Kilroy climbed down as quickly as he dared, careful to avoid breaking any branches, whose sharp cracking sound would alert the troops. About halfway down to the ground, he stepped onto what he thought was a sturdy branch—only to have it move underfoot.
Recoiling, he looked down. Coiled around the branch below was a huge snake, a python twenty feet long and as thick around as his thigh. Its scaly hide was brown with dark brown bands.
It writhed, its sinuous body one giant muscle. It lifted a massive, boxy head, yellow eyes glaring. Jaws gaped, baring a fanged maw and wicked forked tongue, as it hissed a warning.
Kilroy’s heart felt like it jumped up into his mouth as he was seized for an instant by primal fear. Adrenaline flooded him.
His nerve returned. He drew the survival knife from his belt sheath and brandished it, holding on to a branch with his other hand.
The python was curled around the branch below so that its swaying head was at the far end of the branch. A long upswooping curve of its neck raised its heavy head, bringing it to Kilroy’s eye level.
Kilroy knew that the python kills not by its bite but by constriction, wrapping its muscular coils around its prey and crushing the life out of it. Lethal or not, though, a bite from those curved and gleaming three-inch fangs would be no picnic. The python also uses its hard head as a club to stun its victim into insensibility.
He and the python were eye to eye. “I’ll cut your fucking head off,” Kilroy rasped throatily. He wasn’t sure he believed it, and he didn’t think the python did, either.
The python hissed in response, a sound like the venting of a steam engine.
Steadily eyeing the serpent, Kilroy squirmed away from it, circling to the other side of the trunk. One foot extended, he felt around with it until he found a lower branch opposite that wasn’t occupied by the python.
Clenching the flat of his blade between his teeth to free his hand, Kilroy hastily climbed from his perch, scrambling down the side of the tree. Coming to a branch twelve feet above the ground, he gripped it in both hands, extended his arms full length beneath it, and hang-dropped to the earth below. Soft, marshy soil cushioned his fall, which he took on bent legs.
The python remained where it was on the branch, looping its head around the trunk to follow Kilroy’s progress. Kilroy scrambled out from under the tree.
Raynor was on his feet, holding the M-16 in one hand, muzzle angled toward the serpent. Kilroy sheathed his knife, securing the butt strap that held it in place. “Don’t shoot—he’s harmless.”
Raynor laughed without mirth. “That must be why you got down that tree so fast.”
Kilroy grabbed his rifle. The python made no move to pursue. Kilroy gave the snake a dirty look. “You’re lucky I didn’t turn you into a pair of cowboy boots, you prick,” he said to it.
The python seemed unimpressed.
“What’d you see up there? Apart from your new buddy, that is,” Raynor asked.
“One of those good news, bad news deals,” Kilroy said. “The bad news is that there’re troops a quarter mile west of us. There’s a river there—the Rada, I think. They’ve got a boat looking for us. Ground troops, too.”
“How many?”
“A shitload. There’s a flooded area to our east. Looked like there were boats out there, too.”
“And the good news?”
“There’s a big river to the south. The Kondo, the one that’ll take us to the coast.”
Raynor showed his teeth in a forced grin. “How far, Kilroy?”
That was the question. On foot through the swamp, while being sought by a small army? And Raynor with a skinful of poison, his condition worsening by the hour?
“How far?” Raynor repeated.
“A day’s march,” Kilroy said, not sugarcoating it, giving it to him straight. Raynor’s face fell, his expression one of defeat.
“Or a couple of hours by boat,” Kilroy added quickly.
“We don’t have a boat,” Raynor said. “Why not wish for an airplane while you’re at it?”
“We’ll steal one or hijack it from the Nigerians. If it comes to it, we can build a raft and float downstream on it by night.”
“It’s a plan, anyway.” Raynor’s tone was bleak.
He and Kilroy resumed their trek, crossing south across the basin. Not much of a hike if they had been able to move in a straight line. But the swamp offered few straightaways and no easy routes.
It was a journey of constant detours, zigzagging between isolated spans of solid ground too soon interrupted by marshy bogs, impenetrable thickets, and channels too deep to ford.
Several hours passed before they neared the basin’s south rim. The way was barred by a belt of black muck some fifteen feet wide.
Kilroy used his knife to cut off the branches of a slender sapling, trimming it down to an eight-foot pole. Toeing the edge of the black belt, he probed the mud with the pole. The stuff was deeper than a man’s height.
Not quicksand, but quickmud.
Twenty yards away, a fallen tree stretched across the black belt at right angles. It had once stood on the far side but had toppled toward the near side, forming a natural bridge that spanned the quickmud. The trunk was largely bare of branches where it crossed the obstacle; it was three feet in diameter, its rounded upper surface partly covered by patches of moss.
Raynor handed Kilroy his M-16. “You take it. My sense of balance is a little shaky. I wouldn’t want to fall in and foul it.”
“You won’t,” Kilroy said, but he took the weapon, slinging it over his left shoulder.
Raynor went first, stepping up onto the fallen tree.
“Easy,” Kilroy said. “Take whatever time you need.”
“The longer I stand here dicking around, the more likely I am to fall,” said Raynor.
“Cross it on hands and knees if you have to.”
Raynor shook his head. “My best chance is to scoot across.” He stood sideways, leading with his left side. His legs were spread wider than shoulder width apart. “Here goes nothing,” he said.
He edged across the tree like a basketball player moving sideways downcourt. He lifted his left foot, moving it forward, planting it securely before lifting his right foot and advancing it. A mechanical style but it seemed to be working for him.
He reached the midpoint of the tree before his foot slipped. He cut off a choked cry, fighting for balance. He regained his footing and sidestepped quickly, hurrying to the far side.
Raynor had reached the opposite bank when he pitched forward, falling headfirst toward the serpentine tangle of dirt-encrusted roots that spread umbrella-like from the base of the downed tree.
His right arm flailed around seeking a handhold to arrest his fall, not finding one. He fell heavily on his left side. Gnarled roots cushioned his fall. Still, he shrieked with pain.
His outcry pierced the thick, oppressive air.
A troop of monkeys clustered in a nearby tree fled, startled, loosing a chorus of shrillings and chatterings as they scrambled to the tips of the boughs and flung themselves through empty space to a neighboring treetop.
Kilroy nimbly crossed the tree bridge to the opposite side. Raynor lay still, unmoving, tangled in brownish-white root work. His eyes were squeezed shut; pencil-thick veins stood out on his forehead.
“Bill. Bill!” Kilroy said