"Энди Макнаб. День независимости (engl) " - читать интересную книгу автора

me back aboard.
"Got a leak in the bag."
There was a mumble of Arabic between the two of them, and a schoolboy
snigger or two. Fair one: I would have found it funny too.
I shivered as I wrung out my bobble hat and gloves, but even wet wool
keeps its heat-retaining qualities and I knew I was going to need all the
help I could get on this part of the trip.
Lotfi fought to keep the boat upright as his mate and I leant on the
front or bow, as Lotfi was constantly reminding me -to keep it down. He
finally got the craft under control and we were soon ploughing through the
crests, my eyes stinging as the salt spray hit my face with the force of
pebble dash. As waves lifted us and the outboard screamed in protest as the
propeller left the water, I could see lights on the coast and could just
make out the glow of Oran, Algeria's second largest city. But we were
steering clear of its busy port, where the Spanish ferries to'd and fro'd;
we were heading about ten Ks east, to make landfall at a point between the
city and a place called Cap Ferrat. One look at the map during the briefing
in Alexandria had made it clear the French had left their mark here big
time. The coastline was peppered with Cap this, Plage that, Port the other.
Cap Ferrat itself was easy to recognize. Its lighthouse flashed every
few seconds in the darkness to the left of the glow from Oran. We were
heading for a small spit of land that housed some of the intermittent
clusters of light we were starting to make out quite well now as we got
closer to the coastline.
As the bow crashed through the water I moved to the rear of the boat to
minimize the effects of the spray and wind, pissed off that I was wet and
cold before I'd even started this job. Lotfi was the other side of the
outboard. I looked across as he checked his GPS and adjusted the throttle to
keep us on the right bearing.
The brine burned my eyes, but this was a whole lot better than the sub
we'd just left. It had been built in the 1960s and the air con was losing
its grip. After being cooped up in diesel fumes for three days, waiting for
the right moment to make this hit, I'd been gagging to be out in the fresh
air, even air this fresh. I comforted myself with the thought that the next
time I inhaled diesel I'd be chugging along ninety metres below the
Mediterranean, back to Alexandria, drinking steaming cups of sweet black tea
and celebrating the end of my very last job.
The lights got closer and the coastline took on a bit more shape. Lotfi
didn't need the GPS any more and it went into the rubber bow bag. We were
maybe four hundred metres off the shore and I could start to make out the
target area. The higher, rocky ground was flooded with light, and in the
blackness below it, I could just about make out the cliff, and the beach
Lotfi had assured us was good enough to land on.
We moved forward more slowly now, the engine just ticking over to keep
the noise down. When we were about a hundred metres from the beach, Lotfi
cut the fuel and tilted the outboard until it locked horizontal once more.
The boat lost momentum and began to wallow in the swell. He'd already
started to connect one of the full fuel bladders in preparation for our
exfiltration. We couldn't afford to mince about if the shit hit the fan and
we had to do a runner.