Special Ops - By W.E.B. Griffin Page 0,242

half-dozen cows.”

“Tell me what you want done, Thomas.”

“Go to George. See if you get them on the air. That would solve a lot of problems. Show them where we are, and have them start this way.”

“You want all of them?”

“How many are there?”

“Looks like a company: three big trucks, two pickups, and a jeep.”

“I’d like to have about twenty shooters, maybe a .30-caliber Browning. No more than that.”

“Can trucks use this track if they find it?”

“No, but the jeep might be able to make it. That would come in handy if somebody got dinged. Is it towing a trailer?”

“Yeah.”

“Tell them to try to bring the jeep and the trailer.”

“You want them now?”

“You might as well get them started now. But I don’t want to start anything today. It’s too close to dark. If we can get them assembled here, by the time they get here, I’ll reconnoiter the Simba camp.”

“I thought you said you found them.”

“I did, but we stopped trailing just before I got on the horn. We don’t think the camp is far from here. I’ll have to check that out.”

“Okay, Thomas. Watch your ass. If they get can’t get their radios working, I’ll come back.”

“Thank you. Out.”

“Birddog out.”

Thomas took a small coil of nylon cord from his pocket and used it to lash the backpack radio more securely to the tree. Then he climbed down to the ground. He went to his rucksack and took from it a small, squarish pack, three inches thick and roughly a foot square.

Sergeant First Jette squatted on the ground, holding his rifle between his knees, and watched him with unconcealed curiosity.

Jette’s eyes widened when Thomas unfolded the pack, turning it into a tent of sorts. There was a flat roof, held up by nylon lines tied to the trees Thomas had looked for and found. The walls were nylon netting reaching to the ground. The floor was separate, and held in place by tree branches Thomas cut and then sharpened and drove into the ground with the heel of his boot.

Thomas went back to his rucksack and took from it the aerosol can of insect spray he had used on Withers’s corpse; a plastic bottle that had once contained shampoo; and another, smaller pouch. He went to the tent, raised the netting, sprayed it thoroughly, and then went inside, taking his rifle and pistol with him.

He was now out of the rain in an insect-free environment. Sergeant First Jette was squatting in pouring rain, slapping at an assortment of native insects upon which the rain had no apparent effect.

“If you will take your machete and cut us wood for a fire, Sergeant First Jette, I will share my tent with you.”

“Major, sir, if I cut wood, it will not burn. It is wet.”

“If you do not cut wood, you will stay there in the rain,” Thomas said. “It’s up to you.”

“When do we kill the Simbas, Major, sir?”

“Not now, Sergeant First Jette,” Thomas said. “In the morning. Now you cut wood and I clean my weapons and then eat. Or, if you do not cut wood, then you stay there in the rain and you do not eat.”

Sergeant First Jette rose effortlessly to his feet from his squatting position, unhooked his machette from his web belt, and disappeared into the bush.

Thomas field-stripped his Car-16 weapon, sprayed the mechanism with Three-In-One oil, reassembled it, chambered a round, and then laid it on the floor of his tent. Then he did the same thing with his .45 automatic, except that instead of laying it on the tent floor, he carried it with him while he went to the tree where he had hung his rucksack and web gear. He took another plastic-wrapped package from the rucksack and returned to his tent to wait for Sergeant First Jette to finish his wood collecting.

Jette came in about five minutes, his arms full of small limbs of trees.

“Shave some slivers from the bigger pieces,” Thomas ordered. “Put them on the bottom, with some leaves from the ground, and then put the larger pieces over them, leaving enough room for air.”

“With respect, Major, sir, I know how to lay a fire.”

“But you do not know, you tell me, how to make a fire with wet green wood?”

“Wet, green wood, Major, sir, will not burn.”

“Lay the fire, Sergeant First Jette, and then as we watch the fire burn, we will have our supper.”

When Jette had laid the fire, making a nice conical shape of it, Thomas raised the