Leopard Hunts in Darkness - Smith Wilbur - Страница 160

"No." Very small and faint. "I can't do it." "Then none of us are going anywhere," he said sharply.

"It's the only way out. You do it or we rot here. Do you hear me?" He worked up close beneath her, so that her sagging buttocks were pressed into his belly. Then he braced with all his strength, pressing with both legs into one side of the chimney and with his shoulders into the other, forming a human bridge beneath her.

"Slowly let go," he whispered. "Sit on my stomach."

"Craig, I'm too heavy."

"Do it, damn you. Do id" Her weight came onto him, and the pain was too much to bear. His sinews and muscles were tearing, his vision filled with flashing lights.

"Now straighten up,"he blurted.

She came up onto her -knees; her kneecaps bit into his flesh like crucifixion n.41s.

"Stand!"he groaned. Quickly!" She tottered on the unsteady platform of his body as she came upright.

"Reach up! High as you can!"

"Craig, there is a hole up here!" "Can you get into it?" No reply. She shifted her stance on him, and he cried aloud with the effort of holding her.

She bounced, and then her weight was gone. He heard her feet scrabbling against the shaft and the brush of the rope as she drained herself upwards and it followed her likea monkey's tail.

"Craig, it's a shelf a cave!"

"Find somewhere to tie your end of the rope." A minute, and another he couldn't hold out, his limbs were numb, his shoulders were'I've tied it! It's safe." He tugged on the rope and it came up firm and secure.

He took a loop around his wrist and let his feet go. He swung out of the chimney and dangled into the open shaft.

He pulled himself up the rope, hand over hand, and then he tumbled over the sill into the stone window, and Sally-Anne hugged him to her bosom. Too far gone to speak, he clung to her likea child to its mother.

"What is happening up there?" Tungata could not contain his impatience.

"We have found another lead," Craig called back. "It must be open to the surface somewhere there are bats."

"What must we do?"

"I am going to drop the rope. There will be a loop in it.

Sarah first. She will have to cross the pole and get into the loop. The two of us will be able to pull her up." It was a long message to shout. "Do you understand?"

"Yes. I'll make her do it." Craig tied a loop in the end of the rope, and then, in complete darkness, crawled back to the anchor point that Sally' Anne had chosen. He ran his hands over it. It was a pinnacle of rock, twelve feet back from the ledge and her knot was good. He went back and dropped the looped end down into the shaft. He lay on his stomach and peered down into the echoing darkness. The fire glow was far below, a dull furnace redness. He could hear the whisper of their voices.

"What's keeping you?" he demanded.

Then he saw the dark shape, only just visible in the firelight, moving out across the pole bridge. It was too big to be one person, and then he realized that both Tungata and Sarah were on the pole together. Tungata was coaxing her across, riding out backwards and drawing her after him.

They moved out of sight, directly below the window.

"Pupho, swing the rope to the left." Craig obeyed, and felt the tug on it as Tungata grabbed the swinging loop.

"All right, Sarah is in the loop."

"Explain to her that she must walk up the rock as we pull her." Sally-Anne sat directly behind Craig, the rope running over his shoulder to her. Craig had his feet braced against the side wall.

"Pull!" he ordered, and quickly she picked up the rhythm of it. Sarah was small and slim, but it was a long haul and Craig's hands were raw. It was five minutes of hard work before they dragged her over the sill and the three of them rested together.

"All right, Sam. We are ready for you now." He dropped the loop into the shaft.

There were three of them on the rope now, sitting one behind the other, but Tungata was a big, heavy man. Craig could hear the girls whimpering and sobbing with the effort.

"Sam, can you jam V6urself into the chimney?" Craig gasped. "Give us a re5tr He felt the weight go off the rope, and the three of them lay in a heap and rested.

"All right, let's go again." Tungata seemed even heavier now, but finally he came tumbling into the window, and none of them could talk for a while.

Craig was the first to find his voice. "Oh, shit, we forgot the diamonds! We left the bloody diamonds."

PP

There was a click and a yellow glow of light as Tungata switched on the second lantern that he had brought up with him. They all blinked owlishly at each other, and Tungata chuckled hoarsely.

"Why do you think I was so heavy?" He held the canvas bag in his lap, and as he patted it, the diamonds crunched together with a sound likea squirrel chewing nuts.

"Hero!" Craig grunted with relief. "But switch off, there are only a few minutes" life left in that battery." They used the lantern in flashes. The first flash showed them that the rock window opened into a low-roofed cave, so wide that they could not make out the side walls. The roof was coated with a furry mass of bats. Their eyes were a myriad pinpricks of reflected light and their naked faces were pink and hideous as they stared down at them, hanging upside down.