Hyena Dawn (5 page)

‘
You’ll get everything available — legally and illegally. And Rayne, you’ll be in command.’

‘
You bastard, sir.’

‘
My pleasure, Captain Gallagher. I knew you couldn’t resist it.’

Major Martin Long walked down the long gravel drive that led from the hospital buildings to the road. He hated himself. He shouldn’t have done it, but then who the hell else was there that he could have used? If Sam found out, she’d never forgive him.

The approaches made to him had been subtle. The Americans had obviously been looking for the right man for a long time, and then the CIA must have seen the intelligence reports on Gallagher. Rayne was an incredible fighter; he was also the only white man Long knew who could disguise himself as a black man and convince another black - his mastery of black languages was that good.

Who could really know what had gone on, out there in Mozambique? Rayne had started operating on his own a month before. Sheer suicide, they’d all thought, but he’d survived, and he had led the army into some of the biggest terrorist camps they’d found for a long time.

Now the Americans wanted to use him for their crazy mission. It had to be done, of course, the Russians had to be stopped. The timing was perfect: mentally speaking, Rayne was a total mess.

The door of the car was opened for Long by his army driver. He paused for a moment before getting in, and looked back at the hospital. There was still time. He could go back and tell Rayne they felt he wasn’t well enough to do the job.

The car door slammed as he got in. The driver jumped in the front and pulled away. Sometimes, Major Martin Long thought, it was better not to think at all.

Rayne lay back in the wheelchair, thinking about the rollercoaster of events that had got him where he was. It had all started four and a half years ago, in May 1974. His mind drifted back to that time, helped by the effects of the drugs. He had been a different person then, with different goals. He had just turned twenty-one. He already had his BA in law, passed with straight As, and was in his final year of the LLB degree. He wanted to become a civil rights lawyer, like his father. Like Bruce
Gallagher too, he wanted to win the coveted Rhodes scholarship and go on to Oxford University.

At school Rayne had been a
victor ludorum,
gaining colours in rugby, athletics and cricket. Now at university he had concentrated single-mindedly on rugby. He knew it was only a matter of time before he was selected for the Transvaal provincial team. More importantly, sport was a major part of the selection process for the Rhodes scholarship.

The match was an inter-varsity one between his own side, ‘Wits’, which he captained, and Stellenbosch, the ‘Maties’. Stellenbosch was the home of the Afrikaner rugby elite, schooled by the legendary Dr Danie Craven. It was the best side in the country and unbeaten that year. Rayne was determined to change all that.

The match was referred to as a friendly. Really, he thought, that was a stupid description of any event that held up a challenge. You won or you lost, and there was nothing nice about losing.

It was the second half, and his team was losing by three points because of an unfair decision that had awarded the Maties a penalty in the first half.

The ball came into the Maties’ hands after a rough scrum, and they passed the ball easily from one back to another as they shot down the sunburnt grass of the playing field. It was a try in the making. Rayne’s mind had raced into overdrive. There was no way they were going to score a try if he could help it.

His legs forced their way into the dry, brown turf as he sprinted at electrifying speed down the pitch, his whole body focused on the Matie back who was dangerously close to the line. Almost upon him, Rayne saw the back grab the ball. He launched himself into the air and crashed down against the back’s thighs in an expert flying tackle.

The man crashed to the ground and Rayne heard a muffled crack. The crowd roared with approval and his own team-mates rushed to congratulate him on a brilliant tackle. The back was on the ground and still not moving. ‘Still stunned,’ Rayne had thought to himself.

The referee ran over to the slumped body and eased it over. A deathly hush came over the ground. The ref looked up into Rayne’s steel-blue eyes and shivered.

‘
You’ve killed him,’ he said very quietly.

Rayne went completely cold. The people, the ground, seemed to recede into the distance. He felt himself speaking. ‘I didn’t kill him. It was a fair tackle.’ The words that came out of his mouth were without emotion.

Next day in the
Rand Daily Mail
the headline spelt out the words that were to haunt him for the rest of his life.
Death tackle kills mine magnate’s son. Gallagher on the line.
The article continued in the same sensationalist style:

Yesterday, in a so-called ‘friendly’ intervarsity match, Rayne Gallagher, Wits’ star player and the captain of the team, killed Tom Rudd, son of Tony Rudd the mine magnate, in a flying tackle. Gallagher is said to have reacted to the news calmly.

Rudd was rushed to the Johannesburg General Hospital for a full autopsy. Distinguished pathologist Dr Max Scheider made a short statement to this reporter later. He said that Rudd’s neck had broken after being tackled by Gallagher.

Tony Rudd said he would demand a full inquest into his son’s untimely death and Gallagher’s rough standard of play. Mrs Rudd is currently under sedation in a Pretoria hospital.

This incident confirms criticism of the rough standard of play by the Wits team. It is believed that Gallagher had already been previously suspended from the Wits team for rough play.

Neither Gallagher nor his father, the distinguished advocate Mr Bruce Gallagher SC, were available for comment. The Vice-Chancellor of the University of the Witwatersrand, Dr Bozzoli, said that he regarded the death as a tragic incident, and the matter would be fully investigated.

The spectacular picture of the death tackle, exclusive to the
Rand Daily Mail,
was taken by Wits photographer Aaron Golding.

Rayne remembered the interview with his father that had followed. He remembered Bruce Gallagher’s deep voice bellowing through the many rooms of the family’s exclusive home on Johannesburg’s prestigious Westcliff Ridge. Rayne had always known who he’d inherited his hot temper from. They were in the study. Through its large windows you could see as far as Pretoria.

‘
It was an accident, and they’ve branded you a murderer! And now this talk of a university inquest! It’s farcical. That photograph should never have seen the light of day.’

‘
Forget it, Dad. You’re wasting your breath, save it for the courtroom. The damage is done. I’m not going to get the Rhodes scholarship after that.’

Bruce Gallagher stared across at his son’s hardened face. Not a boy any longer, but a man he was proud of. The keen blue eyes missed nothing. How would he take this?

‘
I’ve started clearing out my flat, Dad. I’ll bring the furniture back in the morning. I have to get away from here.’

‘
Go away? Where? You’ve still got another six months to go before you get your LLB!’

‘
I’ve had enough. That was a good, clean tackle. I didn’t come down on him that hard, any fool could see that. No. Enough of the charade. I’ve decided I want to join the Rhodesian SAS. I’ve studied enough. I want to be with some real people, men not wimps.’

‘
You’re crazy, Rayne, you’re over-reacting. How can you talk about joining the Rhodesian army? Think what you’ll be fighting for, the supremacy of the white man and the entrenchment of his rights. Everything I’ve struggled against in my legal career!’

‘
Come off it, Father. Show me a black state with better justice than ours.’

‘
If you join the Rhodesian army, you can consider yourself a stranger in this house.’

Without realising it, Bruce had put Rayne in a corner. He regretted the words as soon as he said them, but it was too late.

‘
So be it. I’m going. I’ll say goodbye to Mother.’

‘
Rayne, you bloody fool!’

‘
Goodbye, Father.’

Two weeks later he had been on the train, headed towards Bulawayo, the capital of Matabeleland. When they crossed the South African border, Rayne had felt as though a weight had been lifted from his shoulders.

He remembered his first sight of this new land, Rhodesia, less inhabited and developed than the South African landscape he had been travelling across earlier in the day. He had no idea that the area of Matabeleland he was passing through would soon be known to him by the operational name of Repulse. Already he could feel the increase in temperature and see the landscape changing subtly. More green trees, and increasingly lush vegetation that clung to the sides of the rolling hills and rock outcrops.

The area was no stranger to violence, or to the changing procession of peoples who chose to live amongst its massive granite domes and rocky outcrops. First the peaceful bushmen were displaced by the Rozvi people, who developed a sophisticated civilisation mining iron and gold. Then in the nineteenth century the Zulu chiefs, Mzilikazi and Shaka, teamed up and seized the Rozvi people’s land. Mzilikazi and his followers became known as the Matabele. But they in their turn, impressive warriors though they were, fell prey to the firepower of Rhodes’ Pioneer Column in the quest to colonise. Thus Rhodesia had been born, and the seeds were sown of decades of future conflict between black and white . . .

‘
Sir, please be seated. Major Long will see you at eleven hundred hours. He would like you to fill out your curriculum vitae.’

Rayne vividly remembered the immaculately dressed junior officer who had handed him an anonymous-looking buff form and a black ballpoint pen. He had sat down on one of the cheap metal and plastic chairs that filled the tiny office. The place was hot and oppressive. He had thought that joining the army would be simple. He was beginning to find out that there was a lot of red tape to be gone through. Most of the questions on the form were similar to those on an application form for an ordinary job, but there were others that were more unusual. There was a section asking about his knowledge of black languages and tribal customs. Another section dealt with previous injuries and disabilities, and a third section had questions relating to the types of activity the applicant might be interested in. Rayne favoured joining the airborne regiment, the legendary SAS.

By the time he had answered all the questions it was nearly eleven o’clock. One of the phones on the reception desk rang and the immaculate-looking officer answered it. Then he put the phone down delicately and stared across at Rayne. ‘Major Long will see you now, sir. Please take the form with you.’

Major Long had been standing up and staring at something through the window of his office. At first Rayne wondered if he had noticed him come in.

‘
Sit down.’

The accent had a Scottish flavour and was very precise. Major Long turned and faced him. The expression on his face was severe, the dark eyes running over Rayne carefully.

‘
So you want to fight in our stupid bloody war, laddie?’

He took the buff form from Rayne’s hand and walked behind his desk. He sat down and scrutinised the paper carefully. ‘Very interesting, Mr Gallagher. It doesn’t tell me what I want to know. Why the hell are you in this office volunteering to fight in someone else’s war?’

In as few words as possible, Rayne gave the story of his decision to join the Rhodesian army. The more he spoke, the more uneasy he felt. He began to realise how trivial his own problems must sound to a man who had seen soldiers die in action. He finished his explanation and there was a lengthy silence as Major Long continued to stare at him. Eventually he spoke.

‘
Mr Gallagher, you are not a Rhodesian. My father emigrated here from Scotland, he fought in the Second World War for Rhodesia - and that’s why I’m here, fighting for something I believe in. I think you’ve made a rash decision. You must realise how much it costs to train and equip a fighting man. Having heard what you have told me, I cannot accept you for the Rhodesian Light Infantry.’