Gavin Lyall - Shooting Script

'A drink, Señorita?'he suggested. 'Or may I show you to your room? And I will arrange dinner.'

She hit him with a ten-kilowatt smile and said she'd settle for a gin and tonic.

The conversation lapsed. Beyond the open french windows the sky darkened and the sea breathed politely on the empty beach. A fat lizard came out to stand sentry duty in the light spilling on to the patio.

Finally I said: 'Any idea of when this raid's supposed to come off?'

Luiz spun round and snapped: 'We are not discussing that any more.'

I smiled crookedly: I had a pretty good idea of what was going to happen now.

It did. Miss Jiminez looked up brightly. 'You are talking about the bombing of the generals' aeroplanes?'

Luiz said soothingly:'Señorita, you need not concern yourself-'

'But this is what I am here for.'

He looked baffled. Whitmore said slowly: 'I thought you came to take home your brother.'

'I came to avenge him. I will have him sent home tomorrow. I will stay here.'

Luiz chewed his lip. Whitmore put on a puzzled frown. J.B. gave me a sharp glance, but didn't say anything.

I said 'Well – when?'

'When the aeroplane is ready,' Miss Jiminez said, 'I will inform my father. After that, he will give one day's warning.'

I nodded. 'When are the bombs coming? And what bombs?'

'Diego was fixing that,' Whitmore said. 'We ain't heard anything since – I'm trying to get in touch again.'

Luiz stopped eating his lip and said: 'Four 500-pounders.'

'High-explosive?'

'Yes.'

I nodded again. The Mitchell would carry 2,000 pounds, all right. In fact, given a long enough runway, I was pretty sure the Mitchell would carry everything you could cram into her and your Uncle Harry's bathtub besides. She was a hell of a load-carrier – given a long enough runway. But that was the problem: I couldn't see the authorities at Palisadoes or Mon-tego Bay, which had the long runways, giving flight clearance to this particular jaunt.

I looked at Miss Jiminez. 'I want your father to understand that I can't do this attack at just any time of day. It's got to be-'

She gave me a smile that raised flash burns. 'But of course. As your Kitchener of Khartoum once said, "We have to make war as we must, and not as we would like to." It must be dawn or dusk.'

Everybody was staring at her. I shook my head and muttered: 'You ain't heard nothing, yet.' Then, louder: "That's right. They seem to send at least a section up to forward base near the mountains during the day-'

'At Cordillera,' she said.

"That's the place, is it? But they don't seem to leave aircrafton it overnight. I'd guess Ned's scared of guerrilla raids and doesn't trust the army to-'

'The generals do not trust each other,' she said. 'General Boscohas been recruiting ground troops for his Air Force -like your RAF Regiment – to become an airfield defence unit. He now has about three thousand men. Some are seconded from his other branches; many of the non-commissioned officers were once policemen.'

Now Luiz was really staring. Then he shook his head to see if he was still awake, and asked:'Señorita, how do you know these things?'

She seemed surprised.'Señor, you forget who is my father.'

Whitmore said: 'Your father's 500 miles from Caracas.'

'Señor Whitmore, the Repúblicais not closed like a door. Letters come. Aeroplanes land there.'

Luiz persisted. 'But your brother did not know all these things.'

'My brother was my mother's son,' she said – quite sharply. 'I am my father's daughter. Diego knew what I told him.'

I'd begun to suspect something like that. I'd never seen Diego as the hard-working spider in the middle of an intelligence web. And the link between the Repúblicaand Caracas -because of the common language and something of a common history – would be much stronger than between the Repúblicaand Jamaica.

But mostly I was interested in the news of the trouble between the Air Force and the Army. I saw why-Ned had worked the cumbersome old system of controlling ground-attack fighters from right back at home base instead of letting the Army direct them on target from up on the front line – the way Ned himself had learnt it in Korea.

But that wasn't the point right now. I said: 'Right – I attack at first light or last light. All things considered, it hadbetterbe-'

'Dusk would be best,' Miss Jiminez said briskly. 'You would be more certain to catch all of them on the ground, then.'

'It had better be dawn,' I said firmly.

I got a sharp, rather startled, look.

'Purely military problem,' I said soothingly. 'With bombs and full fuel that plane's going to be pretty heavy for a short strip like Boscobel or Port Antonio. So I want the air as cool as I can get it for take-off; more power for the engines, more lift for the wings. If I go in at last light, I take off in the afternoon: If I attack at first light, I take off "around two in the morning. It's as simple as that.'

She frowned.'Capitán, even Clausewitz believed that a "purely military judgment is a distinction which cannot be allowed".'

'He should've tried flying an overloaded Mitchell off a 3,000-foot runway in hot weather before he started making wild statements like that.'

'One cannot avoid all risks, Capitán. As Clausewitz said-'

'Clausewitz never said one horse made a cavalry charge. If I miss a couple of Vampires, the attack's still eighty per cent successful. But if I pile into the trees on take-off, you've got a hundred per cent flop. There won't beany attack.'

There'd be a few per cent of Keith Carr missing, too, if I went tree-pruning with a load of 500-pounders. But probably Clausewitz had said something reassuring about that as well, so I kept quiet.

Whitmore said firmly: 'Okay, so you hit 'em at sun-up. If they do get any jets up, you're going to have to come a-run-ning. Be daylight.'

I just nodded. Speed wouldn't be much help against a Vampire that could go twice my speed and more. And no clouds to hide in, not around dawn. 'But at least I won't be making a night landing on a strip that doesn't have any lighting.'

Nobody had thought of that, of course. Whitmore crooked his eyebrows and said: 'But you'll have to take off in the dark – how about that?'

'A sight easier than landing. I can do it with just a hurricane lamp planted at die end of the strip.'

There was a silence while everybody thought up the next problem.

J.B. said suddenly: 'What about radar? Won't they see you coming?'

I had my mouth open when Miss Jiminez said: 'There is no radar in the Caribbean except at Puerto Rico and Cuba. You should know these things if you wish to help.'

J.B.'s face shut with a snap like a rat-trap.

Luiz said:'Señorita Penroseonly does our legal work; she does not pretend to be a general.'

'She makes contracts for my father to sign,' Miss Jiminez said scornfully.

Whitmore came to the rescue again. 'All right, kids. This is just a planning session. The real fighting comes later – and Carr does that.' He looked at me. 'Anything more, fella?'

There was one thing that had better be said, but I was uneasy about saying it in front of Miss Jiminez. I dug out my pipe and started to fill it while I gave myself time to think. Whitmore sighed, grunted, and threw me a cigarette.

I lit it, decided I'd better say my piece anyway, and said: 'Just one thing: we're dealing with an old aeroplane. It could go unserviceable – seriously – at any time. So the attack could be called off at the last minute.' I turned to Miss Jiminez. 'If your father's depending on the raid, you'd better tell him not to move until heknows it's coming off.'

There was no warmth in her look now. It was a hard searchlight stare.'Capitán- the attackmust happen. You must takeany risk.'