but he’s leaving us for dead on this climb.’
It took The Rope forty minutes to negotiate those few feet of smooth rock, but at last he had reached the underside of the overhang. He paused there for a couple of minutes, giving his aching muscles what rest he could and bracing himself for the next effort, then he jammed the fingers of his left hand into a narrow crevice, using his thumb to wedge them in place, and launched himself outwards and upwards. The first time his scrabbling fingers fell just short and he dropped back, crashing against the cliff face with an impact that made Shepherd wince, but The Rope merely steadied himself, took a deep breath, and then launched himself again. This time his flailing fingertips caught the very tip of the ledge and held firm. He adjusted his grip a fraction, braced his feet against the smooth rock face for what little extra traction they could give and then, in one movement, pulled his left hand free of the crevice and grabbed at the ledge. He was now hanging, parallel to the ground almost 3000 feet below, but in another astonishing demonstration of his upper body strength, he pulled himself up as easily as a man doing chin-ups in the gym, swung a leg over the ledge and next moment was kneeling on it, lowering a rope to Shepherd and the others, waiting below.
Half-climbing, half-hauled by The Rope, each man in turn joined him on the ledge and from there to the ridge line was a relatively easy climb up a deeply-fissured rock face. It had taken them all day but they finally reached the top. They inched their way forward to look down the other side and in the fading light they could see faint smudges of smoke drifting up from camp fires on the valley floor below them.
They ate the rest of their rations as darkness fell and then, using the ropes, they descended the rock face in stages. Enough moonlight was filtering through the cloud cover to help them navigate their way down the cliff, but the dense thickets of rhododendrons and clumps of scrub alders along the valley floor made the darkness there almost impenetrable, though the faint smell of wood smoke on the breeze showed that the terrorists’ campsite was not far away.
They held a brief whispered discussion at the foot of the cliff. ‘The terrain and the vegetation may make it difficult for us to infiltrate undetected,’ Shepherd said. ‘Without a recce, we don’t know what sentries they’ve got posted and twenty of them will be a challenge if they’re alerted before we get to them. So I think we’d be better moving a little further west. We’ll lie up there and intercept them as they move off after daybreak.’
‘Agreed,’ Jock said. ‘A linear ambush: minimum effort, maximum results.’
They moved away from the cliff, threading their way around the densest patches of rhododendrons, until they reached a track, the dusty ground underfoot shining pale grey in the moonlight. Shepherd turned to The Rope. ‘We’ll set up the ambush here, you stay in cover while we deal with the bastards that killed Gul.’
‘Like hell I will,’ The Rope said. ‘He’s family, I’m family. I’m in this with you.’
Shepherd grinned. ‘I thought you’d say that, but I had to make the offer!’
They chose a place where the track ran through a broad clearing and lay up in cover at the edge of the undergrowth, forming a linear ambush, all on the same side of the track, in a long line and spaced at twenty-yard intervals. Shepherd and Jock stationed themselves at either end with The Rope in the middle, flanked by Geordie and Jimbo.
As the first greying of the sky signalled the approach of dawn, they settled themselves, lying prone with their weapons at the ready and began the long wait.
About an hour after the sun had risen, Shepherd, closest to the terrorists’ camp, heard the first faint sounds of movement and a few minutes later, the first of them came into view, moving cautiously, the barrel of his gun tracking his gaze as
It took The Rope forty minutes to negotiate those few feet of smooth rock, but at last he had reached the underside of the overhang. He paused there for a couple of minutes, giving his aching muscles what rest he could and bracing himself for the next effort, then he jammed the fingers of his left hand into a narrow crevice, using his thumb to wedge them in place, and launched himself outwards and upwards. The first time his scrabbling fingers fell just short and he dropped back, crashing against the cliff face with an impact that made Shepherd wince, but The Rope merely steadied himself, took a deep breath, and then launched himself again. This time his flailing fingertips caught the very tip of the ledge and held firm. He adjusted his grip a fraction, braced his feet against the smooth rock face for what little extra traction they could give and then, in one movement, pulled his left hand free of the crevice and grabbed at the ledge. He was now hanging, parallel to the ground almost 3000 feet below, but in another astonishing demonstration of his upper body strength, he pulled himself up as easily as a man doing chin-ups in the gym, swung a leg over the ledge and next moment was kneeling on it, lowering a rope to Shepherd and the others, waiting below.
Half-climbing, half-hauled by The Rope, each man in turn joined him on the ledge and from there to the ridge line was a relatively easy climb up a deeply-fissured rock face. It had taken them all day but they finally reached the top. They inched their way forward to look down the other side and in the fading light they could see faint smudges of smoke drifting up from camp fires on the valley floor below them.
They ate the rest of their rations as darkness fell and then, using the ropes, they descended the rock face in stages. Enough moonlight was filtering through the cloud cover to help them navigate their way down the cliff, but the dense thickets of rhododendrons and clumps of scrub alders along the valley floor made the darkness there almost impenetrable, though the faint smell of wood smoke on the breeze showed that the terrorists’ campsite was not far away.
They held a brief whispered discussion at the foot of the cliff. ‘The terrain and the vegetation may make it difficult for us to infiltrate undetected,’ Shepherd said. ‘Without a recce, we don’t know what sentries they’ve got posted and twenty of them will be a challenge if they’re alerted before we get to them. So I think we’d be better moving a little further west. We’ll lie up there and intercept them as they move off after daybreak.’
‘Agreed,’ Jock said. ‘A linear ambush: minimum effort, maximum results.’
They moved away from the cliff, threading their way around the densest patches of rhododendrons, until they reached a track, the dusty ground underfoot shining pale grey in the moonlight. Shepherd turned to The Rope. ‘We’ll set up the ambush here, you stay in cover while we deal with the bastards that killed Gul.’
‘Like hell I will,’ The Rope said. ‘He’s family, I’m family. I’m in this with you.’
Shepherd grinned. ‘I thought you’d say that, but I had to make the offer!’
They chose a place where the track ran through a broad clearing and lay up in cover at the edge of the undergrowth, forming a linear ambush, all on the same side of the track, in a long line and spaced at twenty-yard intervals. Shepherd and Jock stationed themselves at either end with The Rope in the middle, flanked by Geordie and Jimbo.
As the first greying of the sky signalled the approach of dawn, they settled themselves, lying prone with their weapons at the ready and began the long wait.
About an hour after the sun had risen, Shepherd, closest to the terrorists’ camp, heard the first faint sounds of movement and a few minutes later, the first of them came into view, moving cautiously, the barrel of his gun tracking his gaze as
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