Recoil - Andy McNab [68]
I got to the river and leaned against one of the rocks, watching the line of people shuffling along the track. I could see her, one side covered with mud where she must have fallen. Her hair was orange with the stuff.
I waited for her to come to me. I was too knackered to do anything else, and in a fair amount of pain. The friction burns felt like they were bleeding now. At least when it was raining the water kept everything rinsed and cool, but now I was covered with sweat and grime and my shirt was rasping against the rash, like working parts rubbing together without gun oil.
What made me feel even worse was that I could see Tim now, coming out of a dip way behind her, bringing up the stragglers. He got me thinking again. I couldn’t help myself. Stefan was right. There was so much I didn’t know about her. Maybe she did run away from things if they didn’t work out the way she wanted them to. Maybe we didn’t know each other that well. She’s flapping about me turning up with an AK, and there’s me getting pissed off that she’s not throwing herself into my arms and chatting excitedly about the fun times.
Fuck it. I didn’t want to think about that any more. We had a job to do.
I felt weird as she approached. I didn’t want to say anything personal to her. It was suddenly like she was a work colleague rather than someone I’d been sleeping with. ‘I’ve got the first lot in and everything’s OK.’ I paused. ‘You OK?’ As if the answer was going to be: ‘Why yes, and you?’
She didn’t look up, didn’t make any sort of personal connection as she over-concentrated on helping a woman along the track. ‘Thanks, I’m fine.’
I stayed with her, not holding her, not helping her, just being with her as we turned into the valley and entered the sangar protection zone.
We made our way to the others, who were being directed by Crucial into a small re-entrant on the right-hand side of the valley. People had settled into dugouts and even some of the mine shafts.
‘Silky, try to get some water down you. You’ve got to keep hydrated. I’ll see you in a minute, OK?’
I wasn’t worried about the sick and injured. They were as safe as they would ever be. I was only worried about her hydration levels. She was going to need so much fluid down her it would be coming out of her ears. She didn’t know it yet, but we had a busy day ahead. If she thought she was staying in this shit-hole and playing Mother Teresa, she had another think coming.
2
As I emerged from the re-entrant and turned towards the tents, Tim came down the valley carrying a baby in each arm, their wailing mother close behind him. I watched him with them, completely competent, completely at ease. If I’d been one of these poor little fuckers, I’d have wanted him close by. It got me thinking about the two of them, or the possibility of the two of them. I didn’t want to ask the question, but I wanted to know the answer.
I cut away again. I still had a job to do, I kept telling myself, as I headed for the tents. Miners surrounded by empty fertilizer bags and the lime-green and yellow jerry-cans of diesel were mixing ANFO in oil drums like they were stirring huge cauldrons of porridge and the three bears were arriving any minute. They had to finish before it rained again. The mix had to be kept dry: one drop of water, it lost its detonation capability. And they didn’t have much time to get the stuff back into the bags and into position before every mad LRA fuck within five hundred miles steamed into the valley.
I got to the bottom of the knoll the tents were sited on and followed the mud track up towards them. Lumps of rock had been positioned at intervals to make progress less slippery, but they didn’t help much.
The HQ was well placed. It commanded an elevated view into the valley as well as out to the river four hundred away and the treeline another thirty or so beyond it.