the pilot. Paul Schramm leaned forward and pointed at the altimeter. âLose some height,â he said. âLose a lot of height, in fact. Iâll never see anything from up here.â
âYouâll see even less if I go into that muck.â
âLetâs try, anyway.â
The pilot turned the plane through a right angle as easily as if he were swinging on a lamppost, and leveled out, but he did not lose height.
âTheyâre down there somewhere,â Schramm said. âI know it. What are you afraid of?â
âI donât trust this squalid altimeter,â the pilot said.
âFor Christâs sake! It got us over the Jebel! Besides, thereâs nothing near here to fly into. Itâs all just desert.â
âMaybe. This wreck was being pulled apart in a hangar only an hour ago. I bet they bust the altimeter. Bet they forgot to reset it.â
âLooks good to me.â
âAnyway, thereâs desert and desert. Iâve seen dunes a hundred meters high in the Calanscio.â He meant the Sand Sea that formed the eastern side of the Jalo Gap. It did indeed look like a sea: a succession of monstrously heaving waves and swells.
âWeâre nowhere near the Calanscio,â Schramm said. âWeâre in the Gap, arenât we?â
âI donât trust that squalid compass,â the pilot said. âThereâs something peculiar about it.â He swung onto another leg of the search and watched the compass react. âDamned mechanics,â he muttered. âFirst thing they do is bust the compass.â
Schramm lost patience. âGet down there,â he ordered. âOr Iâll have you court-martialled.â
The pilot sighed and eased the control column forward. The haze gradually thickened until it was like flying through industrial smog, yellow-brown, quivering with dust. Visibility was so bad that it was impossible to tell where the haze ended and the desert began. The horizon wasnât much help: just a blur where brown-yellow turned to yellow-brown. âWeâre down,â the pilot grunted. âHope you like it.â
For ten minutes they searched and saw nothing. By then they both knew they were through the Gap and on the edge of the open desert, with the Calanscio receding to their left and Jalo Oasis falling behind to their right. Schramm realized now what a barren idea this search had been.Guessing where the enemy was didnât necessarily mean you could do anything about it.
âYou know this wreck flies on fuel, donât you?â said the pilot.
âI know.â Schramm glanced at the gauge. Low.
âYou canât trust that,â the pilot said. âFirst thing they do is bust the fuel gauge.â
âAll right. Since weâve got to go back, letâs stay down and look for wheel tracks.â
âIs that all you want? Christ, if thatâs all you want I can show you dozens of them, hundreds. Itâs like an autobahn down there, next exit five hundred kilometers south, Kufra. Our Latin comrades used to have a garrison down at Kufra, you know.â
âI know.â
âThat was before the British turned up.â
âI know that too.â
âFirst thing the British do is bust the Italians.â
âIâve heard enough from you,â Schramm said. âJust drive the bus.â
The plane flew north. The pilot had been right: tire tracks were everywhere. Some were obviously old, partly smoothed by the wind, but many were new. Or looked new. Schramm despaired. A month, a week, five minutes; who could tell the difference? Then the pilot nudged him. Schramm looked where the pilot was looking, away to the left. Five square blobs on wheels. âGet closer,â he said.
The pilot circled, edging slightly inwards. The vehicles were moving very slowly.
âCould be an Italian patrol,â Schramm said. âI canât tell from