Bloody Passage (v5) by Jack Higgins

Author:Jack Higgins
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Published: 2011-03-16T03:09:32+00:00

8

Fire in the Night

In spite of the weather we sighted a considerable number of small fishing craft on the way in--tunny boats mostly. By the time we were close inshore, the storm seemed to have blown itself out, the wind dropping, leaving only a calm gray evening with a light rain falling.

The entrance to Gela Bay was a narrow passage between two jagged peaks which according to the charts, were known as the Sisters. Inside, there was an enormous landlocked lagoon fringed by white beaches and backed by a scattering of palm trees. There was a stone pier and a couple of motorized fishing dhows were tied up there. There were perhaps half-a-dozen flat-roofed houses scattered among the palm trees--no more.

We dropped anchor in a part of the channel where there was eight to ten fathoms of water. Barzini cut the engine and came out to join Langley and Simone and me at the rail.

The rain hissed down into the water of the lagoon. "Come to sunny Africa," Langley observed.

"So what?" I said. "You're not here to get a tan."

Nino and Angelo Carter appeared from the companionway looking pale. I said to Simone, "Try to get some food down them, will you? We've got work to do. They aren't going to be much good in this state."

She shepherded them below and Barzini said, "Now what?"

"I'll go ashore and see what's what. Zingari might be there now. You never know. Are you coming?"

"No, I'll stay. Take the pretty boy here with you. He probably needs the exercise."

If he was trying to bait Langley he was wasting his time for he simply grinned good-humoredly and gave me a hand to get the large inflatable dinghy over the side.

I pressed the starting button on the outboard motor and we moved in toward the shore. There wasn't much activity. An Arab with a white turban wound around his head, came out of the wheelhouse of one of the fishing boats and looked across at us and a small boy stood at the water's edge in the rain and watched us come in.

We ran the dinghy up on shore and got out. Langley said, "Now what?"

"I don't know," I said. "Maybe Zingari won't be here until later. We'll have a look around."

"At what?" he inquired.

I led the way, moving up from the beach past the stone pier. The houses were poor places, two of them on the edge of an olive grove. Another had a large veranda and, to judge by the baskets and fishing nets which hung from the roof and the cooking pots on display, was obviously the local store.

A man wearing a woolen barracan, the day-to-day dress of the average Libyan, was drinking a bottle of beer and watching us at the same time.

At the other end of the olive grove there was a huddle of black goatskin tents, a hobbled gray camel and a few goats grazing on the stunted grass. Nothing else except the harsh, barren landscape beyond, the dirt road dwindling into infinity.

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