It was easier, in the daylight, to avoid the rocks and the treacherous patches of mud. In five minutes they broke through the last line of bushes and came out on to the seashore. It took them a few heart-stopping seconds to realise that their boat was gone.
‘Well,’ said Tammy, ‘what do we do now?’
Hussein said nothing. He simply looked towards Hugo. His confidence was unshaken.
What did they do next? Hugo consulted his dazed and tired brain. The three things he wanted were a bath, a long drink, and twelve hours’ sleep. Two of these might be managed, after a fashion. He said, ‘I think the first thing is to clean up a bit. Then we’ll find somewhere to get under cover.’
‘We’re none of us pretty,’ agreed Tammy. In the cold light of morning this was seen to be less than the truth. Her dress had been a light summer number, suitable for a picnic. What was left of the top was tied in a rough knot over her breast. The bottom was torn to shreds. Her legs showed a solid surface of mud and filth, broken by trickles of blood. Hugo was in better shape only because his jacket and shoes had stood up better to the night’s work. Hussein looked like the survivor of a lost battle, his clothes in rags, his arm in a sling, his face the colour of paper, his feet bare and bleeding.
The first part of the programme was the easiest. Hugo and Tammy made Hussein sit down, and washed his feet and legs for him. Then they took off all their own clothes, walked out into the sea, and washed themselves down. They then came back, used their discarded clothes as towels, and put them on again.
Finding somewhere to lie up was not so easy. The bushes were too low to give much shade. They were cool at the moment, with their bathe and their damp clothes, but before long the need for shade was going to be paramount.
‘We’ll have to build something,’ said Hugo. He found a flat space on the north side of a ridge of outcrop, cleared away the loose stones, and pulled up the small bushes until they had room to lie down. Then he and Tammy pulled up other bushes to make some sort of head cover. It was unpleasant work for torn hands.
Then they lay down to try to get some sleep. Fatigue fought against the flies, and the flies soon won.
Hugo was uncertain whether he slept at all. At best it was a short, uneasy doze. He rolled over, groaned and sat up. The others were both awake.
Tammy said, ‘Speaking personally, I could do with a drink.’
Hugo realised, then, how thirsty he was himself. He said, ‘There must be houses. In fact, I think I saw one, a bit back from the road, just beyond where we turned off. A house means water. I’ll scout around. You keep an eye on Hussein.’
‘No need if you don’t wish,’ said Hussein. ‘I shall be all right by myself.’
‘You don’t look all right to me,’ said Tammy. ‘You look like something the cat’s dragged in and left on the hearth-rug.’
‘You don’t look so hot yourself,’ said Hussein with something of his old spirit.
‘If you’re going to argue,’ said Hugo, ‘keep your voices down.’ He got stiffly to his feet and started off.
At the top of the track he stopped and examined the road cautiously. It was suspiciously quiet. The last time he had driven along it there had been a continuous stream of cars, carts and bicyclists. Now it was deserted. He could hear, in the distance, from the direction of Mohara, the rattle of machine-gun fire and what sounded like the ‘crump’ of mortar shells. This made him think. He was fairly certain that Martin Cowcroft had told him that neither side possessed mortars. It looked as though one side had got hold of them. This meant that some, at least, of the consignment of arms had been landed.
If the rebels were centred on the Palace area and the royalists were holding the town, he was behind the enemy lines, and it was clearly his job to get back to Mohara as quickly as possible. It could be managed during the hours of darkness that night. The fighting lines would not be continuous, and the rough belt of scrub along the shore extended almost to the outskirts of the town. Alone, he could do it. But not with a girl and a cripple.
The road in front of him remained quiet and empty. Hugo got up and made his way along it, keeping to the verge on the left-hand side, ready to dive into cover the moment danger threatened.
The house he was making for was a white-walled, red-tiled building standing back from the road and partly masked by palm trees. It was not, as he had first thought, a farmhouse. It was a fairly pretentious villa and was surrounded by a head-high wall with a spiked railing on the top. The ironwork gates were locked. It was not a formidable obstacle. Hugo got his hand through the bars and lifted the bolt which went into the ground and held one gate. Then he kicked the other until it opened.
All the ground floor windows in front were barred. Above them a balcony ran round three sides of the house. It looked like an open invitation to an active burglar. You used the cross bars of the windows as a foothold, hoisted yourself on to the balcony, and broke in by a first-storey window.
Before putting this to the test, he walked round to the back of the house to see if there was an easier way in. Here there was a courtyard, with sheds round two sides, and in one of the sheds he found the well. Peering from the top he could see no glint of water. He remembered Cowcroft telling him that where these aquifers existed they were sometimes two or three hundred feet deep. A pipe ran down the side. The water supply was clearly operated by an electric pump. Equally clearly the electricity had been turned off.
It was at this moment that he heard the noise. He had been vaguely conscious, for some time, of a grumbling. Now it sharpened into something like a bark. In the far corner of the yard a dog was lying in a patch of shade. It was attached by a length of chain to a ring in the wall. And it was nearly dead of thirst.
Hugo’s feelings about the absent owners of the villa changed from curiosity to dislike. To have scuttled off in a panic in the face of the rebels was understandable. To have left their dog chained up to die of thirst put them outside the pale. Fortified by anger, he hoisted himself up on to the first floor balcony, opened a French window by putting the sole of his foot through it, and started, with enthusiasm, to commit the first burglary of his life.
Although the water pump had been turned off, there must still be a supply in the cistern. If the owners had left in a hurry they would not have had time to drain it. Sure enough, when he turned on one of the bath taps, a trickle of rust coloured water came out. He let it run until it had cleared and then tasted it cautiously. It was brackish, but drinkable. He splashed it over his face and hair and swallowed a good deal of it. The next problem was containers.
Rejecting flower vases, chamber pots, saucepans, a soup tureen and a metal ice bucket as being either too bulky or too likely to spill, he finally unearthed half a dozen dusty, but empty bottles from the bottom of the kitchen dresser. They held about a pint each. He rinsed them out, filled them and corked them. Then he put them into a rush-work shopping basket, and fashioned a sling out of a roller towel so that he could carry the basket over his shoulder, leaving both his hands free.
After that he turned his mind to food. There was a big refrigerator in the kitchen. He opened the door, and shut it again hastily. The electricity must have been off for some days. He tried the cupboards.
The first two held kitchen stuff, and china. In the last one there were some oddments of food. An unopened packet of Brekkibrix (‘the Busy Man’s Breakfast Food’), a tin of tomatoes and a large brown-paper bag full of dates. Hugo divided the dates into two smaller packages, which he put in the side pockets of his jacket, belted his jacket in the top of his trousers, and let the Brekkibrix and the tomatoes slide down into the loop so formed. He remembered to take a tin-opener, too.
Fortunately the back door turned out to be bolted, but not locked. He let himself out into the yard, clanking loudly at each step.
The dog gave a token growl when approached, but was too weak to get up. Hugo unpacked the Brekkibrix, and one bottle of water. He soaked two or three of the brix in water and put them down in front of the dog, who looked at them disinterestedly. Then he poured the rest of one of the bottles into the dog’s drinking bowl. The dog staggered to its feet, buried its nose in the trough, and started lapping. Hugo slid his hand round the animal’s neck and gently unfastened the clip which attached its collar to the chain.
He said, ‘You’re on your own now, boy. Keep out of sight, and don’t let yourself get picked up by some hairy Arab who wants to slice you up for cat’s meat and you’ve got a fifty-fifty chance of coming through. Just the same as us, really.’
The dog was too busy drinking to take any notice. Hugo wadded the remaining five bottles of water with palm leaves to stop them clanking. Then he started back.
When Tammy saw him coming, she gave a croak of pleasure. ‘I hope you found that water,’ she said. ‘Another half-hour and I’d have been drinking the sea.’
‘I got water. And food, of a sort.’ Hugo patted his stomach.
‘You look like the Hunchback of Notre Dame behind and a pregnant woman in front!’
‘Never mind my appearance,’ said Hugo. ‘Let’s get started on breakfast.’
Whilst he was away, Tammy had improved the camouflage of their hideout by adding tufts of grass to the brushwood roof. Hussein was lying underneath it, on his back. His eyes were open, and his face flushed and sweating. He drank the water, but would eat nothing. Hugo opened the tin of tomatoes, and tried a mixture of Brekkibrix and tomato juice. The taste was curious but not unpleasant. For a second course they ate some dates.
Tammy said, ‘Hussein has been telling me what happened at the Palace. I guess perhaps he’d better put you wise.’
Hugo said, ‘Don’t talk now if you don’t want to.’ Although the morning was already hot, the boy was both shivering and sweating. It was clear that he had a fever on him.
‘I will tell you,’ said Hussein. ‘It was in the morning. Yesterday morning. The gate was open for the morning
medjlis.
Three or four men came in together. They had pistols under their robes. They shot the gate guard. Then the others, who had been hiding nearby, rushed in. When the first shots were fired, Major Youba, who had charge of my uncle. Sheik Hammuz, shot him.’
‘Killed him?’
‘Of course. Those were his orders.’
Hugo said, ‘Don’t describe the next bit if you’d rather not. I can guess the sort of things that happened.’
‘There was much shooting. My father was one of the first to be killed. After he was killed, some of the Palace Guard surrendered. Major Youba would not surrender, although he had been wounded. In the end they overpowered him, and dragged him out. It was Dr. Kassim who arranged how he should die.’
‘Ah,’ said Hugo.
‘Don’t tell it again, Hussein,’ said Tammy. ‘It’s horrible.’
‘No, I will tell you. He had the Major tied to the muzzle of the gun. The big gun in the courtyard. Then he loaded it, and fired it himself.’
‘How perfectly horrible.’
‘He didn’t get off scot-free,’ said Tammy. ‘It crushed his foot. He’d forgotten that the – I don’t know the name – the thing that controls the recoil ?’
‘The recuperator?’
‘Yes. It would not be working too well after all those years. The gun jumped back and ran over his foot. It broke many of the bones.’
‘Splendid.’
‘I was glad too, and I said so. That was when he had my arm broken. Then he had the prisoners from the royal guard taken out and tied to posts and they shot at them. They tried to see how much they could shoot at them without killing them. It took a long time. They made me watch.’
The tears were running down the boy’s face. Tammy said, ‘Stop thinking about it, Hussein. What’s done is done. It’s all over now. Try to get some sleep.’
She made him lie down, and sat beside him, stroking his head with one hand, and using the other to keep the flies off his face. Hugo watched her with mixed feelings. After a time he did seem to fall into an uneasy sleep.
Tammy said, ‘You realise we’ve got to get that arm set properly. I tried to dress it, but I couldn’t do anything really. The end of the bone is sticking through the skin. If it isn’t seen to, his arm’s going bad, that’s for sure.’
‘I’ve been thinking about that,’ said Hugo. The first thing is to find out what’s happening, and we can only do that in Mohara. When I was out just now I heard mortar fire. That means that some of the arms I was buying for the Ruler have arrived. One plane-load, perhaps. If our people got them it gives the police the edge. But it means more than that. It means they’ve got the rebels pinned down outside the town. If they were rushing round the streets, killing and looting, you wouldn’t attack them with mortars.’
‘That sounds sort of logical,’ said Tammy. ‘What do you suggest we do? Wait here till they’ve got things under control?’
‘We can’t do that. Because of Hussein, and because we may be spotted. I shall have to get into Mohara tonight. It shouldn’t be too difficult. There won’t be any fixed lines. This isn’t trench warfare.’
‘And when you get there?’
‘If our side’s on top, I’ll get them to lay on a patrol to come out here and pick you up. They’ll certainly want to do that. He’s all the Ruler they’ve got left now.’
‘He’s a fine boy,’ said Tammy. ‘He’ll make a good king if we can get him through. What happens if things aren’t so you can organise a rescue party?’
‘I’ve thought about that, too. What I’ll have to do is steal a boat, and come back here myself. The best place to make for will be Oman. It’s not too far, and the Oman Scouts would look after us.’
‘It sounds all right,’ said Tammy doubtfully.
‘
If
you can find a boat. And
if
you can get it up here.’
‘We’ll cross those bridges when we come to them,’ said Hugo. He suddenly felt unreasonably cheerful. ‘I’m going to have another swim. You can be getting lunch ready. Brekkibrix, date and tomato stew.’
Hours later, as the sun was at last going down, throwing long shadows over the sea, tipping the waves with sparks of fire, something moved, way out, between the light and the dark.