I’ve got something to show you, he hand signaled me. Are you done, here?
Yes, I told him.
Come on, then.
He led me into his area, to one of the larger plastic buildings in the territory of the second regiment he had been given to investigate. He brought me to the building’s back. The curving sides of such structures are not difficult to climb quietly if you have had some practise doing so. He led me to the top of the roof curve and pointed at a small hole.
I looked in and saw six men with the collar tabs of Regimental Commanders, sitting together at a table, apparently having sometime since finished a meal. Also present were some officers of lesser rank, but none of these were at the table. Bubble plastic, in addition to its other virtues, is a good sound baffle; and since the table and those about it were not directly under the observation hole, but over against one of the curving walls, some distance off, I could not make out their conversation. It was just below comprehension level. I could hear their words, but not understand them.
But I could watch the way they spoke and their gestures, and tell how they were reacting to each other. It became evident, after a few minutes, that there were a great many tensions around that table. There was no open argument, but they sat and looked at each other in ways that were next to open challenges and the rumble of their voices bristled with the electricity of controlled angers.
I felt my shoulder tapped, and took my attention from the hole to the night outside. It took a few seconds to adjust to the relative darkness on top of the structure; but when I did, I could see the Michael was again talking to me with his hands.
Look at the youngest of the Commanders—the one on your left, with the very black mustache. That’s the Commander of my regiment.
I looked, identified the man, and lifted my gaze from the hole briefly to nod.
Now look across the table and as far down from him as possible. You see the somewhat heavy Commander with the gray sideburns and the lips that almost pout?
I looked, raised my head and nodded again.
That’s the Commander of the Guard Regiment. He and my Commander are beginning to wear on each other. If not, they’d be seated side by side and pretending that anything that ever was between their two regiments has been put aside. It’s almost as bad with the junior officers, if you know the signs to look for in each one’s case. Can you guess what’s triggered it off?
No, I told him, but I suppose you do, or you wouldn’t have brought me here.
I’ve been watching for some time. They had the maps out earlier, and it was easy to tell what they were discussing. It’s the position of each regiment in the line of battle, tomorrow. They’ve agreed what it’s to be, at last, but no one’s happy with the final decision.
I nodded.
/ wanted you to see it for yourself. They’re all ready to go at each other’s throats and it’s an explosive situation. Maybe Amanda can find something in it she can use. I brought you here because I was hoping that when we go back to rendezvous with the others, you ‘II support me in suggesting she come and see this for herself.
I nodded again. The brittle emotions betrayed by the commanders below had been obvious, even to me, the moment I had first looked through the hole.
We slipped quietly back down the curve of the building to the shadowed ground at its back and moved out together toward the rendezvous point.
We had no trouble making our way out through the rest of the encampment and back to our meeting spot. It was safely beyond the illumination of the lights that the regiments had set up amongst their buildings. Ian and Amanda were already there; and we stood together, looking back at the activity in the encampment as we compared notes.
“I called Captain El Man in to look at something I’d found,” Michael said. “In my alternate area, there was a meeting going on between the regimental commanders—“
The sound of a shot from someone’s antique explosive firearm cut him short. We all turned toward the encampment; and saw a lean figure wearing a white shirt brilliantly reflective in the lights, running toward us, while a gang of men poured out of one of the tents, stared about, and then started in pursuit. ‘ The one they chased was running directly for us, in his obvious desire to get away from the camp. It would have been easy to believe that he had seen us and was running to us for help; but the situation did not support that conclusion. Aside from the unlikeliness of his seeking aid from strangers dressed and equipped as we were, it was obvious that with his eyes still dilated from the lights of the camp, and staring at black-dressed figures like ours, he was completely unable to see us.
All of us dropped flat into the sparse grass of the
plain. But he still came straight for us. Another shot sounded from his pursuers.
It only seems, of course, that the luck in such situations is always bad. It is not so, of course. Good and bad balance out. But knowing this does not help when things seem freakishly determined to do their worst. The fugitive had all the open Naharese plain into which to run. He came toward us instead as if drawn on a cable. We lay still. Unless he actually stepped on one of us, there was a chance he could run right through us and not know we were there.
He did not step on one of us, but he did trip over Michael, stagger on a step, check, and glance down to see what had interrupted his flight. He looked directly at Amanda, and stopped, staring down in astonishment. A second later, he had started to swing around to face his pursuers, his mouth open to shout to them.
Whether he had expected the information of what he had found to soothe their anger toward him, or whether he had simply forgotten at that moment that they had been chasing him, was beside the point. He was obviously about to betray our presence, and Amanda did exactly the correct thing—even if it produced the least desirable results. She uncoiled on the ground like a spring released from tension, one fist taking the fugitive in the adam’s apple to cut off his cry and the other going into him just under the breastbone to take the wind out of him and put him down without killing him.
She had been forced to rise between him and his pursuers. But, all black as she was in contrast to the brilliant whiteness of his shirt, she would well have flickered for a second before their eyes without being
recognized; and with the man down, we could have slipped away from the pursuers without their realizing until too late that we had been there. But the incredible bad luck of that moment was still with us.
As she took the man down, another shot sounded from the pursuers, clearly aimed at the now-stationary target of the fugitive—and Amanda went down with him.
She was up again in a second.
“Fine—I’m fine,” she said. “Let’s go!”
We went, fading off into the darkness at the same steady trot at which we had come to the camp. Until we were aware of specific pursuit there was no point in burning up our reserves of energy. We moved steadily away, back toward Gebel Nahar, while the pursuers finally reached the fugitive, surrounded him, got him on his feet and talking.
By that time we could see them flashing around them the lights some of them had been carrying, searching the plain for us. But we were well away by that time, and drawing farther off every second. No pursuit developed.
“Too bad,” said Ian, as the sound and lights of the camp dwindled behind us. “But no great harm done. What happened to you, ‘Manda?”
She did not answer. Instead, she went down again, stumbling and dropping abruptly. In a second we were all back and squatting around her.
She was plainly having trouble breathing.
“Sorry . .” she whispered.
Ian was already cutting away the clothing over her left shoulder.
“Not much blood,” he said.
The tone of his voice said he was very angry with her. So was I. It was entirely possible that she might have killed herself by trying to run with a wound that should not have been excited by that kind of treatment. She had acted instinctively to hide the knowledge that she had been hit by that last shot, so that the rest of us would not hesitate in getting away safely. It was not hard to understand the impulse that had made her do it—but she should not have.