Vortex

The sight brought tears of frustrated anger and hate to Jaime’s eyes, clouding his vision. His uncle, his smiling, bright-haired aunt, and three young cousins lay entwined in that grave-butchered without warning or pity. His hands balled into fists. He wanted to kill and kill and kill again.

He took a deep, shuddering breath. Simple thoughts raced through his mind in a dizzying succession. Calm down. Don’t let them bear you. They mustn’t hear you. Not yet.

Jaime choked back a racking cough. The smell of smoke and other burnt things still clung to the ashes.

Slowly, very slowly, his hands unclenched. He kept watching the Cuban camp, wanting desperately to hear or see his

father and the other commandos as they closed in, but knowing that if he could spot them, so could the enemy sentries. No, it was better by far to wait in silence and seeming isolation.

So he lay flat, trying hard to cultivate the stoic patience of the fighting man. He glanced once at the luminous dial of his watch: 2010 hours. The others should be in position by now. It would be his honor to signal their attack with a single, well-placed bullet.

He lowered the binoculars and fumbled for the rifle by his side. It was not a modern assault rifle, but a bolt-action British .303 Enfield, fitted with a telescopic sight. Jaime was rated a good shot by both his friends and his father, which among Boers made him very good indeed.

The rifle’s smooth wooden stock felt good against his cheek and shoulder-a solid, reassuring promise of vengeance. No man with such a weapon in his hands and an enemy in sight was truly impotent.

He scanned the distant shapes outlined against the campfires.

His father had told him what to look for, and he’d picked his own target-a tall, black-haired man whose uniform was neater than the others.

Although Jaime couldn’t speak Spanish and was too far away to hear it even if he could, it was clear that when the tall man spoke, other men listened, and obeyed. He had to be an officer.

Scraps of charred paper fluttered in a sudden gust of cold night wind.

The breeze was across his line of fire. Not the best situation, he thought, but at least it would carry sounds away from the Cuban sentries.

His father’s team, led by Commandant Goetke, was stationed downwind, hopefully close by.

A bird chirped suddenly, barely audible over the noise of the wind rushing over ruined homes. It was time.

Carefully, slowly, silently, Jaime Steers lifted his rifle and swung it onto the brace he’d half-buried in the pile of rubble in front of him.

Then he squinted through the telescopic sight and settled into firing position.

Although the sight was more powerful than his binoculars,

it had a narrower field of view. For a heart-stopping moment he thought he’d lost his target. But then he found the Cuban again, sitting in front of a small fire by himself, sipping cautiously from a steaming cup held in his right hand.

Through the sight, Jaime could actually see the Cuban’s smiling, clean-shaven face clearly. A cold sensation rippled down his spine. He’d hunted game often enough and had even stood guard over their house when his father had been worried about unruly blacks in the town, but he had never had to kill a man before.

Then, remembering what had happened to his uncle’s family, he realized it wouldn’t be too difficult. He checked the wind and adjusted his grip a little. Holding the Cuban officer in his sight, he took a deep breath and let it out. Another quick, shallow breath. His cross hairs settled over the man’s uniformed chest and steadied.

He pulled the trigger.

The Enfield cracked once, sounding very loud in the darkness, and the

Cuban looked up just as Jaime’s shot struck him. He fell forward, folding inward as though the bullet had let all the air out of him. His coffee cup dropped out of his hand and rolled onto the ground.

Through the scope, Jaime saw stunned men looking at their fallen leader.

Most seemed frozen in place.

A sudden chorus of other shots rang out, and Jimmy knew his brother,

Johann, and his other friends were also in action. Sentries and other soldiers all around the laager began failing-cut down by well-aimed rifle fire.

Goetke had placed Jaime and the other snipers all around the encampment.

They were supposed to force the Cubans to go to ground, to hunker down inside their defensive circle.

Jaime squinted through his sight at the fire-lit scene of confusion, remembering Commandant Goetke’s strict orders: “Do not shoot unless you will kill your target. I don’t want a lot of fire. I want deadly fire.”

The commando leader’s tactic was working. With only a few shots coming in from many directions, the Cubans weren’t shooting back, reluctant to expose themselves to an unseen enemy.

Most of the Cubans were behind cover now, and with a

hunter’s instinct, he swung the rifle left-scanning for an armored vehicle he’d noticed parked on his side of the laager. It hadn’t moved for hours.