Mr. Segura?”

“You said before that you were short of pilots even more than planes,” Lewis said. “I’d like to sign on. You saw I can handle the planes you have, and — I’m good. I think I can be of use.”

Robinson gave a wry smile. “Mr. Segura, don’t get me wrong, from what I saw this afternoon, you’re exactly what I need, but… The emperor was very clear that he wanted his air force to be composed of black men.”