Free Chris Ryan by The One That Got Away Page B

what to do. Clearly it was too dangerous to spend any length of time where we were, and the vital necessity was to get a message through to base, asking for a relocation or a return. The trouble was, the 319 radio did not seem to be work�ing. It should have been possible for us to communicate instantly with Forest Hero, the base station in Cyprus, and from there messages should have been back in Al Jouf within a couple of minutes. Any message from us would be passed straight to the CO or the Ops officer, whatever the time of day or night. But although Legs patiently tried dif�ferent frequencies and experimented with various aerial arrays, he could not evoke any response. What we didn't realise till much later was that we'd been given the wrong frequencies � so Legs sat there, trying and trying to get through, assuming that this was one of those days (which you often get) when atmosphere conditions are bad, and radios just don't work. For the moment there was no serious worry, because we knew that as a fall-back we had the Lost Comms procedure whereby, if we had not come on air within forty-eight hours, a helicopter would automatically return, either bringing us a new radio set or armed with a plan to shift us elsewhere. We took turns to go on stag, while the others had a meal or a sleep. We did an hour's guard-duty each, holding the clackers for detonating the claymores and watching the wadi. The rest of the guys, having had a sleepless night, were glad to get their heads down. It was so cold that several of them struggled into their NBC suits and lay around in them. We were all more or less hidden, and there was a good chance that if we kept still, even a man looking up the wadi from a distance would not have seen us. 50The One That Got Away Then, late in the afternoon, we heard voices. A boy of twelve or thirteen, his voice just breaking, began calling out, and a man answered him. Peering cautiously over the west�ern rim, we saw the boy and the man � maybe his father �driving a herd of goats. They were walking across the plain, nearly parallel to the course of the wadi, but heading in towards us as they moved northwards, and calling the goats on as they went. The truck with slatted sides was still parked the far side of the MSR, so it looked as if the goatherds had come out to check their flock, or were about to load the animals up. Either way, they were too close to us for comfort. We grabbed our weapons and lay like stones, hardly breathing, every man with a round up the spout. From the jingling of the goat bells and the voices, we reckoned the flock passed within fifty metres of our hiding place. As the sounds faded into the distance, we kept still, listening. Half an hour later, we crept to the top of the bank again to check what was hap�pening: the truck had disappeared, and there was no sign of the goats � but where they had gone, we couldn't tell. This place was decidedly bad news. There was so much activity in the area that it could only be a matter of time before we were compromised. Legs, cool as ever and lying in a hollow, redoubled his efforts to get through on the radio. Mark went over to help him, and the pair of them worked on the set, switching frequencies and rigging dif�ferent aerials. Once you get through to base, you always feel better � at least you have contact. But now there was no re�sponse, and people began to grow apprehensive. We were also getting frozen. At one point Andy came up to me and said banteringly, 'I hope your feet are cold.' `Like fucking ice,' I told him. `Good,' he said, 'I'm pleased to hear that � with those bloody boots on.' I had the best boots of anyone in the patrol. One of the guys had ordinary army boots, and a couple were wearing jungle boots. Whatever we had, our feet were numb. Oddly enough, I didn't feel hungry, and all I ate during the day was a bar of chocolate and a packet of biscuits. Contact!51 As soon as it got dark, we put out a recce party;