Free The Mysterious Ambassador by Lee Falk Page B

Diana indignantly.
"To coin a phrase, Diana, might makes right," said Luaga.
The Phantom nodded. He liked this kind of clarity. "You will make a good president, Lamanda Luaga," he said.
     
"A good president? How?" said Luaga bitterly. "He has the army, he has everything now. I'm a doctor with a stethoscope."
"It's not over. It has only begun," said the Phantom. "Your time will come. For now, we must ask Kirk to cancel that second rescue team before Bababu shoots them down. And we must remain here for a time until the army clears out of the jungle."
They all looked at him hopefully, inspired by his confidence.
"Our time will come? When?" asked the lawyer, Onata Omu.
"Soon. There's an old Wambesi saying—where there's life there's hope."
"Wambesi?" said Luaga, smiling.
"Universal," said the Phantom.
In Bababu's palace, the two new pilots, Davis and Fredericks, waited in the ornate reception room with Ambassador Cari. The second rescue crew had arrived at Mawitaan airport only an hour earlier.
"What's the scoop on this general?" asked Davis, a tall lean man.
Ambassador Cari shrugged and rolled his eyes to the ceiling as if he'd seen something vile.
"A reporter at the airport said he was a butcher with the manners of a hungry tiger," said Fredericks, a burly ex-marine.
"Shhsh," said Cari. "The walls have ears."
"Do the walls understand English?"
"The walls have translators."
Almost on cue, the inner door opened and Colonel Mokata stepped out. They looked at him, startled. Had lie heard? But he smiled coldly. Evidently, he hadn't.
"The general will see you now," he said.
Bababu sat back in his leather chair, his familiar cigarette holder in one hand, a beaker of beer in the other hand. He nodded to Cari and looked pleasantly at the two pilots.
"We're the new crew," said Davis. "Here to get the UN medical team out of the jungle."
Bababu nodded and belched.
"We were told we needed your personal permission to make the flight," continued Davis.
Bababu nodded again, enjoying himself.
"Do we have it?" asked Davis.
"You do," said Bababu. "Why not? Your brave doctors have helped my people, is it not true, Cari? Yours is an errand of mercy. Go, with my blessing."
"Thank you, sir," said Davis, surprised.
"I'm glad you are here, Cari," said Bababu. "I wish to apply for membership in your United Nations."
"That is not in my hands," said Cari, with no expression on his face.
"I understand you do not decide such matters. However, your recommendations would be weighty, true?" said Bababu.
Cari shrugged. "Mine would be one voice among many."
"One highly respected voice," said Bababu, determined to present himself as statesman as well as conqueror.
"Thank you," said Cari.
"Will you speak for me, for us?" said Bababu.
Cari looked at him silently for a moment.
"There is the matter of the elected congress and the elected President, Luaga," he said.
Bababu started to swell with rage, then controlled himself.
"The congress is returning," he said, ignoring the mention of Luaga. "They will make me President. It will be announced."
"How can they? The people who elected them also elected Lamanda Luaga as President," said Cari quietly.
Bababu exploded with anger. He smashed the glass beaker on his desk, beer spilling over the polished top and on his own fancy uniform.
"Are you an ambassador or an idiot?" he roared. "I told you in this very room that Luaga"—he pronounced the name through clenched teeth as though hating the sound—"that Luaga is dead. Dead, Dead, Dead!"
The pilots stared at the enraged dictator, then at the neat, calm Cari.
"So you did. You promised evidence. We have seen no evidence," he said in a quiet voice.
He knew it was an easy matter for Bababu to end the matter with a simple statement that he now ruled. But like Luaga, he also knew why Bababu wanted some show of legitimacy—the promised loans of many millions intended to establish industry in the new nation—money that Bababu would doubtless put in his own pocket, or, more