The Last Place God Made - Jack Higgins [77]
The launch was grounded on a mudbank, her deck tilted steeply to one side. The hull and wheelhouse were peppered with arrows and the man who hung over the stern rail had several in his back. There was no sign of the other two. I could only hope, for their sakes, that the Huna hadn't taken them alive.
So that was very much that. I carried on up-river, my speed right down, and passed low over the mission. There was no sign of life and I tried calling them over the radio again. A moment later and Avila's voice sounded in my ear with reasonable clarity although the strength was weak and there was lots of static.
'Senhor Hannah, thanks be to God you have come.'
'It's Mallory,' I said. 'How are things down there?'
'Senhorita Martin, the good Sister and I are in the church, senhor. We are all that is left.' In spite of the distortion, the astonishment in his voice was plain. 'But you here, senhor. How can this be?'
'Never mind that now. I found the launch downstream. They didn't get very far, those friends of yours. I'm going to land now. Get ready to bring the women across.'
'An impossibility, senhor. There is no boat.'
I told him to stand by and turned over the jetty. He was right enough, so I crossed the river and went in low over the airstrip. There was no sign of life there, but there was a canoe by the little wooden pier.
I circled the mission again and called up Avila. 'There's a canoe at the landing strip pier. Have the women ready to go and I'll come over for you. I'm going down now.'
I banked steeply and plunged in very fast, going in low over the trees. A final burst of power to level out and I was down. I taxied to the far end of the campo, turned the Hayley into the wind ready for a quick take-off and cut the engine.
I sat there for a couple of minutes waiting for something to happen. Nothing did, so I primed the two Mills bombs, shoved a clip into the Thompson, slipped the haversack over my shoulder, got out and started towards the river.
Except for the path which had been flattened by constant use as a landing strip, the grass over the rest of the campo was three or four feet high. Somewhere on the right, birds lifted in alarm. Enough to warn me in normal circumstances, but then it all happened so fast.
There were suddenly voices high and shrill, a strange crackling noise. When I turned, flames were sweeping across the campo from the edge of the jungle, the long, dry grass flaring like touch paper. Beyond, through the smoke, I caught sight of feathered head-dresses, but no arrows came my way. Presumably they thought me a moth to their flame.
It was certainly the end of the Hayley for as I turned to run, the flames were already flaring around the underbelly. I was halfway to the river when her tanks blew up, burning fuel and fuselage spraying out in a mushroom of flames. That really finished things off and within a few moments the entire campo was a kind of lake of fire.
But at least it put an impassable barrier between myself and the Huna, one flaw in their plan or so it seemed. I scrambled into the canoe at the jetty, pushed off and found half a dozen canoes packed with Huna coming down-river to meet me.
*
Even with the Thompson, there were too many to take on alone and in any case, I couldn't paddle and fire at the same time. There seemed to be only one thing to do which was to push like hell for the other side and that's exactly what I did.
A point in my favour was the numerous shoals and sandbanks in that part of the river. I got to the far side of a particularly large one, ibis rising in a great red cloud, putting what seemed like something of a barrier between us.
They were nothing if not resourceful. Two canoes simply grounded on the sandbank and their occupants jumped out and ran towards me, ankle-deep in water. The other turned and paddled back upstream to cut me off.
The men on the sandbank were too close for comfort by now so I dropped