Fire Force(138)

‘How about a picture of me and the wife?’ said the South African, handing Steve a Sony digital camera.

Steve looked nervously back towards the soldiers. None of them were paying much attention to the bridge. In fact, they looked like they were about to knock off for the day. Glancing ahead, he could see that the rest of the unit was already safely across into Tuka, waiting for them amid the tour buses pulled up in the car park opposite.

‘Sure, mate,’ He took the camera, waited for the man to put a protective arm around his wife, pointed and clicked.

‘You want a picture with your pals?’

Steve shook his head, jerking a thumb towards Ian. ‘Have you seen the guy’s face? I’ll buy a postcard.’

Ian and Ganju were already walking alongside the rest of the party towards the Tukan border. Steve took one last look at the cascading wall of water. The early-evening sunset was streaking the sky a golden orange behind it, and he promised himself that one day, he’d come and take a proper look. Then he quickened his pace. A hundred yards turned into twenty. He heard some shouting back on the Batotean side of the bridge, and allowed himself to steal a quick glance: a tourist had just got into a shouting match with a stallholder about their change and one of the soldiers had intervened. Still holding his camera and his carving, Steve walked casually past the checkpoint. The Tukan soldiers didn’t look at him, nor did Steve look at them. As he stepped off the last metal girder, and onto Tukan soil, he could feel the air emptying out of his chest.

We’ve made it, he told himself.

‘Have a good trip,’ said the South African.

Steve nodded curtly. ‘You too.’

The man walked towards the waiting bus, while Steve strode across the bustling car park towards the taxi rank. Nearly all the visitors to the Falls these days stayed in Tuka and, with the day drawing to a close, the place was thronging with people getting back into the tour buses that had brought them down from the safari lodges and the hotels.

‘Keep it calm,’ hissed Ollie to everyone as they started to regroup. ‘No celebrations, and don’t do anything to draw attention to ourselves. We can have a few beers when we get back to London.’

He’d already organised a taxi. There was a line of cars waiting to take the few tourists who hadn’t come in an organised party back to their hotels: Mercedes and Toyota people-carriers, all of them with plenty of years on them, but all kept in immaculate condition by the drivers. The driver slid open the doors to his Toyota. Nine people was a squeeze - the vehicle wasn’t built for any more than six - but Ollie had already paid him twice the going rate and the man seemed pleased enough with that. He told the driver to take them to Ramsey. Ten kilometres from the Falls, and named after the Victorian explorer Heathfield Ramsey, the first European to explore this part of the Zambezi River, it was an old colonial town, with some light industry, but which mostly served the tourist traffic. From Ramsey’s Hakata Airport, there was one flight a day to Johannesburg, and from there they could get any one of a dozen different connections back to Europe.

Home, Steve told himself. Safety . . .

The driver pulled away from the kerb, honked his way through the parking lot, and steered up onto the road. There was still a mass of stalls up on the highway, selling fruit and soft drinks, but after half a mile they disappeared, and they were driving through the dusty, flat scrub that would take them up to the airport. Steve closed his eyes, paying no attention to the view. South African, BA and Tukan Airways all operated flights out of Hakata to Johannesburg, but Steve had no idea of the schedules. They’d get on any plane they could blag a ticket for: if there were no flights tonight, they could find somewhere quiet to stay, sink a few well-earned beers, then get on the first flight they could buy a ticket for in the morning.

‘Where the fuck are we going?’ Ian said suddenly.

Steve opened his eyes again.

They were driving down a dirt track, travelling far too fast. The driver had pushed the Toyota up to sixty, and it was skidding over rocks and slamming into the holes which pitted the surface of the track. The clouds had darkened, and rain was starting to spit down on them. On both sides of the track were thick trees. Through a gap, Steve could see a flash of water. The rain was increasing in intensity, coming down in thick waves, reducing visibility. But the driver didn’t seem to care.

‘I said, where the fuck are we going?’ shouted Ian, louder this time.

The driver remained silent, his hands gripping the wheel.

Where the hell are we going? Steve asked himself. Because it sure as hell isn’t Hakata Airport.

Ollie had already pulled his gun. ‘Answer the question, man,’ he growled.