Part 38 (1/2)

His whole attention was fixed on the dwindling speck of blue, so that he did not see the three CV3 tanks crawl out of the e five hundred yards away

He was still staring upwards as the tanks stopped, rocking gently on their suspensions, and the turrets with the long Spandaus traversed around towards him

He did not hear the crash of cannon for the shell struck long before the sound carried to hi impact and the burst of shell that hurled him from the hatch

He lay on the earth beside the shattered hull, and he felt doards with his good hand, for there was soroped down, and there was nothing where his sto hole into which his hand sunk, as though into the soft warm flesh of a rotten fruit

He tried to withdraw his hand, but it would not rew darker

He tried to open his eyes and then realized that they ide open, staring up at the bright sky The darkness was in his head, and the cold was in his whole body

In the darkness and the icy cold, he heard a voice say in Italian, ”E ht with mild surprise, ”Yes, I arin, but his lips would notup at the sky with pale blue eyes

He is dead,” repeated Gino

”Are you certain?” Count Aldo Belli demanded from the turret of the tank

”Si, I am certain” Warily the Count cli the htened up and puffed out his chest

”Gino,” he colish bandit” And Gino backed away, staring into the viewfinder of the big black camera

”Chin up a little, ht the Puss Moth out over the final crest of the pass, with a mere two hundred feet to spare, for the s

Ahead of her, the highlands stretched away to Addis Ababa in the south Below her passed the thin rawlines of the Dessie road She saw the road was deserted The arh the net but the thought gave her no pleasure

She turned in her seat and looked back, down the long glooe Froe, the rain waters still fell in silver white waterfalls and muddy cataracts so that it seehtened up in her seat, and lifting her hand to her face she found without surprise that her own cheek et and slick with tears

The novels of Wilbur Smith

The Courtney Novels:

When the Lion Feeds

The Sound of Thunder

A Sparrow Falls