The Serene Invasion (4 page)

Ben grunted. She tugged her wrists apart and the twine separated. She was taken by a quick panic. What to do now? Take up the sword and rush from the hut, and attack while they prayed? She turned and peered cautiously through the window, then swore under her breath.

“What? Ben asked.

The Somali was back on the truck, stationed behind the machine gun. The Arabs were standing, brushing sand from their faded military garb.

She turned and sat down quickly, placing her hands behind her back. She glanced at Ben. Great beads of sweat stood out like dew on his face.

The Arabs stepped back into the hut. Ali propped his rifle in the corner near the open door. He approached the camera, knelt and fingered the controls. Sally watched the other man move across the hut and take up the sword. He hefted it in both hands, assessing its balance. His face was expressionless as he concentrated on the weapon. He really does not feel a thing, she thought; we might indeed be pigs to the slaughter.

Ali was looking from Sally to Ben, as if trying to decide which one of them should die first. When his attention returned to the camera, she thought, she would make a run for the gun beside the door.

She had never in her life fired a weapon. Did the rifle have a safety mechanism, a catch that had to be switched before she could fire? Or could she simply aim the rifle and pull the trigger?

She decided to shoot the sword-wielder first, and then aim at Ali. She would keep him alive, tell Ben to order the Somali to jump from the truck and move away. She would like to keep Ali alive, deliver him to the authorities...

She smiled at the absurdity of the thought.

“You,” Ali snapped, gesturing to Ben. “You first.” He moved from the camera, reached down and took Ben’s arm, dragging him towards the butcher’s block. Ben caught her eyes, desperation and pleading on his face.

Ali pushed him into a kneeling position before the block, head down. The swordsman stepped forward, took Ben roughly by the scruff of his neck and forced his face towards the curved timber slab. He pushed down brutally. Ben’s chin hit the timber, slid over the edge. His neck looked horribly exposed.

“Sally...” Ben sobbed.

The Arab stepped back, positioning himself with a fidgeting two-footed shuffle like a golfer addressing a tee-shot. He adjusted his hold on the hilt of the sword until he’d achieved a comfortable grip.

I must act, she thought; I must act now.

She screamed and launched herself forwards. She scattered the camera and tripod, caroming into Ali and knocking him off his feet. She reached out and grabbed the gun. Fumbling with the remarkably heavy weapon, she slipped her forefinger around the curved metal of the trigger.

She lifted the rifle, swaying, and pointed it at Ali and the other Arab.

Both men stared at her, frozen. Ali had picked himself up from the floor and was crouched, stilled by the weapon in her hands. The Arab with the sword was poised as if flash-frozen, his expression incredulous.

Before she thought what to do next, Ali’s eyes lifted, flicked behind her, and in that instant Sally thought: I should not have screamed...

Something slammed into the back of her head and she yelled in pain and fell to the floor, spilling the rifle.

Someone kicked her in the stomach – the swordsman – and the Somali who’d attacked her now dragged her in the corner and squatted over her, forcing the muzzle of his pistol against her temple.

She breathed hard, fighting the pain that throbbed in the back of her skull.

On the floor, foetal, Ben was sobbing to himself.

Ali was yelling at her, incoherent with rage, spittle flying.

The Somali said, “He says, you watch your boyfriend die, then your turn.”

On the floor, Ben began to recite the Lord’s Prayer.

Sally curled against the wall and stared at Ben, unable to close her eyes despite knowing what – thanks to her incompetence – was about to happen.

Ali picked up the camera and reassembled the tripod. He switched it on, caught Sally’s eye and smiled.

The swordsman stepped up to the block for the second time, adjusted his footing, then his grip, and lifted the sword.

Sally wanted to cry out, vent her rage, but all she could do was cower into herself and sob.

The swordsman raised the weapon above his head, its blade catching the sunlight.

Sally looked away, biting her lip, steeling herself for the terrible sound of the sword as it hit the back of Ben’s neck.

The moment seemed to go on forever.

Through the window, she saw something flash high in the sky. She looked up, experiencing the ridiculous hope that it might be a helicopter, searching for them. She saw nothing more than a glint of light high up, soon gone. The blue sky seemed to have dulled, as if a mist had descended.

She stared at the timber beside her head, holding herself tight, the point of the Somali’s pistol still pressed, painful and hot, against the skin of her temple.

“...
for ever and ever, Amen
...”

Then silence.

She wondered if the swordsman was playing a vindictive game, delaying the inevitable so that Ben should suffer all the more.

She forced her gaze from the wall and stared at the swordsman. He stood, legs apart, sword half raised, a curious expression of puzzlement on his bearded face.

Ali yelled at him in Arabic.

Sword still poised, horizontal to his body above Ben’s bared neck, the swordsman replied. He appeared faintly comical, frozen in position, speaking in a low voice.

Beside her, the Somali sniggered to himself.

Ali strode over to the swordsman, reached out and slapped his face softly, almost mockingly.

On the floor at their feet, Ben still murmured the Lord’s Prayer with quiet dignity.

As she watched, the swordsman turned away from Ben and dropped the sword on the floor, and Sally could only assume that, for some reason, he had been unable to bring himself to murder Ben.

Yelling his disgust, Ali snatched up the sword, pushed the Arab to one side, and stood over Ben. He raised the sword, and this time Sally could not bring herself to avert her gaze.

When Ali had raised the sword so that it was at a right angle to his body, he paused. Or, at least, that was what it looked like to Sally. He held the sword at arm’s length, directly above Ben’s neck, and seemed unable to lift the weapon any further. He appeared to be shaking as if with suppressed rage.

From where he was leaning against the wall, in a state of shock, the watching Arab said something.

Beside her, the crouching Somali shouted at Ali. He turned to Sally and said, “They are cowards. Typical Yemenis.” He spat something at them in Arabic.

Dazed, Ali backed from the chopping block until he fetched up against the wall, the sword dangling in his grip.

On the floor, Ben timorously looked up. He raised himself so that he was kneeling, and stared at his tormentors with nascent hope on his face.

The Somali swore, surged to his feet and crossed the floor in two strides. Before Sally could cry out in horror at what he was about to do, he raised the gun to Ben’s forehead and pulled the trigger.

Or attempted to pull the trigger.

He stood with the pistol connected to Ben’s sweat-beaded forehead, arm outstretched, an expression of ridiculous concentration on his thin face, like an infant attempting to perform a feat beyond his capabilities. He was convulsing, his whole body taken by a violent tremor.

No matter how hard he tried, the gun would not go off.

He cursed, flung the pistol aside, and grabbed Ali’s rifle from where it lay on the floor. He swung the gun, inserted his finger into the trigger guard, and aimed at Ben.

The doctor closed his eyes, his lips moving in silent prayer.

As if released from paralysis, acting without fully knowing what she was doing, Sally pushed herself across the floor, grabbed the Somali’s discarded pistol and stood quickly.

She held the weapon at arm’s length, hands trembling, and directed it at the Somali. “Drop the rifle,” she said in a voice that quavered maddeningly.

The Somali seemed to be caught in indecision. His eyes flicked towards the Arabs, as if seeking orders.

Ali moved towards her, reaching out.

Sally lifted the pistol, aimed above his head, and pulled the trigger. This time the weapon fired, deafeningly loud in the confines of the hut. The Arabs flinched and cowered back against the wall. The Somali dropped the rifle and stared at her.

The bullet had splintered the timbers in the ceiling, and a brilliant shaft of golden sunlight fell through like a spotlight, falling on Ben as he knelt in prayer in the centre of the room.

“If you move,” she said, aiming at the terrorists, “you die...” Her voice trembled. She said to Ben, “Go out to the truck. See if the keys are in the ignition.”

Ben rose to his feet and moved slowly, his arms still bound behind his back, and walked towards the door. “Sally...?”

“Just get out of here!”

“Sally, don’t shoot them, okay. Just don’t shoot them...”

He left the hut.

She said to Ali, “Where are the keys?”

He licked his lips. “In the...”

He was interrupted by Ben’s shout. “They’re here.”

Sally backed to the door, gripping the pistol in her outstretched hands.

Despite what the three had put her through, Ben’s abjuration to leniency was redundant. She had no desire to exact revenge.

“If you move,” she said, “I will shoot. Don’t move until we’ve driven away from here.”

She backed through the door, aiming at the cowering trio all the while, until she came to the truck.

She cursed Ben silently for not having the engine revving, then remembered that his hands were still tied. She reached behind her with one hand, found the door handle and pulled. Within the hut, the terrorists stood watching her, frozen.

She slipped into the driver’s seat, expecting them to rush her at any second. Ben was beside her, sitting awkwardly in the passenger seat, knotted hands behind his back. With a surge of adrenaline she lodged the pistol between the dashboard and the windscreen and gunned the engine. The truck bucked, jolted, and surged forward.

She glanced back at the hut as she turned the truck and accelerated away. There was no sign of Ali or the others.

Ben said something over the roar of the engine.

“What?” Sally yelled.

Ben said, “My prayers were answered, Sally.”

She looked up, through the windscreen. It was late afternoon, and the sun should have been bright above the distant tree line. All she saw was a diffuse blur where the fiery ball should have been.

She said, “Their guns jammed, Ben. We were lucky.”

“You saw them, saw what happened. It was the work of the Lord. Their guns did not jam, Sally. They just could not bring themselves to kill us.”

She shook her head. “I don’t know what the hell happened. I’m just grateful...”

She brought the truck to a sudden stop, leaned through the window and vomited.

S
HE FOLLOWED THE
wadi to the road running north-south, and turned left.

She accelerated, residual fear pushing her to drive at speed. She knew the terrorists had no means of leaving the hut other than on foot, but it was as if what they had subjected her to was affecting her rationality. She half expected the men to leap out at them from behind the passing trees.

They came to a T-junction and Sally braked.

Ben said, “I know where we are. See, in the distance, the village of Moganda. We are perhaps one hour away from Kallani.”

“Turn around, Ben, and I’ll try to untie you.”

She picked at the tight knot until she had worked the twine loose and pulled the binds free. He smiled at her, rubbing his wrists.

She gunned the engine and turned right. She checked the fuel gauge, smiled when she saw that it indicated the tank was a little less than half full.

The decision came upon her unexpectedly. She knew, once she arrived back at the medical centre, that she would locate Dr Krasnic and resign then and there. Krasnic would demur, tell her to take a break and think through her decision. But she also knew that she was never going to work at Kallani again.

She had given the place five years of her life, and that was quite enough.

They came to the outskirts of Kallani just under an hour later. A crowd surged along the high street. An almost palpable sense of excitement filled the humid late afternoon air. The attack at the medical centre was big news, in a place where for month after month nothing ever happened.

They edged through the crowds, drove through the centre of town, and minutes later arrived at the medical centre. The gates were open, and within Sally made out two Ugandan army trucks, a police car and a Red Cross jeep.

Crowds milled outside and within the compound so that their return, edging through the citizens and into the medical centre, was hardly commented upon.