The five mercenaries grouped themselves on the afterdeck behind the crew quarters and talked until the sun was high. They all approved of the plan of attack and accepted that Shannon's reconnaissance had been accurate and precise. If anything had changed since then, if there had been an unforeseen addition to the town's defenses or improvements to the palace, they knew they could all die. They would be very few, dangerously few, for such a job, and there was no margin for things going wrong. But they accepted that either they had to win within twenty minutes or they would have to get back to their boats and leave in a hurry?those that could leave. They knew that no one
was going to come looking for wounded, and that anyone finding one of his colleagues badly hurt and immovable would be expected to give him one mercenary's last gift to another, the quick, clean way out, preferable to capture and the slow death. It was part of the rules, and they had all had to do it before.
Just before noon they parted company and turned in.
They all woke early on the morning of Day Ninety-nine. Shannon had been up half the night, watching beside Waldenberg as the coastline loomed out of the perimeter of the tiny radar screen at the rear of the wheelhouse.
"I want you to come within visual range of the coast to the south of the capital," he had told the captain, "and spend the morning steaming northwards, parallel to the shore, so that at noon we are off the coast here."
His finger jabbed the sea off the coast of Manandi. During the twenty days at sea he had come to trust the German captain. Waldenberg, having taken his money in Ploce port, had stuck by his side of the bargain, giving himself completely to making the operation as successful as he could. Shannon was confident the seaman would hold his ship at readiness four miles off the coast, a bit to the south of Clarence, while the firefight went on, and if the distress call came over the walkie-talkie, that he would wait until the men who had managed to escape rejoined the Toscana in their speedboats, before making at full power for the open sea. There was no spare man Shannon could leave behind to ensure this, so he had to trust Waldenberg.
He had already found the frequency on the ship's radio on which Endean wanted him to transmit bis first message, and this was timed for noon.
The morning passed slowly. Through the ship's telescope Shannon watched the estuary of the Zangaro River move past, a long, low line of mangrove trees along the horizon. At midmorning he could make out
the break in the green line where the town of Clarence lay, and passed the telescope to Vlaminck, Langarotti, Dupree, and Semmler. Each studied the off-white blur in silence and handed the glass to the next man. They smoked more than usual and mooched around the deck, tense and bored with the waiting, wishing, now they were so close, that they could go straight into action.
At noon Shannon began to transmit his message. He read it clear into the radio speaker. It was just one word, "Plantain." He gave it every ten seconds for five minutes, then broke for five minutes, then gave it again. Three times within thirty minutes, each time over a five-minute period, he broadcast the word and hoped that Endean would hear it somewhere on the mainland. It meant simply that Shannon and his men were on time and in position, and that they would strike Clarence and Kimba's palace in the small hours of the following morning.
Twenty-two miles away across the water, Simon Endean heard the word on his Braun transistor radio, folded the long wasp-antenna, left the hotel balcony, and withdrew into the bedroom. Then he began slowly and carefully to explain to the former colonel of the Zangaran army that within twenty-four hours he, An-toine Bobi, would be President of Zangaro. At four in the afternoon the colonel, grinning and chuckling at the thought of the reprisals he would take against those who had assisted in his ousting, struck his deal with Endean. He signed the document granting Bormac Trading Company a ten-year exclusive mining concession in the Crystal Mountains for a flat annual fee, a tiny profits-participation by the Zangaran government, and watched Endean place in an envelope and seal a check certified by a Swiss bank for half a million dollars in the name of Antoine Bobi.
In Clarence preparations went ahead through the afternoon for the following day's independence celebrations. Six prisoners, lying badly beaten in the cells
beneath the former colonial police station, listened to the cries of the Kimba Patriotic Youth marching through the streets above them, and knew that they would be battered to death in the main square as part of the celebrations Kimba had prepared. Photographs of the President were prominently hung on every public building, and the diplomatic wives prepared their migraines so they would be excused attendance at the ceremonies.
In the shuttered palace, surrounded by his guards, President Jean Kimba sat alone at his desk, contemplating the advent of his sixth year of office.
During the afternoon the Toscana and her lethal cargo put about and began to cruise slowly back down the coast from the north.
In the wheelhouse Shannon sipped his coffee and explained to Waldenberg how he wanted the Toscana placed.
"Hold her just north of the border until sundown," he told his captain. "After nine p.m., start her up again and move diagonally toward the coast. Between sundown and nine, we will have streamed the three assault craft astern of the ship, each loaded with its complement. That will have to be done by flashlight, but well away from the land, at least ten miles out.
"When you start to move, around nine, keep her really slow, so you end up here, four miles out from the shore and one mile north of the peninsula at two a.m. You'll be out of sight of the city in that position. With all lights doused, no one should see you. So far as I know, there's no radar on the peninsula, unless a ship is in port."
"Even if there is, she should not have a radar on," growled Waldenberg. He was bent over his inshore chart of the coast, measuring his distances with compasses and set-square. "When does the first craft set free and move inshore?"
"At two. That will be Dupree and his mortar crew.
The other two boats cast adrift and head for the beach one hour later. Okay?"
"Okay," said Waldenberg. "I'll have you there."
"It has to be accurate," insisted Shannon. "We'll see no lights in Clarence, even if there are any, until we round the headland. So we'll be on compass heading only, calculating by speed and heading, until we see the outline of the shore, which might be no more than a hundred meters. It depends on the sky; cloud, moon, and stars."
Waldenberg nodded. He knew the rest. After he heard the firefight begin, he was to ease the Toscana across the mouth of the harbor four miles out, and heave to again two miles to the south of Clarence, four miles out from the tip of the peninsula. From then on he would listen on his walkie-talkie. If all went well, he would stay where he was until sunup. If things went badly, he would turn on the lights at the masthead, the forepeak, and the stern, to guide the returning force back to the Toscana.
Darkness that evening came early, for the sky was overcast and the moon would not rise until the small hours of the morning. The rains had already started, and twice in the previous three days the men had weathered drenching downpours as the skies opened. The weather report from Monrovia, listened to avidly on the radio, indicated there would be scattered squalls along the coast that night, but no tornadoes, and they could only pray there would be no torrential rains while the men were in their open boats or while the battle for the palace was on.
Before sundown the tarpaulins were hauled off the equipment piled in rows along the main deck, and when darkness fell Shannon and Norbiatto began organizing the departure of the assault craft. The first over the side was the one Dupree would use. There was no point in using the derrick; the sea was only eight feet beneath the deck at the lowest point. The men lowered the fully inflated craft into the water manually, and Semmler and Dupree went down into it as it bobbed against the Toscana's side in the slow swell.
The two of them hoisted the heavy outboard engine into place over the stern and screwed it tight to the backboard. Before placing the muffler on top of it, Semmler started the Johnson up and ran her for two minutes. The Serbian engineer had already given all three engines a thorough check-over, and it ran like a sewing machine. With the muffling box on top, the noise died to a low hum.
Semmler climbed out, and the equipment was lowered to Dupree's waiting hands. There were the baseplates and sighting gear for both mortars, then the two mortar tubes. Dupree was taking forty mortar bombs for the palace and twelve for the barracks. To be on the safe side, he took sixty bombs, all primed and fused for detonation on impact.
He also took both flare-launching rockets and the ten flares, one of the gas-powered foghorns, one walkie-talkie, and his night glasses. Slung over his shoulder he had his personal Schmeisser, and tucked in his belt were five full magazines. The two Africans who were going with him, Timothy and Sunday, were the last into the assault craft.
When it was ready, Shannon stared down at the three faces that looked back up at him in the dun glow from the flashlight. "Good luck," he called softly.
For answer Dupree raised one thumb and nodded. Holding the painter of the assault craft, Semmler moved back along the rail while Dupree fended off from down below. When the craft was streamed astern of the Toscana in complete darkness, Semmler tied her painter to the after rail, leaving the three men to bob up and down on the swell.
The second boat took less time to get into the water, for the men had got the hang of it. Marc Vlaminck went down with Semmler to set the outboard engine in position, for this was their boat. Vlaminck was taking one bazooka and twelve rockets, two on his
own body, the other ten carried by his back-up man, who was Patrick. Semmler had his Schmeisser and five magazines in easy-extraction pouches hung around his belt. He had a set of night glasses around his neck and the second walkie-talkie strapped to one thigh. As he was the only man who could speak German, French, and reasonable English, he would double as the main attack party's radio operator. When the two whites were ensconced in their craft, Patrick and Jinja, who would be Semmler's back-up man, slid down the Jacob's ladder from the Toscana and took their places.
The boat was streamed astern of the ship, and Dupree's painter was passed to Semmler, who made it fast to his own assault craft. The two inflatable vessels bobbed behind the Toscana in line astern, separated by the length of rope, but none of their occupants said a word.
Langarotti and Shannon took the third and last boat. They were accompanied by Bartholomew and Johnny, the latter a big, grinning fighter who had been promoted at Shannon's insistence when they last fought together, but who had refused to take his own company, as his new rank entitled him to, preferring to stick close to Shannon and look after him.
Just before Shannon, who was the last man into the boats, descended the ladder, Captain Waldenberg appeared from the direction of the bridge and tugged at his sleeve. The German pulled the mercenary to one side and muttered quietly, "We may have a problem."
Shannon was immobile, frozen by the thought that something had gone seriously wrong. "What is it?" he asked.
"There's a ship. Lying off Clarence, farther out than we are."
"How long since you saw it?"
"Some time," said Waldenberg, "but I thought it must be cruising south down the coast, like us, or moving northward. But it's not; it's riding to."
"You're sure? There's no doubt about it?"
"None at all. When we came down the coast we
were moving so slowly that if the other had been steaming in the same direction, she'd be well away by now. If northward, she'd have passed us by now. She's immobile."
"Any indication of what she is, who she belongs to?"
The German shook his head. "The size of a freighter. No indication who she is, unless we contact her."
Shannon thought for several minutes. "If she were a freighter bringing cargo to Zangaro, would she anchor till morning before entering harbor?" he asked.
Waldenberg nodded. "Quite possible. Entry by night is frequently not allowed in some of the smaller ports along this coast. She's probably riding out until the morning before asking permission to enter port."
"If you've seen her, presumably she's seen you?" Shannon suggested.
"Bound to," said Waldenberg. "We're on her radar all right."
"Could her radar pick up the dinghies?"
"Unlikely," said the captain. "Too low in the water, most probably."
"We go ahead," said Shannon. "It's too late now. We have to assume she's just a freighter waiting out the night."
"She's bound to hear the firefight," said Waldenberg.
"What can she do about it?"
The German grinned. "Not much. If you fail, and we're not out of here before sunrise, she'll recognize the Toscana through binoculars."
"We mustn't fail, then. Carry on as ordered."
Waldenberg went back to his bridge. The middle-aged African doctor, who had watched the proceedings in silence, stepped forward.
"Good luck, Major," he said in perfectly modulated English. "God go with you."
Shannon felt like saying that he would have preferred a Wombat recoilless rifle, but held his tongue.
He knew these people took religion very seriously. He nodded, said, "Sure," and went over the side.
Out in the darkness, as he looked up at the dim blob of the Toscana's stern above him, there was complete silence but for the slap of the water against the rubberized hulls of the boats. Occasionally it gurgled behind the ship's rudder. From the landward side there was not a sound, for they were well out of earshot of the shore, and by the time they came close enough to hear shouts and laughter it would be well past midnight and, with luck, everyone would be asleep. Not that there was much laughter in Clarence, but Shannon was aware how far a single, sharp sound can travel over water at night, and everyone in his party, in the boats and on the Toscana, was sworn to silence and no smoking.
