The Virus by Stanley Johnson

Author:Stanley Johnson [Johnson, Stanley]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780062414892
Publisher: HarperCollins
Published: 2015-05-26T04:00:00+00:00

11

Colonel Albert Mugambu was pleased by the way it had all gone. He was more than pleased; he was delighted.

The two specially constructed crates had been safely loaded into the cargo compartment of the plane. Now, conscious of a job well done, he sat curtained off from his men like a sultan in his splendour, a glass of Turborg Export beer in one hand and his ever-present fly-swat in the other. From time to time he looked out of the window and by the light of the full moon saw the thick equatorial jungle unroll beneath the wingtips.

He took another pull at his glass of beer as the plane, showing no lights, began to drop down towards a deserted airfield once used by the West Germans for a “secret” rocket project. (The Germans had pulled out, largely as a result of political pressures, after the “secret” became known, but the installations remained. The jungle had begun to encroach on the perimeter; nevertheless, the runways were perfectly serviceable.) Mugambu burped contentedly. Yes, he reflected, he had more than fulfilled his task. Men like that pompous American, Lowell Kaplan, might think of him as a drunken oaf. How wrong they were! Half a dozen of the darts used in the operation in the crater had been tipped not with curare but with a highly potent tranquillizing drug. Two of these darts had been used to good effect. The still-alive bodies of two green monkeys, instead of being burned with the rest, had been secretly removed from the crater area — it was easy enough to find a moment when the attention of the WHO team was engaged elsewhere — and had been placed in crates that formed part of Mugambu’s personal baggage.

Mugambu had every confidence in those crates. He had personally taken delivery of them from his contact in Kinshasha. He had inspected the life-support system, the air-filtration system, the recycling system and so forth. He was personally quite convinced that there was no danger that any virus could escape from the animals while they were contained within the crates. But to make doubly sure he had insisted that his hand-picked team retain their masks and pressure suits at all times when handling the load.

The airstrip rose suddenly to meet them out of the forest. Then they were down. The Zaire Air Force DC8 taxied bumpily to the side and waited. Mugambu remained on board. There was nothing to tempt him out of the plane — the forest which loomed on all sides had a distinctly unfriendly appearance. And besides, the arrangement was that his cargo would remain on board until the other party arrived.

Sweating, now that they were on the ground, and smelling of beer, Mugambu went to stand by the open door of the plane. He lit a cigarette and the tip of it glowed in the night. He could feel the tension mounting inside him. What if the American didn’t come? Should he fly on to Kinshasha? But then

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