Mack Reynolds: The Best Ye Breed

“Probably in town, drunk,” Bazaine said. “We can’t take the chance of sending looking for him. This bunch of wogs would love the opportunity to start shooting.”

The men were working with brisk military efficiency.

Sean looked around. “And where’s Bryan?”

“All shook up. He’s in the back of the second lorry.”

“Poor bastard,” Sean groaned. Then, “All right, let’s get the hell out of here before that son-of-a-bitch El Hassan changes his mind. He’s obviously as suspicious as a leprechaun.”

The two officers climbed into the jeep, Sean behind the wheel. The men, their camp breaking completed, their guns now in hand, were swarming into the lorries.

The jeep led the way, over the parade ground, out through the large gate. Guémama and his men watched after them, their faces unhappy.

As soon as they were clear of the fort, Sean snapped, “Get on that tight-beam, Raul. Notify those pilots in Adrar to get on down here as quickly as possible. Tell them we’ll be approximately two or three kilometers north of Tamanrasset. When we see them, we’ll send up a flare.”

The Frenchman leaned over the seat to reach into the back. He said, surprise in his voice, “There’s four bottles of cognac here. That damned nigger sergeant must have located some more.”

Sean rasped, “I’ll be having some, wherever it came from. Hand me a bottle and get on that damned tight-beam.”

The Frenchman shrugged and handed over one of the bottles and took up the tight-beam radio phone. He spoke into it in French.

Back in the fort, Homer Crawford looked at Bey and said musingly, “I suppose that was the best thing to do.”

His field marshal nodded. “Yes, So far this revolt has been all but bloodless, save for our confrontation with the Arab Union. It wouldn’t do for some garbled accounts of a massacre of whites—mercenaries or not—to filter back to the media in Europe and America. Sorry you returned their weapons, though.”

Cliff said, “What in the hell did they really want?”

Meg, invitation obviously not necessary, had slumped into one of the chairs vacated by Sean Ryan and his two captains. She said flatly, “They wanted to assassinate the lot of you.”

Homer nodded. “That seems to fit in. Though they would have had their work cut out.” He looked at Megan McDaid. “You made a noble gesture. I understand that Captain O’Casey was your fiancé. Isobel and Doctor Smythe are correct. Advanced medicine today is in the hands of the developed countries. I suggest that, as a white, you be attached to the doctor’s staff as a laison officer in our negotiations with medical bodies of other nations.”

A knock came at the door.

Homer frowned and made a motion to the returned Guémama who opened up.

It was Lon Charles, bearing a military gray cannister, and, of all things, looking on the sheepish side.

Bey scowled and said, “Why in the devil aren’t you with the others? They must be ready to take off.”

“Man, they’re gone,” Lon told him. “This cat’s defected. I like the looks of things around here and thought I’d enlist with El Hassan. Miss Isobel, maybe she wasn’t trying to, but she kind of talked me into it.”

“Welcome to the club,” Cliff said. “You must have holes in your head—like the rest of us.”

Homer said, “Sit down, Sergeant. I understand that was your rank with the mercenaries. Tell me, how did they expect to get away with it, this far into El Hassan’s territory? If they tried to gun us down, they would have had to run all the way to the Mediterranean. And some of the El Hassan followers are on the fanatical side.”

Lon put his cannister down on the table gingerly and sat himself. He said, “We had a helio-jet coming in to pick us up.”

Kenny said, “That makes sense. But it doesn’t make sense to think that they’d get a crack at us at all. Isobel even had their guns taken away from them, as obviously she would.”

Lon said gently, “They wasn’t gonna use guns.”

All eyes were on him and Lon Charles was a simple enough soul to enjoy his moment.

Bey rasped suddenly, “What’s in that can?” And Lon said, “Fission grenades. That can’s their supply of miniature fission grenades.”

“Don’t be silly. There is no such thing.”

The former Green Beret ignored that and spoke to El Hassan. “There’s eight of them in that there can. We was going to lay them down in a pattern. It was gonna cover all of Fort Laperrine and Tamanrasset. Just about everybody’d go. But you and these people here was the ones that counted. Including Miss Isobel. That’s what stuck in my throat. I been a mercenary for a long time, and I done some pretty bad things, but they just didn’t care who all got it, just so long as you did.”

Homer looked at Meg McDaid. “You knew about this?”

Her hand was at her mouth, her eyes wide, as she stared at the negro sergeant. “No. No,” she said unbelievingly. “And Bryan’s with them. He wouldn’t…” She came to a pathetic halt and said to Lon, “Do they know you took the grenades, or whatever you called them?”

Lon Charles shook his head. “They were hid in a special compartment built into the chassis of one of the lorries. They probably still don’t know they’re gone.”

Isobel said to Homer, as though indignant that he had even asked the question, “Of course Meg didn’t know about it. If she had, she wouldn’t have come over to us. Or, otherwise, would have immediately reported the existence of these fission things. I assume Lon means some kind of miniature atomic bombs.”

Homer Crawford took a seemingly regretful breath and said to Isobel, “All right. You’re our Vizier of Information. Immediately get in touch with those reporters and TV men, in fact get in touch with all the delegations from the developed countries. We’ll have an immediate conference here and expose the whole scheme, with both Doctor McDaid and Sergeant Charles testifying.”

“Then what?” Bey said deliberately.

Homer sent his eyes to his military head. “Then we’ll take after them, complete with TV and photographer coverage.”

Isobel hurried off on her mission.

Bey turned to Guémamaa and snapped in Tamaheg, “Assemble the Camel Corps!”

Homer held up a hand. “No.”

Bey, Cliff, Kenny and Jimmy Peters joined Lon Charles and Meg in staring at him.

“What do you mean?” Kenny demanded. “You said we were going after them.”

Homer nodded. “But not with a thousand men. There’s only twenty-three of them. Twenty-three of us will go after them. El Hassan and two of his viziers, you Cliff and you Kenny, and Guémama and nineteen of his picked camelmen. It’s time we taught a lesson to such elements as these white mercenaries. Armed with superior weapons and advanced vehicles such as armored cars and even aircraft, they’ve been murdering, looting, raping and butchering up and down Africa for decades, against blacks often armed with no more than spears and bush knives. The message got out that a handful of whites were worth hundreds of blacks. We’ll prove otherwise and we’ll do it before TV and newsreel cameras.”

“Okay,” Bey said. “But it’ll be El Hassan and three of his viziers and eighteen of the camelmen.”

“You’re wounded.”

“But not so badly that I’ll miss this hoedown,” Bey said defiantly.

“Seventeen of the camelmen,” Lon Charles said. “When this cat defects, he defects all the way. I never did like that bunch of bums.” He looked at Meg. “Only Doctor McDaid.”

Homer drew over a chart from a pile of papers on the table. “All right. Let’s get the preliminary tactics laid out. Sergeant, do you know where they’ll wait for this helio-jet?”