Newsmen Discover - The book charge was simple: "Admiring the light of the moon." Three of us had browsed along the bank of the Congo River at 1:30 a.m. The moon was whole and almost yellow, but no reflection seemed to light upon the river, a vast expanse of brown shadows rushing in the darkness. Some lights from Brazzaville across the river speckled the view on the right, and the lights on top of Mt. Stanley, the home of the president, did the same on the left. The air was cool and quiet. We turned, and a man approached us in the dark. He stopped 30 feet away. He wore a long overcoat that made him seem shapeless. A rifle jutted out from one side of him. He asked us what we were doing, and we told him we had come to admire this beautiful view of the Congo River in the moonlight, and he called out nervously, "Sergeant. Sergeant." Congo lore is full of tales of Congolese soldiers who, fearful and distrustful, suddenly panic and fire away...

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