Десмонд Бэгли - High Citadel

Armstrong saw the truck turn and head towards him. ‘Run,’ he shouted to Benedetta, and took to his heels, dragging her by the hand and making down the tunnel.

Willis saw the mouth of the tunnel yawn darkly before him and pressed closer to the body of the truck. As the nose of the truck hit the low wall, rocks exploded into the interior, splintering against the tunnel sides.

Then Willis was hit. The bullet took him in the small of the back and he let go of the wheel and the edge of the door. In the next instant, as the truck roared into the tunnel to crash at the bend, Willis was wiped off the running-board by the rock face and was flung in a crumpled heap to the ground just by the entrance.

He stirred slightly as a bullet clipped the rock just above his head and his hands groped forward helplessly, the fingers scrabbling at the cold rock. Then two bullets hit him almost simultaneously and he jerked once and was still.

It seemed enormously quiet as Armstrong and Benedetta dragged O’Hara from the cab of the truck. The shooting had stopped and there was no sound at all apart from the creakings of the cooling engine and the clatter as Armstrong kicked something loose on the floor of the cab. They were working in darkness because a well-directed shot straight down the tunnel would be dangerous.

At last they got O’Hara into safety round the corner and Benedetta lit the wick of the last paraffin bottle. O’Hara was unconscious and badly injured; his right arm hung limp and his shoulder was a ghastly mess of torn flesh and splintered bone. His face was badly cut too, because he had been thrown forward when the truck had crashed at the bend of the tunnel and Benedetta looked at him with tears in her eyes and wondered where to start.

Aguillar tottered forward, the breath wheezing in his chest, and said with difficulty, ‘In the name of God, what has happened?’

‘You cannot help, tío ,’ she said. ‘Lie down again.’ Aguillar looked down at O’Hara with shocked eyes — it was brought home to him that war is a bloody business. Then he said, ‘Where is Señor Willis?’

‘I think he’s dead,’ said Armstrong quietly. ‘He didn’t come back.’

Aguillar sank down silently next to O’Hara, his face grey. ‘Let me help,’ he said.

‘I’ll go back on watch,’ said Armstrong. ‘Though what use that will be I don’t know. It’ll be dark soon. I suppose that’s what they’re waiting for.’

He went away into the darkness towards the truck, and Benedetta examined O’Hara’s shattered shoulder. She looked up at Aguillar helplessly. ‘What can I do? This needs a doctor — a hospital; we cannot do anything here.’

‘We must do what we can,’ said Aguillar. ‘Before he recovers consciousness. Bring the light closer.’

He began to pick out fragments of bone from the bloody flesh and by the time he had finished and Benedetta had bandaged the wound and put the arm in a sling O’Hara was wide awake, suppressing his groans. He looked up at Benedetta and whispered, ‘Where’s Willis?’

She shook her head slowly and O’Hara turned his face away. He felt a growing rage within him at the unfairness of things; just when he had found life again he must leave it — and what a way to leave; cooped up in a cold, dank tunnel at the mercy of human wolves. From nearby he could hear a woman babbling incoherently. ‘Who is that?’

‘Jenny,’ said Benedetta. ‘She is delirious.’

They made O’Hara as comfortable as possible and then Benedetta stood up. ‘I must help Armstrong.’ Aguillar looked up and saw that her face was taut with anger and fatigue, the skin drawn tightly over her cheekbones and dark smudges below her eyes. He sighed softly and nipped the guttering wick into darkness.

Armstrong was crouched by the truck. ‘I was waiting for someone,’ he said.

‘Who were you expecting?’ she said sarcastically. ‘We two are the only able-bodied left.’ Then she said in a low voice, ‘I’m sorry.’

‘That’s all right,’ said Armstrong. ‘How’s Tim?’

Her voice was bitter. ‘He’ll live — if he’s allowed to.’

Armstrong said nothing for a long time, allowing the anger and frustration to seep from her, then he said, ‘Everything’s quiet; they haven’t made a move and I don’t understand it. I’d like to go up there and have a look when it gets really dark outside.’

‘Don’t be an idiot,’ said Benedetta in alarm. ‘What can a defenceless man do?’

‘Oh, I wouldn’t start anything,’ said Armstrong. ‘And I wouldn’t be exactly defenceless. Tim had one of those little machine-guns with him, and I think there are some full magazines. I haven’t been able to find out how it works in the dark; I think I’ll go back and examine it in the light of our lamp. The crossbow is here, too; and a couple of bolts — I’ll leave those here with you.’

She took his arm. ‘Don’t leave yet.’

He caught the loneliness and desolation in her voice and subsided. Presently he said, ‘Who would have thought that Willis would do a thing like that? It was the act of a really brave man and I never thought he was that.’

‘Who knows what lies inside a man?’ said Benedetta softly, and Armstrong knew she was thinking of O’Hara.

He stayed with her a while and talked the tension out of her, then went back and lit the lamp. O’Hara looked across at him with pain-filled eyes. ‘Has the truck had it?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Armstrong. ‘I haven’t looked yet.’

‘I thought we might make a getaway in it,’ said O’Hara.

‘I’ll have a look at it. I don’t think it took much damage from the knocks it had — those chaps had it pretty well armoured against our crossbow bolts. But I don’t think the bullets did it any good; the armour wouldn’t be proof against those.’

Aguillar came closer. ‘Perhaps we might try in the darkness — to get away, I mean.’

‘Where to?’ asked Armstrong practically. ‘They’ll have the bridge covered — and I wouldn’t like to take a truck across that at night — it would be suicidal. And they’ll have plenty of light up here, too; they’ll keep the entrance to the tunnel well covered.’ He rubbed the top of his head. ‘I don’t know why they don’t just come in and take us right now.’

‘I think I killed the top man,’ said O’Hara. ‘I hope I did. And I don’t think Santos has the stomach to push in here — he’s scared of what he might meet.’

‘Who is Santos?’ asked Aguillar.

‘The Cuban.’ O’Hara smiled weakly. ‘I got pretty close to him down below.’

‘You did a lot of damage when you came up in the truck,’ observed Armstrong. ‘I don’t wonder they’re scared. Maybe they’ll give up.’

‘Not now,’ said O’Hara with conviction. ‘They’re too close to success to give up now. Anyway, all they have to do now is to camp outside and starve us out.’

They were silent for a long time thinking about that, then Armstrong said, ‘I’d rather go down in glory.’ He pulled forward the sub-machine-gun. ‘Do you know how this thing works?’

O’Hara showed him how to work the simple mechanism, and when he had gone back to his post Aguillar said, ‘I am sorry about your shoulder, señor.’

O’Hara bared his teeth in a brief grin. ‘Not as sorry as I am — it hurts like the devil. But it doesn’t matter, you know; I’m not likely to feel pain for long.’

Aguillar’s asthmatical wheezing stopped momentarily as he caught his breath. ‘Then you think this is the end?’

‘I do.’

‘A pity, señor. I could have made much use of you in the new Cordillera. A man in my position needs good men — they are as hard to find as the teeth of a hen.’