Canal Dreams (1989) #7 by Iain M. Banks

Author:Iain M. Banks [Banks, Iain M.]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: General, Fiction
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Sucre looked wide-eyed at her for a second.

She stared back. The firing deep inside the ship

went on. Sucre grabbed her hand, spun her round in

front of him and threw her through the door, back

into the corridor he’d bundled her out of minutes

earlier. ‘Down!’ he shouted, ramming the rifle into

her back, making her run. She half-fell down the

stairs, Sucre clattering behind her. The firing

stopped beneath them as they went down the next

companionway.

Grey smoke drifted from the doorway of

theNadia ‘s saloon into the corridor. She could

hear crying and shouts. Sucre screamed at her to

keep going; the gun hit her in the lower back again.

The saloon was thick with acrid, stinging

smoke. Bodies lay amongst the plush chairs and

couches like obscene scatter cushions. She was

standing behind one of thevenceristas ; he was

shouting, waving his gun around.

Anothervencerista stood behind the bar, heavy

machine-gun poised, smoke curling from it.

She looked at the bodies. The ringing in her ears

made it difficult to hear things, but she thought

somebody was calling her name. The bodies

covered much of the floor, almost from end to end

of the room. A few of the dark-skinned men were

still at the far end, standing there with their hands

behind their heads, looking cowed and terrified.

‘Hisako!’ She heard her name, and raised her

head. It was Philippe. She was shoved towards

him anyway, pushed in the back so that she had no

choice but to move, and so ran across the bloody

carpet, stumbled over bodies to him. He hugged

her, mumbled in French into her hair, but the

ringing noise smothered all his words.

Sucre was shouting at the other twovenceristas .

Then he ran down the length of the saloon and

screamed at the Moroccan and Algerian men

standing there. He slapped one, punched another in

the belly, and clubbed a third with his rifle,

sending the man crumpling to the deck.

Morevenceristas piled in through the door, waving

their guns. Sucre kicked one of the Algerians in the

leg, making the man hop about, trying to keep his

balance while not moving his hands from the back

of his head; Sucre kicked him in the other leg,

making him fall over.

‘Hisako, Hisako,’ Philippe said. She leant her

head on his shoulder, and looked through the room;

at Sucre kicking the curled up Algerian lying on the

floor near the far wall; at Mandamus, squatting

beneath an up-ended chair, bulging out from under

it like a snail too big for its shell; at Broekman,

lying on the floor, looking up now; at Janney and

the Bleveans, Captain Bleveans holding his wife’s

head down near the floor at the side of the couch

the motionless Janney lay upon; at Endo, sitting

back against the wall, cross-legged, like a slim-

line buddha.

‘Hisako -- ‘

‘These men were very stupid!’ Sucre shrieked

at them, waving his gun at the Moroccans and

Algerians. ‘They died, see!’ He kicked one of the

bodies on the floor. They weren’t all dead; Hisako

could hear moans. ‘This what you want?’ Sucre

shouted. ‘This what you want? They died like that

stupid gringo kid out there!’ Hisako wondered if

anyone of the people Sucre was shouting at would

realise he meant Orrick. ‘You want this, do you?

You want to die? Is that what you want, huh? Is it?’

He seemed really to want an answer.

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