Fredric Ostrander looked at Dave Moroka. "Strange bedfellows," he said.
Moroka grinned wryly. "My long view hasn't changed," he said. "It's just that this African matter takes precedence right now."
"Nor mine, of course," Ostrander said. He cleared his throat. "However, I hope you last out the night. El Hassan needs strong men."
"Same to you," Moroka said gruffly. "Let's get going, or the fight will be over while we hand each other flowers."
Epilogue
El Hassan stood in the smoking, war-wasted ruin of Fort Laperine, his mind empty. The body of Jack Peters was ten feet to his left, burned beyond recognition and crumpled over a flame thrower which he'd eliminated in the last few moments of the fighting. Had he let his eyes go out the gun port before which he stood, it might have been possible for El Hassan to have picked out the bodies of David Moroka and Fredric Ostrander amidst those of the several hundred Haratin serfs who had swarmed out of the souk area at the crucial moment and stormed the half manned fort—unarmed save for knives and farm implements.
To his right, Dr. Warren Harding Smythe supervised two Tuareg who were carrying off the broken body of Kenny Ballalou; there was still faint life in it.
The doctor looked at him. "You are satisfied, I assume?"
El Hassan failed to hear him.
Smythe turned and stomped off, following his impressed nurses.