A Time to Die - Smith Wilbur - Страница 191

Sean crawled back until he was hidden by the high windrow of brush. Then he rose to his feet and ran doubled over, out to the right flank.

Four hundred meters out he dropped to his knees and crawled forward, finding another position facing the forest wall. He wriggled in behind a protective stump and marshaled his breathing, watching the tree fine, the AKM set on automatic fire and his thumb on the safety catch.

He had anticipated the. next move almost perfectly; the flanking movement came out of the forest only a hundred meters further to his right. A detachnVnt of eight troopers, they came all together, trying to reach the cover of the windrow in a single concerted rush, and Sean let them get halfway across the cut line.

"This is better, I should be able to get a brace out of this covey," he told himself. He had them in enfilade; his fire would be coming in from their flank and sweeping the line. He picked out the section leader, who was running slightly ahead of the line. Sean led him by a man's length so he would run into the stream of fire, took him at knee height because the AKM rode up brutally in automatic, and held the trigger down.

The section leader dropped as though he had fallen over a trip wire, and the two men following him ran into the same burst. Sean saw the bullets hit them. One of them took it in the shoulder, and a puff of dust flew from his camouflage tunic to mark the strike.

The other was a head shot, a clean hit in the temple, and as he went down his baseball cap fluttered from his head like a maimed dove.

"Three." Sean changed magazines, pleased with the result. He had expected one and hoped for two.

The rest of them had turned and were racing back for the forest, their attack broken completely. Sean got off another quick burst before they reached the trees and thought he saw one of them hunch his shoulders and lurch to the shot, but he kept going and disappeared.

Almost immediately there was another burst of firing back in the center, and Sean jumped up from behind his stump and ran back to help Alphonso.

As he ran, somebody opened up on him from the forest. Shot passed close to his head with that vicious whiplashing sound that made his adrenaline spurt hotly into his bloodstream. He ducked his head and ran on. He was enjoying himself, riding the curling wave of his terror.

In the center there was a sharp firefight raging. Renarno was trying to rush the open ground, and they were almost across when Sean fell flat in the brush near Alphonso and added the weight of his fire to the defense. The attack wavered and broke just short of the row of deadwood behind which they lay. The Renamo went ducking and dodging back between the tree stumps, the AK fire kicking up dust around them.

"Two!" Alphonso shouted across at Sean. "I put two of them down." But Matatu was tugging at Sean's arm and pointing out to the left flank. Sean was just able to get a glimpse of another group of Renamo cutting across the cut line and reaching cover on this side. The attacks on the right and center had been diversions. Now there were a dozen or so Renanio coming in behind them; within minutes they would be surrounded, pinned down helplessly.

"Alphonso, they have got in our rear," Sean called across.

"There was nothing we could do to stop them," Alphonso answered. "There are too many, we are too few."

"I am going back to hold the rear. I'll be with the women."

"They won't attack again," Alphonso told him flatly. "Now that they have us surrounded they will wait for the hen shaw to come." A burst of automatic fire raked the pile of deadwood, and they ducked instinctively.

"They are only shooting to hold us," Alphonso called. 11 ey Th don't have to risk losing more men."

"How long until the helicopter arrives? Sean wanted his own estimate confirmed.

"Not more than an hour," Alphonso told him with finality.

"Then it will all be over very quickly."

Alphonso was, right Against the Hind there was no defense, no more tricks to play.

"I'm leaving you here," Sean repeated, and he crawled back to the hollow in which the women were concealed.

Claudia had Minnie on her lap, but she looked up expectantly as Sean slid down the shallow side of the hollow.

"They've got in behind us," Sean told her shortly. "We are surrounded" He dumped the empty AK magazines in front of her.

"There are boxes of spare ammo, in AlPhonso's pack. You know how to fin these."

It would keep her busy. The next hour was going to be difficult to live through. Sean crawled to the back lip of the hollow and peered over the edge.

He saw something move in the dried brown leaves fifty paces ahead of him, and he fired a quick burst into the brush. His fire was returned from three or four positions in their rear. AK bullets cracked overhead, and behind him Minnie wailed with fright. The minutes dragged past slowly, the silence broken every few seconds by sporadic bursts of -holding fire from the Renanio positions.

Claudia crawled up beside Sean and stacked the replenished magazines at his right elbow.

"How many boxes leftT" he asked.

"Ten," she told him, and pressed a little closer to him.

It didn't really matter that there were only two hundred rounds remaining in Alphonso's pack. Scan looked up at the sky. Any moment now they woulil hear the whistle of the Hind's turbos. Claudia read his Aoughts, and she groped for his hand. Lying in the hot African sun, they held hands and waited. There was nothing left to say, nothing more they could do. No defense, however feeble. All that remained was to wait for the inevitable.