The Dark of the Sun
Wilbur Smith
PRAISE FOR WILBUR SMITH
‘Wilbur Smith rarely misses a trick’
Sunday Times
‘The world’s leading adventure writer’
Daily Express
‘Action is the name of Wilbur Smith’s game and he is a master’
Washington Post
‘The pace would do credit to a Porsche, and the invention is as bright and explosive as a fireworks display’
Sunday Telegraph
‘A violent saga set in Boer War South Africa, told with vigour and enthusiasm . . . Wilbur Smith spins a fine tale’
Evening Standard
‘A bonanza of excitement’
New York Times
‘. . . a natural storyteller who moves confidently and often splendidly in his period and sustains a flow of convincing incident’
Scotsman
‘Raw experience, grim realism, history and romance welded with mystery and the bewilderment of life itself’
Library Journal
‘A thundering good read’
Irish Times
‘Extrovert and vigorous . . . constantly changing incidents and memorable portraits’
Liverpool Daily Post
‘An immensely powerful book, disturbing and compulsive, harsh yet compassionate’
She
‘An epic novel . . . it would be hard to think of a theme that was more appropriate today . . . Smith writes with a great passion for the soul of Africa’
Today
‘I read on to the last page, hooked by its frenzied inventiveness piling up incident upon incident . . . mighty entertainment’
Yorkshire Post
‘There is a streak of genuine poetry, all the more attractive for being unfeigned’
Sunday Telegraph
‘. . . action follows action . . . mystery is piled on mystery . . . tales to delight the millions of addicts of the gutsy adventure story’
Sunday Express
‘Action-crammed’
Sunday Times
‘Rattling good adventure’
Evening Standard
THE DARK OF
THE SUN
Wilbur Smith was born in Central Africa in 1933. He was educated at Michaelhouse and Rhodes University.
He became a full-time writer in 1964 after the successful publication of When the Lion Feeds, and has written thirty novels, all meticulously researched on his numerous expeditions worldwide. His books are now translated into twenty-six languages.
The novels of Wilbur Smith
THE COURTNEYS
When the Lion Feeds
The Sound of Thunder
A Sparrow Falls
Birds of Prey
Monsoon
Blue Horizon
The Triumph of the Sun
THE COURTNEYS OF AFRICA
The Burning Shore
Power of the Sword
Rage
A Time to Die
Golden Fox
THE BALLANTYNE NOVELS
A Falcon Flies
Men of Men
The Angels Weep
The Leopard Hunts in Darkness
THE EGYPTIAN NOVELS
River God
The Seventh Scroll
Warlock
The Quest
also
The Dark of the Sun
Shout at the Devil
Gold Mine
The Diamond Hunters
The Sunbird
Eagle in the Sky
The Eye of the Tiger
Cry Wolf
Hungry as the Sea
Wild Justice
Elephant Song
WILBUR SMITH
THE DARK
OF THE SUN
PAN BOOKS
This book is for my wife and the jewel of my
life, Mokhiniso, with all my love and gratitude
for the enchanted years that I have been
married to her.
First published in Great Britain 1965
This edition published 1998 by Pan Books
This electronic edition published 2008 by Pan Books
an imprint of Pan Macmillan Ltd
Pan Macmillan, 20 New Wharf Rd, London N1 9RR
Basingstoke and Oxford
Associated companies throughout the world
www.panmacmillan.com
ISBN 978-0-330-46770-4 in Adobe Reader format
ISBN 978-0-330-46769-8 in Adobe Digital Editions format
ISBN 978-0-330-46772-8 in Microsoft Reader format
ISBN 978-0-330-46771-1 in Mobipocket format
Copyright © Wilbur Smith 1998
The right of Wilbur Smith to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
You may not copy, store, distribute, transmit, reproduce or otherwise make available this publication (or any part of it) in any form, or by any means (electronic, digital, optical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Visit www.panmacmillan.com to read more about all our books and to buy them. You will also find features, author interviews and news of any author events, and you can sign up for e-newsletters so that you're always first to hear about our new releases.
– 1 –
‘I don’t like the idea,’ announced Wally Hendry, and belched. He moved his tongue round his mouth getting the taste of it before he went on. ‘I think the whole idea stinks like a ten-day corpse.’ He lay sprawled on one of the beds with a glass balanced on his naked chest and he was sweating heavily in the Congo heat.
‘Unfortunately your opinion doesn’t alter the fact that we are going.’ Bruce Curry went on laying out his shaving tackle without looking up.
‘You shoulda told them to keep it, told them we were staying here in Elisabethville – why didn’t you tell them that, hey?’ Hendry picked up his glass and swallowed the contents.
‘Because they pay me not to argue.’ Bruce spoke without interest and looked at himself in the fly-spotted mirror above the washbasin. The face that looked back was sun-darkened with a cap of close-cropped black hair; soft hair that would be unruly and inclined to curl if it were longer. Black eyebrows slanting upwards at the corners, green eyes with a heavy fringe of lashes and a mouth which could smile as readily as it could sulk. Bruce regarded his good looks without pleasure. It was a long time since he had felt that emotion, a long time since his mouth had either smiled or sulked. He did not feel the old tolerant affection for his nose, the large slightly hooked nose that rescued his face from prettiness and gave him the air of a genteel pirate.
‘Jesus!’ growled Wally Hendry from the bed. ‘I’ve had just about a gutsful of this nigger army. I don’t mind fighting – but I don’t fancy going hundreds of miles out into the bush to play nursemaid to a bunch of bloody refugees.’
‘It’s a hell of a life,’ agreed Bruce absently and spread shaving-soap on his face. The lather was very white against his tan. Under a skin that glowed so healthily that it appeared to have been freshly oiled, the muscles of his shoulders and chest changed shape as he moved. He was in good condition, fitter than he had been for many years, but this fact gave him no more pleasure than had his face.
‘Get me another drink, André.’ Wally Hendry thrust his empty glass into the hand of the man who sat on the edge of the bed.
The Belgian stood up and went across to the table obediently.
‘More whisky and less beer in this one,’ Wall
y instructed, turned once more to Bruce and belched again. ‘That’s what I think of the idea.’
As André poured Scotch whisky into the glass and filled it with beer Wally hitched around the pistol in its webbing holster until it hung between his legs.
‘When are we leaving?’ he asked.
‘There’ll be an engine and five coaches at the goods yard first thing tomorrow morning. We’ll load up and get going as soon as possible.’ Bruce started to shave, drawing the razor down from temple to chin and leaving the skin smooth and brown behind it.
‘After three months of fighting a bunch of greasy little Gurkhas I was looking forward to a bit of fun – I haven’t even had a pretty in all that time – now the second day after the ceasefire and they ship us out again.’
‘C’est la guerre,’ muttered Bruce, his face twisted in the act of shaving.
‘What’s that mean?’ demanded Wally suspiciously.
‘That’s war,’ Bruce translated.
‘Talk English, Bucko.’
It was the measure of Wally Hendry that after six months in the Belgian Congo he could neither speak nor understand a single word of French.
There was silence again, broken only by the scraping of Bruce’s razor and the small metallic sound as the fourth man in the hotel room stripped and cleaned his FN rifle.
‘Have a drink, Haig,’ Wally invited him.
‘No, thanks.’ Michael Haig glanced up, not trying to conceal his distaste as he looked at Wally.
‘You’re another snotty bastard – don’t want to drink with me, hey? Even the high-class Captain Curry is drinking with me. What makes you so goddam special?’
‘You know that I don’t drink.’ Haig turned his attention back to his weapon, handling it with easy familiarity. For all of them the ugly automatic rifles had become an extension of their own bodies. Even while shaving Bruce had only to drop his hand to reach the rifle propped against the wall, and the two men on the bed had theirs on the floor beside them.
‘You don’t drink!’ chuckled Wally. ‘Then how did you get that complexion, Bucko? How come your nose looks like a ripe plum?’
Haig’s mouth tightened and the hands on his rifle stilled.
‘Cut it out, Wally,’ said Bruce without heat.
‘Haig don’t drink,’ crowed Wally, and dug the little Belgian in the ribs with his thumb, ‘get that, André! He’s a tee-bloody-total! My old man was a teetotal also; sometimes for two, three months at a time he was teetotal, and then he’d come home one night and sock the old lady in the clock so you could hear her teeth rattle from across the street.’
His laughter choked him and he had to wait for it to clear before he went on.
‘My bet is that you’re that kind of teetotal, Haig. One drink and you wake up ten days later; that’s it, isn’t it? One drink and – pow! – the old girl gets it in the chops and the kids don’t eat for a couple of weeks.’
Haig laid the rifle down carefully on the bed and looked at Wally with his jaws clenched, but Wally had not noticed. He went on happily.
‘André, take the whisky bottle and hold it under Old Teetotal Haig’s nose. Let’s watch him slobber at the mouth and his eyes stand out like a pair of dog’s balls.’
Haig stood up. Twice the age of Wally – a man in his middle fifties, with grey in his hair and the refinement of his features not completely obliterated by the marks that life had left upon them. He had arms like a boxer and a powerful set to his shoulders. ‘It’s about time you learned a few manners, Hendry. Get on your feet.’
‘You wanta dance or something? I don’t waltz – ask André. He’ll dance with you – won’t you, André?’
Haig was balanced on the balls of his feet, his hands closed and raised slightly. Bruce Curry placed his razor on the shelf above the basin, and moved quietly round the table with soap still on his face to take up a position from which he could intervene. There he waited, watching the two men.
‘Get up, you filthy guttersnipe.’
‘Hey, André, get that. He talks pretty, hey? He talks real pretty.’
‘I’m going to smash that ugly face of yours right into the middle of the place where your brain should have been.’
‘Jokes! This boy is a natural comic.’ Wally laughed, but there was something wrong with the sound of it. Bruce knew then that Wally was not going to fight. Big arms and swollen chest covered with ginger hair, belly flat and hard-looking, thick-necked below the wide flat-featured face with its little Mongolian eyes; but Wally wasn’t going to fight. Bruce was puzzled: he remembered the night at the road bridge and he knew that Hendry was no coward, and yet now he was not going to take up Haig’s challenge.
Mike Haig moved towards the bed.
‘Leave him, Mike.’ André spoke for the first time, his voice soft as a girl’s. ‘He was only joking. He didn’t mean it.’
‘Hendry, don’t think I’m too much of a gentleman to hit you because you’re on your back. Don’t make that mistake.’
‘Big deal,’ muttered Wally. ‘This boy’s not only a comic, he’s a bloody hero also.’
Haig stood over him and lifted his right hand with the fist, bunched like a hammer, aimed at Wally’s face.
‘Haig!’ Bruce hadn’t raised his voice but its tone checked the older man.
‘That’s enough,’ said Bruce.
‘But this filthy little—’
‘Yes, I know,’ said Bruce. ‘Leave him!’ With his fist still up Mike Haig hesitated, and there was no movement in the room. Above them the corrugated iron roof popped loudly as it expanded in the heat of the Congo midday, and the only other sound was Haig’s breathing. He was panting and his face was congested with blood.
‘Please, Mike,’ whispered André. ‘He didn’t mean it.’
Slowly Haig’s anger changed to disgust and he dropped his hand, turned away and picked up his rifle from the other bed.
‘I can’t stand the smell in this room another minute. I’ll wait for you in the truck downstairs, Bruce.’
‘I won’t be long,’ agreed Bruce as Mike went to the door.
‘Don’t push your luck, Haig,’ Wally called after him. ‘Next time you won’t get off so easily.’
In the doorway Mike Haig swung quickly, but, with a hand on his shoulder, Bruce turned him again.
‘Forget it, Mike,’ he said, and closed the door after him.
‘He’s just bloody lucky that he’s an old man,’ growled Wally. ‘Otherwise I’d have fixed him good.’
‘Sure,’ said Bruce. ‘It was decent of you to let him go.’ The soap had dried on his face and he wet his brush to lather again.
‘Yeah, I couldn’t hit an old bloke like that, could I?’
‘No.’ Bruce smiled a little. ‘But don’t worry, you frightened the hell out of him. He won’t try it again.’
‘He’d better not!’ warned Hendry. ‘Next time I’ll kill the old bugger.’
No, you won’t, thought Bruce, you’ll back down again as you have just done, as you’ve done a dozen times before. Mike and I are the only ones who can make you do it; in the same way as an animal will growl at its trainer but cringe away when he cracks the whip. He began shaving again.
The heat in the room was unpleasant to breathe; it drew the perspiration out of them and the smell of their bodies blended sourly with stale cigarette smoke and liquor fumes.
‘Where are you and Mike going?’ André ended the long silence.
‘We’re going to see if we can draw the supplies for this trip. If we have any luck we’ll take them down to the goods yard and have Ruffy put an armed guard on them overnight,’ Bruce answered him, leaning over the basin and splashing water up into his face.
‘How long will we be away?’
Bruce shrugged. ‘A week – ten days’. He sat on his bed and pulled on one of his jungle boots. ‘That is, if we don’t have any trouble.’
‘Trouble, Bruce?’ asked André.
‘From Msapa Junction we’ll have to go two hun
dred miles through country crawling with Baluba.’
‘But we’ll be in a train,’ protested André. ‘They’ve only got bows and arrows, they can’t touch us.’
‘André, there are seven rivers to cross – one big one – and bridges are easily destroyed. Rails can be torn up.’ Bruce began to lace the boot. ‘I don’t think it’s going to be a Sunday school picnic.’
‘Christ. I think the whole thing stinks,’ repeated Wally moodily. ‘Why are we going anyway?’
‘Because,’ Bruce began patiently, ‘for the last three months the entire population of Port Reprieve has been cut off from the rest of the world. There are women and children with them. They are fast running out of food and the other necessities of life.’ Bruce paused to light a cigarette, and then went on talking as he exhaled. ‘All around them the Baluba tribe is in open revolt, burning, raping and killing indiscriminately. As yet they haven’t attacked the town but it won’t be very long until they do. Added to which there are rumours that rebel groups of Central Congolese troops and of our own forces have formed themselves into bands of heavily-armed shufta. They also are running amok through the northern part of the territory. Nobody knows for certain what is happening out there, but whatever it is you can be sure it’s not very pretty. We are going to fetch those people in to safety.’
‘Why don’t the U.N. people send out a plane?’ asked André.
‘No landing field.’
‘Helicopters?’
‘Out of range.’
‘For my money the bastards can stay there,’ grunted Wally. ‘If the Balubas fancy a little man steak, who are we to do them out of a meal? Every man’s entitled to eat and as long as it’s not me they’re eating, more power to their teeth, say I.’ He placed his foot against André back and straightened his leg suddenly, throwing the Belgian off the bed on to his knees.
‘Go and get me a pretty.’
‘There aren’t any, Wally. I’ll get you another drink.’ André scrambled to his feet and reached for Wally’s empty glass, but Wally’s hand dropped on to his wrist.
‘I said pretty, André, not drink.’
‘I don’t know where to find them, Wally.’ André’s voice was desperate. ‘I don’t know what to say to them even.’
