African Sky (35 page)

‘Keys,' Bryant barked, holding up his manacled wrists to Pembroke. ‘Stay where you are, fatso,' he said to Hayes, menacing him with the revolver. Hayes cowered in the rear of the truck, his hands covering his broken nose.

‘You won't get far,' Pembroke said defiantly.

‘Cut the dramatics, pal, and unlock these cuffs. I don't want to get far, you bloody fool, just back to Kumalo to warn them.'

‘Warn them about what?' Pembroke asked as he fished a handcuff key from his pocket and leaned forward to free Bryant's wrists.

‘I don't even want to imagine,' Bryant said. ‘Look, mate, if you see Pip Lovejoy, tell her to meet me at Kumalo. If nothing happens I'll turn myself in again. But, for the record, I didn't kill Felicity Langham. I've got an idea who did, though.'

‘Who?'

‘Get Lovejoy. I don't have time to explain it all to you. Just out of interest, tell me why you blokes decided to arrest me?'

Pembroke bit his lip. Hayes had explained the chain of events that had led to Bryant becoming a suspect.

‘Haven't got all day, mate. You want the bullet in the leg or the arm? Your choice.'

Pembroke relented. ‘You bought petrol from the man who was the original suspect.'

‘Petrol?'

‘A man called Nkomo. Black marketeer. You left Felicity Langham's personal things in Nkomo's car, it was a set-up.'

Bryant thought about it for a moment and everything fell into place. ‘You're right about one thing. It was the set-up of the century'. He looked around him. They were on the main street. The game would be up soon. ‘Lie on the floor, face down. And help Hayes do the same thing. Go on, before I shoot you for real.' Pembroke complied.

Bryant shifted to the front of the truck and rapped on the roof of the cab. The driver slowed and checked his mirror. As he did, Bryant leaned around the side and thrust the pistol through the window until the muzzle was planted in the side of the man's head. ‘Pull over!'

The man did as he was ordered. Bryant hopped out of the truck and ordered all three policemen to get out. He motioned for them to move away from the vehicle towards a telegraph pole. ‘Ring-a-rosie time,' he said to Pembroke. ‘Get your cuffs out and join yourselves together, around the pole.'

‘You're making it worse for yourself,' the young policeman said. Hayes just shook his head as Pembroke snapped the handcuff on his wrist and then the driver's.

‘It'll be a hell of a lot worse for a lot more people if I let you take me in,' Bryant said. ‘Keys. All of you. Someone'll find you soon enough. It's a busy town.'

Bryant placed the .303 rifle in the back of the pick-up, climbed in the cab and started the engine. He rammed the truck into gear and the tyres squealed as he did a U-turn. He took a series of turns at speed
until he was on the Salisbury Road, heading out of town. He floored the accelerator, pushing the speedometer up to sixty miles an hour. The engine and gearbox whined in protest.

The flat, dull landscape whizzed by. A shadow overtook him and he looked up through the windscreen. It was a twin-engine Oxford trainer, on a short final approach to Kumalo. He was almost there. He checked his watch. It was ten. The wings parade would start in two hours and Prime Minister Huggins would arrive at the base at eleven, in advance of Jan Smuts. He would have to convince Rogers to cancel the parade, send the Rhodesian PM packing and divert Smuts' aircraft to another airfield. There would be time for explanations later. If he were wrong he'd either end up in gaol or stripped of his rank. The wheels skidded as he braked and turned left up the drive to the main gate. An askari called something into the guardroom, then came smartly to attention as Bryant rolled to a stop. He kept the engine running.

Flight Sergeant Henderson stepped from the guardroom and marched smartly to the boom gate. Always immaculately turned out, Henderson looked as if he had stepped from the pages of the air force drill manual today. His uniform was starched as stiff as cardboard, the toe caps of his boots shone like black glass, and the pistol belt and holster at his waist were so white they almost hurt Bryant's eyes. No doubt the extra doses of spit and polish were for the benefit of the visiting brass. ‘Call the Wingco and tell him I'm on my way, Henderson,' Bryant ordered.

‘Morning, sir. Expected you in the company of a couple of coppers, we did,' Henderson said as he approached the truck. He made no move to carry out his orders. ‘I see you've got yourself a police vehicle, though.'

‘All a mistake. Open the boom gate, Flight,' Bryant said. He gripped the steering wheel with one hand so hard that it hurt.

Bryant saw Henderson was looking at the Webley revolver on the seat next to him.

Henderson slowly reached for his own holster and began to unbutton
it. ‘Perhaps you'd like to wait in the guardroom, Mr Bryant, and we'll telephone him from there.'

‘I gave you an order, damn it. Open that fucking boom gate!'

Henderson had his hand on the grip of his pistol now. ‘Be so kind as to get out of the vehicle, sir.' The African askari was edging closer to the vehicle, from the other side. ‘Open the door for Squadron Leader Bryant, Sixpence.'

Bryant floored the accelerator and dropped the clutch. The rear wheels of the police truck spun on the concrete and smoke poured from the burning rubber as they struggled to find purchase. The rear of the vehicle slid from side to side, and then suddenly leaped forward and smashed through the freshly repainted red-and-white-striped boom, shattering the timber. He tore up the base's main road, leaving black skid marks and running askaris in his wake. Somewhere behind him an alarm bell started to ring.

He sped past the orderly room and came to a screeching halt outside Wing Commander Rogers' office. A telephone rang inside. The guardroom had called ahead of him. Pistol in hand, he bounded up the stairs and through the flyscreen door. An NCO dropped a full cup of tea when he saw the wide-eyed, gun-toting Australian.

‘Bryant!' Wing Commander Rogers said as he stepped from his office. ‘Put the gun down, man,' he said, holding empty hands up to the wounded flyer.

‘Sir, you've got to call off the parade. An attack is about to take place.'

‘Yes, yes, er . . . Paul. Put the gun down and we'll talk about it.'

‘What?' Bryant looked at the pistol in his hand, only half aware he was still holding it.

He lifted it higher and Rogers screamed, ‘No!'

‘Sir, I'm not here to hurt anyone.'

‘Drop the gun, then, Bryant.'

He let his hand drop to his side, but he would not surrender the weapon until he had convinced them all he was not insane or a murderer. ‘Sir, I've found Smythe's missing kite . . . I mean, I know what happened to it.'

‘Put the gun down, Paul, and you can tell me all about it. Now, what's this about an attack?'

‘Germans, sir. A spy, and maybe his accomplice, have got Smythe's Harvard and I'm fairly sure they're going to use it to attack the parade today.'

Rogers frowned. ‘Calm down, Paul. We're a long way from the nearest Germans. And as for them bombing us, I really don't see what damage they can do with a Harvard. Now, take a seat.'

‘Sir, I'm not mad. I believe the Ossewa Brandwag agent we were informed about, Reitz, has managed to capture an aircraft and will use it to attack the base, and probably Prime Ministers Huggins and Smuts as well. Exactly how he'll do that, I'm not sure, but we
have
to cancel the parade. You'll have three hundred qualified fighter and bomber pilots out in the open, plus aircraft and dignitaries. They'll be sitting ducks.'

‘Yes, yes, I'm sure you're right to be so concerned about us all, and our new pilots but, again, I think there's little one man in an unarmed Harvard trainer can do.'

‘Belts . . .' Bryant said. ‘She needed belts and . . .' It was not coming out right. His head throbbed and he felt nauseous again. His wounds were catching up with him.

‘Belts? What do . . . ?' the wing commander said, but he was cut short by the tramp of boots on stairs and the crash of the door opening again. Henderson stood in the doorway, pistol drawn. Behind him, three African askaris armed with .303s were bumping into each other, and their flight sergeant, in their rush to get into the building.

‘Drop it!' Henderson barked.

Bryant turned and saw the look of a man itching to fire his first shot in anger. He glanced at the Wingco and noted the condescending look of disbelief on his face. They thought he was mad. Bugger it. They were probably right.

Bryant pulled the pistol's trigger. It was hanging by his side, so the round punched harmlessly through the wooden floorboards and into the dirt below, but the sound of the gunshot in the confines of the
building made everyone else jump a foot. He caught a glimpse of Henderson cowering on the floor, and the wing commander staring at him with an almost comical look of bemusement. Bryant jumped up onto the NCO clerk's desk and, arms crossed protectively in front of his face, leaped through the closed window. Glass exploded around him, and he was vaguely aware of yet more cuts on his body as he landed, feet together, in the grass behind the wing commander's office. As he ran, he heard confused shouting behind him.

He sprinted down the laneways behind the administrative buildings until he reached the hangars. Susannah Beattie and her parachute packers, all dressed up in their best air force khaki tunics and skirts, looked up from cups of tea outside their building and stared open-mouthed at the bloodied running figure. He ignored them and wheeled past the maintenance hangar. At last he was on the concrete airstrip. An area in front of the hangars had been roped off and rows of chairs sat under an open-sided marquee. In front of the seat was a raised dais, where Huggins and Smuts would take the salute as the graduating airmen marched past them. Between two hangars, scores of newly qualified pilots milled about, having a cigarette or chatting while they waited to be formed up to march on for a final rehearsal of the parade. No official guests had arrived yet, but Bryant knew they would soon, so as to be in place when the prime ministers appeared. Huggins would be entertained in the officers' mess before Rogers escorted him out to the dais. Bryant should have been in his best uniform, overseeing the event. Instead he was running from his own men like a fugitive.

The Oxford he'd seen coming in had landed and was taxiing past him. Stretching out in front of him was a line of about twenty aircraft, representative of all the types used in the Empire Air Training Scheme. The Oxford trundled down the line to take its place. Somewhere out of sight, bagpipers tuned their instruments. The wailing notes only heightened his anxiety.

He looked behind and saw Henderson leading a growing posse of armed men. The flight sergeant was calling his name now, and several
of the about-to-graduate pilots looked from the askaris and back to him. It would only be moments before he was overwhelmed by eager volunteers. Bryant took a deep breath and started running again, this time down the line of parked aircraft.

The Oxford had pulled up at the end of the line of aircraft, next to a Harvard, whose propeller was still turning as the pilot was allowing the engine to cool, before shutting it down. Bryant stuffed the pistol into the waistband of his trousers, out of sight in the small of his back, and climbed up onto the wing of the Harvard. The blast of hot exhaust snatched at the tattered remnants of his shirt.

The pilot noticed the movement beside him and looked over. He pulled off his flying helmet, revealing a mass of thick black curls. ‘What's happening?' he yelled above the noise.

Bryant recognised the man. Costas, a Greek instructor seconded to the air training group from the Royal Hellenic Air Force. ‘Get out,' Bryant ordered.

‘Paul, you look like hell! You survived the crash, I see. What went wrong?'

‘No time to explain, Spiro. Are your guns loaded?'

Costas looked confused. ‘Why, yes. I just dropped off my trainee. We were called back from gunnery practice to join this show for the politicians.'

‘Get out, I need this kite,' Bryant said.

‘You're injured, I don't think you should be flying,' the Greek yelled above the noise of the idling engine.

Bryant looked over his shoulder and saw Henderson and company charging down the airstrip, past the VIP seating. He leaned over the pilot, saw that he had already unbuckled his parachute harness. Bryant grabbed a fist full of dark hair. Costas struggled, swore in Greek and lashed out.

Bryant unhanded him and drew the pistol from behind his back. He pointed it at the pilot. ‘I'm serious, Spiro. Get out. Someone's going to try to sabotage the parade, and I have to stop them. People's lives are at stake.'

Costas nodded and said: ‘Watch the temperature gauge, Paul. She's running a little hot.' He stepped down off the wing and walked towards the group of men who were pursuing Bryant. He turned and waved as the Harvard taxied out of the queue, out onto the runway.

‘Your friend Bryant,' said Hayes, pausing as he coughed and spat clotted blood out of the police car's window, ‘is a flaming madman. He needs shooting.'

Pip ignored Hayes' ranting and directed her questioning to young Roger Pembroke, who seemed a lot more lucid.

She had gone with the car to collect the three stranded officers, where a passing vicar had noticed them from his car, handcuffed to a telegraph pole. They had quickly been freed, and all had started babbling about Bryant's escape. ‘Charge him with assault, I will,' Hayes had blurted, blood drooling onto his blue shirt as he spoke.

Pip was seated in the front of the police car, next to a male constable who was driving. Hayes, Pembroke and their driver were squeezed into the back seat. ‘Roger, tell me again what Paul Bryant told you to pass on to me,' she said

Pembroke closed his eyes in concentration. ‘He wanted you to meet him at Kumalo. He didn't understand why we wanted to arrest him, so I told him that we had proof he had set up Innocent Nkomo. That seemed to register with him, and then he said something about it being the set-up of the century.'