Sahara (29 page)

She looked out the window, but all she saw was total blackness. There were no lights to be seen on the empty desert floor. A glance at her watch told her it was ten past midnight, only one and a half short hours since they loaded the last of the equipment and contamination samples on board and took off from the graveyard that was Asselar.

She sat quietly and relaxed, thinking that perhaps the pilots were simply turning on a new course and changing altitude. But the sinking sensation in her stomach told her the plane was still dropping.

Eva rose into the aisle and walked to the rear of the cabin where Hopper exiled himself so he could smoke his pipe. She approached his seat and gently shook him awake. “Frank, something’s wrong.”

Hopper was a light sleeper and almost instantly focused his eyes and looked up at her questioningly. “What did you say?”

“The plane is descending. I think we’re landing.”

“Nonsense,” he snorted. “Cairo is five hours away.”

“No, I heard the engines slack off.”

“The pilots have probably throttled back to conserve fuel.”

“We’re losing altitude. I’m sure of it.”

Hopper reacted to the seriousness of her tone and sat up and tilted his head, listening to the engines. Then he leaned over his armrest and peered down the aisle toward the forward bulkhead of the passenger cabin. “I believe you’re right. The nose seems angled down slightly.”

Eva nodded toward the cockpit. “The pilots have always kept the door open during flight. It’s closed now.”

“Does appear odd, but I’m sure we’re overreacting.” He threw off the blanket covering his large frame and stiffly rose to a standing position. “However, it won’t hurt to have a look.”

Eva followed him up the aisle to the cockpit door. Hopper turned the knob and his face suddenly clouded with concern. “The damn thing’s locked.” He pounded on the door, but after a few moments there was no response. If anything, the aircraft’s angle of descent increased. “Something mighty queer is going on. You better wake the others.”

Eva hurried back down the aisle and prodded the other members of the team out of their weary sleep. Grimes was the first to reach Hopper.

“Why are we landing?” he asked Hopper.

“I haven’t the vaguest idea. The pilots aren’t of a mind to communicate.”

“Perhaps they’re making an emergency landing.”

“If they are, they’re keeping it to themselves.”

Eva leaned over a seat and peered into the darkness through a window. A small cluster of dim, yellow lights pierced the night several kilometers beyond the nose of the aircraft. “Lights ahead,” she announced.

“We could kick the door in,” Grimes suggested.

“For what purpose?” demanded Hopper. “If the pilots mean to land, there’s no way we can stop them. None of us can take control of a jetliner.”

“Then there is little we can do but return to our seats and fasten our seatbelts,” said Eva.

The words had not left her mouth when the landing lights flashed on, illuminating a faceless desert. The landing gear dropped and the pilot made a tight bank as he lined up on the as yet unseen airfield. By the time they had all strapped themselves in, the tires thumped into hard-packed sand and the engines roared as the pilot engaged the air brakes. The soft surface of the unpaved runway produced enough drag to slow the plane down without the pilots standing on the brakes. The plane taxied toward a row of floodlights that stood beside the airstrip and rolled to a halt.

“I wonder where this is?” murmured Eva.

“We’ll find out soon enough,” said Hopper, moving toward the cockpit door, determined this time to kick it in. But it swung open before he reached it, and the pilot stepped into the cabin. “What is the meaning of this stopover?” Hopper demanded. “Is there a mechanical problem?”

“This is where you get off,” the pilot said slowly.

“What are you talking about? You’re supposed to fly us to Cairo.”

“My orders are to set you down at Tebezza.”

“This is a UN chartered aircraft. You were hired to take us to whatever destination we require, and Tebezza, or whatever you call it, is not one of them.”

“Consider it an unscheduled stop,” the pilot said doggedly.

“You simply can’t throw us out in the middle of the desert. How do we get out of here and continue to Cairo?”

“Arrangements have been made.”

“What about our equipment?”

“It will be guarded.”

“Our samples must get to the World Health laboratory in Paris as soon as possible.”

“That is not my concern. Now if you will please collect your personal items and disembark.”

“We’ll do no such thing,” Hopper said indignantly.

The pilot brushed past Hopper and walked swiftly down the aisle to the rear exit. He undogged the shaft locks and pushed a large switch. The hydraulic pumps whirred as the aft floor slowly dropped and became a stairway leading to the ground. Then the pilot raised a large-caliber revolver he’d been holding behind his back and waved it at the startled scientists.

“Get off the aircraft, now!” he ordered gruffly.

Hopper moved until he was standing almost toe to toe with the pilot, completely ignoring the gun barrel touching his stomach. “Who are you? Why are you doing this?”

“I am Lieutenant Abubakar Babanandi of the Malian air force, and I am acting under orders from my superiors.”

“And just who might they be?”

“The Malian Supreme Military Council.”

“You mean General Kazim. He calls the shots around here—”

Hopper grunted in agony as Lieutenant Babanandi rammed the muzzle of his revolver sharply into the scientist’s upper groin. “Please do not cause trouble, Doctor. Depart the plane or I will shoot you where you stand.”

Eva clutched Hopper by the arm. “Do what he says, Frank. Don’t let your pride kill you.”

Hopper swayed on his feet, hands instinctively pressed against his groin. Babanandi seemed hard and cold, but Eva detected more fear in his eyes than hostility. Without another word, Babanandi crudely pushed Hopper onto the first step.

“I warn you. Do not linger.”

Twenty seconds later, half supported by Eva, Hopper stepped to the ground and looked around.

A half dozen men, their heads and faces hidden in the indigo-tinted, heavily wrapped veil of the Tuaregs, walked over and stood in a semicircle around Hopper. They were all quite tall and menacing. They wore long flowing black robes, and were armed with broadswords that hung in sashes tied around their waists. They held automatic rifles, whose muzzles were collectively pointing at Hopper’s chest.

Two other figures approached. One was a towering man, thin with light-skinned hands, the only part of him that showed except for eyes barely visible through the slit in his
litham.
His robe was dyed a deep purple but his veil was white. The top of Hopper’s head just came level with the stranger’s shoulders.

His companion was a woman who was built like a gravel truck whose bed was fully loaded. She was dressed in a dirty, loose-fitting dress that stopped short of the knees, revealing legs that were as thick as telephone poles. Unlike the others, her head was uncovered. Though she was as dark as the southern Africans and her hair was woolly, she had high cheekbones, a rounded chin, and sharp nose. Her eyes were small and beady, and her mouth stretched nearly the full width of her face. There was a cold and sadistic look about her, enhanced by a broken nose and a scarred forehead. It was a face that had once been brutalized. She held a thick leather thong in one hand that had a small knot on one end. She eyed Hopper as if she was a torturer of the Inquisition measuring her next victim for the iron maiden.

“What is this place?” Hopper demanded without introduction.

“Tebezza,” answered the tall man.

“I’ve already been told that. But just where is Tebezza?”

The answer came in English accented in what Hopper guessed was a northern Irish. “Tebezza is where the desert ends and hell begins. Here gold is mined by convicted prisoners and slaves.”

“Something on the order of the salt mines at Taoudenni,” said Hopper, staring at the rifles aimed at him as he spoke. “Do you mind not sticking those guns in my face?”

“They are a necessity, Dr. Hopper.”

“Not to worry. We haven’t come to steal your—” Hopper broke off in midsentence. His eyes turned blank as the color ebbed from his face, and he spoke in an astonished whisper. “You know my name?”

“Yes, we have been expecting you.”

“Who are you?”

“My name is Selig O’Bannion. I am Chief Engineer of the mining operation.” O’Bannion turned and nodded at the big woman. “My straw boss is Melika, which means queen. You and your people will take your orders from her.”

Perhaps ten seconds passed in silence broken only by the slowly turning turbines of the aircraft. Then Hopper blurted, “Orders, what the hell are you talking about?”

“You were sent here, courtesy of General Zateb Kazim. It is his express wish that you work in the mines.”

“This is kidnapping!” Hopper gasped.

O’Bannion shook his head patiently. “Hardly kidnapping, Dr. Hopper. You and your UN team of scientists will not be ransomed or held as hostages. You have been condemned to labor in the mines of Tebezza, excavating gold for the national treasury of Mali.”

“You’re madder than a cockroach—” Hopper began, then staggered back against the steps as Melika slashed him across the face with her heavy thong. He stiffened from the shocking blow and touched the welt that was raising on his cheek.

“Your first lesson as a slave, you putrid pig,” the mountainous woman spat. “Beginning now, you do not speak unless ordered.”

She raised her thong to strike Hopper again, but O’Bannion grabbed her arm. “Easy, woman. Give him time to get used to the idea.” He looked up at the other scientists who had descended the steps and formed around Hopper, shock spread across their faces, the beginnings of terror in their eyes. “I want them in good condition for their first day’s work.”

Reluctantly, Melika lowered the thong. “I fear you are shedding your thick skin, Selig. They are not made of porcelain.”

“You’re an American,” said Eva.

Melika grinned. “That’s right, honey. Ten years as Chief of Guards at the Women’s Institution in Corona, California. Take it from one who knows, they don’t come any tougher than there.”

“Melika takes special care of the female workers,” said O’Bannion. “I’m sure she’ll see to it you’re considered one of the family.”

“You make women work in the mines?” Hopper said disbelievingly.

“Yes, a number of them, including their children,” O’Bannion answered matter-of-factly.

“You’re flagrantly committing human rights violations,” said Eva angrily.

Melika looked at O’Bannion, a fiendish expression on her face. “May I?”

He nodded. “You may.”

The big woman shoved the end of the thong into Eva’s stomach, doubling her over. Then she brought it down on the back of Eva’s neck. Eva folded like a wet blanket and would have struck the ground if Hopper hadn’t grabbed her around the waist.

“You’ll soon learn that even verbal resistance is futile,” said O’Bannion. “Better you cooperate and make your remaining time on earth as painless as possible.”

Hopper’s lips parted in incredulity. “We’re respected scientists of the World Health Organization. You can’t just execute any of us on a whim.”

“Execute you, good doctor?” O’Bannion said casually. “Nothing of the sort. I intend to work you to death.”

24

The scheme went exactly as Pitt hoped. After the guard shoved him back into the steamy bilge with Giordino, he appeared subservient and cooperative by raising his hands so the guard could lock his cuff chain around the steam pipe. Only this time Pitt held his hands up on the opposite side of the pipe bracket. Satisfied Pitt was solidly rechained, the guard silently let the steel trapdoor drop with a loud clang on his prisoners in the stifling atmosphere of the confined compartment.

Giordino sat uncaringly in a pool of moisture and massaged the back of his head. In the dense mist Pitt could hardly see him. “How’d it go?” Giordino asked.

“Massarde and Kazim are thick as thieves. They’re partners in some kind of shady operation. Massarde pays off the General for favors. That much was obvious. Beyond that, I didn’t learn much.”

“Next question.”

“Shoot.”

“How do we get out of this teapot?”

Pitt lifted his hands and grinned. “With a mere twist of the wrist.”

Now bound to the opposite side of the bracket, he slid his chain along the pipe until he reached the aft bulkhead that held the rack that contained several different-sized wrenches. He took one and tried it around the fitting mounted on the bulkhead to support the passage of the steam pipe. It was too large, but the next wrench was a perfect fit. He laid hold of the handle and pulled. The fitting was frozen with rust and failed to budge. Pitt rested a moment, then planted his feet against a steel beam, grasped the wrench with both hands, and heaved with all his strength. The fitting’s threads begrudgingly broke their hold, and it moved. The first quarter turn took every muscle in Pitt’s arms. With each twist the fitting began to rotate more easily. When it was finally free and attached by only two threads, Pitt paused and turned to Giordino.

“Okay, she’s ready to be disconnected. We’re lucky it’s fed by low-pressure steam for heating the staterooms above or we’ll know how a poor lobster feels in the pot when she drops loose. As it is, we’ll be drenched with enough steam to smother us if we don’t get out of here in one hell of a hurry.”

Giordino rose to his feet, knees flexed, head bent low as his soaked curly black hair met the deck plating above. “Put the guard within my reach, and I’ll take care of the rest.”

Pitt nodded wordlessly and gave the fitting a series of fast rotations until it slipped free. Then he used the chain on his cuffs to hang on the pipe, using his weight to pull it free. A cloud of steam erupted and burst into the small confines of the bilge. Within seconds it was so thick Pitt and Giordino became completely lost to each other. In one swift movement, Pitt slipped his chain free over the end of the flowing pipe, scalding the backs of his hands.