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CHAPTER ONE

Below me were the hot sands of the Kalahari Desert. All around me was the rented Beechcraft Queen Air, in which I was seeing Africa. The propellers whirred beautifully, the twin engines purred, I was happy as any bird that might have flown through these African skies as I was doing.

I was on vacation.

At long last, my employer, the New York Mafia Prosecution and Harassment Organization, had finally broken down and told me to take a month off and have some fun for myself.

I am Cherry Delight, member of the Femmes Fatale division of N.Y.M.P.H.O.. My real name is Priscilla Delissio, but friends and I have shortened that mouthful to something easier to say. I am of Italian-American extraction, and I hate the Mafia not only because of its crimes but because it gives us other Italians a bad name.

But right now I wasn't thinking about the Mafiosi. I was on what I called a sightseeing safari from Tunis to Capetown and back again the other side. I had chosen a Beechcraft Queen Air B 80, which accommodate about ten people because I was using the space between the cockpit and tail to store my gear, which included a sleeping bag. I wanted to be able to touch down and spend a few hours at a particularly inviting spot I might see from the air, and this Queen Air made me a home away from home.

I had already visited the Great Mosque in Kairouan and gone on a camel ride over a part of the Sahara, I had watched the Dosso horsemen of Niger and seen the reed boats paddled along the Congo River. Quite recently I had stood in awe and stared at Victoria Falls.

Now I was on my way to Capetown, to relax and enjoy a good hotel which served fine food, before going on to visit the Kimberley diamond fields. I had letters of introduction from everybody and his uncle, I anticipated no problems.

I was speeding low across this flatland when I saw a hump on the ground far ahead. It seemed to me that this hump moved, just a little; at least, its shadow did.

Now I had seen elephant herds and some running zebras already, I had taken a couple of snapshots even from the cockpit. I wondered what manner of beast this might be below me, and reached for the camera on the seat beside me.

A vulture was high in the air above the Beechcraft, lazily circling. I saw its shadow move along the sand, then veer off to one side. At the same time, I saw that the hump had arms and legs and ahead.

It was a man.

He was still alive if he moved, I reasoned. He was a big one, in tattered shirt and jodhpurs, with a black mane of hair and a beard. I could see something clutched in his left hand, that quivered, every so often, even as his legs moved as though he sought to walk, though he lay flat on the ground.

My eyes touched the flat ground on either side of him. It was stony, bleak, but it would afford a good landing spot. I circled around, glided ground-ward. The three wheels bumped a little, but I made a good enough landing.

I sought for a canteen I had bought but never used. I paused to fill it with water, then grabbed for my Gucci shoulder-bag. This was a new purchase, I had just about demolished my prior one in the Project Plates case. My Gold Cup Colt automatic was inside the Gucci, where I always keep it.

It was sheer habit that made me grab the bag. I didn't need it, but without it, I feel undressed.

I slipped from the Beechcraft and ran over the hot red sand, telling myself the light sandals I wore in the plane were never meant for walking on this outskirt of Hell itself. I danced and jumped, I emitted naughty words, but I finally got to the guy and braved the sand by putting a knee on it.

Immediately, I wished I hadn't, but I caught hold of the man and rolled him onto his back. He was a reasonably handsome joe, with his skin burned the color of old bronze, and he had a build on him like a civilized Tarzan. I liked him, I told myself I was not about to let him die.

The canteen lowered to his lips as I linked my arm about his neck and lifted his head. First I poured water all over his face to revive him, then when his eyelids quivered, I let the water trickle over his mouth.

Like those of an infant for the bottle nipple, his lips parted. He would have swallowed the entire canteen if I'd let him, but after he had taken enough to make him remember he was still alive, I drew it away.

His eyelids opened. He had green eyes, like mine. He said, "I didn't die, then.

"No way. Wait a second, I'll give you some more water. Mustn't take too much."

He nodded, his eyes studying me. I was wearing a body sweater sans brassiere, and a pair of old hot pants that looked particularly good on me. No stockings, just the rope sandals on my otherwise bare feet. I was scarcely glamorous, but it was a comfortable enough outfit.

His cracked lips split into a smile and he nodded weakly. "Smart girl. I'm dying of thirst, of course.

You must know that."

A faint wind touched my long red hair, made it move about to tickle my throat and shoulders. His eyes watched the wind play with it.

After a moment he asked, "Where did you come from? The Kalahari is tough on pretty girls."

"From the sky."

My head nodded toward the Beechcraft. He turned his head, jerking faintly with surprise as he saw its sleek lines.

"You flew that?"

"In a manner of speaking. I learned how a year or two ago and when my employer gave me time off for good behavior, I decided on a solo flight over Africa."

"Thank God for that," he chuckled.

I stared down at him, puzzled. "But what are you doing out here on this desert, all alone?”

He hesitated many seconds, studying my face. At last he shrugged and said, "I was on a walking tour."

“Come off it," I hooted. "Really, I was."

My finger touched the Webley in his belt, ran its pink tip down onto his somewhat hairy chest where the tatters of his shirt no longer covered it so well.

"And no canteen," I murmured. "Also, you cling to that little bag in your left hand as though it were worth more than life itself to you. No, mister. I don't know who you are or what you are, but you're not on any walking tour."

"You're so smart, you tell me."

I cocked my head at him. His faint grin was challenging, his eyes honest and forthright.

"Offhand, I'd say you were a diamond thief, making your way from the Orange Free State to the coast. But you seem too honest to me. Or else, you're half a con man."

"No thief, no con man. But you're close." I shrugged. "It isn't any of my business." He tried to get up, my arm was there to help him. His legs were rubbery, they could hardly hold him up. When I took a good look at his boots, that were so cracked and worn, cut by the rocks over which he'd walked, I knew the reason why.

"Lean on me, we'll make it to the plane." We took two steps.

Then a bullet plowed the sand three feet in front of us. I yelped and ducked out from under his arm, my hand going by instinct toward the Gucci bag.

Three men were trotting horses toward us from half a mile away. As the Colt gun-butt settled between my fingers, I found myself cursing the good Samaritanism that had made me stop for this character.

I threw him a cold glance. His face was as hard as the bronze it resembled, as he stared at those oncoming figures.

"I'm sorry to have dragged you into this," he muttered. "Those men have been after me a long time, close to two weeks, I should judge."

"Are they the law?”

No. Crooks. They want what I have.”

"And what do you have that's worth so much trouble?

His smile was resigned. "I might as well tell you, since neither of us is going to be able to profit by them. We'll be dead in a few minutes, I think."

He untied the drawstring of the bag and poured out on his big palm a collection of dirty gray stones. I glanced at them, then at his quizzical grin.

"And what are those things?"

“Diamonds."

"Diamonds!" I yelped. "You're putting me on! Those dull old things?”

“They're rough, uncut stones. This one," and his forefinger touched a stone that looked to be the size of a plum, is a real find. It may be larger than the Cullinan. I call it The Afrikaner.”

I gulped. If he was telling the truth, he had a fortune there on his palm. I looked up into his face, I wanted to see his eyes as I asked my next question.

"How did you get them? I thought the Kimberley people were very careful about anybody hunting diamonds on their lands?”

"I work for DeKeers."

Even I had heard of the largest diamond concern in the world. I nodded, turning my eyes toward the three men who were walking their horses toward us more slowly. There was something about those three men that made the short hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

They were dark, swarthy types, with unshaven jowls. Two of them were beefy, like Mafia buttons. The third man was thinner, with a cold, snakelike look about him. They were Sicilian types, all right, and I instinctively bristled.

My common sense came to my rescue. This was South Africa, a land of desert sands and empty rocks. No Mafioso in his right mind would come here looking for profits.

Still there were the diamonds.

"These men have been hunting you for a long time?" I asked.

"Since I was in camp, making my studies of the ground, sampling it for diamonds."

It seemed to let them out as Mafia. Why would three buttons be down in this lost corner of the world on the off chance that this guy was going to make a big diamond strike? It just didn't make sense.

I watched them rein up and sit their saddles. "Lost your way, fellas?" I asked.

One of them grinned, coldly. He was the lean man, apparently the leader, because he spoke next.

“We have you outnumbered. You, Voorhout, drop that gun. We don't want to kill you. All we want are the diamonds and the map."

My ears twitched. Map? What was this about a map?

"If he drops his gun, you can kill us both and nobody'll ever know but the vultures."

The three men grinned at me. They felt very confident, they didn't know I was Cherry Delight of the N.Y.M.P.H.O. femmes fatales, and that I had a Colt automatic in my shoulder bag. But it was good tactics, disarm your enemies first, then slaughter them at your leisure.

"Don't do it," I whispered to the big man.

He shook his head. "I can't risk your life," he muttered. "Alone, I might have put up a fight, I was trying to run away from them to prevent that, but it seems I have no choice."

His hand touched the Webley. "I'm dropping it," he yelled.

One of the burly boys lifted his own gun, half aiming it at my companion. "Don't play any tricks.

The Webley came out of his belt, and the big man dropped it at his feet. My own hand was still inside the Gucci, my fingers wrapped about the Colt. It was not yet time to use it, I kept telling myself.

"Now back away, over that way."

The leader waved his hand, urging us to move to one side of the gun and away from the Beechcraft. We went obediently. When we were ten feet away, the leader chuckled.

"Grazie! You've made it easy for us."

"I knew it," I howled. "You're Mafia."

Had I accused them of being Martians, they couldn't have looked more surprised. The man at my elbow grunted, as though somebody had belted him below the belt.

"Mafia," I heard him whisper. “Of course. Now I understand it."

What he meant by that remark, I wasn't to learn for a little while. Because even as I made my accusation, the two hefty buttons raised their guns and aimed them at us.

"You're right," said their thin leader, leaning his weight on the pommel of his saddle. “Though how you may have guessed that, I can't imagine.

"However, it doesn't matter. Drop them, Rocco. Lou. And make it a clean kill."

I hurled myself at my companion, giving him a body block any Miami Dolphin might be proud of. At the same time my trusty little Gold Cup came out of the Gucci bag and spat fire at the closer of the beefy boys.

We went down in a tangle of arms and legs, with the Dutchman yelling in surprise. As sand sprayed around me, I saw the guy at whom I'd aimed reel in the saddle.

I scrabbled on hands and toes—that hot sand was roasting my feet, but I ignored that—to make distance between my companion and myself. The lean man was shouting Italian curses and pulling at a gun that seemed to be stuck in his shoulder holster.

My trigger finger snapped off another shot, that missed its target. A bullet plowed the sand between my hands. Close, sister! I warned myself, and fell belly-down on that roadway to Hell, and steadied my right hand by gripping its wrist with my left.

I sighed and fired.

The other beefy button went back out of his saddle as though a giant hand had reached out to slap against him. His horse reared, veering into the mount of the thinner man, knocking him to the ground.

The third Mafioso was bent over in his saddle, moaning. I could see a trail of blood running down his right arm and chest from a shoulder wound. He was out of the action for a little time.

I swung back on the lean man. He was flat on these hot sands, too. He probably had his gun out by this time and would be waiting to pop me. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw my companion standing huge against the bright blue sky.

My sandaled foot lashed out, kicked him in the shins. "Get down here, you stupid ape," I yelled.

He dropped as though I'd shot him. A moment later his embarrassed voice was saying, "Sorry about that. I wasn't thinking. Everything happened so fast..."

"Sure, sure. Now just keep your head down and let me handle this baby."

There was a little silence, then: “But you're a girl! How can you be so good at this sort of thing?”

"Tell you later, buster."

"My name is Voorhout. Jan Voorhout."

“Then shut up, Jan.”

I needed all my concentration to deal with the thin man who was somewhere out there behind a little dune, maybe crawling like crazy to get behind me and finish me off before I was aware of him.

Two can play at that game.

"You stay here," I ordered, starting to wriggle away from him. "I have business to attend to."

My right hand stabbed out, caught his Webley and tossed it to him. “Here, take that. But check its barrel for sand. If it's clogged, you'll blow your head off when you try to fire it. Be careful."

I moved on, angling my movement to carry me behind the Beechcraft. I was a little surprised that the Mafioso hadn't put a bullet or two in its tires, then I thought that maybe he might want the plane to take him out of this hellhole. It would be a lot more comfortable flying over these baking sands than walking across them, even on horseback.

I left the Beechcraft behind me and slid onward, digging into the sand with my elbows and knees. I made good time, and every once in a while I would lift my head and give a fast look—see to make sure I wasn't framed in the sights of the enemy gun.

My back trail wound in a wide curve, carrying me a good hundred yards to the north and then to the east, until I felt that the thin man would never be expecting me. Then I angled my crawl to the south.

The ground here was slightly rippled, from long centuries of that desert wind which is first cousin to the simoom. The dunes are not so deep as those of the Sahara, but they will hide a man's body. Thin Man was behind one of the dunes toward which I slid. My job was to see him before he spotted me.

I slid on, knowing how a snake must feel. My Colt was always up there ahead of me at the end of my extended arm, I wasn't going to be caught napping. But I saw nothing as I wriggled along, until finally it dawned on me that the Mafioso must be employing those same tactics as I was myself.

He was heading for where I had been, I was right where he had been lying half an hour or more ago. I swung about toward the Beechcraft and where I had left Jan Voorhout.

I swiveled about and waited. Sooner or later I had to see something that would show me where he had gone. I lay astride a sand dune, up there in plain sight for anybody who wanted to look, but I figured that my enemy wouldn't be turning his head behind him to search for me.

I held my breath.

Then I saw a touch of brilliance against the beige sameness of the sands. The button on a bush jacket. I waited, and was rewarded. Everything comes to those who wait, the old adage has it, and this time, it was right.

The thin guy came into view, sliding over the top of a dune. I could see his gun in his hand. My left hand grabbed for my right wrist. I steadied the Gold Cup, and yelled.

I squeezed off my shot.

The man in the bush jacket jerked, flopping as he rolled down the other side of the dune. I got to my feet and began running toward him, the smoke from the Colt trailing along behind me.

He lay face up to the pitiless sun, eyes open and staring. A little hole was in the middle of his forehead, where I had aimed when he turned his face toward me in reflex to my shout.

"Look out!" a voice shouted.

I hurled myself face-down across the body of the man I had just killed, remembering too late the wounded button with the bullet in his shoulder.

Bullets plowed the sand on either side of me as I did a flip to get behind the dead body of the Mafioso. A fast glance showed me my last opponent, galloping right at me like a crazy man, about thirty feet away.

His face was twisted in sorrow and rage, his mouth was open to a silent screaming. What with the heat and the fact that what had been a victory had turned so suddenly to defeat, I think he had lost his wits. All he could see was a redheaded girl who had killed his two fellows, and who deserved to die.

He was shooting as he came, but he shot wildly, as though to overpower me by a display of weaponry. I lay there, watching his horse bring him closer and closer.

At the very last moment, even as those hooves seemed about to batter me into the sand and the rock, I got off my shot.

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